That WTF feeling when you want to express something, but can’t. I'm kicking it in Delhi, yet been typing & backspacing like crazy for half a day. So much feels, yet I can’t find the right words to perfectly express them. You know that feeling where everything's awesome, life is great & you're in 'The Zone'...but it would be so much better if that one person were there with you? Fuck, yaar...all yoga & meditation practices, down the drain! Bahahahahah! Enjoying it, though! There is beauty in the nuances of life, in the rawness of human emotion, be it happiness, sadness, joy, grief, fear, excitement...& I am thoroughly enjoying drowning in this chaos. O Govinda! Feeling Your separation I am considering a moment to be like twelve years or more. Tears are flowing from my eyes like torrents of rain, & I am feeling all vacant in the world in Your absence. - Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu (Sri Siksastakam Verse 7) – Love it when I read words which perfectly describe what I cannot describe. This song is one of my current obsessions. Such beautiful lyrics! It is always an ongoing battle between the head & the heart. The mind wants to control everything, down to the tiniest detail. It demands certainty...no surprises, gotdang it!
To some, the heart may seem like an impatient fool burning his tongue again & again every morning while sipping on his favourite hot chai: 'Idiot, if you would just wait for a while & let it cool!'...but such is the madness of the heart. It is devoid of logic & reason. It is a courageously impulsive bugger. It just knows, 'Okey, now this,' & *boom*. I used to be an over-planner. Everything had to be planned & prepared down to the most minute detail, ASAFP. But life has shown me that not everything is 'plan-able'. Sometimes you just have to jump first, think later. But more often than not, you can have a plan, but you have to remain flexible enough to adapt to any change which happens along the way. Well, it seems I've gone to the other end of the spectrum now - too relaxed, bahahahahah...I didn't really know who what where why when how, I just knew I wanted to be here in India. & here I am. Grateful for every experience, grateful for good friends, grateful for this life. Ah, mama India...every time I return, you teach me so much. Just to sit on your lap is a blessing. Sometimes, the things, places, & people we hold dearest to our hearts teach us the biggest lessons. Hope this post makes sense, I literally can't brain much at the moment.
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Image from www.scoopwhoop.com That moment you understand that everything happens for a reason, & that you are that much better off now because of all that shit... & then you think back on your old self & be like, ‘Damn, I was pretty much a dumb ass back then huh? Bahahahahah!' When the idea of relationships was that it would be the two of you against the world, for ever & ever (oh, the horror!), that you'd be joined at the hip for the rest of your lives (holy smokes!)...dayummm, son! Oh sweet bejesus, those were crazy times..! A few days ago I was watching the travel channel & they were advertising a beach side resort as a location for a romantic getaway. Oh geez, maybe it's because I rarely watch TV, or that I never before noticed how they have always been airing cheesy overrated stuff like this...but I was like, 'Homaigot, not boring ah every day every where hold hand! Snorkeling also hold hand, eat dinner also hold hand! Aiyooo sien lah weh!' Seriously though, I'd rather have a best friend than a metaphorical conjoined twin. Bohot cheesy hogaya...& everything doing together, boring lah weh, give some air to breathe can ah!?! Until when want to drama drama like this woh, suffocating, sial! :P :P :P 'What time are you coming home?' 'Why are you looking at him/her?' 'Are you seriously going to wear that?' 'Who are you talking to?' Homaigot, my brain will break..! Life is so much better when you don't have to answer these questions. If you are lucky enough to have found someone who is on the same wavelength, then jackpot! But most of the time...hmmm! Maybe experiences have turned me into a cynic, but I’m not completely in the clear yet, dear friends! I still do have my dumb ass moments every once in a while…bahahahahah! So what really is love? If you're not living your lives together, is it still love? If the other’s actions determine the amount & quality of your love towards them, is it really love, then? Actually, what the hell has any of this have to do with what you are choosing to put out there? Is the age-old model of love, as dictated by society, really love? There is a very beautiful phrase by Rumi: Two lanterns hang alone, yet their light mingles as one. Indeed, aloneness is the very basis of all relationships. You have to really know what you’re about, & to be damn bloody sure about it, before you can relate to another. The beauty of loving in aloneness is that you are free to love the other in your own way. & loving another does not necessarily mean that you have to be physically close, it does not mean you have to talk the whole day, it doesn’t even mean that you have to be in an ‘official’ relationship. Sometimes, it even means that you have to step away because that's what's best for both parties. Even without the other's presence, a heart that loves totally is a heart that is loyal & devoted. Yes, some people are capable of polyamory, but I'm speaking purely on my experience here. To some, it may seem like utter foolishness. But the heart sees no other option. It can't convince itself not to love. To deny itself its feelings would be to suppress its truth. Love can happen in silence, it can happen without the other even knowing it, or heck, without you yourself even knowing it! Yes, it has its own magical way of sneaking up on people like that, the cunning bastard! <3 The heart wants what it wants, regardless of what the mind says, regardless of what others say. So why to fight it? To be able to love, & to have found someone/people who you love deeply, is a blessing. The best things in life are unexplainable, & that’s what makes them so miraculous. Maybe you randomly meet someone, &…you just know. Even though maybe at that time your mind refuses to acknowledge the fact. Lastly, a heart which has tasted freedom will never create a prison for the other. It allows total freedom, because the image of dank prison walls & cast iron bars still weigh heavy in its mind’s eye. Love’s secret is that you must love without desires that bind. Hafiz, enjoy the one you love, drink deep and embrace; seek not with her to please your world, just give love and be kind. - Hafiz Shirazi - Two persons absolutely complete in their individual aloneness are not dependent on each other. Their giving & sharing is totally because of an overflowing of love, without expecting anything in return. It is the culmination of all these things which makes a love like this so pure & divine. There are no laws to bind it, no guidelines to dictate how it should proceed, no regulations as to how long it will last. Even the heart itself does not know how long it will love; here today, maybe gone tomorrow...so while love is there, why to not go totally into it? Look at a rose flower dancing in the wind, & in the rain, & in the sun...
