It appears to me that all of us have taken birth as human beings to grow. There are always two possibilities that co-exist at the same time. The first possibility is to set the meaning of life around pleasures. The world is full of many temptations which offer different types of pleasures. Tasty food offers pleasure to the tongue, good clothes make us feel happy because society praises our sense of dressing, a big and comfortable home makes our body comfortable, money makes us feel secure to keep getting these comforts, name, fame, and power makes us feel good being the most sought forms of social validation, social networking also provides us the same social validation in a moderate form. Some take pleasure in keeping their body fit and healthy. There is a desired outcome in all the seeking and we keep following the same for almost the whole of our lives.
Generally, we set the meaning of life around one or more of these things. Some of us are not able to achieve the desired outcome and keep struggling and making efforts. Some, out of these, get frustrated, some give up, and some get exhausted. Some can get the desired outcome and either set a different goal in life or become complacent and develop mid-life crises around the meaninglessness of life, as if they are just waiting for death in the absence of any purpose of living.
We see a very strange phenomenon taking place. People extend their self or ego to their kids and sometimes a few other family members. Whatever pleasures and comforts they were seeking for themselves, they started seeking for their kids and family members. They want their kids to have a career that offers fat pay packages, powers, names, and fame. They want their kids to have tasty food, nice clothes, and comfortable homes. The extension of ego does not stop here. When a person becomes a grandfather, he wants to ensure all these things for his grandchildren as well.
Thus, we set the meaning of life in terms of comforts and pleasures, and either get frustrated, exhausted, and give up; or become complacent and develop mid-life crisis, or extend our ego to kids and family members and keep making efforts to get the similar comforts and pleasures for them. In the process, we get so fixated on the outcomes that we are unable to see the true meaning of life. Had the meaning of life been to get all these pleasures and comforts, why would there be death? The body and mind have been given to us as tools to explore life. We often take it the other way, as if life has been given to us to serve the body and mind with comforts and pleasures. The tools are made available to a doctor to carry out the surgeries. If the doctor mistakenly believes that the purpose of his entire education and experience is to keep the tools safe and comfortable, he will end up wasting his entire education.
The second possibility of living is to live life as a process. When we live life with this mindset, we do not live in the past or the future, rather we live in the present moment. Life in such a case means exploration and creation in each moment. Since we are not fixated on a particular outcome, we live life as it comes and try to use our instruments, the body, and the mind, to the best of our abilities. Since we are not fixated on any outcome, our minds do not wander between the past and future and remain in the moment. That gives the body and the mind immense scope for creation and exploration. Since entire attention remains in the present moment, we are able to give the best performance and outcomes by-products. I feel that the best of the scientists, sportsmen, artists, and best performers in any profession or occupation have always been the ones who have not been fixated on defined outcomes, but rather who have lived life like a process. This ensures our growth as a human being since we just flow with divine guidance.
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