Renaissance : Essex

 

Sept 29 2021

Left home the previous day at 8:30 pm headed to Kochi airport. Last-minute rush always makes me forget the important stuff. Had a baggage allowance of 40 kgs, so had to sacrifice some stuff back though. I'm really bad at making relationships with friends/family, didn't call anyone much and rightly so, I didn't have anything to say! What would I even say, Hey Uncle Tim, I'm going to the UK for studies taking a hefty loan because I couldn't secure admission to a top college in India... Ahhh. 

There's a lot of things to rectify within me and hopefully, I'm trying to be the best version of myself. We used to wonder what was the need for school subjects like Social Science and Literature when I was least interested in either. See how tables turned, I guess I learned more about life from it than science. One of Kabeer's Doha comes to my mind while I think about life at present. 

बुरा जो देखन मैं चला, बुरा न मिल्या कोय। 

जो मन खोजै आपने, मुझसे बुरा न कोय।।

which translates to " I searched for the crooked, met not a single one

When searched myself, 'I' found the crooked one "

This doha deals with our perception behaviour and tendencies. It has been invariably noticed that we tend to find fault with someone else for our situations and circumstances. Our "I", the ego, always tries to put blame on others. Non-awareness of our own self is the cause of this attitude. Resultantly, we find ourselves being busy criticizing and condemning others and conveniently term them as crooked or evil.

So Kabir says that instead of finding fault and maligning others, dive deep into your own self. Amazingly, an honest introspection will reveal that all fault lies with "me" and "my" own perceptions and attitudes. If there is any evil or crookedness, it is in "me". Correcting this and opting for a loving and compassionate attitude will change one's perceptions and the world will appear wonderful all over again.