Chapter 6. Embedding Truth

Sometimes we forget who we are, we forget who we are because we get disconnected from the core of our true nature our true selves. Are we really weak? Are we really a slave of our emotions of worldly expectations, hatred, stress and jealousy? Or are we a part of her light? It was impossible to tell what had happened. Amrit opens the door of his car to step outside and he is crying like a little child, tears rolling down his cheeks, wheezing and constantly gulping, his lips shivering and his face looks so fragile now. A face which was quite stable and emotionless looked weak and defeated. Throughout the ride the air conditioner was switched on but he was sweating now, his hair shining in the sun some gray some black, one hand holding his apron the other holding his briefcase, 39 year old doctor Amrit stood their crying incessantly in front of his Goddess Mother, Ma Durga. “ Why do you cry Amrit?” Comes a voice from Ma approaching him from the other side. “ I surrendered myself to all the worldly emotions, let them control me, I forgot that you existed and I’ve made terrible decisions.” “Do you realise the ignorance behind your actions? Are you able to reflect your own mind design?” “ yes Ma, I do.” “Then you must never look back now. You must fix this feeling of realisation into your heart, mind and soul, that will help your actions to be guided in a direction on the path of righteousness” “ How do I make them permanent Ma? How do I fix this realisation into myself permanently?” “ You will find the answer from the patient on bed no.9 in the surgery ward”, saying this Ma Durga vanished as a breeze blew from south. Amrit felt as if a pearl fell on his watch, it was his last tear, as he saw his watch more carefully he observed that it had stopped, time did stop as an energy to reach One’s true identity began to manifest. 

 Inside the surgery ward he first interacted with the patients who were transferred from the emergency unit. He knew where his steps were taking him gradually. One by one.. Bed 6, bed 7, bed 8. There he was standing with a file in front of bed number 9. A 9 year old girl with acute pain in her abdomen. He wondered how this little girl could tell him things that were so profound. “ How do you feel dear? How is your pain?” “Doctor uncle the pain has increased”(she continues pointing at her naval and the lower right quadrant of her abdomen). “Hmm..let me see”, after examining carefully he calls the girls parents. “ We need to operate on her appendix and remove it, my diagnosis is acute appendicitis. We will do some confirmatory tests too.” A worried father of the girl replied, “ Sir when will the operation take place?” “Tomorrow morning, yes that will be fine, tomorrow morning, you don’t have to worry. It is a laparoscopic procedure and I’ll do it within half an hour and she can go home with you by tomorrow evening”, he says smiling at the girl. An expression of relief now comes on the fathers face and he runs his hands through the little girls hair gently. Back at his Table in the ward Amrit wonders. How is this little 9 year old going to give me spiritual answers. Sitting on his chair, hands leaning on the desk in the ward, a place from where he can clearly see all the patients, he makes a decision, he would stay the night in the ward itself. With every tick of the clock he closely observed the girl, there was something peculiar about her. She was too calm for her age, yes she was in pain but and sick but there was a tremendous amount of depth in her eyes, he didn’t observe it earlier because he was more focused on her disease. He also noticed that her hair was too long for a tender age of 9. As the tube light flickered her face would shine in some magical way, it was so unique that he stood up from his chair once but bemused that the other people in the ward weren’t able to see what he could he silently sat down. Night arrives. The girls parents are asleep and so is everyone in the ward except Amrit, the nurses on duty is in the pharmacy to get some syringes and medicines. Reading the blood reports of a patient that had just arrived he observes something. The little girl her name Sadhika gets up from her bed, her parents still asleep. She slowly makes her way to the entrance of the ward. Amrit gets up and stops her at once. “ where are you going child? This is the time to sleep and not roam around” “Doctor uncle I saw mother outside” “No child your mother is there look near your bed”, pointing at the small sofa for the visitors adjacent to the bed. “No doctor I’m speaking of the goddess mother” 

