Is anything yours own in this world ?

Twelfth December is my birthday, in the morning my husband greets me with great happiness singing in full mood that “Today is my happy birthday, hey, you wish me, today is my happy birthday” I laughed and said, “Why such a reverse process?” Today is my birthday, so do you want me to wish or should you do it for me? He said “KYA TERA KYA MERA BHULA DE MERE YAAR” because all this which is yours is mine and what is mine is yours. I said yes it is true.

After a while, he revise his statement and said me you know actually, “What is yours is yours and what is mine is mine.” I said I believe that “what was yours yesterday is mine today and what is mine today will probably be someone else’s tomorrow”. But he said-no-no, what is mine is only mine and will remain mine forever, no one’s ever becomes ours and ours can never belong to anyone So I feel like asking question that is anything yours own actually in this world? I asked and in reply he said “My wealth, my body, my relationships, my job, my respect and the love I get from society, all this is personal, it belongs to the one who belongs to him and cannot belong to anyone else, from where I got the urge to write this article. I asked him that this body, relationships, wealth, etc. are really your own? He said yes, why do you have any doubts? I said no, there is no doubt but a question. Can I ask you? He said yes, so I asked, “All these things which you believe your own will never leave you and will always be with you?” then he replied – When the time comes, everything has to be given up! I said if it is so, how can it be called your own? Because we must never give up what is ours, what is our own never be left. He widened his eyes in response to my statement and said yes very true.

From this ten minute discussion I got a few natural ideas which I have presented here in the form of an article :

1) When we accept someone as our own and forget the difference between the two, a wonderful self-fulfilling bliss arises, which is indescribable. In our example today, the way my husband expressed his happiness by understanding his birthday for my birthday in the morning and saying, “Today is my happy birthday” indicates the same thing. Even for a few moments the person enjoys the wonderful joy of forgetting yours and mine which not only makes a person happy but also makes the environment around him, the individuals and the whole environment positive and happy. Same is happened in those sacred moments of intercourse, when two people forget their identity and become one, they forget time and ego for a few moments, so there is real joy. But when ego, time and identity are revived, only energy loss and fatigue is felt. Thus egolessness and timelessness are responsible for true happiness. Which we have either not understood or perhaps have forgotten in petty selfishness and ignorance even though we have understood.

2) When the ego (which has been absorbed in the spirit of ADVAITA for a while) suddenly becomes alive and active again in the true bliss of two moments, the person is plunged into the despair of reality and he starts saying like my husband “What is yours is yours and what is mine is mine ”. In fact, all the struggles of life started from separation that is feeling of you and me such as my religion and your religion, my relatives and your relatives, my money and your money, my country and your country etc. etc. which creates an unfilled gap between individuals, excludes loving relationships and warmth from life. Moreover, as love, empathy and affection diminish from life the element of ego automatically becomes active and fiery which finally makes the person alone and begins to believe that there is no one our own in life. All are useless and selfish. Such negativity makes life miserable. It is the statement of the scriptures that only the duality of you & me (the spirit of DVAITA (duality) has separated the soul from supreme soul. The soul which is a treasury of infinite power which we may have forgotten because of it we have lost the infinite power we have got and experiencing extreme powerlessness from time to time. If you and I become the “hum” then all the conflict is over in a second. That is why the song sung by ARIJIT Singh “KITNE HASI ALAM HO JAATE ME AUR TUM GAR HUM HO JAATE – DARD DILO KE KUM HO JAATE ME AUR TUM GAR HUM HO JAATE”. I find it very meaningful and heart-touching. The same thing is explained by the scriptures in the spirit of ADVAITA.

3) What is really ours in this world? Because the basic meaning of being our, is that it will never leave you and will always be with you. Neither painful experiences, nor luck, nor death will be able to take it away from you. We all know that everything we have, such as body, wealth, relationships, etc., can take away by either misery or luck or death. What are the reasons according to you for breaking up the relations? We all know that bitter experience and death are the two main reasons for breaking up the close relationships. By deep study of human life one can understand that most relationships are broken by bitter experience and the remaining relationship is robs by death. In the same way wealth or body also leaves with the fate or death. So tell me, is all this ours? You might have a question that then what is actually our own in this world?

Think do you have any an indestructible or immortal element? That is never possible to destroy what is only yours that never leaves you? Neither grief nor death can snatch it away?
Yes – that is a powerful and indestructible element. Who just loves you. Whether you care about it or not, love it or not, whether you hate it all your life, don’t accept it, ignore it, it calls you over and over again even if you don’t listen to it, yet it doesn’t hurt you or not reduce love towards you, it will not leave you even after death, that divine element is nothing but your own soul, the “self”. The element of God that is so holy, so selfless, so loving that you have neglected it all your life, have not heard of it, have not loved it (because of being engaged in worldly pleasures) will never leave you, it will never break your faith, will always stand up for your help and will come with a single true cry and will end your all pains, sorrows, regrets in a second.

Another uniqueness of that divine element is that it is never too late to get it because darkness is two years old or two ages old, no matter how dense, only one lamp can remove it. All that is needed is to realize the need to light the lamp and to know the correct way to light the lamp. So let’s remove the conflict between you and me from life, remove the veil of ego and light the lamp of soul for the unceasing attainment of bliss.

Shilpa Shah Director In-charge HKBBA College