Live Like a Lotus Leaf in the Waters of Life

Published by Dr. Archika Didi at February 25, 2022

What is attachment?

It means holding on to materials or people strongly as if it’s impossible for you to live without them. All your happiness depends on them only. You develop a sort of mental connection with certain people and things. They limit your vision, and knowledge determining your actions, happiness and grief.

The feeling controls lives, minds as well as the senses. It also define people’s lives, personality and, sometimes, destiny.

And often, they create a great disturbance in life.

How attachment creates disturbance?

Undoubtedly, attachment is a strong human attribute that has been considered darkness by enlightened masters. It’s like a darkness of ego. You can understand it by reflecting upon it. When there is dark all around, you are unable to see anything, you fail to understand where the actual path is and it also happens that you bump into unwanted things injuring yourself.

Likewise, the life of a person, who is disillusioned due to attachment, is also full of darkness. He fails to understand anything. Such a person only feels deep affection towards his own children, wealth or property. He considers only those materials best that are his own. Nothing else comes into his sight. Sometimes, such a person gets disillusioned and fails to understand what is right.

Deep inside, he understands something is wrong, still he’ll take a certain step for his child. His emotion is making him do all that and in the course of time, such a person gets involved in conflict with strangers as well. The person fights and develops enmity with all and gets furious over his own people.

So, a strong affection towards anything will disturb you, trouble you, inflict sadness upon you and make you wander into the trap of this materialistic world.

Live a ‘conflict-free life’ through detachment

Lord Buddha calls the attribute, Craving (Trishna) and Lord Krishna calls it, Attachment (Asakti). You are deeply fond of your property, which belonged to your father earlier, now it’s yours. Who will own it after sometimes, no one knows. Still, you are so possessive about it.

This property will stay here even after you. Yet, your self-centeredness & affection is making you lament over it. You fight for properties; conflicts arise even between father and son. Relationships break over it.

Therefore, in the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna says, transcend the darkness of attachment. As you cross it, you attain detachment.

Detachment means you are neither in favour of something nor in its opposition, rather you become available to equanimity. And now you are free from any kind of attachment. And this is the way to living like a beautiful lotus leaf in the muddy waters of life.