What is inside us comes out in the form of our behavior. If there is love and compassion inside, that comes out in the form of care, concern, and passion. If there is fear inside, that comes out in the form of insecurity, jealousy, aggression, and exploitation. Somebody may try to manipulate his appearance by pretending. A Samel flower looks quite beautiful from a distance but as we approach the tree, we realize that the flowers do not have much beauty or smell and that is the reason why the flowers of samel are not used in prayers and decoration. The moment they get off the tree, they shrivel very fast and become useless. Similarly, the people, who pretend to be different from what they are, become quite inauthentic, and to hide their inauthenticities, they are always afraid to come close to any person and always maintain a layer of protection even in their closest of relationships. The moment the lid of their inner gutter opens, they smell intolerably foul.
The inner fears come out in different forms. Sometimes they come out directly. For example, fear of death is reflected in the behavior of many people when they get some disease or they have to visit a doctor. Fear of failure is quite visible on the faces of many students in the examination hall and outside. In fact, the same fear becomes all the more visible on the day of the results. Job insecurity and the fear of bad performance appraisal are reflected when we have to make presentations before the senior management. Fear of losing a relationship is reflected when relationships are tense. Fear of social rejection gets reflected on our faces when we get a negative comment at a social gathering.
Sometimes the outward manifestation of these fears is in the form of "greed" for something that we feel like a "winning formula". For example, people who are afraid of discomfort, make money or power their winning formula. They keep making efforts to earn money despite not knowing the use of the money they earn. Many people make "social validation" their winning formula against their inner insecurities of "isolation" and "loneliness". They do not feel complete inside and that incompleteness inside is quite painful. But rather than facing that "loneliness" upfront, they try to run away from that and make "social validation" their winning formula. The more we become greedy, the weaker we become inside. The right cause of the disease is not diagnosed and we keep taking paracetamol and end up damaging our kidneys.
Sometimes the inner fear reflects in the form of "jealousy". We have an inner fear of loneliness and make social validation our winning formula and when in a meeting our colleague gets the praise, we become jealous and insecure. We seek security in a relationship to defend our fear of being lonely and when that friend gives more attention to someone else, we become insecure and jealous. We have a fear of performing due to our incompetence and getting a competent subordinate and becoming jealous of him.
Sometimes the inner fear gets manifested in the form of "aggressive behavior". When we have fear inside, we somehow want to feel "in control". Since it is beyond our capacity to feel "in control" in from of our seniors, we start shouting as we see someone who is weaker to us. We start shouting at our maids and employees. We start shouting at the people who can't react due to the position they are occupying. We start hitting at the helpless animals. We start blowing the horn for no reason. We are not able to respond at the office due to fear and when we come back home, we start shouting at the kids. Some weak husbands become aggressive with their wives.
The inner fear may also manifest in the form of "escape". Some people will not confront the reality and run away. For example, they would hold their beliefs tightly which makes them comfortable. Some would believe in God and some would deny the existence of God, without making any effort whether God exists or not. The believers would conveniently close their eyes and ears to the questions being asked by the atheists and the atheists would close their eyes and ears to the questions being asked by the theists. We make a worldview of our own frame our own logic and choose to stay in a society that conforms to such worldview and never question that worldview or allow that to be questioned because truth is very expensive and requires a lot of time and effort.
Whatever the form, fear, and insecurity inside gets reflected in our outer behavior. On the other hand, whenever we have love inside, that gets reflected in the form of care and concern. We are always concerned about the people around us suffering from diseases, limited resources, and crises in relationships. We want to naturally help them out. There is a natural care, concern, and sensitivity. When we have love inside, it reflects in the form of love and affection towards everybody including our family members, kids, relatives, friends, organization, nation, hobby, and society. We want to work for the better of all these. We work passionately. We try to give our hundred percent to whatever task we take into our hands. Whatever is "in" comes "out" and therefore there is no use of pretension. Pretentions disappear as we examine a little closely like looking at the flower of semal. Kabir has beautifully described it in the following couplet:
कबीर ऐसा यहु संसार है, जैसा सैंबल फूल।
दिन दस के व्यौहार में, झूठै रंगि न भूलि॥
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