Chapter 5 - Solitude

This is a very special fable, as it is like no other. It is a story about a world where the wheel hadn’t been invented at all.

In the absence of this invention, history has been quite different from our world. Humanity has been flourishing, but without this important invention.

Transportation is carried majorly through water. Animal and human labour are the driving engines for powering daily tasks. There are no automated machines or engines, no need for roads, and humanity did not take the path of trade & commerce.

Life is simple and straightforward; people rely on fire, water and natural sources. A lot of water canals and lakes were made as roads for the boats.

People exchange things through barter, and jobs are selected on the basis of discovering life-purpose. Each individual discovers what service they want to do.?

Young boy Uday is the life of the priest-house. He is a sweet talker, and impresses everyone with his wit and kindness. Everyone in the house considers the boy as their source of joy. But to his father, the village priest - Shankar, he is the source of constant worry.

Shankar sees Uday as the boy with no purpose. His mind is always restless, and doesn’t land up on one particular thing. Uday soon will have to decide what he would want to do in life, but for that, he has to go deep within and discover.

No one in the house can understand why Shankar worries, but he can see what others don’t.

He used to notice the uneasiness in his son Uday. Uday was always surrounded by somebody all the time. He was addicted to having company and used crowds of people to hide his jitters. It was a coping mechanism he used to not face his feelings.

Soon, everyone he hung out with started choosing their paths, and found their life purposes. This was stressing Uday.

Lost in the tension of finding company, he went to the temple. He stood in front of the Krishna idol and started sharing his troubles.?He always thought that he is a people’s person and there was nothing wrong in that. Now, when everyone is sort of betraying him, he feels cheated and lonely.

It was the cue Shankar was looking for. So he approached his son after finishing his daily rituals and asked Uday to walk along.

He explained that all the idols in the temples are depicted in their accomplished form, and that they are only accompanied by their better-halves. The journey of finding and fulfilling life-purpose is a solo task, hence one has to endure his own company.

Shankar asked Uday to take a boat first thing in the morning and just keep sailing. He will have something when he returns. He just has to focus on sailing, that’s it.

This temporarily distracted Uday's mind from his current feelings, and he felt excited for the adventure.

The Uday left was not the one who returned. This put a smile on Shankar’s face and he knew what had happened.

Next morning, Shankar asked Uday to come and assist him in his morning temple rituals. Afterwards, they took a walk. Uday carried a peaceful look throughout.?

They talked about how his journey started with excitement, met with worries as there was no one and nothing to distract his mind, and followed by him spending the time with his thoughts finally. He even thought about the things he never gave attention to. He was seeing the world with a reduced pace and a clearer vision. Then, it hit him. Nature!

Uday experienced nature like never before. He wanted to be the one who looks after it. He explained his vision of landscaping and told his father he would want to spend his whole life drowned in it. He never felt such a belonging, and he didn’t feel the need to surround him with other people.

With the same smile on his face, Shankar explained what had happened. Uday never focussed inside his mind, lever listened to his thoughts and hence he always surrounded himself with people. Normally it wasn’t a bad thing, but lately it was being a hurdle to achieving clarity he always needed. Mindfulness and solitude were the ways humans always used to get their answers from within. The same thing was missing in Uday. When he kept on ignoring his feelings and keeping his solitude on hold, the worries rose.

There is a beautiful garden within all of us. When left unattended, the beauty worsens.

Nowhere can man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul - Marcus Aurelius