Words From The Master - 11 April 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 6 am till she goes to bed at 11 pm. 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 the speed of light. The world is a global village. Electronic mails have to be replied 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 lifetime. We multi-task and multi-live. 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) will be ready for marriage. My son (an infant) 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 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 a 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 complete focus, with enjoyment, and live the 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 can never do this. There is rarely any enjoyment in what we do, it’s an attitude of getting it over with, even if it is doing something pleasurable. 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 of being silent.

In Zen, meditation is about sitting still and doing nothing, but nevertheless doing it consciously. Stopping the body and mind is healing the body and mind. Next time you are hurrying through something ask the person nearest to you to shout Stop. This will startle you into awareness, and who knows, perhaps even into enlightenment.