Life

Yesterday, I watched the old Bollywood movie " Wo Saat Din ", in which a girl falls in love with a boy and is later forced into marriage with another man. She tries to commit suicide on the first night of marriage, but her husband, being a doctor, saves her. When her husband learns the whole story, he finds her lover and attempts to reunite them. But by this time, that girl has identified so strongly with her role as a wife that she refuses to go.  So, basically, the movie is about the conflict between the free will of an individual and the rules of society , and the movie portrays that even if the girl has been forced against her will, she will naturally assume the role. No doubt the nicety of her husband also plays a very crucial role. But the most critical question is whether the institution of marriage is just a " workable arrangement " between two individuals wherein they try to bring up a family and take care of the family members, give birth to children, an...

Why is self-inquiry so difficult, and why do most people continue to live the way they have been living despite the miseries of daily living? Why are very few of them able to take the first step? Even among the people who take the first step, why do so many people not make any progress? What is the fundamental reason behind all this? The other way of asking the question may be what was so special about Krishna , Jesus , Meera , and everybody else who could break free of all the frames. The starting point is always awareness . A pig is happy lying down in the dirty mud because it is not aware of the foul smell of the dirty mud. Not so that we do not have awareness of the holes in our framework, as children, but most parents discourage such questioning because that's uncomfortable to them. Children often ask questions about death, but we try to hide them behind the false promise of security. Children see through relationships and ask questions as to why we differentiate among relati...

  Dasharatha is fighting a battle between the Asuras and Devas from the side of the Devas bravely, and his wife Kaikeyi is with him. He is fighting the battle riding on a chariot , which is moving in all ten directions—eight directions in this plane, and also the two directions of the unconscious and cosmic plane. While fighting the battle, the bolt of one of the wheels slipped out. Then, Kaikeyi uses her thumb to steady the wheel, and Dasharatha wins the battle. Pleased by this, he grants two boons to Kaikeyi, which she reserves for the future. Our intellect, like Dasharatha, is also fighting the battle in all ten directions in three planes. Eight directions in the plane of normal consciousness, ninth in the unconscious plane and the tenth in the cosmic plane. There are so many conflicts in the domain of the conscious mind, and when we make decisions, there is often a conflict between the self-interest and the larger interest. The self-interest tells us to accumulate for the fu...

 Each family is like a cell of the body. Different cell bodies, like individual members of the family, support each other for the overall survival of the body. A member of the family, say the grandparent, may act as the nucleus of the cell and may store the DNA that gives the sense of purpose to the family. They may also form a cell membrane to protect the family against external attacks. The bread-earner of the family may act like a chloroplast , which makes the food for the family, and the person handling the kitchen may act like mitochondria , which converts the food into energy so that different members of the family get sufficient energy to function properly. Not all cells are alike. Not all families are alike. Some cells have different structures, like the cells of the lungs, which help them absorb oxygen. Some cells, like the cells of the brain, have very different functions to perform and therefore have very different constitutions and structures. Different families also h...

What is this strange feeling of giving, donating, or sacrificing? A boy got a ten-rupee note from his father as pocket money. He gives it to a beggar. Full of pride, he goes back to his father and explains that he donated ten rupees to a beggar. Father asks what you gave to the beggar belonged to whom? Son says that it belonged to him. When? Asks father. Son replies, "In the morning, when you gave that to me". Father told, "You just passed on what you got from someone else". He further asks his son, "Is there something that is yours and which you can donate?"  Do we have something that is our own, and which does not belong to anybody else? We have acquired this body in the womb of our mother from her. We have acquired whatever knowledge we have from our parents, schools, and society. We have acquired money from the organisation we work for. We have learnt different skills by observing the people we interact with. What belongs to us? Nothing. Then how can ...

An infant is so vulnerable, and yet he is so happy. He does not carry the burden of the whole world on his shoulders. He does not have fears. We do so many things across our lives, accumulate money and make relations, and gather powers. Yet, we become more and more insecure. That means there is something very fundamentally wrong with the whole structure. Whatever we do in life, if the starting point is fear, can we ever overcome fear? Suppose we gather money to overcome our fear of running out of money; this means that every effort we put into getting more money reconfirms our belief that we will not be happy in the absence thereof. Suppose we make efforts to get social validation , and win prizes, and medals, that means our belief that we will not be happy in their absence gets stronger every time we make efforts to get those medals and awards. Suppose we make efforts in a relationship by spending more and more time, with the fear that we may lose that relationship. In that case, the ...

Fear, fear, and more fear since childhood. Fear of being a failure, fear of not being accepted by society, fear of losing a support system to survive, fear of losing parents, fear of not being able to get admission to a good college, fear of losing a friend, fear of being cheated, fear of being exploited. Our lives are full of fear. The entire framework of our lives is centred around fear. That's why our decisions are driven by safety, rather than exploration, love, and compassion. The same thing applies to relationships.  There is a short movie on Netflix, " Greater Kalesh ". A girl comes back to celebrate Diwali to find all types of conflicts within the family. Mother is fighting with father because father lied to her that the home they live in was owned by them. She is very disturbed because her husband lied to her, and they have to move out now. Similarly, she is fighting her son because he has decided to marry a girl who is 10 years older than him. Actually, her son...

