A sensible man/woman is always torn asunder by two different kinds of calls- one is from the Material Realm, always trying to pull him/her down and the other one is from the Spiritual Realm, constantly pulling up. We at times, can’t decide which call we should attend to. This is the exact point from where we are not sure where to go and which direction we should take! At this point of time, the Material contrives to have a complete sway over the Spiritual and the Spiritual constantly pricks our conscience not to succumb to it, and this is the root cause of our perpetual agony and restlessness. Is there no hope, no escape? We ourselves have to evolve our own mechanism/scheme in order to overcome this kind of a tricky situation! There always has to be a common point where these two kinds of calls are attended to and struck a perfect balance! Easy to say but hard to practice!! But not impossible!!!

The matter vs. spirit tussle in us has been seem to be going on since the very inception of the ephemeral world, and the man is made to fend for himself/herself amidst this never ending predicament of the life process. In a way, it seems to me that it’s a part of a much bigger cosmic rule which is beyond the level of comprehension of ordinary human beings, and for that matter, even in the case of those who are considered to be extraordinary in their senses and finest in perceptions! The rules are set in an intricate style that we can never be able to completely take shelter either in total Materialism or in complete Spiritualism and also we can never be able to dare to break the rules in order to see the aftermath, and this again is a part of a bigger conspiracy! Total dependence on Materialism destructs our long built and highly cherished human society and its bonding, and taking complete recourse to Spiritualism puts an end to the very evolutionary process called human civilization.

I frequently quote the words of the great scientist Albert Einstein in many of the occasions such as this – “Science without religion is lame and religion without science is blind” (Here I’m taking religion in a more liberal sense which includes spiritualism.), and I always admire two great modern thinkers and leaders from India who worked from two extremes, whose approaches strikingly differed from each other but their inner conscience and its quest remained the same. The sole purpose of their birth and life was just to uplift the Mankind! One is Babasaheb Ambedkar who worked on Materialism as the only solution for all the ills of our society, and the other is Swami Vivekananda who worked on Spiritualism as the only remedy for all the challenges thrown to mankind by the Material world. Both of them worked relentlessly on their own chosen paths and succeeded in bringing about some meaningful denouement in Indian society, and which is going to have far reaching implications in times to come.

Though it is difficult to conclude which is the precursor for what, we can say with simple logic and common sense that unless a man is fully met with all that he/she cherishes the most materially, s(he) can never aspire to taste the spirituality and the very thought of it is a sheer abhorrence for him/her. There is another side to the coin- unless man/woman has his/her moorings in spiritual realm, his/her material life will be a total shambles! This is a big puzzle of our lives!! It takes a lifetime in many a people in order to unravel this, but what’s the use in knowing the truth after we had lived our full life based on total falsehood and bigotry? Materialism and Spiritualism are two parallel lines like the railway tracks, they never converge at any point of time but definitely help in propelling us in our long march towards our perfect destiny, if both of them are equally and meaningfully compensated for by each other.

The views expressed by me are purely personal and may not be generalized, and I always bow with deference to those who give more intellectually and spiritually driven insights.