Daily news, TV serial shows and movies

Most of these have a very large correlation with our daily emotional fluctuations and small correlation with what actually happens in our daily lives. I agree that this does help us connect with and converse with our colleagues, friends, relatives and even perfect strangers, but how many of us keep in mind the drops of emotional trauma that might one day lead to a flood in each of our lives? How many of us draw the line during these conversations - the line that divides banter and arguments, the line that divides conversation from confrontation, the line that divides our responsibility from someone else's?

Alas! There are very few who do, including me. I might be aware of this line every time I cross it, but I can hardly dream of achieving perfect control over my desire to toe it. This disaffects our happiness. This affects our psyche and consequently our health and quality of life. One can hardly think that banning the bringers and causative agents of these emotional spikes could be a practical solution. Of course, we even have no right to stifle these expressions of human emotions.

What is within our right and ability is to ban our reactions and exposure to these agents of trauma-drops.

Recognition

Just when I thought I was an excellent person, this occurred to me. People don't recognize you for what bad thing you did not do, but they recognize you for what good thing you did. Possibly only in rare cases do you find yourselves being recognized for not doing something bad, but even that needs you to take action because the sheep around you are telling you to do that bad thing.

Maybe being so silent doesn't work after all.

Oh, the pain!

The heart says one thing,
the mind says another.

Why can't I listen to one,
while happily ignoring the other?

Is this why I was born,
just to see myself being torn?

This pain is so unbearable,
catching you when most vulnerable.

I wish I could simply decide,
I wish I could otherwise hide.

But as long as I am here,
this I should always fear.

To do or not to do and
To be or not to be?

These I am trying to answer,
and I can not go any farther.

Pain and pleasure cycles and how to overcome them

I remember during my childhood when one of my classmates and I were arguing about the particular line-type to be used to demarcate one country from another on an international political map. According to the legend, the line-type for state boundaries was a thin dot-dash line, and the line-type for national boundaries was a thick dot-dash line. My classmate had failed to notice the difference in thickness of one type from the other and argued this way:

The line type for state boundaries is a dot-dash line that begins with a dot, and that for national boundaries is one that begins with a dash.

I didn't know how to respond to this, but I remember even until now how funny it sounded when he explained it. But upon very recent introspection, I found that I could have been just as easily mistaken about his argument too. He might have been drawing them that way (one beginning with a dot and one with a dash) but may be I missed to notice the difference in thicknesses of his lines.

This misunderstanding has been very useful to me because it helped me understand how the human mind interprets repetitive cycles.

Let's come to the pain-pleasure cycles in life. It can not be argued that they are inevitable even though in your life they might be controlled to make a straight line without any ups and downs. Maybe you are a yogi. So, given that the most miserable person in the world, the happiest person in the world and a yogi have these cycles in their lives, we question, "What is it that differentiates one from another one of them?"

Here is my answer: The miserable person is on the dash of the cycle. The happy person is on the dot of the cycle. The yogi, because he is enlightened, separated himself from the cycle because he had understood long ago that the cycle is not a part of reality. The miserable person will next be on the dot and the happy person will next be on the dash. What changed? Just the moment of our observation. Note that our labels "miserable" and "happy" themselves are given based on where the person is on the cycle. The yogi realizes the circularity of this labeling method, and transcends the limitations of language. Thus he separates himself from the cycle and is at equilibrium with the world.

The Trinity of human groups

After lots of thinking, I came up with a model to explain whatever people as groups do to each other, whether or not they are aware of their collective consequences.

I define three entities: the Ruled, the Ruling and the Unruled entities. Remember that these are ever-changing. (Nilekani moved from the Unruled to the Ruling entity.)

Most people like jailed criminals, taxpayers, children, servants, government employees, the army, navy and airforce and many more which I am sure I missed fall into the Ruled category. This entity is where everybody's self lies. Whenever an individual is by himself, irrespective of his actual entity (the Ruled, the Ruling or the Unruled entity), his mental self falls into the Ruled entity. When he cannot clearly identify a particular entity to associate with, God becomes the unity of the three entities and the individual recognizes his self as part of all these three entities. But let us not get into individual spirituality during a discussion about collective human interactions.

The Ruling category is the one that people tend to think about whenever they openly discuss their collective problems and hold the entity responsible. They are the one who have to solve their problems. One should never forget that one rule does not govern all sections of people and no rule is universal or ever-lasting. Rules are ever-changing with time and space. The Legal authority falls into the Ruling entity.

Interestingly, the Unruled entity of human collection is where the most change and exciting action takes place. This is what should be truly held responsible from within, but alas, it is not the case so often. Otherwise, what would be the fun in social life? Anyway, the Unruled entity is comprised of groups like the drug market, the entire sales/corporate market, civilian entertainment, social reformers and crazy people, newspapers and media, agents of change and awareness like leaders and ghosts of fame past, unrestrained criminals, etc. Ideally, this is what people should listen to and hold responsible directly, but with collective self-restraint. But as per my observation, most "holding responsible" happens not directly between the Ruled and the Unruled, but almost always through the Ruling entity. The flipside to the Unruled entity is that enormous sacrifice is needed on the part of the Unruled, whether it is before or after they face the consequences of their actions.

This collective interactions give rise to a need for a common language, culture and normality. What one should particularly note is that the individual understanding of what is "normal" arises from these collective interactions.

Mind, concept and application

One should apply the mind to the concept. If he applies the concept to the mind, the concept will remain unchanged and the mind will rot. But if he applies the mind to the concept, amazing and fruitful results will be obtained. There lies the power of the mind. Here, the mind is the tool, not the object. (However, if you are practising raja-yoga, the mind becomes the tool and the object. That is not relevant here.)

Let's take an example. If you have an immersible water heater and a bucket of water, you would be ill-advised to pour the water over the heater, wouldn't you? The water will not only remain unheated, but the heater will be damaged (Your circuit-breaker might trip, too!). If you want to use the heater properly, put it carefully in the water and you will get what you want or need.