The Essence of Things

How hard it is to Just Be

It was a wonderful morning, brilliant after thunder shower weather, and I spent a good amount of time in the garden, as the plants and flowers looked so happy.

It all started with this single full bloom of a pink ganneru (don’t know it in English), one of my all time favorites, especially for its fragrance. Its subtle and intoxicating. And I kept going out for it, and diksha's like, what are you doing ma, you’re actually going out these many times, just to smell it??? And that’s when I realized it was actually putting me into a meditative space. It was just so beautiful in itself.

That’s when a strange journey began. I looked around and saw so many other flowers, almost like for the first time. Why first time? Because behind each of those flowers was a story, and I’d been so caught up in the story that the stories I think had become bigger than the flowers. I almost felt like I’d completely missed the essence.

This flower was my grandmothers favourite. Kanakamburam.

This one had a symbolism in its stamen or pistils or whatever, the five red ones for the pandavas and the hundred yellow ones for the kauravas

This was from a little twig I'd picked up on my first walk to LalBagh

This one I put up against resistance because folks said this should not be kept in houses as its a graveyard flower. And why? Its fault being that it blooms easily , anywhere and all through the year, doesn't need much care. And its for all those reasons that I liked it and wanted it too :)

This one because I'd done some extra caring when it got infested and even blogged about 

The learning? How much of 'me' do I need in anything to really connect. And more......how much of the 'me', in terms of stories and labeling is actually taking away from it's essence. And what's more, there's almost a belief that the personal stories actually enhance the experience. I learnt differently today.

Extrapolating to within. How much of our own image of ourselves, or others image of us, builds layers around how we connect to ourselves. Doesn't any image become a limiting factor? Minus all the layers, in silence and in stillness, maybe there is that little extra chance that we connect deeper within......