Mere Sapno ki Rani

I was a Sydenhamite and rejoined the college as a lecturer after completing C.A. Those were the golden years of the college. Being interested in music/singing, I also took active interest in Sydenham’s Performing Arts Society. The very first song I sang for a Sydenham fest then was “Mere sapno ki Rani kab aayegi tu.” During the same period I also got introduced to spirituality. I heard many spiritual masters and met my Guru Haribhai Kothari. And through them, I learnt my first lesson in Love. Till then I was under a delusion that I knew what it is, and anyways how many of us ever think that we need to learn what love is. I learnt that ‘Love’ is different from ‘Like’.  We always feel that we can love only what we like. But love includes adepting/identifying with what we dislike in others. I learnt that we (as eternal souls) have 3 bodies - a. Gross physical body, b. Subtle body (mind, thoughts, emotions, feelings), c. Causal body (our basic nature, samskars, deep – rooted conditionings, our subconscious and unconscious archives). Love is to identify with all the three bodies (not just the Gross body), respect her thoughts, emotions, nature, personality traits all of which may not be always pleasing, socially correct. There will be aspects which we can’t understand, can’t agree with, grossly vicious (rudeness, laziness, lying). Love doesn’t mean we endorse them blindly, but to learn to adopt with compassion, patience with the awareness that nobody is perfect and by being immensely grateful for all her positive attributes, her care, her tolerance to my viciousness. I leant that I cannot love/marry just the physical body, i.e. how she looks, but also what she is deep down in her archives. “Love needs to be unconditional” was no longer just a cliché to me. Sensitivity to what she is must compliment sensuality to how she looks. I learnt that spirituality does not negate sensuality (as many believe so). My vision of “Mere sapno ki Rani” started changing within. I learnt that love is not a business transaction of giving and asking. It is giving unilaterally and not “I-did-so-much-and-see-what-you-did-in-return” syndrome. All this sounds too idealistic, and yet I learnt that this was just the basic ABCD of any spiritual literacy and the base of any blissful relationship. It is a strange paradox that the last song I sang on Sydenham stage (before quitting) was “Har kisiko Nahi Milta Yahan Pyaar Zindagi Mein” – perhaps the most important lesson of my journey which started with “Mere sapno ki Rani kab aayegi tu.”

Happy new year to you all!