Sharav Creative Writing 2011. Theme: Inebriation
Discourse by Swami P.K.Ludhke
The destiny of human being is intoxicatingly woven into the destiny of Alcohol. Man fritters away his entire life in pursuit of perfect life and a perfect life partner, without realizing the true meaning of his existence. In today’s materialistic world, everyone is driven by selfishness. Everyone is a friend of everyone else, yet nobody belongs to anybody else. Man has become a solitary and isolated, left at the mercy of the Supreme. There is desperate need for spiritual enlightenment.
It has always been a big question for spiritual seekers: How to control the mind? How can we find peace? Yes, there is a way. Inebriation, which appears very strange but it is the most effective one in today’s post modern era. Peace is not just the absence of violence; it is the cessation of aggression along with its roots and its imprints in the mind. Inebriation precisely does the same. It induces eternal peace. Your sensations stop responding and your vision deceives your conscience. Everything around you appears as a lump of mass, without any gestalt. You are transported to a different and unrealistic state of mind where you become oblivious to pain and suffering. Everything around you becomes insignificant. All directions are same, leading to the ultimate salvation.
The essential aspect of this simple and yet powerful technique is in the intake of most fancy looking dark coloured liquor in the bar and expression of blocked, repressed cravings of the mind, and the possibility to do so in a very unusual way through the method of gibberish actions which is very freeing and liberating. It allows the participant to transcend their usual precincts of decency and morality to indulge themselves into their unfulfilled desires, hidden until now in their subconscious minds due to societal fear of admonition.
Inebriation, when done with absolute intensity, takes us out of our logical mind and into the realms of the mysterious and spiritual. Simply allow whatever is offered to you in a shapely piece of glass into your body, without bothering whether it is meaningful or harmful. If needed, just throw up and resume the intake till the piece of glass slithers away from your hand and you feel as if you are falling into a bottomless well.
Many myths about inebriation have misguided humankind through the ages. However, over the past few decades, inebriation has emerged as one of the two most popular means of deliverance, the other being junk food. Hence, we need newer, sustaining and energising myths to guide and inspire us. The fact that we are the part of the immense unfolding of Alcohol, reiterates the essence of Self realization because we feel this Alcohol throbbing in our bones, singing in our hearts and interpenetrating our souls.
Sohini Sarkar 