In me, is there a Wanderer?

An Essay on the State of my Wandering Mind and Self

This is the dream that causes my existence to ache, for I am too attached to carry this out. This is the dream of a wanderer caught in the net of urban systems and institutions, willing to succumb to see a few smiles and a beg a few hugs. Is it all worth it? This summing up can only happen in my last moments, but I have gotten used not to regret anything - and this too shall pass as just an aching sore...

I attain Peace only through writing, for this is how I speak to myself. Am I a wanderer?

The most important thing for me is to grow inside and not outside, for that will take its natural course. My serious battle is with myself, my questions, and my travels. How do I intend to wander if I feel myself connecting and attaching everywhere? I feel compassion for every soul that passes my existence, whether they sell me a bus ticket or find me in this myriad of internet networks. Probably, the trick is not to detach, but to attach in a pure manner.

If I attach, philosophy tells me I am not free, but there I differ! Every soul has some wisdom to part towards you. My wandering lies in meeting people, many more as they come my way and I go towards theirs. This can be done through the simple physical practice of nomadic behaviour. But, sitting within my seat, hot and comfortable, in Chennai, I am still a wanderer. I wander day and night within myself, carefully sharpening my ears to another's trials, questions, searches, and knowledge.

This strikes me, when the most "mundane" questions are thrown my way. Not, when someone asks me "What is life?" or "Who are you?" (for these actually seem mundane and fixed within languages). But, when a bus conductor seriously questions a boy hanging out of the bus, "If you insist on hanging out and crowding the bus by not letting people in, how will I sell tickets and still save your life?" This is a trial many bus conductors live day in and day out. This, of course, can be solved by re-planning buses itself. Apparently, boys love hanging out of the bus for two simple reasons - it is the test of their youth, and the women sit on the left side next to the door. So, bus drivers could start selling the tickets, like done in the West, and the women could start sitting on the right. But, won't this put conductors into further turmoil, for they would have lost their jobs?

For me, the most important searches lie in trying to question our every day realities that involve more souls than anything else. This is not theology, strictly left to certain practicioners and theologists. This is not just the path for philosophers, anthropologists, sociologists, or any others who like to stay within their definitions. This is for those who are ready to live the every day life apart from the personal politics and ideologies, with a humble openness to receive and debate.

Again, this debate, though I testify an inner process, isn't reserved for the individual. It is the discipline of dialogue that strengthens this state. For a wanderer, doesn't need to free her physical proximities, but actually test her intimate proximities. Who are you willing to love? Who are you willing to tolerate? Who are you willing to receive?

If I let that creep who insisted on staring at my breasts just get away, I would really feel misused. Instead, I shout loud at him and further question myself and others, "What is it that men find so interesting or stimulating in looking at women in such a disrespecting manner?" This is not just sick behaviour, but a condition in itself. Why does a man feel justified when he does this? How can he find the right to blame my clothing? What brought about this condition? Women, cannot free themselves of this blame too. However, it may be progressionist for a woman to write about a penis, some women can get down to the insociable side of actually extracting pleasure from a rubbing a man's groin in the bus. Should a woman also start questioning a man's clothing? Why is it that women are told what is dirty and what is not, according to the men's conveniences? Why is masturbating looked at as a social and psychological dysfunction by counselors? My mind wanders.

It is only when I speak, ask and read, that I realize most of the times I do not ask new questions. However, this hardly matters. I ask, I imbibe and that is all that matters.

In order to wander, there are only two disciplines I have left to learn - the hardest. They are, to free my ego (not to suppress it, but to understand it as well as I understand desire in all its forms for myself) and to remain honest (this is the art of creating silence within oneself and the ability not to hurt another soul's integrity).

The art of creating silence does not mean suppressing, again. It is the art of strengthening decisiveness, the openness to mistakes, the ability to imbibe energy, beauty and knowledge from an entity (soul, idea, plant, elephant, etc), the simplicity of common sense, the sensibility of cultural propriety, the character of integrity, the humility to see beauty in every soul, and the sense of belief in the purity of existence and disappearance.

Silence, this is what this piece leaves me with now.

And...

Silence,

is what I intend to leave you with forever.

Breathe Silence.

Author's Note

These are questions I chose to ask myself, and questions I suggest others could ask themselves.