The Great Escape

“You can never run away. Not ever. The only way out is in.” – Juno Diaz

I always knew that I was an escapist at heart. . . I preferred fantasy worlds to the real one. Strange, but true. From childhood, I always had a knack of disentangling myself out of the harsh situations around me and immersing myself into a parallel world. Reality never wowed me. When mundane life bound me, I would find a way to escape somehow.

Everyone’s trying to escape. Even animals respond in predictable ways to avoid pain and punishment. Avoidance and escape are the two main categories of behaviour under unpleasant conditions. It is a "get me out of here" or "shut this off" reaction, aimed at escape from pain or frustration. We humans are but an evolved species of our little brethren. Mindless hours spent surfing the internet or television, loud pointless conversations, junk food, alcohol, drugs, anti-depressants, painkillers, sleeping pills, porn, late hours partying....it’s all about the Great Escape!

Whether it’s composing poetry, creating great pieces of art or trying to commit suicide, apparently all so paradoxical, it’s always really been the same – attempts at the Great Escape. 

That raises the big question. What are we trying to flee from? And what does this really tell us about the state of affair of our relationships and the society we inhabit?

There is a huge amount of pain out there. The picture perfect make up and smiles, clothes and sparkly accessories, flashy cars and ostentatious lifestyles, fun party pics and boastful tweets on social media can’t disguise the pain, confusion, anxiety and terror that everyone feels within. Millions feel embittered, bewildered, and anxious of a future that’s not yet arrived. Our tactics of escape delay us from facing our reality, but face it we have to some day!

That's the weird thing about trying to escape. You never really can! Maybe momentarily, but not entirely. Fiction books can’t offer real escape, but they can temporarily prevent you from going insane.  Writing, composition and painting is therapeutic, albeit briefly. Most of us seek companionship solely to escape the trepidation of being alone. But strangely, learning to be solitary is central to the art of loving and living free. When we can learn to be alone, we can be with others without using them as a channel of escape. 

So what’s the solution? Well, we must first recognize that the root of all pain exists within. Every action manifested externally, can find its source within. And we can only heal this source once we identify and acknowledge its presence. Learn to introspect and find a balance between what you can control and what you can’t. It’s about creating harmony between effort and surrender. It’s about realizing that you don’t need external affection or endorsement in order to be good enough. When someone judges, reacts, rejects, hurts or abandons you, it’s never about you. It’s about them and their own anxieties, insecurities, fears and needs, and you no longer have to internalize that and make it your fear. Your self-worth isn’t reliant upon the world accepting you – you are unique, and perfect in the eyes of your Creator. Who else then has the authority to condemn or judge you? 

Instead of defending your worth or employing tactics to be a part of the Great Escape, go within and discover your unique powers, talents and skills not to escape reality but to create it. Break down your imaginary walls, reach out to others equally in pain and jointly heal and transform the grief within. The Power of One allows us to see that it’s not just our individual pain we are trying to escape from but “our collective human suffering”; and it’s not me alone that will fix our pain, it is “all of us” jointly. Together, we have no need to Escape. Together we can Imagine, Create and Manifest the wonderful world we want to inhabit.

Change your Destiny with Faith

I finally comprehended the enormity of Martin Luther’s words, “Pray, and let God worry.”

To many people, Faith is a fraudulent phrase. A blind belief in some mysterious and arcane philosophy of yore. From childhood we are trained to understand that empirical science requires independent, provable evidence to support any fact before it is accepted as accurate. Faith, however, does not argue with the empirical mind which wants to hold truth in the same way as one holds a real object in the palms of their hand. Faith transcends the inquiring mind, and stands on a higher inner truth which lies at the centre of our core. Faith triumphs when the human spirit realizes that no one else’s certainty can be our own assurance. If we have faith, conviction arises but naturally.

Over the years, I came to accept the reality of not knowing where I was headed. And now I simply love it. When I tried to control outcomes, I was either disappointed with the results or simply unnerved when situations altered. The more I tried to control the end of the story, the more it took another surprise twist and turn in the plot. The difficulty didn’t lie in accepting the result, the anger arose from silently knowing that I couldn’t control my environment. A shocker after a lifetime of being trained to think that I was in supreme and aggressive control of every outcome. 

And one day, in the midst of a whirlpool of events, dialogues, decisions, emotions and just simply being exhausted, I let go. I let go of over thinking, authority, and apprehension... I just let go of my Ego and discovered an inexplicable faith in the universe. And it was in that moment of being thrown in mid air with no hope in sight, that my wings unfurled and I began to fly. And as I soared, I still didn’t know which way I was headed, but the marvel lay in simply unfolding my rusty wings and just letting go. I knew not my direction, but I knew the winds would carry me far.

