"Holy Cow" Part 2

Is my barrier is coming down?
What if the feeling of being less effected by the impressions I’m getting in India is due to me wanting to be seen as equal? I can see this world and suddenly I don’t feel like an outsider. My spirit is feeling so at home, regardless of what others might see and think as I catch their eye with too much ease. I’m accepting of what’s here and what’s real. I don’t flinch as I’m seeing the men squatting by the seashore to do their “business” each morning as I walk along the beach. I don’t have time to be shocked as I’m seeing a toddler with no clothes on, sitting in the gutter, because 2 minutes later something else catches my eye and the memory of the toddler in the gutter is stored permanently in my mind with no further purpose only to question my lack of sympathy. I’m seeing the crippled beggar who was merely skin and bone making eye contact with me and smiling and I’m not even stopping to give him the equivalent of 0,30cents, as the voice in my head is saying: “what makes you different from the last beggar who pleaded with me for some spare change?”

Do all my reactions make me a bad, heartless and cruel person? Should I feel guilty for having more than they do? Should I regret my reaction in that moment and hope that in the future I will act differently? Should I feel ashamed of my roots? Should I have simply reacted like many tourists would? If I were to convince myself that everything I felt and did in these situations is wrong, then doesn’t that mean I’m looking at myself and the world with only the darkness within myself and the world? If this were to be the case, then I’d never feel good being here. I’d get myself into a vicious circle of negativity: no matter what way I’d react, it wouldn’t be the right way and no matter what I’d see it wouldn’t appeal to my eyes and no matter what I’d do it would never be enough.


Being in India with a negative attitude is something I wasn‘t aiming for and so that’s not what I‘m getting. I came to feel good and that’s what I‘m feeling. If I were to feel so much guilt, sadness and shame each time I’d see something that isn’t seen at home and if I’d have a saddened reaction with every sore-sight, then how would I cope? How would I enjoy and see beauty in all? I wouldn’t, due to these emotions that would be overbearing.

I came to India to be apart 0f their way of life. I came here to make some sort of a difference by means of being a living person and not a “walking wallet”. I know this is how I’m looked at by locals, but that’s their judgment and I choose to ignore it. I didn’t come here to feel bad and annoyed with the unfairness of the world or with the imbalance of the planet or with myself for being the person I am with the luck that I carry with me, wherever I go. So I can’t feel bad for adjusting and accepting what I see and therefore I don’t. This acceptance of “what is” is also the answer to my question I posed earlier: how can I turn a blind eye. This acceptance is also my reason for feeling safe, regardless of what happens.