What is the meaning of a relationship? We have a wide variety of relationships around us. Parents, siblings, friends, cousins, colleagues, subordinates, bosses, neighbours, grandparents, and so on. We enjoy some of these relationships, while not the rest. Why? What fills a relationship with joy? The purpose of relationships is very intrinsically linked to the purpose of life . Why have we come to this world? To take birth, have fear of death, failure, and loss, make efforts to gather money and powers to allay our fears, and die? That looks so stupid. That can't be the purpose of life. Even a person with very average intelligence would say that it can't be the purpose of life. However, most of us continue to do the same thing. In silent moments, when we are not in a hurry to get ready for the office or meet deadlines, when the mind is not full of thoughts and worries, we sometimes have a strange realisation that something is wrong with the way we are living. Something deeper and...

  Krishna asks Arjuna to hit arrows at Bhishma while Arjuna is hiding behind Shikhandi . Krishna also asks Yudhistira to confirm that Ashwathama has been killed, when the fact was that it was not Ashwathama rather an elephant that was killed. He also asked Arjuna to kill Karna while the chariot of Karna was stuck in the mud. He also asked Bhima to hit Duryodhana on his thigh, which was against the rules of the game. Rama also killed Bali while hiding behind the tree, which was against the rules of that time. But how can Krishna and Rama do something that is Adharma ? It is because what matters is the larger cause and not the details. Spying on somebody and intruding on somebody's privacy is not good, and yet almost every country has a spy agency. When it comes to the security of the nation, individual privacy does not matter. Killing, per se, is bad, but when the soldiers at the border kill the soldiers of the other country, that's celebrated by the country. Marriage i...

  In a doubles tennis game , two players play as a team. Both players have to play their game, as well as support each other. Though they play side by side and cover half of the field, many times, if a player feels that his partner is not in a position to take the shot, he tries to help his partner out. But both play their own game. If one of them stops playing his own game and starts to observe the game of his partner and comment on his shots, they are sure to lose. First, the partner would get frustrated and would not be able to focus on his game. Second , the person who is commenting has stopped playing the game and therefore would not be able to appreciate the efforts put in by his partner, who is playing the game. His comments would not stem from an appreciation of reality, but rather from the mental stories he has created, as he himself has stopped playing the game and moved away from reality. Third , since he is not playing the game, he will have more and more time and ener...

Children are suffering. Parents are suffering too. Children feel that parents do not listen to them, and parents think that their children do not listen to them. Who is not listening to the other? Who is right and who is wrong? There is a crisis in almost every relationship . Everybody is suffering in the process. Why? There must be some reason for such widespread suffering, and if there is a reason, there should be some solution as well. The whole of human society is founded on cooperation . Communication and conversation are the backbone of cooperation and coexistence.  For a conversation to happen, three things are needed. First, the speaker. Second, the listener. Third, the communication. Often in our conversations, all three are absent. How? That's an absurd statement. If the speaker does not tell the truth, there is no speaker. Quite often, we are reluctant to share what's going on inside. Either we do not trust the listener and sense a threat of manipulation. Or we do n...

It is the gap between competence and expectations that makes our lives fulfilling or frustrating. Many people have very low competence, yet they also have very low expectations. They stay happy in their limited world. On the other hand, many people with high competence and high expectations. They keep struggling all through their lives to match their competence with their expectations. They continually work on improving their competence and set new targets for themselves. Some people develop very high expectations while not working on their competence in that proportion, and they remain frustrated for the whole of their lives. The people who have high competence and low expectations are always the most contented ones. How do we develop competence, and how do expectations grow? The world is so full of attractions. The more we look outside, the more we develop expectations. The more one observes one's internal world, and more such expectations drop. The reverse applies to the compe...

We have been playing the game we learnt from our society during our childhood. We are also surrounded by people who are equally busy playing the same game. We are conditioned to live with a deep sense of insecurity since our very childhood. Insecurity which is an outcome of so many mental stories woven together. Darkness is threatening to us because we have heard stories of ghosts, and therefore, believing in God feels safe. God will protect us from evil forces. We fear being bullied, and therefore, we make friends who stand with us when we are being bullied. We feel insecure being alone. What will happen if there is a medical emergency? Who will take me to the hospital? We maintain good relationships with our neighbours to ensure we have the assurance of help in emergencies. We have been told since the beginning that it's not easy to live alone, and therefore, we marry someone who will stay with us in our old age. We are somehow made to believe that wealth gives us happiness throu...

Sports have wonderful lessons for life. When we play any sport, say for example tennis , we stay completely aware during the game. We can't be certain about the shot we are going to play. We look at the shot played by the opponent, observe our own position, the speed of the ball, its movement and position and then, having analysed all these elements, we hit a shot. As we keep playing tennis, this analysis comes naturally to us, and we do not have to make efforts. Initially, when we learn to play the game, we struggle. Sometimes we will be slower and miss the ball. Sometimes we will be faster and move ahead of the ball and will lock our shoulder, and we will play with a locked shoulder. Sometimes we will hit harder than needed, and sometimes the speed will be less. Slowly, as we keep playing tennis, we develop a very precise judgement naturally and play the right shot. Life is also like a game. We can't be certain of anything. Everything is changing. In relationships, family, or...

All of us are conditioned by the society in which we are born. Whatever we learn since childhood becomes our own thought process. When we go to the temple or church, or mosque, we do not say that my religion has told me to believe in God; rather, we say that "I" believe in God. Whatever food we have tasted since childhood becomes our taste. We do not say that my society or parents have developed my taste buds like that; rather, we say that "I" like such and such food. We own up to the rights and wrongs taught by our society. If my society told me that non-vegetarian food is not good, I would say that "I" don't like non-vegetarian food. "I".  What is "I" devoid of all these influences? Probably "nothing" or "everything". What is Canvas devoid of painting? Probably nothing since there is no painting and it's blank. Or full of every possibility. What is "I" devoid of all this conditioning? Probably no...