Humanitarianism and cosmopolitan outlook

Thankless ungrateful attitude, sometimes even betrayal.

This makes one wonder what​​ use is all the philosophies which are sprinkled in every realm about the 'values' based on moral high ground? 

We take everything for granted but when granted and get it we brush it off as our entitlement and act as if we are doing a favor for being available to receive the bounties. This is there everywhere on one side and on the other side some act as privileged lord's who can throw their weight around by any means and get things done.

There are no basic human gestures of gratitude and appreciation , even if there is no recognition. 

We have developed a collective national psychology of criticizing and questioning everything except our own attitudes and contributions.

We don't value many simple and humane things which are more vital for cohabitation rather than elaborate rituals. I know people may get offended when I say this. I say it purposely, because Indians don't take care of the elders in their own family but will do all sorts of fanfare for funerals and post funeral rituals for years on and give lengthy discourse on that, this happens in most regions of many religions in India.

We can claim to be better evolved citizens only when we respect scientific approaches, exhibit rational attitude, manifest humanitarianism and adopt a cosmopolitan outlook which respects everyone's talents, time and trade-offs which cannot be compromised and taken for granted.

Values

Validation and Wisdom

Can we have validation beyond and besides Oriental, Occidental, incidental or accidental values? Can such a validation lead to real wisdom? And what is wisdom?

Every word, every language, every ism, every idea , every validation has gone through a sea change and the only thing we can see is 'change'.

“We live in a changing universe, and few things are changing faster than our conception of it”-Timothy Ferris

Any method of validation must be geared towards a world which offers peace and a conducive atmosphere for unity based on real understanding of the need for cohabitation on this planet of all species and elements of nature.

So, any validation must be fundamentally humanitarian in principle [ so that humane values are prioritized over any ideology or regional or tradition or trend based moralistic strictures], environment friendly in approach  [ for the sake of leaving a livable planet for posterity] and global in perspective [ for the sake of universal applicability wherever or whoever wants to adopt it].

My intention is not to sound over philosophical and dampen any sincere and scholarly attempt by anyone but it is only to ensure that one set of validation to replace another set of validation may not serve any purpose in the long run as it may even inadvertently  generating competitive merits and demerits debates and claims of  complexes etc.

So, any  validation which attempts to attract a greater number of  people , especially youth must factor in many aspects, some of which have been indicated below.

Though , at the outset, we all must accept that there cannot be a please all and fix all [problems ] validation.

In short there is no panacea for all human problems.

Still, it is worth evolving synergetic proposals when we think of validation keeping intact the sensitivities, acceptability  adoptability and the happiness of  as many as possible.

Let us journey through the many aspects to be factored in  and also see why it is necessary to take such a journey?

No event in history in any part of the world, no issue in any socio-political system, no invention in any branch of science, no idea in any philosophical system, no scripture in any religion, no art or literature depicting any cultural or regional traditional flavors, no economic activity impacting human life , no study of  human emotional or psychological  reactions, no geological or ecological changes have happened without some purpose and therefore, it would be wrong to study or evaluate any of them without or out of  context.

Everything, everyone in every domain have  contributed through evolutionary process to the present state of  life as it is.

Therefore, it is no wonder that  from time immemorial these domains namely religions, science, social systems, arts, literature, history, trade [economics],human psychology, geological wealth etc have dominated the arena of discourse and developed technologies too to suit or make optimum utilization of these aspects of human life and mathematics  chipped in to help us decipher the patterns and also project the probable growth trajectory of all these activities.

In a way, most of these domains indicated above form part of every life to some extent ,of course,  with different manifestations and varying degrees of intensities and relative importance, but, all of them are in some way interconnected, interdependent and are interrelated.

Therefore, any meaningful system of validation cannot  sustain if it fails to factor in at least a superficial macro perspective of  all the above vital aspects.

My oft repeated favorite quotes ;-

"The spirit of Advaita is not to keep away from anything, but to keep in tune with everything." -  Swami Chinmayananda

 “In the end nothing less than the whole of everything can be the truth of anything at all”- William James

So, it goes without saying that no specific/particular  approach of  validation can claim greater or superior standing if it restricts itself  to any exclusive ideological identity [however lofty , good and great it may be ] or any constraining cocoon of  confirmation bias based regional, religious or national fervent doctrinal designs.  

After all, we all PICK what we want, what we can and what we are destined to.

We need  a sound  PHILOSOPHICAL approach which creates  synergy  than  seclusion be it termed as Oriental, Occidental, or incidental or accidental .

We can have any categorization and classification for intellectual and academic reference but human life requires a validation that may have wind through all of them and  transcend all that .

