Act Versus Intent

This morning I was contemplating on the topic and realized that a lot of times though the end result action may be the same, but its very critical to know the intent behind the action. To illustrate the same, consider a scenario, where there are two teachers who have taken the kids out for a outbound experience. One teacher may genuinely believe that as the kids are still in a relatively controlled environment, I should let them explore and learning can happen only if I let them free. The other teacher may feel, that as this is a relatively controlled environment, I don’t need to monitor the kids and can laze around while the kids are busy themselves.
Come to think about it, the end result is the same… but the intent is very different. One is doing it to promote learning and growth in the kids and the other is doing it more for his own convenience.
I tend to believe that the intent will make a difference as most likely at the end of the day, the first teacher will try to engage the kids in a discussion to share what they have learnt or what did they notice and try to make it a learning for the group, whereas the first will probably just end the activity and take the kids back getting over with his responsibility.

So, I feel that we should not judge anything on the action alone, but try to understand the intent.

Gratitude To The Receiver

On this site and elsewhere also, we keep coming across a lot of blogs which encourage us all to give- give help, give support, give material goods, give food, give love… and so on.

What I feel gets missed out is the importance of the receiver. The receiver is as important as the giver. Would like to share my personal experience… I like to feed birds and dogs. Now, when it comes to birds, I have always had the feeling that, wherever you put the bird feed, the birds would invariably, be able to detect them and eat. A couple of months back I relocated to a new place and I have had a hard time finding the place where the birds come and feed. I tried various parks, walls, parapets etc and at each of the place the next day would show me uneaten grains… and every morning when I saw the unaccepted offering, I felt unhappy. Finally, I found a place, where the birds started coming and eating, but this experience very clearly highlighted to me the importance of the receiver.

Think, what if there was no one to receive whatever you wish to share …

That’s why I say, Be grateful to the circumstances which have given to you the opportunity to be a giver AND show gratitude to the receiver

Pruning

The other day I was out for my morning walk, when I realized that the trees had been pruned. There were branches all over the place… it had me thinking!!!
Pruning is one of the most common procedures used for maintenance of mature trees. The trees had lost, but had they actually lost? The pruning was done to remove the weak and diseased branches/sections of the tree; some not diseased but which needed to go to have better growth for the tree; to enhance the growth potential of the tree…
There are so many times when we are going through what seems like really rough times in our lives… we seem to be losing out on everything… we lament our losses, but is it that the power which is responsible for maintaining us is taking away (pruning) that which is no longer needed by us; that which is hampering our growth?
Think…
Lets have faith and accept the tough times as the pruning that we go through to emerge better!!!

My Daily Prayer

Love, health, happiness, prosperity, joy and success for everyone.
When people leave this plane, may they be closer to the higher power than when they had come to this plane.
If people are suffering for their karmic lessons, may they learn the lessons well and quickly. May they have the strength and sense of humour to go through these lessons.
If people are suffering due to human complexes and drama, then let them be open to healing from the higher power. Let them heal and have a great life.
May there be peace and joy everywhere. May everyone believe in the higher power in whatever way they want – religion, gurus, books, creative outlets, sports, singing … whatever and stay happy.
May the vibration of this plane become better and there be peace and joy!

Dead Animals vs Dead Plants

The other day I was out for my morning walk and I came across a dead rat in the middle of the path, and as you would expect, I went as far away from it as possible and tried not to breathe and crossed that portion. From the next day, though the dead rat was no longer there I have been avoiding stepping on to the same place and make that small detour. While keeping away from that portion, I was walking over some tree leaves and it suddenly occurred to me that while the rat was dead, so are the leaves of the tree. We have no qualms on walking on them… why? If there is a branch of a tree fallen, we just jump over it and some of us who are more creative, will see if the dried branch will make for an interesting landscape. The reaction for a lot of us would be the same even if you were to replace the dead rat with any other animal – frog, pigeon, sparrow, dog.

Why…

Its been on my mind … one reason very practically could be the fact that dead animal can lead to diseases, but that still does not answer that why I would avoid the area when the dead rat had been removed. Another explanation would come as the life force in different categories, but I guess, plants sustain so much life that it would be unfair to consider them any less…

Why…

Need some views

Geeta Saar - II

Another confusion which I had concerned the point which said “Atma na paida hoti hai, na marti hai” which is to say that soul is neither born nor it dies.

This led to a lot of confusion in my mind. Every being has a soul and in the last few years the number of human beings has increased multifold. If the above is true then there has to be increase in the number of souls. I will share the different thought process that I went through.

First, I thought, maybe some of the human beings just do not have the soul, but very soon found that the soul maybe at different stages of evolution but is there in all beings, and so the reason does not hold good.

Then, I started thinking that may be it’s the so called lower beings, as in animals, microbes, insects etc. which are evolving past their karma and coming as human beings. (In my mind when I saw people who were not very humane, this logic seemed to fit well  ). The only problem with this was that I was not able to find any conclusive evidence which could hold it to be true. We still have more than enough living beings, so though there is a possibility that some of the souls may be advancing from these stages, but it could not explain the increase.

