A couple of days back I was carrying a book in my bag on 'Tao'. Usually I carry a book, to read while travelling. And I also have a few other things in the bag like a water bottle etc. That day after reading some part of the book, I opened my bag to keep the book back in. I thought due to other things in the bag the book might get spoilt, so thought of keeping the book in an inner compartment in the bag. These kinds of bags usually have an inner compartment, where you can keep things that are important, but you don't need frequently.

But then I thought if I keep the book in that compartment then I am likely to forget about it. I am a mad reader. I read too many books at one time. At home I will read one book, while travelling I will read another or may be some magazine, or a news paper. So I thought if I keep this book in the inner compartment and forget about it, then I will be carrying this book everyday with me with no intention to read it. But I will be carrying an unnecessary load with me, and it will be a hidden load. I will not know about it, but I will be carrying it never the less, robbing me of some of my energy. Here the energy that I am spending is not substantial but I am just giving a metaphor.

Just like a hidden compartment in a bag, we have hidden compartment in our mind. They say there are four types (or say parts) of mind ' conscious, unconscious, subconscious, and super conscious. I don't want to use these technical terms in this discussion. I will just talk of the deep hidden compartments in our mind. When we learnt swimming in our childhood, and after that never practised it, the knowledge and skills of swimming will go and sit in these compartments, and can be used later when needed. The mind is such and amazing instrument. But just like the way we had stored this useful data about swimming skills, we also store a lot of other things which will later become a burden to your being. Somebody has insulted you, somebody has harmed you financially or some other way. You will go on storing these things. As if it is going to be useful later on. These things will not be useful to you. Rather they will be a burden to you. You will feel very heavy due the load of these things. When you recollect them later in your life, it will cause some more frustration to you. You will again relive that situation, the insult, the anger. This is really amazing. This indicates that the insult, the anger is really a perception of the mind. The situation has gone, the person has died, or may be has transformed into a saint now. But you carry the situation; you carry the bad image of the person in your mind; ready to experience the whole suffering all over again, whenever you get a chance.

But what is the solution? Is it possible to decide to what to store and what not to store in our mind? It is possible, and the solution is what so many spiritual mystics, enlightened beings have been telling us. That is to be aware, to jump out of the mind, to transcend the mind. In fact it is not a solution at all. A solution can be only to a problem; once you fall out of mind then the problems would disappear. Because the problems exist only in the mind, out of mind they cease to exist.

The book was not a problem at all. In fact it would have been worth carrying the extra load of the book, of the book of 'Tao'. Because some day I would have noticed the book laying there and I would open some random page and bump into another profound insight. But these stupid (and hurtful) things that we store, in our mind can not be useful, in fact they will hurt us.

Even I still keep on storing these stupid things in my mind. Because, I am also still a beginner, on this spiritual journey. And I don't know where I stand. How much far I have reached. I was watching a program on NGC (or may be Discovery), and it was told in the program, that if we calibrate earth's entire life in into 24 hours, then man is existing only for the last 15 seconds. Don't you think this is funny? We think man has made much progress; man has made an astounding journey from caves to skyscrapers of the big cities of the world. But Sir, you were here only for last 15 seconds. We walk on this earth as if we always existed, as if we are eternal. We used the earth as if it is our house, we own it. We don't own it. It is a house maybe, but a rented house. Millions of years back dinosaurs had rented it, and now we do. And we are amazed by man's progress? We think that we have made it. Scientists say 20 light years away there is a planet which is exactly like earth. Who knows, the civilizations over there may have made much more progress than us, and without harming their environment.

So I don't know how much more progress I have made on this spiritual journey. I don't know where I stand. But I don't care. Who cares about the destination, when the journey is so beautiful?

Note: The concepts are taken from my readings of Osho and other spiritual mystics. Rest is my understanding of it.

