“When desire blinds the mind with delusion and dust, O thou holy one, thou wakeful come with the light and thy thunder.” - Rabindranath Tagore
People nowadays indulge themselves if not in material things, in physical pleasures. As the world constantly change, innovation also progresses. This made us become dependent and addicted to things like gadgets and social media. Generations of today, spend most of their time just browsing and posting on Facebook and Instagram. They want to update their status just to get more likes and shares. Everyone is so hooked that they tend to forget what is really more important. It’s true that people only remember God when they have problems. That’s why whenever people felt so lost and troubled, you can see them bowing their heads and pray.
Prayer is like a lullaby, it sooths our mind and soul. It makes us humble, when everyone around us are too proud and greedy. Tagore says in Gitanjali, “When the heart is hard and parched up, come upon me with a shower of mercy. When grace is lost from life, come with a burst of song.” Prayer will serves as a guide to bring people back in the right direction. The sound of silence speaks volumes to those who knows how to listen, for prayer is silently sung and only God can hear it. In the song The Sound of Silence, “Fools” said I, “You do not know silence like a cancer grows, hear my words that I might teach you, take my arms that I might reach you” But my words like silent teardrops fell and echoed in the wells of silence. It means people become too self-centered, blinded by their endless needs and desires. Instead of worshipping God, they worship money, power and other material things. It’s very different from Hindu beliefs, they say if you want to be spiritually strong, you have to practice asceticism meaning to live a strict and simple way of life away from society and avoid physical pleasure. Another stanza, And the people bowed and prayed to the neon god they made and the sign flashed out it’s warning in the words of the prophets are written on the subway walls and tenement halls and whispered in the sound of silence. If only people knows how to back down from the pedestal they built so high, if they think that they are indestructible already, well think again. Wise men know better, in just one blink of an eye everything can crumble down, turned into dust and the only salvation left is just them and their penance. People start listening in times of crisis, people become suddenly aware of their true existence. That’s why we see them bow their heads and offer a silent prayer.
