Business to the Buddha

Tag: Ego

  • How can I be liberated?







    The business of “I” is unique. We think that it relates to “me” but that the catch-22 situation. Whenever, I say this word “I” it reminds me of two consecutive chapters of The book of Mirdad. Mirdad is unique as his book, On one page he says – don’t use the word “I” it is forbidden word on the Noah’s ark; on the very next page he says “I” is the most creative word” (it is source and center of all things).

    When we say “I” it is largely the Ego talking, whereas when Mirdad says “I” (the creative word) it is the source of and frobuddhapixabaym the creator of the world. The question is – “Is ego ‘purpose of existence’ or a problem?”

    Here is what The Buddha told Sariputta on the same.

    ————————-

    Sariputta came to Buddha.

    He asked Buddha, “How can I be liberated?”

    Buddha said, “Do not come to me, go elsewhere – because I cannot liberate you, I can only liberate you from this ‘you’.”

    Buddha said further, “‘I’ is never liberated. One is liberated from the ‘I’. So if you are looking for your liberation, go somewhere else. But yes, if you want liberation from yourself, you have come to the right place. I will make you free from yourself. So do not ask how you will be liberated. You will not survive in your liberation. You should ask how to be free from this ‘I’ – how to be liberated from this ‘I’.”

    ————————-

    Liberated from what? If the “I” is dropped, the question ends, isn’t it!

    We can at most get attached to the actions we do, not the results. That is why I write about myself – “I’m passionate about my work and actions and empathetically careful, attached and committed to them.” Experts (read Lord Krishna) suggests do not even get attached to the actions! That is difficult, just imagine how difficult it is to detach from the “I”.

    Source – Osho, Finger Pointing To The Moon, Image source – Pixabay

  • Our Ego Vs the Universe!







    I have written on ego earlier, actually a couple of times. I received this video on Whatsapp found it interesting so thought to share it on my blog – The universe is so big and thankfully we know this now. Still we create our own world due to our ego – Size of the Universe

    The world we create around us Vs our size

    The source of this video is unknown to me currently.

  • Identity crisis







    A person wrote on his matrimony profile on defining a suitable match – “Preferably a doctor or an engineer…” Sounds funny isn’t it?

    I was talking about this topic with my wife and she had contention on the subject not on the content. I gave it another try – I told her, remember Golmaal old movie? In that movie Utpal Dutt has a perception – people with mustache are good in character. That is a way of creating a perception, an identity. Let me put more types of identities – say I identify myself as an Indian. You identify yourself as a CA or a Marwari or a born Bengali. These are all identities. What if one fine day morning we remove these identities of each individual? Would world be a better place? Perhaps yes. Let me give you an example –

    Say two people waking up in Gaza strip and Jerusalem on Monday morning – both of them identifying themselves as

    A – Muslim, inhabitant of Palestine, suppressed etcjust-be-597091_640

    B – Jew, Original inhabitants of Jerusalem etc

    If on a Monday morning A and B both only know that he/she is supposed to do xyz activity. Remember this activity is not killing the other. The activity is for survival and comfortable life perhaps peaceful and progressive life. Would there be a solution to Middle Eastern problem?

    Take another example – if followers of ISIS forget they are following the commandments written in Kuran! They get into the crisis of identifying themselves as someone who is fighting a holy war. Would we have a solution in Syria?

    In the context of religion, if every human being forgets that he / she is associated with a religion – though keeps on following the suggested practices – wouldn’t we have far lesser organized, religion based crimes in the world?

    In political sense the identification can be – he is a democrat and she is a republican. Should we define ourselves or others in these lines? Why should one be identified by such labels?

    Let me go a step further, what if we stop identifying ourselves from Nation A or Nation B, we just remain a nobody.

    The crisis are mostly created by the identities we have created around ourselves, isnt it? If we get rid of our identities wouldn’t that crisis be a good solution?

    At a very basic level, the identity could be – I am an engineer or you are from Vernacular medium of education. Yes these small things become identity and at times do or die reasons; recent example is Rohith Vemula. In India we identify people with their castes too. The other definitions are – I own a BMW, he has a Maruti 800 1998 model and that guy doesnt even have a car. I am rich, he is poor. On me this could be – com’on I write blogs! I have an identity on the internet. Isn’t it too shallow?

    We need to get rid of all these labels.

    Well, I had written the sentence “Preferably a doctor or an engineer…” on my matrimony profile. I had most serious discussions with an Arts graduate, I got married to a commerce graduate. That sentence I wrote because some or the other site made it mandatory to write partner preference, my full sentence was – “… There has to be understanding and matching of thoughts…” I wrote those two criteria because I after stretching enough I was not able to complete some word limit, I think 200 words!

