Human Situations - 3

Life presents many situations joyful as well as painful. It is the greatest university where we learn the art of living. Whatever situation we are in is the right situation we are called to face with confidence, courage, and serenity. The way we deal with our adverse situations especially shows us who we are, what we are about, and what guides our life, that is, our philosophy of life.

Situation 3:  After a fulfilling life in the USA, my wife and I decided to live a holistic life devoted to spirituality beyond religions in India. We decided to make our Shantisadan Siddhashram (Peacehaven Center for Realization) in a small village in the outskirts of Munnar our headquarters. We had little knowledge of what we were getting into. My wife volunteered to teach communicative English in a school very near to a parish school competing with it. Our relationship with the Catholic parish seemed to be fine before a bigoted, young parish priest decided to 'straighten us' out. After the ward prayer meeting conducted in a home near the ashram, a well-meaning and prominent member of the parish happened to tell the priest about the improved standard of spoken English since my wife started teaching in the rival school. His ignorant and bigoted answer was: "What good can come out of a person living in sin?"  According to him we were an unmarried couple causing scandal to others. His answer shocked a close relative of mine who attended the prayer meeting. She communicated this information through an aunt of hers to my manager who happened to be my nephew, and who in his fear and naivete shielded me from this information for fear of hurting me and also taking on a powerful parish priest.  I did not know what was going on as I was the last one to get the information. When I did get the information through a close friend of mine after a couple of months, a great deal of damage to good will for us has already taken place. After verifying the information from others present at the prayer meeting, I decided to confront the parish priest through a hand-delivered letter.  In the letter I asked him to apologize publicly if  he made statements damaging to our reputation publicly. To make the story short, the priest created a smoke-screen to cover his crime. His parishioners got emotionally charged in support of him and damaged, in the cover of night, my car and my property causing a large financial loss. My manager's house was encircled at night causing him a minor mental breakdown. To add insult to injury, my folks came from my home town far away, and without my knowledge went to the parish, and  apologized to the parish priest apparently to save me from bodily harm and further financial damage to my property. When we came to know of it, my wife asked my close relatives to leave our premises.

The written complaint to the local police inspector, brought him and his police officers to the ashram. The police inspector asked me if I wanted to press the charges against the parish priest or to settle the problem through conversation with him. I agreed to settling the issues through dialogue in keeping with the spirit of the ashram. After two weeks I was told by the police inspector that the priest would not be able to come for the meeting due to possible complications with the Church. I was faced again with pressing the charges against the parish priest or letting the whole thing go. After agonizing prayerful reflection, I decided to let go. This unrepentant priest is at large after he was transferred.  The parishioners finally seem to have realized  the  damage caused by a  misguided priest; and they have at present a positive attitude toward the ashram.

Others may have made other decisions in the situation I faced. I made the decision I thought would be best in view of who I am, and what my mission in life is. Any priest or leader can hide behind a smoke-screen for some time.  Finally facts would have to speak for themselves. And as Abraham Lincoln once said: "You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time".

Swami Snehananda Jyoti 

Guilt of Abusing

The college from where I graduated in engineering was on the bank of river Ganges. I joined the college about three months late due to my own reasons. Meanwhile the menace of ragging period was almost over. Still I had to face few sessions of mass-ragging. Few people from the senior batches would take us to the bridge over the Ganges River, and will force us to pronounce abusive words loudly. Before this time I had studied in a closely guarded public school and I never had any experience of saying any abusive words even privately. Anyway I was forced to say many such words and I had to say it to avoid being beaten up by my seniors. Even though I said all those words under such a pressure, I clearly had guilt inside me, that I should not learn these words as a practice. My friends, who were habitual of using such words, knew that I won’t use such words and they regarded me as different person. I also noticed that although many of the students were using such language amongst their own groups, all of them were courteous and careful enough for not using such words in front of teachers or parents.