My remarkable learning was that I don’t need to exactly know what is transpiring, or precisely where it is all headed. All I had to learn in that single moment of letting go was to acknowledge and appreciate the many possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to welcome them with faith and unerring trust. In my journey of faith I discovered that ever so often amazing encounters and situations come into our lives out of thin air. We can't always understand them, but we must have faith in them. It was tempting to revert to my old hard shell and question everything, but I realized that it paid to simply possess a measure of good faith in the intent of the Universe.

We are at our strongest when we no longer need to prove our strength. Have unwavering Faith in the bigger plan, and the Cosmos will stretch its magnanimous hand in your direction. Because you have changed your Destiny by simply Believing. And once you have made that change, everything will fall into place. But isn’t that how it was supposed to be in the very first place?

Yesterday I lost a friend, but gained the world!

All through my childhood I was taught when not to let go and why it was important to hang on firmly. Kites, balloons and mothers’ hands were created to teach us this all important lesson. The monkey bars and ropes at gym class explicitly taught us to hold on for dear life or plunge into an abyss of pain and bruises. Classrooms were designed to teach us that letting go equated to failure. And well meaning adults preached never-endingly about how relationships were based on self-sacrifice, clinging on and staying stuck, even at the cost of heartbreak, disillusionment and abuse.

Even though I evolved from a clumsy toddler to an independent, strong, mature woman, letting go was simply something I was not ready to consider. A life time of well-meaning counsel and conditioning is not easy to let go. A fear of condemnation and the unfamiliar made me believe that misery and the status quo was the better option.

Sometimes it takes heartbreak, defeat, loss of health, an unfortunate encounter or maybe even an enlightening book to wake us out of our anaesthetized coma and make us realize that we are worth so much more than what we're settling for. When we grasp the truth that clinging on to the past is like holding on to your baby walker even after you can walk. When we see the value of emptying an old closet of mind baggage, to finally receive the blessings of what we truly need. When we finally realize that when we let go of who we are, we realize the potential of what we can become.

In the year long process of letting go, I certainly lost many things including friends from the past... but I finally started finding myself. Letting go was a tough process of releasing old attachments and notions that no longer served me, emotions, grudges, fears, frustrations and disillusionments of the past that had weighed down my heart. I had to make a conscious choice to shed the ‘old me’ every single day.... to help renew, release, and therein be reborn anew. To my surprise I realized that Time was not the great healer....letting go certainly was.

So what did I gain from my purge. Well, I certainly attained peace of mind, balance, and harmony within. I won freedom from unnecessary internal turmoil, and reclaimed both my mental and physical health. Letting go also allowed others to take on greater responsibility for their lives and actions, and enabled me to break free from situations that never belonged to me in the first place. Letting go of people who had weighed me down for too many years helped me to finally soar high and pursue my own maverick dreams.

I was finally able to find my long lost self-respect, my faith in God and the universe, and most importantly, my voice!

A Quest for the Truth Within

If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation. – Jiddu Krishnamuti

I have discovered that I am a second-hand edition. I have existed all these years based on what I have been told, steered by the counsel of my parents, friends, peers, colleagues, desires, circumstances and surroundings. The media has certainly shaped, moulded and influenced me to the point that there is nothing original in me anymore. Nothing new... not a single part of me is original, nor any discovery that I have made for myself. It took me 45 years to realize that there was nothing unique, pure or lucid within me anymore! 

When I was young, I associated academic accomplishments and being part of an uber-cool peer group with self-worth. Well, turned out that obese kids weren’t considered cool...which led to years of low self-esteem and a phobia of large groups. Empty book shops and libraries became my cavern of solace. I convinced myself that aloofness and introversion was the new cool.

As I grew older I worked exceedingly hard at getting good grades, dream jobs, promotions, cabins, trophies and perks, thinking that everything would finally fall into place. Surprisingly, it still didn’t. I had shed all that unwanted weight, reverse aged and rearranged my goals, but I was still unhappy. In retrospect, all this sounds extremely irrational, but at that time all my choices and aspirations made perfect sense.

Yes, I certainly proved to the entire world that I was intelligent, but this “proof” seemed strangely hollow. I had spent so much of my adult life working toward what I thought were my important life milestones only to find out that they meant nothing to me. Instead of feeling a sense of pride and self-worth, I felt a sense of emptiness and loss. I no longer knew who I was, what I wanted, my goals, or even a sense of direction. I was a product fashioned out of the expectations of society, but somewhere in the midst of that turbulent pretentious journey, I had lost my original song.

