I keep waiting for these phases in life when i feel both down and out. The whole world then just shrinks down and i start thinking a lot. A lot more than i usually do. But then i don't think about the things i normally think about. I think about death, and how fascinating death really is. I mean its THE only thing that removes all the pain and all the suffering from human life just like that. Human death brings pain to the near and dear ones but then suffering is a part of life, and really its a vicious circle and no one can escape it. For all i care about, i'm just eagerly awaiting the day it will all end for me.
Enough talking about death, its time to talk about life. Life in all its glory is meaningless. People who could never find any meaning in life tried to give it some meaning, while others wasted their time on this earth cribbing about how there is no purpose they can attach to their lives. Some people think they are leading a life different from others. Take for example how one fine day you could say that Bear Grylls leads a life very different from the life your dad lives. Is it just because he is famous man who comes on television and inspires a million others. A person who looks happy all the times, and says that he's just happy with what he does. Do you think you'll watch his show if started crying on television about how he too feels that life is just a shit hole and nothing? At various times in life, people try to associate meaning with life just because they all know it deep down that there is nothing they can do about it. That we are all just chained up and the best we can do is to stop thinking about how bleak things are and just wear a happy mask that other people notice and thereby distract us from slipping to where we know we will never return from.
People do The Art Of Living course, they join the Landmark Forum because they somehow, amazingly alleviate their suffering. For what i know its just like repainting the your home. For many years the paint will stick to the walls, but then it'll slowly age and fall off. You can't stop the rains and the harsh sunlight and the strong winds from thrashing away the glory of your walls. All you can do is just repaint, and repaint and repaint until the day your home eventually collapses.
I don't want to wear any paint of any sort and any color. I understand that this pain and suffering is all we are ordained to have and happiness is just a part and parcel of life. I don't want to challenge the norms and commit suicide, i don't want to end my life so soon. I just want to live and see how much more my beliefs strengthen, and by beliefs i mean the beliefs in my philosophy and then i want to live to see myself die. I want to talk to a man whose about to die, for no Gautam Buddha, no sage, no Sri Sri Ravi Shankar holds more wisdom than a man who knows that he's about to die. The end of it all, the end of suffering, the end of happiness, the end of attachment ! Freed from the chains of misery, no life to look forward to, no life to look back at, just slipping in the vacuum of time, all by yourself, slowly and surely slipping from the memories of the near and dear ones, as the notion of your life fades away, and it all becomes clear that it never was the way you thought it was, and how your life was as inconsequential as you always feared it to be :)
Read your blogpost yesterday and have been trying to send a comment since then but the hostel net and my ancient desktop are giving me grief.
ReplyDeleteThe post seemed so.... negative, coming from you. Sure life is tough sometimes. And whatever we do, it's not gonna make us any more than an insignificant spek in the vast cosmos. And sure, art of life courses are bullshit. But it is in the end given to you unconditionally. You can make whatever out of your life. Making it better is purpose enough. Making it better for other people is purpose enough. Living it on your own terms is purpose enough. Take care, and bounce back soon.
regards,
Su/ Pixie :)
strangely these lines were whirling around in my head while I read :
ReplyDelete"..the days slipped by from my window watching..dying to believe in what you heard..lost in thought and lost in time..I took a heavenly ride..coming back to life."
a-seemingly-pessimistic-but-actually-a-cautiously-optimistic post, and still, I'd just say :
The urge to live is biological;
The impulse to die is psychological..
I think people do what they do in "self improvement" because they get to have a belief to hang onto.
ReplyDeleteThis belief is that within this duration, however long the workshop or course is, there is hope:
"hope of ease of suffering," or
"hope of meaning to suffering," or even
"hope of meaning at all."
However, you cannot hang a hat onto a belief, even when this belief is founded on hope, if this hope takes life from outside forces (including forces from someone else's inner world, because what is their inner force, is your outside force and it does not come from you.)