Violence occurs as an obstacle in the path towards freedom. Every desire/action of a human being is a sub-conscious effort to attain freedom. Now the question arises, why freedom! To start with, we do not make a choice of our births, colours, cultures etc. on our own. This is our first dilemma that contradicts our pride of being born free. Secondly, we are said to have a free will but side-by-side we are told what to do and what not to do! Hence, unknowingly or knowingly we have an innate desire to cut these chains to arrive at a state of freedom. Still, why lack of freedom gives rise to violence? It is because one-way or the other, we blame others for depriving us of freedom. This situation arises due to the paradox of looking for right things at wrong places: One evening, a neighbour noticed that Mulla Nasruddin was searching for something outside of his home. He approached Nasruddin and asked, Mulla! Have you lost something? Mulla told him that he lost his ring and asked his help to find the ring. . After some searching without any result, the neighbour asked, where did you exactly drop it? Mulla replied, Inside the house If you lost the ring inside your house, then why are you looking for it here. Well, there is more light out here. Replied Mulla. This is exactly the situation, as we like to draw a straight line on a crooked surface. For instance, politically, we shout freedom but ended up obtaining smaller countries out of bigger countries. Likewise, slogans of religious freedom concentrate us in smaller pockets. Evidently, humanity compromises sky of freedom with less and less space. Is it freedom or imprisonment? It is strange that freedom, which is limitless, is seen through the lens of extreme limitedness. This is a great human tragedy that we desire an open sky by confining ourselves into a tiny dungeon. With this conflict of understanding, chaos is the only outcome, yet we want to live a peaceful life. The gravity of self-created contradictions keeps us pulling down from the sky of freedom to live a life of anger and frustration giving rise to a violent way of life. Basically, we are thirsty for inner freedom, but hiding this ailment with tons of fancy diseases like lack of power, not being religious, not wealthy etc. etc. A king after taking a heavy meal felt dryness in his throat. The court physicians had been called and after consultation, he was given some sort of oil to apply but dryness remained. Then, he had been asked to take honey, but dryness of his throat sustained. They kept on trying different methods, but condition of Kings throat kept getting worse. At that point, they ended up inviting a wise man. After checking Kings throat and getting information about the symptoms, disease was diagnosed as thirst with the treatment of water and lo! The King was healed. Surrounded with so many lies yet in search of truth, we talk about peace and non-violence. It is like dreaming light with closed eyes. Unless and until we face ourselves truthfully, there can be no genuine solution to any genuine problem. This is what freedom is all about i.e. to determine the causes of chains and bonds that are hindering us to fly like an eagle in an open sky. To put it in more realistic words, to realize what is stopping us to feel more loving and joyful, as freedom and being in love is synonymous. People who love and laugh a lot are never violent and only such individuals seem to be capable of piercing the veil of conditioning and gets transported to a stage where religion, sects, nationalities do not matter. Love has an inherent quality of extinguishing the fire of hatred and violence in no time whatsoever. This is where, violence ends and peace begins.
saiyed shahbazi www.shahbazcenter.org
