We
look out for a chance to do something that we like to do the most!
It
is not exactly about a 'priority'... (if it were so, we all would
practice 'running' to a break-neck-speed, even at a very young
age.... so that during emergency, we can run away from risk, threat,
danger, task, responsibility, accountability... why,... even to
catch that running-train or a bus!... It is not 'exactly' about
running alone... we would 'equip' ourselves too well,... and
running after something is what we dislike most... 'door-delivery'
is the in-thing now!... or, there is an 'on-line' getting of
things/done...).
We
thought, we like 'movies' a lot... but most of us got out of that
movie-going-habit, when life itself unfolded like a suspense movie!
(Will I get up on time, will the breakfast be ready on time, will the
bus arrive on time, will the boss not fall sick at least today....
Cashiers are privileged to enjoy that 'sinking feeling at the pit of
the stomach' .... described by GB Shaw, in his essay, 'How I became
a public speaker'... when the final physical cash amount and the
book totals are being matched to see if 'all is well'! GB Shaw said,
he always had that 'feeling' when he tried to face an audience to
speak...)
Now,
the TV movies are working like sleeping pills for quite a few of us
(anyway there will be a repeat telecast very soon!)...
So,
it is not 'that-kind-of-interest'...
I
used to ask, (some neighbour aunt...)..'why doesn't your son like
brinjals?'... She says, 'He does not like it 'that-much''.. I am
now tempted to ask, 'Then how much... which-much... if not
much-much, .... kuch-kuch?' (the answer feels so evasive... with
that 'that-much'!)... There was a time, when most kids never dislike
any vegetable... maybe they eat a little extra when that
'roast-able' dish like aloo, sweet-potato, etc are well-roasted...
having the crisp-crunchy outer surface, and the gulpable-sweet core
soaked with spices!
My
'liking' for a jaggery-porridge(payasam), amused the elders, when I
was just going to be two ... It used to arrive at 10 pm... the
village used to sleep at 8.30pm (or soon after)... No electricity
there.. After dark, only the dim light of a hand held oil lamp can
be seen from a distance... the person carrying it was 'identified'
from the sound he makes with his foot-steps... 'Ah, it is the
priest!'... A temple priest, whom I used to observe very keenly all
through my childhood, used to fetch the left-over of prasadam... just
two handfuls, enough for a kid that I was (others have only a
teaspoonful... abstaining to taste it was un-religious-act, likely
to invoke the 'deity's anger even!).... it was rice, jaggery,
enriched with Ghee, and other aromatic ingredients.. it used to get
cooked in a small firewood stove right inside the temple complex,
taking its own time to boil and cook, when the priest used to attend
to 'deity' worship intermittently.. ... this item was the last
offering of the day, before the temple closes... so, the
cohesiveness of jaggery permeating into the core of the rice grain,
taking along with it, a little fragrance of other ingredients, over a
couple of hours, made that dish 'heavenly' to taste! (My grandmother
later narrated, she was amused to come to that tiny mat where I was
to sleep till the bed was unfolded, at 10 pm, and announce 'Kaavu
prasadam-P-a-y-a-s-a-m'... and I would stir, they help me sit, and
feed small morsels of that 'superb-sweet-dish', while I maintain
'eyes closed' but enjoy chewing the dish... and reward them with a
mini-smile, when the taste permeates into the mouth... ! Little
did I knew, that it constituted--very incidentally—into a training
to eat with focused awareness! Eyes closed, mind almost
disengaged... awareness, invoked by that familiar taste!... Almost
like a blessing for 'sweet-filled-dreams'! The next sleep-session
was a bit more with hazy-awareness... truly a blessing!)
That
priest was perhaps, the earliest of my spiritual 'benefactors'....
I still wonder, why and how he took a 'special liking' for me! What
did he like in himself, that attracted me into that liking?... Logic
failed to surmise the reasons! He hardly talked to me, even when I
grew towards the age of 5 and thereafter! But his glances towards me
were quite mystic, for sure! And my reply glances, blank stare into
the unseen emptiness of his eyes! There was nothing to be found in
his eyes!.. (that was yet another strange query within! Why do I
keep looking at a pair of eyes, that do not 'speak' but seem to say a
lot?'... That mystic-liking taking shape within me! (Not that I
really could recognise all that was happening with me!... It was
just kuch-kuch of much-much! (little, little of a lot more!)...
.....
We
miss... to look at what is lacking, when our 'liking' (to
'be-at-something' that we desire to have, become, etc) does not do
its job!... And when it is about spirituality, we don't even know
that we are missing-to-know... that a 'unique kind of liking' is
needed to pursue it intensely enough!... I even used to wonder,
'how do people miss to know that they ought to have liked-to-know
about themselves very well?... Is it not the very fundamentals of
life?... Does it not help to be-led by 'life-itself' .....
entrusting ourselves to that 'life-within' to take us along the
'life' happening all around us?... (Oh! ... The ability even, to
frame this questions into words, could creep in only when the urge to
ask was no more!... Now it is only of 'nuisance-value' when I am
tempted to really ask this to somebody face-to-face!... No time,
quality-time, to allocate for such non-urgent matters!)...
Do
we like .. .... adequately enough... to maintain our health (not
just remaining out of 'dis-ease', ill-health... or just 'managing
somehow' those chronic ailments?.... I wonder, if at those MBBS
classes, they demonstrate with a live-healthy-person, about what
'health' means, or looks like... the little that I could see was in
the movie, “Munna Bhai, MBBS... where the frantic search was only
for a 'body'... and we enjoyed the comedy when it was a live and
reasonably disease-free body!)...
Do
we like... adequately enough .... to look at how we emote?...
there is no structure in place (by whatever name..), to really train
us into maintaining a 'well-balanced-emotional-state'... what ever
the provocation from the outside situation!... Even when the body
is dis-eased... we call it, 'I am unwell'.. time to get out of
that 'well'!... (it is okay to continue to say so 'I am unwell'...
but, we need to be aware, it is 'just-the-body' that is well, unwell,
at-ease, dis-eased, comfortable, in-dis-comfort, under -a
spell-of-some-craving, etc..... 'I am hungry' is okay, but let us
know, that 'we feel hungry, ... really'... and it was not just
that the stomach became empty, when the digestion process was over,
and the poor stomach is busy with its own best-of-likings now...
cleaning the 'system'!!!
Now,
before a dislike to read creeps into a reader, and further takes
over, let me click my 'liking-finished'... right here!
Likely-to-be...
yours,
psn
(7th December, 2013)
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