india

It's easy to look at someone else's travel photos while you are sitting at home and think "oh wow, how fantastic someone else's life seems compared to mine". i do it all the time when i am home. But just remember: we can only post photos of exotic places and fun activities, but it is impossible to post photos of inner turmoil, mental disturbances, pain, worry or stress. We don't see that posted on facebook or on a blog, yet every one of us feels these things, regardless of where we are. Sometimes we might feel like we can momentarily escape from these things by travelling somewhere, but it turns out to be only a distraction for us. The only true freedom from these things comes from within, and from the constant acceptance of these things as normal and fine and just as lovely as the more favourable points of view that we have sometimes. All is perception, not reality. Reality is that we just are as we are. Things just are as they are. This happens, that happens. Only our attachment to them or aversion to them cause the suffering. On another more tangible note: the more i am away from canada, though i LOVE canada, the more crazy our life there seems. The endless chasing after things, after success, after achievements, up, up, up, without taking the time to actually enjoy the things that are free. It truly is a rat race. The longer i stay here, the less my life in canada actually makes sense to me sometimes when i think of it. it all just seems like such senseless striving at the expense of our relationships with eachother and time spent together just being. we ARE human beings ,not human DOINGS, after all. as my mother reminded me on the plane ride over here. Don't get me wrong, I love my life in Canada, i LOVE the lifestyle , all the fancy things, and the stuff that works and isn't broken. The systems that function in a reliable predictable fashion. So unlike India with it's unpredictability and bank machines that are out of cash today, and street lights that haven't been operational in decades, and bribes to officials and power outages, and cable break downs, and interruptions to internet service. Life just goes on, people adjust, people are used to it. Every time i come here i am hit by the generosity of the people, the warmth, the thoughtfulness, the intense HUMANNESS that is on display here that makes me feel like my life back home is missing something. Something i didn't even know it was missing until i came to india the first time. Maybe that is part of the reason i am marrying an indian man. maybe its to bring a part of that part i feel i am missing back with me. maybe it is to have a constant reminder in my life every day of what is truly important. like a life line. having my brother, my mother, my step-father here is amazing. having family here is heaven. i only wish my dad could have come, but i feel him here in spirit.