Continuing from where I left off in the last post..........
Chiquita: "secondly....we look at a ease,comfort n then death.....materialistic things...social politeness.....on these lines..may be we are all materialistic!!! we work to 2 make a living....wt we call a decent living.......we can get a meal by begging,but thats not wt we want........we feel gud when ppl acknowlegde ur deeds........think abt it.......can we live without materialistic things????wt r they???or r we sounding too unreal?"
Going with the Procession
Sounding too unreal..... Absolutely not. What is real to us 'is real to us', and there is no denying that fact. Everything that you have said is true.
We do things and feel proud that we did that and this. But if we look real carefully we will see that when we actually did something, there was a motivation force which had pushed us to do, sometimes even when our mind was saying no no. We get good marks because we studied well. And what made us study well. The motivation to be first in the class. To make our parents happy. And where did this motivation come from in the first place. It had just come.........
The Swami when he was young had once told that all that he wants was to sit in peace somewhere in the Himalayas. But take a look at his life. No other person in recent history has done the amount of deeds that he has done. He was literally running around the globe. Finally some time before his death, he says that there was some force pushing him against his 'will' to do all those things. He had just not wanted it.......
We all know from repeated experience that all those things that we are trying to achieve, once we achieve it, the glory/happiness will get over real quick and we will again start on the next quest. And the quest is not exactly something that thrills us. We need money for our comfort and the responsibilities that we have to fulfill. So we slog away at a job morn till night, coming back home cursing the boss and completely drained out. We sort of spend our entire adult life like this........
Which means we are not exactly enjoying, still we are doing it. Even the Swami was no exception. We just have to do what we have to do. And we can't stop it......
The only caveat is, let us allow our instinct to decide what we do. Our conscience. If we can know at least on an intellectual level what is the ultimate point in life. The realization that we are here for a very short time............... Are we here just to build up something, which will take all our life, a life of 'tension', and finally sit back and thing, did I waste my entire life in misery.......
Maybe one day, just like all those great people we too will be able to unravel the mystery of life. Till then, lets go with the procession........ and keep searching...........................
Monday, 11 June 2007
Friday, 1 June 2007
Dignity of Indians
I had received a comment a few days back and was giving an explanation to a few questions that was asked, and I found that I had so much to say that I am turning that into a post!
This is what Chiquita (fyi its pronounced Chi Kee Taa!) had to say:
hey here i go!!
few more questions?
can you pleaze define*dignity of indians*..i do not get the term.
secondly....we look at a ease,comfort n then death.....materialistic things...social politeness.....on these lines..may be we are all materialistic!!! we work to 2 make a living....wt we call a decent living.......we can get a meal by begging,but thats not wt we want........we feel gud when ppl acknowlegde ur deeds........think abt it.......can we live without materialistic things????wt r they???or r we sounding too unreal?
waiting 4 more on this!!
keep bloggin!
cheers!!
Dignity of Indians.
The answer to that lies in history (I am not an expert in this so please forgive any small factual errors)! You are all aware of how our nation has been repeatedly attacked and plundered by various foreign countries. If you look behind you will see that those people who had conquered us have perished while we persist!
All those big rulers from Ottomans to the Mughals, from Alexander to the British, have come and gone..... They have taken a lot from us, lot of materialistic things, but they also took back with them our culture. We may not be too aware, but the west knows a lot about us, not exactly as we would like to be known, as a nuclear power and an IT power house. They see it as a land of great 'culture'. Its about this culture that the Swami is talking about.
Its this culture that makes us strong. Allowing us to surmount the greatest of difficulties. Where else in the world have they defeated an 'empire' by non-violence. By showing the 'other cheek'. We might thing that these are all old fashioned and no longer valid. The thing is what we are calling old fashioned is less than 100 years old. And in terms of history 100 years is just like a day! And history is something that keeps repeating itself!
I will give a small example. In the Indo-Pak war of the 6os, we had actually overpowered Pakistan and we could have just run riot and taken back not just our own land but Pakistan as well. But at that exact moment WE decided to go to the United Nations and stop the war! In all of history have your heard of such a thing! A bully is normall someone who bullies not because of his strength, but because of his insecurites. We are so amazingly strong that we forgive rather than conquor! And where do we get this strength from - our culture.
When those occidental nations came to conquor us, they came here seeing our wealth, what they did not see at first was that the real wealth of our country was the people in it. The riches were not exactly materialistic, it was 'made' by them. Fast forward to the present and see. The wealth that we have started accumulating again is by 'services'(the IT industry is just that), where there is no physical wealth. Its just the strength and hard work of our fellow country men!!!!!!
Now there is a natural question. How did this come about?
Thats the spirituality that the Swami was talking about. Once Sharathchandra Chakravarty asked him, "Swami you keep telling about kripa, kripa, kripa. What is this kripa?" The Swami's answer was, "Kripa is that aura you see around those persons who have realized the ultimate truth of life."
I will give an example. In Kerala there is a person called Amrithanandamayi. I have never seen her, but I know serveral people who are great 'devotees' of her. If you go to see her, there will be a long queue where she sees each person and 'hugs' them. People keep saying that they have an out of the world experience when they go near her. She is someone who was born to a fisherwomman, and has never recieved any formal education in her life. Nor has she been educated in the Vedas or anyting on those lines. But she is someone who knows something that we don't know. Something we can't see or define with logic. This is what the Swami is talking about!!!!
You may not realize, but there are people like this, just normal common people, walking among us and are bringing a change to us and making our lives happier without we even realizing it.