The search continued…

I meanwhile started looking more deeply into the message of Geeta, which said that we are the image of the “INFINITE” which is the supreme power. I also looked at the concept of universe as a hologram. In a hologram, every part contains all the information as the whole. That had my mind racing, saying that if this world is a hologram, then possibly we human beings are that small parts of the supreme power but contain all the information as the whole, but to access that stage we need to be aligned in a particular way. Even to access all the information on holograms, you need to get it under a light with particular wavelength. That seems to work for us human beings too as a lot of people who have spiritual experience are in a different frequency and hence wavelength at that point.

If I were to take the same logic forward, then I found that each one of us is capable of being broken into small pieces and still hold the same information. Infinite divided into anything is infinite. Maybe the human beings are taking this route to sort out their karma, and thus it leads to more number of people or the supreme power just creates more as from the INFINITE you can take away anything and still stays infinite.

I am also exploring if the parallel universe may give me some answers, but this is where I am today on this.

Would love to hear other’s views as my search still continues…

Geeta Saar - I

In India, it is very normal to come across calendars and table tops which write down “Geeta Saar” (the essence of Geeta). This gives the opportunity to get introduced to this great philosophy in some ways. As a young child when I first read those, a few things just gave me ????QUESTIONS???? and a journey began.

One of my questions: “Karm kar aur phal ki chinta na kar” which is to say that you do your duties but do not worry about the result. This is one of the lines which is given in some of the geeta saar. It left me wondering that if I have to just focus on my duty alone without keeping the goal in mind, how effective will be that action?

To add to this confusion was that I had also read a story about Arjun exemplifying his powers of concentration. The story says that once Arjun’s teacher, Guru Dronacharya decided to test his students in their skill of archery. He hung a wooden bird from the branch of a tree and then summoned his students. He asked the first one to aim for the bird's eye but not shoot just yet. He then asked the student what the student could see. The student replied that he could see the garden, the tree, flowers, etc. Drona asked him to step aside and not shoot. He repeated the same process with a few other students. When it was Arjun's turn, Arjun told his Guru that the only thing he could see was the bird's eye. This satisfied the Guru and he allowed Arjun to shoot the bird. The lesson here is the power of focus.
From this story what I took away was that you need to focus on your goal to be able to achieve what you had set out for. Now, this story and Geeta saar – both of which have Arjun as an important character left me confused as it seemed to be saying contradictory things.
Over the years I seem to have understood that what these are saying is NOT contradictory. The first exemplifies the power of focus and the geeta saar actually helps in doing that. When you focus on action alone, you are not bothered by what the result of that action is going to be and your being is completely immersed in that action. What Arjun saw was the eye of the bird but not that he has hit the eye. He was not distracted by things in the vicinity of his goal and focused on how best to aim at the bird’s eye. If he would have been bothered by the result of his action, he would have started getting anxious about his success. That would have channelized his energy away from the task at hand and the possibility of failure would have increased. It’s a similar thing with all of us, when we start doing something, we focus on the work at hand but again the anxiety of failure keeps eating away our energy. The outcome is in the hands of the higher power but the action is the right and duty of all human beings. When Arjun shot the arrow, he still could have been a failure if suddenly the wind direction would have changed, but more importantly, he did whatever was in his power.
When we are taking care of a loved one, we do our best so that the person is nursed back to health, but that will happen only if the higher power wills it. If it is the end of life or suffering for that being, there is nothing that you can do. You can do only as much as is in your power and that is your “Karma” or action. At the end you need to feel that you have done whatever was possible and that is the “Karma”.

“Act of kindness followed by unhappiness and anger against the recipients”

We all have patterns in life and the first step to break that pattern is identification. Once you have identified your pattern, you have already taken the first step. Here we are discussing the pattern, when people care with love but expect the same and when not receiving commensurate response, get angry with the same people and hurt them.

Having identified the pattern, now there has to be a resolve to break that pattern.

The next step is to become aware and see whenever you are getting into that pattern and stop yourself.

Every time you are doing the “act of kindness”, pl step back and think, what are you wanting in return. That act should gratify you RIGHT THEN. You maybe are getting love, respect, importance, self-satisfaction, superiority by indulging in that act - AND THAT IS YOUR GRATIFICATION. You have to look at that act as a selfish act which is giving you that gratification. The moment you do that, your transaction will be over in that moment and there is nothing that you will look for in return for your action at a later date. If you think that gratification is not good enough then pl do not even go ahead with that “act of kindness”. Make every act an act of selfishness – not the way people understand it conventionally, but the way we discussed it.

There is this concept of Objectivism which was given by Ayn Rand, which apart from other things, also believes in rational self-interest. It says that you should act so as to maximize self-interest. This is not to be taken negatively as things like happiness, love, respect, self-importance and feeling of being useful – all need to be taken as gratification. This theory is useful if taken in this manner as it allows you to act without expectations and would lead to better relationships. More importantly as we discussed above you are not carrying baggage of your act to the next moment.