Suffering

What is the primary characteristic of life? That which shines throughtout its different forms and appearences, that which defines the journey of life more starkingly and precisely than anything else.

Is it bliss? Nay, for not many people recognise this, or rather, it is not revealed to many.

Is it anger, irritation or dejection? No, since these are not primary colours, but rather sprouts from other states.

Suffering is undoubtedly the primary characteristic of life, be it on a physical level or mental level. It is the ingredient which adds meaning to life, even as being embodied with the power to raise questions regarding the meaning of life.

Every person on earth knows what suffering is. But few know how to suffer. There is bliss in suffering, to the person who knows the purpose of his life on earth, be it out of revelation or conviction.

Suffering is what brings us to the earth. It is to suffer that we are born. Only by suffering can we transcend pain. Thus it is the greatest teacher among experiences, always guiding you, irrespective of you paying heed or not.

Selves

Selves

The many faces of a man - multiple beings all embedded in the realm of the mind. The one surfacing at any given moment being left to chance, nay, chance is the adjudicator and the director of the play, with the screenplay being left entirely at the hands of each individual actor. The no. of artists on stage solely decided by the ruling actor of the moment, or rather his perceptions.

The play expands by the day to incorporate and nurse more artists, each of them a master in his own right, with an Ego quotient as high as possible. The seven selves, as described by Kahlil Gibran, are forever engaged in battle to gain supremacy of the mind, of the self. Each of the selves stake a claim to the throne, backed up with a convincing set of arguments.

Yet, alas, anniliation of one at the hands of the other is virtually impossible, even though they are perenially at loggerheads with each other. The rules of the earthly world, thus alleviate itself from that of the mind.

The bane of mankind has been its inability to comprehend the mental realm, the only possesion which sets him apart from fellow tellurians, which like an over-spoilt child can prove to be his downfall. The emphasis of eastern thought on "the observation of the mind" seems apt, and the saying goes "Conquer the mind to conquer the world".

The Ordeal

Why am I on this earth? Certainly not due to chance or the mischief of some prankster god. Nor am I only restricted to the physical realm, with equations governing my movements, thoughts and heartbeat.

The reason seems to be myself. The answer is to be obtained from within. Thus, in-line with the greater reason of existence, would certainly be the paths trodden during the same. Thus the selection of the paths and the means seems to have been made by none other than myself.

( By "myself", I do not mean the mind-body-intellect complex which forms the physical dimension of me. But rather, the I is the higher self, The Eye To The Eye, That which is revealed only to intuition, and that which is subtlest among the subtle. )

Man thus cries over the happenings which he has chosen for himself. Thus, he deserves not to cry. More precisely, he does not have the right to do so.

But who is to blame? It is evidently the eternal conflict between the mind and the self. The self wriggling in the effort to remove the cobwebs created by the mind, ever yearning to return to its source; The primordial energy.