And then one day as I listened to a bunch of colleagues rant on and on like a stuck gramophone record about how imperfect our lives were, the drudgery of relationships and life, and a future of evident doom, it hit me. This was not my song! This had never been me. My childhood song had been all about hope, love, magic, candour, courage and happiness. When did someone else’s mandate become my personal mantra? As I abruptly walked out of that conversation, my quest to discover my true self began.

Somewhere along the way, I had allowed the outer worldly chaos to smother my inner light and sense of true purpose. Rediscovering my sense of identity and soul purpose became my burning mission in 2016. The universe gauged my sense of urgency and stretched out its magnanimous hand. A series of interesting chance encounters, esoteric literature, healings and meditations led me to understand that the inward journey is an important aspect of our outer life. Whatever happens inwardly has direct repercussions on what germinates and reflects outwardly. The inner light and purity cannot be hidden, but neither can the defilements.

We mistakenly believe we can portray something we are not. That is not possible. The Buddha said that one only knows a person after having heard him speak many times and having lived with him for a long time. Most of us generally try to show ourselves off as something better than we really are. Then, of course, we become disappointed in ourselves when we fail, and we become equally disenchanted in others. The blame game begins, and a downward spiral into self loathing and revulsion in whoever we can censure commences. But to realistically know ourselves makes it possible to truly love. For when we understand ourself, we understand others...and out of that understanding comes love. The kind of feeling that offers the light-heartedness to any relationship or task at hand, which is so essential to the turbulent times that we live in. By accepting ourselves and others as we truly are, our job of purification, chipping away at the defilements, is made much easier. And our inner song is finally able to break through the pretentious din and clutter to radiate in its utmost purity and glory.

Script Your Sparkle

“Your current circumstances are part of your redemption story that the Universe is writing.” – Evinda Lepins

Life! It’s the only bona fide reality we face every single day. To most of us the daily drudge and grind of existence sucks. And yet none of us really pause to take stock of what really ails. We are so terrified and focused on the next negative situation that’s going to crush us that we forget to pause and just BE!

We allow our situations to label our state of mind. Our lifetime conditioning convinces us that our external circumstances define us. The voices in our head start whispering gently enough – “I’d love to do that, but...” or “I’m not that lucky...” or “I wanted to go, but...” Before you know it, these silent voices in our head become our outer shell and caustic persona.

If you allow your past or existing situations to label you, you can be assured that they will eventually destroy you. Your mind will become a possessed excuse factory which will spin out a million reasons as to why you shouldn’t take that leap of faith or crucial decision that could be a game-changer. Your mind will gradually convince you that you can’t change, that your problems are just too massive to be resolved, and that you need to slip into a coma of inescapable fated doom.

If you choose to be at the mercy of life’s events, then be ready to also accept that events have no mercy. However if you choose to change your outlook and attempt to make a change in your heart and not your circumstance, then you will be amazed by what can be! If you can choose to believe that the Universe is scripting a brilliant story that is way bigger than all those myriad pesky circumstances past and present, you will find the strength to transcend the grind and surge ahead into an inspired tomorrow.

Nobody who made it big allowed their circumstances to defeat them. None of the great ones were ever content to settle to the status quo. They opted to look at crushing situations optimistically and take control of their outcome. Their thoughts were the controlling factor of their outcome. They allowed the pain and defeats of their past to become their teachers to guide them into humility and service. The pain helped them look beyond the superficial and forced them onto their true path thereby crafting a destiny for the greater good. And that’s what made for greatness, and history!

There are no extra unwanted actors or roles in the cosmos. Your journey so far has been part of a greater story the Universe has been scripting. We are all here because we have an important role to play. Stop allowing a few negative situations to dim your sparkle. Break free from the toxic victim mindset and embrace the power and potential of your greatness. Stop thinking like an extra, and become the lead role. You are the Star of your Destiny, now start acting like one! 

Piecing together an Alternate Paradigm

“Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

The winds of change are blowing all around the world. Be it political turmoil, financial upheaval, havoc in our personal and professional relationships, disruptions in health and cerebral peace...it’s visible across all spheres of our existence. Sudden, raucous and disruptive; change and chaos seems to be the new ‘in vogue’ world order.

