Tag: Man’s search for meaning (Page 4 of 6)

On imagination, discernment and the peace perspective can bring

December 7, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

Imagine a little girl with a big paintbrush in her hand. She’s got hold of water colours for the first time and she just cannot wait to paint something.
She chooses the living room wall as her maiden canvas.
Soon, the smooth white wall gets dyed in mild shades of every color in the palette.

Her mother arrives to find that her daughter has painted her dress just as much as the wall she’s been painting on.

The mother could take recourse in two ways.
She could either

a) See things as they are.

Consider it to be a wall in flux, which could be painted over again.
She could use her discernment in a sound direction.

b) See things as if they’re so much more.

Consider it to be disaster and reprimand a budding artist at the outset.
She could use her imagination, albiet in a misleading direction.

The two key phrasess here are

a) sound discernment

b) misled imagination.

Discernment and Imagination are powerful tools, but when used incorrectly either cause us only detriment.

Now imagine the same incident again.
The mother could use another train of thought.

She could either

a) See things as they are

Look at only the colored stains on the wall and not the blobs of a butterflies her child sees through her eyes.
She could use her discernment in an unsound and sterile manner.

b) See things as if they’re so much more

She could not only look at the blobs of the butterflies but use her imagination to see the whole animal kingdom waiting to appear on the living room wall.
She could look at it as the first page of her little daughter’s art portfolio.

She could use her imagination in the right direction. I call it right because it brings peace to both mother and daughter and the art still thrives.

Again, as I’d said earlier, discernment and imagination are powerful tools.
We must make use our wisdom to make the right choice,
The ideal mix of discernment and imagination.

True wisdom though, lay in the mind of an unconditioned child.
Like the little painter, who could see things the ideal way.

By discernment she knew it was a wall but her imagination suggested her to use it as a canvas.

By discernment she knew it to be a blank canvas, but her imagination suggested her that it could be so much more.

The little girl was easily weaving her thoughts using both discernment and imagination as it deemed fit.

Much of the distress we face in life is because of unwise choices between discernment and imagination.

We imagine fear of failure and discern obstacles to be dead ends.
While we could imagine ways to triumph and discern obstacles only to be hurdles that must be jumped over.

The choices we make shape our reality.

Any tool is only powerful if used with wisdom.

With sound discernment and well directed imagination,
Life would reveal itself in ways that serve you best.

Imagine !

What’s to learn from a Blank Page?

December 5, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

This is a blank piece of paper.
Well, it used to be.
Now that I’m writing on it, it isn’t blank anymore.

But wait a moment, and imagine
Is it just a blank page?
Or is it so much more than what we think it is?

A blank page is an ocean of possibilities.

It could be a page where a toddler squiggles his first lines ever with a tiny red pencil.

It could be a crumpled ball that the toddler’s kitten plays with for hours at end.

It could be the first paper plane the little boy makes.

It could be a frog he learns to make in origami class.

It could be a hand-fan he waves to soothe his kitten on a hot summer day.

It could be a cone that contains freshly roasted groundnuts, worth all the riches in the whole wide world.

It could be the first love letter he ever writes, brim with an innocent passion.

Or a mournful poem he pens when he falls in unrequited love.

It could contain a doodle that he sketches, one that has the ideal mix of amusement and hope.

Or it could have wayward scribbles all over, intelligible only to him who’s certain of his confusion.

It could be a painting his old grandmother paints, an artist who finally summons the courage to play with colours again.

It could contain notes of a beautiful symphony his sister composes, one that’s yet to be ever played.

It could contain an elegant equation, that explains deep mysteries of the universe with simple, irrefutable logic.

It could contain a sketch of a prototype he imagines as a young inventor,
An invention that changes the face of mankind.

It could be the declaration of independence, a freedom his nation fought for years to earn.

It could contain his will that he writes realising that the end is near.

Or maybe it can just be a blank piece of paper that ages gracefully.

If a blank sheet of paper could be so much more,
How about the miracle of existence that’s alive in the little boy?
In you?
In me?

Could we be so much more? Just like the blank sheet of paper?

We are not merely a blank page,
We are also the embodiment of energy that can transform it into something beautiful.

We are a billion beautiful possibilities.

