The last few weeks I have contemplated on being busy. Personally I am not a very busy person. This was a conscious decision few years ago when I realised that there was more to life that just running the rat race that we all run. There was something more that we need time for. With that I decided to cut down on things in my life. It didn't come hard for me but those around me it came as a shock. For some it was rather unpleasant and other it was something of a socially deviant thing that I was doing. But by this time I had subject myself to doing things according societal norms but none had brought me the promised 'satisfactions', so I was going to listen to myself. I always had good instincts but sometime despite those, was too adamant when my instincts told me to go in a direction which would not have brought much approval from the rest of the world. But finally I was willing to give it a try.
So now I have much time to meditate and reflect and contemplate. I find that it had made me much stronger over the years. I am less moved by what goes around me, the opinions, praise and blame of others. I find that I have a house and a safe place inside me that I can walk into anytime and in that I am always welcome and loved and cherished and that I can find peace, quiet and even moments of bliss and happiness in the midst of darkness outside. I am truly grateful for that.
So, now I have looked outside of my life the last few weeks. For I have encountered the word "busy" many times from many people from around me. I find it rather interesting that we all like being busy. Being busy gives us something to do, to occupy ourselves with and our time with. With that we no longer feel alone, bored, unworthy, left to our own devices, unloved and without meaning in their lives. So we like being busy. It's funny that people don't know 'WHY' they get busy in the first place. I think if they only did they probably will not get busy as much as they do.
I met people who work because they want to be busy, they study because they want to keep busy, they want to look after their grandchildren because they want to be busy, some want to have children because they want to be busy....but I don't think they do these things because they want to be 'busy' but because they want to be loved, find meaning, feel worthy, feel that they belong to someone, or something.....either way we all have this burning desire to feel part of something. Why?
Because our 'EGO' cannot stand on its own. We are in essence are very weak. I understand this because I have investigate this within myself. The need to be. We need to get occupied with things sometimes anything because we want to belong. We need to be part of something. So we do things in a very selfish way. This is why people get disappointed. When other don't meet your expectations, when other let you down or criticize you or whatever, we feel resentment or disappointment because we do things out of selfish desire. If we did things for the sake of doing, then none of these self centered needs will arise.
So, in order to free our EGO, to make ourselves stand on our own we need to first and foremost see ourselves very clearly. We need to put ourselves in the microscope. But the nature of the beast is that when we are so busy doing things and running around like a chicken with its head cut off, there is not a moment to breath or a moment of rest to put ourselves under the microscope or even take a peak through that lens, and even if we do both, there isn't the time to understand and process what we just saw. So, we keep on rolling with the punches, as they say until the last punch throws us right into the coffin. But what use will that do to us?!! This is my biggest questions.
I mean we live life, and other live life trying so hard to make a "life for themselves" so they say. They all say that. They do a job, buy a house, a car, raise a family do many more things to "make or build a life for themselves" but they don't take the time for themselves and they are in the centre of the drama: they are the main character of the play. When the main character of the play is weak and doesn't know the lines, can that play or movie or drama be a successful play/drama or movie?! NO! So why? Why all this hullabaloo to run around and do so much and get busy when you are the one who is being run down to the ground?! Why not take the time and treat as if you were the main character of your own movie for goodness sake?
But I doubt people will ever see it like that. If I tell it the way I said it above, they will say that I am being selfish. But really ask yourselves am I being selfish or am I asking you to be realistic?
What is also ironic is the world is so programmed to think busy and reward busy. A person who is not busy (now I don't mean someone who is lazy and sleeps all day and is like a couch potato) in people's eyes should be a monastic or should be living in a temple. But these days even the priests are too busy! The world presses and oppresses if someone takes that time to contemplate and to meditate and live that quiet life. It's hard to have that choice that almost as if you are being discriminated for wanting that. Isn't that ironic.
My wish for myself above all is that I would find more moments of quietness and time of reflection as I continue this life. Whatever the future may hold, I value the moments of reflection greatly. They are a source of strength and great understanding. No books or degree has ever given me the kind of understanding and strength that has some about through meditation and contemplation of Dhamma. I am truly grateful to the Buddha for that. My wish for anyone else is that they in their hearts would know this truth as well. All we do, be it great or small, comes to and end someday, and there is nothing we take with us except the time that we have spent with ourselves in those quiet times. If we haven't done that, then we have wasted a precious life we have received and death would be in vain.
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