Catherine: Hello, Sundari.
Good to hear your news! Since my brain bleed, the jiva, Catherine, is just living an existence. She no longer has any joie de vivre and absolutely no zing! Even Vedanta fails to ignite any desires. I don’t even enjoy food anymore. The personality has been altered. I have no idea why the jiva is like this and I am sure there is a reason for it. I just hope that in time this state will lift and I will get some sort of direction back in my life. I have asked Isvara to help me. It is like misery without the misery. It is just like an existence of nothingness, like a living dead jiva. It is a bit hard to describe.
A personality is just an object in awareness, does it really matter? If you have any ideas about this, I would love to hear them.
Sundari: My dear friend, you have been so much on our mind! Isvara has been telling me to contact you for weeks, and had it not been that we are so busy with the Tiruvannamalai talks (and sick on top of it), I would have. You beat me to it. I had this feeling you are not okay – well, YOU are okay, but your not-self is going through a testing and trying time. Sounds like the jiva is stuck in limbo, not here or anywhere, in the void. But you could also be describing moksa in a way – total freedom from desire. Not so great for the jiva, as it happens, but at least you do know that you are the knower of the jiva and the void, that is, in you and you are not in it. You are the fullness that knows the apparent nothingness.
It will pass, dear friend, there is nothing you can do to hurry it along. It may seem like Isvara has taken the colour from your world, but nothing ever fades or diminishes you. Hang in there, that beautiful, funny, gorgeous Catherine-jiva will be back, don’t worry! She is far too bright a spark to be gone for too long. It is just part of the process of healing, both the body and the mind. Relax, take it easy. There is nothing to do but surrender to Isvara and trust that all things in the mithya world pass. I wish I was to give you a big hug!
We are praying for you and beseeching Isvara to give you back Catherine! I think maybe Isvara likes keeping her for himself – and has just borrowed her!
We love you and are here for you.
~ Sundari