P.L. Deshpande (a renowned Marathi author) in one of his books 'Wyakti ani walli' has told about his encounter with a Parasi old chap, that he bumps into in a train compartment. P.L. was a kind of person who liked meeting new people. He had a nice chat with the Parasi old man and during their conversation the Parasi man tells P.L. ' 'People say god means this, god means that. But feel god means suffering. Whatever is happening just go on suffering (read experiencing and enduring) it.' And after this he asks P.L. what he thinks about it. P.L. says (not to the old man) ' 'what could I say? One more definition is added to so many definitions of god.'

I had read this book and also listened to this on an audio tape (narration by P.L.) long back. When I heard this concept ' 'God means suffering' first in this audio tape, I liked it and I always used to think if there could be a deeper meaning in this. Then one day I was listening to a discourse by Osho on Patanjali. This discourse is part of a series of Osho's commentary on Patanjali called ' 'Yoga ' the alpha and the omega'. Osho tells us what Patanjali said about suffering. It answers the question that generally people ask i.e. why there is so much suffering in the world, why are people suffering with so many atrocities, problems. Why is there so much crime in the world so many robberies, murders, the rich suppressing the poor, men suppressing women and all the stuff that causes so much pain to everyone? And if there is some god some where then why doesn't he come and put and end to all this suffering.

Patanjali says all this suffering that man has to go through is the training that man is receiving from the divine. It is a like passing through fire so that all the impurities are removed and what emerges out of it is pure gold. What Patanjali is saying is really true. When I look back to my life I feel if I had not experienced (whatever) sufferings that I had gone through (not that I have suffered a lot); I would not be the kind of mature person that I am today. Buddha himself was not in pain or suffering, he was having all the opulence that a man could have. In fact he was having so much pleasure all the time that his body and mind must have lost sensitivity with the pleasure. Then one day while going to a 'Yuvak Mahotsav' he came to know about illness, old age and death. When we come into this world in the initial years we are not so much aware of sorrows and sufferings, then slowly we start having our share of grief as we grow. We start to suffer slowly because as years pass and we grow older we start having more and more desires. This process is gradual and we comfortably get adjusted to the cycle of desiring and suffering, because it happens gradually. In case of Buddha the sudden knowledge about suffering came to him as a shock, and took him to the path of realizing truth.

You can not escape the suffering and you shouldn't

A month back when I was riding my bike a cow came in my way and I had to pull the breaks immediately. Due to this the bike slipped and I had some scratches on my leg and foot. Some scratches were fine, but one was more than a scratch, it was a little deeper cut. It took almost a month to heal completely. It was a pain to take care of it while taking bath, when I went to office. I tried hard so that it healed quickly; so that I would be spared of the trouble I was going through because of it. But it was all in vain. It took whatever time it needed to heal, whatever time it needed for that kind of deep cut to heal. The cut at all was not interested in what I wanted; it took whatever time it needed. This is what we do all the time, I feel. Our wants are really unfair and unrealistic many times; we don't realize this. The universe, existence or god (or whatever you want to call it) is at all not interested in what we want, what our stupid mind desires. The existence has its own rules according to which life is happening. Life here includes our (human's) lives as well as the course of actions taking place between the various objects in the universe. Existence gives a damn about what we think; it goes on following its own universal laws.

By trying to heal the cut quickly I was trying to escape the suffering that it brought along with it. But it was foolish because the suffering added something to me, it made me learn something. Now I would be more careful while riding a bike. Also it was beautiful to see the body heal itself. While seeing the wound heal slowly, I felt medicines do help but body has its own way of healing itself. This added to my understanding that everything is happening by itself and it is very less (if at all) that we can ‘do'.

All we want to do all the time, is to have pleasure, whatever way we can

Fortunately, touchwood, I don't have any extreme bad habits. I like to have tea. But having too much of tea causes acidity. So I was just wondering if I should have half a cup of tea instead of a full cup. By cutting down on the amount of tea I gulped down each time, I will be able to have tea more number of times in a day. I thought of this and I thought what the hell am I doing? I am just adjusting situations so that I will be able have more pleasure; give more comfort to my body, to my taste buds or whatever. The time that I spend not eating anything after a meal is just a 'sadhana' that I do so that I will feel hungry again and could eat something. Why do we give so much importance to our desires and pleasures?

