#167 You are more than your roles
Role – a word we have borrowed from the language of theatre for real life too. An actor plays diverse roles on the stage. The more diverse the roles in his portfolio the more accomplished he is. If the script requires him to be tough, he does it. If the script requires him to be kind, he does it. While playing the role, he is alert, deliberate and faithful to the script. Let us suppose the actor plays the role of a homeless person who is a drug addict and given to crime. The actor actually lives in a million dollar mansion and showers thrice a day. But in the role, he is unkempt with torn clothes that are stinking. Why is he dressed like that and why does he mouth dialogues that reflect such bitterness and hatred of the world? He does what the script demands because he knows it is a role. In one situation he is supposed to cry aloud and in another he is supposed to act delirious. He is able to cry real tears with no use for glycerine. Hearing sniffs in the audience, the actor is happy within. Internally he congratulates himself for giving such a fine performance as he is crying without glycerine. Now that ‘s a first for him! As the lights dim on stage he transports the audience into another world with his monologue, the intonations in his voice and eyes rolling upwards like he is in a trance. The audience give him a standing ovation. His friend and some fans rush to congratulate him backstage. The homeless person who looked delirious and empty is now smiling ear to ear and poses for selfies with his fans. After a few minutes he excuses himself to go into his plush vanity van to have a shower, change into his designer clothing and rush to the after performance party he is hosting at the nearby seven star hotel.
For the duration of the play, the actor was the role. There was no difference between the actor and the role. But the actor knew very well that the role is me for now, but I am not just this role. There are many roles I have played in different theatre productions, some of which were award winning and there will be many more that I will play in my lifetime. All through the play the actor remembered himself. He was just doing his job which was to identify with the character, how the character walks, talks, thinks and feels and to fully live the character. The actor assumed the role of the homeless without losing his identity. The actor had awareness of oneself as different from the role. In fact, in real life, he had an argument with his partner before the show because he felt that the dress she was going to wear for the party was too revealing. Yet he was able to suspend that role and focus on his role on stage. Becoming the role did require a different costume and make up but for those few hours the actor became the role. This awareness of the space between the actor and the role was not physical.
Real life is not seen as theatre. We use the word role to indicate our position including our attitude, behaviour and actions with reference to someone else. What can we learn from actors and their roles? I share 9 life lessons.
Each role is referential, relative and often exclusive. Son is a role, father is a role, husband is a role, professional is a role. Son is only with reference to the father and father is only with reference to the son. Husband is also only with reference to the wife, as the wife often reminds him and professional is with reference to his work. Although a professional at work, in the same company, he may be a subordinate to the boss but the boss to his team members. Logically if you are the son of your father, you are not the professional at work except in the rare instance that you are in the family business.
Problems of one role need not affect the other – Any role is fraught with problems. Why? Because when two people are involved, there will be differences in ways of thinking, ways of relating. Rarely is there a role that is free from problems. As a son or daughter you have problems. As a father or mother you have problems and as a professional facing the great resignation you definitely have problems. The different problems that you experience in the different roles pile up one on top of the other. You feel like a problem. Others are definitely experienced as problems. In the play the actor knew that he was playing the role but in real life often we are not able to see ourselves as separate from the role. If we shift attention to the person, the simple conscious being that is aware of the roles, then there is a space of awareness which is not physical. The problems of one role can be confined to the role. If you have a bad day at work, you can clearly see that your feelings of frustration are related to your role as a professional and have nothing to do with your son eagerly waiting to play with you. There need not be any hangover of the role of the professional onto the role of a father. There is no need to extend your frustration to fume at your son or your dog. Better to go for a walk and work out the trapped energy of the emotion out of your system so that you are now fresh and ready to be available to your other relationships. You can see that your role as a professional is different from your role as a father and all the other roles you have. One of you says but life is too busy. Agreed. It helps to have different dress codes for different roles. If that is not possible then one reminds oneself that the problems of one role stay confined to that role only. One of my earliest podcast episodes was titled The Hangover and you can listen to it on the podcast.
Roles are fulfilling when they are scripted by Dharma – Generally an actor is given a script during rehearsal. But in real life how do we decide what is the script for one’s role as a son/daughter/sister/brother/husband/wife/mother/father. We just pick up an unconscious script depending on how we are treated, our observations of similar roles in society and our evolving relationships with the person. In addition to this, what can help us is the voice of Dharma in our hearts based on the principle of reciprocity. Just like I want to be accepted and supported, the other too wants to be accepted and supported. Just like I don’t want to be cheated or humiliated the other too does not want to be cheated or humiliated. This voice of Dharma almost feels instinctive. If you reflect on which of your relationships feels fulfilling, invariably you will see that there is reciprocity of warmth, respect and support for each other be it your role as a partner or a professional. In other words the role is upheld by the values of Dharma which makes it fulfilling. When your work contributes to the impact of the project, you have good working relationships and a decent remuneration, the role of a professional feels fulfilling. Needless to say, Dharma is not being upheld if you are overworked, underpaid and are unclear about your contribution to the project and that can be frustrating.
