Life in numbers

Life may be measured qualitatively or quantitatively. We can choose to look at the passage of time in terms of minutes, hours, days, months or decades. In critical situations we are forced to mark the passage of time in terms of seconds and minutes. However, for the most past, we push the thought of time into the background as if the the steady loss of this precious resource is a faraway fantasy. By looking at life qualitatively, the importance of time becomes real in every moment, not just when its finitude becomes apparent through circumstances beyond one’s control. Life is numbered from day zero of our existence and we have the freedom to spend our time joyfully or riddled with fear and anxiety. Time does not treat anyone preferentially based on how one uses that valuable resource. In the eyes of time, all are equal. This very moment runs concurrently for everyone whether or not we are aware of it; and whether one is awake, sleeping or dreaming.

Indian Independence

It has now been 70 years since India attained her independence from British rule. At that time, many small kingdoms had to be brought under one umbrella for the nation to take shape. It can be said that the heart of India was born when independence was achieved in 1947. But the soul of India has been in existence for thousands of years, since the ancient Vedic times. Indian culture has always espoused unity amidst diversity. Every living creature lives in and shares a heavenly space between the earth and the sky. Why is this space heavenly? It is because it nurtures and sustains all life forms without preference for one over another. Beyond the sky, outer space is hostile to life as we know it. We are indeed very lucky that we have this rare chance of being witness to the wonders of the universe from such a comfortable and beautiful place we call earth.

The Mind: Full of preservatives

The origins of modern day “instant” digital photography are buried in antiquity. The earliest forms employed a pinhole camera, also called camera obscura (Latin for dark room). A basic pinhole camera is a box with a tiny aperture that lets in light, which falls on the opposite wall creating an inverted image of the object that was illuminated. Later, glass lenses replaced the pinholes. The 10th century Arab physicist, Ibn al-Haytham is credited with the invention of the world’s first pinhole camera. The principles of camera obscura were initially described by the ancient Greeks and the Chinese. In the 1820s, Nicéphore Niépce employed the phenomenon of camera obscura and captured the world’s first photographic record. The next big revolution was color photography and more recently digital photography. The first photograph took several several days of exposure. These days, we can take several photographs in a fraction of a second using our smart phones. Our eyes are the best examples of pinhole cameras. In fact, camera obscura was the model for the human eye as described by Leonardo Da Vinci.  René Descartes extended this to the eye and the mind. Although the human eye is a prototypical pinhole camera bringing in information to the brain, the other four senses also bring in “images” of the world around us in the form of sensory input that can be analysed and interpreted by the mind.

Coping with death

Death is not a generational event confined to humans. There is life and death embedded in every moment, the death of one is the birth of another. Life is strung out along a string of infinite moments, each one could be the last, no one can be sure. Death is implied when we are born. But when it happens, it can be an emotionally explosive powder keg for those left behind. Death has a long fuse that is lit the moment we are born. Time burns down that fuse. Life is a transition between birth and death, we cannot remember the former and tend to forget the latter. But death does not forget us. We get a sampling of it every night in deep sleep where we are unaware of anything. No doubt, there is a great sense of loss when we lose a loved one. This event cannot be avoided by anyone and only time can eat our grief. How do we hasten this process of healing and see the darkness that death brings in a new light?

The body is an interface

The sport of diving is very easy to watch but a perfect dive is extremely difficult to execute. There is a lot of physics that is involved in executing a complicated dive with twists, turns and somersaults. It is easy to enjoy the aesthetics of a perfectly executed dive but the viewer may fail to think of the efforts that have led to that point or the dangers that are involved in the sport of diving. The risk to the diver rises as the height of the platform increases. All the energy for the dive that includes the flips and turns are harnessed before the diver leaves the platform or a springboard. Once airborne, one is committed. Everything that a diver does while on the board and in the air determines the entry into the water. A splashless entry is the ultimate objective besides the aesthetics of the flips and turns in the air. Life is like the sport of diving. A “quiet and splashless entry” into our deeper being depends on how we train and use our body. Those who can effortlessly dive into their being are few and far in between. It isn’t a gift, rather a culmination of many years or even a lifetime of effort. Everyone has the capability to slip beyond that dark core that we perceive with our eyes closed. But that raw ability has to be refined and sharpened with repeated practice. Just as a diver is the only one who can truly experience a splashless entry, only those who have mastered diving deep within themselves can experience lasting peace and bliss that everyone craves. 

Eye of an ant and the body of an elephant

Living without the power of sight is hard to imagine. Those tiny apertures just a few millimeters across, are such a great gift, adding immense value to our lives. We take them for granted until sight starts to fail us. Our lives start in the darkness of the womb and ends when the curtain like eyelids close for the final time. In between we experience light, without which nothing would be visible. The opening and closing of this grand drama is not only played out over many years, but daily as well. When we sleep, we enter the womb of our own consciousness. The entryway is through darkness. Our consciousness is very much alive, but we are unaware of it. As soon as we awaken, that communion with our own consciousness within is instantly overpowered by light that reflects off the world of objects. That inner light emanating from our own consciousness is never seen, and thought to be non existent.

Self consciousness

From a very young age we are taught not to be self conscious. We are encouraged to project outward confidence. All the senses are geared to look externally and seek out the world. The mind is kept very busy through its constant engagement with the sense organs. Slowly over time, we conclude that reality is that which exists outside of us. We ignore what lurks within the darkness behind the visible part of the mind and what’s behind the functioning of each individual cell. On a physical level cells and organs are continuously functioning. We seldom pay attention to them until an illness strikes. The attention of the mind is quickly diverted from the external world to the illness within the body. Through the lens of illness, there is constant awareness of the living reality that the human body is. But this awareness is chained to the body and cannot go beyond it. Only when the body is rendered “invisible” through deeper introspection with constant awareness, self consciousness takes a positive turn. When limited to the body, it turns negative and is ultimately a dead end. The mind has convinced us that there is nothing beyond the body, which becomes a virtual starting point from which the mind pushes us outwards.