God Who? Where?

20:04pm. Deva's house.

Seems like a twlight hour or is it the effect of the yellow colored tubelight in her house? Twilight hour - they say if you pray at this exact moment, your prayer is answered. By whom? The energy that rules this Universe, I would presume? Because God has taken various forms and is currently a work in progress, much like me. Vanity? No. Reasoning. Yes.

How did this transformation happen to me? I've lived all my life in a Mylapore Agraharam; spent my teenage years in temples nearby chanting slokas day and night with my grand-mom; followed simple traditions like waking up early everyday of the Margazhi month (December) to do the traditional kolams on the streets of the family house that I shared with my many cousins...? The answer is simply...LIFE. Life teaches you to face everything - good, bad & ugly with a 'Why so? Why me?'

The moment I started questioning happenings, the minute I saw reason behind my setbacks, the moment I stepped on a plane and saw the cloud around it's wings - I knew my Mahavishnu's Vaikuntam was not a part of my real world. It was at best a lavish 'film set' from erstwhile A P Nagarajan's movies! The Milky Way (Paarkkadal) is far above aeroplane heights, yes, but I'm quite certain that Andal's lover & Lakshmi's husband could not defy gravity and 'live on' in a human form in a zone where oxygen is absent! My vision of my God, stops with a smiling N T Ramarao in his Vishwaroopam with more than four arms instead of the normal two.

So could my 'God' be someONE or someTHING, living/being elsewhere? 2000 and 8 years hence, we enter the New Age way of finding God Consciousness. "I'm not a religious person, but you can call me...well...Spiritual", one hears this from peers and colleagues more often now. Being Spiritual is IN. Self help books and incessant gatherings by white robed Gurus, seemed to hold the promise of showing God to helpless souls (my saamiyaar tales are for yet another post! Wait on...!) like me. But they all ceased to have that power once I interviewed them for one magazine or the other. 'Miracle' was more possible with my mind conjuring up images that in some state of sleep seemed real, than from any Guru who could conjure up lingams from cloth bags.

God, confused me; because as long as I plainly believed in 'HIM', I had no problems with HIM. The second I questioned creation/people/events, was when I realised the powerless-ness of the images inside the Perumal Sannidhi in my house! Even as a child, I went to temples to learn more about the history of that place or just be lost in the architectural splendor of the pillars and statues or willingly transport myself to another era of kings & kingdoms (Do re-read my earlier post on the Tanjavur Temple visit!). Yes, I will admit that as I grew older, God became more personal. (He always was actually; I remember saying I wanted to marry Srinivasa'r' in my Mylapore temple anyway!)

And from HIM - HE, God slowly became IT - THE FORCE. Prayer was more an exercise in affirmation that things will improve; if they didn't I always saw it as something I have'nt done right, hence it was not happening right. To abandon the traditional God as was shown to me by my parents, meant increasing the level of burden I had to shoulder. To look for a great deal of faith in myself; to accept more responsiblity for my words & deeds; to take corrective action for lost time. I dont wish to hurt anyone who has traditional beliefs in god and therefore religion, hence I abide with most of the 'things to do with God' when it comes from my parents/friends. I do somethings for them even if I have no personal faith in the practises of worship.

Be it Gravity or God, I do see a 'connection' between us and Nature; a kindred-ness in emotional moments (mostly in pain) and when I say Nature, it also includes places - how sometimes we dont have answers to phenomena like Deja Vu or ESP-like occurences even in our daily life. Science has answers to most queries and my humble research tells me that the human mind is a great workshop - it is capable of a travel beyond boundaries! Man has fought & killed in the name of God/Religion - the absence of which is actually a platform for discovery and invention or in most cases, even Art. A quick reading of Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything & Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion should put any unquiet mind to rest. With time, I guess any person will make their peace with the 'knowledge' that we are our own God(s)! This thought comes from our scriptures, which mostly is mistaken to be just the Vedas. Much like how the Greeks left behind volumes on human life, our Indian ancestors have also left us with great works like the Upanishads, which is not a pro-God or religion treatise but is actually a philosophical/political/social set of insights for our everyday life!

Aham Brahmaasmi - Tat Tvam Asi. Naane Brahmam - Neeyum Athuvey. I am God-consciousness. So are you.
A film called Anbe Sivam well illustrates this theory. To see God in a child's smile, in one act of kindness to a fellow human being, in one moment of ecstasy, in that single second of running the extra mile for success, in the gratification of seeing a job well done, in even wanting to help another being - you can add more 'such' to this list. No one human being is higher or lower than another, except in intelligence or talent (which is also unique). Rich or poor, it is ultimately your attitude and who or what you take to be your benchmark in life that determines your success or lack of it in this planet.

Does God need veneration? Ritual? Tradition? I dont think so. Religion is a man made commodity that is used to stir up emotions to suit a moment's maddness. Humanity is a bigger religion than any man made one. The fact that we all possess similar DNA (Darwin's evolution theory links us to apes, birds, amphibians, reptiles, one floating amoeba)...this single thought from Science should tell us to stop any practice/differentiation in the name of caste/religion/color.

Of course, at work, I parade my Vadakalai Iyengar lineage in all glory - just for the many laughs and also to drill it into myself that I am NOT any name that religion accords me; I am just SUJATHA - a woman born and living in a geographically bordered city called Chennai, in a country called India.