When I write this, I do not speak for all but for the questions that I have had and the answers that I have received. It is not to say that if you disagree with me, you seem to have either the right or the right answer. It plausibly means that the way you have explored the world around yourself is different than the way that I have explored it.

In my last post, The Quest of Questioning, I talked about how the quest of genuine questioning is the one ultimate quest of human existence and how it can bring you close to who you were, are and will become. This quest will eventually lead you closer to your potential as an individual and to all the possibilities that life can expect out of you. Since the time I was a child, I have had thousands of genuine questions and I would always be seeking answers to them. Most of the times these answers eluded me and as I became older, the answers seem to have forgotten their way towards me.

One of the most pertinent questions that I have had in my childhood came when my father expired. I was six years old and at that time I did not understand what had happened and how it would shape me as a person in the future. I had thousands of questions which I wanted to seek; one of them being, ‘Out of everyone, why only him and why only me?’ People around me gave answers which could not satisfy me. They said that it is the God’s will and that no one could stop what is already destined. This particular statement intrigued me and I began to ask more. “What is destiny?” “Can we ever change it?” “Who decided what is my destiny?” As a kid when I would ask these questions I would either not be taken seriously or given answers which took me back to the God.

I also went to the temples to look for my answers. I did all my rituals which were told to me by my family. By the time, I got into an adult phase, the worldly attachments had started to take over. My genuine quest of asking questions was replaced with my quest of being visible in this world. And then, one day, everything was defined.

Once, I got my hands on a piece of paper which had all my life written over it. It had mentioned all the subjects that I would be interested in, the time when I would get married, and so on. In India, astrology is a revered science and every news channel in the morning becomes a horoscope predicting machine. In the Hindu traditions even today, many events are decided based on the horoscope with marriage being on this list. After so many years, finally I had found answers to my questions. At the time of my birth, based on the position of the stars and planets, my life was decided and it continues to decide my fate even today. I could see some relevance of it in my current life too, at that time. Yes, I was an angry kid! Yes, my birth had an impact on the health of my father! Yes, I would be interested in subjects such as administration and education! With all these correlations coming true, it became an eternal truth for me. My fate was sealed. And, I had accepted it.

Recently, I arrived at crossroads where this eternal truth started to take over my whole life. My thoughts instead of focusing on my actions started to focus on my stars. My past started to come into my present and it started to empower both my present and my future. Something was not right. Is my destiny really sealed for good by the stars? I decided then that it was time to seek again and to find more answers. My quest lead me to some days where I would just find myself completely overpowered by the intensity of this search.

After days of search, I finally found some answers. These answers blew my mind. The stars and the planets actually do play a significant role in our lives until we let them do so. All of this can be controlled if we take life into our own hands and change the course of our own destiny. Such a powerful realisation to have! The Hindu philosophy which believes in astrology also says that you can chalk out your own life by taking control of your actions. I have heard all of this a million times in motivational quotes and books. But when I found its existence on my own, through my work and research, it has become much more striking.

The people that you meet daily who advice you and give suggestions on how to shape your life through the movement of the stars and planets are not wrong.  However, they aren’t right either. Indian spiritual guru, Sadhguru, in one of his conversations said that when people who have decided to take on a spiritual path go and meet people who are the ‘star-tellers’ are mostly categorically told that now since you have taken life into your own hands, no one will predict your future but yourself. This understanding of taking life into our own hands is both powerful and scary at the same time. How wonderful it is if you become the master of your own fate? You can be anyone. Who will you be?

India or Bharata has always been the land of seekers; and, when we seek, we question. The questions that we ask and the answers we get create impressions on our mind that eventually makes us who we are. After all, who are we but ourselves just before this present moment?

In my limited existence, I have realised the need to ask the genuine questions and the immaculate power that you inspire within when you get the right answers. As adults, we question less and believe that the questions that we have either will not be heard or are not worthy enough to be heard. At times, we even think them to be foolish. However, we all have been foolish once and it was the time when we were probably the happiest.

It was a time when we were all little children, looking up to people around us, our eyes gleaming with glitter and mouth with questions. We would ask and then ask more; our hunger for knowledge, learning and curiosity knew no bounds. But slowly and slowly our questions started to become irrelevant to the people around us; at our homes, and sadly even at our schools. We started to believe in the loss of value of our own questions and eventually, we became adults and our existence a pandemonious flute of doubts.

History has always told us that the people who dared to ask genuine questions (not just for the sake of it) made all the difference. In his famous speech, when Steve Jobs said “Stay hungy; Stay foolish”, he not only personified his own life but also the beauty of asking questions genuinely. There are three probable ways in which the quest of genuine questioning can be satiated (the list is not exhaustive). First, through already written readings and spoken words of people who had the similar quest; second, discussions with available people around us who had similar experiences (preferably with person/s who is/are a true Guru); and third, by going within your own existence and trying to find the answers there.

In the first two approaches there are chances that you might get diverted to the whims of others’ understanding. Hence, the third aspect becomes the most critical. Whatever you read in a book or hear in a speech; whatever you are being told by the people around you, it has to go under the test of your own wisdom and experience, and your own within must then tell you to either accept or reject. This inner voice knows all the right answers for you; it gets itself heard every time when you ask genuine questions and receive genuine answers. When this listening and telling happens, the real answers to your questions surface in front of your eyes and you get the true text and the real Guru/s.

So, ask those questions that you have today. But make sure that your wisdom and your voice of righteousness are behind it. Never be afraid. If you are a parent or a teacher, inspire your children to ask questions and never belittle them as a response to what they seek. If you are an adult, unmask that cloak of inhibition and start asking questions that you always wanted to ask, irrespective of the weirdness, difficulties and lack of space. Ask for it and it shall come.

“If you want to change the world, start by changing yourself. If you want to change yourself, change your questions.”