In the relentless pursuit of wealth and status, we forgot the essence of life—our soul
Engrossed in material pursuits, man forgot his own self. He discovered various things in his external world but never peeped inside himself to find out his glittering soul, which is the nucleus of his life. “Business,” writes Seneca, “is a distraction from life itself.” Ambitions of a palatial house, a great car, and a huge bank balance have kept us all in the quagmire that never releases us from its clutches.
We consider material gains our mere aim of existence. We have assigned importance to houses and lost our home and family. We have resorted to cars, losing the great joy of walking, which leads to the deterioration of our health. We acquired a lot of money but lost time, life in this rat race of capitalism.
We are mortals but cherish immortal desires, writes Seneca, that alienate us from our own beings, and we live our lives in a chimaera that the world has shown us matters the most. We strictly guard personal property but lose time carelessly, without knowing its importance. We don’t live our lives as we should. We waste them in pursuits that are trivial and trifling.
What is the need of the hour then? One may ask. What should we do to make our lives worthy and meaningful? Shaheed Muthahari answers the question: we must spend our lives on the achievement of those things that don’t alienate us when we die, but remain with us even after death.
The primary, everlasting possession of a man is his spirituality—the piety and purified existence that one lives based on the tenets of religion, obeying the ordinances of God. It is this spirituality that keeps our worldly desires in control. Buddha, in his first hymn of victory, says that his enlightenment brought his worldly cravings under control. The spiritual enlightenment resolved the material issues.
We live in a world where interpretations govern us and drive our lives forward. We are engulfed by these interpretations and have nowhere to go. Reconsider! How have things like the world, man, God, religion, freedom, justice, and beauty been interpreted for us to believe in and live our lives based on them? You will definitely realise that these and hundreds of other things have been interpreted materially.
Everywhere we encounter material interpretations of these things and concepts. The worth of a man has been tied to his financial position, and this tops the list when we have to assess the character and personality of a man. Beauty has been boiled down to the physical format of a human being. Justice has been defined as economic equality. Our being has been denigrated by material interpretations and demarcations.
In this gross business of material life, we lost touch with our true self, the spiritual dimension of life. We are unaware of ourselves. Alexis Carrel writes in his book Man, the Unknown, that modern civilisation is denigrating. It has shown only one aspect of life to man and distanced him from his inner life, from his soul.
Materialism led to our inferiority complex. We frequently make analogies with others based on our material status quo. How do we experience elevation in relation to the world and other human fellows? Spirituality bestows us an elevated place over the creation—people. We feel uniquely loved by God, and that gladdens us and makes our lives meaningful. The feeling of being little in relation to God and higher in relation to other creatures brings forth joy and peace.
We need spiritual health more than our physical health. How many of us are present to our lives? Not many are, as they lack spirituality and never attend to their inner selves. Jobs, businesses, people—keep them absent from their own selves. A life devoted to jobs, businesses, and people is not worthy because one remains absent from one’s own realm of self.
Don’t we see people, writes Seneca, around us who are close-fisted regarding their wealth but extravagant regarding their time—life—and waste it in ordinary pursuits without being fearful of its short span? We know our life is very short, but according to Seneca, it is sufficient if we use it well. We should seek the ways that keep us alive and beat the brutal nature of life – its evanescence.
Fida Hussain Bhat
az*********@***il.com