Hazrat Inayat Khan continues with his description of the unavoidable states of intoxication that we face in life. The previous post in the series is here.
Every stimulus that one experiences through food and drink is really a small intoxication. But it is not only the food that one eats, the water that one drinks, and all that one sees and hears and touches that has an influence, an effect, on a man’s being and intoxicates him; even the air that he breathes from morning till evening is continually giving him a stimulus and an intoxication. If this is true, is there then one moment when a man is not intoxicated? He is always intoxicated, only sometimes more so than others.
This is, however, not the only intoxication. A man’s absorption in the affairs of his life also keeps him intoxicated; and besides the intoxication of his work and affairs in which his mind is absorbed, there is a third intoxication, and that is the attachment that a man has to himself, the sympathy he has with himself. It is this intoxication which makes him selfish, greedy, and very often unjust towards his fellow men. The effect of this intoxication is that a man is continually feeling, thinking, and acting with the idea in mind of what would be to his interest, what could bring him an advantage;’ and in this idea his whole life and all his time become fully involved. It is this intoxication that makes him say, ‘This one is my friend and that one is my enemy; this one is my well-wisher, but that one is against me’; and it is this intoxication that builds the ego, the false ego of man.
Just as an intoxicated man does not really know what is profitable to him, so a selfish man in his selfishness never knows nor understands what is really to his advantage. In moments of soberness a man wonders, ‘If this is intoxication, then what is reality? I would like to know what reality is.’ But to know reality, not only the eyes and ears are necessary, but soberness too is needed to hear and see better. One might ask why all this should be called intoxication if it seems to be the normal state of every person. It can be called a normal condition only in so far as it is indeed the condition of everyone; but intoxication remains intoxication; it is not satisfactory. There is an innate longing for a certain satisfaction which man does not know, and this satisfaction he seeks. No active person with any wisdom will deny the fact that often an effort he makes for happiness seems to result in disappointment; this shows that the effort was in the wrong direction. But apart from the making of an effort to find reality, one must first realize what this intoxication is; in order to do this, the first step on the path of truth is to know that such a thing as intoxication exists.
There is the intoxication of childhood. Imagine what attention, what service, what care the child demands at that time when it still does not know who takes the trouble or who takes care of it! It plays with its toys, it plays with its playmates, it knows not what is awaiting it in the future. What it wants, what it plays with, is what is immediately around it; it does not see further. Nobody in his childhood has ever known the value of his mother or his father or of those who care for him, until he reaches that stage when he begins to see for himself. And when we observe the condition of youth, that again is another intoxication, it is the time of blossoming, of the fullness of energy. The soul in that spring-time never thinks that it can be anything else; the soul never thinks that this is a passing stage. The soul at that time is full of intoxication, it knows nothing apart from itself. How many errors a youth commits, how many faults he has, how many thoughtless, inconsiderate things he does, of which he afterwards repents but about which he never thinks at the time! It is not the fault of the soul, it is the intoxication of that time of life. The person who is intoxicated is not responsible for what he does; neither is the child to be blamed for not being responsible or appreciative enough, nor the youth for being blind in his energy; it is natural.
The intoxication remains as a person goes on in life; there is only a change of wine. The wine of childhood is different from the wine of youth, and when the wine of youth is finished, some other wine is taken. Then, according to what walk of life a man follows, he drinks that wine which absorbs his life, either collecting wealth or acquiring power or seeking a position; all these are wines which intoxicate man. And if one goes even further in life, intoxication still pursues one. It may be that one is interested in music or fond of poetry, or one may love art or delight in learning; it is all intoxication. If all these different occupations and interests are like different wines, what is there then in the world that can be called a state of soberness? It is wine indeed from beginning to end. Even those who are good and advanced, spiritual and moral, they also have a certain wine. One has to take wine all the way; but there are different wines. A highly advanced artist, a great poet, an inspired musician will admit that there are moments of intoxication which come to him through his art as a joy, as an upliftment, and it makes him exalted; it is as if he were not living in this world.
To be continued…