The mandarins: why do I suffer for my sanity

Simone de Beauvoir, an outstanding novelist and a companion of Jean-Paul Sartre wrote a semi autobiographical novel, which evoked an eternal dilemma for an intellectual or a public person about how to be truthful.  When the dilemma is a choice between defence of an ideology and commitment to one’s conscience, how does one resolve it.

The period of 50’s was the spring time of socialist thinking.  A journalist who had gone to Russia had discovered the existence of concentration camps in Siberia.  When he came back and revealed the story to the famous newspaper Le Monde, the editor was not sure whether to publish it or not. His problem was that publication of a story like this could harm the people’s faith in socialist ideology.  But, by not publishing it, he would violate the journalistic ethics.  Either way he was damned.

It is not important as to what did he actually do.  What is important is to realize that ethical dilemma face us everyday.  The famous lines of veteran poet, Dinkar seem to reverberate in the corridor of our conscience, he said, “papa ka bhagi nahin hai keval vyagh, those who are neutral, the time will write their crimes too”, i.e., those who do injustice or cause violence are not the only one to blame, those who keep quiet are also equally guilty.  Don’t all of us face such a challenge in our life everyday. 

I have always argued that breakthroughs in life cannot be achieved without authenticity.  And authenticity cannot be achieved without bringing the outer and the inner being in sync.  To achieve this synchrony, we have to develop the courage to be humble and vulnerable.   We cannot empower ourselves without being vulnerable.  It is only in the moment of vulnerability that we listen to our inner voice.  And without listening to our inner voice, can we ever be peaceful.

There is nobody who does not have to answer his/her inner call.  Nobody from outside can really goad anybody to pay more attention to this voice.  In fact, many times to run away from the ordeal of listening to this voice, we engage ourselves in mundane and sometime not so mundane occupations.  We assume like an ostrich that by hiding our head in the sand, the echo of inner voice will disappear.  It doesn’t.

Mahabharat is full of instances when Lord Krishna defies the principles of justice and fairness by advising shortcuts.  This has remained a question in the minds of ordinary mortals as to why would somebody so knowledgeable and a visionary advise shortcuts.  Why would ends be used to justify the means.  Gandhi argued for the opposite but he revered Lord Krishna.   Are we like abhimanyu, caught in the chakravyuh not knowing how to come out? Having just burnt the Ravana, we have perhaps lost the ability to realize that the truth is not black and white.  When Lord Ram asked Sita to prove her chastity because a washer man on the street had doubted it, he had created a new norm of accountability ( disregading the rights of  sita) .  Even one dissenter counted.  But, why don’t we reflect on the fact that Ravana, a sage as he was, did not touch Sita despite having her in his captivity because her consent eluded him.  Can we see the virtues in the wicked and vices in the righteous.  But then, that is not what normal people do.  Are we normal?

How do people then manage to be sane?  When Vincent von Gogh, the famous artist became incoherent and schizophrenic towards the later days of his life, he had to spend time in an asylum.  There is a famous song in which the poet wonders whether sanity is worth it if the price to be paid is to compromise.  Do some  not suffer because of their sanity?

In a way, many of us are living in an asylum asking the same question.  Do we keep our schizophrenia and maintain our visions, grand and perhaps also generous or we listen to our inner voice, get away from illusions and begin to see the world as it is.  If a poet or a painter loses the capability to create, so it be.  Wouldn’t this world be much more manageable if poets don’t promise a world that is different and the painters don’t show the colours of compassion?……..