(Inspired by Stoic : Epictetus, book: Enchiridion)
In the quiet of that February morning, with the calendar showing the tenth of the month, I sat at my desk in the 2nd Floor of my Bengaluru home...
Turning over in my mind these stray thoughts that had come to me like unexpected visitors.
I wrote at the top of my page: “Art of Living,” as If Living was as simple as jotting down recipe for idli.
Anyways, i procceded : The art of living, it seemed to me, was simply this :
- Not to fail in one’s desires, and yet not to tumble into the very pits one should avoid.
- To pass through life itself without uneasiness, without fear, without that tiresome perturbation that visits us at midnight.
- One should move among one’s fellows—son, father, citizen, husband, neighbour, fellow-traveller, even ruler and ruled—with the same easy grace as the banyan tree gives shade to all who pass beneath it, without fuss or fanfare.
While there is art to live, Then there is the craft of life itself, the daily practice.
- First, one must learn that God is the provider for all things. Nothing can be hidden from Him—neither our small acts, nor our intentions, nor even the secret thoughts that flit across the mind like mischievous monkeys. It is no use trying to draw the curtain.
- And what of the nature of the gods? They are faithful, free, beneficent, and magnanimous. So must we try to be.
- Finally, speaking of craft of living, Let man become, in his own small way, an imitator of God. Let every word he utters and every deed he performs be in quiet harmony with that divine fruit.
Thus I sat, pen in hand, on an ordinary Tuesday, wondering how simple these truths were, and also gasping how endlessly difficult to follow in the crowded lanes of Bengaluru.
Life, after all, is both the teacher and the examiner, and one has no choice but to appear for it every single day.