Listen to the blank page singing softly,
That you,
as me ,
Just as us all,

Are art in the making.

On Performing best on the stage of life

December 3, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

‘All the world is a stage
And all men and women merely players’

Thus, said Shakespeare in one of his poems back in the day.

The beauty of truth is in its timelessness, as captured beautifully in the opening lines of the poem.

At each living moment, we assume the role of someone, the spirit of an ideal.
For instance, at this moment, I represent the spirit of a thinker and writer.
You represent the spirit of a reader.

At times we represent the spirit of a friend, a teacher, a brother, a mother, a listener, a speaker, a traveller, a seeker, a child, a father….

But are we able to perform best in all these roles that we assume on a day to day basis?

Most likely, no.

The reason for this is because we look at the world through the lens of our ego, a lens prone to aberrations and distortion.

Identification of the self with the ego comes at the cost of objectivity.

Let me explain.

Say you somehow find yourself at a social gathering that you’d ideally not attend.
And since you feel quite out of place, you stay aloof and wait for the moment when you can get out of there.
A certain someone comes to you and breaks into a conversation.
Now, at that moment, even if your ego wishes that you were out of this situation, there is no running away from the reality of that moment.

At that moment, you embody the spirit of an attendee, a listener.

Now if you choose to be a good attendee, and listen with utmost attention, you would do yourself and the gentleman you’re interacting with a good favour.

But if you identify yourself with your ego, the kind of person you think you are, and look at the situation from that lens, it’s likely that you’d converse half heartedly with much lesser attention.

Which choice is better in your opinion?
In the greater good, I’d choose the former.

I mentioned an inadvertent situation in the example because most of our interactions are of that nature.

Once we choose to play the best role we can at that moment, and think beyond our Ego, we will function much better as a person and refine our interpersonal relationships.

And, let me assure you that this approach does not come at the cost of individuality.
In fact, it only enhances our personality and refines our objectivity towards situations in life.

With such an outlook, all our half heartedness towards situations will vanish and we would only look to perform our role in the best manner possible at that moment.

And those moments will culminate into a best possible life.

Identify your role in each moment,
And perform best,
The show is always on,
Why not make it meaningful !

On realising the ideal state of being

December 2, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

‘I want to bicycle from India to Hongkong to see my son’ shared Nirupama, a 71 years young bicyclist I met in Pune.

As lofty as her dream sounded to either of us, I was sure she would be on this dream trip very soon.
She had shared stories about her bicycle trips to Laddakh, Kanniyakumari among other places in India.
Having started bicycling after retiring from work at the age of 60, she kept on challenging herself and went past barriers even young adults wouldn’t dare dream to.

I saw the apprehension in her eyes while she shared her dream, wondering if she could go bicycling across countries to see her son.

I wanted to make her believe that she could do it.
I took out my phone and showed her a route she could take to reach Hongkong starting from Bangkok.

Her eyes lit up like a chiselled diamond.

And I am sure, as I write this, she’s busy back home, thinking of ways to make this trip happen.

What an inspiration she is !

This encounter reminded me of two other elderly friends I had met in Thailand.
One of them by the name of Phulong, 72, who wants to bicycle all around Thailand on his own.
I’m sure he’s biking around in some part of Thailand as I write this.

The other friend, Eugene, 72, an Irishman I had met at a hostel, wished to sail to India on his Yacht.
In fact, that what was he was going to start doing the moment he was back home.
Maybe he’s fixing up his Yacth as you’re reading this.

Meeting such ambitious and proactive elderly folk left me humbled.
I wondered how they could exist in such a state of being.

The answer I found was on the lines of their perception and interaction with two factors :

a) Time

b) Mindspace.

The elderly have only a decade
or so of life left to make something of. Yet, they have the a lot of time to reflect, imagine and think of ways to achieve a distant dream. The awareness of the finitude of their life only helps them to attribute more value to the little time they have on earth.

Also, the mindspace of ‘It is Now or Never’ is most obvious at their age. They are not afraid of anything that used to hold them back when they were young adults. They are in a position to imagine without inhibition.

I couldn’t help but draw a parallel between the relationship kids have with time and mindspace vis-a-vis the elderly.

