stomachache to avoid going to school while having a chocolate milkshake brought to bed by a butler while the cI watched a Hindi movie recently that took me a little by surprise on how much things have changed in India, if the lifestyle and the upbringing of children depicted in the movie were actually true. The story revolved around how a very wealthy but socially awkward man is forced to adopt four children after the death of their parents in a road accident where this man happened to be the culprit. The movie had a very controlled performance by Saif Ali Khan, and Rani Mukherjee was brilliant in every scene that she appeared in. But what really got me thinking, and indeed a little unsettled, was the lifestyle that the children were brought up in. Luxury would be an inadequate description of what was portrayed. I am not sure how many in my generation would have had the luxury of faking a hild is busy playing a video game. I say “my generation” because to even think of luxuries at the time our parents and grandparents were growing up is impossible. Virtually every home in India would have stories of struggle and determination of members of these earlier generations. We and the generation that is coming up are really enjoying the fruits of that struggle.
Anyway, back to the movie. Being neither a parent nor a teacher, I am not sure what the right way to bring up and educate a child is. I am not sure if the upbringing depicted in the movie is one to be aspired for by parents. However, this incident strongly reminded me of Sri Aurobindo’s “first madness”. In a letter to his wife, Mrinalinidevi, dated 30th August 1905, Sri Aurobindo writes “I have three madnesses. The first is that I firmly believe that whatever virtue, talent, learning and knowledge and wealth that God has given me, all belong to Him, and that I am entitled to spend only as much as is needed for the maintenance of the family and what is absolutely necessary. Whatever remains should be returned to God”. (The other two “madnesses” were an intense desire to realize God and burning conviction that India was a land destined for greatness and it would be through spiritual awakening that she would realize this greatness). This “madness” of Sri Aurobindo goes against the very grain of material acquisition and the ostentatious flaunting of these acquisitions that are seen by some as signs of success in the modern world. It goes against the portrait in the Gita of the ideal person who is unaffected by the trappings of the world and is in a state of perfect equanimity in the presence and absence of material wealth….the “sthitha prajna” of the Gita. I believe each one of us can actually vividly visualize what a state of bliss and happiness such a person would be enjoying. What a state of contentment and freedom he/she would experience. What a perfect instrument of the Divine such a person would be as a karma yogi. Yet there is something that prevents us from realizing such a state even though we can almost physically feel the bliss that it would endow. Call it the ego or the attachment that material objects have for us, but they do indeed create strong bondages.
Urged on by Sri Aurobindo’s “madness, I decided to do a mental inventory of the bondages, emotional and material, that I had created for myself. I viewed them as tentacles that were holding me down. And there were more of them than I had imagined. Simple bondages like the material possessions that had begun to form the trappings of my life to egoistic notions and ideas that had almost created a parallel world for me. The list would not end and eventually I was overwhelmed by the exercise. It was a tiring and humbling experience and I came out of it a little shaken. It was a case of “I know what would make me free and yet I can’t bring myself to do it”. The tentacles hold me down and I fear I would add new ones that would only bog me down further.
The experience, however, was a cathartic one too. I realized confronting one’s own bondages can be a liberating experience for a start. However, I am convinced that this start would be futile if the journey is not embarked upon. As The Mother says, vigilance is to be the watchword in the way forward. Vigilance against the ego ascertaining itself through our desires and will and a self-scrutiny of all our actions. A daunting task for sure, walking the “razor’s edge” as the Katha Upanishad so vividly puts it, but one that I am convinced would be worth every effort. One can only pray for Sri Aurobindo and The Mother’s blessings and grace to be with us as one embarks on this journey.
Sumant Balakrishnan
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