To Become Nothing...!!!

[Venu]

Excerpts from a latenight musing

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What does it mean to become nothing? Why do we yearn to become someone or something? Asserting ourselves that we are somewhat different or superior from others and..everything else..what is this desire all about? To become a scientist, a scholar, a politician, a musician, ...a philontropist, a criminal..a someone...where is it taking us? The desire to get whatever we want, to get things that are not ready to be associated with us, a desire to stop things and make them dance to our tunes..??

Dogs don't need shoes to walk, cars to travel, yet they are also living. They don't need foamfilled beds to sleep in. They never needed viagra. Would man have survived the cold without a heater if he trained himself to be that way?
"Dogs are great teachers. They are at home in the world. They live in the moment, and they force us to stay there with them. Dogs love us unconditionally, not for our bodies or bank accounts"--Susan Cheever, New York Times Book Review. Courtesy of Reader's Digest April 2000 Issue.
What's this desire all about? The desire to write whatever comes into my mind, to make it a permanent reference, ....to go thru some travail and afterwards claim that I have been victorious, and that am a survivor. Survivor of what? Thinking from a bird's point of view, I might have missed out a thousand other wonderful experiences in my life because of whatever I'm so focussed on now. Focus. Aim. Career. Money. Either my degree or job or family life...so engrossed I'm with "my" that I don't see the striking beauty that springs around me. I go to school, seep my blood with words that make no sense to my heart, write some exams, my concern being only how I could convince a few professors and a few "learned" ones of this world, and to forget everything else, go to work, avoid human faces and prefer mute machines instead, get the paycheck and drive the car, concentrate on the traffic even while going to relax....am I ever relaxing? Go home, stuff my stomach with some food that has become a compulsion and then mumble something to my family...sleep....this cycle goes on and on..

One more year, I can say, I have lived in Canada for two years. More or less, I'm eligible for immigration since I have "lived" here. Am I living here? How many moments am I truly living here??? Very few. May be none. Either I'm so sad about what I didn't get hold of, or am so glad about what I have. Where's that silent tranquility??? That feeling of utter silence, neither happiness nor sadness, just the contentful "myself"...

Why should I perform? Why am I unhappy when I don't perform? What's there to perform? Why do I need to have something always to feel secured and happy? This afternoon the internet connection in my apartment went off, I didn't know what to do. Kind of helpless. Can I not live here without always doing or performing something?
The other day, I was talking to my supervisor about the previous assignment, he said it was "very impressive", I was so pleased. Several months ago, Dr. Hill, our Head of the department commented that I spoke like an Englishman, maybe he was just joking, but was I not so ...happy to hear such a comment? Why do I always need some kinda recognition from others? Do I not know what I'm? Why do I need a certificate or an acknowledgement from the people whose opinion may change the next moment when I say a single wrong word?

Either I crave for an Ivy League education or a monastery...why can't I be someone who'll not, who doesn't have to, who doesn't want to, plunder his mind with all these questions? Just to walk on the snow without a shoe....yes, I can do it, I can tolerate the cold if I practice it...just to walk without a mask, just not to seek a smile from the Caucasian walking nearby, just to do whatever makes me not happy, not sad, but someother feeling that cannot be written about.

Only men do have winters, not the birds I'm coming across very often. They are still swimming the freezing waters of the South Saskatchewan river..no cold, still fishing, they don't classify theirselves as vegetarian or nonvegetarian...they have no names, they don't say fuck you, they don't study, they don't fall in love, they don't do anything that we human beings think we're supposed to do. Yet they are there. Flying, living, swimming, and flourishing. And without meditating. Without a stress-reduction session. If they are sick, they die. Just like that. They don't control things. they don't know how to, they don't know if there's such a thing as controlling something. The word is unknown to them.

Maybe nothingness will be better.
Yes, I'm going back to my roots. Roots of being a no one, a nothingness. How does it sound? Does it matter anyway? I'm doing --er experiencing this very moment, not haunted by the past or illusioned by the future. Perhaps I won't need any education, any self realization, no religion or principle to stick on to.......just to walk my way, not knowing my age, not knowing the currency I'm using, not having a passport.....just to fade away into the bright sunlight, or freeze into the pure snowwhite prairies...to be a no one, to be nothing........to be fragmented into a billion pieces, to be nowhere and everywhere, to be nothing and evreything...

what else is there to write? Words do stop once you reach the summit, no more words, they are inadequate, they are meaningless most of the time...no more words..and no more thoughts...just get the hell outa this room and feel the snow outside, the darkness of this night, and then maybe I'll feel something more and maybe.......Good Night!