While it is finitude that helps the elderly imagine and act without inhibition, it is the apparent infinitude, a timelessness in which the imaginative spirit of a child thrives.

A child has no fear of dreaming or acting on its dreams. If a child wants to be a doctor, he would just put a dummy stethoscope around it’s neck, wear the elder siblings oversized shirt and he’s ready to treat anyone and everyone in sight.
A child imagines and acts in the best of its capacity.

As young adults, what can we learn from the elderly and kids about ambition, imagination and taking action?

We live in an age where we have neither the time nor the mindspace to imagine and act on our dreams.
Aren’t most of us busy with something or the other that commands all of our immediate attention?

And sadly, we have become comfortable with devoting time to things that we are asked to do, without really thinking if it truly matters to us in the long run.

Part of the reason is because we dwell in the dangerous domain in our understanding of time,
in between finitude and infinitude.

If we really feel a sense of timelessness as kids, we would truly be present in each moment and be able to imagine the way we must.
At the same time, if we truly understand the finitude, the fragility of life, as the elderly do, we would, at all times, act responsibly and do things that matter to us.

Would it not be the best way to exist,
To live with complete understanding of our relationship with time and mindspace?
To understand finitude and infinity and let the wagon of our lives soar on the twin rails of imagination and action ?

If we choose to live with this awareness,
Could life ever be little?

A sermon from my 5 year old teacher

November 18, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

I’d come to visit the reforestation community I had volunteered at for much of last two years.
Incidentally, since it was also the place where I had started my bicycle trip, I felt the need to visit again to get a sense of closure to this incredible journey I’d been on.

One of the special aspects about this community is the concept of Unschooling or ‘Nature led learning’.

The kids as well as adults seek to learn and grow by interacting with the environment around them, guided by the compass of their curiosity.

While I was volunteering here, the most profound lessons I learned came from the kids in the community.
It was always such a joy to gain perspective from children who were just being, learning, growing and evolving as a function of their environment.

So yesterday, when I sat down to have breakfast in the morning with all our community members, I got a wonderful surprise snuggled up in another volunteer’s lap.
It was one my little teachers, Rahaphaello. A five year old bundle of joy we all kindly called Rafi.

I was happy to know that he had stayed through my eight month absence in the community.

At first, he gingerly observed me from a distance, as if trying to place me in his mind. It had been a while since I was away after all.

Slowly he walked towards me to get a closer look. With each onward step, his memory jogged him to fond memories and soon enough he came close and held me in an affectionate embrace.

He had grown taller and heavier in these eight months. His eyes shone as brightly as I have always know.

His eyes were gazing deeply into mine, as if casting a spell that needed cooperation from both of us.

‘You know what I see in your eyes?’ he asked.

‘You tell me Rafi, what do you see in my eyes?’

‘In your eyes….
It’s …it’s…round ..like the earth,
I can see the whole world in your eyes!’

Still in my arms, with a gaze transfixed,
And with all the love that could ever be found, he looked at the world he saw in my eyes.

‘You know what I see in your eyes Rafi?’

‘What?’

‘It is a big star, very very big….
And it’s shining bright…
Maybe it’s many stars..
Could it be a galaxy of stars?
Or could it be the whole universe?’

‘The whole universe?’

‘Yes, yes , the whole universe, right when it all began, with a beautiful big bang.’

‘Oh really? I want to see my eyes then ! ‘ he said excitedly and ran towards a mirror.

And like many of the lessons he taught me without knowing, it ended at the threshold of his attention span.
It was a habit of his,
Of leaving you in deep thought as he jumped away to another context he fancied in his surroundings in that moment.

—-

Nihilistic thoughts often flirt in our mind.
‘What is the point of it all ?’ one often wonders.
‘We are just a speck of startdust in the grand scheme of things and nothing really matters.’

But it takes the wisdom of a child to make one realise that even in the speck of an eye, in the speck of an insignificant being one is,
Dwells the blueprint of the whole universe,
Of creation itself.

Even in such a momentary happenstance of our existence in the grand sceme of the cosmos,
There are the answers, to all the mysetry, all the magic there is.

How easily did Rafi teach us all,
That the secret to an ever fansinated consciousness, like that of a child’s, is accessible to us all if we choose to find magic in what we relegate as mundane !

