'Detachment'. What does it even mean? Why is it such an aspirational goal? Why is it so misunderstood?
Because it sounds like a 'de-attachment', it's normally understood as a 'letting go off'. It's really not about letting go of life....not about giving up and sitting in the Himalayas, definitely not about giving up on the material world.
It's also not about sitting in this space of nothing impacts me, not about giving up on 'emotions and joys'.
I think a lot of the ambiguity surrounding the word is because it gets mixed up with 'Indifference'. Being immune to what happens around you.
Indifference is a killer. It makes you passive. You stop to care. And when you care little for yourself, how can you even care for the other. What you then do, you do as obligation, as duty. You become a bystander in your own life.
The concept kind of hit me during my Vipassana experience. Detachment encompasses within itself an ability to 'live life' and not to 'move away from life'. It's in fact about living life with love, excitement and exuberance ....but all unconditional.
To really live, to love, to want, to do, to act......and find joy in the process. Enjoy the process, enjoy the goal, enjoy the achievement........ but not let it's lack break us.
Paradoxically, detachment goes hand in hand with compassion. It's not just to care, but to care deeply..... deeply enough to live and let live. And remember, the process starts with you. When you are full, you give fully. It's an extremely empowering and liberating space.
I'm not saying it's possible to be there all the time...guess we'd be Buddha if we were. It's about a mindset.....to find the capacity and space within us. To create it as a sacred room, which we can enter at will. And once you know it and embrace it, you'll see it percolate into more and more space within you. And the times you are out of it become less compelling and less frequent. It becomes you and you become it.
It's paradoxically the deepest space of joy and freedom !
Vanaprastha while still living a life of gruhastha. Give up the need to hold and cling to what you think is yours. Setting free is the process of detachment.
ReplyDeleteHey Girija, yes, all of that ...and yet being completely present :)
ReplyDeleteLoved this post. Absolutely spot on when you bring out the difference between indifference and detachment. There is an element of interest and compassion always remaining as you said even while being detached. The reason I feel why detachment is so great is primarily because if there is disappointment from the other side, it does not affect me, does not get me down. But if there is success on the other side, I still feel happy! So its a great space to be in for our mental well being.
ReplyDeleteHi Srivatsa, It was lovely to get up to your comment this morning. One, happy you liked it, and two, and more significantly, the fact that your understanding was so in sync, and how well you brought out the challenge that makes this such an aspirational goal :)
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