Roles include our choices – Dharma involves karma which implies freedom of choice. We have the power to choose how much to do for another person, or not do or do differently. Sometimes our choices work and sometimes they don’t. Nagging the person for keeping the wet towel on the bed creates another fight and hence you have the choice to ignore the behaviour, quietly put it away, dump the towel in the washing machine or ask the person how you can avoid nagging.
There are roles that come to us because of our birth– the role as a son, daughter, sibling, niece, nephew, grandchild etc. We have the privilege of relating and contributing to their happiness as much as it is our right be fulfilled in these relationships. Then, there are roles that are born of choice, such as friendships, partnerships etc. Depending on our age and stage of life and what the situation requires we can decide how to relate to the other. Sometimes the very relationship becomes untenable because of Adharma and hence it is best to walk away. No role should have to feel like a burden. We recognize that each role has choices.
Roles have goals – If you look at any relationship there is a purpose in relating to the person. The thematic goal is care, support and a contribution to the person’s happiness and growth. If you are relating to your child, then the way you show care when the child is 10 years will be different compared to when the child is travelling abroad to study. The love and care endure. If you are relating to your team member then you show your care and commitment to the project goals by fulfilling your share of the work and always have the team member’s back. In any relationship it helps to articulate what your goal is, so that you calibrate it to reality.
Your responsibility is the other person’s right and vice versa – By performing your responsibilities you ensure that the other person’s rights are met. As you perform your responsibility as a professional. It is your right to have decent working environment, a benchmarked remuneration and opportunities for growth in your career. If the CEO of the company performs these responsibilities of ensuring a decent work environment, offering a fair remuneration and sends you for training programs to upgrade your skills, then her responsibility is fulfilling your right. This brings me to the next point
No role is perfect – If the desire for moksha is not discerned, then there is adhyasa, projection on the relationship, in that, it must be fulfilling at all times, in all places and all situations. Because we see ourselves as incomplete, we project completeness onto the person or the relationship. Obviously reality bites and how! Sooner rather than later, we swear off all relationships and withdraw into our shell. The truth is that any relationship whether it is between two partners, or a parent-child or work colleagues can provide some care, support, knowledge and definitely contribute to the person’s happiness and growth. The completeness that is sought by every human heart can never be fulfilled by any relationship because that completeness is your very nature, waiting to be discovered. Even a guru-shishya relationship is not perfect but if you stick with the teaching then you can discover your true nature. The goal can be achieved. When we are objective to what a relationship can be for us, we can free the relationship from our unrealistic expectations of completeness, born of our ignorance of seeing oneself as incomplete. We can enjoy the relationship and see the person as a co-traveller in life’s journey.
Roles depend on me. I am independent of all roles – I am the conscious person, performing different roles. Obviously, no role can exist without me, the person. The role is the person but the person is not the role. Why? Because the person continues to be there even when some roles end due to death or separation. The person is present for that fraction of a second when she picks up one role and drops the other. On the weekend, you went to the theatre to watch Spiderman with your daughter and bumped into your colleague during the intermission. Picture this. Your 10 year old child is standing on your left and your colleague is standing on your right. You look towards your colleague and ask – did we hear from that client. And then say – Just a second. Puja can you just stand in the queue to buy popcorn. When you look towards your colleague, you are his work colleague not his mother. You look towards your daughter. You are the parent not the work colleague. There is no confusion whatsoever. You did not meditate or chant a mantra to discover that you were able to drop one role and pick up the other, all in a few seconds. This moment reveals something deeply profound – I can pick up and drop a role because I am independent of the role. This space of awareness frees us, the person who is a conscious person. In Vedanta we learn to get in touch with this simple person who has the privilege and blessing to perform different roles according to one’s karma.
Roles help us enquire into the real – I am aware of the changing roles and the roles changing because the person is unchanging. because of a relationship, the person ‘I’ undergoes change. But the change in the person ‘I’, is not total. In the change that happens, am I replaced? In relating to my mother, I am not replaced. In relating to my son, I am not replaced. The daughter -I is replaced by the mother -I, but the ‘I’ is not totally replaced. If I the person was replaced there would be no continuity at all. If it is totally replaced, there will be neither mother nor daughter because the one who related to the son has vanished, while a new one who has appeared in his place cannot have a relationship with the daughter. The partial change in the subject ‘I’ does not seem to leave any trace upon the ‘I’. Therefore, you are able to assume a new role altogether without suffering a change on your part. This extraordinary endowment that we have been given reveals a great fact about life. It is an amazing capacity to undergo change when you relate to something, without intrinsically undergoing change. All the changes from childhood to youth to middle age are objects of my awareness. I am the unchanging subject. Then, what is the content of the unchanging subject? Awareness that is consciousness.
Consciousness is not a property or a part of me but that awareness in which this body-mind exists and all forms exist. Roles come and go in the person’s life. Lifetimes come and go in the Consciousness that is you. Reality that is you is ever untouched by all the roles you play. This does not mean that you become callous or indifferent. Rather, you are the unchanging reality that is present in all the roles. No role is opposed to the unchanging Consciousness that you are. You are the unchanging reality in all your roles.
