We are often made to believe that this world is not something we should be attached to. They say attachment is the root cause of sorrow. In all likelihood they are right.
They are right not simply because scriptures say so, but
also because we all have experienced it.
Why it is so that in spite of being fully aware of sorrow
being the primary outcome of attachment we all get attached to something or the
other; or someone or the other? Everyone says that attachment is natural for us
till we know the truth and understand how we get affected by our own nature. Everyone says our mind, intellect, desires and
ego are the main culprits and we are poor victims of their design.
I am also one among many, who pass on the responsibility of
the disaster to my desires, mind, intellect…circumstances…the training I have
received…my surroundings…and so on and so forth.
If in some court proceedings, a judge asked a suspect as to
why he killed, and the suspected responded, “What else could I have done? My
mind told my hand to pick up a revolver and my finger to pull the trigger.”
will the judge pronounce him ‘not guilty’? If we continue with this logic the
judge might as well go for pronouncing punishments for suspect’s mind, hand and
fingers.
For some reason we know little about, we come to this world.
Having come here we have to live here. This is a physical world. To understand
and deal with physical things, we need some physical capabilities and tools.
Our body, mind, intellect, desires and the concept that we exist physically are
such tool that grant us necessary abilities to know about the material aspects
of our lives and to put them to ‘proper
use’.
We are not the first ones to think about the ‘proper use’ of
life. Billions of people have thought about it. Many of them have created ‘the
knowledge’ about the aforesaid ‘proper use’. But it seems we have not advanced
even an inch in using that knowledge. We are as lost as we have ever been. The
question is, “Why so?”
The only answer I could think of is, “We do not take our
lives seriously.”
We use all the tools given to us for maintaining them in
good order so that we can satisfy our desires. And what are our desires? To
enjoy maintaining the tools we have been granted. To look good, to be as
comfortable as possible, to see, to hear, to touch, to speak, to enjoy all
sensory pleasures, to be known by others, to feel important, to be in good
health, to be assured again and again that all our senses work properly, to be
assured that there is no danger to the tools we possess…the list is endless. We
devote our entire life in maintaining the tools we were granted and just leave
this world one day; without knowing for what purpose the tools were to be used
by us.
Had we been serious about our lives the things could have
been very different. Perhaps, things would have been different not only for us,
but for the human society as a whole.
‘Being serious’ does not mean that we should stop smiling
and laughing, it simply means asking ‘Why’ more number of times than ‘What’ and
‘How’.
9/23/2013
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