While there’s a temptation to turn a blind eye, pull up the bed covers and camouflage ourselves into a dark corner in the hope that we survive this era of turbulence and chaos, the reality is that nothing is going to stay the same. It is obvious that a massive shift is happening in the fabric of the universe and our very existence. You can feel it in your gut that life is just not what it once was, and you’re not quite sure where it’s headed. But one thing is for sure - it’s high time for all us to let go of the snug status quo, and start exploring and experimenting with alternative possibilities and solutions if we have any hope of coming out of the next decade sane and sanguine.

While change is paramount, there’s also a danger of changing everything too fast, all at once. Often when situations don’t feel good in our lives, we want to transform everything at once...but too many hurried shifts can lead to collision and anarchy. Small adjustments and tweaks may be the key to getting the ball rolling in the right direction.  All you may need is simply a shift of perspective that helps you interpret your situation differently, which in turn can open up many positive choices and unconventional solutions.

Like the assiduous Egyptian Goddess Isis who used her magical skills aeons ago to gather the dismembered and strewn body parts of her husband Osiris to restore him back to life, this new era of chaos encourages us to bring together scattered parts of our lives into a unified whole. Queen Isis didn’t flinch at the challenge of recovering the missing pieces of her husband Osiris, so neither should we feel that we have an impossible task ahead of us. Piece by piece is surely the way ahead.

Resist the temptation to fix the drawbacks perceived in others, and try to be focused on how to shift your own life to a higher frequency, which in turn can translate to healing, growth and amity in all the different dimensions of your life. 

The turbulence in the outer world offers all of us a chance to embrace our unique inner talents, beliefs and ideas in order to open up fresh landscapes and opportunities in the year ahead. Yes, cold gusty winds are blowing indeed, but it’s exactly maybe what all of us need to explore an alternative approach and spur us on. An alternate paradigm shift is often exacting and hard won.

There’s Strength in Surrender

“Surrender is a long journey from the outer turmoil to the inner peace.” – Sri Chinmoy

There’s the Left Brain side of me that endeavoured to constantly be in control, analyze and use logic at every possible turn. The word ‘Hope’ seemed ludicrous as it offered me the imaginary freedom to design dreams and manifest my deepest desires magically. To move forward from years of disciplined rational rearing, inflexible plans and worksheets with tight timelines seemed a complete no-no.

And yet surrendering to the Universe and the miracle of Hope was exactly what I needed. To evolve and move past my need to be in charge, rein in, regulate and micro manage every aspect of my life and surrounding was the best decision I ever took in my life. And that’s when I discovered that Surrender and Hope were the channels to greater possibilities and miracles.

During this gradual process of letting go, I realized we try to control things because of what we imagine will happen if we don’t. In other words, control is entrenched in fear. The need to sub-consciously control also stems out of the fact that we desire an exact outcome – one that we believe is best for us. But do we really know what’s best for us? Maybe letting go can unlock many pathways to all types of amazing possibilities that simply can’t exist when we are mentally stuck to a narrow path.

Surrendering is a long drawn process. It’s both an art and a science. It literally means to stop the warfare...both within, and with the universe. It means bowing to the natural rhyme and rhythm of the cosmos, and going with the flow. Above all, it’s about having complete and utter faith in the higher plan designed exclusively for you.

Don’t get me wrong. Surrender isn’t about inertia. It’s about taking effective action, but from a place of implicit Faith and Trust. When we are in an aggressive control gear, it almost feels like we are fighting headwinds against all odds. Surrender is about letting the winds guide your sails and smoothly moving into the direction that life was anyways supposed to take you.

Over the past year my multiple areas of surrender spanned surrendering and letting go of all the people, objects and situations that no longer served me. I also learnt to bring up all that was buried deep in my heart come to the surface and be healed. The simple act of becoming conscious of past hurts, regrets, grief, doubts and misgivings was therapeutic to say the least. Releasing these many dormant layers of darkness to the universe helped bring in new light and start a process of healing. Letting go helped open up space for new energies to enter...and therein started my fantastic journey from darkness and despondency to joy, hope and light.

Einstein famously quoted, “The most important decision we make is whether we believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe.” After years of imprudently deeming that I was battling a harsh world, I finally surrendered to the belief that I lived in a friendly universe. The universe had never been my adversary....au contraire I had conditioned myself to become my worst enemy!

Being receptive and having faith in the universe is a skill that needs to be practised and worked upon every single day. Challenges will abound to test your newfound faith. But therein lies your greatest potential for progress. It really helps to believe that you co-exist in a friendly universe, one that supports you at every step so that you don’t have to waste time looking around for imaginary daggers and hidden potholes. The choice is yours – to fight your way through life, or to let go of the steering wheel and let the winds of faith guide your sails towards an amazing new destination.