He stared blankly at the words flashing on his monitor. He felt that the walls of his tiny cubicle were about to move and crush him between them. So what if they were made of ply? It weren’t the walls, but the cubicle that was going to crush him. The conditioned cold air blew out ceaselessly from the vent above him, touching his scalp after crossing the dense mat of curled hair that lay over it. Everything was silent, as it always was in and around his cubicle. Yes, they spoke, cracked jokes, laughed, shared facts and figures and discussed what they were doing in this silence. But they took ample care not to let their voices develop a crack on its surface.
All was in place. At the end of the month, he would receive a message on his technologically advanced phone from the bank dealing with his company saying that a fat amount had been credited by the company into his salary account. Whenever he revealed the name of his company to the people he met, they would start respecting him more. His visiting card took a minute more for the receiver to believe that the person whose card he is handling is actually on the position mentioned on the card. He had a cubicle of his own, which most of his colleagues and juniors spent at least a moment each day dreaming of being in. In the parking space owed by his company, stood a vehicle which automobile enthusiasts on the roads which it ran used to stare at, waiting for him to plug in the ignition key. In his pocket, he carried another key, to a lavish flat which he had rented to make a home out of it. No brands detached themselves from his attire. Each week ended with at least two parties at two top-notch waterholes in the city. And women, struck by his affluence, were ready to fall at his feet and on his bed, to associate himself with him. Nothing was less. Yet something was amiss. Bloody life!
Welcome to the life of Mr. Subodh Mirajkar. The young achiever. And proud son of middle-class government servant parents Praveen and Madhvi Mirajkar. A diligent SEC B boy who made it big – of course, not that big, but quite big as per the middle class standards – totally on his own. No godfather, no cheap tactics, no politics just hard work, dedication, innovation, motivation and all other words which appear in those management and self help books that people of his cadre are often found reading in their extra time.
And soon, Mr. Subodh Mirajkar, one of the several Asst. Vice Presidents of the world’s most respected financial institution - Metrobank Corp., which believed that ‘Metros never sleep’, was about to tie himself in the knot of happiness and immense joy, with Ms. Sonal Daftardar. Another of his kind, selected for him by his proud parents and accepted by him after scrutinizing almost every girl in his caste, showcased on all the leading matrimony sites, after meeting them several times and rejecting them finally. Sonal was the one he could not reject. She was beautiful, smart, intelligent, had a job like him in a corporation like his, earning a salary which equaled his and a streak of attractiveness that had hit Subodh hard. She too had no qualms in accepting Subodh as her life partner. He was just the man she had thought of all these years, to share the rest of her life with her. Her prince charming probably. He loved her. She loved him. It was a god-made couple. Ready to begin a life in unison in a short span of time. Most probably after their next appraisals.
Life was just the way it should have been for a young high-level corporate executive.
Yet, Subodh today stared at a screen filled with numbers in MS Excel sheets that were a key to his company’s and in turn his own happiness, with a growing feeling of hollowness within.
He wanted to pick up and crash the monitor on the floor. Whirl the keyboard away. Kick the CPU in its hard disk and smash the walls of his cubicle. He wanted to spray the entire space that was called office with volatile fluids and turn it into a bonfire. If possible, he could behead everybody around him and paint the floor with the stains of blood gushing out from the abrupt ends of their blood vessels. He wanted to crash his car into something indestructible and turn it into a huge piece of metallic junk instantly, with assorted parts lying around it. He wanted to destroy every thing. Every-fucking-thing!
He put his hand into his bag and pulled out a peach that he was carrying today - a part of his fitness improvement schedule through consumption of fruits daily. He hurriedly opened his swiss-knife, chose the usual knife and violently cut it into two pieces, spraying its juice over one of the cubicle walls. He wanted to cut it into two equal halves. But the seed right in the center of it wouldn’t let him do so.
He had to cut it in to two unequal halves.
***
“Is there something more you want to tell?” Dr. Padhye asked him inquisitively.
“No” Subodh was firm on his answer.
“See... you won’t feel better till you open yourself completely...” Dr. Padhye egged on.