Today, in the name of changing times and progressive society we see the occurrence of public programs that openly use such abusive and foul language, being attended by well known celebrities. I also saw a talk show on a leading TV channel, where a leading female anchor was in a way endorsing such events, in the name of trend of the youth and freedom of expression for them. In the name of freedom of speech, people start bashing the very basic nature of social fabric. Humor that uses the names of human private parts, may be okay for extremely closed local group of similar age, but when it is publicly done and endorsed by a larger group, it definitely indicates that something somewhere is getting on an unusual track. It does need attention of society. If we are able to give right kind of values to our children or are able to maintain sufficient communication between generations, things will continue on the right track. The concern heightens when such kind of acts doesn’t even incite the guilt that our generations had. It further heightens when either real people are used as joke props or some people even start daring to use religious icons to directly and consciously hurt sentiments of other people. This may be to gain quick popularity. Interestingly, today one can even get money by getting larger youtube hit count, as you will find advertisements of various leading brands on such videos. Some of them also start calling such things as creative freedom. 

I do not know if these people will also classify the act of people like ‘Jack the ripper’, the serial killer, in the category of creativity. I strongly and actively condemn the acts of public use of abusive language. More than the use of abuse, I am worried much more about the disappearance of guilt. The whole social fabric is based on mutual respect. Disappearance of guilt can break this thread forever. I am myself a torch bearer for freedom of speech movement, but speech definitely means a purpose. Today we have great social networking tools. It is up to us that we use them for our benefit or for destroying the purpose out of our life. I don’t believe in locks and banns. What I believe in is, telling the new entrants to this society, that why few things were made the way they are. We definitely need to tell a child, that why we can’t roam around without clothes. The basic questions will come from the new generations. It is the people from our generation who need to learn the answers correctly and handle things with the right kind of logic and right kind of communication. After all the wits of forthcoming generations are getting better and better every day. An open and trained mind is definitely better than just an open mind.

Dr. Sunil Ji Garg

Festival of Kites

Like everything in this Universe, humans also have a history of origin and growth. When the type took its’ origin some 85 million years ago, it would have been known by its fundamental qualities as a species. We have documents of Homo habilis and Homo heidel bergensis. Anatomically modern humans evolved from archaic Homo sapiens in the Middle Paleolithic, about 200,000 years ago. The transition to behavioral modernity with the development of symbolic culture, language, and specialized lithic technology happened around 50,000 years ago according to many anthropologists  although some suggest a gradual change in behavior over a longer time span. 

As it grew in number, it would have been identified by names. Humans still grew, not only in number but also in culture. Different cultures emerged and people had to be marked by the culture they belonged to. That was not the end; individuals later came to be identified by their race, caste, country and material possessions and power. The only time in which human beings were identified by the quality each held was the Vedic Period. 

Today, everyone upon earth is marked by the profession each one is engaged in. Everywhere we meet Mr Professions and Miss/Mrs Professions only. Individuality has no relevance; only personalities exist. Here, what we completely lose is our link with the values, which we once thought to be crucial in the lives of everybody. What that surprises me is that humans believe that they have advancement without any value aside. 

The festival of Kites has gone. Still, I remember the story of a kite which was flying high in the sky. A parrot saw that it flies even above an average birds range. It asked the kite how it could do so, without wings. The kite replied that unless the boy on the ground below was not controlling it, it could have gone much higher. The parrot told the kite that it can help it and the parrot cut the thread which held the kite. What happened thereafter, I need not tell you. The kite did not go an inch up; instead, it slowly came down. The moral of the story is clear; unless we hold tight our connection to values, all sorts of Professions miserably collapse.    

Joseph Mattappally

Ohm’s Law of Life

In my IAS entrance examination I opted for two papers of Physics. Though I had not been a student of Physics, the studyof the subject during my Engineering Course had given me enough confidence. I remember that my score in one paper of Physics was the highest among those who were selected. I also remember one exercise in that paper on Ohm’s Law. It was a simple numerical question of forty marks whose solution required only a few lines. 