Buddha had said that the root cause of all suffering is desire. If we keep on blindly satisfying our desires and urges; then it is no wonder that mankind is engulfed in a deep sorrow.

U.G. calls his experience of enlightenment as that of an irreversible change. It means, after that man will not go back to his old state of - sometimes conscious, sometimes unconscious ' ness. When we practice meditation for some time by effort we get into a conscious state of being (the intensity of consciousness may vary). As the effect of the meditation ceases we go back to our old state of unconscious, sleep. Then what happens when a person gets enlightened? As my understanding goes, it can be understood with example of an object and earths gravitational force. When we throw an object up in the air it goes up to a certain height and then falls back on the ground. If we throw it with greater force then it will travel a little more distance before falling back to earth. Throwing the ball in the air is like our meditation efforts. Just like the ball travels some distance in the air we travel some distance on the path of consciousness. But like the fate of the ball we have to come back to our state of unconscious.  
 
Everything has solution, isn't it? Almost everything is possible, except exceeding the speed of light. So if we want something to overcome earth's gravitational field and reach outer space, then we need to throw it with its escape velocity. So for us to be free from our ego, desires et al, our efforts need to be so total that it is enough to be enlightened. The intensity and totality of our efforts will help us get enlightened. Just like the object thrown with escape velocity frees from earth's gravitational field, we will be free from our egos and desires. Now again, as I understand escape velocity depends on the mass of an object.  So escape velocity of each object will be different. Similarly the amount of effort each person needs to put to move ahead on the path of enlightenment will be different.

Okay, enough of logical thinking. Although the effort needed for enlightenment will be different for different people as I understand (from reading discourses of many masters); it does not depend the person's intellect, educational background or sophistication. Some masters say even too much of effort can also be a problem. As they say - the very effort is the barrier. If you want to sleep and you make too much of effort to sleep; then you will not be able to sleep. Because to make the effort you will have to stay awake, otherwise who will make the effort? You will be able to sleep only when the effort stops.

Note: I am not an expert on enlightenment. (Please laugh, this was a joke.)  Above are just a few random thoughts that were moving around in my head. The reader is free to condemn the post as anything ranging from a child's school essay to an intellectual's stupid analysis. I have taken some of the examples/ anecdotes described above (knowingly or unknowingly) from my readings of few of the spiritual mystics.

It was late in the night. I was returning from office after a hard days work. As I got down from the auto-rickshaw on the highway, paid the fare and started walking towards my building, I noted that the road was very quiet and deserted. I continued walking and after a minute saw a dark shadow following me. Now, I don't believe in ghosts, but that does not mean I am not scared of them. Soon the shadow outpaced me and reached me.

Shadow: Hello

Me: Hi

The shadow was wearing black clothes, and its overall attire was scary. The shadow smiled and I forced a smile back. Amazingly its face looked familiar to me.

Shadow: How is life?

Me: Life is fine.    …   Do I know you, Sir?

Shadow: Yes, you do.

Me: I am not sure.

Shadow: Well, I am fear.

Me: Fear? Fear what? That is your name?

Shadow: No. That is who I am. I am fear.

Me: What do you mean? (I was anxious now.)

Shadow: Hmmm don't I look familiar to you?

Me: Yes, you do. But I can't remember where I have seen you.

Shadow: Well, I am looking familiar to you because, I was always with you in some form or the other. (The shadow paused.)

Me: Go on. I am listening. (It was both interesting and scary at the same time.)

Shadow: I was with you when you were awaiting your graduation results. I was with you when you were deciding on changing your job. I was with you when were thinking of quitting an overseas opportunity.

Me: And what were you doing there?

Shadow: I was not doing anything. Just giving you company. I was a creation of your own mind. And I still am.

Me: (I was getting edgy.) Will you please tell me who the hell you really are?

Shadow: I am a symbol of all kinds of fears that you have ever had. I am a creation of your mind.