  • Love







    Note – This blog was initially drafted on Oct 16th 2011 and was incomplete. The author thinks – however – that love is never incomplete.

    I have heard that “I” cease to exist in Meditation. I was thinking about it and heard a song on radio – Jane kyun log mohabbat kiya karte hai?… English translation of the title of the song is “I do not know why people fall in love?” ‘I don’t know’ is implied here. It’s a sad song from Bollywood Movie Mehboob ki mehndi staring Rajesh Khanna and Lina Chandavarkar as leads. I’ve heard this song umpteen number of times since childhood but I don’t remember watching this movie. No doubt Music by duo Laxmikant & Pyarelal is very good, lyrics from Anand Bakshi are to the point in many sense and Lata Mangeshkar cannot go wrong with single note ever. The song might fit in situations of many people’s life; therefore a very famous song of that time.

    These two things collided in mind – meditation & ceasing of ego, and love. The thoughts went in the direction love and analyzing the song. As a student of Hindi language I read different nature of love; but when I did image search on Google for LOVE, I saw either girl / boy or similar concept. Wonder what is the difference between lust and love in such search result. I searched on net for the Hindi lessons we learnt as student and found these 5 nature of love (read more here) –

    1. Santa-rati (reverence, neutral)Love Quotes
    2. Prita-rati (service)
    3. Preyo-rati (friendship)
    4. Vatsalya-rati (parental)
    5. Madhurya-rati (conjugal, sexual)

    What I learnt as student and what I get on Google made me think even further, for example check in the above quote image which I found randomly on Google Search. However good this quote sounds but there are points to ponder 1. we have “I” & 2. some result gets some importance! Love if it binds (forget blinds), makes one get attached to someone or something. This definition of love which binds or outcome becomes important is a problem. We have more ownership issues with love. Then whatever type of love – as mentioned above – that is a trouble. Love is an entanglement – a wonderful entanglement but an entanglement. Read more on entanglement here – Entanglement of an undergarment.

    I was thinking about the song (Jane kyun log mohabbat kiya karte hai?…) – and the way it represents the pain one goes through in love. At the same time, I was thinking about existence of ego – I.  I questioned myself – If the ego does not cease to exist in love, is it love? In a simple sentence “I love you”. I shows ego, you shows – you are separate from me. So, if both these words stay in the sentence is there any meaning of the word – LOVE?

    Than I remembered a quote from The book of Mirdad – (My blog on the same, The Book)

    ‘Less possessing – less possessed.
    More possessing – more possessed.
    More possessed – less accessed.
    Less possessed – more accessed.’

    Net net I thought – if love causes you to own someone / something, that is a problem and yes there is a relationship between Love and Mediation. Than I read this quote by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar “Love is not an emotion, it is your very existence.” If love is actually our existence, than I think “I” ceases to exist when someone is in true love, isn’t it?

    Image source – http://www.picturequotes.com/every-moment-spent-with-you-is-like-a-beautiful-dream-come-true-quote-16541

  • Styles of Tribute







    I was having some orange juice in a restaurant with a friend of mine. Suddenly his phone rang; he could not avoid that call. It was his wife on the other side. How can you ignore call from your boss? He picked up the phone and the voice on the other side was somewhat panicky. There is breaking news on Television that there was an earthquake in Nepal, I tried calling but the lines at our native place are jammed / busy.

    My friend reassured his wife. Don’t worry, I shall call, you cannot do anything sitting here and worrying. Whatever happened will happen. His reassurance was firm, I was surprised. The tremors were felt in Delhi and Kolkata as well. We finished our discussion, he went to his next engagement and I towards home. I called my sister, brother and my in-laws. Thankfully everyone was safe. However, this event touched me; two kinds of thoughts were running through my mind.

    Nepal Earthquake Tweet 1

    1. My friends response and
    2. Feeling the insignificance of human being.

    His response perfectly fits in the Reaction and response story. My friend must have felt for his family (in the UP border of Nepal), however he was completely measure. Perhaps he knew nothing is going to happen to his family or he has accepted that the earthquake has done its job. Now I have to decide how should I work on its aftermath?

    The feeling of insignificance is nothing new to me. I have written about the same earlier in my blogs Ego, Size of the Universe! and Ek Omkar Satnam. This time the feeling included another aspect, the terrorists and their stupidity.

