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Wednesday, June 6, 2012

The Awareness of Unawareness

Shankaranand was a shy old man who spent most of his day in prayers. He was a sanyasi by choice. He ate frugally, lived simply and gave away all the extra income that came to him by his discourses on Brahmgyan (the knowledge of Eternal Light).


One night in his sleep he had dreams of all his loved ones passing away; he repeatedly saw their lifeless forms. He was jolted out of his slumber because of the shock that his being experienced by those dreams. He was disappointed by realizing his own fear of death and fear of separation from his loved ones. He understood that he is still a very attached and lost being.
Shankarand hurriedly wore his dhoti and chaddar and took off to the nearest cremation ground by the bank of the holy river Gandak.


It was the dead of the night; the keeper of the ground was fast asleep in his cottage.
Shankaranand sat next to the three burning pyres by the river. He could hear packs of hyenas laughing sinisterly from the bushes, owls were hooting through the dead stillness, and bats flew past his head repeatedly. The scenario was enough to scare any sane individual but he had seen enough death in his sleep to let any fear move him while he is awake.

He asked the Divine Light to show him the most frightening form of death. A voice boomed in his head and it asked "Shankaranand! Are you sure you can face the dreadful face of the death and fear?"
To which he nodded his head and said yes.
The voice boomed again, "Then open your eyes and see it for yourself."
 

He opened his eyes and saw movement in the burning body of the man right next to him. The half burnt skeletal form moved off the logs of charred wood and got up. The bones were rickety and the flesh was still burning on them. The half burnt body moved slowly towards him. Sankaranand stared at it blankly. As it came close, the actual human face of the dead man trailed around the horrifying apparition like a double image on a mirror.

The apparition finally spoke, "Shankarananad, I am Gangadhar, the village grocer. A few nights ago in my shop I saw rat droppings in the rice container. I cleaned it up thinking that throwing away so much rice would not be profitable for my business. So what if people eat it, they eat such contaminated stuff anyway. I forgot to wash my hand before having dinner at home. Two days later I died of stomach poisoning. My greed took away my life. Now look at me, do I look like I can use those extra coins?"

Shankaranand sighed and did not respond to his question.The apparition fell on the ground and disappeared slowly.


Then he heard the eerie sound of anklets, he saw a very beautiful young girl rising from the ashes of the second body. She wore bride's outfit- red and golden sari and dazzling jewelery. She had a veil on her face and she walked slowly and coyly. She looked at him from the corner of her eyes as she moved closer to him. He looked up again. "She is indeed very beautiful! I wonder what happened to this innocent young girl?", he thought to himself.

She spoke in a haunting low melodious voice. "My husband never came home; I have been waiting from the night of our wedding till today. It has been 30 years. I am still an untouched virgin longing for my mate. I know he ran away with another girl in the village that very night. Yet I waited in hope for the fulfillment of my desire to be a wife, a mother and live the life of a Grahasthin (homemaker).
Look at me-I died, but my desires are keeping me alive and young, now I will find him again and marry him. This time I will make sure that he does not run away on the night of our wedding with someone else."

Shankaranad felt pity for the woman who agonized for a punishingly long period of time for the fulfillment of her desires.



Finally from the last pyre, dark bellowing smoke started rising. Instinctively he was about to cover his nose. As he stopped, he heard loud coughing. A woman rose from her pyre; her lungs were emitting black soot. From her lungs jumped out tiny human skeletons. Thousands of them sprung out, running amok. He looked at her form inquisitively. All those nasty beings were running into a hole of light that pierced open on the other side and her lungs became clearer slowly. As those being jumped  into light he saw something that shocked him. A demonic skeleton being jutted out of her backbone, and grew into her like an attached twin. He spoke through his saw-like demonic teeth, as he hissed and spoke in a hoarse voice. "I am her nemesis. She destroyed my family in her last birth. We decided to come and live in her body, and destroy her this time. Now our vengeance is complete." He hissed demonically and fell back into the ashes.


Shankaranad took a sigh of relief.
Morning was breaking through the darkest hour of the night. He got up and walked slowly towards the Gandak.


As he looked at his own image into the water he thought to himself,
"I, the form of Shankaranand, ran from the fear of attachment and the pain it caused me in my sleep.
Here my awakened self sees the grotesque forms of Greed, Desire, Vengeance and Ego.
I wonder which one is useful in life and which one exists beyond death.
I know now that none of it it useful when I am alive. Nothing sticks to my being when I am dead.
Then why am I feeling it? Why did these dead people feel it? What did they want to know through that emotion?
Did those souls want that experience of suffering caused by those emotions?
Was that the only purpose of their birth?"
He felt sad at the pain caused by the ignorance of those souls.
He was sad at the thought of his own attachment to the physical forms of his loved ones around him?
" If all of them are Divine energies then why am I so attached to their body and appearance?
Is that the Leela/Maya of God that operates through different beings, making us feel attached to the voice, sound, laughter, humor and the way a being creates itself as a unique individual.  
Whether it is Kama (Lust), Krodh (Anger) Lobha (Greed), Ahankar (Ego) or Moh (Attachment).
Would I still fear death if I accepted them as they are without becoming a part of them?
Would I feel pain if I stayed a witness, even if I stood right in the path of the hurricane of these emotions?"

The worst of these emotions is the fear of these emotions. The questions were many and the answer was only one.
Sun rose slowly coloring the dull sky with flames of orange.

He walked slowly feeling the cool morning air on his body. The silence of the earth rising from its slumber soothed him. Sounds of birds chirping filled the morning sky. The heaviness of the night lifted off his heart. He felt a new found joy surging from his being.
He realized that death is a doorway to birth of something new. Sometimes a breakdown is necessary for a breakthrough. Only then one can realize that the true purpose of life is to live it.