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Donors and Grabbers

Rama is searching for Sita desperately and meets Hanumana. Hanumana makes him meet Sugriva. Rama, despite not being in a happy state of mind, listens to the story of Sugriva and understands his pain. He makes all the effort to help Sugriva and keep his pain aside. Similarly, when he reaches Lanka, he listens to the pain of Vibhishana and promises to help him and as soon as he kills Ravana, he makes Vibhishana king of Lanka. Krishna has no interest in the kingdom of Hastinapur and yet helps not only Arjuna but also Duryodhana. On the last day of Buddha on this earth, he tells Ananda that he is going to leave the body and Ananda announces in the village so that whoever wants to have darshan of Buddha may do so. Just a few moments before leaving the body, when the body is quite weak and fragile, one person insists that Buddha should preach to him about dhamma and Buddha compassionately teaches him about Dhamma. We also have heard the story of Dadhichi who donated his bones to Indra so that he can make his Vajra to kill the demons.

On the other hand, we have Ravana who kidnapped the wife of Rama by deception. We have the story of Duryodhana who took away the kingdom of Pandavas by cheating and made all the plans to kill them. We have the story of the British who ruled India and till the time they ruled, they exploited India and when they realized that they would not be able to rule, they divided India which led to the killing of so many innocent people. We have Hitler and so many other dictators who burned and killed many innocent people for fun. 

Not so that we have these two kinds of people only in stories. We see the donors and grabbers in each country, state, organization, and home. The grabbers would like to grab everything on the offer. Right from money to positions. Even in a queue for darshan of the lord, they would like to grab the pushing the weak people behind. They would like to employ all the means to remain first. They would not hesitate to file a suit against their sibling to get the property of their choice. They would do anything to get the attention of the boss right from telling lies to taking the credit of their subordinates. 

I feel that everybody would agree with me that the grabbers, with time, become more and more aggressive at grabbing. They become quite insensitive. Builders with the mentality of a grabber do not hesitate to grab the land of a poor orphanage. Bosses with the mentality of a grabber do not hesitate to exploit their employees for their petty interests. they can make their employees work throughout the night just to get that one silent praise from their boss. Probably, everything is just a tool for them. However, externally they appear to be very strong, they are very weak from the inside. Their fragility and insecurities also increase with time. It is because the more they try to control others the more they realize how vulnerable they are. 

I feel that everyone has a choice to make almost every moment of his life-to be a donor or a grabber. Grabbing may have benefits in the outer world but it makes us weak inside. It makes the inner darkness more darker. It strengthens the ignorance inside. It sucks whatever little ray of light exists inside us to guide us towards our true nature. On the other hand, when we help others and connect to them, that giving strengthens our inner connection. That takes away so much of fear and insecurity. After all, fear and insecurity exist because we do not see reality and get stuck in some mental imaginations (generally as a result of conditioning). The moment we see the reality, that conditioning drops just like the darkness drops with a ray of light. The problem generally is that we get so obsessed with the falsity that deny any and every attempt of nature to show us a ray of light. The more we get into the grip of ignorance the more fearful we become inwardly and the more efforts we make to grab into the outer world just to become more unhappy. The vicious cycle keeps going on until we get to observe reality and see things as they are. That possibility of being aware exists in every moment, we have to just choose that possibility. 


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