    When the earth/universe wants to teach us our significance or if it wants to cut us to size only one natural calamity is enough. If that is not enough, there are stupid people killing each other in the name of their “mind game” called religion. Though at a later stage I heard, read and saw some pictures of tweets where religious preachers were preaching their religion rather. Surprised, yet when religion becomes bigger than humanity these sighting should not be startling.

    May the souls rest in peace. Wish Tributes are not met with nonsensical statements as few shown in the images here.

    A homage should be paid to the minds of those who write such comments at a time of grief of others.

    Nepal Earthquake Tweet 2 Nepal Earthquake Tweet 3

    PS – There should be lessons on compassion for such people.

  • Drop meets the ocean







    In 2006 I was new to Mumbai city, when I met Anisha. She was studying in 9th standard. My distant relative asked me to meet her and guide her for preparing for IIT-JEE (I’d prepared for JEE too). When I met her, I felt as if she has accepted the things the way they were. I scolded her for the lax attitude and said – “…this is the problem with Mumbaikars, they accept the things and are comfortable in traveling in crowded trains, getting pushed etc. Why you people get angry when outsiders come here and make good money? Outsiders are new and they may feel uncomfortable and they would want to have a car instead of traveling in crowded trains. I never catch train, because at times it hurts my ego!..”

    When I was new to Mumbai, I tried avoiding crowd, traffic and trains. The way people told me & what I observed – crowd and packed trains was actually amazing experience in itself. Well, over a period of time, I got used to traveling in local trains. Though mostly I traveled the opposite direction of traffic so that was not that painful to me.

    Recently, my wife joined her office. She had heard stories of packed trains as any new person hears in Mumbai. She was scared to travel. I had tried to help her travel in most comfortable trains – starting from our nearest station, early morning and first class etc. However, at the time of dropping her at station I realized this –

    Drop meeting OceanIn whatever circumstances when one becomes a part of the crowd and goes with the flow, he/she does not need to make way and things just happen naturally. One can get in the trains effortlessly and get out also effortlessly. This analogy is similar to drop meeting the ocean or drop become the ocean itself. An individual is drop and the crowd is ocean. A very spiritual connection I could make, however incorrect it may be in terms of example. When an individual becomes part of the bigger consciousness, he/she may leave his/her ego!

    I dont know what conspired (God knows inspired), Anisha has completed her Engineering and now pursuing her Masters from a good university in the US. She is becoming somebody not part of crowd (nobody).

    Image source – https://www.flickr.com/photos/alex_hill/4010380393/

  • Ek Omkar Satnam







    You know what? Whatever you are thinking is not your thought! This thought is the will of God. There is no FREE-WILL.

    when I thought about the last lines of Ek Omkar Satnam Gurbani I felt helpless. The last line means – “O Nanak, it is written that you shall obey the Hukam (order) of His Command, and walk in the Way of His Will.”

    Check some distorted meaning based video from the movie Rang De Basanti and read a better English translation of the Gurubani here.

    When I tried comprehending the meaning of Gurubani, I felt as if I am egoist. I questioned myself – then what am I doing? Why am I doing it? And why should anyone even have ambition or goals or anything? Is everything is what THE God wants me to think do and act? What is my CHOICE then? What if the thought and CHOICE is also implanted by HIM? Who am I? Am I a dead weight that should just flow with the river of life?

    Things get complicated when such questions come in mind. The mind doesn’t want to accept its “non-existence” and heart says that is right, who are you? [check the hearts reasoning universe and Two men in a room – Ego] Why do you go on and on, where do you want to go, where will you reach – remember it is a treadmill you are running to stay wherever you are. More your mind runs faster you will have to run. Just leave it to His WILL.

    Are you a swimmer? If you can not swim and kind of drown, the more you try to save yourself more you get into trouble. That is how the FREE WILL and HIS Will business seem to work. The harder your try miserably you fail.

    Today when I learnt the meaning of Ek Omkar Satnam, it made me realize that I am just “an insignificant nothing”, but the mind doesn’t accept it.

  • Size of the Universe!







    Once I was walking to office. I saw two carts in little distance, both had guava. One had fresh guava and other had relatively not so fresh once. I instantly thought what if these stale ones have insects and small creatures. A guava for those insects & small creatures must be the world in itself.

    I remembered I ate an apple yesterday, what if it too has such insects? Those insects were nothing in front of me, there must be many such insects within me right now! Few of them must be thinking – “I did this great stuff or that great stuff today” et al. Interesting, isn’t it? For me or you – well we do not even know they exist, forget about their ‘great’ actions.

    What if we are such small insects for someone! We are going across the galaxy and lo! this is another something small for someone. Someone who we don’t even know or imagine that he/she even exists!

