When I was a teenager, I believed that all my problems were outside. I wanted to travel to the far and wide corners of the world to find meaning to this endless void that I was trapped in (or so I thought). I wondered why this world was at war at all times. I wanted to be a peace-maker; I wanted to be the activist who would change the world.
Things changed drastically when I arrived in England in the fall of 2019. I felt like I was cruising over a wave of activism and change. But along the way as I joined this wave of activism, I realised that many people were only there because they wanted to merely feel good about themselves. People who were primary contributors to the ecological damage thought that a green-washing of thoughts and protests could give them a feeling of accomplishment. Many people joined the protest, because it meant that they had a collective around them. I ran as far away as I could from this world of Activism and Change.
Now, it was time for a glitch in the human evolution. I was a 22 yo student at the University of Gloucestershire when the covid pandemic hit the United Kingdom. Humanity was shutting itself down. This glitch showed the reality of this world to many people, they went inwards, and many got even more caught up in the drama. It was a shocking time for me, as everyone I knew, had left the university halls. I was stranded in a huge property with empty rooms, a bunch of books and a single friend to discuss things and meet physically.
Let me say this now, first, we do not know everything about this world, nor am I claiming that I do. I am almost clueless as anyone else out there. Truth for all of us is the ultimate aphrodisiac pleasure, that we want to attain. We live in societies, some privileged and some deprived, yet we all suffer. Suffering is the only common thread for all of us. We all go through the same mess that this life throws at us. Yet, our will holds on and pushes us forward. We are then turned into products of our surroundings and we take the form and act as the surroundings demand. We hardly ever have control over our life. We act according to the society and never push ourselves to the boundaries of our thoughts. That is because we think that it is painful to be alone and isolated when a thought grapples us. But, we forget to understand that that too is only the thought which is taking a back door entry to control our lives. Marcus Aurelius puts the purpose of humans in a simple sentence, “The object of One’s life is not to be on the side of the majority; but to escape oneself into the ranks of the insane.”
Those three months of intense isolation and self analysis built the basis, I believe, of my overall understanding. This followed with a workaway job in Scotland after the lockdown, where I was in Huntly, Aberdeenshire with a couple working on their garden. This meant I was so disconnected with the world of news and all the chaos that the world was going through. I was going out on walks and enjoying this alone time with nature. I feel humbled to have had this experience which helped me grow as a human being. At some point when the world was being conditioned, I was away hibernating in my own little bubble.
I then moved on to Edinburgh where I lived with an art-collector/writer, Julian, who influenced me to read and write. This is where I start exploring the nature of this world. Reading into psychology and philosophy. Coming back to society after many months of living this way was a traumatic experience, I could hardly believe what I was seeing in England. The streets were empty, everyone was scared, politics had changed and it felt as if I left England and came back into an Orwellian England. There were cameras everywhere, the state of surveillance had shot up, people were acting as an app demanded them to. It was horrible to navigate through all this. Only a handful of my friends supported me through this time. Maja, Jago, Seb, Isabel, Gabriel helped me get through these tough times.
I was determined to avoid this trap of conditioning. I made a decision in my life that would change the way I live my day to day life. I decided to never give in to the society, into thoughts, ideas, ideologies, labels, and moreover the rules that are dictated upon me. This was not a sudden transition. By then, I had decided to pack up and move back to India. I moved straight into a village, which was primitive by all modern standards. It didn’t have any internet, mobile network, and the light was cut almost frequently. Upanishads, Puranas, Podcasts, psychedelic scholars and my grandparents became my go to guides as I dived into this quest of understanding and living a free life. I chose not to be a hermit, my grandparents lived alongside me. I worked in their farm, went for walks into the jungles, made friends with many locals who I had never met before. Narvan, on the west coast of India was my base for over 6 months.
By now, I was mature enough to know that the problems of the human society could not be blamed on any outside thing. I realised, that I was the main culprit in this entire movie. I had fictionalised this entire world in my head and my ignorance was avoiding me from seeing the good within the hearts of others. I also realised that all this ignorance was a huge technological mess. Going back into my past made me realise that I was more happier when I did not have to prove myself that often. I realised that it was my excessive addiction to social media; ie, Instagram and Whatsapp that had cultivated this need to keep proving myself to a void of strangers.
I took all the necessary steps to change the way I lived. I started replacing all my bad habits with good habits. That meant more yoga, more meditation, being more creative in everyday life and being honest in my thoughts and emotions. Plants became my friends, I cultivated this friendship with each one of them with a lot of love. They grew with me. As I started changing these habits, this world of internet, which was spewing out hate and ignorance onto my brain started diminishing. I was more aware of the situations, I felt a presence and used this as a guide to even deeper this search for knowledge and truth.
It was about time to use all this knowledge that I had accumulated for so long... Thoughts of walking had crossed my mind. If I were to use this knowledge, I knew I had to go into the unknown. I had to do something that no one had done before. So I embarked on a journey to walk to the eastern shore of India, starting from Narvan which was at the western shore.
The media had quickly turned me into a hero. A myth figure that would make the society laud and appreciate me, but not listen to what I had to really say. I was published into both the left and the right wing newspapers of India. I quickly realised how the media establishment in India was manipulating every thought of the Indian audience. I tried speaking truth with every reporter, but the lies were always a step ahead at all times. In the end I gave up on this quest to prove to the people. I started lecturing in every university and school that I would pass by. I found that to be the only neutral ground to discuss things that I was discussing. I was asking for everyone listening to me, to use their heads, to use their intellect and reject the ideas of the society.
I ended up walking over 1850 kms. I came back to write a book on this experience. The world is not how we are made to believe. Nature is a sacred force. We are all in a race to destroy ourselves at a much faster rate. I was thinking of Apocalypse. But this time it was the Greek meaning of apocalupsis that mattered, to die and re-generate. I understood that this world is a circle that only comes back to the start. A tree grows, gives flowers and fruit, they fall on ground and make way for a new tree to grow and so the cycle keeps repeating itself. We humans, are in the sweet middle spot of life and death witnessing this process of life and death. I realised that all names and labels had to be dropped to witness this world as it is.
By this time, all my friends had already found a job, married, and they were buying properties. I could see everyone getting lost into this maze of social media, news, politics, societal habits, which I had already dismissed from my mind a long time back. I took a decision to come back into this world of internet and write about the experiences I had, to show an alternative world that exists right here in front of us all. Through the writings that I shared on Instagram, and more so from the lectures, I got a feeling that many of you, like me, want to understand ourselves and in turn understand the world around us. That is why I have started this blog.
Understanding is easy when our minds are open. Truth is simple, but to be simple is the most difficult thing. To live in the moment and enjoy everything that comes our way; bad, good and evil, is to live in peace with the nature. I am still on this quest, finding meaning. It might be that I might not reach there, but by pushing ourselves we can start this journey to know ourselves better. So, today I am embarking on this new journey, through these yellowish pages. I hope you will accompany me as I dive into the depths of the abyss, to come back with a gem to share with all of you.
I hope you find what you seek. Peace.