Astitva - Identity

The following work is my own. this is my attempt at understanding self and one's identity!

अस्तित्व की खोज में निकला था मैं,
अस्तित्व ही खो कर आ गया मैं।
सुना, देखा पर पाया नहीं,
उसे तो कोई समझा ही नहीं।
               वन में वृक्ष का अस्तित्व,
               वृक्ष में पत्तों का अस्तित्व,
               क्या पाया है कोई?
               समझ पाया है कोई?
सागर में जल का अस्तित्व,
जल में बूँद का अस्तित्व,
प्रेम में प्रेमियों का अस्तित्व,
क्या समझा है कोई?
                अस्तित्व तो समर्पण है,
                अस्तित्व तो रचना है,
                अस्तित्व तो प्रेम है, ना ईर्ष्या है,
                देखा, पाया और समझा बस इतना ही। 

What’s your promised land?

The book of Exodus tells the story of the Promised Land – the land promised to Abraham by God. God promised Abraham and later his descendants a land full of milk, honey and bread for them and all of their followers. This is a very well-known story and am sure many of us must have heard it as well. One must note that there is only one Promised Land where a person gets all that he wants or rather promised by God, provided he fulfils all the duties and complies by the rules laid out for him.

In the Hindu way of thinking, we have not one but 3 promised lands – Swarga, Kailasha and Vaikuntha. Let’s examine and understand!

Swarga or Heaven

Swarga or the pinnacle of all human wants is ruled by Indra. Full of all riches and dancing damsels, it is the dream of all humans. Asuras fight all their life gain control of the Swarga. Indra is the protector of Swarga and keeps both Asuras and Humans away.

There are three main things which make the swarga – Kamadhenu (an all-giving cow), Kalpavriksha (an all-giving tree) and Chintamani (an all-problem-resolver gem). Each of these items give you what you want when you ask them. Yet, we always see Indra worried of others taking over his swarga. Each time, there is an undefeatable Asura at his door and he runs for help. Each time there is a sage or a good king on the earth and he sends his damsels to dissuade them from their deeds.

Indra yearns for power and strives to feed himself before anything else.

All-in-all we see a lot of prosperity, yet no peace in this promised land.

Mount Kailasha

The abode of Shiva atop the mountains is covered with snow. Nothing grows there and nothing sustains there due to frigid. Yet Shiva and his family lives happily. Shiva is beyond the hunger. He is devoid of all the Maya emotions. In any calendar depicting Shiva’s family, you’ll see Shiva’s conveyance – Nandi the bull. Despite of no vegetation and no grass, the bull is happy. He doesn’t feels hungry! Shiva’s wife – Parvati or Annapurna or Devi rides a lion. A lion preys on a bull to feed itself. But they don’t do so. The snake around Shiva’s neck feeds on the rat. And there is a rat – Ganesha’s ride. Peacock – Karthikeya’s ride, eats snakes. But it doesn’t do it either. All live in harmony with each other.

 

This is because they are not hungry – they do not feel the hunger. Another thing to note – animals kill only when they are hungry! Animals feel their own hunger and care for that only. Humans on the other hand have the ability to sense other’s hunger too.

At Mount Kailasha we see a lot of peace but no prosperity.

Vaikuntha

The ocean of milk, the bed of Sheshnaga, Lakshmi at his footsteps, Garuda bowing to take orders and followers worshipping – the abode of Vishnu is well displayed in this image.

Vaikuntha is where we see prosperity and peace living together in a harmonious balance with each other. While the Sheshnaga provides a bed for Vishnu, Garuda provides him a ride. While Sheshnaga examines everything with a shorthsighted approach, Garuda provides farsightedness. Though many followers are here and many a gods asking for help, Vishnu rests in peace and smiles all the time. This peace is what keeps Lakshmi with him. He doesn’t has to fight anyone to protect Lakshmi, but she is with him by her choice.

Vishnu considers other’s hunger before himself. He empathizes with others and hence is known as the preserver.

Consider, what’s your hunger. Consider whose hunger matters to you! And you’ll get to your promised land.

I must give thanks to Dr Devdutta Pattnaik for having helped me see these patterns. This article is his ideas, represented in my words.

Activity or Inactivity – What should I do?

Arjuna asked Sri Krishna – “O Janardana, O Kesava, why do you urge me to engage in this ghastly warfare, if you think that intelligence is better than furtive work?” – Why should I engage in fighting with the people I I grew up up with? Why should I fight the teacher, who taught me the art of war? Why should I kill the cousins that I played with? Why should I kill so many innocents who have nothing to do with me or Duryodhana? Why should I fight with my elders, who always taught me the way to lead my life?”

I ask the same question – When Shiva closes his eyes to the Maya and realizes that the Maya is the cause of grief, why should we go on the path of Maya?

Sri Krishna answered Arjuna – “Partha, the prakriti or the nature is supposed to recreate itself. Its nature is to procreate and move on continuously. This is the way Brahma created the universe. This is the way I engage with the world.”

