"Aamar swapne dekha rajkanye thake, saat saagar ar tero nadir pare. Mayurpankhi bhiriye diye aami dekhe elam tare."
Well, this is an excerpt from a famous bengali song sung by Shyamal Mitra. It says " The princess of my dream dwells at the other end of the seven seas and thirteen rivers. I anchored my peacock shaped decorated boat there and met her." Yes indeed, we are all on our respective voyages to meet the dreams of our life, but it so happens that only some of us succeed, whilst others simply sink without a trace. And there are some others who succeed late. The trouble is that the dream itself is not always clear, let alone the path to reach it. And this is what life is - a treacherous, seemingly aimless voyage through thick veil of grey mist where we can't foresee what is in store for us. There can be a giant whirlpool waiting to gulp us down to death or a fierce cyclone waiting to throw us so high in the sky that there is no coming back or a giant iceberg to turn us into peices. But yet, at every moment we seem to be deeply engrossed in the nitty-gritty of our journey, completely oblivious to the fact that we may breath our last the very next moment. This is life - to continue to think about all the positive and warm things standing in a cold and damp graveyard amidst a thousands dead bodies, to continue to relish all the sweet memories and happenings while getting entangled in the cobweb of death and sorrow. Let me share, in this regard, a nice metaphorical story I once read many years back.
Well, this is an excerpt from a famous bengali song sung by Shyamal Mitra. It says " The princess of my dream dwells at the other end of the seven seas and thirteen rivers. I anchored my peacock shaped decorated boat there and met her." Yes indeed, we are all on our respective voyages to meet the dreams of our life, but it so happens that only some of us succeed, whilst others simply sink without a trace. And there are some others who succeed late. The trouble is that the dream itself is not always clear, let alone the path to reach it. And this is what life is - a treacherous, seemingly aimless voyage through thick veil of grey mist where we can't foresee what is in store for us. There can be a giant whirlpool waiting to gulp us down to death or a fierce cyclone waiting to throw us so high in the sky that there is no coming back or a giant iceberg to turn us into peices. But yet, at every moment we seem to be deeply engrossed in the nitty-gritty of our journey, completely oblivious to the fact that we may breath our last the very next moment. This is life - to continue to think about all the positive and warm things standing in a cold and damp graveyard amidst a thousands dead bodies, to continue to relish all the sweet memories and happenings while getting entangled in the cobweb of death and sorrow. Let me share, in this regard, a nice metaphorical story I once read many years back.
A man was being chased by a fierce blood-thirsty tiger. He was trying very hard to dodge it. But eventually, on his quest to escape, he reached the end of a cliff. Now he was left with only two options - either wait for the tiger to come and kill him or jump from the cliff into the gorge. He decided to jump and while falling he saw a bunch of twigs and tendrils of grapes hanging from the cliff. He caught hold of them and got momentary relief. Because soon he realized that a mice was trying to cut the bunch. He was terrified to the extreme. However, when he saw a cluster of ripe grapes hanging from the twigs, he could not resist but pluck the grapes and relish them. This is life.
And according to the philosophy of Vedanta, this all is a big dream, formally known as Maya. The fatal attraction to life, in spite of knowing that it is nothing but a sea of death and sorrow, that all things sweet and warm are always followed by things sour and cold, that the ultimate predictable future of all beatuful as well as ugly creations is death and destruction, is the manifestation of Maya. Alluring dreams are prevailing our minds and they are responsible for this mess called life.
Let me finish off with the prayer - let us do not get tempted by these alluring dreams, and that let truth be bestowed upon our life.
"asato maa sadgamaya, tamoso maa jyotirgomaya, mrityurmaa amritangamaya." - Brihadaranyaka Upanishad
