Written By Shital Ravi
I write once again about the Vari. The ‘Vari story’ was an article I wrote for The Mind Diaries as part of its second anniversary edition. It touched upon the Vari’s benefits on one’s mental health and well-being. This time I write of the inner journey that I embarked upon while doing the Vari.
Just to recap about what the Vari is – it is the walk that the Varkari embarks upon from Alandi to Pandharpur with the Palki of Dnyaneshwar Mauli. There are other routes too taken by Varkaris with the palkis of different saints. The Varkaris are part of various Dindis (groups walking and staying together) who walk, eat, and camp together for the whole journey. It is a 21-day pilgrimage covering more than 250 kms, which ends on the Ekadashi of the month of Ashadi when one takes darshan of Lord Vitthal Mauli at Pandharpur.
All the walking through the day away from your daily grind is the outer journey, which has its own set of challenges. But parallelly, another journey happened, the inner journey. As the outer journey progressed from one town to another, covering milestones and kilometres, taking us nearer to our destination, the inner journey too progressed from one milestone to another, taking me nearer to more conscious self-awareness, more clarity in thinking, a more centred being and a calmer mind. All this happens through a lot of self-introspection, observation, shedding unnecessary biases, and so much more. The ‘me’ who started this journey was not the same ‘me’ at the end of it. Rather, there was much less ‘me-ness’ by the end of it.
So, what did I learn while walking towards the sanctum sanctorum of Lord Vitthal as well as the sanctum sanctorum of the self?
Testing my own limits
Walking for 36 kms where even one was a struggle is something that the more I think of, the less I decipher. Where I barely manage a km of walking on a daily basis, walking the patch of 36 kms from Pune to Sasvad which includes a 4 km ghat too is something unimaginable. But well, here I am, writing about it!
This single journey was an eye opener. An ocean of people walking and walking. I wondered how all these people are walking without anything happening to their feet. Don’t they feel pain, fatigue, cramps or anything? They are singing, dancing, sometimes running and some are doing it without footwear! And what did I do? I cried.
Yes, I cried because I could not go on, I cried because I was in pain, I cried because every step was becoming a herculean effort. But through those incessant tears, I prayed. In the ghats, when it was becoming more and more harder, I kept my faith going and I prayed ardently to Lord Vitthal to somehow help me cross over. It is said that Bhagwan comes in the form of humans to help you. And I think that is the essence of Vari. For every bumbling jack, self-doubting person like me, there are at least 100 Varkaris known and unknown who seek you out and tell you not to stop and keep going. In the midst of the ocean of people, here I was walking and crying, goaded and coaxed by others gently to put one step after another. Well, I finally made it.
Back to the basics
The outer journey of the Vari is full of novel experiences. You are moving from one place to another almost every day leading a sort of nomadic life for the 21 days. Most Varkaris live in Zilla parishad schools, town halls, temple precincts, courtyards of local people, makeshift tents, wherever your dindi has been able to forge a stay. The amenities are basic. For city dwellers the amenities can seem absolutely primitive. It either makes you want to run away on the second day or makes you want to explore and test your limits and unlearn your conditioned living and learn new ways. It’s a choice that you make. I too had felt like turning back when I came down with a fever on the second day. But fellow Varkaris rallied around me, motivating, helping, getting medicines and nursing me back to enough health that I chose to continue. It has been one of the best decisions that I have ever made in my life and will never ever regret it.
Stop the TFG (taken for granted) syndrome
Vari made me see what truly matters. There are so many things that we easily take for granted in our daily lives which are actually filled with joyful abundance. We just need to observe and become aware of these. Simple things like:
- A good, hot meal.
- A clean place to sleep at night.
- A fan when it is hot.
- A clean bed sheet when it is cold.
- Clean water to drink.
- Clean, dry clothes to wear.
- Simple coconut oil to apply to your aching feet.
Everything to be savoured and be grateful for. Nothing to be taken for granted.
Sharing
The Vari built an appreciation and immense gratitude not only to what we have in life, but gratitude towards others for almost every Varkari was readily helping the others. I said almost because I must say that this spirit of service to the fellow Varkari is embodied far greater in the poorer section of society. It is the ones who are in the lap of luxury who have in abundance who many a times falter. People from poorer dindis were ready to share their hot meals, toilets allotted to them, water from their dindi tankers. They even made space for me in the small hall to sleep when I was feeling unwell, which was meant for them to sit and have lunch. I realised that many of us city dwellers had much to learn from them. Many of us carry a chip on our shoulders and are unable to share though there is abundance. This dichotomy is perplexing. But the conditioning of not sharing what we think is ours and ours alone has gripped us so much that it makes us intolerant towards others. It has made us immune to the wanting soul.
I do not generalise. Not everyone is so. But hands down, in the Vari, it was the village people, the simple people, poorer people who won in giving and sharing.
How enough is enough
Even before I did the Vari, I had heard an oft-repeated phrase in Marathi – Ek Divasacha Sansar. The literal meaning of this phrase is one day’s samsara or worldly living. The Vari actually taught this. It teaches you to live on a day-to-day basis. We run behind accumulating, wanting more and more of what we already have. Senselessly we hoard and want everything in plurals: house, car, jewellery and what not. Many a times, most of us do not know when and where to stop. We do not realise that we can stop once we have enough and in fact focus on the other important things in life. The Vari makes you do a raincheck.
To sum up in Sant Dnyaneshwar Mauli’s words:
“चालतां चालतां शिकावे | वाटचाल जीवनाचे ||
पाऊले पडता वाटेवरी | अनुभव येई तत्त्वाचे ||
सुख–दु:ख दोन्ही मिळती | जसे नदीचे दोन तीर ||
संत संगती ठेवी जोडी | तोच पावे गंतव्य ठिकाण ||”
“By walking, one learns. The journey itself teaches life’s ways.
With every step on the path, wisdom unfolds.
Joy and sorrow come together, like two banks of a river.
But one who walks with saints finds the true destination.”