Growth and individualism Vs Change and Love

I am writing this on the basis of my limited reading and understanding of current issues in our society and my love for spirituality – which I call as “understanding of self”.   As I see the world today, most people in our society – especially youth are stuck in dilemma and twist of above titled words in different ways

1.       Growth – Most people want to certainly grow in terms of money, power and status (read previous blog for more on this)

2.       Individualism – Most People want themselves to be accepted as they are and don’t want to adapt / compromise / Change

3.       Change – Everyone wants world to change for better so that they and society can live happily together

4.       Love – Everyone without exception - want to love and be loved

Spiritual knowledge makes me understand that everything we do starting from getting up from bed in morning to getting back in bed is for one common reason/gain – “Happiness or Sukh”. That’s the very intrinsic nature of our soul which is eternal and hence can’t change. So, in any society, every individual has this intrinsic nature to love and to be loved. In an idealistic society, which existed at some point of time (sometimes called as Ram Rajya) - people adapted to each other’s likes and dislikes, to find middle ground where they can live, let live, trust and forgive each other easily and hence could love each other deeply. Because most of them were aware that they are not body, but eternal soul and life is journey beyond body. So love was enough ground to stay with each other. Moreover, people earned love rather than demanding it; by earning means, they had self sacrificing qualities. Theory of objectivism says, love is actually our response to those few people we meet, toward whom we feel the high respect, admiration, and attraction. And before we can really grant love to those we value, we must be in tune with our own values and character, and know what it is we believe to be the right and the good, what qualities we are looking for in other people.

Every individual and hence society has both good and evil qualities, amongst the two whichever is stronger that ultimately decides our destiny. As time has passed now we live in world where the component of evil i.e growth and mis-quoted individualism in society is gaining more importance and love is taking backseat…may be two can’t co-exist in long term or maybe we have become confused and hypocrite.

Sometimes when I travel by Mumbai local, I see people crumpled against each other like animals, fighting, shouting and sometimes even beating each other. The objective of getting into that train was to reach destination which is office, working there will give them growth which means Money – Power and Status. So do people like getting crumpled? Answer is No – then why do they do it? To achieve something which will possibly give them happiness? In office employees adapt to what boss says, they respect him irrespective of his qualities, Doctor listen to their patient’s nonsense and vice versa, citizens listen to politicians and authorities for same reasons.  So we adapt / compromise for our growth and comfort. But Individualism says do what you feel is correct neither at expense of others nor to please others. Where is the real individualism in what we doing? So here comes the component of hypocrisy in us, we say to our loved ones to accept us as we are…but we adapt / change for world which is not in our hand and from where we may get material gain – Money, Power and Status.  So we want to change / adapt and work hard to gain money power and status which is a false and temporary, but we fail to change / adapt and work hard to earn love and give love even to limited people in our relationships. Every individual is different, so it’s certainly difficult to get all people around you with thoughts and deeds exactly as you. To love each other certainly we will need to tune into each other’s frequency; this doesn’t mean we are going away from our self. It just means in this small life we are respecting each other for mutual happiness.  So yet I haven’t got answer for simple question that, if wife or husband, father or son, mother or children can self sacrifice to earn money power and status why they can’t self sacrifice/change/adapt for each other’s love? Nevertheless I will continue my search…real test of love is always in difficult circumstances.

Ultimately when we die it will not matter how much money power and status we acquired, neither it will matter what we felt was correct / incorrect, but certainly it may matter how much love we gained because that was intrinsic quality of our soul which is the foundation of life. Stronger the foundation stronger is the building.  

Things beyond Money, Power and Status

Money, Power and status are excesses beyond the needs of an average human being. Starting from being a primate to a two-legged social animal, we are continuously developing ourselves. Simply because we were not content living on all fours, eating raw food and moreover we have had non ending ambitions.

The basic difference between a human and an animal exists, by a line of limited ambitions for animals and everything beyond that line - unlimited ambitions - for humans. Animals don’t care about the future, they live in the moment with every thirst and craving satisfied by finding out something substantiate to eat. Humans, by nature only, always safe keep various things of need in various warehouses.

 But the unlimited ambitions of humans have given rise to disparity in society. At the same time this disparity retains a kind of equilibrium, without which there would be chaos. While humanity’s development is due to people running after success, the equilibrium is maintained by people who are content being successful within the limitations that they have drawn for themselves.

Since the time man discovered how to make fire, nature has always teased him, drawing him out of his self imposed limitations. It presented various challenges in the form of unsurmountable mountains, uncrossable rivers, too distant planets and stars, and mysterious death traps in the form of ocean beds. But every single challenge has scaled, measured and achieved. In this 21^st century, the carrot that dangles in front of the youth is symbolized by wealth, power and fame. If this dangling carrot, propels, motivates and pushes man to constantly discover new ground and in the process, discover newer potentials, it will definitely contribute to human development. One of the examples of this development can be the billionaire BILL GATES. He continuously pushed the human race with his vision for the software industry. He had no respect for status-quo at any level and thus he gave us a new way of doing business based on moving information; he empowered individuals with new technology, and made every aspect of business, digital.  