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This was written a longtime back, written with so much frustration, loneliness ...I found it comfortable to concentrate on the Mother Nature to forget that there are problems to be dealt with. That situation hasn't yet changed, perhaps it has worsened, but I grown a litle more courageous to face those hurdles. All I can say is that problems or confusions, are necessary, in life--sometimes. They make you humble. They make you appreciate little things. They make you understand others more. They give some meaning to this otherwise mundane life!

[Edina]

Hi Venu, welcome to Canada and back to this board!! ;D Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us!
Although I can't say that I know how you're feeling, but have visited that frame of mind that you're talking about, many times. Am I allowed to call it 'search for meaning'? Those hurdles that we face with everyday aren't the ones that make us the person who we want to be? Didn't we choose them? Isn't it up to us to change the path and take another direction, if we don't like these challenges? It seems to me, you're choosing the feeling of nothingness to ease the pain instead of changing your present and future. Why has your situation worsened? Why don't you help yourself? What keeps you back from it?

-- Asks a fellow immigrant (now citizen), who's similarly living and learning from her dreams in Canada.

[peter]

"In the field,
I am the absence of the field.
This is always the case:
Wherever I am
I am what is missing".......

A Japanese Bear once shared that with me. Koan wasis name.
I keep this close.
One day it will come for me as I always look for it.
blotter

[Venu]

Edina: It has nothing to do with immigration or failure or life in Canada in particular. Those questions and thoughts were always there with me. Now they have become more prodding. That's the only difference. You can't avoid certain questions for a longtime. Am I right?

[Edina]

You are right.

[Edina]

What a beautiful day today! I can feel it, spring is coming!!! Is the sun out and shining in Saskatchewan too?

[Venu]

That's a funny question that you asked me Edina. Saskatchewan is called the Land of Living Skies. The Sun is always out, bright and shining.But no warmth. It's still freaking cold outside. Around -14 C. Actually this is warmer comparing to the -40 and -50s we normally encounter.
Yeah, today is a bright warm day. Spring? We have some 2 feet of snow out there, bright and white and glaring.........This is Wonderland!

[JTwolf]

Hey Venu......Boy howdy, can I ever relate to what you wrote! Or at least there was a time when I could. Back when I was trying to "make it". Always wanting more, never having enough, sick of the grind, of traffic, of people, of greed, of need, of sacrifice without recognition, of recognition, of it all......
Now, I am in a much better place! I am happy! I have nothing, per sey, I am broke, in fact, but I have what I need to survive. Thrive isn't an issue anymore. I am happy just to be. If by chance I do thrive, well, whooopppeeeee!!! And if I don't, well, whhhooooppppeeee!!
I am opening a Health food store here in my little town. Is it for me?? Is it to become wealthy with?? No. It is for the people of this town of 5000. They need it. As do I, being one of those 5000. We need the vitamin supplements, the organic foods, the fresh juices, and vegetables.....will there be money made?? Perhaps. Not really an issue though.
Focus on today. On the next step in front of you. Don't worry about tomorrow, or ten steps down the line. Be thankful and grateful for the oppurtunity to take that next step. Walk slow, enjoy every moment of that next step......realize that without help from somewhere, that next step would never be taken. Humility is knowing we are not alone, and being okay with that. Or at least one step in it!

[Edina]

The "Land of Living Skies"--I've heard that before! One of my native (Indian) friends is originally from there.

Thank God, here is 3 C right now, but on The Weather Network just saw, they're predicting snow with rain again for tomorrow. How nice will that be?

[Grave]

You are wonderful Venu. Thank you for being here.

You've asked a perfect question Venu
To have a perfect answer would be an achievement.
To achieve I'd need to exist
If I exist, I would not know for real what is to become nothing.
So, I can only imagine.

This is my imagination: -

Nothing could mean

1)none but I
2)none nor I
3)no I
4) *Please suggest*

In the 1st option, I would constantly have to refer to the word "nothing". I would have to imagine, there exists a "Nothing".
Can "Nothing" exist and is nothing?

2nd option is in its general sense, the “Thingless” one.