 Amrit was numb. Dumbstruck. His eyes moist, his throat felt choked. Barely able to utter a word, he tries, “Wh..What are you talking about?” She doesn’t reply and starts walking outside towards the corridor. Amrit doesn’t resist and follows her. The corridor is empty and he can see the clearly see the wall on the other end. Sadhika is pointing the same wall. On the wall is hung a photo of Ma Durga, a faint memory projects in front of his eyes as he recollects his father had hung it there in the initial days when the nursing home had been inaugurated. Sadhika’s back is seen, long luxuriant hair, and her body emanating light. He says, “ Take me there MA” A reply comes, the voice is of a 9 year old but it has the depth of a million years of truth, “Then follow me” As he takes his first step the carpet and the floor below change into crystalline water, not of much height but reaching to his ankles. His eyes fixed at Sadhika he feels the cold punch below but it is his body that feels his, his soul is already fixed somewhere else. Taking the second step the walls around vanish and a sky full of stars surrounds him. Sadhika speaks, “ The worldly things are not fixed Cr Amrit, neither this body. What’s fixed is that internal soul. Making the light of realisation permanent is possible only by observing the soul while taking every step”. She is still walking towards the Ma Durga’s photo which seems to be suspended in air now, her back still turned towards Amrit. Amrit behind takes his third step. With it he feels something unusual happen. The water beneath has begun freezing, and even before he can take the next step the whole water has freezed and his left is locked inside. Sadhika is unaffected, surprisingly she is walking over the ice, towards the photo. Amrit feels helpless. He calls her, “Ma help me, I’m stuck” “You are not stuck your body is!” Amrit wondered what Sadhika meant. He was actually stuck in ego, stuck in lust, stuck in jealousy, stuck in his own anger. He tries to remove himself, he tries really hard. Yes the next step after realisation was to try, and so he did. Trying to move his feet with all force he cries in pain, he is breathless and struggling but he wants to beat the dark traits of man. He doesn’t stop and goes on utilising all the energy he got, and there you see, his legs finally come out. The sharp ice has pierced at various places inside his skin all around his ankles and he is bleeding, his feet all red. Look! Amrit takes the fourth step and Sadhika’s clothes which were that provided by the hospital to the patients had turned into a red dress and his blood had vanished, he was no more bleeding. She says her back still turned towards Amrit, “ Not only a devotee is coloured in the emotion of devotion, but the goddess too embraces it”. Amrit now takes the sixth step and he sees around him over the ice a streak of Diya’s lit in line extending till the photo on the other end”. He smiles and takes the seventh step to find that he has entered a room with marble walls, the marbles reflect the light of the Diyas, as if he and Sadhika are surrounded by a dome of flames that are moving slowly like feathers. He is very close to Sadhika now and also to the photo of Ma Durga. Amrit places his foot forward to take the the eighth step and speaks, “ Who are you?” “Keep asking this question again and again. Not to me but to you yourself.” A fragrance of flowers fills the room as he asks the question to himself and as he does the fragrance keeps on increasing, he notices that Sadhika’s neck is covered with a garland of marigolds. He continues asking the question to himself and the fragrance and the flowers increase. Sadhika turns now standing just in front of Ma Durga’s photo. Her face radiating brilliance. Her hair merges with the photo, her face moves inside the photo, her body size increases and gets embedded in the photo completely coinciding with the photo, the garlands covering the photo. Amrit decides to take the last step, the ninth step, not by his feet but his forehead. His soul asking him to surrender, he gradually bends down and takes the ninth step and makes his forehead touch the ice floor, fixing his realisations deep within himself by understanding himself.

 Amrit gets up to find himself in the Durga temple near his nursing home. Astonished he starts sweating. He turns back and taken aback again. He sees 9 year old Sadhika with her family, all looking happy and content. “ Sir you visit this temple often? We come here too, and after yesterday’s operation we had particularly decided in advance that we would come here, we are so thankful to you Doctor”, says her father. Amrit still clueless replies, “ yes it’s near so I come here when I find time....”, “ sorry I’ve got to leave I’ve some patients to attend”, saying this he hurries but then someone calls from behind. “Thank you Doctor uncle” It is Sadhika’s voice, he turns, she is smiling. He doesn’t reply welcome, he says a short, brief -“Thank you” and walks in haste towards his nursing home. Back in the doctors lounge he asked his colleague about the operation. “ sir you were amazing..I got a bit worried when she started bleeding all of a sudden in between but you handled it so well and we wrapped up the operation before time”. Amrit could hardly recollect. In the corridor outside the wards there were no Diyas and the carpet was in place on the floor. He was tired by what all had happened. He packed his bag and made his way back. At the end of the corridor he sees MA Durga’s photo decorated with a beautiful garland, the smell of which is familiar. Still immersed in the ecstatic fragrance he rests on his bed in his house. He grabbed the newspaper and began reading. One of the headline reads, “ Multiple Avalanches in Amarnath, As number of fatalities among the pilgrims increases, shortage of Medical staff emerging problem” (To be continued.......)