By Geetanjali Sharma
Wandering thoughts and unanswered questions have often brewed in shallow conversations and futile attempts to believe in and follow religion.
The practices I saw being taught—both at home and in school—the faith I was surrounded by, the religion that was spoken of, and the traditions that had been followed for generations without any drama, formed the way of life I knew. Still, as the odd one with too many questions at hand, my prayers did find a sense of belonging, and some aspects of faith made their way into my heart to stay. While the wheel of devotion kept moving, it never truly borrowed my attention. As my distance from being devoted to an entity increased, my faith and focus on certain beliefs allowed me to gather strength, making me hopeful and confident.
Back in the day, I once attended a session at my university, titled “A Dialogue on Discounting the Most Powerful Forces of Nature”. The speaker spoke about the power belief holds and how it triumphs over all that’s beyond our control—nature being the mightiest of all. This delivery of a strong, logically framed message didn’t allow my faith to find any hidden doors to escape. Maybe this has to do with the way our conscience keeps us guarded from losing what we’ve always known.
My soaked thoughts feel like a drive through a patch of thick fog, which I hope hasn’t left you feeling uncertain about this piece.
Allow me another chance.
Even though I come from a family where ‘shubh din’ and almost everything under the sun were preached and practiced, my mind never found enough reason to give up or give in. I began to believe in what made sense to me—some religion and some logic. My fears held strong and demanded more attention, and we all know that faith calms the unsettled mind.
But as my beliefs grew stronger in my juvenile years, my ability to see ancient religious scriptures or mythological dramas without a critical lens became blurry. While my mind sometimes crawls back to the roots of wisdom through the years of growing and feeding my soul with the presence of a higher power, my heart tries to understand what it might mean to those who only know of logic as their primary mantra.
I am able to host my ideologies freely. It is certainly a challenge for ‘non-believers’ to express their state in a world that doesn’t desire to acknowledge the non-existence of an entity governing our world.
As I pass through this learning curve with a partner who has driven away from the thick fog, I see it as a perfect example of belief and disbelief living and growing together—in love and patience.
(Geetanjali Sharma is an author and communications specialist. She holds a post-graduate degree in international communication from Macquarie University, Australia.)
