Devil's Advocate

SOME say he wants us to lust after every drop of life, that he urges us to be more virile,makes us wish ill of someone whilst looking at a falling star, that he suggests the unthinkable, that he compels... that he even has a workshop in our mind. It's the Devil that I want to ponder. And I think Devil's favourite guise is that of innocence.

Recently at a friend's place, I observed his little son up to something. While their pet dog sat chewing some dirty looking thing, this little fella took out a stone from the rockery and put it on the dog's tail.The dog yelped and tried to free its tail, which it managed. The little gentleman watched this discomfort coolly after which, this generally sweet cuddly child, who now seemed anything but that, came waddling towards me. I asked him why he did it maybe the dog had yapped at him or chewed his favourite toy... his answer ... 'Aise hi.'(Just like that in hindi).

I was reminded of a famous international award-winning campaign for a brand of toys.It showed a close up of an insect, its feet broken and the headline said "Why should he have six legs when I have two?" The base line: 'Makes sense to kids'.Kids have their own logic. Call it devilish if you want, but they feel it and do it because they are unselfconscious. Innocent. A child is uninhibited. The devil part of him is very natural. The higher your innocence, the more comfortable your Devil will be. The more 'civilised' you get, the more self-conscious
does your devil become.

Go close to nature and watch the uninhibited people, you will find the Devil co- existing, fluid, so entwined with their being that it is impossible to separate the two.

Tribals flaunt their sexuality, but in a civilised society, this will be seen as immoral, trying to tempt, seduce, doing the wrong thing.

There is innocence in the child and there is innocence in tribals, and so is there innocence in the Devil. But innocence cannot be acquired. It has to be your natural state. You have to understand the rhythm of your being to dance to the tunes of your true nature.When we come into this world, we are very comfortable with our daitya (devil) and our Dev (God) and we don't know how to separate the two, but slowly man is taught to deny the devil. We are conditioned. made to look for the Devil consciously and avoid it, and because we are made to feel conscious of good and bad, right and wrong, God or Devil, we define a limit. We tell ourselves, 'Beyond this limit, it's wrong'. Like, heterosexual is good, any other form deviant. We mark the territory of the Devil. Beyond a certain limit, it's the 'space of the Devil' and in the process, we end up making our own Devil larger.

The best food for the Devil is Ostracism.

Should we be suppressing the devil within us, or instead acknowledges Us presence and give it expression I wonder because the moment you separate it, shun it, it becomes more pronounced, more potent.

A lady falls - the kid laughs out aloud. Probably you want to laugh too, but your acquired understanding of limits come into play and you tell yourself you won't laugh.

Why do we attempt to disguise our Devil? It's a counterforce. It's natural.

A dark side is there in all of us and in those whom we look up to.