Most of the candidates were puzzled to see such a simple question carrying forty marks and I was no exception. However, the question was tricky and required a clear conception of Ohm’s Law. Fortunately, I could understand the trick and solved it as the first question feeling quite happy about scoring forty marks in the first ten minutes. When the candidates came out of the examination hall, that question was the topic of discussion. Each one was giving his own interpretation and the answers varied widely from candidate to candidate. This created a very interesting scene as our selection depended on this question. Fortunately, my answer was correct and that was largely responsible for my selection as well as the highest score in the paper. I have narrated this incident many times. The interesting fact was that most of those who had obtained a master’s degree or even a doctorate in Physics had committed a mistake in solving the question. They could not believe that a question of forty marks could be that simple. As a result they had interpreted the question in their own way and gone off the track. Perhaps, they did not have a clear understanding of the Ohm’s Law and made a mistake. Subsequently, I contemplated over the incident and related it to one simple aspect of life.

The fundamental laws of living are so simple that we often fail to understand them and make our lives complicated. If we draw a simile from Ohm’s law, the electric current may be compared with the motivation to live and the objective is to have a continuous flow of motivation in good quantity. For this, there has to be a source of power. Such a source can either be a battery or power line. When the source is a battery, the current flows for a limited period depending upon the strength of the battery and the resistance in the circuit. If we wish the current to flow for all time, the battery should either be replaced or recharged. In case the source is a power line, such replacement or recharging is not required. The energy in that case will come directly from the power-house and as long as the power-station works, the current will continue to flow.

The second factor on which the amount of current depends is the resistance. The lower the resistance, the higher is the amount of current. In case the resistance becomes zero, the current will become infinite and the conductor in such a case becomes a super-conductor. Super-conductivity is the latest development in science, and it is said that it can solve the energy problem to a great extent because there is no loss of energy in a superconductor.

In life, the source of motivation can either be material objects or divine power. Material objects like name, fame, wealth, position, etc., give us a strong motivation to live but all these sources are transitory, like a battery. After a time they stop giving motivation and need either replacement or recharging. On the other hand, if divinity is the source of motivation like a power-house, there is no question of its depletion. The motivation to live then continues till we ourselves become part of divinity. The equivalent of resistance in life is our ego. The more dominant the ego, the more is the loss of our energy. Therefore, the aim should be to reduce our ego as much as possible. If we become totally egoless, the current will become infinite and, perhaps, that is the stage of reaching divinity itself. However, as long as we live in the world, it may not be possible. 

Therefore, the conclusion is that if we connect ourselves with the divine power-house with full sense of surrender, we shall experience infinite life current flowing through us like a superconductor and there will be no loss of energy. This is what is called Ohm’s law in physics and we may call it O’m’s Law in Life.

Rakesh Mittal IAS

Human Situations - 2

We are often placed in situations of not our own choosing. However, It is important that we deal with them safely and appropriately.

Situation 2:  About 13 years ago, a client/patient of mine expressed his desire to visit India when he learned about my going to India. He had never been outside of the USA.  After considering carefully the ethical standards that  govern doctor-patient relations, I decided that my patient could psychologically benefit from the trip. He had generalized anxiety disorder, had relationship problems, and fear of flying. He visited India with my family and enjoyed the trip. As I was planning to start ashrams in  India, I closed my practice, and stopped seeing him as a patient. Over the years, we kept in touch, and sometimes he visited me in my home in the USA when I returned from India. During such a visit last year, he shared an experience that he had many years ago during his trip to India with me. He stated that he saw a naked lady with her two kids taking bath in a stream. The particular spot of the mountain stream running at the edge of the present ashram property near Munnar, where he saw the lady and her kids happens to be a public bathing place, where also persons in the locality crossed the stream.  I was very surprised at what he said. I said very spontaneously: "I have hard time believing what you said". His unexpected strong response took me by surprise. He challenged me: "Are you saying I am lying? Are you calling me a liar? He looked very angrily at me and decided: "You are calling me a liar".  Holding my ground and trying to tell him that I did not say he lied, but just that I had difficulty believing what he said in the Indian cultural context did not help the situation. He expected an apology from me. An apology would have been phony as i would have rendered it merely to appease him. As he continued to  look daggers at me, I left his presence.  After a few minutes I came to the conclusion that there was no chance of reconciliation that day, I came back and asked him to leave my home, and he obliged.

