Wise men say…

This is related to an earlier post with a related title. :)

Apologies for the recent emo entries. If BLT were reading this, I imagine him smirking because he used to claim that my blog was always emo and angsty. But anyway, I digress, yes, apologies especially to those I have burdened with unnecessary issues, it isn’t fair on you.

Sheryl Crow isn’t that bad a singer. In fact, I’ve found one of her songs to be quite soothing.
All my yesterdays are all boxed up and neatly put away… Butterflies are free to fly, and so they fly away…
Okay, very emo, I know.

———

Escapism is sometimes quite appealing although some believe that it never achieves anything except for temporary respite. This echoes very strongly of Siddhartha.
“What is meditation? What is leaving one’s body? What is fasting? What is holding one’s breath? It is fleeing from the self, it is a short escape of the agony of being a self, it is a short numbing of the senses against the pain and the pointlessness of life. The same escape, the same short numbing is what the driver of an ox-cart finds in the inn, drinking a few bowls of rice-wine or fermented coconut-milk. Then he won’t feel his self any more, then he won’t feel the pains of life any more, then he finds a short numbing of the senses. When he falls asleep over his bowl of rice-wine, he’ll find the same what Siddhartha and Govinda find when they escape their bodies through long exercises, staying in the non-self. This is how it is, oh Govinda.”

Yes, at times we all run away from our problems, many a times because we think that they are unsolvable. We try different ways to take our minds off our present situation, our hurts, our confusion, our tiredness, our sadness and what have you. I have a friend who has to find happiness in the little things, in acting silly when she’s stressed out. She tells me that being silly keeps her sane, and I’ve witnessed her doing that. Another friend of mine refuses to think about the issue even though it’s staring him straight in the face; avoiding the topic at all costs. Of course, there are people who dance or write. Me? Well, I normally get grumpy when I am upset or something and my form of ‘escapism’ (If I may use the term) is to withdraw and not be sociable. Though I find singing random songs makes me happy or simply being high is quite cathartic. But as some of the hyper girls in Haven noted, you end up even more tired after being on an emotional high. Simply put, and I state the obvious, escapism really only works as a temporary respite, though some try to do it for their whole lives. It leaves you dissatisfied and you realise that your problems are still there, sometimes worsened because you’ve left it for so long.

Is it possible to try and escape from reality when one keeps staying on a problem? Will there come a point when one’s perception gets so distorted because they become rather disillusioned and sometimes a tad delusional because they keep dwelling on what they think is a problem? It’s a bit like Orsino being in love with the idea of being in love, as I told Cheryl last night. I know that I’m stretching the definition of ‘escapism’ a little, but you get the gist. You get so caught up in your view of reality, that you don’t see things as they really are.

Yes, refusing to think about a problem seems like a way of running away from a problem, but hanging onto one’s distorted perception of what they think is real is worse, in my opinion.

And a part of me fears that’s what I’m doing now.

It reminds me of a story that Ferd told us during English once, though he was using it to illustrate a different point.
A monk was walking by a house one day and he saw an old woman searching earnestly for something among the grass in her garden.
“Old woman, are you looking for something? Can I help you?”
The old woman replied, “Yes, I’ve lost my needle somewhere in this grass.”
The monk drew his robes around him and both of them searched the grass for almost an hour.
Sweaty and tired, the monk said to the old woman, “We’ve been searching for the needle for such a long time, are you sure it’s here?”
“Oh, I dropped my needle in the house, when I was sewing, but I came out into the garden to look for it because it’s brighter out here.”

We all are looking for solutions to our problems but going out to the grass to look for the needle doesn’t help at all. Running away, like Jonah, doesn’t help and we’ll only be drawn back to the one who can solve all our problems.

I do believe; help me to overcome my unbelief.
In my distress I called to the LORD,
and he answered me.
From the depths of the grave I called for help,
and you listened to my cry.