March 12, 2014

The Spiritual Traveller : 1 "The journey is the destination"

Kathopanishad 
यदा सर्वे प्रभिद्यन्ते हृदयस्येह ग्रन्थयः ।
अथ मर्त्योऽमृतो भवत्येतावद्ध्यनुशासनम् ॥ १५ ॥
When all the ties of the heart are severed here in this body/life, then the mortal becomes immortal. This much alone is the teaching. 

I keep on reading that post over and over along the endless road that is bringing us to Hampi.
Us is me and three others travellers I met at 8am this morning at Margao train station in Goa. The voice in the loud speaker kept on repeating a mantra:
"The train to Bangalore will have a delay of 15 hours" 
All around people where wondering what to do. Two middle aged women and a younger one were standing near me. I face them smiling: 
"Are you going to Hampi? Would you mind to share a car with me ? "
Outside the station I asked the first driver I met. 
"How much to go to Hampi?" 
After several phone calls to his boss and a bargain with, me we agreed on a price. I went to report to the threes other women. 
At 9h30 we were all comfortably sitting, ready for a.... 
"How many hours?" I asked. 
"I don't know exactly 8/10h" replied reluctantly the driver 
"I never went up to there... I only went up to the Karnakata border" he finally admitted  gently shaking his head in the typical Indian manner.

Trust settled in all of us… or was it exhaustion…?
Goa state is incredibly lavish and the journey up to the mountain beautiful.
At the Karnakata border we stopped for a chai and the endless Indian formalities.
A car arrived behind us three French women and a driver. 
They were also on the way to Hampi and their driver knew the road well. We became a caravan. Back in the car our driver had a smile of release on his face, he found his guide.

The monsoon should have been finished but unexpected heavy rainfall considerably slowed down our journey. At 4pm under a pouring rain we reached Hubli and stopped for lunch.
It appeared that I was the only one with a reservation for the night in Hampi and by then it was clear that we would not reach before night. I called my guesthouse and luckily they were able to find arrangement for all us.
Back on the road, we exhausted all the possible topic of casual conversation.
Two Australian, mother and daughter at the end of one-month journey.
One jet lagged Belgian who 48h before jumped on a last minute plane for one week in India.
The endless rain, the road, the large fields of south India, the mountains, the gigantic  rocks… I am getting restless... on the side of the road a huge post appeared “The journey is the destination”
First I just noticed that it was is a motorcycle add, but the post kept on reappearing.  Slowly the motorcycle faded away and the message emerged:
“The journey is the destination”
There is nothing else just the experience of life here and now. There is nothing to be reached in the future nor in the past, both are a product of the mind. The Self only is. The destination is to be fully present, here and now, into the journey.



Hare OM


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