He felt that I was attacking his integrity. Yet his perception of the scene and my difficulty in  believing it could have stayed side by side for what they were. Two incompatible views need not have deteriorated into the verge of physical violence on the part one tolerating different views. Good friendship allows freedom and safety in respectful and appropriate expression of any view. To agree to disagree in an agreeable way should form part of any human discourse to facilitate humanity's march toward unity of humanity.

Swami Snehananda Jyoti 

Soft Corner

He had come to see me after a long gap of two years. He was working in the software development team with me. He had suddenly left our organisation for a meager salary jump to another organisation. He did not transfer his charge to other colleague so I was a little unhappy with him. I had both officially and personally requested him earlier to come and handover his work charge, but he never turned up. Just two days before he rang me and requested me for his experience certificate. I clearly informed him, that without handing over his charge he cannot get it. He agreed to come a day before, but again he did not come. Yesterday again, he called me and requested to come today. Although I was a little upset with his behaviour, in the interest of work, I gave him the appointment. Fortunately, he came today at exact time. He entered the room and approached me to touch my feet. I said, “It’s Okay and shook hands with him”. But somehow with his gesture, I developed a soft corner for him. Why and how, but it happened.

One can say that a fair person should never bother about such things. But I did feel that a gesture of touching my feet made me soft. Something did occur inside me which made me different from what I was a few moments before. After that, the whole day passed quite smoothly for us. He handed over the charge to another person, explaining everything in detail. I also ordered lunch for him. I gave a well worded experience letter to him in the evening.

Later in the evening, when I was having a chat with me, I thought that whether, it was his gesture of touching feet, that made me softer, or my personality has changed, that I can’t be angry with people so easily. That’s how our behavioral traits are. Life can be made simple by some simple interactions. There could be many interpretations of this episode. Developing a soft corner due to a particular gesture could be considered a weakness for a person on the decision seat. But in this episode, it aided a fair end result. Hope my readers will also have their own soft corners.

Dr. Sunil Ji Garg

Thank You Mother Pigeon

Sometime back, I was into an Apartments Complex. Just inside the gate, in front of the garden, there was a black board in which it was written: ‘It is intelligence and not knowledge that makes an ideal human being’. I could not easily swallow what was written there and I do not endorse this statement too. What I understood was that people generally confuse between, intelligence, knowledge, purpose and value. Intelligence is generally interpreted in terms of one's capacity for logic, abstract thought, understanding, self-awareness, communication, learning, emotional knowledge, memory, planning, creativity and problem solving. Intelligence is not restricted to humans only; instead every matter has intelligence in some degrees. Knowledge, at the same time, is our awareness or understanding of someone or something or skills, which is acquired through experience or education by perceiving, discovering, or learning. In my opinion, neither knowledge nor intelligence is invariably what an ideal human being is. 

In an ancient temple, a number of pigeons lived happily on roof top. When the temple was under renovation the pigeons relocated themselves to a Church nearby. When the Church was undergoing a facelift, they flew to a mosque. When the mosque was under painting, they flew to the market place, where they found people fighting each other. A baby pigeon asked the mother pigeon, 

"Who are these people?"

The mother replied that they were "Human beings".

The baby asked, "But why are they fighting with each other".

The mother said "These human beings going to temple are called 'Hindus' and the people going to Church are called 'Christians' and the people going to Mosque are called 'Muslims'.

The Baby pigeon asked, "why is it so? Look, when we were in the Temple we were called Pigeons, when we were in the church we were called Pigeons and when we were in the Mosque, we were called Pigeons. Similarly they should be called just 'Human beings' wherever they go".

The mother Pigeon said, 'You and me and our Pigeon friends have experienced God and that's why we are living here in a highly elevated place peacefully. These people are yet to experience God. Hence they are living below us and fighting and killing each other".

This story, I think, answers our questions on who we should have been. 

Joseph Mattappally