My son has entered the “WHY” phase.
The one where every word, every action, every ritual is met with a relentless question. And with every “Why, Baba?” he asks, I find myself questioning my own existence.
I suppose all fathers go through this. Once, I was the child in his shoes, throwing the same relentless “whys” at my father. My father, a man of deep-rooted traditions, spent hours in the pooja room, lost in rituals I barely understood. I’d ask him why. Sometimes, I'd get silence. Sometimes, a vague explanation. Most times, just a rabid response saying, "Don't ask stupid questions. Get lost."
Maybe he did it because he believed in it. Maybe he did it for us, to keep our lives safe, prosperous and blessed. But as a child, answers didn’t matter as much as the curiosity itself. And as I grew, the questions faded. Somewhere along the way, I stopped asking.
But life has a way of circling back. Now, the roles have reversed. My son questions things I never even thought of questioning.
One evening, he looks up at me with those big, unfiltered eyes and asks, "Baba, why are you?"
Not, "How are you?"
Not "What do you do?"
But, "Why are you?"
I smiled, (thinking of Drax, from Infinity War, asking - Why is Gamora?), ready to correct him. But he repeated it, just as certain as before. And in that moment, something inside me changed.
Because ‘WHY’ is the hardest question anyone can ever ask.
Why do we follow traditions we don't understand?
Why do we choose a path in life?
Why do we love someone so blindly?
Why do people change?
Why should someone choose us over the rest?
Sounds something straight out of Sadguru's playbook, but it’s not just theory. It’s life. It’s everything. And so, I sit with my son’s question. Only this time, I’m not searching for an answer. I’m embracing the question.
Because maybe the answer is in the question itself.
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