Like most of the people of my generation and a lot from the
older one too, I was clueless why we followed certain rituals and traditions.
The cluelessness and the lack of reasoning created a chaos in my head and
stopped me from following what we call our customs and traditions.
Being born in a family where father is an ardent follower of
Arya Samaj and mother, a devotee of Durga, you have a choice to make, brain put
to work, curiosity fuelled and you have a time of your life finding what is right
and what is wrong!
Whereas my father said God has no form, I saw my mother
worshipping deities. The little mind did not know which path to follow, though
the ‘One Power’ concept left a deep indentation in the heart and mind.
Where does God live? Would God be unhappy if I didn’t do pooja? Doesn’t He already know that I
love him and I respect him? Why we need to chant mantras? Answers that I got
could not suffice the hunger of knowing the actual reasons behind them. And
also there were certain rules related to religion that deeply infuriated me in
my growing up years. I went out of my mind when I was told that I was not
supposed to touch deities while on periods and no visiting holy places! I could
not find any logic to support it.
I would think to myself if He has created me, I, in my
entirety, belong to Him. He only made me this way. Mera achha bhi uska, mera bura bhi. Though it is not my bura, it is his science. And as always,
I could not find answer for this too. Hence, I became a rebel. Rebel against
religion.
I stopped visiting temples, stopped worshipping. It was my
way of not surrendering to the illogical system that was supposed to be
followed, with eyes blindfolded.
As I now discover on my journey to seek, I am awestruck and
overwhelmed and left with goosebumps because all what I have seen, been told to
do since childhood, which I had been reluctant to as there was no logic
available to tell me the significance, turns out to be pure science and
metaphysics.
Had I been aware of the relevance of those rituals, those
little things that used to be a part of our daily life, the magnitude of its
effect unknown to me at that time, I would have been in a different phase of
life today. But nothing can beat the feeling of unearthing the meaning of life
by your own self!
In archaic times, Hinduism used to be a full-fledged
spiritual machinery. The customs followed were all backed by science, with eye-opening
reasons behind them. Over a period of time, the spiritual culture of the land
lost its form and age-old traditions got distorted. With Mughal invasions and
later British rule, the close to nature and living with inner bliss format got
inebriated to the extent that it became difficult for us to identify with our
own selves. Things rounded off for social relevance, whole system twisted and
turned to suit political and personal reasons. With significance unknown and
relevance unfound, to me, it all looked like a religious melodrama.
Despite the fact that we are born in the land with highest
level of human spiritual evolvement, we are ignorant of the very basics of it.
We invariably ape the West, because our minds, our education system, our
identity have simply become the byproducts of the British culture.
As the facts are unfolding, I feel blessed, contrary to what
I have felt my entire life, to be born in a culture where everything is
believed to be based on energy. We are all ‘Energy Beings,’ be it human or the
whole cosmos, is the origin and foundation of the entire system. It’s my loss
that I am discovering things now when I have lived almost half of my life.
Rather late than never. At least I would not live the rest of it in ignorance.
Never knew Nazar Utarna, a ritual that is done in almost all homes
of India, is a simple and scientific process of cleaning one’s energies of
negativity.
So this is what has happened to us modern Indians. We do
things, if only we happen to do, not knowing why we are doing it, then slowly
we lose interest and stop following, simply because we don’t know why we are doing
it.
There are reasons more than one behind the conduct of women in
periods and religion related saga. What is being followed till date is the
distorted and beaten up form of a logical and functional system that was
followed to suit ancient times, no more relevant but still dragged. It is like
bullock carts were used once upon a time. Now that I have a car, still I need
to put the bull in front to pull my car because that’s what our ancestors used
to move around!
If we are smart enough not to let the bull pull the car, we
need to be smart enough to sieve relevant from irrelevant in all spheres of
life.
In an age where there were no appliances or technology to
make life easy as it is now, people had to go through a lot of physical work
unlike today. For instance, they did not have the convenience of opening a
flour bag and getting the meal ready in minutes. They toiled really hard from
the point of getting the grains to cleaning, washing, drying and grinding all
by themselves. So women, to give their bodies rest, were waivered from such
labour intensive work.
Earlier people lived surrounded by nature. The woman in
menstruation was kept enclosed in a house because of the fear that wild animals
might get attracted by the smell of the blood. So simple reasons like these
necessitated that a woman be treated differently at that time which over
centuries became a malpractice simply because things were followed and passed
onto generations without knowing their very significance.
As I mentioned, it was all science based, visiting a holy
place had a science too but after the Bhakti movement, the devotees’ emotions took
over and the science behind visiting holy places got subdued. This is where the
priests and the pandits became the owners of God. I chose to refrain from
visiting a temple, even though wanting to, because of the malpractices and the
conduct that priests generally have everywhere. Don’t they act as if they are
the Gods there?!
One question that has always made me scratch my head is that
why we need to visit a temple when the same idol I have at home. Looks like I
found my Head & Shoulders :P
These days temples can be found in every nook and cranny of a
city, under every peepal tree one can
hold sight of, idea behind being acquiring the land and making religion a
profitable business.
In olden times, temples were strategically placed to receive maximum
energy from magnetic and electric wave distributions and copper plates were
used to radiate it to the surroundings. Moreover, the sages and seers, the
ancient spiritual scientists, infused the surroundings with the energies of the
sacred mantras. Being in the presence of such force helped people lead a
blissful, experiential life. This explained to me why I felt something
different visiting certain holy places.
There are numerous other things like fasting, wearing tilak
and sindoor, touching feet of the elderly, joining hands in namaste, all revolving
around detoxifying the mind, body and soul, energizing the seven chakras and
making one more receptive to the divine.
For proper functioning, lubrication is not only needed in
joints, it is needed in life as well. Imagine what it would be to climb a fleet
of stairs with a pair of bad knees. Climbing would not be much of an issue if
one has been paying attention and working towards maintaining them. So not the
incline, knees are what need more focus. I have identified the lubricant for my
joints, please do find yours too!
We are born in a rich soil, things do go haywire sometimes.
Not cribbing, not running away, not settling with what has been thrown your way
but finding ways out, putting things back to track, getting connected to the
roots, making your own path is what we need to get things sorted. It is just a
matter of being aware. Know who you are! Dive within!
Simplify, Live Happy!