That maybe the meaning of life,
After all,
Is to realize that the universe is undeniably,
within you.

The meaning of life as revealed by a tree

October 13, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

In the woods I stood, facing a friend
A tree
Whose life was breathing poetry

I had a question
And it knew,
‘Ask’, it said
To the wind as it blew

‘Cur Hic Statis‘, my friend my dear,
Why is it, that you stand here?

Gently it smiled, content in its being,
Revealing an answer in what I was seeing.

‘Even when I was a seed’ said the tree
‘I believed in all that I could ever be
Buried in soil, I couldn’t hear, not see
But Give and Grow was mother nature’s decree.’

And when I was a sapling, I aimed for the sky
Not doubtful about how and why
The sun was the compass, the aim was high
I had to blossom, I had to grow,
Else life would be a lie.

I realised from the day I was sown,
The need for water was much bigger than my own
So, each leaf and petal, through pleasure and pain
Sang hymns to the wind and summoned rain.

Restful yet restless, with no time to bide
My nature, as nature’s is to provide
Through ups and downs, in the season’s tow
Sometimes fast, at times slow,
But never do I stop to grow.

Droughts and passing storms give an advice sound,
Be humble and have feet firmly on the ground
And even if I cannot move helter-skelter
For those who can, I give shade and shelter.

WORK, I know not, I only know BEING
How could living be of any other kind?
After all, it’s a matter of choosing and believing,
The world is a projection of your mind.

Cur hic statis
‘Why do you stand here’ you ask
As the end comes close by the hour

I REALIZE, I BE
I’m a hundred trees,
A million fruit,
A billion flower.

And,
A fruit lands in my lap, breaking my reverie,
I REALIZE,
I UNDERSTAND,
What I could be.

I eat the fruit and plant the seed
As I journey on,
To become a tree.

What a half marathon taught me about cultivating lasting friendships

October 8, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

It’s a matter of great privilege to have an enduring friendship. Even more so, when you can still do things together with the same friends who you grew up with.

I feel fortunate on that regard. I still have my childhood friends around who are proactive and find ways to do things together.

Recently, two of my friends and I decided to participate in a running event. One of them and myself were participating in a half marathon and the other hand chosen a 10 kilometer run.

I was apprehensive about my ability to run such a long distance, as were my friends, but since we were all in the challenge together, it made things easier on some level.

But there was one hang up we faced four days before the run. My friends had already registered for the event and I, because of my indecision and procrastination, hadn’t enrolled yet.
On checking the website, we came to know that the event was sold out and I couldn’t officially be part of the run.

It was a bit disappointing to us all.
We wanted to do this together.
But fate seemed to have other plans.

So did I.

The night before the run, I told my friends that I was going to run as well. I would run from home at the same time they start at the official start line, and run the half marathon distance as planned. So even if I would not be running on the same path as them, I would be running at the same time on the streets of the same city.
They happily agreed to the idea.

At 5:30 am the next morning, we all started to run together, on our own paths, in our own realities.
I ran about alone in the city with an app on my phone telling me about my progress with each kilometer.

Once I was past my 7 km mark, I took a turn on the road that coincided with the official race path!

I took a little detour and timed my run such that the distance I had covered coincided with that of other participants at the 11km mark on the racetrack.

And once I reached the 11km mark, I was on par with other runners on the official path to the finish line.

That felt magical, to be running on the official track out of pure chance!

Having other runners run alongside helped me with pushing myself in the later half of the race. I didn’t have a bib number attached on my chest as others but I was a runner just the same.

At the 17 kilometer mark, I saw a runner from behind who I could recognise anyday out of a huge crowd.

It was my friend !

He seemed to be having some trouble during the run. He looked tired and was walking for a brief stretch.

But I believed he could do much better. I breezed past him on the track and patted him on the back.
The surprise of finding me on the official racetrack filled him with great joy.
A sudden rush of energy took over him.

From that point on, he raced onward with all his might running past me within a kilometer.

I was happy to see him go full throttle as he blended in with other runners beyond my sight.

Eventually, we ended the race at the official finishing spot, relishing each other’s achievement and the togetherness that came along with it.

In that moment of celebration past the finish line, I also found a great lesson about friendship and the paths we take in our life.