    We look at the world with our own speck, yes we create our own world, unaware about small or huge ‘other’ around us!

    Related blogs –

    Ego

    Give up Dominion

  • Give up Dominion







    Just imagine, there are only humans on the planet earth! I think that was what happened to the Dinosaurs. Perhaps they started killing other dinosaurs just to capture more land – territory – for their survival. They tried to prove their superiority and eventually got over powered by the universe with some meteoroid. Whatever the reality of dinosaurs was, try to see if there seems to be an analogy.

    We humans are almost doing what dinosaurs did. They were the kings of the planet, they tried to capture as much land from other species as well as their own species e.g. other dinosaurs. We are one step ahead – we are eating in the mind-share also.

    Wikipedia definition of mind-share – When people think of examples of a product type or category, they usually think of a limited number of brands. The aim of mind share is to establish a brand as being one of the best kinds of a given product or service, and to even have the brand name become a synonym for the product or service offered. For example – in India Colgate is Toothpaste, Maggi is instant noodle more recent across the world, searching something on net is – Google it!

    The mind-share in larger terms happens to be in many forms – Forbes creates a list of most rich, powerful, etc etc list. Recently, Economic Times published a list of 100 most power CEOs (business people) of India. Product or service as example given above, religion creates another different type of mind-share. But effectively, the problem with this kind of mind-share is – a complex of superiority. My brand is better, my religion is better, my company is better and I am most powerful etc.

    Here is another short video from the movie Instinct staring Anthony Hopkins and Cuba Gooding Jr. This is in continuation of the previous blog – We the takers!

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGriwjHA8bM]

    Here, Dr Powell ( character of Hopkins) says something interesting (source – script) –

    …We have only one thing to give up – our dominion. We don’t own the world. We’re not kings here, not gods. Can we give that up?

    Too precious!

    all that control? Too tempting, being a god?

    Dominion - source- http://eremozoic.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/ego-eco.jpg

    Actually, at times I feel that physical ownership can be given and taken easily. You own land and sell it to someone else, now the owner is changed. Tougher is mental ownership. I am a born Hindu, for me Hinduism becomes most sacred religion because I was taught this. Think of a Muslim or Christan child he was taught the same. We fight more wars based on our religious belief rather than anything else. Though I am a born Hindu (actually a Lingayat who do not consider themselves as Hindus as such) but I think the method of giving up this dominion is Yoga, Meditation, Prayers (any religious prayer without superiority complex) or Service (check Sikhism & the Art of Living).

    Why I put Yoga first because Patanjali has said first few very important steps to get rid of this mind problem. Why I specifically put Sikhism and Art of Living because I have seen Sikhs that way (go to a Gurudwara – the richest would be serving) and I have been involved with few service projects of Art of Living.

    Thank you Vijay you made me watch Instinct.

    Related blogs –

    Illusion of control, Ego, Forbidden word, Evolution

    When will we stop?, What more we need?, Cogito ergo sum

    Dichotomy of happiness, Cause, What difference will it make?

    Image source – http://eremozoic.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/ego-eco.jpg

  • The circle, conflicts and avoiding conflicts







    Perform an experiment – a simple 2-minute experiment. Take a blank sheet of paper and a pen. At the center of the page, put a dot. What is it? A dot nothing else right? Now draw a big circle with the dot as the center of the circle. Now what is the dot? It is center of the circle, right? Everything on the page is around it “now”.

    The dot was nothing when there was no circular periphery. The dot was meaningless in itself. The periphery gave it a very powerful definition. It became the center of the existence e.g. the periphery. Now for a moment if you remove the dot (the center of the periphery), the periphery losses its definition. The periphery would not remain a circle without the dot “center”. This is interdependent co-arising in one sense for the center and the circle.

    Visualize the page you took is the universe and the dot represents you. We think that “I am” the center of the universe. This is the case with many of us – if not all. We are self centered. Everything is around me and everything should happen as per my desire. But there are more dots on the page with each one having its periphery, these periphery intersect which causes conflict. How to avoid the conflicts? I see there are three possible ways to avoid it –

    When I was searching for an image for this blog I found this image

    1. reduce the periphery such that only you remain in that periphery
    2. increase the periphery such that everything falls under it without intersection
    3. Make your periphery someone (only one) else with “full devotion”

    In Indian philosophical context first two could be path of meditation and third is path of devotion (Bhakti). Do you know any other? Please share.

    Image source – http://www.astronomyforum.net/blogs/astroval/106-where-center-universe.html

    A different perspective on dot – http://phataktejas.wordpress.com/2012/02/15/dot-hain-to-hot-hain/