Shinda & Company

Besides being the title of the LP that signalled a return to prominence for Nas, the declaration of the words ‘I am..’ have traditionally been followed by a list of characteristics to describe one’s self. A name, a nationality, a religion, an education etc, all are seemingly first-rate ways to describe a person, but end up failing to accomplish that which it set out to do.

Everything we base our introduction on is all subject to impermanence.  We have been fooling ourselves for years, with our heavily defined boxes of self image.  Even with these definitions, we truly fail to understand that our boxes are composed of a transient ego.  We have grown up in a world where we are told who we are based upon a measuring stick that in itself is all illusion, all temporary, all pointless.  In this illusion, we have truly forgotten who we are.  It reminds me of a story I once heard in katha where Bhai Kulwant Singh is talking about a mistaken identity of a lion.

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I saw the lion herding the cows. ||1||Pause||

In the monsoon season of southern India, a lioness with child was ready to deliver.  By the time of delivery, the rainfall was so immense, that upon giving birth to the cub, the lioness had to retreat for shelter.  There in the middle of this storm, a lion cub was left; born with his eyes closed, shivering in the cold and drifting back and forth in the elevated waters of the nearby bank.  With the passing of night, the rain had receded and a farmer while out grazing his sheep noticed the cub lying on the river banks without any shelter or family.

The gentlemen sensing an attraction to the cub picked him up and brought him to the farm where he proceeded to raise the lion as one of his own.  The farmer nurtured the cub on cow’s milk, fed him fruits, grains and vegetables.  The farmer raised the cub to an adolescent the same way he reared his sheep.  After the cub was able, the farmer thought to put the young lion in the stable with the sheep and goats.  The lion became very attached and fond of his companions and began to talk and walk as if he was a sheep.  Soon enough, when time permitted, the farmer thought it would be a good idea to graze the sheep, with the lion as their protection.  The farmer figured that the lion that was born blind and had no idea who he was or what he was would be the perfect Sheppard to scare away other predators.  For all the lion knew, he was an overgrown sheep with different physical attributes.

So on the field one day, when the sheep were grazing, in the distant land, a load growl was heard.  At that instant, all the sheep lift their heads up from their feed and began to stare right at their lion, who himself was stunned gazing off in the direction of the roar.  The lion seemed to be shaken beyond mend as the sheep began to gaze upon his empty stare.  Again, in the distance, another roar was heard.  Then at the snap of a finger, a switch went off and the lion snapped.  He grabbed the closest sheep and slaughtered it with his paw. The entire herd followed suit one by one until they had dispersed or had the earth lined with their blood. After nature had taken its course on the lion, he began to match roars to his relatives in the distance.

For the life of lion up to that breaking point, he was raised in uncertainty, a mistaken identity we can call it. He did not for one second think that he was not a sheep.  He had no idea what a lion was.  This is the same shadow overcast on the minds of the sikh panth.  We have been raised in this western society, this world and nurtured to be sheep, stewarded by our mind.  Whatever our sensations say, we follow suit without thought.  We have, like the lion, begun to utter the vocabulary of the sheep.  We have begun to think and act like sheep. We may call ourselves Kings and Queens of our jungle, but we cannot control our own mind.   We have given the reins of our chariot to our sensations to take us wherever they please.  The notion of being free is all a fallacy.

The difference between us and the lion is that we, to some extent, know who we are supposed to be.  The lion lived his entire life in misconception.  Yet, he was still able to snap out of his spell; all with the simple primal noise of his species.  The lion just had to listen to it.

Keeping in mind the primal sound of our species, we need to snap back.  We have to pack some sort of cold snap. We need to use a tool to shape and mould our mind.  In order to cut and shape diamonds, one uses other diamonds.  In order to form steel, we use other forms of steel.  So what tool should we use to form the mind?  The mind itself is not made of anything from this world.  Its elements exist in a world that cannot be seen with these eyes nor touched with these hands.  The tool used to shape the mind, like the mind itself, has to have it elements from a different world.  That would then be naam, the Word.

Over the many years of our lives, we have forgotten who we are, and we have created an identity to fill the void left by maya.  However, regardless whether we think we know who we are or we do not, the sound of naam/bani will take its course naturally.  So let us snap back, with realization of who we truly are.  Let us break these shackles that bind us to the dark ways of maya.  Let us embrace our god given right to be free.  The method in which to accomplish this, much like the roar heard in the distance for the lion, is attention.

The real question then becomes, when the time comes, will we be attentive?

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Tagged: Sikhi