In an ancient Indian kingdom, a king ordered a theatrical performance. One of the play’s characters was the princess of Kashi. The playwright was looking for a young girl to play the part. However, the queen felt her son, the young prince, was apt for the role and dressed him as a princess. The play was staged successfully, and the prince looked adorable dressed up as a princess. The queen rejoiced at the delicate beauty of her son and commissioned the royal painter to paint a portrait of him dressed up as the princess of Kashi.
Fifteen years passed by, and the prince forgot all about the play. He became a muscular young man and spent all his time horseriding, hunting, and wrestling. One day while exploring an old attic in the palace, he chanced upon the portrait of a beautiful princess. It was titled “The Princess of Kashi.” The date on the painting confirmed that the princess and the prince would be nearly the same age.
Love blossomed in the heart of the prince. He suddenly stopped attending his classes and started moping around in his room. His parents and friends kept showering him with gifts and compliments, but nothing mattered to him. His brain kept conjuring up images of the princess and weaved hypothetical narratives of how they could be united.
Finally, the worried king called his prime minister and asked him to intervene. The minister put his arm around the young prince and told him he knew what was bothering him. “These are classic symptoms of lovesickness,” he laughed. The shy prince opened up and talked about how he saw the portrait of the Princess of Kashi and fell in love with her. He then requested the minister to send the princess a marriage proposal.
The minister laughed heartily and asked the prince to bring the portrait of the princess. Then he placed it along with the picture of the young prince and told him the story of a play performed years ago and how the prince dressed up as a princess. The young prince realized that he had simply fallen in love with a portrait of himself. He laughed aloud at his embarrassing mistake and returned to his duties as a prince.
Many years ago, when I was an individual contributor, I had this lingering desire to be a manager. I felt I had the soft and technical skills to succeed in that job. The problem with a desire is that it often takes over your life. If it’s intense enough, it haunts you through the day and torments you even when you sleep.
I spent months reviewing hypothetical scenarios of what I would do differently if I were a manager. The problem was I was not a manager, and this daydreaming was taking focus away from my job. This started impacting my performance which had the opposite effect of what I was hoping for anyway.
We seem to think that the only way to deal with desires is to fulfill them or be tormented by them. We forget that we can simply examine a desire and make relevant decisions based on our findings. In my case, after torturing myself for a few months, I examined why I wanted to be a manager. I looked beyond social prestige, increased pay, and other perks. Finally, I settled down on the thought that I wanted to have enough influence to execute my ideas. As an individual contributor, my ideas were mainly dying on my manager’s table because he did not want to take risks. I wanted to have control over the presentation and execution of my ideas. This really helped me because I moved away from the idea of becoming a manager to developing skills and networks that would help me present and implement innovative ideas.
I finally became a manager in a couple of years. I started by being an average one, descended to a bad one, and eventually rose to become pretty good. As I looked back at the whole experience, I wish someone had held my hand and told me, irrespective of the designation I desire, I would be the same person. I wish they told me that the desires are inherently empty and a result of social conditioning. It would have saved me months of agony. I would have focused on developing skills rather than daydreaming about fulfilling desires. I wish someone had told me the story of the princess of Kashi.
Let’s reflect on the story and examine how the prince’s problem was solved. Did the prince marry the princess of Kashi and fulfill his desire? Did he find out the princess was dead or married to somebody else? Neither of these things happened. The problem was resolved because he realized there was no princess of Kashi apart from him. This knowledge helped get rid of the desire.
Most of us tether between two states. Fulfillment of desire and frustration of desire. However, neither of these is the solution. The solution was simply to realize that the desire is empty. Swami Vivekananda, the great Indian saint, summarized this situation beautifully.
Things are dead in themselves. We breathe life into it. Then we run after them or run away from them.
Attraction, fear, terror, and repulsion are like the princess of Kashi. It is “You” dressed up as temptation or terror. Once we realize that we are universal consciousness, the whole universe becomes one with us, like the princess of Kashi, became one with the prince.
If you feel scandalized about the fact that I am calling emotions empty or a fictitious creation of the mind, I recommend you watch this video by Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett.
Indic knowledge systems present some of the most esoteric knowledge in the world. However, in ancient times, the guru would choose the brightest students to give them this knowledge. We are fortunate to have these texts available to us. However, in order to receive them we need to purify our minds and Vedic Sadhana is the most powerful way to do it. You can use the Vedic Sadhana app, which makes the ancient rituals and practices followed by the sages of India available for you.