In life, past a certain age, all our friends take different paths in our lives. Part of it is voluntary and a part out of pure chance.
And often, we feel distant and disillusioned by the notion of an enduring friendship.

But we need to realise that at some point in our lives, our path will diverge from the ones each of our friends take.

We still need to keep running on our own paths, forever trusting in our self and the connection we share with people who we believe in.

At some point, sooner or later, our paths will coincide, for all path lead to the same end, if followed with courage and complete honesty.

We all have to, at our own pace, persevere, and keep on running on our own path with faith that’s complete and unwavering.

And if we tread the path of our own choosing in our lives and go all the way,
We are bound to find the confluence we’ve always longed for,
With the people we have always loved.

So, is there a reason to feel sad when our paths diverge with that of the people we love?

No.

As long as they are true in their heart for their pursuit and you are in your own,
And you both persevere,
You will always find each other when your paths meet,
Forever happy with each other’s growth.

Tread with faith
And persevere.
The friendship will endure.

It’s only a matter of time.

What can we learn from a kid waving a train goodbye?

October 7, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

A window seat on a train ride.
Feels like such a luxury doesn’t it?
Why wouldn’t it,
For it offers a unique cinematic experience after all.
The landscape is neither static nor moving too fast like in a motion picture.
It breezes at a pace that’s easy on the eye, offering enough mind space to dwell on worlds within and without.

Recently, I had the fortune of having a window seat on a train ride from Kolkata to Pune. Much to my disappointment, it had air conditioning in all of its coaches.
An air conditioned coach doesn’t offer the same experience as a sleeper class open window. No gush of wind messing up your hair, no influence of outside weather on the inside, no hawkers, certainly not as much fun.
It is quite a sterile environment, an AC coach.
But I still had a window seat.
I couldn’t complain !

Sometime in the afternoon, I found myself looking at the landscape of central India through the tinted window.
The train chugged by a little agrarian hamlet.
Amid the vedant rice fields, I saw a mud house where a group of little girls were playing.
As they saw the train passing by, they all took a break from their play and started waving at the train in sheer jubilance.
The buoyancy in their being lifted my spirits. I couldn’t help but smile and wave back.

But then, I realised,

‘These are tinted windows ! I can see the girls but the girls can surely not see me wave back at them !’

But did it make a difference to their enthusiasm?

The girls would never know who they are waving goodbye to, or if they were waved back at.
They smiled and greeted strangers nevertheless.

And did I not smile? Sure I did,
As many other passengers must have, at the sight of their effervescent energy.
That’s a child’s karma.

A child’s mind has a primeval consciousness.
It willingly gives energy to people and places around it. At some level, it understands that the energy will come back in much bigger a bulk.
It is unsullied by the transactional, quid pro quo paradigm adults dwell in.

For an adult, it is easy to feel lost, isolated and self centered in his being.

‘Why should I even do something if I don’t see a benefit on the horizon, a profit of some sort?’ one wonders.
Growing up, we become used to doing something for something in return.

Our mindset about work is best reflected in our conversations. The most common questions we ask one another as adults are,

‘What do you do?’

and

‘How much do you make?’

The answer to the latter is much based on the judgement of the answer to the former question.
Usually, the reply is in terms of one’s occupation and income respectively.

But maybe we need to do the asking a bit differently.
Maybe should ask each other and our self,

‘What do you love to do?’

And

‘How much do you give?’

You would wonder,
‘How does this relate to the little girls waving a train goodbye?’

At that moment, when the girls are waving, they are doing what they love to do, in accordance to their natural instinct.

And what are they giving?

Many smiles to people who they would never know.
However little, however fleeting it may be,
They add value.

Now,
What can we learn from them?

Foremost,
To involve our self in the most natural extension of our being,
By doing things we love to do.

And,

To give unconditionally, with utmost joy,
Without expectations.

It they can, deep in their hearts, find such happiness in giving,
Can’t we?

It is not easy to shift our perspective as an adult and start to give our energy without knowing what result it would yield, or what benefit we will get as a result.

Well, we can all start simple.

How about starting with waving goodbye to a train we will never see again?

Yes, you will feel awkward,
And to lift that hand would need overcoming inertia we didn’t know to exist.

