Grit & Grace

India is the Great Teacher

That’s what we say.

Is it because so many inquisitive souls have walked these roads? Leaving shards of wisdom in their wake?

India is many things.

She is unforgiving and unapologetic in her ways.

She moves for no man.

You must dive in and allow her to sweep you away.

If you can be content with uncomfortability, you will be blessed with a glimpse of her secrets.

India is a world of opposites.

She reveals her beauty in between the hard places.

In a “simple dish” with 20 ingredients.

In a warm, comforting chai at a dirty roadside stall.

In the frills and decorations wrapped around rusted automobiles.

In the elaborate Murtis within crumbling temple walls.

India is intense and heavy. Life is turned up all the way. Colors are vivid and variable. Flora and fauna spring up wherever there’s space. Sounds and smells are literally constant. She is passionate and consuming. She requires your full attention, while also requiring nothing at all. Come as you are, everyone is engulfed right into the madness.

People are everywhere, and with people come people things: egos and attitudes, pain and poverty, judgement and denial. But also compassion and friendship, perseverance and ingenuity, innocence and awe.

You cannot hide here, which is ironic because most of us are running away from something.

And even if we manage to leave our bullshit behind -we cannot escape ourselves.

Certainly we know this; its as if India were a medicine we willingly swallow- a medicine that forces us to take a deep long look inside.

Somewhere in between blistering feet and luke-warm bucket baths, we remember who we are. What is left when we strip away everything we thought made us whole? There’s not a lot of room for extras when daily living requires such effort.

Can we learn to appreciate the simplicity of life? Sunshine to dry our laundry, rain to feed the Earth and grow our food. Real human connection to feel love and belonging?

Underneath her web of chaos, India knows these precious truths. She will teach you too.

She is in the outstretched hand of the beggar. She is the woman washing laundry in the gutter. She is in the barefoot smiling children, perfectly content to be playing outside without cell phones or fancy toys. She is the street sounds that make your ears bleed. She is the perpetual haze that lingers over the city. She is in the patience of waiting for your hand written receipt, or your food, or your taxi, or your delivery…oh the waiting…

She is in the delicate silk of a saree sailing on the back of a scooter -side saddle of course. She is in the intricate Rangolis outside the most impoverished houses.

Like Kali herself, India is a goddess who knows no bounds. Pushing the threshold until spilling over the edge. Up close and personal, she invades your space, and there is no escape. Despite making you uncomfortable, you can’t deny her allure. Mysterious and haunting, she challenges you in just the way you need.

She invites you to find beauty in the perverse. What sides of yourself are you so afraid to see?

She teaches that you can in fact, be both: beautiful and ugly, abundant and destitute, content and impatient, generous and selfish, forgiving and harsh.

And it is here, in this world of opposites, we can come to realize that we don't have to choose.