“Nothing Doc, just all tat I told you... ” Subodh began lifting himself up from the recliner chair in Dr. Padhye’s counseling room.
This rising feeling of unrest that had been boiling within him , has led Subodh to Dr. Padhye. One of the city’s leading psychiatrists. It had been eight sittings till date. But Subodh still felt such moments of outbursts which engulfed his mind with the feeling of causing massive destruction. Following Dr. Padhye’s suggestion, he would divert the rage into destroying something smaller and less important than everything around him – like the Peach.
In each session, Dr. Padhye tried to delve into his past to unearth the seeds of incidents that had germinated and grown into these sudden thoughts that occupied Subodh’s mind. He asked questions about the phases he had gone through, got clarifications on events and their after effects, inquired about people in his life and their behaviors, he tried to dig in deeper, till he reached the rock. Every disclosure stopped right there and he had to trail all the way back to the surface of conscious behavior, to continue with his investigation. There was a point after which Subodh stopped revealing his life to Dr. Padhye. And Dr. Padhye was steadfast on crossing that point to pull Subodh out of his slowly strengthening process of self-destruction.
“Subodh... at your age... usually people suffer from an age-relate crisis in which they feel that they haven’t attained something in spite of being of this age.... it occurs typically as people approach their thirties... even though we still call it the mid-youth crisis.... ”
The specification relieved Subodh. In every visit to Dr. Padhye, he expected him to confirm a mental disorder for him and stamp him mentally ill. Yes, of course he might get his sick leaves for it, or he might even get kicked out from the corp. But he cared less about such subsidary issues in these visits to Dr. Padhye. He wanted to be diagnosed with a problem. He wanted to assure himself that there was something wrong inside his skull. He needed a rigid justification for the waves of anger and violence he felt swelling inside him. He needed to convince himself that it was not what had been churning inside him for years that triggered these thoughts. And what Dr. Padhye just said, did that for him. Now he had a medical condition which could be blamed for the turmoil in him. Subodh was happy.
“Do you feel there is something that everybody else has except you?” Dr. Padhye’s eyes pierced into his.
“No...” Subodh spoke out words coated with confidence.
“Something that you don’t have... but some person in particular has?” Dr. Padhye’s eyes still held their grip on Subodh’s.
Subodh flinched.
***
Subodh is a bit tall. Not too tall. As tall as a hunky male should be. He is naturally well built. Plus he hits the gym everyday, toning out the cuts and curves on his body. He has dark, curly hair, which he has maintained to an average length of four inches approximately. And he is judiciously fair.
Sonal is taller than any average chic. Of course not as tall as Venezuelan model, but decently tall. She too works out, but innovatively. Like Aerobics and Power Yoga, etc. which help her to maintain an attractive figure. Her assets are well in place and size. She has straight dark hair, which shine. Thanks to all the nourishment that the shampoos these days provide. She has a gorgeous smile, beautiful large eyes and she is fairer than Subodh.
When they are together, they appear to be soulmates. When they talk to each other, they appear to be soulmates too.
“Hey cutiepie!” That’s what Subodh addressed her as. After every counseling session, she insisted on meeting him to know about the latest proceedings in his therapy. And each time she had to be disappointed, because of Dr. Padhye’s inability to identify the disorder or ailment that was tightening its grip on Subodh.
“Hey sweetypie!” she came and bend over to hug Subodh who didn’t get up from his couch to welcome her. Yes, that was what Subodh was addressed as.
“Did my honey bunny go to the shrink today?” She asked dropping the overloaded purse and the laptop bag mounted on her shoulder on the empty couch besides theirs.
“Yaa my sweet plum...” Subodh answered.
“And what did the shrinky say to my bunny rabbit?” She pinched his nose gently.
“Shrinky said that this li’l dolly should not worry... her bunny rabbit is fine...” He put his arm around her.
“Naaaa... tell your guardian angel the truth na honey bunny...” she said in a childish tone hitting her fist on his arm playfully.
“Really my cutiepie...” He put his arm around her and looked into her eyes.