But after the train has passed,
If we find our self smiling,
We would have learnt a lesson.

The secret to finding sweet fruit

October 6, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

It was my last evening in Thimpu, Bhutan. Wandering through the market, I wondered what I should get as a souvenir from Bhutan for memory.
After wandering about in the little marketplace, I found a few shops selling fruits.
I had read that most of Bhutan’s agricultural produce is organic. I wondered how fruit in this country would taste like. My love for fruit steered me into one of these shops.

The fruit was nearly arranged in wooden cartons. I didn’t have a lot to choose from the local fruit since much of it was imported from India. On asking the shopkeeper, I got to know that only the Apples and Plums were the locally grown fruit in the shop.
The plums were smaller and much rosier than the ones grown in India.
I decided to get a bagful for myself as an edible souvenir.

At night after dinner, I chose to eat one of the plums as dessert.
However, much unlike a sweet tasting dessert, it had a strong tart flavor. I ate another one to try my luck, but it tasted the same as the one earlier. I packed away the rest of the plums in a bag.
Maybe they need to ripen more, I wondered.

The next day, I was on a shared taxi ride to Phuentsholing, a bordering town one has to cross to enter India. The ride on the highway was pleasant for a couple of hours.
But then, the driver decided to take a short cut to save time.

Within ten minutes of hitting that bumpy shortcut road, we hit a gridlock. A huge lorry had gotten stuck on the narrow road blocking the entire path.
We had to alight and wait for a JCB truck to arrive and pull out the truck stuck on the way.
All my fellow passengers were local Bhutanese. There was a little boy in tow of a mother, two farmer women, and a couple of youth along with us on the ride.

I could sense that the little boy was thristy. I looked around to find a Buddhist temple not very far away from where our car was.
I walked upto the temple and asked one of the novice monks if I could get some water. He happily agreed and guided me to a source of water.

I wondered how I could express my gratitude to the monk.
Then,
I remembered I had a bag of plums with me !
I opened my bag and offered a few to him. That was all I had that I could share with him.
He happily accepted it and waved me goodbye.

The road was still blocked.
I reached our taxi and offered water to the mother. Incidentally everyone in the car was thirsty. They all had their share of water and passed it around.
I still had a lot of plums left with me.
I offered two to each of the passengers.
The little boy was delighted at the sight of the fruit.
He savoured each nibble with complete involvement.

Looking at him enjoy the plum so much, I wondered if it was an acquired taste or was he hungry or had the plum ripened overnight?

I looked into my bag to find a solitary piece of fruit left inside. I took it in my hand and bit into it with hope.

Quite unlike last night’s tart flavour, my taste buds were engulfed by pulpy sweetness of that plum.
It was the dessert I was wanting to taste last night!

All my fellow passengers enjoyed the fruit just as much.

I wondered what made the fruit taste so sweet overnight.

Maybe it was the spirit of sharing.

How a Himalayan trek refined my Education about Veganism

September 8, 2018 / Sreenath Sreenivasan / 0 Comments

It had been five hours since we started our trek downhill from Beding, a little hamlet in the Rolwaling valley in North-East Nepal.
Exhausted as we were, the sight of a house at a distance felt like spotting an Oasis.
Our determined feet stamped onward to reach the solitary house in a village called Dugong.

We could smell a local alcohol made out of rice called ‘Rakshi’ brewing in the kitchen.

‘Namaste, Ajool…’ my friend Lee greeted enthusiastically.

An elderly Sherpa lady stooped out of her house with the most welcoming smile I’ve ever been graced with.

She invited us into her kitchen-cum-restaurant.

We could see she only had two wood fired stoves with her with one brewing the ‘Rakshi’.

‘Khana Jaldi Chaiyo’ Lee explained with animation that we need food fast.

She laughed and pointed her finger towards a packet of noodles. I was sure she was used to the state of hunger of trekkers.

We assented at her suggestion and she got busy in her kitchen.

The house was made out of a lot of wood, labor and love. The cutlery, minimal and neatly arranged. There was water pipe delivering water right to her house straight from the little cascade behind her log cabin. The place had an energy of contentment, one that can only come with age, acceptance and wisdom.
There was a place for everything and everything was in its place.

