[Notes below were a collective effort of many behind-the-scenes, in particular, Arti Bhandari, Zeal Shah and Gayathri Ramachandran. Thank you for the opportunity to serve in this way -- we all learned so much through the process!]

This week’s inaugural Awakin Talks webinar tantalisingly-titled “What would Gandhi do?” was a veritable buffet of delectable delights for the Spirit. Anchored by Nipun, the main course consisted of servings of several slices of wisdom and insight from Gandhian scholars Micheal Nagler and Rajni Bakshi. This was then rounded out by the dessert course where two everyday heroes of the ServiceSpace India ecosystem, Drishti Trivedi and Rohan Bhansali, shared stories on what insights have surfaced for them, and what keeps them hopeful, in these interesting times we are living through. We will post the full transcript of the call soon, but till then, we leave you with this collection of wisdom nuggets from the call.

Body versus the Soul in these times of the pandemic
“What about covid-20 or covid-21? There are endless potential series of disasters. Is there something we can do to position ourselves better against all this?” wondered Micheal Nagler in his opening set of responses to the question ‘What would Gandhi do?’ He fleshed out his thoughts further, by saying “The entire emphasis today, with regards to the virus, is to defeat the antigen when it gets into your body, but what’s important is to make our bodies more resilient for any disaster that comes along. To do that, we need to make our mind more resilient and strong… My 2 orientations to this are to listen to ourselves and make ourselves as strong as possible. We have to realise that we are body, mind and spirit. The modern orientation is to body, body, body; and that is not going to help us gain any resiliency!”

Michael also impishly quoted Gandhi from his health guide “If our bodies could be in contact with the skies, without the intervention of houses, roofs and even clothes, we are likely to enjoy the maximum amount of health!” remarking that some of that would go over very well with people in California!

Surfacing similarly resonant thoughts at a later point in the conversation, Rajni Bakshi asked, “Should we allow the body to trample over and stifle the soul?” She continued by remarking that, “For Gandhi, soul is paramount, and for him, swaraj meant freedom from our afflictive emotions, what the Buddhists call ‘afflictive emotions’!”

On mirroring the world: “All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body,” remarked Nipun at one point in the call

Michael had similar thoughts to offer on this theme: “When we talk about the virus, we need to acknowledge that there is an inner human-driven component to this pandemic. Which means that there is something that we can do about it…During the Bihar Earthquake, when Gandhi was fighting against the atrocities towards the untouchables, he is known to have said -- “The earthquake is a divine chastisement against the great sin we are committing, and still committing to those we regard as untouchables”.

"Scientists today talk about the subtle energy, which was second nature to Gandhi. When we have a negative thought, a negative vibration propagates out in the world. Conversely, when we have love and compassion in our mind and heart, that goes out into the world and manifests in the form of the physical behaviour of humans.”

“It is important to ground ourselves to our true nature. A US Marine handing relief supplies in Sri Lanka after the tsunami shared, “I have been serving my country for 30 years, and this is the first time I ever got any fulfilment!” This is a true display of human nature, to see the possibilities of goodness within us.”

Micheal also remarked that everyone knows that Gandhi wanted to be a nurse, so what he would do during these times is care for the sickest and the most vulnerable people. And that Love can be tough -- to which point he narrated the story of Sucheta Kripalani being asked by Bapu to go to Noakhali, at the time of post-partition riots, to restore harmony in the village. When Mirabehn protested this decision, Gandhi is purported to have asked Sucheta, “I don’t believe in death. Do you?”. She replied, “No, Bapu.” He said, “Then go!”

“We have to grow wiser than we are today, in order to find what beauties are hidden in human nature. Take an inventory of all the beautiful things that are going on around the world. What does this say about human nature?”

On the joys of not being in the ‘mad race’ (what Gandhi called the ‘paagal dhaud’), and on Experiments with Truth

Rajni Bakshi had much to offer here: “How do we escape from this mad race to always do more, become more, travel more? This is the epochal challenge of our species! Living simply brings joy for our existence and this joy becomes a launching pad for us to work towards changing the world for better.”

“No doubt there is a flowering of care and compassion! And to many of us who thought that this close contact to our mortality would make people realise that hate and violence are a waste of time, shockingly that has not happened to a large extent. Examples of discriminations against patients and doctors, communal violence, and the animosity around us shows that we are still knotted in the fear — of death, of the other, of illness, and of hunger.”

“It is inevitable to grope our way to the truth; there are only experiments with truth... We must be kind to our failures. When I am not able to respond with love and compassion, I must be kind to myself, recognise the failure and keep working on it. Empathise with the underlying fears of death and uncertainty. Never give up on my potential or the other’s potential to strive for it!”

On directions for a new compass (We don’t want to go back to normal, because normal was the problem!)

Rajni Bakshi brought up Gandhi’s disciple JC Kumarappa, author of ‘Economy of Permanence’ who remarked that, “An economy that is based purely on the monetary or material standards of value, does not take a realistic perspective in time and space. These shortcomings lead to a blind alley of violence and destruction, from which there is no escape.”

Rajni Bakshi: “We need a systemic shift in terms of how we understand value. Systems that run the world only understand the monetary value. But can an act which brings thousands of people together to volunteer be confined to this parameter? We need to build a single composite measure that can value all that truly matters… Love, compassion and generosity comes from within, and so does hatred, fear and prejudice. So we need to engage with these emotions and have a collective dialogue around it.”

Michael Nagler: “I would pick a single focus...We need to shift the vision of human nature and build out from that.” And to drive home his point, Micheal quoted Arnold Toynbee - “Enthusiasm can only be aroused by two things: first, an ideal, which takes the imagination by storm. Second, a definite intelligible plan for carrying that ideal into practice”

“My belief in non-violence is based on the assumption that human nature in its essence is one, and therefore unfailingly responds to the advances of love,” -- Mahatma Gandhi.

Nipun shared another beautiful quote of Gandhi “The law of love will work, just as the law of gravitation will work, whether we accept it or not.”. In these perplexing times, where there’s both suffering and healing, one finds solace and positivity in the extraordinary acts of kindness rippling in the world. Drishti shared, in this context, a story that really moved her about prisoners in Udaipur jail who have reduced their food consumption, so that that food can go to the villagers outside. She said, “I never imagined that this part of society could also show the ability to serve” and so the story served as both a source of insight and transformation for her. On a similar theme, Rohan surfaced a story he had read about Sikh devotees from a Delhi gurudwara who are going to the mosque nearby, and bridging the gap by supporting Muslim devotees to cook food, serve food, wash the dishes, and then go buy vegetables together for the next day! These two love-warriors had several other inspiring stories to share, which will find their place in the full transcript :)

Till then, we leave you with a message shared by Rajni Bakshi towards the end, while paying homage to the spirit of migrant workers who have suffered terribly though these times in India, and yet, several of them continue to have a smile on their face: “Pessimism is for better times. When things are as tough as they are, we can't afford to be pessimistic… Spiritually, nothing has changed. Impermanence is perennial. The possibility of death and suffering is perennial. The only thing that has changed is our sense of the timelines…Nobody can know if they are in the 95% that will sail through, or the 5% whose bodies will go into crisis… So I would close by saying laugh a lot. Love and laughter are the best insurance policies in a moment such as this.”