The thought of Diwali brings along a very simple yet powerful chant in mind, Asato Ma Sad Gamaya, Tamaso Ma Jyotir Gamaya. These two remarkably beautiful lines simply mean, “God, lead us from untruth to truth and from darkness to light.”
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oi_4hIU3Eho?rel=0&showinfo=0&w=640&h=360]
We consider decorating and lighting up our houses, our buildings and everything around us; but what we must understand is the fact that Diwali is not just for lighting up the edifice but for illuminating our lives, improving our lives, walking out of darkness toward light and doing something better than what we are presently doing. This Diwali should bring along light in everyone’s life.
When speaking of light and darkness in Diwali, they have deeper meanings to them; Light means Knowledge, understanding of others and true values. While Darkness means ignorance, lack of values and not considering the situation or the point of view of others.
We are becoming darker and darker from the humanity perspective. There is so much loneness, so much fear, so much hate, and so much unhappiness in every corner of the world. This festival, we should strive to come out of darkness; the darkness that is within our existence and around us, within the society, within the community, our nation and within religions.
Lack of knowledge, lack of consideration, lack of humanity is driven by darkness. It brings in darkness in our society, our community and in the overall global scenario. The moment we start considering ourselves brighter than others and think that others are in the dark, that’s where we are mistaken, it causes disappointments and that’s when we plunge down to war, violence, disrespect, unrest, social unrest and all global based human to human problems.
Every person had a point of view, every person is bright, each of us has a spark regardless of where we live, what we are, what color are, what religion we follow, we all have something beautiful within us. We all have a spark within us. We all have different colorful unique lights. We must all come together, spend time to understand each other, to understand the value of other religions to understand each other in general.
This festival must bring along enough light to conquer and overcome the darkness within us, be it in the form of our fear, ego, sadness, greed, lust, or anger. Each and every person must be able see the light in others, help to spread the light, share the light, and enlighten the darkness within us as well. The light should make us see a brighter picture and brighter life everywhere, and radiate faith in humanity and reflect this glow all across the world.