After a moment, I wondered what this old lady would be doing for company. She only had one neighbour who seemed to be out for work in the forest.

‘She must surely feel lonely all by herself’ I wondered.

Within moments we heard the door of the kitchen being banged at. We wondered who it could be. The Sherpa lady’s face lit up with a smile. She reprimanded at the person at the door with unmistakable affection.

The determined banging continued on.
Finally she could no longer keep the door closed and lightly let it ajar.
And with the halo of the outside world behind itself, shone the bright white fur of a little baby sheep.

It jumped inside the kitchen and went straight to the lady. For the next half an hour, they played with each other like grandson and grandmother. There was such stubborn affection in the sheep for the lady, that it would never leave her alone. The lady would push it aside with loving aggression only to secretly expect it to come back to harass her.

Tumbling many pots and pans around the kitchen and eating out of places it shouldn’t, the baby sheep made itself feel at home.

The lady could only love the sheep more. There was no other way.

Once our meals were ready, she served us on the beautifully aged table made out of forest wood.
She rested herself on the ground, took the sheep in her lap and adoringly spoke to it in a language she was sure the sheep understood, only to not obey.

Just moments ago, I was feeling a bit sad for the woman who I assumed was living all by herself in this remote mountain village.
How wrong was I !
She had such a bountiful expression of life living alongside her.
The sheep was not just entertainment, or company or a means to have food, milk or leather for that matter.
It was life itself for her.

Witnessing this aspect of life changed my perspective profoundly.

A day ago, we were served Yak cheese with boiled potatoes in the village uphill. I was a bit hesitant while eating since I refrain from having animal products as much as possible.
But that was the only food available and we had to respect the emotion of the locals for whom Yak cheese is a delicacy reserved for special occasions.
We chose to eat what was served.

Much to my surprise, that was certainly one of the most delicious food combinations I had ever tasted.
I ate as much as I possibly could.
The next day, we saw free roaming Yak in the pastures nearby being milked lovingly by a village lady.

The Yak showed it’s affection back in equal measure, much like the baby sheep at the Sherpa lady’s house.

I felt fortunate for being able to witness this bond between humans and animals. I have lived in cities all my life and have never experienced this paradigm of a relationship.

A few years ago, I chose to follow a Vegan lifestyle, primarily educating myself from resources online about how cruel the animal rearing industry is.
My education happened mostly,
online.

But for the first time, I could actually see how effortlessly animals and humans exist symbiotically.
With sincere love for each other.
There was never a rope in sight to secure an animal, for their hearts were always strung together to their human friends’ hearts.
In harsh winter, the animals are taken care of by the local villagers like family. The village moves downhill to warmer places only when all its animals do.

In a way, it felt as if the animals took care of their human friends by giving them loving company, and perhaps a share of their milk.
Of course it can be disputed, and seen as exploitation.

I would argue like that earlier.

But once I saw the pristine relationship between man and animal in such harsh environment where weather and loneliness can take a toll on your health,
I realised the need for them to coexist in such beautiful harmony.

No animal is reared for meat in the villages here in the hills. And an animal’s death is mourned just as much as a family member’s.
Here, man chooses to be animal himself and treat another animal as family.

I turned Vegan thinking it would help end suffering, save the planet and create a peaceful world.
I still oppose commercial farming of animals.
But, this experience of witnessing symbiotic coexistence between man and animal has only made me realise my own animal self,
And how,
To understand our nature better, we need to spend time in nature.

While educating myself about veganism on my smartphone screen, all I could see was oppression and violence inflicted by us on animals.
I could feel a sense of guilt and hopelessness inside me for what we do to our fellow earthlings.

But out here in nature,
far away from the civilization I was brought up in, I could witness the animal side of us humans –
calm, compassionate and caring in the heart.
This education filled me with warmth, hope and optimism.

As I journey back to my life in the city,
A deeper understanding dawns upon me with each step,
About our true nature as a being,
The love we all have in our hearts,
And the way we should tread forward despite our conditioning,
Retaining the deep loving spirit that is part of us all.

Once we can do that, can we ever hurt any being?

Yak cheese tastes amazing by the way.
But what would feel inevitably better and worth experiencing is the gentle rub of a Yak’s fur on your shoulder on a windy winter morning.