8.03.2010

Fear of the unknown world beyond death

 
He lay there on his deathbed, his eyes graying within their dark circles as he furiously fluctuated between this world and the other. He barely recognized me and when he did it was not just an achievement for him, it was a moment of happiness for his family that he could actually connect with this world and its reality. He had grown thin and pale as the cancer had slowly eaten into most of his body. He still gave a beaming smile when he realized that he connected with me and is proper English retorted - I recognized you! That was the last smile I saw on his face.

I ascended the steps to visit him once again. This time he lay there silent, contained and wrapped in linen ready for his last journey. The grim atmosphere of the living waiting  for death to take him now had a strange sense of relief in all the enveloping sadness. He has suffered the last 5 hours and his family had resigned to removing the oxygen mask and leave him to his peril rather than keep him alive and torture him with more pain with the aid of medical science. There was no point, he had crossed the line and there was no coming back.

I sat there watching him and wondered what the purpose of his existence was. What was that moment while he battled the unknown at the time of transition from this world to the next. Isn't the solving of that mystery the soul purpose of our existence? The fact that I exist is the only truth that I am going to die. How then do I approach death?

We are presented with two things when alive, breath and consciousness and we waste it on comfort of various kinds. We essentially require a roof over our heads and 3 meals a day for survival but the line of desires is endless. The Tripura Rahasya echoes one thought through all its passages. This thought is to use the weapons of consciousness and breath to control just one enemy - our mind. Most people come out with cowardly statements of the inability to do so without even trying to achieve it. Our first problem is thought. The scriptures insist on controlling not just the thought but also the quality of it [impure/pure]. Everything else we do is pretty much a waste of time and life energy.

There will come that day, when we are lying there just like the old man, awaiting our moment of death. How many of us are going to be conscious about it and how many of us will have the courage to embrace the unknown when we are left with no choice? There is one more weapon that the Tripura Rahasya talks about that can bail us out of miserable death and that is the power of intelligence.

The human state is a state that enables us to take the right steps to practice and evolve ourselves to go to the next level. But the transition to the next level requires discarding of the body in this level and the only support we have is the power of our own intelligence. It is believed to be capable of doing many things, the starting point of course is the realization of what is reality. There is this old man lying in front of me, motionless - he is just mass, mass that is already on its way to decay. But where is he? Where is that consciousness that beamed a smile at me a day ago? Where did that go? What is the pulse of that reality of which I have no idea right now? And since I am an ignorant fool who doesn't understand that reality, how can I assume that this world is all the reality that exists?

Isn't the idea of reality a relative term in itself? The Tripura Rahasya beautifully illustrates this concept. You exist because my intelligence claims that you are there with a name and a background. If my intelligence ceased to recognize your presence, you simply don't exist in my reality. How then are you real? You then belong to relative reality, a part of a larger illusion that is so dense that we think its "real". And when we are faced with a person who has left his earthly state, what lies in front of us is a mass of human flesh waiting to be discarded. He now permanently ceases to be a part of our reality. Does that mean he doesn't exist at all, or is it that we don't know the other reality where he belongs now.

The Tripura Rahasya enlightens us with a spectacular theory. The only way to fight ignorance in life is to enhance the power of our intelligence. Intelligence is a weapon that can distinguish the real from the unreal and as it gets polished it loses all attachment to desire. It therefore renders a person completely detached from the workings of this world. The evolved soul now disconnects not only from the people around him but also from material comforts and more importantly from the familiarity within which he was cocooned. He now owes nothing to this world and has transcended the dense illusion within which he was imprisoned. Now, when the time comes for him to discard his earthly body, he is far more ready for a better transition where he is aware of the change and is freed from the misery of this dense cloud of imprisonment. He has no fear, he simply embraces the path ahead.

At that point, we still see a dead man, but he is the only one who knows how alive he is at the point of transition. He just leaves, he doesn't die. That is real achievement.
Photo courtesy: Moloy's photo stream

10 comments:

YOSEE said...

All we have, to base our conceptions of The Great Beyond , are words of some "realised" souls. But still, real knowing can come only from first hand experience. I fear nothing . But look forward to the Ultimate Adventure towards which my whole life was building up. I bet it'll be most illuminating !

JC said...

