By Dr. Tilak Verma
(Continued from Passing Show 1...) I am ready to take the first-ever drag from my just-purchased, "Passing Show" cigarette! And that’s when I spot him, or should I say, he spots me.
Jindoo Ram! Our pot-bellied, rotund cook, maker of the choicest curries, renowned for his koftas with cashews embedded on the inside and for perfect, evenly cooked, puffed rotis.
“Having fun and enjoying, I see.” He observes and moves on, disappearing into the crowd before I can think of an excuse, offer an explanation, or plead for secrecy.
Oh boy! I fling the Passing Show aside and head home weighing my options, the best being, I decide, the truth. For my confession I choose my aunt. She is smart, lovely, elegant, and educated in the US, Boston, at a prestigious, renowned all-girl’s college, on a full scholarship no less, and at a time when it was unheard of for women to travel overseas for education. She should be favorably inclined, I imagine.
So, I tell her, and she listens patiently, attentively. Her response begins with, "You have chosen a difficult profession, an area of study with a long and arduous journey (how did she know?)” and ends with, “there will be time enough for pleasurable pursuits later.” I got the point: I must choose the good, right pursuit, not the pleasurable one, like the passing show cigarette.
My mind returns to the Katha Upanishad dialogue. “Both the good and pleasant approach man; the wise man discriminates between the two, having examined them well. Yea, the wiseman prefers the good to the pleasant, but the fool chooses the pleasant, through avarice and attachment.”
The talk highlighted how by choosing the path of right and avoiding the temptation of the path of pleasant passing show (A much ado about nothing), one advances more and more to the eternal bliss. Swamiji concludes saying, “All is well for those who choose wisely but those who prefer pleasure end up with nothing in their pursuit of the passing show.”
Source: Katha Upanishad
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