“Na! na! na!... tell me what the shrinky said!” She added a bit more childishness to her tone.
Subodh took a few moments to decide if he should go ahead with the disclosure of his newly detected mental illness. Sonal, immediately apprehended his hesitation and came closer to him. She rest her palm on his cheek and looked at him lovingly.
“Tell me sweetiepie... what did the Doctor say?” she asked softly.
The moment she touched Subodh, he felt a strong wave of repulsion arising out of his spine and spreading through his body.
Words arose like gases from the marshes of thoughts that had gathered in him and began floating inside him. He suddenly wanted Sonal to stop speaking. He severely wished that her words wouldn’t reach his ears at that moment. He tried hard to deter her overflowing emotions from reaching him. He wanted her to just stay put wherever she was. He did not at all need her poignant reactions at this moment. No crying, no weeping, no sudden outburst of sympathy. He did not want anything of that at all now. All he wanted was her to shut up!
“Tell me my sweetheart... Did he say that there’s something serious?” she almost had tears in her eyes. But the line had ticked off Subodh by now.
The words in his mind got clearer. He read them aloud in his mind.
‘Fuck you bitch! Just fuck off!’ his mind shouted. ‘Shut your fucking mouth up and shove all your lovey dovey shit up your arse! I don’t need this crap. Leave me. Leave me now you psycho bitch! Get lost! I don’t need your crap. Just stop this fucking pansy and pretentious behaviour of yours! Fuck off. Just fuck off!’ The words filled him up occupying every inch and corner of his body. His palms curled into fists, rigid enough to crush his own bones. Annoyance pumped up engulfing him in a smouldering fury. He felt an insuppressible urge to shout aloud rise inside him. His temples throbbed and sweat trickled down his side-locks. He could feel its slow progression. A bout of flaring energy covered his body. Unable to behold its force, it began trembling. He could fling away everything before him, the chairs, tables, couches, even Sonal and bang his fists on the walls of the cafe till they cracked and crumbled down, burying him inside its rubble. He wanted those huge blocks of concrete to come down pounding on his chest and bend his ribs to pierce into his lungs. He wanted his head to be smashed by one such concrete block and finish all that resides inside it. Words, thoughts, emotions, feelings and memories. Destroy it all. At his own cost, if need be.
He forcefully diverted all of his vehemence into his knee and gently touched the coffee table with it. The cafe was filled with a large crashing sound. He opened his eyes. The frame of the coffee table lay upturned before him. Its glass shattered into countless little pieces that spread all over the floor like a galaxy. Two broken coffee cups sunk in them drenching the shards of glass around them in double shot espresso. He looked at Sonal in astonishment. She was staring at him in shocked teary eyes. Before he could hold her hand and explain anything to her, he stood up, mounted her purse and her laptop on her shoulder and left away weeping. He looked around. All eyes stared at him in bewilderment and annoyance. The same annoyance that had ignited an unexplained frenzy in him a few moments ago.
As the attendant came over to assess the situation, Subodh looked straight at him and asked in perplexity.
“What happened?”
***
“No, Yoga cannot heal anything” said the Guru, “Yes... but it can help you regain control son”.
No. He didn’t want to come to this place. Not that it sucked or something. But discomfort almost choked him whenever he stood at the gates of it. An unexplained repulsion stuffed him as he approached this place. There were times when he even rejected the idea of entering its premises and returned back home.
But times come, when one has to confront the demons of fear residing within, to overcome a much bigger evil. Subodh didn’t have much of an option now.
The growing rage of embracing spirituality had been rampant in Subodh’s office too. Statistically speaking, nearly 64.32% of the staff in his office was down with spirituality. Including Rohan, who next to him, who shared everything in his life with Subodh, including endless bottles of beer. That, with obviousness made Subodh liable to share the intricacies of his life with him. Subodh didn’t have much problem with it, except at moments when he provided Subodh with some pretentious solutions to his problems. At such times, Subodh wanted to break one of the available beer bottles on his head. But those feelings were just momentary.
