I rechecked once again the exact meaning of the word ‘Epiphany’, and then I came to know this. It is, “A sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.” After many months, started taking a silent and engaging walk on a momentous and breezy morning of summer I will never forget. Silent because, it was a revisit to earlier reflection of my most sought after true being with harmony of self; and engaging because it reinvented my ability to have a talk with myself which anyhow I lost in the mean time due to the uncontrolled growth of worry in which I was encapsulated. That worry, about the direction in which I was going, was however unwarranted.
We do not need authority every time to comment on the problems of life. What after all the authority means? They are actually the keen observers of the events, sequenced in the chain of epiphanies. The experts as they are called are sophisticatedly alert and active to sense the subtle trend of characters and pattern of behaviours reflecting out of occasional epiphanies. The hallmark of excellence is nothing but to deal with these apparently small epiphanies of daily life. These small things and incidences may be very redundant affairs for the person who is dealing with the professional virtues of precision and perfection but truly they are the gates towards getting ourselves exposed to the larger drama of reality unfolding in greater world outside our narrow imagination about what really a life constitutes for.
These epiphanies are not isolated events altogether. Interestingly it is our perception makes the epiphany out of an ordinary happening. Epiphany is like a traditional proverb, accumulating vast wisdom inherited since generations and still making a point to be uttered at particular moment, instance or crossroads of life. It is that state of receptive mind going beyond superficial attentive mind to grab the most obvious things to understand in non-obvious ways. Things do not happen just like that. They have rational meaning coming out of theoretical explanation through some practical mechanism to indicate towards larger possibilities.
It is a matter of supreme satisfaction that (if) we are discussing epiphanies every now and then. It is an evidence of hypocrisy coming due to wrong perception of authority, a feel of power and an arrogance of expertise when we see people ridiculing these moments which according to them are obscurely mundane. When we watch every day with great curiosity, we observe many things which are not privy to the mind obsessed with competing with others. When we discuss minute issues, emphasis added on micro, it gives strength to have grip of visualising scenarios which are much more dynamic, complex and vast in their expanse of existence.
When we claim that we gain experience over the time, what do we mean. It is actually a self-generated wisdom out of these trivial matters. The trivial, not because of a sense of futileness reflecting from it, but due to feeling it gives about rudimentary arrangement of the building blocks it gives about how we think, how we behave and how we act. It is not about talking in a superficial way and in vain about the things which shape routine times in our consciousness. It is however, our urge with deep eagerness to absorb the germ of the thoughts we believe in from the events unfolding in front of our eyes, every moment, every coming step of the road ahead.
A relation which empowers our every drop of blood is the conference room of such epiphanies. We constantly discuss about all these epiphanies to make the sense of the position and direction we are headed towards. We may not be academically sound in the deliberation about the true meaning of the daily events occurring but that does not matter. The fact that we never stop of debating about all these issues makes it more worthwhile. It gives a space to intercept the possible risks, uncertainties and destabilising factors in our today, tomorrow from having a brief look of the yesterday. What more, by having a frequent chat about all these things, we develop a capacity to overcome the problems which at the outset seem overwhelmingly challenging requiring audacious courage to contest those out rightly.
Therefore we need a mirror, very very transparent and reflective; so as to see the things they are, not as they should be. Then after watching those things in the mirror, we begin the conversation with mirror itself about how things should be. So, mirror is actually creator, disseminator of the values we are searching in the life. Discovery of that mirror enables us to search those values in every walk of life. In the mean time, mirror becomes everything. It becomes soul gravity of our being. We revolve around that mirror. We constantly need to have insights about life from that mirror. In a sense, that mirror evolves and ushers in a role which is actually a larger epiphany radiating the essence of our mortal life. We are in search of that radar and telescope which enlarges and maps the outer universe and distant future for us. We are in a passionate mood to construct that microscope which will tell us everything about us so honestly, so ruthlessly to shape our times in turn. The discovery of that epiphany in our mental and physical realms makes us profoundly happy and unquestionably wealthy.
When we ask ourselves about what is novel in our lives we should ponder over the exceptions rather than uniform criteria of achievements. Success, recognition and honours are really the pedestals strongly craved for. We earn respect after we gain something. We earn laurels of history when we lose something in a unique way like none has lost that in common ways. We do not discuss what legacy is hidden behind the silver appreciation and golden mementos. The persons who are keenly observing us are witnesses of the true meaning of legacy we are carrying with us. That legacy may not be qualified according to the principles of history but for our life, that legacy is no less than figment of history. A localised history, a history of solitude. Epiphany is the true historical account of our solitude.
None knows true inner being of ours better than the mind of epiphany. That mind may be enshrined in an epiphany of any pure human body, in a legendary book, in a great story of drama or film, in a symbol of inspiration, a deity deserving devoted worshipping or any material thing we consider worthy of adoring for it`s structural beauty. Then to instantaneously engage ourselves, to know the true meaning of epiphany is actually the sole and soulful project of our whole life. That project drives our every physical senses and divine aspirations. That project alone carries logic to live. Only that project gives excuses, justifications and mad reasoning to everything we do. That project in its entirety captures our every breath making ourselves desperate to die to embrace the spirit of that project. We become nothing but a small epiphany for that project which is actually the greatest epiphany of our life.
So, epiphany is whole universe of imagination and living for us. If there are no epiphanies we will not understand, rather we will never try to interpret the extraordinary out of ordinary. Epiphany makes us selfless to respect the virtues of the nature around us only to enrich us in return. That enrichment is like royal lighthouse which bestows upon us the enlightened pragmatic philosophy which everyone chases to have at their disposal by paying any value. Philosophy, not coming out of its shear rational logic, but to give a vision. To understand it better, let me quote what William Somerset Maugham said, “The value of art is not beauty, but right action.” Isn`t it! Let us go for right action and then see maybe we could realise beauty of the art. An art of making sense of epiphany and an art of linking that sense to the larger story of life unfolding by the expression of all the proud and regretful epiphanies.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No comments:
Post a Comment