I came across this one, in a beauty salon. I had gone for a lengthy ‘hair treatment’ after a long time, post this lockdown period. Now a days the mind seeks out to speak to people as much as possible, since I spend so much time indoors. As a result, I got to talking with the lady doing the treatment, she also owns the salon.
I realized we have so much in common, in the way we look at life. Both us were ‘seekers’ of inspiration!
I learned, that she had enrolled in a Sanskrit learning course for over five years now. I was so amazed at the knowledge acquiring appetite she had. I loved it, when she said the following about the Sanskrit language, “It is so much more than a Language. It feels like, it has the secrets of the entire Universe stored in it.”
She has been running a beauty salon successfully for eleven years, has a daughter who is sixteen years old, lives with her in-laws, does all the house-hold chores on her own, and still has the capacity to learn a new language, and that too with this depth. I was in awe of her the entire time I was there.
We generally miss to see the extent of inspiration around us. I think to myself, ‘We really need to begin talking to people, listen to their stories!!’
In any case, she narrated a very short story of one her batch mates in the Sanskrit course, which remained with me. Here it goes; ‘One of the subjects in the course, is a very difficult one. This classmate of hers was not confident of her learning, of this subject. Before the examination on this subject, she went to a temple, placed her exam hall ticket in front of the deity and folded her hands in prayer. She said, ‘please help me pass in this subject.’ With this belief, she went ahead and wrote the exam. Post the test, she narrated this ‘act’ of hers to the classmates and the professor in charge, in one of the class sessions. The professor heard her quietly, and scolded her when she finished narrating. She said, ‘You fool, when you had already decided to ‘file the application’, why did you not ask for a ‘distinction’? Why did you limit yourself to pass marks only?’ The entire class laughed, she nodded too, in her naivety. But this left us with a deeper meaning in the professor’s remarks.’ The salon lady smiled, went in deep thought after the narration and carried on with her activities.
I sat there, with the mask on my hair, thinking about this huge lesson which was unfolded very simply to me. In our limited thinking, we ask for such ‘small wishes’, just to ‘get through’ the situation at hand. We do not believe at that moment of desperation, that there is a possibility of something better and huge, awaiting us. Most of the times we do get that ‘little’ thing we ‘ask’ for, and miss out on the humungous gifts that were ‘planned’ for us.
One of the reasons could be, is we do not surrender to the prospect, that there is something better in store for us. We want to take control of everything, hence ask for and manifest these insignificant wishes only. That is for ‘the immediate pain’ to go away. Eventually, end up not being ‘satisfied’ enough with it.
Innately, we know that we deserve more. It is the mind, due a developed belief system, tells us, that we ‘should’ be limiting ourselves.
We don’t know the ‘bigger plan’ of the universe for us. Once in a while, surrender with complete faith would be healthy, I believe :)
From above incident, I am able to recall something I read in ‘The Bhagwat Gita’, explained by Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, that has been retained by the mind.
“udarah sarva evai ‘te
jnani tv atmai ‘va me matam
asthitah sa hi yuktatmd
main eva ‘nuttamam gatim”
“Noble indeed are all these but the sage, I hold, is verily Myself. For being perfectly harmonized. he resorts to Me alone as the highest goal.”
“We pray to avoid emotional suffering (artal) , gain practical advantages (artharthi), obtain intellectual satisfaction (jijnasuh) or gain wisdom (janani). All these are noble. Even if we pray for material things, turn prayer into a formal routine or use it as a mascot, we recognize the reality of the religious sense. Prayer is the effort of man to reach God. It assumes that there is an answering Presence in the world. If we ask, it shall be given to us. Through the exercise of prayer, we kindle a light in our consciousness which shows up our silly pride, our selfish greed, our fears and hopes. It is a means for the building up of an integral personality, a harmony of body, mind and spirit. Slowly we feel that it is degrading to pray for luck in life or success in examinations. We pray that we may know the Divine and be more and more like Him. Prayer is a way of life. Slowly it becomes the practice of the presence of God. It is jnana, integral wisdom, divine life. The jnani who knows God as He is, loves God for what He is. He lives in the Divine. God is dear to him as he is dear to God. While the first three types attempt to use God according to their ideas, the knowers belong to God to be used according to His will. Therefore they are the best of them all. It is possible that, when we are in deep distress, we may pray with such single-heartedness and intensity, to be relieved of our agony. If such a prayer be answered, it may be thwarting
the purpose of God which we are unable to see in our blindness The jnani, however, has the purity of heart and singleness of will to see the plan of God and ask for its realization. “Thy will, not mine, be done.”
*Reference: https://en.krishnakosh.org/krishna/Bhagavadgita_-Radhakrishnan_172
