Vanaprastha

It has been uppermost in my mind for quite some time that I am approaching what in the ancient Hindu scheme of things was called vanaprastha, the third stage of a full and well-lived life.

The first stage, after infancy that is, is preparation for living a life (which means education in a broad sense); the second, living the life of an active householder – earning a living, raising a family, perhaps influencing the world in some significant way or the other, as artists, scientists, reformers and statesmen do. In the third stage, you have not only done most of what you could, but you have begun to grow weary and rather bored about it, your worldly responsibilities as well as cares (‘what do people think about me?’) are both on the wane, and so, in the fitness of things, unless you are chronically ill or very poor or seriously disabled, you begin to think of withdrawing from close, daily, ceaseless involvement with the world. You may still for a while (for some that may mean a decade or more) keep doing more or less what you have been doing for ages, but you do it in an increasingly more detached, relaxed way, and you try to find more and more time and opportunity to enjoy yourself, your real self, not the sensuous monkey that keeps chittering away inside, endlessly eager to stay drowned in ‘what most of the rest of the world is doing’, which usually means dressing up, shopping, watching TV, surfing the Net, drinking, gambling, partying, preening, envying others and so on and on. For a lot of sane, self-possessed people, it means paying more focused attention to their favourite hobbies, whatever they may be, music, gardening, exercise, travelling, reading, writing, charity, religion, blissful sleep… the options are almost as numerous and varied as people.

It is also a time when one loses loved ones right and left, either because they quarrel and drift away or simply die. And so, alas, for many people it is a time of deepening fear of death. One of the most regrettable facts of modern life is that the ‘scientific’ outlook has only vastly spread and intensified this fear. On the one hand, it has instilled in us the conviction that this (this bodily existence, this world) is all there is, and we come here only once, so we must make the most of it for as long as we can; on the other hand the endless ‘advancement’ of medical care has stoked the hope that new drugs, new procedures, new prosthetics will keep us going for just a little while longer, and together, they have created absolute terror about the very idea that no matter how hard we try, we must die sooner or later. So even decrepitude – which happens to most people beyond eighty, when, even if they are not a burden on themselves or anybody else, it is quite evident to everybody that they are neither of any use to anyone nor enjoy anything about life any more, wearing diapers again, for God’s sake, and hobbling about with walkers, memory gradually fading away – is considered to be preferable to death, and there is now no dirtier word in the dictionary; nothing that you say upsets people more: I have checked a thousand times. Nijeke buro keno bolchhen Sir, why do you call yourself old, they all chant, consoling themselves with platitudes, not realizing they are irritating me with imbecility clothed as concern. Why not? What is so sad and shameful about getting old? Isn’t it the hard earned self-satisfaction of finally seeing the distant shore after a lifetime of struggle and suffering on the storm-tossed ocean of life? The joyful expectation of ‘quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over’?

Every religion in the world concurs on this – life means endless suffering, with happiness only a fleeting, occasional illusion. Every religion tries to prescribe a way of living that reduces the burden of suffering in this world, persuades followers that the aim is to get through this life as quickly and lightly as possible (‘this world is not my home, I’m just passing through’… echoed in every land and language over millennia), and tries to prepare them for what comes next, whether they call it extinction or another life or nirvana or heaven. Why have we forgotten, and what have we gained in exchange? More physical luxuries and distractions to ‘enjoy’ for a little longer than our ancestors did, and more prolonged, more exquisite suffering alongwith? The world today is full of hundreds of millions of well-fed, well-clothed, well-housed, constantly ‘entertained’ people who are bored to death, perennially depressed, merely drifting aimlessly through life, yet clinging insanely to it all the same. With what pity our cave-dwelling ancestors might have shaken their heads at us!

So vanaprastha, I am trying to teach myself, could yet be the best time of my life, precisely because the increasing immediacy of death will force me, if only I let it, to focus on the little that is left, the little that really matters, the little that could make my life ultimately worthwhile to me.