Chitrabhanu Man with Vision

Author(s): Clare Rosenfield
Publisher: Jain Meditation International Centre New York

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there was a lone Digambar temple. There they had the chance to free themselves from the familiar atmosphere which evoked the continuous memory of little Magi. Father and son came closer and closer together at that time. It was then that Rup started feeling deeply for his father and admiring him wholeheartedly. They stayed near the little temple until the inner wound was less sore and until they felt ready to go back to the business of living again.
But this time, seven years after the loss of his mother, Rup's young heart was not filled with hope. He felt robbed of a living companion, and weighed down by a lurking fear of death.
Unanswerable questions welled forth.
Where did she go? Why did she go? Did she meet my mother? Why do we live if we all have to die? And what is it that causes one person to go and not another? Why did it happen to Magi and not to me? This marked his second investigation into death. It prodded him into a deep search.
Confronting a Habit
Several months passed. Rup's feeling of loss turned into a kind of loneliness. When he came home from school, it was to an empty house, his own heart into which fear had crept. He trembled to go close to it. Instead of verbalizing his fear, he ran away from it. For a while, as the fear lay smoldering under his conscious mind, he became caught up with another kind of smoldering, smoking. It was as if subconsciously he was looking for something to cover up his loneliness and quench his inner burning, and instead found something which would fan its flames.
It all began when some mischievous friends took hold of young Rup. "Come on!” they urged him. “Come join us in a smoke!" They dragged him off playfully to a secluded spot
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