A Right  Path Always Heads Forward !

              -  P.Natarajan.

Pathways always show the directions for the destination. The Road Map is a must to reach the desired place in the shortest or most comfortable manner.

The mention of the word ‘ SPACE ‘ has to link with the direction. When we ask for the location of the cricket stadium in a city, we get replies that it is North of (say) Gandhi Park and likes of these.

Reaching Rajpath in Delhi, say , from Zakir Hussain Marg is described in a direction with reference to the landmark “ India Gate “

        ( Rajpath in front of India Gate )

Parents advise the ways to lead a happy married life to their daughters. Teachers do career counselling to the Student community for a bright future and for leading the life in the right way. They  also reiterate never to step into the wrong ways.

Should there arise problems, we think of possible ways to solve them. We discuss the matter with trusted friends and elders who had settled well in life. Experience is a good teacher.

When a talk centres around something which has to take place shortly, we think of developing alternatives and then don’t we reach an agreement about the ways for performing in the best manner possible ?

A Way of life means some chosen path by an individual. He leads a life without giving way to unnecessary worries.

Like there are two linking points connecting one place to the other in Space, Time serves as a vital dimension to connect the childhood days to boyhood days, then through the adult days to married life and then to old age.

For example we quote the year 1947 when India got Independence. We always refer the periods when a particular state was under President’s rule. For example, Bengaluru was under President’s rule between so and so years.

In Sanskrit there is a sloka which describes the status of a particular period in human life.

It runs like this :-

Saishave abyasta vidyanam, yownae vishayaishinam

vardhake munivrithinam  yoganande chatushtaya

About those who in their adolescence are masterly in studies; in adulthood predisposed for material pleasures; in old-age gravitating towards saintlike activities, and at end-time yoking their minds with the Absolute and ultimately evicting their souls from their bodies to attain moksha... [1-8]

शैशवेऽभ्यस्तविद्यानां यौवने विषयैषिणाम्।
वार्धके मुनिवृत्तीनां योगेनान्ते तनुत्यजाम्॥ १-८

śaiśave'bhyastavidyānāaṁ yauvane viṣayaiṣiṇām |
vārdhake munivṛttīnāṁ yogenānte tanutyajām || 1-8

In a man’s life the childhood is a period of learning, Youthhood is a period of earning or building a career when you understand business matters, Old age is earmarked for a life of austerity or simple living like a saint without any ‘raga or doshas ‘ and towards the fag end of life, it is advised to lead all the four stages in one. So ‘ways’ are described in a scale of years in a man’s life.

Let us not forget about the ways one’s mind wanders. Random thoughts run in succession in the mind. It may think of Taj Mahal at one instant and in the next second the thought may be about “White House’ in Washington D.C and may leap in the next moment to Queen's Palace in London and so on. ‘Chalanam’ is the apt word for wandering of thoughts.

We move in mind, move in Space, move in life from one stage to the other and describe the ways we had moved when we narrate the experience like in an autobiography. I wish to refer to the last two lines of a Sanskrit Sloka which summarises the theme discussed above:-

sothsahanam nastyasadhi naranam

margarabda sarva yathnas palanthi

.

There is nothing impossible for men endowed with agility ( the ability to think and draw conclusions quickly, intellectual acuity ), The verse focuses that “Efforts or hard work, when given a right start and led in the right directions with right means, undoubtedly meet with success”.

Life is a wonderful experience

Enriched by the joy of prayers.

pn