“Guruji can help you...” He had said sipping from his third tumbler of beer. “I have found so much of peace since I have started following him... You too will benefit from him... don’t worry... just go and listen to him in first few sessions... you don’t even need to perform any aasan... ”
“Hmmm... ” Subodh replied looking into his tumbler of beer, reacting coolly to counter Rohan’s alcohol-induced enthusiasm.
“You should really give it a try. It’s worth it. His guidance will help you a lot....” Rohan continued with zeal of conviction.
Subodh stayed unmoved by his opinions. And a bit annoyed. He diverted himself from the conversation by focussing on finishing the beer in his tumbler. He was genuinely not interested. Not that it was some sham or something. Just that he wasn’t eager enough to take that path. He had heard a lot about Guruji and his fast popularising yogic cult. That too before any of these faddists like Rohan had even a slightest idea of Guruji’s existence. That evening Subodh sank himself in beer, shutting his ears to Rohan’s blabber.
But after the incident at the cafe, he thought he should find a way to put an end to his sudden bouts of angst. Visiting the shrink was fine. But it wasn’t yielding any concrete solutions. He still felt the rigors of rage gripping him from time to time. Each time it occurred he felt ashamed. Self hatred tainted his each thought for days. And more than anything else, he used to be taken aback by his outburst. He found it hard to believe his own actions. This realisation killed his spirit. The outcome of his flare-ups kept chewing his conscience every moment. Everything coalescenced into an endless trance of self-loathing, forming a cocoon around himself. Subodh wanted to break it and set himself free from this daze at the earliest. He wanted to breathe the air of solace. And in the desperateness of it, he thought of giving Guruji’s wisdom a try.
He was never that convinced about seeking guidance from Guruji completely. Even after he had made up his mind to attend his discourses. So he thrice walked up to the gates of Guruji’s Ashram, and turned back. Though he thought he had convinced himself enough for it, there was something deep within which was preventing him from taking the route. Not conscience or sixth sense, but an unidentified repulsion towards the place. Some unknown force deep within ultimately killed all the inspiration that he gathered inside him to enter Guruji’s world. Again, he didn’t know where it came from. Just like his antagonistic outbursts.
Each time the memory of the incident at the cafe stung him hard, he felt a frantic urge inside him to find an escape route. With time, he had expected it to wither off. Instead, the feeling caught a stronger hold of him with the passage of time. And so did the desperateness to free from its clutches.
“Everybody comes here with a purpose...” Guruji said when Subodh sat face-to-face with him, as a part of an interview that Guruji took before accepting disciples. Had it been a job interview, Subodh would’ve tackled it with flair of confidence and charm. He was trained for it in the management college. And a prodigy like Subodh had grasped every bit of it, imbibing it in his persona. The result was, he was picked up by his company, before anybody else, leaving his other classmates green-eyed. After all, it was the job, his entire classroom was dreaming of.
But he didn’t rightly know how to prepare himself for a spiritual interview like this one. He wasn’t trained for it, no book spoke of it and none of the Google search results were much useful in it.
Subodh had entered Guruji’s room with a bit of uncertainty regarding the questions Guruji would ask and the answers he would be able to give. But Guruji seemed like an expert interviewer. After being an imperative corporate world for nearly two decades, one fine day Guruji decided to give up everything and dedicate his life for promoting this age-old school of physical exercise. Who would know more about interviewing people more than him?
“... What is your purpose?” Guruji asked soothingly.
Subodh took a while to answer the question. He couldn’t decide what exactly his purpose was - to escape from the growing discomfort, to liberate himself from the binds of an inexplicable rage, or to reach out to the source of that rage and resolve it completely. He decided to present Guruji with the premises of his crisis and let Guruji decipher it. He narrated the incidents to Guruji in the order of their occurrence, last being the one at the coffee shop.
“And you didn’t realise that you were verbally abusing your girlfriend in a public place?” Guruji asked with mild astonishment.
“...No... I thought I was just speaking it in my mind... but... ” Subodh looked for the right way to put it.
