Written Messages

Paris – Delhi Flight

July 10, 2008

1)    There was a dinner get-together hosted by a family with a curiosity about Shibendu but not with any genuine interest or deep enquiry in his work.

In the symbolic Biblical story, it is not the eating of the forbidden fruit, but the idle and stupid curiosity that is the “original sin”! Curiosity was the separative (satanic) consciousness which resulted in the fall from heavenly divinity that is the non-divisive happy awareness. Thus sorrow and suffering became the hallmark of mankind disconnecting humanity from the Holy and the Sacred. Curiosity, as we can see, emanates from the clumsy and complicated ego which is filled with borrowed concepts and conclusions, surmises and speculations, imaginations and influences, delusions and dullness, assertions and arrogance giving rise to all kinds of conflicts, confusions and compulsions.

Comprehension and its sacred energy is the outcome of deep enquiry and exploration (Swadhyay) into the inner affairs of our timeless being as also the outer affairs of our time-bound becoming – without the interference from the ego-center. Comprehension is Cosmos, whereas Curiosity is Chaos. Comprehension is the dance of divinity, whereas Curiosity merely proliferates neurotic doubts and nonsensical desires.

So in this dinner get-together, Shibendu talked only briefly, but nobody listened. They were busy in sharing drinks from wine bottles and when they saw that Shibendu is not participating in the process, there were exciting and entertaining justifications and rationalization declaring that wine is medicinally recommended too. Fermentation of wine is the fortification of fragmentation in the wicked consciousness of human beings. Talking about light does not bring sight to the blind. Shibendu just kept mum.

Shibendu’s ecstasy is real and infinite, not to be found in escapes through drinking. Human beings are pitifully deficient in the ability to comprehend and control the consequences of their fears, greed, envies and stupidities. They cannot free themselves of the disease of “my god”, “my country”, “my language”, “my culture”, “My family”, “my house”, “my Guru” and so on.

2)    Vast Black Sea in front and a beautiful mountain range behind, Shibendu was in dialogue with devotee-friends of Varna (Bulgaria). One of them asked: How does this little illusion “I” obscure the vast intelligence (Chaitanya) available in our body? How does this upstart “I” block the energy of understanding (Chiti-Shakti) with which we are endowed? How does this hoax “I” camouflage the holy?

Well, some small dust in your eyes will not allow you to see the vast sea and the big mountain range which are here. So the fictitious dichotomy in your consciousness will definitely darken the fathomless divinity in the human awareness!

3)    An outstanding priest of Bulgarian Orthodox Church came to see Shibendu and said something rather unexpected: Christians maintain that God is far away in heaven and you must strive, struggle and suffer a lot to reach Him. Communists say that the ecstasy of divinity is right here, very near, just around. Just get rid of the divisions and bring an end to the exploitation of man by man.

Only the priest of a former Communist country can perhaps utter something so profound. But then what went wrong? The big “I” implementing the ideals of Communism so brutally, became the biggest division and dichotomy and thus exploitations and classes continued under different banners. And the expected ecstasy of paradise was lost. Priests with their crafts and cunning business are in control of humans again, driving the divinity far away!

Wherever the divisive – separative “I” psyche – is the center of performance, there has to be havoc ultimately. And when “no-I”, the Chaitanya is at the helm of affairs, there is the holy Utopia.

Jai Utopia