We live in the 21st century India which is a mixture of new beliefs and thought processing systems and, the last bastion of traditional thinking and social behaviour. India has been a great example of studying changing behavioural and social patterns through generations for a now ex-sociology student. Even when I was studying the subject, I couldn't help but notice the changing landscape of my present generation and the following one.
Born into a family of working parents, they embraced solid values of both western and Indian values and; their belief systems. My father always made me wary about the "stretchable" nature as far time was concerned for us Indians. On the other hand, there was an abundance of teachings on the element of spirituality that my state had to offer. From the western side, I still remember him telling me "You know son, westerners are like leeches - they won't let go until they have reaped the outcome of their efforts" and entertainment was treated the way it should be - "entertainment". I grew up listening to English music and watching Hollywood movies. These were just forms of entertainment and not any form of attack on our culture which by the way makes me yell "Our current crop of hindi movies are doing an excellent job of it as the latter is concerned".
I think that the level of exposure that our current crop of kids are exposed to has created a cesspool of undefined belief systems - there are simply no boundaries nor transfer of knowledge to separate these systems. A few examples are in order,
1. Western eating habits are being included in our eating styles. Take a look around the streets you'll see grossly overweight people salivating in front of fast food restaurants. Not too mention the people inside! This is a prime example of a sense addiction - slave to taste. Now, people will talk about bad health when associating themselves with junk food, but forget the deeper meaning that lies within - being a slave to a sense
to one of the five senses, the other being sight, smell, touch and auditory systems.
Conversely, its anti-thesis would be eating clean foods and/or dieting in order to have a great/good body and be proud of it. That will be associated with having good health and cosmetic reasons, but then again overlooking the fact we are feeding our eyes now i.e. slave to sight.
2. Belief in god - Touchy subject I know and the most difficult subject to discuss on. If any parents do transfer spiritual and religious teachings to their kids, the most difficult part would be to explain to their children, "why believe in god". Many of them do it mechanically, which needless to explain wouldn't sustain in the long run. People give me blank faces the moment I put forward my points of view. But the ones who give the "why's" create a recurring cycle of validation in the minds of their children. There is no blind-sightedness and after a certain point of time it becomes inculcated in their psyche. Again, a yawning gap in our teaching systems. A good start would be to ask "who am I"?
On the other hand, its opposite would be to blindly follow whatever is handed in the scriptures. For examples, a notion that you belong to a certain caste based on your birth. Needless to say, a brahmin by birth may turn out to be a hypocrite while a sudra may attain moskhsa. A perfect analogy to this would be to ask - Does a woman become a mother just by giving birth to a child or earn that right by raising him/her?
3. What constitutes work/job? Somehow we have managed to separate our lives into professional and personal roles and forgotten the larger picture of the overall nature of the karma that we have to fulfill. For example, shouldn't we have the same commitment to our families and kids as our jobs. Or is it because we are aligned to our jobs for love of money, peer pressure and competition. Conversely, do we take care of our families cause we love them and/or we are attached to them emotionally and/or need and emotional support. Again all excellent examples of being slaves to our senses.
There can be a few more examples, but largely I wrote this some gaps that exist on our current society. After a small discourse from my brother, I guess fates are tied into our karma and its fruits. Maybe some people are destined to achieve something that others cannot. Realizing something that cannot be validated purely by scientific knowledge and logic is a great challenge and mystery. Maybe fate has some plans for this as well.
As I write this, I can't help think about a couple of lines of an Oriya song that I heard today - "We have come alone to this world and will leave alone as well".
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