Sometime back when I was without a job and in a very bad economical position in my life, my dad's brother had given me an opportunity for a job in Muscat with a good pay. I had to use a lot of logic and things like, its not good for my long term career to turn down that offer(I would just like to mention something else in this context. My mom, she trusts me so much that I don't know what I would do without her. Because she somehow always understands!). Now when I see back, I find that the main underlying reason for me to not go was that I did not want to leave our country. There is something that holds me back very strongly!
Ofcourse there are tonnes of people who are waiting for an opportunity to 'run away' from our country. But ask them once they have accomplished their dream, and they would say that they want to go back. Because what they saw was a mirage and they want to get back to reality. Then why do they stay back? They use logic. Logic that they had wasted a whole life time to get that green card. They feel that they are now respected because they are rich and living a life that is just a dream for many Indians. What if he goes back and people consider him as a fool. He finally fools himself into believing that he is doing the right thing, the 'clever' thing, and continues to live the mirage!
So Chiquita, that was our 'dignity' that Swami Vivekanda was talking about. Our culture. Our true nature!
You have asked more questions. A lot of the answers lie in what I have already written above. I will get back to it in a later post. Thank You for taking the time to read and give such a thoughtful comment......
:-)....................
This is what Chiquita (fyi its pronounced Chi Kee Taa!) had to say:
hey here i go!!
few more questions?
can you pleaze define*dignity of indians*..i do not get the term.
secondly....we look at a ease,comfort n then death.....materialistic things...social politeness.....on these lines..may be we are all materialistic!!! we work to 2 make a living....wt we call a decent living.......we can get a meal by begging,but thats not wt we want........we feel gud when ppl acknowlegde ur deeds........think abt it.......can we live without materialistic things????wt r they???or r we sounding too unreal?
waiting 4 more on this!!
keep bloggin!
cheers!!
Dignity of Indians.
The answer to that lies in history (I am not an expert in this so please forgive any small factual errors)! You are all aware of how our nation has been repeatedly attacked and plundered by various foreign countries. If you look behind you will see that those people who had conquered us have perished while we persist!
All those big rulers from Ottomans to the Mughals, from Alexander to the British, have come and gone..... They have taken a lot from us, lot of materialistic things, but they also took back with them our culture. We may not be too aware, but the west knows a lot about us, not exactly as we would like to be known, as a nuclear power and an IT power house. They see it as a land of great 'culture'. Its about this culture that the Swami is talking about.
Its this culture that makes us strong. Allowing us to surmount the greatest of difficulties. Where else in the world have they defeated an 'empire' by non-violence. By showing the 'other cheek'. We might thing that these are all old fashioned and no longer valid. The thing is what we are calling old fashioned is less than 100 years old. And in terms of history 100 years is just like a day! And history is something that keeps repeating itself!
I will give a small example. In the Indo-Pak war of the 6os, we had actually overpowered Pakistan and we could have just run riot and taken back not just our own land but Pakistan as well. But at that exact moment WE decided to go to the United Nations and stop the war! In all of history have your heard of such a thing! A bully is normall someone who bullies not because of his strength, but because of his insecurites. We are so amazingly strong that we forgive rather than conquor! And where do we get this strength from - our culture.
When those occidental nations came to conquor us, they came here seeing our wealth, what they did not see at first was that the real wealth of our country was the people in it. The riches were not exactly materialistic, it was 'made' by them. Fast forward to the present and see. The wealth that we have started accumulating again is by 'services'(the IT industry is just that), where there is no physical wealth. Its just the strength and hard work of our fellow country men!!!!!!
Now there is a natural question. How did this come about?
Thats the spirituality that the Swami was talking about. Once Sharathchandra Chakravarty asked him, "Swami you keep telling about kripa, kripa, kripa. What is this kripa?" The Swami's answer was, "Kripa is that aura you see around those persons who have realized the ultimate truth of life."
I will give an example. In Kerala there is a person called Amrithanandamayi. I have never seen her, but I know serveral people who are great 'devotees' of her. If you go to see her, there will be a long queue where she sees each person and 'hugs' them. People keep saying that they have an out of the world experience when they go near her. She is someone who was born to a fisherwomman, and has never recieved any formal education in her life. Nor has she been educated in the Vedas or anyting on those lines. But she is someone who knows something that we don't know. Something we can't see or define with logic. This is what the Swami is talking about!!!!
You may not realize, but there are people like this, just normal common people, walking among us and are bringing a change to us and making our lives happier without we even realizing it.
Sometime back when I was without a job and in a very bad economical position in my life, my dad's brother had given me an opportunity for a job in Muscat with a good pay. I had to use a lot of logic and things like, its not good for my long term career to turn down that offer(I would just like to mention something else in this context. My mom, she trusts me so much that I don't know what I would do without her. Because she somehow always understands!). Now when I see back, I find that the main underlying reason for me to not go was that I did not want to leave our country. There is something that holds me back very strongly!
Ofcourse there are tonnes of people who are waiting for an opportunity to 'run away' from our country. But ask them once they have accomplished their dream, and they would say that they want to go back. Because what they saw was a mirage and they want to get back to reality. Then why do they stay back? They use logic. Logic that they had wasted a whole life time to get that green card. They feel that they are now respected because they are rich and living a life that is just a dream for many Indians. What if he goes back and people consider him as a fool. He finally fools himself into believing that he is doing the right thing, the 'clever' thing, and continues to live the mirage!
So Chiquita, that was our 'dignity' that Swami Vivekanda was talking about. Our culture. Our true nature!
You have asked more questions. A lot of the answers lie in what I have already written above. I will get back to it in a later post. Thank You for taking the time to read and give such a thoughtful comment......
:-)....................
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