DEATH
Compulsory Break
ONE of the rules of government service is that if a government servant goes on leave without first having obtained official approval, the government has the right to consider his absence a break in service. This means that his seniority will be affected; he will lose all rights to the benefits of service, and will return to the status which he had on day one of his appointment. He will, therefore, forfeit all the rights of promotion due to him for all his past years of service. A break in service will thus mean a demotion for him.
This principle, in the context of the history of mankind, applies to all human beings, only on a larger scale, and may be termed a break in history. In this world, everyone stands on the history he has carved out for himself. He is born, he gradually grows up, then different opportunities present themselves to him, by availing of which he makes a history of his own and acquires for himself various kinds of supports—a home, property, a family, circle of friends, popularity, power, wealth, treasures, etc. His history becomes his identity. He knows himself through it. This happens with every person. Everyone constructs his own history—a never-ending struggle—and it in turn is a bastion of strength for him.
Death comes to everyone, as an irrevocable part of human fate, and it mostly comes without warning. Man is then disconnected from the stage of life before death and is taken on to the stage of life after death.
But few have the opportunity to live on for a lengthy period of time. Inevitably, within a period of approximately a hundred years, the moment called death comes suddenly. Death comes to everyone, as an irrevocable part of human fate, and it mostly comes without warning. Man is then disconnected from the stage of life before death and is taken on to the stage of life after death. It is like having the entire history of one’s deeds suddenly nullified, and returning to a state without a history. The advent of death, an event which takes place in the life of every person, may thus be called a break in history. Everyone devotes their energies to constructing a world which will satisfy their hopes and desires. Every person lives in a world of his own making. Then, all of a sudden, death comes and compels them to leave this world and enter a world for which they have made no preparation. One leaves behind the world so painstakingly built by them, only to find that the world which lies ahead for them is a never-ending desert for which they were not prepared. One who has lived all along in security and comfort is suddenly confronted with having to live in a state of total deprivation.
The stage of life before death is not just the first but is also the final chance for all human beings to bow to God’s will. They are not going— at any later stage—to have a second chance. One who made use of this chance only to provide himself with worldly comforts and luxuries will be compelled to live in the stage of life after death divested of all former material supports. For death will separate him from his past history and he will never have another chance to make a new history.
How strange it is that man is losing the only chance he has today of developing those virtues most desired for him by God and how devastating it will be when, tomorrow, man will be in a total state of deprivation, and it will not be possible for him to save himself from it.
Going against one’s conscience is
not very easy. It is this behaviour
that creates what is called tension
or stress. If you want to live with a
tension free mind, listen to the voice
of your conscience and follow it
without any reservation.