Time to Leave

GOODBYE

I was walking to hand over my ID card in office as it was my last working day. As I was walking, I started pondering. What I thought would be mine was to be handed over. An identity in office was to be surrendered. I was given a visitor card on the last day. What belonged to me yesterday, was no more mine today. Where I belonged to till today, will no more mine tomorrow. The accessories and facilities that I enjoyed till today will never be given to me from tomorrow. 

These are all small things in life. But can we learn something from this. Yes, the ultimate lesson. Everything in life is temporary. Be it our office, work, home, happiness, sorrow – everything is temporary. This feeling is not due to an overwhelming philosophical outlook that suddenly flashed in me. Though all this was known, it kind of came more strongly on me – a kind of vairagyam, one can say. Yes, I know within two days, I will be back to pavilion resuming my duties and to my EGO self. But, such times are ones where we can dwell internally and have atleast a fraction of realization for a fraction of second. One day, we are bound to lose everything including our breath. What we call my parents, my children, my husband, I, Mine, My etc – the very identity will be lost.

Why do we crib for something which is not permanently ours? Why do we harp on results? Why do we get disappointed when we see/hear/speak negative about us? Well, this is what we call EGO. As long as we think that the soul is the body, we cannot get off this. It will keep hitting us time and again. We are bound to get entangled in all dualities of life. When we realize that these feelings are only for the body and not for the soul, it will liberate us. Then, we won’t be languishing for all that we lost and fear for all that is yet to come.

But how do we achieve this equipoise? How can we thoughtless? For people like us, it is karma yoga to start off with. We have to learn to do our karma by being neutral to the result of the action. Yes, it is difficult but with slow, steady and conscious practice, it is possible. By doing karma, we clean ourselves from all impurities. When a mirror is dusty, we can’t have a clear picture of ourselves in it. Our reflections will be dusty. But when we clean the mirror, the reflections are clear. In the same way, our soul is covered with dust of our vasanas. We have to clean with the water of karma, wipe it with the cloth of devotion to make it clean. The atma will then shine and reflect on us. That is when true knowledge evolves. What I mean by karma is to do our daily duties as prescribed in the shastras, do our daily prayers, perform poojas on special festival days, arrange for satsang at homes to read, discuss about godhead and raise ourselves from this level of ignorance to a level of true knowledge.

RAM RAM