When editing and spirituality meet, it’s humility 101
Dear friends,
Recently, my writing and spiritual worlds met and led me down the path of a humbling experience. While I have always considered myself somewhat of a spiritual person, spirituality has especially been an earnest work in progress this past decade, ever since I started following the spiritual path of Vedanta.
In fact, “Daily spiritual” was the first pick for my Substack’s title before I settled for Imperfectly Perfect, dedicated as well to the beauty of the perfect journey we call life, however imperfect it may seem at times.
Humility, by Francesco Ciccolella
The revered Swami Chinmayananda, a journalist turned ascetic who brought global attention to Vedanta with his Chinmaya Mission Centers worldwide, was once asked by a devotee as to how to balance spiritual and family life. He responded with his characteristic humor: “Why do you have two lives? Have only one!”
Ha! Well said, Gurudev.
Indeed, that’s the goal, to lead a life that’s thoughtful, respecting the universal force—whatever name you choose to give it—that is within all of us. That’s why, when this experience happened, I wondered if it was a call from the above that I had more work to do in the domain of humility and being less self-righteous about things.
As background, I am on the editorial team of the Chinmaya Mission Washington Regional Center, in the midst of producing two books to be released at the Mahasamdhi Aradhana Camp end of July in the Washington, DC area. That’s when leaders from the Vedantic tradition from all over the world will gather in our nation’s capital to commemorate the practice of Vedanta and the man who renounced it all to spiral Vedanta into global visibility, Swami Chinmayananda. Can you imagine the wisdom prevailing in that Marriott hotel in DC where the Camp is set to take place—staggering indeed!
Anyway, back to the story, I was dutifully proofing the print signature of one of the books to be published, a beautifully done prayer consecration to Swami Chinmayananda. I went about my usual business of marking up the book: What?! Such overuse of exclamation marks, no quotation marks around direct quotes, plethora of title cases used, even for household items listed (Lamp, Incense, Table, etc.).
Having been pulled into the project towards the tail end, I felt increasingly concerned and empathetic towards the designer who had to make so many changes at this late stage. Not to mention, I was a bit irritated at myself for spotting so many “faults” in the text.
Then Swami Dheerananda, a sage and humorous Vedanta teacher and also my guru, requested me to come proof the book along with him and another teacher this past Saturday. I willingly accepted. Little did I know that that meant reading the entire 100-page book aloud, recording it word to word, and in the process, pausing to make detailed notations on a sheet of paper of every edit encountered—of which there were plenty, some discussed in great detail over a cup of piping hot chai.
And I thought I was detail oriented! No, Swamiji clearly took the cake!
Editing, spiritually
I thought I was done with the proofing job the day before I met Swami Dheerananda, but as I read through, Swamiji vetoed some things I had carefully marked up throughout the book, providing eloquent explanations that went contrary to standard proofing conventions.
Direct quotation marks, out! There were direct quotes from Swami Chinmayananda interspersed throughout the book, but none had quotation marks. Swami Dheerananda explained that Swami Chinmayananda and his presence pervade everything. So, attributing some quotes to him within quotation marks would be counterintuitive, as the whole book then, including prayers, directions on performing pujas, aratis, and chants, should be within quotes!
That observation was a mind boggler, and even as I opened my mouth to argue that convention was convention after all and quotation marks should be brought back, I shut up.
It suddenly clicked!
This book simply cannot be edited like others. In fact, this was not a book at all, but a capture and an affirmation of faith and devotion, which come from the heart, unbound by conventional rules. My editing therefore had to be dictated by love, not by the heavy hand of a writer-grammarian.
Editing with love
Yes, editing with love and fueled by devotion takes you down another path—one with an indulgent eye.
Like a mother treats her child—critical as always so s/he learns and gets better, yet indulgent, recognizing that that little person in front of you is nothing but an extension of your own self, a bundle of love.
Yes, editing with love is like a mom’s tough love.
Therefore, the overuse of exclamation points that I had flagged, and which typically drive writers and editors mad when overused, were also OK. Why not? Don’t we sing passionately, or chant like in a trance? In the written world, an exclamation can serve a similar purpose—express passion, reverence, and emotion. In regular email writing, the overuse of exclamations might seem childish. In this instance of a prayer book, exclamations convey childlike devotion, which is the purest form of faith.
That’s editing with love.
Wherein the overuse of title cases was concerned, perhaps it was meant to convey the flourish and love for these special items needed for the special occasion of a puja or a prayer offering.
Humility, learned
Everything looked different once I accepted that I would edit with love. Somehow, things fell into place, and my edits did not seem urgent or even required as before. Of course, I corrected some typos. But overall, if poets can take creative license with the language, then Vedanta teachers can be inspired by faith and devotion to take license with grammar and language too, no?
It was certainly the most interesting leap of faith I had taken in editing in the past three decades. My roles as a writer and Vedanta follower blended into the most delightful moment of humility that I am not likely to forget for a long time.
Or, maybe I should forget it and just edit with love. Swami Chinmayananda once cautioned:
“Humility is a strange thing. The minute you think you have got it, you have lost it!”
Did you experience a time when you were humbled when you thought you knew it all? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Meaningfully yours,
Anu Prabhala
I enjoyed reading this very much. For me it was a great example of having to let go of one's ego. "Humility is a strange thing. The minute you think you have got it, you have lost it!” made me smile. Some years ago a friend was telling me about what she had been doing as a volunteer in a meditation centre. I remarked that she must be accumulating lots of good Karma. She replied that as she will now be thinking about how spiritual she is being, all that good Karma will be negated because she will be doing it for all the wrong reasons!
In a similar vein, a guru called Rajneesh once said that Christians are really greedy, because most people just want a good life while they are living, whereas Christians want a great life after death too! I think he was simply making the point about living in the here and now rather than having a dig at Christianity!
That was clever of me! I wrote a comment and then came back to try to edit it and managed to delete it instead! My comment ran something like this: “that was a fascinating read Anu. I have to confess that I had not even heard of Verdanta before and had to resort to Google to find out what it was all about. I found it too deep to taken, in one session but I shall read more about it. Like many, I worry about the meaning of life, and I’m receptive to any new thoughts philosophies and interpretations. More prosaically I like your comments on editing. Although I’m not a big league writer, I have often found that reading a piece aloud reveals nuances repetitions and sometimes nonsenses which you miss by simply staring at a screen. Thank you for sharing your thoughts”
I think version two came across a lot longer than the first version!