Freedom n Boundary

As a small child I remember attending a debate on the topic; “Man is Born Free but everywhere he is in chains”. There was ‘for’ and ‘against’ discussion on this topic. As a child I don’t remember much on the discussion or whether ‘for’ was correct or ‘against’. But this phrase pondered my mind many times at different phases of my life. Let us try and analyze what exactly is freedom and what are these chains or boundaries.

There are few society bound chains on all of us, from our family, education, values, culture etc. These are healthy chains and are actually required for our overall growth and benefits.

But there are few chains which we put ourselves more often than others do. We try to conform to certain ideas, thoughts and when we do so, we are in fact slaves to those ideas and thoughts. Thoughts/Chains of resentment and guilt. These are the two emotions we keep holding. Forgiveness has power. Think about the chains which bound us when we fail to forgive: retaliation, isolation, revenge, retribution, reprisal, vindictiveness. Holding on to resentment calls for maintaining a constant supply of energy to the chains of defensiveness, suspicion, and anger.

Doing so takes up a lot of physical and emotional energy. We nurture our resentments like cherished pets. To be actually free, one has to break free from these chains. Forgiving yourself or someone else for the guilt or mistakes, but it does not mean one gets an opportunity to do the same mistake once again. Rather one should take it as an opportunity to correct oneself and become a better person, this is the best apology for the wrong deeds done in the past.

Freedom is the yearning of every heart. It is the quest of the human spirit. From the beginning of time, man has always searched for freedom in life. It is as if the seed of freedom is planted in the heart and soul. Every adventure of man has been the expression of this freedom; it has been the desire for, or the expression of his state of freedom.

Owning thousands of things doesn’t really make us free. Quite on the contrary, each object we own takes up not just physical but also mental space! And thus creates chains of attachment to materialistic goods. If one has to become truly free to travel in life and also have the internal capacity for creative thinking, declutter your life! This is one of the important ways to become free. Try it out today: Look at your cupboards, shelves and rooms and take note of all the things you hardly use but are still occupying some space. Start by giving these things away, either to relatives, charitable organizations, or to maids, drivers or sweepers, there are enough poor people in this country. It’s simple: The more we give, the lighter we feel from the chains of attachment to goods- and free we are.

“Your freedom ends where my nose begins”- is an old proverb. Our freedom guarantees us to do what is right, but not to throw mud on others or hurt them. Our freedom should not be hindrance in others freedom...freedom does not mean to do whatsoever I feel good, while it means live and let others live. These are the few chains, which we should respect and honor.

One can never truly be free because freedom has a price to pay and the price is giving up some of our freedom. But one can work to be free from all kinds of negative thoughts and emotions like, sorrow, grief, anger, greed and jealousy, as they are all illusions. These emotions are ephemeral. All the beings are bonded due to lack of knowledge but they get free and achieve liberation once they realize that the world is nothing but illusion. One who can surrender to Lord, and free himself form attachments to living and non living objects, can experience freedom. Once we get His unconditional support we gain freedom from fear, worry and despair.

On this independence day let us give off the chains that have bound us to the ordinary. We deserve the best and we shall get the best.

Travel Light

If you wish to travel far and fast, travel light. Take off the baggage of all your anger, jealousies, unforgiveness, greed, proud and fears.

"Less luggage, more comfort" is something that all travelers know to be true. It is particularly true when we deal with the journey of life. Not just in a physical sense (we know very well what it means to be trim and fit), but in a much deeper psychological sense. In that sense, we are always traveling, and each of us carries a fair amount of baggage. It is only rarely that we feel freed of all mental baggage, and are able to glide about freely and joyfully, like birds in the sky.

Both physical and emotional baggage needs to be minimized. We should know exactly what to keep and what to leave behind and what to throw away forever. It is natural to accumulate junk on the way. Spring cleaning is something which we all heard of, but it is actually important to practice it in our closets, if they are stuffed, cluttered, means it is dangerous, things are left unchecked. It weighs us down, keeps us still and makes us slow. At times in my team and at home I would force people to clean their drawers and closets, because that helps in the proper flow of energy and makes you in charge of what is where and how to deal with it. Similarly in your mind we need to organize which baggage we want to carry, and what is to be deleted forever.

The shedding of emotional baggage is very important, to discover the real who I am, who I will be, to create new we have to clear the earlier clutter and debris, we have to make room for creating something new.

Psychological baggage is centered on that notion, and along with it, all my remembered past and imagined future. Along with it comes lot of regrets, misfortunes, why’s and why not’s and bla bla…. But we never count on our blessings, which each one of us has. So from this bla……bla….the things that really matter should remain, and let everything else go away. This bla … bla…is like the weeds in the agricultural field, disturbing the growth of the main crop, what is more important CROP or WEEDS, weeds ofcourse need to be thrown out. So throw this unwanted emotional baggage out and Travel Light.

Let go of the baggage of the ego-self, and be free!

Let go, and be free! How simple! Yet, how difficult it is in actual practice! Especially when we cling to the baggage so tenaciously, and so unconsciously. Dropping the baggage of one’s ego-self and thereby discovering real freedom is the most absorbing errand that a spiritual aspirant can have in life. All that is required is continual awareness, awareness of the clinging, and a letting go of the attachments that binds one…

People have serious difficulty in understanding that attachments are the root cause of human suffering. Until that understanding dawn, clearly and sharply, the clinging will continue, and so will suffering. The understanding can be initially painful, but it is a passing pain, as in a surgical operation. Truth can be very bitter, when one has been deluding oneself all of one’s life.

The dropping of the baggage of the ego-self is common to all spiritual paths. This is why the essence of all religions is said to be the same. Without the surrender of the ego-self, you can never discover your real self.

People are afraid of “letting go”. This is understandable; until one discovers the liberation that follows the “letting go”, one will resist surrender. Indeed, all of us have glimpsed this liberating experience at some point or other in our lives, especially in our early childhood. It is an experience of joy, a sense of oneness and affinity towards everything. It is characterised by an absence of resistance to the natural “flow” of life. It is a state of peace and harmony, bereft of distraction and worry. In it, there is no sense of time. It is, in summary, a truly wonderful state, accessible to all who are able to “let go”.

The ego-pleasure that emanates from an enhanced sense of self-importance (more baggage) is what most of us crave for, but it is an outcome of delusion, and will inevitably bring in its wake its painful opposite, ego-pain.

The joyous experience of the "flow" state, unencumbered by baggage, can be felt in the thick of apparently intense activity. Any skilled worker or talented artiste or sportsman will testify to this. Such activity turns out to be “perfect” when one is fully focused on the task at hand, with a relaxed concentration and without any distraction. One allows the universal energy to express itself through one’s medium, without interference, and without any motive of profit or worry about the outcome. In fact, interferences by the ego-self only serve to contaminate the perfection in the work. When we are concerned about failure or success, then our complete focus shifts from the task in hand to its outcome, and this need to win drains us of our energy to perform well.

In summary, the first thing that needs to be clearly understood is that the baggage of the ego-self is the only obstruction to true freedom and joyous living. Driven by the ways of the world, our normal tendency is to add to that baggage, rather than to lighten the load. The problem stems not from “successes” in life, but from the false notion that “I am the doer” that accompanies these achievements, and from clinging to attachments. Through continual awareness however, we discover the art of traveling light, and becoming one with the flow of life. We discover a sense of joyous freedom and connectedness with the universe. Bon voyage!