Enthusiasm is elementary, my dear Watson

Dear friends,

As I reminisce the many funny and meaningful memories together with my late friend and mentor, Bruce, one on enthusiasm stands out in particular, marked also for its relevance to our daily lives.

Early in our publishing career together, Bruce told me: “You should never lose that enthusiasm in life, Anu.” I can’t recall what he said that in response to—I am typically always excited and giggly about things, bordering on being silly even, particularly back then, having hit a mere thirty. “Enthusiasm is next to God, guard it well and for life,” he added. He also explained with the meticulous precision of the erudite he was, that enthusiasm came from the Greek word Entheos. En meant “in” or “inside” and theos meant “God”.

So, enthusiasm means that we have a God inside of us.

Today, I realize that’s remarkably close to the Vedantic belief that God resides within us as Atman. Back then, I probably vaguely nodded and got back to work, much like a child does when given advice by parents.

Tucked away in the annals of my memory till a few days back, this incident swooped to the forefront out of the blue—a good 22 years later! I was in the kitchen going about the daily cooking chores and the realization dawned that I might be growing increasingly jaded with age, not exactly being the Ms. Enthusiastic I was called out to be. For example, I don’t cook with the same gusto as before. I am still enthused about things, especially helping people, but I am far from jumping up and down in excitement like before.

On Enthusiasm, and Bumpy Roads in West Virginia

Like that time, when we took a trip from Bruce and his wife, BJ’s hometown of Charlestown, West Virginia to the artsy Shepherdstown, a half hour away, with moi and my husband, Sri in the backseat—we rode the verdant bumpy country road in their low sedan cutting through corn fields on both sides. I recall squealing in laughter, tickled by the constant roller coaster effect triggered by the undulations on the road. I remember Bruce looking back with a mix of surprise and disbelief—his eyes tearing up characteristically with laughter—as if to say, what in the world is wrong with you? He even mentioned something to the effect that he had never seen folks so happy driving down the plain ol’ country roads of West Virginia.

A quintessential country road in West Virginia with roads meandering between fields on both sides. A stray red barn adds a dash of red ever so often to the otherwise quiet, blissful green all around.

OK, I was two decades younger then. But even discounting the age factor—that you typically grow a bit more even tempered with age—arguably, as it’s not happening much to me—I feel a bit subdued, in the Department of Enthusiasm.  

So, that talk on enthusiasm with Bruce 22 years back, popped back into my mind. When you are a parent, and as kids grow up, heavier issues emerge to the top of the pile, I guess—classes, college, teen parenting, health, aging parents, worry about the future, you name it.

Perhaps we are less in the moment as adults and more in the future, and also traipsing into bygones more often, suddenly conscious of our finite presence on this earth. 

Enthusiasm is spontaneous. How does one remain spontaneous if you are preoccupied by the musings of life? One could enthusiastically muse with anxiety about things, but that’s a euphemism for worrying, isn’t it? <<wink>>.

Perplexed, I sent an email to my guru, Swami Dheerananda, whose sage advice I remain eternally grateful for, and explained the situation to him:

A dear friend has moved on from this world and he found my enthusiasm towards life remarkable at one point. I did too, yeah, honestly. However, why do I feel like I am less of that person now, even though, God willing, I have a decent life? How do I fine tune and recalibrate? Swamiji asked me to dwell on verse 30 from Chapter 3 of the Bhagavad Geeta:

mayi sarvāṇi karmāṇi sannyasyādhyātma-chetasā
nirāśhīr nirmamo bhūtvā yudhyasva vigata-jvaraḥ

Renounce all actions in Me, with the mind centered on the Self, free from hope and egoism, free from (mental) fever, do fight!

Being free from hope and egoism

The context for the Bhagavad Geeta or the Song of Krishna of course is that warrior Arjuna did not want to fight his relatives in the battlefield of Kurukshetra (symbolic of the battlefield of life) and Lord Krishna narrates the 700 verses of the Bhagavad Geeta to Arjuna to capture the essence of life itself, and nudges him to do his action righteously, having belief in him as God.

Swami Chinmayananda, whose commentary accompanies the version of the Bhagavad Geeta I have, explains the verse brilliantly.

In order to function seamlessly, Lord Krishna asks that Arjuna first, believe in himself or the God within (as the divine Krishna is our divine consciousness), and second, let his mind be “free from hope and egoism”. 

What is hope? Hope is a period not born yet.

And what is ego? Ego comprises the dead moments of the past.

Both these states of mind take you away from the present, where we should be, in order to do our duties to the best of our abilities and get the best out of us.

I realized right off the bat, that the verse was telling me exactly what I felt earlier: as we age, we are less in the moment and more in the future or the past, and that impacts enthusiasm, which is spontaneously staying in the present.

As always, the Geeta never ceases to amaze me with its relevance to daily life. I am equally, if not more amazed that my guru, Swami Dheerananda, seems to know exactly what I need to hear as he picks just the right verse to put it all into place, perfectly.

While enthusiasm is spontaneous, dwellings of the mind are anything but. Perhaps much like when you apply brakes to a train or a car and it comes to a screeching halt, the mind slows you down with its thoughts and musings, brakes are applied to enthusiasm, and you lose your verve, your spontaneity.

The verse from the Bhagavad Geeta also references the God within, much like the Greek Entheos.  Our motives can be pure only when the mind is made to sing the glories of the Self or the God within. How do you achieve this? By doing our karma or our work.

When we lose ourselves in our karma or the action at hand—whether it is assembling binders for your school, cooking for a family, mowing the grass (a favorite activity of Bruce!), running the treadmill at the gym—free from hope (no traipsing into the future) and egoism (no journeying into regrets to the past), then we are truly anchored in the present. That being involved purely in the present enables us to do that action so well that it takes us closer to our inner perfection or our Self or our God. 

It’s kind of what they refer to when they say, give your 100% to the task! Swami Chinmayananda explains that our inborn nature is to get overly anxious about present activities and life. When you overthink, you lose enthusiasm. Let’s not do that, shall we?

So, what’s the recipe to maintaining enthusiasm in life?

It’s rather elementary, if you think of it; the key is to stick with it—with belief and…enthusiasm!

• Don’t overthink.

• Perform the action at hand to your best.

• Hold the mind tight in the present, not dwelling on the past or the future.

• And believe in your Self, your God.

Life then becomes much like driving down the green roads of West Virginia, squealing with laughter despite the bumps, no matter what the age!

Meaningfully yours,
Anu Prabhala