Return of the Normalcy
Honestly, as I lived through the conundrum of city life for the last many years, with its maddening pace and running around, I would often wonder: Is this normal and natural? And I am once again wondering at-the-moment: Is not life more normal and natural now in some ways!
Relationships to remain fragrant have to be nurtured with genuine care and loving attention, else boredom and decay are likely to set in. One of the miracles of Quarantine has been our changing attitude towards anything and everything, starting from bare necessities to top-end gadgets that modern man relies on. Somewhere deep down we realize that getting anything repaired or replaced is not really an option right now, even for those blessed with abundance. Hence we are by default making a genuine effort to nullify and the chance of damaging any utilitarian object and also conserve and protect food items in the kitchen lest a morsel go waste. Never in my life had I seen everything in the kitchen and refrigerator being so carefully utilised. Anything in excess has to be shared with the right person, at the right moment, while it is still fresh. We usually do not need to be trained for anything and I am not sure whether it is at all possible to train grown-up populace. But yes, when totally cornered by life and its experiences we almost instantaneously get tamed. We have all the knowledge and understanding within us, just that the foggy and slothful mind keeps our wisdom in perennial hibernation.
I grew up with this concept since my college days that everyone, including those who happen to be men of the world, with businesses and families to look after should take 4-6 weeks sabbatical to rest and contemplate in silence and solitude, totally detached from family and affairs of the world and then return back to their normal lives. However, this concept would sound so bizarre, impractical and outdated to most. As the world continues to be quarantined, all have time now to reflect, to ponder, to care and perchance meditate. Men are also subconsciously wondering how life should be once they wake up from this rude shock and return back to what we had been used to terming as 'normal'.
One of the meanings of Dharma, as we understand, is the Buddha-Dharma, and there is another broader concept of Dharma, that includes anything and everything that exists and one could think of. Hence cultivating a reverential attitude towards anything and everything, even for so-to-say inanimate objects, would translate into reverence for life, reverence for creation and then we can carry that attitude into our meditations as well. Life cannot be divided into the mundane and the spiritual; they always have to be completely interwoven and intertwined. Like if body, breath, and awareness are different things, we would feel isolated, fragmented and lonely. Similarly for us to experience life in all its glory and completeness there has to be the union of matter and spirit, the material and the mystical. This is truly normal and natural.