For the cycle of nature to keep moving, we all need to play our part and keep performing our actions. Our actions without the expectation of a return makes our deeds even nobler. Humans usually tend to follow a path shown by others. We all look upon others to choose our own activities. Only the ones who choose their own path, shine over others and are chosen as leaders. If the leaders themselves choose the path of inaction or “sanyas”, how would the cycle move?

Inactivity holds the nature’s cycle. Activity keeps it moving. Actions performed by a person are just the roles performed on the stage of the world. The real actor is beyond us. Another way to understand the same concept is the concept of the body and the soul. The body is destructible while the soul is not. The soul moves on to find another body as its house and continues to perform the actions.  

In our own interpretations of the god and the scriptures, we often mistake the God to have different forms and different acts. We often visualize the God to have taught us different paths. What we do not realize that the God himself took different forms to emphasize of different actions that are required to perform based on the situation.

Pravritti or Nivritti

Pravritti –personality –behavioral traits – is often considered as someone’s nature. This explains how a person reacts to a situation. The key in this scenarios is the external stimulus. Nivritti on the other hand defines abstinence or denial of acts that have no meaning. All acts in Nivritti state comes from the internal stimulus.

The hindu scriptures have very well laid out the two paths of life as Pravritti and Nivritti and have as usual left it to us to decide the way.

External stimuli or the desire is abundant all around us. The more you satisfy it, the more it grows. Knowing the purpose of your actions will help performing the actions better. This is where we can combine the external and internal stimuli.

Vishnu on one hand, indulges himself with the creation and helps the worldly creatures to lead their life meaningfully. In his acts, not only he desires he also plays along with the humans. Shiva on the other hand, meditates and turns his back on Brahma’s creation knowing that this is all fake and has no meaning. He knows Brahma created the world and the universe looking for answers to his existence and these creations would have no meaning more than that. While Vishnu displays the pat of Pravritti, Shiva shines the light on Nivritti.

Since Vishnu involves in the worldly matters and plays along, he has an outwardly gaze without leaving the sense of himself. In this process, he procreates and generates warmth all around him. Shiva on the other hand meditates and indulges in himself. He has an inwardly gaze and does not involves with anyone. This creates heat in himself. The inwardly heat or fire, which is expected to come when he opens his third eye. Since all the heat around him is converged inside him, everything around him turns cold into ice. Remember his abode on Mt Kailash.

Prajapati or Pashupati

Long time since my last post. Actually I have been reading less these days and watching more television.

I have been looking at the news channels too sometimes and watched how the media has been covering the so called crime stories. More or less every time a crime is reported, the reporters use the word “animal like behavior” to depict the criminals acts. Along with the same, the media is full of developmental stories displaying the progress the mankind is making today.

The question is what progress have we made? What instinct have we understood and how have we conquered?

As the story of the Hindu Trinity goes, Brahma had multiple sons who were born of his thoughts. Each of the son was born with a purpose. Narada, Sanaatan Kumars were amongst the glorious ones. And also was Daksa Prajapati. Many would remember Daksha as the arrogant father who did not relent to acknowledge the love of her daughter Sati. Due to which, Sati had to jump into fire causing Shiva to take the Rudra Avatar.

Daksha is Brahma’s son with the purpose to instill an order into the nature. Thus he tries to bind the nature into the set of rules. In other words, he tries to domesticate the nature. Daksha leads the humans and shows them the way. Hence he is termed as “PrajaPati” = Master of the People. However, as we understand, humans are an evolution step from the animals. And hence, even humans do have the animal instincts and display animal like behavior. Nature gave humans a powerful brain and the power of imagination through which they can shed off their animal like behavior. But, only a very few have mastered their animal instincts. It is said that one who conquers his or her animal instincts is known as “PashuPati” = Master of the animals. Shiva has been known as the Pashupati forever and has been mentioned in the puranas with that name.

Daksha tried to rule people through the set of rules or laws. In his view, all abiding by the rules are good. He tried to dominate people in order to rule them. However, we see no efforts being made by him to outgrow the development of nature and the humans all around him. He thinks outwards and seeks compliance from others. He does not applies the same rules onto himself. He is not looking onto himself to comply and grow. This arouses a fear in him of losing his safety net. Unable to understand and failure to introspect forms a delusion in front of him and he lives in the same.

Nature created all creatures and with that it created the imbalance so that it can renew itself. It is but natural that lion runs after the deer to feed itself. And the deer runs away from the lion to save itself. While lion eats the deer, the deer eats the grass. All animals hunt when they are hungry. They eat and live and eventually die. They kill but only to satisfy their hunger or when threatened. Humans have a brain to understand this cycle and hence to breakout of the cycle. Humans imagine a day when they would not be able to feed themselves and hence start saving for that day. Later the human mind conjures up the stories to create wealth for children, grandchildren and so on. We accumulate more than necessary and in the process take away from others. We start fighting for the larger share for ourselves. Unfortunately, somewhere we forget where this all has to end. And hence we never give up the animal behavior. 

To be able to grow, we must look inwards. We must overcome the animal in our self and give up the play of nature.

Being a Prajapati is easier, try being a Pashupati.