But chasing after these excesses, by itself is not complete. Human beings need certain intangibles like Love, Integrity, and Generosity to complete them.

Mahatma Gandhi said that seven things will destroy us.

·         Wealth without Work

·         Pleasure without Conscience

·         Knowledge without Character

·         Commerce (Business) Without Morality (Ethics)

·         Science without Humanity

·         Religion without Sacrifice

·         Politics without Principle

For centuries many men lusting after Money, Power and Fame have sought lucrative jobs, or even to the extent of getting money for nothing - manipulating markets and assets so that they don't have to work or produce added value, & just have to manipulate people and things. Even today, there are professions built around making wealth without working, making much money without paying taxes, benefiting from free government programs without carrying a fair share of the financial burdens, and enjoying all the perks of being citizen of the country and membership of corporation without assuming any of the risk or responsibility. Right from childhood, we have not been given character education, which means inculcating in a children, a sense of right and wrong; fundamental rights and duties and basic ethics which establishes a  common set of values that everyone agrees on. It is not too difficult to comprehend, that kindness, fairness, dignity, contribution, and integrity are some of the fundaments worth keeping, and there cannot be any debate on that.

Speaking of values on the business front, Adam Smith has said that “Fairness and benevolence in business are the underpinnings of the free enterprise system called capitalism”. The spirit of the Golden Rule or of win-win is a spirit of morality, of mutual benefit, of fairness for all concerned.

Thus while broadening these horizons of Money, Power and Status we have to concentrate on few intangible aspects like Love, Integrity and generosity. Instead of using power to tyrannize people, it can be used to influence them. By doing this we will be complementing our way of development and improvement. Same way, money should not be gained at the cost of integrity and honesty. It has been considered that money is one of the tools of power, but the real power of money is in giving it away. Similarly, integrity is all about “saying what you do and doing what you say”. It’s an unreduced or unbroken completeness or totality. Today pleasure without conscience is one of the key temptations for executives, and that is reflected through various advertisements, as well as political proceedings. For many, Principles and ethics are honorable words in books but not in practice. But here again to understand the importance and upshot of conscience we can symbolize BILL GATES as an example, He is a person with billions of dollars, and a person of power; yet, at the same time he is a person of integrity. Donating billions of dollars for AIDS prevention shows his generosity and love towards mankind.

          Apart from these intangible assets one more fixed asset that the human race has been gifted with, is Religion. It’s an individual matter that provides everyone with faith and light. It helps us discover ourselves, to discover our true potential and true purpose of being here. It solves various enigmas of life and gives answer to questions like who am I? & why am I here for?, through various scriptures like Bhagwat Gita, Bible etc. Also concepts of spirituality have contributed a lot to the completion of human life. People from various parts of world and various strata of society have had welcomed concepts and practices of Yoga and Meditation, which facilitate a person physically as well as mentally. But if religion is seen as just another hierarchical system, its members won't have a sense of service or inner workship. That is why may be, Gandhiji emphasized on the term Religion without Sacrifice.  He said “Without sacrifice we may become active in a church but remain inactive in its gospel. In other words, we go for the social facade of religion and the piety of religious practices. There is no real walking with people or going the second mile or trying to deal with our social problems that may eventually undo our economic system. It takes sacrifice to serve the needs of other people - the sacrifice of our own pride and prejudice, among other things”.

          One more intangible to keep going is peace. For centuries this social animal has been fighting wars, and increasing the power to tyrannize the inferior ones. We have to understand that none of us have born to rule over others, we just have to broaden our horizons and complete ourselves as human beings. There is a story of an Emperor who tyrannized the entire India and then somewhere realized that his power is futile, and then he becomes a monk, may be that’s why we call him

Ashok- The Great. Mahatma Gandhi said that “In my opinion, non-violence is not passivity in any shape or form. Non-violence, as I understand it, is the activist force in the world. Therefore, whether it is materialism or anything else, if non-violence does not provide an effective antidote, it is not the active force of my conception”. Thus it is important that we as individuals  broaden our horizons of Money, Power etc. after keeping in mind that we have to complement these with peace as well.

Therefore the logical conclusion here is that every one of us has drawn a circle with the circumference of Money, Power and Status and we are working within that circular wall. With the evolution of human race, the radius of this circle is ever increasing, which will represent the development and improvement of human race. This will ensure that every individual is departing from his status-quo and increasing his limits of growth, thus contributing in pushing the human race. But, surely there are things which are beyond these circles and will remain beyond the circle however big it gets. These are the intangibles like Love, Peace, Generosity, Honesty, Kindness, Integrity, Spirituality etc.

          Today a monkey can walk on two legs, dolphins can understand our signals, and can jump accordingly, chimpanzee are also intelligent enough to understand what’s happening around them. The only thing they have not been able to do is inventing fire, which is the first biggest breakthrough for mankind. Yes, we made the fire that differentiates us from animals. Thus, we can say that there is a difference between humans and animals by stated line of ambition. Our unlimited ambitions will keep on driving the human race to reach for the skyline but at the same time these excesses of money, power and status should be complemented with Love, generosity and integrity which are of course beyond the circle.