I Fear To Be Extraordinary

 

            Extraordinary is alarming for it is alluring. Man has unfortunately begun to scale the differences and discriminations on the same plate though they are not meant to be. A basket of apples may be different from a basket of oranges but they are both fruits. Man’s difference in caste, color, section, birth, and religion must be viewed from the same standpoint. They are all the outcome of obscure extraordinariness. If extraordinary people were not born, extraordinariness wouldn’t have been beckoning.
 
            If it was not Christ, Christianity was no more; if it was not Buddha, Buddhism was no more; if it was not Krishna, Hinduism was no more. The birth of extraordinary people creates clans and in turn the clan-isms that are indestructible and multiplies on every generation geometrically into a perpetual prestige. And the social insecurities add fuel to the fire by provoking the statures of clans.
 
            It is not so important whether they are Incarnations or Incredibles, the argument on which will spoil the whole point of wisdom. Let us for a minute, forget everything we know, everything we were taught, and everything we relished so far, and see the world how it is meant to be seen. Do we really know who our fathers were, what they were, and how they were? The answer ‘Yes” would be too naive. We were convinced by the dubious lineage with definite dumbness.
 
            The local politician addressing a religious party was once my classmate in school who got the first prize on an oratorical contest for talking equality. He says he was driven by the leader and the lord. The face that I saw on the news channel the other day arrested for burning a temple looked familiar to me; must be my friend of somewhere that I’m not certain. He quoted the words of a dead Dravidian leader, “He who invented God is a fool. He who propagates God is a scoundrel. He who worships God is a barbarian.” Is the one who burns god a saint? How is he different from a fool or a scoundrel or a barbarian? Ordinary people are getting attracted to the extraordinary ones. They follow them and wish the rest of the world to do it too that ends up in chaos. Thus the man should fear to be extraordinary. The world is deaf but listening.
           
            On the second thought, those men born extraordinary advocated only the love, ahimsa, order, and sacrifice and not the contrary. How did this edification beget cruelty? There is a profound philosophy behind this. A mango is nutty when green, sour when ripen, sweet when pulp but gross when rotten. The same is the ideas. The ideas and philosophy that the great men propose get expired over time and every generation needs a new philosophy or a reformed philosophy to guide them through. The fact that we fail to understand is that the men we follow are not propagators but reformists. Jesus opposed kings and dictators, Buddha countered the sufferings of the poor and Krishna revolutionized politics. In simple words, they were engaged in fighting the contemporary problems of their people. Their goals were achieved, thus their stories are ended and now they are just the lessons to learn-on but not the principles to lean on. By fighting on their names we are expecting the rotten mango to taste sweet.
 
            My argument raises the question, “Is religion meaningless?”
 
            No! The rotten mangoes may taste bitter but the seeds are never futile. But making seed into a tree involves a tough process. Thus understanding god and religion involves a pearl of deeper wisdom. Religion is not a destination but a path and God is not faith but a search. An engineer cannot find a motor in the human body; neither the doctor will find lungs on a machine. Every man has his own search that nobody else can guide him through. Two men choosing two paths are a difference and not discrimination.
 
            Why can’t I suggest my path to my friend? The answer is simple; because he is not you. I have the habit of getting blessings from my mother every time before I start my day. I have a strong feeling that says, by doing so my day gets better. Of course, it is a good habit that I need to suggest to my friend. But I can only ask him to get blessings from his mother and not mine. The discrimination happens only when I consider my mother superior to his.
 
            Thomas Alva Edison invented the bulb and made the world brighter. Did we stop there? Every day we bring advancements into the bulb and now we have better ones. Edison is indeed extraordinary, but not immortal. Men, irrespective of scientist, philosopher, leader, or incarnation are not immortal. That which is immortal is his ideas. The idea of passing electricity through a filament to make it glow must be put into further research for science to get better. Religion must also be put into thought and process for man to flourish.
 
            The curse of manhood that prevents him from accepting what he already knows is pride and prejudice. Men are open-minded but not open-mouthed. Every man knows that the discrimination is absurd and pointless but the pride he has in his own ideas and prejudice that his ignorance accepted make him less confident. The reluctance manifests fear. The fear of falling for the other man’s belief makes him fight one; because every extraordinary man is beckoning and not just his. In a country where every civil shape was built by the black men, the fear will buckle itself to the white men who worry about losing their importance. It is more similar to the fear of the powerful industrial entrepreneur towards the trade union which is powerless in the hierarchy but powerful in numbers.
 
            A peer neighbor of mine fights constantly with me for parking my bike in front of his gates. We have become rivals when water, drainage, compound walls, and everything we see and touch becomes a reason to fight. But he approached me one day when a common street light between our homes failed to work. We solved the case together. That matter of episode made me realize one thing – “We need a common problem to lose sight of those between us”. Wars between world countries might end when an alien invasion happens. Should we wait till an alien comes to teach us integrity and peace?  Or is that the alien who we call as a god? – The unknown and thus the scary? – The extraordinary?
 
            I started this bid to answer various questions but it instead raises a million others. But one thing is true. When we begin to believe the extraordinary without fearing it, we will get the courage to study it and by doing so we will understand it. Believe in God, but do not fear him. Search for the god – your god instead of accepting one; not the extraordinary but the ordinary neutral emptiness that created the extraordinary you just like the one you are following your entire life. The search and research will bring you wonders.