If he ancient Hindus are right, 'I' have died at leat 8.4 million times already!

Deepesh said...

People die daily. Many religious and ill-natured, many trying to achieve consciousness many aloof from all these, die daily. What is the difference? And how we know that this is the difference? Death is still a mistry for science as well as religion, i suppose.

JC said...

'Science' conveys life on earth - that had originally started over 4 billio years ago as a fire-ball - began over 3 billion years ago, say, as the ordinary e-coli bacteria (that believably is responsible only for gastro-enteritis in man),,, and it has evolved due to various forces since then into a grand variety of forms that resulted in the apparent herarchy, with man believably heading it (the animal world)...

'Wise ancient Hindus' gave importance only to the soul within each and every 'life form', as a component of the most evolved soul, immortal Shiva or the Absolute Truth, and considered the external transitory forms as 'mayavi', or illusive...

In view of the above 'death' in various possible ways is believed only an excuse for the soul to exit from one form, and thus become available for undergoing the unending cycles of transformations, as per predetermined cycles according to the 'will of God'...

JC said...

worype'I' was born in a particular family and got exposure to various thoughts based on the location of that family at certain given points in time due to various exigencies.

On the other hand, 'I' have myself formed ideas based on 'my own' experiences from time to time. Thus, 'I' am like a mobile library of ideas (maybe conflicting) on various subjects to a limited extent only. For, 'I' am aware 'I' know only a little while lot yet remains to be known, and 'I' am also aware that 'I' might quit this particular form anytime, for 'I' am not permanent.

And, also life being mysterious how it would happen ftcannot be known in advance (although Yogis, or/ rather elevated souls reportedly could know it)...

JC said...

Kavitha, as 'I' have recorded elsewhere also, 'creation' is supposed to be related with formless being who is related with zero time and space. And hence, as 'we' can observe also to a certain extent and visualise the scenario, maybe there is no 'other world', but only review of events related within time zero, in expanded time, with the help of apparent Sun & Earth that are responsible for expansion of time...and variations in the scenario at the believable different times or Yugas...

The truth can be told, or known only when purpose of the creator to review events that occurred within time zero could be made known by the 'Creator' (by 'entering His mind' as was apparently desired by Stephen Hawking also)...

JC said...

Everyone takes life for granted...For example, no one perhaps questions how one gets to see dreams, ie, images getting projected in 'mind's eyes' involuntarily, when one is apparently asleep and which create pleaswant or unpleasant sensations in mind,,,and one might even learn that the phenomenon apparently occurs even in 'inferior animals' (and thus is not exclusive to humans only) and, therefore, is the truth of evolution of us humans, starting from the original energy stage as realised by the wise ancients...

Thus life/ death is a matter of mind only, but one needs a strong will to realise it...

JC said...

Can 'I' (an 'Apsmara Purush' or forgettable man, in the words of wise ancients) now visualise my soul, that is, the original energy form, similar to a DVD over which information is recorded pertaining to different times related with over 3.5 billion years during which 'I' have apparently believably had over 8'4 million animal forms, that if all known or read in the 'present' could give 'me' the desired information about who, in reality, 'I' am!?

Maybe because it is a matter related to zero time and space, 'I' must attempt in shortest time reaching a thoughtless state - through regular meditation, or 'tapasya, or 'sadhana', that is, control of mind etc for the formless only is immortal and is therefore not subject to death, which causes fear in 'us' the ignorant beings due to lack of knowledge!...

JC said...

Visualising the physical world/ universe akin to my exclusive album where 'I' alone appear in different images of mine at different intervals of time, with the background knowledge that our planet earth in the beginning was a 'fire-ball', like our Sun, 'I' can imagine Sun as the image of earth in the early stages of evolution of 'Earth' as the most evolved one! And, similarly 'I' can imagine other members of the solar system as the images of earth itself at different stages of its evolution...

JC said...

Once 'I' am clear about the above-said as the basis of concept of 'One God and all others as His images' understood as the Absolute Truth. And also man as 'His image' could help one to realise how 'I' myself could also be His Own Image, but apparently representing some time in between zero and infinity and therefore still 'imperfect', for there is only one 'perfect being' in the entire apparent universe which in reality is like God's exclusive photo album!