To be alive!
What does it mean “to be alive”?
Let me tell you an old tale;
“There was a man who was passing by a cemetery at the periphery of a little town. As he was looking at the headstones he found something very curious. It seemed that all the people had lived less than two years. It ranged from hours to days, weeks, months and then a year or two!
He changed his direction and went in the town to ask about what had happened. He thought there might have been a famine or an earthquake or such disasters but even that wouldn’t cater for an answer to his question! He was directed to the wise man of the town to raise his question.
The wise man answered; we do not write on their headstone how many years they were living on this planet. We rather write how long they were really alive!”
A Persian mystical tale
Is life the accumulation of the time from birth to death? If it is, then what if we are alive but connected to a life support machine? Do we still consider it? (though we do not know yet what is going on in the brain and the psyche of such patients).
How come many times we hear ourselves and others saying “I don’t know how and when this last year passed me by”.
Doesn’t it signify that our consciousness mind have not been present in time and space of that period? Doesn’t it mean that we had been running on cruise control and just reacting spontaneously to the situation?
Life is not the accumulation of the hours or days that we live but rather the collection of the moments that we have been aware and conscious of our thoughts and actions. This includes the happy times, sad times, times of despair and triumph.
As a member of the musical group Rcubed we wrote a song about this concept. The lyrics are below.
“Travelling the world and seeing the nations
looking around and observation
seeing beauty, admiration
quenching the thirst and gratification!
Roar of confusion in the brain
fighting the sickness feeling the pain
heaving a big sigh after you cry
life’s a quest and then you fly!
Life is the rain life is the drought
it’s the silence it’s the shout
pick yourself up take the chance
be amazed! you’ll learn to dance!
Sometimes it hurts that you think it’s the end
you want the pain to go away
Maybe it’s there to let you know
that even though you feel so low
You’e still alive!
So, open your book and honor the time
write your story savor the line
within the swamp-land lotus is found
like phoenix from ashes life abounds.
(copyright Rcubed)
Composed, lyrics, vocal (Radovan Klusacek, Roozbeh Malekzadeh, Robert Grech)
This song is available through CDbaby. Click here to listen.