Facts of Life

Dr N C Ramanujachary

Well know facts of life need to be stated again and again, on and on, for they are easily forgotten as they lack immediacy. One such is ‘we reap as we sow’

Life is full of choices and chances; no doubt, it is only one’s effort and merit that gives one anything. One can have the results of one’s own deeds, the three-fold: word, feeling and action. This is common knowledge but is eclipsed when the mind is not clear, alert and aware in matters of daily living and behavior.

You give ‘Love’ and it comes back you in abundance, yet the love you give has to be unconditional, without anticipation, and non-personal. Anticipation and expectancy always bar the ‘coming’. Love has to be non-anticipatory.

We have problems over problems in daily, corporate and political life and this need to be addressed not in one way but in all way. Legislation will not bring rain. The judiciary cannot bring transformation and the executive is less executing, for various reasons. A total reset of human mind, heart and consciousness can only bring in the results for the welfare and prosperity of all, crossing all barriers of caste, creed, race, language and culture. Take for example the case of corruption or terrorism. All outer ‘repairs and renewals’ rebound only in their increase. One solution brings in more and more problems. That Man has to change fundamentally and totally is the suggestion of thinkers of the world. But why is he not changing? Ethics that ought to rule the man of the world were stated and restated by all religions and philosophies, besides the social-pattern studies. Something is holding back the man from operating on these standards however much he is trying to do. We cannot say the man is ignorant; he is only ‘insolent.’

To illustrate, let us see the notion of ‘Aparigraha’. The injunction here is one should not appropriate what legitimately belong to others. Taking credit for acts not immediately performed by one is a subtle example. The harder would be the ‘Land-grabbing’, the instances of which we see performed individually and at corporate level too. Can this attitude be checked either by legislation or judicious interference totally? Mind to appropriate what one wants to possess, by hook or crook, needs remedy. That mind is sick and contaminative. The ethical rule or connotation should go deep into the human mind or consciousness. Cruelty does not mean only harming the animal life. It includes hard words, hurting sentiments and the like.

The Mind, each one of us possess, is a Principle as well as an Entity. It is normally a storehouse of memory and passion, propelling one for action. It is also the ‘thinking’ principle and instrument. A part of the mind is possessive with passions, desires and aspirations; while another part is reflective, open for concern for others and a store of ‘noble and nicer’ ideas. These two parts incessantly provide the pulls and pushes. Man is all the time caught up in this duality. This can be coordinated only when the mind functions as a ‘principle’ too. We view things and are also capable of reviewing them. We cannot do away with the mind, and yet polish it – make it fresh each time.  ‘Buddhi’ -- the pure in-charged mind – is the refined and remodeled Mind we need to acquire. This is within the capacity of each one of us and nothing ‘foreign.’ Attention to the awareness and awakening to that finer focus of life can bring this transformation. At the outset there must                       an openness and willingness ‘to change’. If one thinks there is nothing in him that needs a change the door is ‘closed’. A realization that he is not alone in the world but is one of the many things around brings in the need for change.

All said and done, it is the ‘ethical’ change that has to arise through one’s heart and percolate into the mind and the ‘particularized’ consciousness of each. Reflection of the ‘self’ and the ‘Self’ is the need of the hour. An average man considers ‘self’ or ‘selfishness’ is a ‘natural’ quality for him. But it is not. There are ‘unselfishness’ and ‘selflessness’, (another subtler statement of word) as expressions of action. Selflessness proceeds toward ‘altruism’ and concern for the well-being of all and sundry.

Ultimately Man is the maker of things, in the world, bringing glory or gloom for him and others too. Each action, feeling and thought contributes to this end. It is here his choice of life comes to play. He has to ‘regenerate’ himself without waiting for a ‘reincarnation’ there for.                                                                         ###