“If one know where his rage germinates from... he can uproot it... but when one is unaware of the origin of his anguish... he can do nothing else, but combat it... ” Guruji stood up and walked towards Subodh. He then rested his hand on Subodh’s shoulder. “You haven’t yet told me your purpose... ”, he said.
The revived memories of all the outrages had clogged Subodh’s mind. He felt stifled by their presence in his thoughts. He wanted to bang his palms on his heads so that these thoughts clinging to his mind could be knocked off.
“Can you heal this anger with your yoga Guruji?” He blurted out in despair.
The question was meant to be more of rhetoric. But Guruji stepped forth to answer it.
“No, Yoga cannot heal anything...Yes... but it can help you regain control”.
“How?” Subodh was curious. Guruji’s answer seemed like ray of hope in the darkness that had gathered around Subodh’s life. He was developing a belief that Guruji’s knowledge could take him to his desired destination. And to ascertain this belief, Subodh was eager to know what remedy Guruji would suggest.
“There are mainly five types of Yoga. Each one disciplines one aspect of life. Dnyana Yoga disciplines your knowledge, Bhakti Yoga disciplines your devotion, Karma Yoga disciplines your lifestyle, Hath Yoga disciplines your body and Raaj Yoga disciplines your mind... That’s what you need... a disciplined mind that is in control of all its emotions... And Raaj Yoga can help you with it... ”
“What will I have to do in Raaj Yoga?” Subodh asked quickly, with the sort of enthusiasm one has when he has discovered a solution to his problem and wants to begin executing it right away.
“See Mr. Subodh... Raaj Yoga is a higher order of yoga... You can only perform it when you have prepared your body for it through Hath Yoga...” Guruji said with a sigh.
“Okay... I am ready...” Subodh replied with the fervour with which he usually took up responsibilities in board meetings.
“First know what are ready for before you are ready for anything...” Guruji snapped sternly, in a calm demeanour.
“I didn’t quite get it...” Subodh was a bit baffled by Guruji’s response.
“Hath Yoga is a long procedure... which will require you to master all the Aasans... and this might take some time... maybe days... or months... or even years...” Guruji elaborated his stance.
“Is there any other way Guruji?... I mean...” unknowingly, Subodh blurted out.
Before Subodh could cover up for his impulsive reaction, Guruji smiled. “That’s why I said ‘Know what are ready for before you are ready for anything...’ I knew it looking at you that you don’t have much patience... ”
Subodh felt embarrassed.
“Once there was a prince...” Guruji began, “He was almost of your age... one day he came face to face with the realities of life... and he set out to discover the true meaning of life... he acquainted the world with supreme knowledge about life... Name of this prince was Gautam Buddha... and do you know how he gained this supreme knowledge?”
“By meditating....?” Subodh answered uncertainly.
“It’s called Vipassyana...” Guruji clarified. “Vipassyana means seeing things the way they are... Somehow I have a deep feeling that there is a fact which you are concealing behind the walls of illusions which you have built for yourself... Vipassyana might help you to get rid of these illusions and unravel the fact that is disturbing you, causing your illusions to get distorted... That is where I feel your anger originates from... try it out... maybe it is the medicine you have been looking for, to heal your troubled soul....”
***
Subodh opened his eyes with a flash. Once again, he had failed in his attempt. It was the fifteenth day. And still, there was a thought on which his entire process of meditation came to a halt. A thought he could not observe by detaching himself from it - the way a Vipassi should be doing. One thought, or a thought related to it, always absorbed a part of Subodh into it, and Subodh just lost it. It was an irresolvable impediment in Subodh’s path of Vipassyana.
From the day Guruji had suggested Subodh to take up Vipassyana, he gathered every book available on it and went through every website speaking of it. Nedless to say, most of them were the same and talked about the same topics in a similar fashion. But Subodh did not want to leave any stone unturned. He assimilated every bit and piece of information he could and prepared himself for the journey within.
