Pyaar Ka Jazba - II

This is a pseudo-continuation of yesterday's post as I will focus on yet another sher from the same ghazal which we discepted in the previous post.

As I mentioned yesterday, there are couplets in that ghazal which have a better lyrical value than the matla itself. The couplet we will critique today falls into this category. The lyrics almost immediately appeal and even a casual listener is sub-consciously caught uttering - "waah kya baat kahin hai...". If you have actually been following the blog and listened to the ghazal yesterday, I almost guarantee you that you already know which sher am talking about and you did have that exact emotion run through your heart (notice I say heart and not mind) when that sher occured. If not, go back and listen to the ghazal and then read this post - it will appeal much more...

अपने चेहरे के किसे दाग नज़र आते है ।
वक्त हर शख्स को आईना दिखा देता है ।

Verbatim:

None sees their own flaws, but time, a great disciplinarian that it is, eventually punishes you for those bad traits and behaviors.

Discussion:

The couplet is lucid enough that it doesn't warrant a thorough discussion. But nevertheless, I will put down what it means to me. Time is a wonderful teacher. Its during the bad times in life that we learn the best of the things - about us, about people, and most importantly the flaws we have. Thats a simple chain of thought which I am sure most of us would relate to and thats probably the gist that most of us got from reading the sher in the first place.

Off late I have been reading a book called Jnana Yoga which is a series of lectures by Swami Vivekananda given while in New York and London in the early 1890s. Therein, he speaks about the real nature of man - the quest of every man really is to go towards this perfect man (GOD) rather than material wealths of the world. Its these material pleasures that keep us from achieving our true potential, the realization of advaita and the sense of freedom. During the good times, these pleasures keep us occupied enough that we stop exploring the real nature of man. Time as an eternal teacher (bad times as we call them) mentors us to seek GOD - to break free from these shackles of worldly pleasures. Its really teaching us to focus on the ultimate goal - the achievement of one-ness or advaita with the REAL MAN of which all of us are a base reflection (notice the innuendo to the original sher talking about aaina). Too bad that even during those times (as a terrible student) we seek GOD only to help us get over the impending material obstacles. Its even more unfortunate though that only bad times take us closer to god while we continue to revel in the enjoyment of material senses in the good times. Vivekananda wants us to start early and continue on that path - then time (good or bad), space, and causation are mere events and don't mean a thing.

-- Sifar.