We PICK any or every word in any language to define what we perceive, want to project or promote or protect.

Words and languages are some of the tools and techniques used as the frames of references to record and communicate what we manage to understand to posterity.

PICK refers to

Perspectives,

Interpretations,

Contexts and connotations,

Kindles in us-what a word kindles in us.

Everything has its relevance and appeal to different souls at various levels.

That's why we cannot deny or defy the importance of anything or anyone.

No over simplifications or sweeping generalizations.

This has produced statements and literatures like religion without god, philosophy without religion, spirituality without philosophy, two days back TOI central page article God the real liability for spirituality.

Everyone of these statements or articles or books may make good sense too, but then, intellectualization of ( intellectual approach) of everything may not be grasped by everyone and that may be a crude way to exclude some souls from the ambit of enjoying certain aspects of life.

There are many things which may elude any human intellectual approach but may reveal the splendor of life in all its dimensions and dynamics.

 Besides PHILOSOPHY in brief may be defined as below

Provides prompts and perspectives to perceive life ;

Helps understand hidden aspects of life ;

Interprets intrinsic values, inner meanings and inquires into everything;

Lays out ideas to decipher life’s meanings ;

Offers operation manual for many options for open minded people;

Synergizes scientific methods and sensitivities;

Optimizes our sense of interrelatedness and interdependence;

Promotes broader perceptions beyond parochial frames of reference;

Hitches our life beyond many types of identity cages;

Yokes together our passion and compassion to observe dispassionately,

                                                  and to probe into many things in depth.

Every identity that is dear to those who live it and love it and generates lot of  pride and passion that produce great outputs in many fields.

However, such identity must not act as a protective shield to seclude one from appreciating, accepting and assimilating other identities.

  

 “Evolution itself is an open ended and indeterminate process”… “Given the remarkable progress in our understanding of biochemistry, molecular biology, and evolution as a whole … we have failed to develop concepts, ideas, even a language that could capture the dance of this life” - Guy Murchie

We may extrapolate to many other domains the following statement that is made in the context of why human beings give importance to religion.

“Humans have a need for a stable frame of reference. Religion apparently fills this need. In effect, humans crave answers to questions that no other source of knowledge has an answer to, which only religion may seem to answer. However, a sense of free will must be given in order for religion to appear healthy. An authoritarian notion of religion appears detrimental.”- Erich Fromm,

While the music of life produces melodies out of what one likes and loves; the harmony of  living requires many such different melodies.

Real values of life must value life in its totality devoid of any extraneous identity is that possible?

Each life i.e. my life, your life and the lives of all great saints are really speaking very insignificant transient events of a few years-mostly less than 100 in flesh and blood with conscious awareness- compared to LIFE as a whole which has happened some four million years before and may continue for another few millions years hence in various forms, shapes in multiple species expressing its own attributes some of which we have understood, some we are not even aware of.

In fact the whole of Bhagawad Gita, one of the reasons why it became more popular among the 28 Gitas, is that all its 700 stanzas are sand- witched between two words the starting word 'Dharma' and the last word ‘Mama’.

It must be actually read as ‘Mama Dharma’= my dharma- does not mean either Krishna’s or Arjuna’s Dharma, rather  when everyone reads it becomes ‘his Dhrama’ and all these 700 verses [ subjected to all sorts of excellent, enlightening as well as, often used as tool to justifying traditional practices, explanations by many] primarily are about attitudes to be adopted, actions to be executed and reactions to show at different situations taking into consideration the overall welfare of all [humanism].

This manual is more about balancing the intellect and emotions and most importantly through both emotions and intellect, or to be precise in short it talks about the dynamics of synthesis of human nature and nature of Truth [ define as you may- it is the inevitable and intellectual perception and sometimes all logic eluding factor].

Life is all about movements, actions and reactions which broadly could be defined as i.e. Karma but then the Laws [Dharma ] of motions [Karma] of life are very important and therefore prioritized.

But real universal wisdom in my humble opinion may be like this whether sanctioned or sanctified by either social mores or religious morality.

Wisdom is the work shop where works of evolutionary trends and experiences of everyone in it emerge to express wisely the essence of everything to enlighten everyone;

A wisdom which prioritizes living in the present context and along with practicing certain time tested values which have relevance in present context but with global perspective to bequeath a liveable planet, a lovable society with lovely infrastructures and improved living conditions;

A wisdom that evaluates everything and everyone with contextual relevance and based on the inherent attributes or merits of what or who is being evaluated without extrapolating any  presumptions, opinions, judgments, perceptions, expectations, ideologies, doctrines, identity based ideology and so on;

A wisdom which is willing to make minor adjustments, small compromises, spontaneous cooperation to create compatible and conducive atmosphere with humility devoid of any egocentric pride;

A wisdom with the realization and a perspective that must be aware that life is a constant process of learning of the multiple dimensions of many things and the various dynamics of those dimensions involving the constant interaction and interrelationship with everyone and everything.

