There are two sides of every coin. We notice only one side of the coin out of foolishness and keep suffering our entire lives. For example, there is no doubt that money is very useful in this world and we can buy almost everything in this world with money. That is why there is almost a race to earn money in the society. The billionaires are the new role models of the new generation. While doing a session on mindfulness, we asked the students about their dreams and we were shocked to see that one student said that "becoming the son-in-law of Elon Musk" is his dream. Most of the career options are being decided based on the potential package. However, in this mad race, we tend to ignore the other side of the coin. From a different perspective, we have limited time and energy and when we allocate these limited resources disproportionately to earn money, the rest of the things suffer. In some cases, we fall ill due to work pressure and end up spending the money we have earned with so much effort just getting a painful treatment in some hospital. In some cases, we are not able to invest time and energy in relationships and face a crisis of relationships and therefore suffer severely.
Similarly, there is no doubt that health is wealth and people nowadays are becoming more and more aware of their health. So many people are busy running marathons and going to the gym. However, the death clock is ticking at its own pace. Death is inevitable and the more we invest in this body, the more we get attached to that. I have seen many people develop a deep fear of death. Anita Moorjani, who was diagnosed with cancer and doctors declared that she would die within 24 hours, has explained her near-death experiences in her book "Dying to be Me". She has explained how fear of death actually made her sick. We witnessed many crises during the COVID-19 times. I saw the terror of fear of death. One of our colleagues drank acid and died during COVID-19 times just due to the fear of passing on the virus to his family. That's the other side of the coin. There is no doubt that tools are to be taken good care of by a farmer and the purpose of these tools is to plough the field. If he does not use the tools to plough and keeps just cleaning and polishing the tools without ever putting them to use, that's a sheer waste of the tools. Similarly, if we get fixated on making the body stronger and do not put it to use, that's a sheer waste of the amazing body given to us.
Similarly, we live in a community and these communities have been formed primarily to enable cooperation. We can do so many things far better when we do them together. We have formed organizations to achieve complex tasks. For example, the government is the biggest organization that helps the nation build roads, and railways, enforce the law, regulate different activities, and carry out so many functions that are almost impossible for individuals to perform. Every community and organization has a certain set of rules that help that community to work in harmony. Most societies have tried to enforce this code of conduct using the philosophical framework of religion. On the one hand, religious anchoring makes such a code of conduct quite enforceable and sustainable, on the other hand, it makes the code of conduct quite rigid as well. It takes time to adjust to the changes in the ecosystem. A rigid code of conduct suffocates fresh ideas and significantly restricts the opportunities of growth. People do not dare to explore new ideas for fear of criticism and rejection by society. Thus, the same society that should have helped us to grow becomes a big hurdle to individual growth.
Family is one of the most closely knit units, all the more due to biological reasons. We invest quite a lot in our relationships. In addition to family members, we also build relationships with a number of friends and colleagues. These relationships provide us strength and support us in the moments of low. However, emotions have a very complex interplay. The same support turns into dependency and we start restricting the growth of our near and dear due to the fear that they will run away from us. I have seen many people not allowing their kids to choose the career they want, and also denying the fundamental right to choose their partners due to the fear of separation from kids. We don't get to notice when these relationships become a tool for us. We just want to use them to allay our fears or to get some emotional comfort or pleasure.
Probably, we don't get to see the dark side of the coin since we are fixed on its brighter side. We see that we can buy almost everything with money, but lose awareness of the fact that the time and energy spent to earn money has taken away almost our entire life. We see that investing in health is the best thing in this world, but we fail to notice that fear of death is the cause of so many psychosomatic diseases. We feel that social validation makes us happy but we fail to notice that the same society will ridicule us the moment we defy any of its fixed norms. We feel good with the emotional support provided by the family members and friends, but fail to notice that the need for emotional support has become one of our greatest weaknesses and we have started manipulating the relations for our petty benefit and similarly, we are also being manipulated. I feel that ignorance of the dark side of the coin is the root cause of our suffering. We ignore the dark side, but when we get to confront the dark side of the coin, we are not prepared. We get shocked and get into depression. Awareness is the key. It just requires taking some time off the river. Sit on the bank and meditate on our own thoughts and life. sometimes we do not get to notice the river clearly because we are busy swimming inside.
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