Unique Stillness
This morning the touch of the cool breeze, by giving the countenance wetness, was bestowing upon it newness along with freshness. The magic of this tender touch was actively engaged in eliciting a unique tune from a profound depth. The sound of my moving step combined with this tune raised a rhythmic symphony.
What is happening? Why is it happening so? Though this understanding was lost in ignorance, the ecstatic delight at the sight of the beauty of the world was matchless. Suddenly—
This intoxicating moment raised my eyelid and the nature of my breaths changed. When the moments paused, my being too subsided and my existence was swept away by a new stream and the motion of my every breath called,
“Oh! Wonderful!
Wow! What is going on?
Wow! Wow!” And with a deep breath—“Aha!”
For the ray of the rising sun had tinged the dark black clouds in a deep orange hue, and the redness of this hue was presenting every article in a unique colour. The world, the consciousness of whose beauty had produced an ecstatic delight in my being fifteen minutes back, paused in a revealed state and placed me in the lap of halted moments. I remained in this state for nearly five minutes and exclaimed, “Wow!” The echo of which took me into its tune.
The sunray was bathing the whole world in a red hue. The manifestation of a tree in the fold of this redness which, during the autumnal season bids farewell to its leaves, made its appearances. The face of this farewell gave me the feeling of death.
I remembered Death in this beautiful situation. Wow! Wow!
Death which makes its presence felt by giving us death, death that wipes out life when it makes its appearance, death whose appearance makes the atmosphere sombre, death whom no one likes, the same death gives some strange message in this unique pause.
O Death! You stand unparalleled! What should I say at your appearance? You have come to show your appearance by adorning a beautiful environment.
Today this weather overturned the leaves of the past moments.
The same moments in which I had cherished the desire for death.
The same moments in which I accepted death,
The moments in which I saw death,
And I had many moments when I longed for death.
I know that I mostly remained remembering death. I had never longed for life so deeply as I had longed for death.
My breaths proceeded in the consciousness of death.
My thoughts remained lost in understanding the phenomenon of death.
Why?
Was I not understanding life?
Or,
Was life not fulfilling my wishes?
The answer to both these questions is in the affirmative.
What was my life?
It could be realised only if I thought in this connection.
My life was visited not in thought, but in feelings.
I remember—
During my youth, when at one noon I lay in the shade of mulberry tree, a crow came flying and perched on a branch. My stare was lost in that crow. I came to know of it when the crow took to flying. Then automatically an entreaty came and said,
“Oh! That I could fly like you!”
The gait of my life ever proceeded in the state of depression and in my tender age only Death seemed to be the object that could carry it on a high flight.
My painful convulsion longed to break all restraints. The stream of my love remained thirsty as usual. I had no desire to keep alive; for I wished—
All should be my own.
For:
Every face became my weakness, what could I do?
I was helpless before my own feelings and emotions.
I was helpless before my own longings.
I was anguished by my own passions.
These scorching cinders made my feelings reduced to ashes. Then how could I wish for life? Today when I survey the whole situation, I feel—
My journey of life, from which I gathered through reflection that I had ever longed for euthanasia, remained very deep and comprehensive. It proved entirely wrong, for I had many such moments which were highly ecstatic. I looked for such moments and that ecstasy came to be replenished with love.
The halted moments, the unanswerable moments, the twittering moments—ever remained the objects of my search, for these moments were free from I’ness.
Once I was ill. I grew infatuated with the medicine the doctor had administered. When the medicine was finished, I requested the doctor give me the same medicine. The doctor told my mother to give me a bottle of wine, for that medicine contained ten percent alcohol.
Next, I liked the hospital. I even desired to become a nurse. The atmosphere of the hospital, perfect cleanliness, sweet words of the nurses, charm visible on the faces of the doctors, patients far away from the rough and tumble of life—all looked very amiable. The silence of the place snatched my ‘self’ from me. So the hospital was my favourite place.
Next, I liked the environment of death.
Present in that environment, I collected all people together and imagined their beings together in a still position. The calm on their faces highly appealed to me. They looked out of the hustle and bustle of thought and reflection; they were only besieged with the idea of death. Their solidity looked lost in the world. At that time, they were in that state where they had the beauty of an individual which they had lost sight of in the state of a struggle.
In my youthful age, I had offered a prayer in some such a moment. “O God, if you really exist, station me once between life and death. I shall then see what life is and what death is. And then I’ll see whether to proceed towards death or towards life.”
After nearly twenty-six years, I obtained those moments. I took sleeping pills; I had the realization of both life and death. It was a most beautiful experience.
I looked towards death and uttered, “Wow!”
I looked at life and said, “Wow!”
As my body was sleeping, I was waking. At that time I remembered the longing I had cherished twenty-six years before. I felt grateful to God. I was not at all regretful, for my interior had realized that God had made me do all things to show me these moments. The external environment, whatever it was, was bad, but my inner experience of death transformed all this.
Today these moments have besieged life and rendered it beautiful. Today I am not in search of such moments; rather today, moments are in search of me so that in this unique journey they should cooperate with me and accompany me on my unique journey and there by make me conscious of their existence.
Flowers always blossom in the spring season. The flowers of our understanding, too, bloom in a calm and pleasant season; for to understand this, it is necessary to be in one’s senses.
It is necessary for every movement of life to be in a special state. The internal and external environment should be congenial, so that it might obliterate numerous feelings and emotions, enable the sight of the true essence more conspicuous and concrete, and enter our experience.
In such moments, my energy mingles with consciousness and settles down in the midst of my eyes. The expansion of the five elements disappears and then re-appears in the shape of an experience where a delicious touch and a melodious current waft us into some rare encampment of life.
Today, in this rare encampment, the cloudlet of death is raining on these moments; death which is an integral part of life and without which the knowledge of the world will be incomplete.
Death ever comes to negativity, because positivity is life. Whatever is negative brings into relief all that is positive.
Then what does it want death to confess?
“Death”
Death that does not love anyone, no one likes to die. Still all die, no one survives death. Then why?
Why are we leading our life so carelessly?
Why? Why? Why?
Why did it go away leaving its footfall behind?
I became busy in my daily chores.
Second Morning:-
As I opened the fridge to pour some milk into coffee the moments suddenly paused and life started at its usual pace.
the jug of milk in my hand,
the second hand on the door of the fridge.
When I came out of my halted state I exclaimed, “Wow!”
After birth, lost in the experience of death, the sense of our existence knows that ‘It’ is never to die. Our consciousness of our original shape original shape makes the individual carefree and worriless. Nevertheless, the latter remains unaware of it—that’s why it doesn’t wish to die though it sees the dying people. In this labyrinth of ignorance, it remains deprived of true experience. While, in fact, the light of the immortal character of its being makes it free from worries.
Then I remembered Lord Krishna when he told Arjuna, “The soul can’t be cut in twain by a weapon, nor burnt in fire, air can’t dry it up, water can’t dissolve it.”
Then I remembered Gurbani, “Who can kill and who can be killed who takes birth and meets its end
Who will live O Nanak, and who will meet its death.”
Please wait, don’t go!