Me: Okay. So you are my fear.

Shadow: Yes.

Me: And you are a creation of my mind?

Shadow: Yes, I do not have existence outside of your mind. You throw me out of your mind and I will die.

Me: Fine. So Mr. Fear, why did you suddenly decide to enlighten me with your existence today?

Shadow: I did not. You did. You called me.

Me: I did not call you. I don't remember calling you.

Shadow: Remember? (laughs..) You are only talking about your conscious memory. What about your subconscious?

Me: Don't give me all that scientific talk.

Shadow: I am not giving it to you. You know it. I can't tell you anything that you don't know. I am a product of the known.

Me: and now what does that mean?

Shadow: That means that I will exist only within realms of the known. To embrace the unknown you will have to leave me.

By now we had reached my society's gate.

Me: Right then, as you said its time for me to leave you.

Shadow: Of course you will leave me as your familiar watchman is standing at the gate. Your mind has registered that.

I looked at the watchman, and walked towards the gate. The watchman was looking confused.

Me: What happened, Ramji?

Watchman: Nothing, Sir. I thought that you were talking to someone, but I could not see anyone.

I turned back. There was no one. I kept quiet, entered the compound and simply walked towards my building.

There was no light in the lobby today. God knows what had happened. I hoped the lift was working. Just enough light was coming from the lights on the neighbouring buildings. I entered the lift. There was light in the lift, so the lift was working. I pressed button for my floor and then saw something. I just stopped short of screaming. The shadow was standing in a corner.

Me: You scared meeeee. (I shouted.)

Shadow: (Smiling ) That's my job. I am fear, remember?

Me: Why are you following me? How did you enter here?

Shadow: I did not. You allowed me to enter.

Me: The lift is not moving. What have you done? (I screamed.)

Shadow: I have not done anything. Check the door, you haven't locked it properly.

I locked the door and the lift started moving upwards. I looked at the shadow.

Shadow: You saw there were no lights and started thinking what could be wrong.  You again allowed me to enter your mind. If you are watchful, I won't be able to trouble you. I am talking about my own downfall, because even I am corrupted. Your real being has started to interfere with your thoughts these days. (Looking out of the lift ) See we have arrived at your floor and ohh, there is light here.

The shadow disappeared.

Fasting is mostly associated with purifying your body. Due to the food (good and bad) that we eat everyday, there is much pressure on our digestive system. Due to some impurities in some types of food our body becomes dirty, it accumulates things. When we need to purify our body, we need to get rid of some of the dirt; we want to give the digestive system a rest, we fast. We do not eat for one full day and in the evening we break the fast with the dinner.

Mostly during a fast people eat some snacks that are meant to be eaten during fast, which mostly are oily, fried food. I feel such snacks would do more harm than good. I would like to only eat fruits and drink water during fasting. If even tea and coffee could be avoided it would be great, I feel. Then we would be able to cleanse our system thoroughly.

Then the thought came to my mind, that if we can do a fast to cleanse our body, then why we can't do a fast to cleanse our mind. This kind of fasting is needed because we are using our minds too much. And due to this continuous thinking and analysing, our mind and hence we become too agitated. So a day of fasting of the mind would help. Hmm . interesting. But here the fast needs to be of a different type. The mind needs to be deprived of its food. And what is the food for the mind? It is the thoughts.

One day if we could decide that today I will not think much. We should decide that I will only allow the bare minimum of thoughts to enter my mind. For example if it is weekday, and you go to office, definitely you need to think to finish the work. You need to think about the work that needs to be finished. But you should pledge that apart form these necessary thoughts no other thoughts would enter my mind. Now practically, this actually is not possible. Then what do we do? We can decide that even if these 'other' thoughts come to my mind, I will be aware that they have come and simply watch them pass by. I will not pursue those thoughts and get entangled into a chain of thoughts.

Just imagine, if we are able to do such a mindful (ha..) fast once a week, wouldn’t that help us become quiet, calm and relaxed?