spirituality and me

I’m not spiritual, though I can perhaps say that I am drawn to spirituality in my own strange way.

When I went for Vipassana for the first time, I remember being very excited to hear Goenkaji’s evening sermons. I would bungle through the day, barely able to do as he asked, unable to ‘experience’ for myself. And I would wait eagerly for the evenings, for the explanations that I knew were coming, that made so much sense to my rational mind.

Supriti had called when I was at the shivir. (My phone should not have been on, but the Reliance one was, for it was doubling up as an alarm clock. No one really called me at that number anymore, so I figured I wasn’t breaking any rules by having it on me. But Supriti called, and though I didn’t take her call, I messaged back, and broke a rule as a result.) Anyhow I called back on the 10^th day to explain my absence, and I remember telling her how overwhelming the experience had been. So much of what Goenkaji said was validation for views already held, if only intuitively. He gave words and made concepts out of half formed thoughts and beliefs that had been guiding life so far. And provided so much more new material to think about. It was wonderful!

I never really practised meditation however. Much as I have loved the two Vipassana shivirs that I attended, and I can safely say I gained much from them, it never really became a mainstay in my life. It’s not like I don’t see what it can do for me, it’s just that I lack the discipline, I suppose.

I don’t confuse religion with spirituality, and yet firmly believe that every religion must have once had a spiritual aspect, which has gotten distorted along the way. At any rate, it has been a long held wish to study different religious texts, at least those of Hinduism, Islam and Christianity to begin with, the idea being to go beyond the stories and understand the underlying concepts.

Along the way, I have visited different places of worship, and observed people’s customs, but more importantly their mannerisms and their ‘vibes’. And come to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter which faith or philosophy they follow, truth and integrity is personal.

But that’s not what I had started to say… what I had really meant to say is that along the way I have visited very many places of worship/ meditation, to feel the vibes of the place for myself. From Buddhist temples and monastries in Ladakh, Sikkim, Bhutan and Japan, to Hindu temples in Puri, Calcutta and down South (and so many others all over the country!), to Jain temples in Khajuraho and Palitana, to the Bahai temple in New Delhi, to Igatpuri and the Global pagoda in Mumbai, to the Mother’s shrine in Pondicherry and dome in Auroville, to the synagogue in Jew town in Fort Kochi… and many more that I may not now remember. Could I include here the temple in Koovagam that eunuchs go to for their ceremonial marriage every year, or the temple complex so popular among the transsexual Jogappas of Karnataka?

What I have been most drawn to is silence and peace and love and compassion, wherever I have found it. Sometimes I have found it in places yes, but those places have very often not been places of ‘worship’. And sometimes I have found it in people. And those people have very often not been people of faith/ religion.

Am I stating the obvious?

Here I am reminded of Tagore. While attending rehearsals and discussions around Tagore’s writings (for Manav’s latest play- more on that in another post) I often came across these words: death, infinity, truth, beauty. My first reaction to ‘truth and beauty’ was to scoff at it. Especially since so much of what he wrote was addressed to a woman, undoubtedly a ‘beautiful’ woman- an idea that didn’t appeal to me. Not being beautiful myself, finding so much emphasis on beauty seemed highly unfair to me. This however was a very narrow view of beauty.

As I thought more about it, and tried to look for ‘truth and beauty’ around me, I realised it was everywhere, in everyone. It existed in moments. There are moments of truth and beauty, and they are often moments of absolute honesty, (and perhaps vulnerability…?)and they are everywhere… only the very evolved probably manage to have more in their lives than the rest of us who must experience them in their fleetingness.

Death. I lived in denial for a long time, arguing that Tagore did not experience ‘more than his share’. He lived at a time when families were large, and mortality was high. Everyone would have experienced death from an early age, it was Tagore’s response to it that made him what he was. While this is true theoretically, that still doesn’t take away from the depth of his feeling and the angst that he must have felt, which led to a most remarkable relationship with death, that would last a lifetime.

As I acknowledged my dishonesty in not giving the man his due, I realised something else. All my so-called spirituality, all my search, is eventually directed towards one thing: to make my peace with this thing called Death. All the strength that I attempt to build up in myself, is in preparation for that moment that I know is inevitable- when my parents will no longer be with me. That moment which I dread to even think about, which seems so impossible and so cruel, and yet will one day be real. That moment beyond which life will never be the same again, that moment when I will lose my anchor and my support.

The thought of that moment engulfs me in loneliness, how will I ever face it in reality?

The thought of that one moment brings in sharp relief the ordinariness and fakeness of my everyday life. And of the many frivolous emotions I waste precious time on everyday: guilt, envy, worthlessness, desire, anger…

This then- this love, and attachment to my parents, as mortal as mortal can be- this is my Achilles’ heel. Losing them would be the moment of my undoing. The moment which is unimaginable, beyond which is nothingness, a void, a black hole...