Words From The Master - 16 March 2008

What’s the big hurry?

A young woman confidently smiles at us from the billboard. Her daily routine is written beside her smiling visage. Every hour of her day is filled from the time she wakes up at six till she goes to bed at eleven. At eleven she takes a pill to take care of her headache before she goes to bed so that she can get up fresh the next morning. It’s an ad for a headache pill and that’s why she is smiling.

It’s weird and yet it has become normal. Whatever moves faster is better. Communication is @ speed of light. The world is a global village. Electronic mails have to be responded to within the hour. We all are always in a tearing hurry. Doing what?

Where are we all running to? Rather, what are we all running from in such a great hurry?

We are driven by greed and fear. Greed tells us that there is no time to lose. Fear tells us that we are going to lose. So we hurry not knowing what we are going to lose, not knowing what its value is.

We cram more hours into a day, more years into a life time. We multitask and multilive. We try to enjoy cerebrally without a trace of joy.

A young man came to see me. He said, Swamiji, I have everything sorted out. I am building a house with a 25 year loan. By that time my daughter (a two year old holding his hand) will be ready for marriage. My son (an infant that his wife is carrying) will be in a good job. The house would be very valuable and we can get a lot of money by selling it. We will invest most of it and settle down with you at the Ashram.

He had finished off 25 years of his life in 10 minutes. He feels that his calling is spiritual. Is mortgaging the present for the future spiritual?

This constant running is a reflection of our inner restlessness. We then feel we have missed the bus or the train or the plane. We certainly feel we have missed out on life. Has the running been worth it?

There is good reason to plan for tomorrow, it’s important. However, let’s not forget to live today! We need to learn to do whatever we do with total focus, with enjoyment, and live that moment fully.

Lao Tzu calls this mindfulness Wei-wu-Wei, action with no action. It is to enter into each activity totally, playfully, spontaneously, in such a way that work is play and effort is fun. It is the way a child tackles her work enjoying each moment, not worried about how soon it is to be finished, blowing bubbles if she is washing dishes. An adult mind can never do this. There is rarely enjoyment in what we do, just the attitude of getting it over with, even if it is doing something pleasurable. We are driven.

We keep running because we are afraid to stop; afraid to stop and reflect on what we are doing and why. To be silent can be terrifying as it makes one vulnerable to oneself.

People are afraid to meditate because of this fear to be silent. In Zen, meditation is about just sitting still and doing nothing, but consciously. Stopping the body and mind is healing the body and mind.

Next time you are hurrying through something ask your nearest one to shout out STOP! This will startle you into awareness and who knows, perhaps into enlightenment!