If I go for 3rd option, I would actually be nothing.
Rest of all may still exist, but if I am not, I am nothing and would be void of knowing the nothing, the something and myself.

Can I then say, if to be "something" is "mind/I of thought", to be "nothing" is "void/none for ME (not even the word 'thought')"?

Part two: -

To try to be someone or something is constant "hell".
We continuously try to discover and grow is hell?

But, I can't rule out that when I say "I Want to love, I Want to be one as 'I' or I Want to grow", I am not only trying to achieve still.
If I stop to do such(role of being who is 'doing'), I achieve (become) the Nothing.
For me this is impossible for now. So, I think instead
“If I achieve "I", I would achieve all,including "nothing"”

After hours of thinking my limited point of view has no conclusion, but may I conclude

"I can become nothing either way" or “I am ultimately becoming nothing but Nothing itself-this is to grow”<br>
Part 3
This me who thinks I am, is actually nothing. I am for default a "nothing" so I am always trying to be someone/something, may be for nothing but a change.

(OPEN TO ALL THE MAY BEs)

Grave (I am saying nothing)

[Grave]

JTwolf said:

If by chance I do thrive, well, whooopppeeeee!!! And if I don't, well, whhhooooppppeeee!!

You make me fall of my chair every time. Are you the laughing Buddha in disguise ?

Grave

[Falion]

to become Nothing.....define QUALITY....QUALITY is the key to existence....a deep felt, true definition of this is almost impossible in the impossible....The QUALITY of the second...now....now....now...now...now..now..

[Venu]

To become "nothing" doesn't mean you destroy yourself. Nope.

For example, to have a perfect ugly world (Gee, just for imagination!) will be to have a perfectly beautiful world, right???? (Never mind this statement, if you think deeper, it will give you thousand other questions, so please don't question this, probe this anymore. Please just understand the context buddies!!!!)

To become nothing is to become everything. To be here and there at the same time. To be the fire and the fuel, to be the water and thirst, to be the hunger and the food, to be the question and the answer, to be the seer and the to be seen.

You guys might have read the Nobel Prize winning book "Sidhartha" written by the German writer Herman Hesse. To some extent, it gives us some ideas as to what "nothingness" actually means.

To become everything is maybe this:
To overcome (or outgrow!) the feeling that I wanna become the Prime Minister, the next moment to become Bill Gates, the next moment Vladimir Putin, and the next moment the mother feeding her child nearby. To become the baby and the mother at the same time!!

To overcome the feeling that I wannna experience every other experience in life. To overcome the feeling that I should hold on to every nice person I'm coming across in this bright journey of our life.

To outgrow the feeling to "love" everyone and everything. To hate and at the same time, to love the cold winter and the snow. To become the snow itself, to be the purest white color in all the world...........to be everything, to let go of this ego, this identity........

Simply, to become nothing is to understand, know, realize that I'm everything. The child, the milk, the breasts, the Mother, the snow, the sand, the wind, the music, the singer.....those mountains, these trees. I'm there everywhere. I'm a part of all these. I'm the center of the world. And, so are you. And so is everyone and everything else.

I'm experiencing all the experience in the world. The Prime Minister and Bill Gates are none but my own other costumes. Whatever I'm not experiencing in this form as Venu is being experienced by those guys. I'm living there in Africa, in Argentina, in Mars, in the deepest depths of this earth...I'm exploding there inside those nuclear reactors......I'm living a billion lives.

Like an ant family, I and my other characters are collecting grains to a common granary.

From my limited point of view, all these are assumptions. Reasonable assumptions. Teachings from Gita to Bach. Beliefs. In this limited form as Venu, as of now, I can only assume things. All those written "Truth" doesn't matter to me as long as I don't know, experience, realize them myself. I need to know them personally.

To know that fire burns is entirely different from experiencing the burning sensation itslef, right???

To become nothing means to become everything!

Thank you very much Edina, JTWolf and Grave. And all the world. All the world because, all these questions have to be answered. They have been already answered, perhaps. Every tear, every smile, every desparate moment, every word, every deed, every snowflake has to be accounted for.

Nothing is in vain!

[Venu]

Or, are all these experiences the same? The same honey in a billion different bottles with a billion brandnames?

Are we all experiencing the same experience?

[Falion]

NO. Its like comparing wakefullness to dream-state....It is that stark .