Vipassyana is a serious and a hard task, the books and websites said. And it began with a much serious and a harder task – abstinence. Vipassyana required complete abstinence from activities like killing, stealing, lying, intoxication and sex. Even though Subodh wasn’t actively involved in any killings, he refrained from being a reason of them too. He gave up non-vegetarian food, to begin with. Along with it, he also gave up killing mosquitoes that bit him. He never stole. Sometimes, he forgot to return things like lighters, pens or nail-clippers which he borrowed from his colleagues. So he stopped borrowing. Being in the business, lying was a very difficult thing to avoid, so he took up silence. Don’t talk, don’t lie. He made the equation simple for himself. Desisting intoxication was a much difficult task than abstaining from lying. He stuffed the bar at his home with all the alcohol, weed, hash and tablets he used to party with and locked it, throwing away the keys into the small creek which he had to cross daily on his way to office. He never was an addict, but this was a way he chose to keep himself away from these occasional pleasures. And sex. He stopped interacting completely with all the women with whom he maintained steady physical relationships. This was the most critical part. Whenever Subodh came across an attractive girl, even a minimally attractive one, he wanted to get laid with her. He was in a constant attempt to take some girl or the other to his bedroom. Sometimes he succeeded in it, sometimes he didn’t. Whenever he didn’t, he put in more efforts to see to it that he succeeded the next time. As if he was in an everlasting competition with himself. Like he wanted to desperately prove something to himself. Or to the people around him. Or to the world. Or to someone in particular...
The book said that a Vipassyi – one involved in the practice of Vipassyana, should seclude himself from the world, whenever he plans to meditate. His place for meditation should preferrably be a small cell or a room with enough space for a Vipassyi to sit cross-legged and meditate. He inspected every corner of his house to find one such place. But every corner of his house spoke of lavishness. Finally, there was a place which could provide him with necessary conditions for meditation. He got the unused bathroom in his guest bedroom cleaned by his maid and put a meditation mat there.
In and out... in and out... A Vipaasyi concentrates on his breath. That is how Vipassyana begins. One has to concentrate on his breath. Once you begin doing that, the thoughts that lay idle in your mind, begin to rise and whirl around you. One of them stays lingering before you. But a Vipassyi is not supposed to get involved with it. He or she just has to observe it. You cannot pass a judgement on it, you cannot review it, you just have to observe it. Then the thought leads to another one, from there to another one. And a Vipassyi keeps observing it, if needed, noting it down in his mind. Sometimes imagination replaces thoughts. It reaches untouched heights. It transforms and deforms itself. Creates illusion, situations and fuses dreams with life. But a Vipassyi has to prevent himself from getting carried away by them.
Subodh concentrated on his breath. A stream of thoughts flowed out of his mind. Thoughts from every aspect of his life. In a first few attempts, he would get involved with them, and then realise he had exited his Vipassyana. He would begin concentrating on his breathing again, and a new thought would arise. This continued till a point Subodh got fed up of his eager sensitivity. Disappointed by it, Subodh lost interest in everything, as a feeling of worthlessness began and growing in him. Transversely, it led him to lose interest in the thoughts his mind generated and started looking at them like a stranger. The process of observing thoughts began.
Sometimes he felt a pain in some part of his body. He observed it. The pain grew and subsided through his course of observation. Slowly the thoughts and feelings he could observe grew in number. But he always came down to one thought and his Vipassyana collapsed. It happened with him this time too.
A muscle twitched in his right bicep. He saw it transform into a light pressure. It was than when a part of his mind felt proud of the bulge in his bicep. The mind then felt a bit weary as it fondled with the thought of gym work out which had toned the bicep. A memory from the past arose from that thought. It mentioned how the bicep was before Subodh started working out. Before all that protein shake and nutrition was absorbed by it. Before the instructor suggested how much iron he should pump and how. It was just an average arm with an average layer of fat on it. Nothing special. Subodh then felt the light pressure on his bicep become a gentle pain. The gentle pain released waves of pleasure in his arm. He observed his heart beating faster. A feminine voice spoke something to him. It wasn’t clear. The voice sounded familiar. It got clearer. He recognised the voice instantly.
“You too should try Vipassyana once...” The woman behind the voice said.
***
