Monday, May 26, 2008

Let them Fight

I recently came across an article in the newspaper that says youngsters in India are losing interest in defence services as the topmost career option. Perhaps they think other more lucrative career options are available or they sincerely do not believe in wars. Without trying to analyse why they no longer feel army to be the topmost career choice, I think that if this trend is replicated in other countries, soon a time might come when we no longer will have armies and no longer have wars. If politicians and dictators want to fight, let them fight amongst themselves.

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Blind Idolatory

I feel amused to see what extent people go to in idiolising their favourite film stars, sportpersons and other celebritis. Here in India (especially in the southern India) almost every film star has a temple built in his name where his idol is worshipped! I cannot help but marvel at the idiots who do this and there are a good number.

If we try to understand what causes a person to indulge in such blind idolatory and celebrity worship, what causes a person to take needless interest in the lives of celebrities, their sordid love affairs, private lives and waste his time in reading gossip magazines and aticles, it is nothing but inner poverty. I feel sad to see people savouring every drop of juicy gossip abut celebrities that is printed in mags and newspapers. If a person's own life is lacking in richness, he seeks that richness in the lives of other people and usually it is celebrities and well known people. Such people live unconsciously and do not even try to probe their own potential and divinity. Many a times when a person harbours an overdose of admiration for someone, especially a celebrity, he subconciusly starts beleiving that he himself can never achieve good things in life and very subtly an inferiority complex starts developing. He starts thinking that if he cannot become famous he is an unsuccessful person. He forgets that greatness and success have nothing to do with fame. This sort of attitude has led to an absurdly high valuation of fame in our society. People forget that one can be very successful and great even without being famous. Some of the greatest people on this earth have not been famous or even well known - they have been the real salt of the earth.

It is OK to have admiration for someone but when that admiration becomes an obsession and takes one away from one's self and makes him give imortance to so called role models rather than one's own self, it is detrimental to one's being. One must love one's own self the most for only then richness can enter one's life. This is not being selfish because this is what is most important for a person to do. Success is measured by only one parameter and that is
happiness and true happiness can never be achieved if one's life lacks richness and richness cannot enter if one does not love himself the most.

At the cost of digressing, I would also like to emphasise that since fame is so overvalued in our society, it leads to a lot of inequalities. Why is that film stars, sportpersons earn such astronomical sums of money while the research scientist, the social worker and coutless other people who do far more good to the world than celebrities, have to struggle for funds?

Monday, May 12, 2008

The Quality of Consciousness

Materialisitic people mostly measure success in terms of money, business success, career success, material possessions. Religious people on the other hand measure success in terms of their religious deeds such as chanting of mantras, pilgrimages, charities they have made, rituals they have done and so on. Neither of them are correct as existence rates a person on only one parameter and that is the quality of one's consciousness. True success is only the upliftment in one's consciousness. Nothing else! PERIOD. What your consciousness is, is WHAT YOU ARE. If at the time of one's death, one's consciousness is more evolved (simply put it means if one is a better human being) than what it was during the time of one's youth, existence considers that person's life to be far more meaningful than the life of a person who has accumulated a lot of material possessions and so called religious merits but whose conscioussness has not evolved.

The so called religious people think that just by chanting mantras, performing rituals, visiting churches, temples and mosques, they have done their duty towards God but this is not so. All these activites are good and meaningful but only if they help to elevate one's consciousness such as by making one more loving, less judgemental, more silent and deep. However I personally have seen many religious people. They become so irrtiable, cranky, greedy, hot tempered and quarrelsome. No matter how many religious deeds such people do, it is a complete waste as the most important (and the only one that matters) thing has not happened and that is a beneficial change in the consciousness. It is very difficult also to make such misguided "seekers" see this point of view as most of them do not even understand what conscioussness means. The same explanation holds good for materialistic people. If thier material possessions have not helped them to develop detachment towards them, if thier wealth has not developed in the ma spirit of sharing, then thier consciousness has not really evolved.

Religious deeds, material possessions are merely tools to help us in evolving. But in truth except for very few people, these very tools become the very end. And when this happens, they become a cage which prevets one's consciouness from expanding and experiencing true bliss. A wise man makes even his misfortunes serve his soul's evolution. The expansion of one's consciousness is not dependent on wealth, fame, religious merits. One can use any circumstance of life to evolve a better and finer human being.

Friday, May 09, 2008

Ethics comes from the Heart

When one follows his heart and refrains from doing something his heart tells him not to, one his following true ethics. Ethics are not rules and regulations, ethics are not standards or codes set by someone outside one's own self. Ethics is call of the heart - a deep feeling at the heart that tells one what is right and what is wrong. Ethics is the ability to discriminate and act accordingly in tune with one's higher self.

Many people are "honest" not because they are truly honest but because they are too cowardly to commits acts of dishonesty. It takes guts even to be dishonest. If such people are given the guarentee that they will not be caught, most of them will willingly act unethically given the chance. So "ethics" that exists in a person out of cowardice is not actually ethics but a compromise borne out of sheer helplessness to face one's fear to act dishonestly. A person who is outwardly honest but secretly wishes and dreams of earning money even by unethical means is a hypocrite.

xcalibur

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

Why compete?

Here I am not talking about the kind of competition we see in sports or any other form of healthy competition. I am emphasizing the competitiveness that we see in our day to day lives.

Competing is a way one's ego asserts itself. It's a dance done by the ego for its’ own entertainment. A competitive person is usually never confident of oneself and he constantly needs to feel superior to others. Mostly such people are mentally restless and have constant seeking and hungry look in their eyes. Even when such as a person succeeds at something he is always unsure and never really savors his success for he is too afraid that someone else might be a bigger success than him.

Competition is harmful not only because it strengthens the ego but also because it makes one too interested in defeating others rather than allowing his own creativity to flower. When one is competitive, he becomes insecure, when one is insecure he becomes fearful, fear leads to suspicion, suspicion leads to subterfuge. The victim rather than concentrating fully in developing and using his own talents, wastes a significant part of his energy in trying to belittle and outdo others' achievements. As a result a significant amount of his potential goes to waste.

It is ugly to see ambitious parents inculcating sense of competitiveness in their children. I call it ugly, because it conditions the child's mind from a very tender age in becoming self seeking and downright selfish individuals. When a child is told that he should perform better than his classmates or his cousins he assumes that this is the way one should live (all his life). He then develops a feeling that proving oneself better than others is the only way to attract attention, the only way to succeed and become an achiever and to live life. Such children go up to be overly ambitious individuals who have only one way to measure success and that is by counting the number of promotions that have got in their job or by the amount of money they have made in their business. They might become materially successful but will lead a life full of anxiety and stress. And what is success if one's peace is eroded by constant mental agony and stress? The education system and media is no less to blame than parents for making people competitive. Our rotten education system labels children on the basis of marks and ranks. So right from childhood, children get accustomed to being slotted and labeled. The child who secures a higher rank is a "good boy" while the one with the lowest rank is a "bad boy" irrespective of what other great talents he might be possessing. This ranking system obviously sows the seeds of competitiveness in children. Rarely is any child upon reaching adulthood becomes fortunate enough to be spiritually mature to see through this illusion of superior and inferior.

If I were to pinpoint the single most important cause of a person being competitive, it would be lack of courage to face others. A competitive person suffers from some deep seated inferiority complex and insecurity and hence is always trying to live up to the expectations of others even at the cost of his own happiness. He thinks that by not being number one or by not being successful to the extent others expect him to be, he will not be of any worth. Nothing could be further from truth.