About spirituality among other issues…

I’ve always thought helping a blind man reach the foot over bridge is a better way of reaching god than a week long fast (read self-torture), where you deny yourselves food and water. Torturing the body that the divinity up there so benevolently gave us.

I think even the idea of fasting doesn’t stop there. Isn’t fasting supposed to be saving the food that you have and giving the rest to the needy? Like the haves giving part of what they have to the have-nots? Like bourgeoisie to proletariat?

I’m not atheist. I don’t think there is life in stone idols either, nor am I a great supporter of the Brahmos. I go to the temple when I feel like, for a change. Usually it is when I’m expecting something and mom says, “Pray to god and everything will be fine.” Dad has a better way of putting it. “Walk to that uphill temple and back, it’s a good exercise, you know. While you are at it, also say hi to Ayappa,” he would say.

I go to the temple because of vested interests, because I have something to ask of Him. Ayappa Temple in Ambarnath west is good for its quiet. I hate it when they put on those devotional tapes. The same is with the temple at Mumbra, though when it is not the tapes, it’s either music from people's mobile phones or the smoke from someone’s cigarette that make me grind my teeth together.

My idea of spirituality seems to be different. It is what sociologists like to call humanity. It is behaving the way good samaritans would, helping out. Not going out of the way to do anything, but doing what one must while at one’s own work. Helping blind men find their way. Spreading smiles. Petting animals you find on the road. Giving a seat to a wrinkled old man or a really fat woman (who’s otherwise obstructing movement inside the train compartment).

I find peace in being quiet. Being blank. Nothing to think. No idol. No prayer beads. No mat. No incense. Just me. Time with me. Quality time.