A wisdom that is willing to accommodate multiple methods or means of life with some overall tolerant attitude embedded on humanitarian concerns towards all human life and environmental or natural concern towards all other species.

A wisdom that gets its clarity of understanding through a churning process that takes into consideration several aspects from the practical to the philosophical to the all fantasies of the mind.

Values, Strategy and Culture

Let us stop marketing the craps through certain terminologies and spoil the actual significance of those terminologies.

In this context terms like values, culture, nature versus nurture and so on.

Except in certain spheres like basic social life connected principles, in every other sphere, values like morals are relative and context specific.

Anyone who is not willing to delegate power, authority and freedom to the talented under any guise or excuse cannot talk about values because that very attitude smacks of lack of trust in others and insecurity to oneself arising out of that which is a valueless activity.

If we observe, some recent events we can know why?

Actually talent spotting and allowing such talent space, time, opportunity and freedom to blossom bring huge dividends to whichever domain wherein such an activity happens.

For example Grahame Smith of South Africa made his debut as captain; Dhoni was handed the captaincy when all great seniors were in the team; See how RSS spotted MODI and opted to make him PM candidate instead of much talked about other 5 to 6 names and see the dividends in all these cases that such talents have brought to the domain.

So, all tall talk of values by people who cannot respect domain specific talent and capabilities, and provide such talent a free environment to blossom for the benefit of all is absolute hypocrisy.

In every sphere whoever the person may be, a lot depends on how that person relates to issues, with others, to new ideas, to emerging trends, to crisis, to competitions, to a wide array of suggestions for the betterment of the sphere of activity etc.

After all every aspect of life is a team work. Everyone must know where their responsibility starts and where their role stops.

In every relationship starting from being a member of a family to being a member of a society to leading a corporate set up or a political party or a nation, everyone has to encounter a hoard of compatibility issues and rarely can even any two persons, worse still many persons, be expected to perfectly fit into all the compatibility parameters operating at same frequency with same degree[s] of intensity.

That’s why learning and adjusting are the never ending lessons of live.

In other words any tradeoff-be it time, trust and toil or power, pelf and position must ensure concomitant mileage to the corporation.

What is culture? And what is corporate culture especially when it is an MNC?

In MNC world you can only define corporate culture which, in over simplistic or very general terms, involves multiple compliances dealing with multiple laws with the help of professionals; satisfying clients; keeping employee/staff morale and happiness in tact; take into confidence all investors, share holders and other stake holders; not causing any anti-social or anti-national activity; not showing undue favoritism to any outsider and so on.

It is not episodes of nature versus nurture but epileptic bouts resulting from bursting selfishness of the inflated egos of Indian business promoters.

These could .....

Values

Correct Values Vs Bad Chemistry.

Hats off to you Manjul Bhargava.  Correct  Values Vs Bad Chemistry.

The main mantra is we can neither deny nor defy the importance of anything or anyone.

Life is too vast and complex with some mysteries still unexplained and unraveled.

Life in short is an unsolved jigsaw puzzle with several pieces constantly evolving to fit in appropriate slots.

The process involves constant churning , continuous learning and adjustment.

To quote JK, “There is no end to education. It is not that you read a book, pass an examination, and finish with education.

The whole of life, from the moment you are born to the moment you die, is a process of learning”.

This holds true almost in all spheres of life.

Media which prefers and projects selectively some controversies to the front page, as expected pushed to some inner page corner a very candid interview of a person with great clarity and simple and straight forward observations.

I wish all to read his interview which rightly infects us with positive vibration amid a world of mourning philosophers, unloving critics, fault finding fanatics.

More than anything else it reflects good attitude, concomitant perspective leading to better perception and proper evaluation.

This is real education with correct synergistic vibrations of inner response to external events.

Need to study gamut of education, at least look at its various dimensions, utilities, relevance, contributions to humanity etc and which inevitable various options/methods/means of learning conferences are one such important event  which can throw up lot of positives.

Good education must not to allow verbal labels to distort proper observation and unbiased understanding.

