I have been out of sorts lately. Not unwell. Not in any way
inconvenienced. Just out of sorts. It happens to me when I am not writing. It
is almost as if the thoughts that hurt me spread their tentacles into my mind
and body and hold on tenaciously unless I write. When I write, the tentacle
grips of my thoughts release their hold on me and I am loose and relaxed once
more. I know not the beauty of total relaxation but I doubt anyone who writes
can know the feeling of being completely free of the compulsion to put thought
to words and onto paper. So I thought I would write whatever came into my mind
or rather whatever has been unsettling me so that I can face tomorrow with a
fresh mind and stronger effort.
I was thinking of the inevitability of letting go of certain
people who can never mean what they once meant. I have written a lot on the
effect of distance on a relationship but the effect of callousness is much
greater. When someone decides there is no time to spare or the time spared for
a relationship is burdensome, then there is no relationship. When the weight of
the words unsaid far exceeds that of the words spoken between two people, there
is no longer a bond. I thought of the many people I had known – friends, those
more than friends, those newcomers who managed to make a place in my heart and
wonder how a moment’s callousness or unwillingness to take time can irreparably
destroy something that took years to build.
Is there a purpose in spending time knowing people and
caring for them if it takes but a minute to dissolve the bond that was built?
The answer I have come up with it is that it is not the relationship that
matters in the end, it is what has changed in you that matters – how many happy
moments you have carved out of a life that would otherwise be ordinary, how
many lives you have affected, how many times the bond has given you strength to
move forward when you never thought you could. Every relationship that has
taught you love, hurt, betrayal, hope has also taught you how to deal with all
of it – it is in the learning that you grow as a person.
I also thought of a friend who seems to be going through a
really tough phase. I can see the hurt and the pain and even the confusion. The
answers come to me but I don’t share them. I see mistakes about to be made but
I cannot actually stop them from happening. The truth is that there are certain
circumstances when even with the best intentions all you can do is stand and
watch and let someone make their mistakes. You can also be there when they need
comfort. Knowing when to keep quiet is a valuable learning.
My other thoughts had to do with never ending work – when will
the day come when our little centre can stand on its own feet and flourish –
when all the days of work achieve fruition and when we can sit back and
actually smile with relief at a job well done? I worry about being able to
visualize my future and that of my loved ones. Sometimes the same thoughts go
around in my mind so many times that I greet them as old friends. Sometimes new
thoughts come and mingle with the old overpowering them for a while and then
fading away leaving me once again with my old friends. If I sit and observe my
thoughts, I know they never change in essence but I also know that their tenor
changes and the way I view them changes. That is entirely due to the impact of
life’s lessons – you may worry or think endlessly about those problems you
cannot solve but eventually you will learn to accept them and view them as
sources of strength and inspiration rather than issues you must resolve at all
cost.
Thus ends my ramblings for the day – an ode to thoughts …
7 comments:
You put this very sensibly, Anima. I've also found it true that a thought, like a seed that will branch out or perish, entangles itself with other thoughts. Even our brain's physiology works similarly in the weaving of dendrites across the neurons and synapses. The word "entanglement" carries a rather messy connotation--as if connections are undesirable or lasting. Detachment, a special cognition, and perhaps metaphysical state of the individual, collective, or undifferentiated spirit, is extolled as the end and means of truth, liberty, and joy.
Like a seedling that grows, by genetic design, a design of its having come into being, a genetic, shorn into its very being, which blooms into air and yet roots into earth, so is the mind's material body, thought, a paradoxical issuance and recession. Thought is a tricky thing. It can assert and deny. It can maintain and dissolve. It can synthesize and analyze. It can produce and negate.
Even in negation, the material of thought is active as recession of possibility; to think that we are strengthened, for example, by loss of balance that tugs at our roots, the source of loss itself a lacking, a void in which we are a fielded body, speaks inevitably of an emptiness outside the self that is equally devoid of meaning as it is devoid of attachment. Thus, we find absurdity in the paradox of detachment, for when we detach from relationships, desires, identities, and patterns of thought, no matter what our goal may tentatively be, we detach from meaning. If we see our individual identity as ultimately false, then we wonder what is trying to detach from falsehood and ignorance. If we see our individual identity as true, then then we wonder what external meaning there may be with which it could relate.
Meaning, as some Western existentialists have pointed out, cannot be grounded in or immanent to the external or internal. So where is it? What is the meaning of growing, losing, gaining, going forward or backward, asserting or denying, all the things that come together to form some semblance of sense in human struggle, growth, and life? What orders thought over sleep, or what orders joy over sorrow?
I don't know. In every possibility, I see thoughts, streaming down the current of imagination and wonder. How else could we really see, but know emptiness behind what is seen, to cherish silence behind what is heard?
I feel lonely too,..a life that craves to end soon,..some regrets but all only due to a tortured mind that I was born with,..the distance is huge but on purpose so as not to hurt anyone or myself.
Well Thomas, I have been accused of thinking too much all my life :) - I believe thoughts have their purpose but to go beyond thoughts must be the ultimate aim for the detached state of a witness is most conducive to peace of mind. Having said that, being a witness to one's own life sounds like an extremely boring way to be :) - so I will continue trying to find a balance between thoughts and detachment!
Loneliness is a state of mind - it has nothing to do with whether you are close to or far away from someone - the essence of human nature is loneliness. Far better being lonely than trusting people who betray that trust. And with distance comes clarity - it is always a choice...
I prefer to be alone as the pain never goes away it never dulls and no amount of money helps. It is a wasted life for me and God knows I have tried,..a mirage,..no one should be born with mental illness,..a beautiful family,..no lack of anything,..monetary or otherwise,..yet all I feel is pain and now silence helps. The darkness in me is complete. I feel nothing anymore. Nothing.
Well, Anima, I enjoy your blog, and I appreciate your discussion, but I do not agree that loneliness is the essence of human life. If that were the case, why would God have created us or brought anything into being--because He is lonely from Himself, the self that is perfect and trusting in its loneliness yet deceiving itself in its betrayal of solitude(by creating life)? Distance may bring clarity to some matters, but in our imperfection, it will inevitably occlude others. Some say that God is a mystery, but that does not mean the way to Him is to abandon meaning and attachment.
I also do not agree that detachment is the supreme yogic means. In fact, I think such a supposition is patently false. Love is not only the essence of God (As you likely know, coined by the term "ananda" in the Brahmanic period of Sanskrit literature, denoting pure joy, although the term is likely older), but it is also the supreme means of man's reuniting with God. Vedanta, especially its advaitic branches, disagrees, as did Meister Eckhart in his heretical teachings in Europe. Light and love are the truth that dispel darkness, ignorance, and sin; they are not born of it, but cast down His grace into chaos to plant the seeds of order.
Our life has meaning, we are loved, and we are never alone. Our prayers show this.
Thanks for listening and engaging; it is a welcome change of pace! Regarding thinking "too much," I can only say that most people are afraid to do so, and that it leads many of us to dark corners. Courage!
Thomas, I was answering the other comment. I know who is commenting under the title of 'anonymous' and for him loneliness is a real issue. There have been a few recent incidents in my life when I have lost trust in people I had trusted implicitly. In the aftermath of such experiences, it always feels right to go into a shell and trust only in oneself. My husband is a master at detachment and tells me I get involved - too involved but then how does one live life to the fullest without engaging? ANd how does one engage fully without risking hurt time and again? This is the conundrum :) You are right - we are never as alone as we think we are :)
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