Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Dust thou art! (1.a)

I am going to contemplate on the miracle of my body today, the gateway, as it were, to my encounter with the Lord of my soul. The body, which we are told, was created by God out of mud, and to earth we all shall return! How true it is! Let me begin to realize that whatever be my name and fame, social status, educational qualifications, the great and important offices I hold, the kind of influence I can exert in my community, the number of person who love to follow my words literally, without ever questioning them, the amount of riches and wealth that I have made out of sheer hard work and labor, what am I at the end of it all! A few kilograms of soil, that is what I am, and that is what all of us will ever be!

I would like to spend an hour sitting at the garden, or at a quiet place where I am alone with the earth! Let my feet rest on the ground, the hard earth, and let me walk on the earth consciously telling myself that I am treading on the lives of so many of human persons, who might have died hundreds and thousands of years ago. Let me close my eyes for a while and imagine a pile of human bodies strewn on my path, and I am walking over them! Let me continue my walk imagining that the soil on earth is nothing but the composite of human bodies. Let me also remind myself that one day I would be trodden upon by the future generations. That is what I am!

Now let me sit quietly in a corner of the garden, take a handful of mud and hold it tenderly, look at it lovingly, because that is what I am, and that is what I would be after some years. This is what the people I love the most on earth are and would be after some years. The best and the worst that the world can offer me is nothing but a handful of mud! The greatest possessions I can claim power and authority over are but a few hands full of mud. Let me continue to gaze at the mud, the color, shape, smell and the kind of feeling they create on my fingers; the coarse feeling! Let me smell it and consume the smell of it and fill my lungs with it. This is what I am, this is what I will be!

As I look at the handful of mud in my hand, let me see the mud being shaped by a master craftsman into my image and likeness, let me take a good look at the image of myself before my eyes; the image is lifeless, it is as good as a dead body; there is no life in it! Let me pay attention to the continuous fine tuning of this image by the craftsman, who keeps on improving it; the painstaking task of providing the much needed contours to the image makes the craftsman sweat his blood out, but there is joy on his face. When it is done, I witness him breathing into the lifeless image, and I am created! Once I am in full shape, I see the craftsman no more. I see the marvel of my body, though it is made of mud, it is but an exquisite work of art!

Now it is time for me to move to my room, carrying in my mind the body that had been created out of mud, and remove all the clothes, and stand in the middle of the room. Today is the time for me to take a good look at my body, the wonder machine far superior than any that human beings were able to make. I make take about an hour to really see every part of my body, starting either from the top or the bottom, moving gently from one part to another! I might use a looking mirror to have a look at my face… let me take note of the many things which are in my body, about which I had not been conscious of… the moles, scars, veins, … Let me look at my body as if I am watching at the best art work in a museum! Let me explore the wonder of my body, slowly and respectfully!

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