J. Krishnamurthi an Indian philosopher stated in one of this books that we are spiritual beings having a human experience. That statement did not mean much to me when I read it 20 years ago. All it meant to me was that we were here on this earth because we chose to be so, and to experience whatever we came here for.
So for the past 20 years I have been living a life grounded in that belief that since we are spiritual beings all is going to be ok and well as we return to being spiritual again when we pass on. So how can anything really go wrong in the big picture of life unless we chose to make it wrong or miserable. We had the power to do it as we chose our experiences.
My internal conversation on this is being shared here and now under the subject of “compassion” because I realized the deeper meaning of this word and the higher meaning of life when my brother passed away a year and three months ago.
My brother Sunil was always trouble some all his life. He started smoking when he was in the 10th grade and drinking alcohol sometime soon after that. His substance abuse habits were always troublesome to us as a family and all the people around us. We tried to make him wrong all the time and he rebelled more. There was no end to this drama till his passing in May of 2017. He was in alcohol rehabs most of his adult life, in jail once. His wife and daughter left him as they could not take his habits anymore and moved on.
In all this drama we always made him wrong because of what he did, and this cycle just continued. What was he rebelling about all his life, maybe it was just to be heard, maybe if we just heard him and reasoned with him out of true love, maybe – but we do not know for sure as other than my mother and father who had the most patience with him, everybody else avoided him. He contention was that he loved us all and he was doing everything for love, our contention was that he was using us for his survival. We did not know the answer to this then and we still wonder what the right way of behaving around him was.
On his deathbed he mentioned to my mom and sister that he was sorry for everything. I was not there at that time but just hearing that story I could tell he was sorry. It was like his soul was apologizing for all that it had caused in our lives. The soul, hmmm…the interesting twist was that this was the first time we thought he had a soul. Maybe the soul was going through all the experiences it was going through for having come into this world and we were judging it as right and wrong. Who were we to be judging it all the time, thus causing more pain and suffering for the person and ourselves. Maybe our acceptance of the person or his/her soul just as is/was would have bought more understanding in one’s life and less rebellion. Our human branding of good and bad caused the person to rebel more. Our human justification that we were victimized due to his presence of how we were treated caused more rebellion from the person’s soul. Maybe or maybe not. we do not know the answer.
Then there is the subject of God and our faith in the middle of all this. If God was there, somewhere, then why did he place this person in our life – to cause us more trouble and in turn be troubled also! Or maybe he paced that person in our life to fulfill that person’s, soul’s experiences in this lifetime and also based on the interactions with that person’s soul we completed our own experiences. So, in the bigger picture it all fits, the jigsaw puzzle of life was perfect, we as human beings are placed or born into the perfect surroundings and perfect relations, friends and human interactions to complete all of our experiences that our soul came here for. We do not know that, but for a moment just consider that this was the case. Then this was a perfect world right! All the people who are in our life and all the people who come in touch with us in our everyday life was completing his or her own experiences and also helping you complete yours in their interacting with us.
If this was all perfect, then why is there so much suffering with people around us all the time. That is because we do not realize that we as our souls are here to complete our journey in our own way by interactions with other people in our lives. During the process we struggle with people in our lives not knowing that they were there for a perfect reason i.e. to help you complete your journey. Once we understand this we find compassion for all human beings because we realize that each one is here for his or her own journey and it is all perfect. Once we get this we get other peoples suffering as just something that is the way it is. How they interact with us and make our life miserable or happy is just our interpretation of life.
Knowing this today I see that I should have treated my brother with love and compassion as he was coming from a place of love and his actions were just reflections of what we were throwing at him. If we threw more love his way maybe his life could have been different. If we were not so quick to judge his actions as right or wrong maybe we could have cherished more of him and his soul’s purpose.
In spite of all this when I look at the bigger picture of life. I became a successful business man in life because I wanted to get away from him and his actions. I moved to the USA from India as I wanted to get away from him as he was a burden on the family and I wanted out of there. Ten years ago I forgave him for everything that he had done and for the way he treated me all this life. That got be a lot of peace as I finally forgave him or forgave myself for who I was being around him. So – I turned out this way because of him, right? That was a revelation that I did not get till he passed away. All my success and my understanding of life in a way was because of him. Now I got that he was in my life to fulfill his life’s journey, I do not know what that was, but it did fulfill mine for sure. If only I saw deeper into this soul I could have at least have cherished his love when he was alive.
I guess when we make our choices we make them one of two ways, one through choosing wisely and one made out of ego. The choice made from being wise is easy to change as it is logical that is used to change to undo your first choice. The choice made from ego is the hard one to change as the ego will not back down from the choice even though it knows it might be wrong. Then is when people have to take a step back and analyze the choice and choose to remake their choice or stick with their choice based on a higher conscience of self-awareness and compassion for everyone and everything – not from a place of ego centric behavior. This breaks the pattern of the ego and brings the person more in tune with everything around them.
This whole story about “compassion” was to share that I finally got that everyone is where they are because that is where they want to be. Have compassion for their choices. They are not your choices to make. You have made yours – do not expect them to follow your choices. If they do they are not fulfilling their life’s purpose – you have no idea what that is. So, have compassion for everyone where ever they are in their life. This will cause acceptance of people where they are and where they stand. This will only happen if we accept that each and every one born is trying to fulfil their purpose for what every they were born to do or to discover, whatever that may be – it is their path.
I see so many relationships break, people fighting with each other, people cheating each other for an extra buck, maybe all this will be less if we just understood that all we need is more compassion in our life for everyone and everything and to accept them where they are. They should be coming “from a being/place of love” for everyone or everything rather “than coming for love” in their relationships.
Today my world has changed for the better. People are the most important relationships I have. God comes second. If I treat all the people right and journey with them to fulfill any facet of their life’s journey and help them along their path I am happy. They could also be there to help me in my path, so to recognize that all people are there in my life for a reason is very important for me. Then I thank God for putting them in my path. Isn’t that what’s it’s all about!