We all have unique experiences in life. The country in which we are born and brought up, the culture, society, parents, friends, relatives, and, on top of it all, our own life journey, make us what we are. Change any of these factors, and we will be different. Suppose a child is born in China rather than India, he will be different. If we were born into a different family, we would be quite different. Thus, our thought process and our personality are just a product of all these factors.
We identify so strongly with our personality and thought process that we don't take time to judge others without realizing that the mind that is sitting in the "seat of judgement" is also a product of its circumstances. I was born and brought up in a family of vegetarians and used to judge the people taking non-vegetarian food till I reached NADT, where I found people from all the regions and religions, and when I mingled with them, I realized that food habits are largely dependent upon region. I also listened to a lot of stories about the relationships in the Western world. The parents and the children do not live together. Even when children come to meet their parents, they have food outside. I judged these relationships because my mind was preoccupied with a "concept of love" widely prevalent in our society. A concept wherein there is no value for individual freedom, and people live their lives just to play the role of parents once they marry and have kids. When I came into contact with many such people and interacted with them quite closely during the foreign deputations, I came to realize that their family arrangements are driven by their strong priority for "individual freedom."
Life is the best teacher, and we can learn all through our lives in every moment. We just need an open mind. However, keeping our minds open requires constant effort. Often, due to laziness, we choose comfort by believing in something or the other. Especially if these beliefs are held by a majority. That's easy for us. If we are a part of the crowd, we get social validation, too. We feel safer. Having a different view, as compared to the view held by the peers, has a cost. So many insecure people have formed a "herd view" about something, and they feel secure with the numbers. Now somebody, alone, tries to tell a different viewpoint. Each one in the crowd feels threatened. It's quite easy to kill the voice of one person. It's easy to find fault with the character of such a person and defame him. That's what the crowd will do to protect its own belief system. That was done with every social reformer, be it Buddha or Jesus, or Gandhi. If the crowd accepts that viewpoint, that means they will have to make efforts to drop their own beliefs. That means the very foundation on which they were seeking security will shake. That is too difficult. They prefer to live with those beliefs unless nature shakes them through disasters and crises.
The person who travels to outer space can no longer live with a belief system that the Earth is flat. He will see the reality, and thereafter, there is no question of believing. It's real. There may also be people who hallucinate. In fact, Sudhir Kakkar, a leading psychoanalyst, has written a beautiful book about this phenomenon named "The Analyst and the Mysic". He has tried to investigate the nature of the experiences of Ramakrishna Paramhansa. There may be a lot of debate over the genuineness of experiences. But once somebody gets to realize the limitations of a frame, he can no longer be confined to that frame. He will grow beyond. Life may remain confined in the seed for years. However, once it enters into soil and gets water, it will grow into a plant. It will understand how limited it was as a seed. Yes, there will be challenges, and the seeds confined to the box in the store room of a kitchen may laugh at it, but it knows the "joy of growth" and has no doubt in its mind. I would not like to go back to that box, even while facing the storm or flood. It knows that the purpose of life is not to safe in the box. In fact, that safety is also a myth till it is cooked in the kitchen to become somebody's food.
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