Rabindranath Tagore Blew The Candle

Rabindranath, one of the greatest poets of this country, was living on a small houseboat. He used to live for months together on that houseboat; he loved living on the houseboat. It was a full-moon night and he was reading in his room, a small cabin, just by a small candlelight, and he was reading about aesthetics — what is beauty?

And the full moon outside, and the cuckoo calling from the distant shore, and the moon reflecting all over the lake, and the whole lake was silver…! It was a tremendously silent night, nobody around, except that cuckoo calling. Once in a while a bird would fly over the boat, or a fish would jump in the lake — and those sounds would deepen the silence even more. And he pondered over great books on aesthetics in search of the definition of what beauty is.

Tired, exhausted, in the middle of the night, he blew out the candle…and he was shocked, surprised. As he blew out the candle, the moonrays entered through the window, through the door, inside the cabin. That pale light of the candle had been keeping the moon out. Suddenly, he heard the cuckoo calling from the distant shore.

Suddenly, he became aware of the tremendous silence, the depth of the silence surrounding the boat. A fish jumped, and he came out…. He had never seen such a
beautiful night. A few white clouds floating in the sky, and the moon and the lake and the cuckoo calling…he was transported into another world.

He wrote in his diary, “I am foolish! I have been searching in books for what beauty is, and beauty was standing outside my door, knocking on my door! I was looking for beauty, searching for beauty, with a small candle, and the small candlelight was keeping the moonlight outside.” He wrote in his diary, ”

It seems my small ego is keeping God out — the small ego, like a pale small candlelight, keeping the light of God outside. And he is waiting outside. All that I need to do is to close the books, blow out the candle of the ego and go out — AND SEE!”

Well, a small addition from my side. Unfortunately, we are blinded multifold in the realms of this unknowingly known world. The only thing which we can do is to do the right thing at the right time so that your vision is crystal clear and you atleast know where the candle is present, before blowing it out as Rabindranath Tagore did.

Equilibrium

This is an excerpt/story taken from Osho's teachings, which I thought does brings to light something about being in a state of equilibrium when there are crests and troughs under the seasons of the Sun...Read on....

When I was a small child at school there was a wrestling competition for the whole district; I have never been able to forget that incident. There was a wrestler, the most famous wrestler in those parts, who was defeated. He was going to be the champion, the district champion or something, and he was defeated by a totally unknown man!

The whole crowd laughed in ridicule, people enjoyed it like anything! And I was surprised, everybody was surprised; in a second everybody fell silent, because he also clapped and laughed… the man who had been defeated! He laughed so uproariously that the whole crowd fell silent in embarrassment; what was the matter with this man? And when they fell silent he laughed even more!

Later on I went to him; he was staying just in front of my house in a temple. And I said, ’This is strange – and I loved it! It was very unexpected!’. He said, ’It was so unexpected, that’s why I also laughed! It was really unexpected. I had never expected that I would be defeated by an ordinary man of whom nobody has ever heard! The whole thing was ridiculous, that’s why I laughed!’

But I have never been able to forget his face, the way he laughed and the way he clapped and the way the whole crowd fell silent. This man defeated the whole crowd and their ridicule… he participated! But great courage is needed! A great courage is needed in life to be yourself, in failure, in success, in appreciation, in condemnation, when you are going very high and when you are going very low

Love Unconditionally

During my growing up days, I used to think what is there to stop us to love each other, unconditionally. Scores of reason would come as a flash in front of my mind. None was clear nevertheless. But as I am navigating through my days of life, I am finding one thing that is common to everything - and that is we love because we want to love. We always want some return to our friendship, to our hand-shakes, to our love.

As far as I could decipher the DNA of life, if you like someone, if you really care for someone, if you really want something good for someone, just be good to that person and never in your iota of thoughts, think about the return. This way, you already set the rules and you play the game. But in the end, everyone comes out to be a winner. Remember there is always much more to Winning than winning in real terms.

I have always dreamed of making this world happy....of making people around me happy....of making things easy for my friends and for people who I even do not know directly. Its that feeling of non-attaching ourselves with our action, which perhaps sets to the real upliftment of ourselves in our own eyes. This would never be easy and would never be a piece of cake but if we want contentment and the correctness in our life, this approach is worth a try. We never know what happens tommorrow. So let each today be a stepping stone for each tomorrow so that day-after tomorrow is happy for us and everyone around us.

I guess that's how God would be looking after each one of us. He does not want us to go to him and pray...he just stays there on top and takes care of each one of us, in his own way. We may understand some of his actions, some may not carry any meaning or not-as-desired but everything good or bad is for Us...believe or not believe...But if you ask me, I do believe in Him and pray that my belief should be intact every moment of my life.