It is very fragile; by the evening, its petals will be thrown in all directions. But while it was, it was tremendous; while it was, it was more than any rock. The rock will remain, the rock is permanent; the flower will comes & go. The higher the value, the more fragile it is. - Osho - Aapan gaand hawai, dusar ke kare dawai. (There are wounds on your own ass & you are putting medicine on another’s.) For the past few weeks, one of the things which has weighed heavy on my mind is the subject of relationships. After risking a very precious friendship (read more in my old blog here), I asked myself, ‘What is all this hullabaloo about human connections?’, ‘Is there any error on my part as to how I have been relating to others?’ Quite recently, I received one of the best & juiciest pieces of advice ever: Whatever it is, just say thank you & give your blessings. You cannot have even a tiny ounce of ill-will, or else the blessing cannot manifest. You cannot throw your shit out on others, it’s your own responsibility to handle your shit. If you have shit inside you: go to the toilet, close the door, shit it out, wash your own ass, pull your pants up, & come out of the toilet. Don’t just sit there & expect someone else to wash your ass for you. Maybe your own mother can wash your ass for you, but even then, she can’t do it for you all the time! Bahahahahah! Love it! Besides, dear friends, I’m sure you have been on the receiving end of all this shit-throwing at least once in your life! Remember that one friend who was going through a break up/didn’t get into college/was having a hard time in life/yadda yadda yadda & called you out for coffee & here you were trying to cheer them up but they refused to come out of that shithole? & to make matters worse, maybe they even started giving you a hard time for no reason? Heckuva lot of fun that was, huh? I’m all for people helping other people. But I don’t believe in being someone’s punching bag. Yes, the idealist Libra in me still very much hopes for someone who will walk me through life & help me through every up & down. But at the same time, the realist in me understands that at the end of the day, it is still my own goddamn responsibility to save myself. Not a very nice thought, considering all those Disney cartoons I’ve been watching since toddlerhood. Goddamn social conditioning! I could go on & on about this. But what I’ve learned is:
I did this piece last July: Ripple Effect. Core Connections. Each soul we cross paths with affects us to a certain extent, whether we like it or not, & whether we realize it or not. The question is, how many actually touch your very centre? How many do you allow close enough to see your one, true self? & how many are sincere enough to want to know the real you? Given these two variables, how many people have touched your centre? According to mainstream ideology, our relationships with the people we love would remain the same forever. (Un)Fortunately, life isn’t always this way. We each have our own thing to do in life, our own lessons we have come to this world to learn. & that may mean that our paths will separate. Life is a never-ending journey. Like a train ride, it stops at various stations; some people get off the train, some get on. Some stay. The thing is, we can never really fully control who gets on or off, & who stays. Ironically, this is the beauty of life – not knowing. But that doesn’t mean that out of all these people, some are ‘better’ than others. Regardless of how our relationship with each one of them is, they all played a part in shaping us into the person we are today, & vice versa. Aapan gaand hawai, dusar ke kare dawai. Check yourself. It's not your job to think for someone else. But it is your job to think for yourself. Do you, & everything else will work out just fine. ;) |
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About Prabh LehriI am a yoga teacher based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I am passionate about yoga as a form of healing on the physical, emotional & mental level. I have been on a yoga journey for almost a decade and have been formally sharing my experience in the last 4 years. Archives
December 2017
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