“What demon possessed me that I behaved so well?”

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation”

Henry David Thoreau.

I know some of you have read Walden, some others may haven’t, for they would be living a fast life and wouldn’t care much for the thoughts of a ‘weird’ guy who left everything to live in a forest all alone for years on end. If that is so, it is a great loss. His words are always fresh and totally artless. They might not attract you at first because they are mostly turned inwards, but if you persist, they would take you in, and make your life richer.

If you have time and patience I suggest that you go through it once in your life. It will teach you many things, telling your thing in the most natural style is not the least of it.

To me, that is what poetry is all about- Speaking truth and getting it clearly across. Look at the quoted words again; they explode at the core of your being even when considered out of their context.

Meditate on them, a whole new world would become revealed to you. Not that others haven’t said similar words, they have, but those words lack the certainty of deep experience.

He is wonderful when he says things like this:

“The greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my good behavior. What demon possessed me that I behaved so well?”

There are times when we wondered so ourselves haven’t we? “What demon possessed me that I behaved so well?” At least I have, this goodness that you find within you is not the result of thought, it is spoon fed from your childhood. We don’t stop to reflect on it. I know it is useful to have automatic responses; it frees us up for other things. But when a reaction becomes a habit we often follow it unthinkingly, even where the situation demands other responses. It is a sad day when you know that you have made a mistake, blindly following something within you, and that you can not reverse it whatever you do.

In our fast times to stop and deliberate is so out of tune with life that the rest would look at you as if you are totally wacky if you do it. Everything now is oriented on instilling a fast reaction time within the individual that he/she wouldn’t lose out in the rat race to the top. But really, where is this place that people are running to? I have questioned the intelligent and the ordinary and they both seem stunned by the question. They think that the answer is obvious, but is it?

Have we any idea where we are going, why we are popping up pills to get us into high gear in the morning and to sleep at night? Why are we always on the run? What are we trying to amass? Don’t deride the question as metaphysical, for it is not, unless you are some sort of a pre-determinist you can’t accept the way you live. Do you think that you are predestined to be what you are, a physician, engineer, a lawyer, an executive in a multinational company, a porter, singer, and athlete? If not why do you work so hard at them?

Don’t tell me that you are preparing the world for future generations, it is great to hear it, but it is not entirely true is it. The holy truth seems to be that we are all running away from death and are getting nearer it as we struggle harder and harder.

That is why Thoreau’s words appeal to me:

“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth. I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, and obsequious attendance, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board.”

This hunger for truth is not metaphysical as some suppose it to be. It is something basic we all share. Labeling something would not make it go away. Some think that truth is something that we elicit when we ask bluntly “how is your sex life?” to some one and they go immediately red in the face. There is also such a substratum to life and he did not deny its existence. Hear his own words:

“I found in myself, and still find, an instinct toward a higher, or, as it is named, spiritual life, as do most men, and another toward a primitive rank and savage one, and I reverence them both. I love the wild not less than the good.”

Well most of the wonderful people that I meet daily are so pure that the gods would tremble before them! I often wonder how they could look at their own reflections without squirming. Why go on playing such a sham? Why dress yourself up and parade before others as if you are the first wonder in the world while all the time the hollowness of your mind drones away in the background. At least could you not do something about it? Even owing up to some of the lesser elements in your nature might go a long way in purifying you.

Oh I know, these are harsh words and I am not better than any of you. But that doesn’t alter anything; we don’t have it in us to seek what we desire the most like Thoreau did, that which would give us peace of mind. Instead we dissemble and project a worthless profile for all the world to believe in, I am as guilty of this as the rest is. Thoreau subtly saw through this and was quite firm on the point,
even discarding his preference for the first person while stating these lines.

“I hesitate to say these things, but it is not because of the subject
— I care not how obscene my words are — but because I cannot speak of them without betraying my impurity. We discourse freely without shame of one form of sensuality, and are silent about another. We are so degraded that we cannot speak simply of the necessary functions of human nature.”

Of course he was speaking on the Hindu practice of taking every aspect of life into consideration and prescribing methods to do them, but the words go much further than that. Actually seeking truth need not denigrate other aspects of our physical life, but we all would like to be “shitless” entities, without blemish without even remotely thinking about them and we carry this forward to our emotional adventures as well.

The fact is that we are living in a fantastical world, a truly romantic one without any reference to reality. We forget that we have erected our temples on something baser than we care to admit. We still go on meekly hoping that Thanatology would save us or genetical engineering would make us immortal. We are not metaphysical are we? We are thoroughly practical and pragmatic and we would prefer the virtual reality to reality to boot!

I know I have quoted extensively from Walden considering the length of this post, but when a sage speaks you don’t have anything to add to it. Certain lovely souls might call me a parasite in this respect, but I do not mind, for unfortunately I did not come to this world knowing everything before hand.

Read Walden and become enlightened.