विद्या ददाति विनयं विनयाद्याति पात्रताम् ।

पात्रत्वाद्धनमाप्नोति धनाद्धर्मं ततः सुखम् ॥ ५ ॥

vidyA dadAti vinayaM, vinayAdyAti pAtratAM |
pAtratvAddhanamApnoti, dhanAddharmaM tataH sukhaM || 5 ||

(true/complete) knowledge gives discipline[humility], from discipline [humility] comes worthiness, from worthiness one gets wealth, from wealth (one does) good deeds, from that (comes) joy.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Need-focus-on-science-Manjul/articleshow/50476403.cms

values and liberty

Key values like liberty

1. Read History for a United World by a great historian called Dance. He writes very clearly that originally the word ‘liberty’ and ‘liberal’ meant 'special privilege' and it was mostly used ‘exclusively for the aristocrats and nobles’ in olden days.

[ Incidentally he was one of those historians who wrote very great about India in a small book] So the word ‘liberty’ must have been something like our present day Indian usage of ‘secularism’ or ‘masala’.

2. Semantics of any word is again to be applied or understood with regard to contextual relevance. I am giving certain links in order not to unnecessarily repeat them.

3. I was extremely pleased when MODI said at UN ‘first we must define what ‘terrorism’ is? If we cannot define how can we fight it?”

4. All words especially abstract ones acquire too many connotations and the onus is on the user to use appropriate sieves and filter.

5. How you define 'key values'

6. If it is ‘key’ then what it is going to unlock?

7. Who manufactures the keys and with what?

8. Just now I finished posting to a group of lawyers the following in my FB.

9. But we must remember one thing whomsoever we are debating about or suggesting something to or criticizing, whether be it a scientist, artist, lawyer, teacher ,politician or  judge  they are basically human beings- which means a biochemical entity called as our physical body, but slightly evolved than other species because we as social creatures are expected to function by using, in addition to our basic physical urges, our psychological perceptions and intellectual capacities which influence/influenced by and impact/impacted by many factors some of which are acquired by us by conscious choice some through our socio -cultural environs;

Some get into our system unconsciously through various means and all these shape/shaped by our beliefs, prejudices, attitudes, reactions etc.

10. Above all these as a species we have the extraordinary advantage of conscious awareness to recollect what we remember and what are all documented for our reference, so we need not use lot of energy trying to redo or rethink or try anew many things.

11. So, all these as a combo makes every human being in any position susceptible to certain vulnerabilities, the variation is only in degrees.

12. It is so complex that we may mistake contentions and pretensions for intentions.

13. Science has developed tools to even follow what we are thinking but not what our intentions are.

14. We must remember therefore that judges too are after all human beings.

However, there are certain set norms and natural humanitarian attitudes which everyone is expected to exhibit, more so people who are entrusted with certain higher responsibilities.

15. Emphasis must be more on impregnating the self with values rather than merely appropriating labels and assigning motives superficially.

16. That's why the sages and saints made whatever was good for the individual and society as part of life.

17. Because anything that is part of life expresses itself in specific context with contextual relevance.

18. For example any thirsty man knocks at your door and asks for water you will give it as a spontaneous reaction. http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2015/07/concretizing-concepts-of-value-based.html

19. We need a composed mind, I wrote this for a debate started by a group of clinical psychiatrists who are now counseling students and corporate clients http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2015/09/composed-mind-is-all-about-balance.html

20. Some days back I tweeted the following to the well known writer Pritish Nandy for his tweet

"Our national weaknesses: - deifying or denying; showing unloving criticism & uncritical love and emotionalizing everything”.

21. Ultimately debates and reactions do not get things done they just spill and spit more ideas, words and emotions, some of which are good, useful and entertaining sometimes but not always.

22. We must go about doing what we want , what we can and of course what we are destined to without hurting anyone or at least those who matter to us and not bothering too much about advises from anyone or any source if it defies logic, reason and humanitarianism.

23.  Tolerance

          http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2010/12/tolerance-tolerance-is-not-that-easily.html

24.  If at all there is an impulse to take any advice remember this

                 " George Bernard Shaw is reported to have said

          "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world.
             The unreasonable man adapts the world to himself.

             All progress depends upon the unreasonable man”

25. Ajathi Vada will  provide more answers than any science or scripture. “Ajathi Vada is based out and out on incisive logic and unbiased Self-inquiry (i.e. you have   to examine your own mind and belief systems in order to arrive at the final answer). Ajati vada is spelt out in his Karika on Mandukya Upanishad. The subtle and the Ultimate kernel of all Upanishadic teachings is this Ajativada only. This is the final message of Sage Vasishta in the 32,000 sloka strong Yogavaasishta as well.

26. Ramana Maharshi, Nisargasdatta Maharaj, J Krishanmurti, Atmananda Krishna Menon, Jillellamudi Amma, Mata Amritananda Mayi, a host of other teachers of Non-duality speak of Ajativada.

 Ajati vada means "Nothing is ever born!!!" by sri Ramesam the author of                                       http://beyond-advaita.blogspot.in/