Shall life be guided by a cause?

(my daily journal 16-17 Aug. 20)

Haven’t been able to take a long leave from work for the last 8 years (because I always enjoy what I do), this week I have had an opportunity to spend my full three days alone in Siem Reap.This area was once the social, religious and administrative centre of the Khmer Empire. The area is the home of more than 1,000 temples, built between the 9th and 13th centuries.

As dawns were breaking every morning, I jogged about 20kms to some of the ruinous sites of the temples. Along the journey, I also enjoyed the expanse of tropical jungle surrounding the sites. On my last day I spent the whole afternoon siting by an ancient lake, reading a few of my top selected books.

I wanted to have the tranquility in my own space and use it to do more self-reflections on a number of big choices I have made and how I could navigate better in the future through all the courses I am going to venture into. That is a means for my conscious personal development.

During this span of time, I focused my whole attention on marvelous work of my ancestors and temples’ bas-reliefs/carvings depicting lives and stories of the society about a thousand years ago.

I hoped I could encounter something spiritual that could guide me to be a better and more useful human being or a leader that could do something whose meaning and beauty last in the hearts and souls of more younger generation.

If you are reading to this point, some of you might be laughing at me, for you think I am day-dreaming or bragging myself. I am not although I have a dream. As Cambodians, only a few of us among billions on this planet so far have had a chance to chair or share international podiums despite our glorious root in the past as descendants of the Khmer Empire that lasted from 802 to 1431. Most of the time from that glory point, we are plagued by wars that tore us down. I just wanted to be an inspiration for a younger generation and make my ancestors proud although I am not a wise man.

Somehow, while around those sites, there were a calling from inside of those holy surroundings and led me to find an light behind all these greatness of our past; and that is:

"Life needs a clear (social) cause for it to exist, thrive and flourish; otherwise, it will be tarnished."

The temples in Siem Reap were built to serve religious causes, being Buddhism, Hinduism or any deity in the name of any holy cause.

For Angkor Wat, it took the country 35 years to build, using up about 300,000 laborers and many highly skilled artisans engaging about 6,000 elephants. Its structure is made up of about 10 million sandstone blocks, each of which weighs up to 1,500 kilograms. Despite more than 800 years old, it remained an architectural marvel unlike anything else. The original cause then was dedicated to Hinduism. The moment that Angkor Wat was “rediscovered” in 1840s by the French explorer Henri Mouhot, he wrote that the site was “grander than anything left to us by Greece or Rome.”

I moved on to Bantey Kdei temple. It was built in the late 12th – early 13th century to honour Buddhism. The temple housed about 300 Buddha statues.

I went to another holy site called Neak Poan Temple (literally means the entwined serpents) where I visited just a few weeks ago. The site, built in the second half of the 12th century, was as one of the many hospitals that a great King Jayavarman VII built.

All of these were driven by a very specific cause beyond self.

Equally important to note, persisting in such quest did not go smoothly. Lives would have to be lost and blood had to be spilled so that the cause could be fulfilled during the pursuit.

In such a case, the leader who was kings in this context must not have flinched when receiving reports about casualty, deaths, floods or unforeseen disasters.

To bring the society to this level, one especially a leader must have put their senses of lives beyond themselves.

Such greatness is kindled by a commitment to be totally ambitious and willful for the cause, for the institution and its purpose.

I was led to believe that life shall be led by a cause. Achievements tangibly or intangibly will endure and last if they were cultivated for a good social cause.

I will continue to lead my life with a social cause. My life’s progress and movement, at both personal and professional levels, have been led by a social cause although most of the time I have been in a corporate world. I have been fostered by great organizations that are very committed to good social causes.

From this self reflection exercise, I think I am even more convinced now that:

• The cause shall be pursued relentlessly and with humility.
• The cause shall be bigger than myself.
• The great cause is the one that is crafted for the common goods not for a short-term interest.

David Rubenstein once said, "What do most people say on their deathbed? They don't say I wish I had more money or I wish I worked more. They say, I wish I would have spent more time with my family and done more for my society and community."

That is the cause for a life to exist. Our life shall be in pursuit of a good cause and we shall never allow doubts to cloud those causes. We come to this earth alone and we also leave this earth alone. Our journey is already lonely. Thus, we shall make our existence, sometimes short, really worthwhile and enjoyable.

Life is like a ship. If it leaves port, and gets carried away by a storm, to be thrown around randomly for a year, and then finally returns to port, that ship has not had a purposeful, efficient course. The same applies to us. It’s important to have a strong cause and strive for it. But don't change it too often. Some people drift all their life, and only stop when they are too tired or too old to keep going.

I shall end here with another statement from Seneca, a stoic philosopher and rhetorician. He said about 2,000 years ago that "As is a tale, so life is; not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters."