New Writing

As long as there is this dishonesty prevailing in our hearts, conflict will grow like bacteria in every corner.

Are we REALLY trying striving for better health?

To place my point on the table I ask these three questions (oh I have many but these three will give you an idea )

- Why are liquid poison based mosquito killers being promoted as "safe" for children?...Dont tell me the companies are not aware that the poison used even in highly diluted form is dangerous. And will affect the children's lungs quite badly. If it can kill; a mosquito it cant be safe but we allow wide publicity and everyone laps it up without a second thought and no one speaks against it. I would have thought the doctors would be the first ones to speak up. - Why is alcohol so fashionable? We even allow it to overtake our lives.Why is Chawanprash, a commonly and largely promoted medical item along with achar of all kinds -- used by a very big population are packed in cheap plastic bottles? It is well known that acidic products are not safe in plastic. The medical experts running these companies don't know it or what? - Why is the average human so careless of what he eats and on general knowledge about health matters? Because he does not really care. Indulging in what pleases him is what humans want. People don't go to hospitals for "health", they go there for REPAIR and when out from there go back to their indulgent ways. (like their car goes to the garage for repair) Health was never the important issue.

Dont fall for that "I am doing my best" thing. The latent nature of humans is LAZY. The best comes out only under great pressure. And in this misguided world of making life comfortable to make everybody happy we have destroyed all motivation to even "do". Leave alone - do our best.

PK:

One of the biggest illusions is what the human have started calling love between the sexes. To me this looks like a deliberate attempt to fool oneself. Why is this called love? Then what is this love for a flower, the love of sitting in the sun and loving chocolate or sitting by the sea? Do we really love a person? I don't think so. We love the attention and exclusive appreciation we get and this makes us go weak at the knees. But the truth is that no one opens up to another and we rarely know anyone. Love in this measure is an arrangement.

Why can I love one woman and no one else and not many women at the same time?

We are mixing up our social morals with our psychology. For social order, we advise monogamy and for life. But it has really not much basis in psychology.

There is a temporary attraction and then the relationship slips into a friendly twosome. But forcing the mind to accept that this the love of a lifetime is like causing trauma! On the other hand philosophers advocate living in the present because this is the only moment we really have. So where is the truth?

Siddhi Temple

You raise an interesting distinction between attraction, attachment, social convention, and what we call love. I agree that much of what we label as love is often an arrangement built around psychological needs, identity, and mutual reinforcement.

Where I'd add a nuance is that I don't think the problem is love itself. It's that we rarely meet another person directly. We mostly relate to our ideas, expectations, memories, and projections about them. When those collapse, we often conclude that love has disappeared, when in fact what disappeared was the fantasy.

From my perspective, genuine love isn't exclusive because of fear or social conditioning. It's exclusive only as a practical expression of a particular relationship. The quality of love itself is not diminished by loving others, a flower, the river, or the sun. It's the same openness expressing itself in different forms.

For me, the real question isn't, "Can love last a lifetime?" but "Can I keep seeing this person freshly, instead of through the accumulation of yesterday?" That feels much closer to what my reel was pointing toward.

P. K. Maheshwari

Yes indeed. To add to the discussion - it depends on the mental plane one is. Most of our humanity is living purely on the "physical" plane which means that they see life from a very low ground level. A small number of limited thought patterns run their lives. The basic needs of the body are first to be met. Then comes pride and the ego need to be satisfied. There is very little creative or constructive thinking behind their actions. Their lives are like spring loaded toys that once launched just go on and on till it ends; purely routine in character. The quality of life depending purely on the level of kindness they have evolved into.

These people as I am wont to say, are designed to serve people like you and me so that we can continue with our work keeping the divine connection with the earth alive. But I may add to the distinction that real love even at the human level is possible when the "psychic" being has come forward in a person. Where soul meets soul and they recognize each other and decide that being together is conducive to each other's welfare, including the work they are required to do on earth. Here the relationship is permanent as it is coming from way back in previous lives and continues in the future. The people living at the purely physical level do not understand these relationships and get upset and worried that they may lose control on their partner and it becomes a source of most quarrels we see on earth.

I have yet to meet an Indian in general who listens at all. Here we are all in the TELLING mode. For one thing listening means doing the bidding of others and we dont even wish to do what we want to do. Our telling is also a kind of smoke screen to manage social life without seeming too selfish

The only people who ever listened to me were in the Ashram and mostly foreigners.

Credit has to be given where due. The foreigners who have come to India, specially to partake in life here have come so because they have seen and understood the limits of the physical plane and the wrong habits of humans and what it is doing to life. From where they are they appreciate the candour of India but the Indians themselves are children. There is no applied physics and psychology in their lives. But we have a disorganised free for for all life which is fun in many ways. But unfortunately, no real spiritual growth and growth even at the pragmatic level is anathema to the child's mind.

Starting in the uneducated village culture, to farmers and the labor class or into the richer class as you say the mental vibes are the same.

A general trend of mental arrogance that..... "what I have seen and known is the ultimate".... as older people will say - oh I have seen the world!

Our people from the poorest to richest class refuse to take instructions - this is a huge weakness in our psyche; and worse they insist on doing it their way because they "KNOW". And given a chance to speak they run with their tongues. Every single Indian I meet is an expert on how things cannot be done. They always have a few dozen excuses and reasons up their sleeve.

How do I know? I am a teacher, so I have dealt with students and parents, as an interior designer and product developer I deal with every kind of professional from the carpenter to the rich trader. Before they know what is to be done they start telling me what should be done. And every time I have to lay down the law like: "It is my work, it has to be done my way if you want my money and pl dont waste my time arguing." And then I become the ogre that no self-respecting man can work under.

The old people, be it the old man on the cot outside his hut in the village or someone here in the city with an income of more than 100k a month, the adult simply cannot keep him or herself from trying to overtake your life.

This an Indian habit that comes from our general family style of : "the head of the family, the Karta" will decide! No body else has a say! It becomes a habit that continues from generation to generation as a subconscious pattern.

Since a long time, I have been speaking pointedly about what I see as the THE NEXT STEP humanity has to take in its evolutionary development. This epistle of yours has wonderfully brought out what the ego means and is doing in and to our lives. This what needs to be attended to. This is the next step and asks for all our attention. This is the prescribed "sadhana" for now.

Nobody tells the people that a few seconds of consideration, steeping back - "recul"(french), and not listening to the ego's hurt pride asking us to go to war, is all that the Universe is asking and it will then open the gates of heaven. Most vehementally refuse to accept that it is happening in them.

I am totally against the long lectures that you see people giving on higher consciousness, on Brahma & Vishnu and how we need to pay attention to lessons in Gita, Bible and Dhammapada etc and details of the working of God, How the Universe was made and such useless subjects - all basically pointing to the arrow that we need to appreciate the wisdom and knowledge of the speaker on this Cosmos/Brahmanand and follow him and make his life easier by donations.

Siddhi's post

It's embarrassing how quickly I can turn a tiny, insignificant moment into a full battlefield in my head..

with myself as the primary victim.

I used to think living in an ashram meant I'd miraculously outgrow my own pettiness. But frustration doesn't just evaporate because you're sitting in a quiet room.

Misunderstandings happen. An expectation falls through, someone speaks in a slightly off tone, and within three seconds, my mind is off to the races.

It's a brilliant little maneuver. The second discomfort lands, my ego frantically scans the room for someone to pin it on. If only they had communicated better. If only things were managed properly. If only people weren't so insincere.

It is infinitely easier to point a finger than to sit with the embarrassing, uncomfortable truth: I am angry, and I am choosing to burn myself on it.

The ego doesn't actually want peace. It wants to be right. It wants to build a neat little fortress around its bruised feelings and defend it to the death.

I catch myself in this loop constantly. The sudden tightness in the chest, the sharp impulse to draft a clever retort, the itch to explain why I'm justified. For a long time, I thought spiritual practice meant erasing those ugly, human reactions entirely---turning into some serene, unshakeable person who never feels the sting.

That's a fantasy.

The actual work is just catching the reaction mid-air, before I decide to build an entire identity around it.

The moment I can just look at the irritation without jumping inside it, something breathes again. Nothing outside shifted. The noise is still there. The misunderstanding is still sitting on the table. But I'm no longer inside the fire.

Real transformation is uncomfortable because it strips away your favorite excuses. It forces you to see that nobody else is actually holding the remote control to your internal climate.

Peace isn't some holy state where the world finally decides to behave itself. It's just the quiet that happens when you finally stop arguing with what is already standing right in front of you.

John Shoji Sorensen

Hum. I find it quite interesting when many monastics often seem to believe they have a handle on themselves being less culpable to delusion that others.

P. K. Maheshwari

In the isolated life of monasteries it is easy to think we have arrived with nothing to challenge our assumptions about ourselves like we would face in the brutality of city life.

Another factor is the simplicity and impoverished living imposed by the monasteries and monkhood, one may think that attachment and desire have been removed but this is not true. "Real spiritual emancipation and speedy progress is made in full social life of cities IF one is totally SINCERE and single minded in one's pursuit.

.....

At what point does helping others stop being service and become an addiction?

P. K. Maheshwari

Very soon.

specially if we are getting praise for it

India has been promoting, low quality in manufacturing, illegal activities, uneducated and goonda leaders, cheating at every level, low educational standards and such from the beginning. The easy option way out thru bribing. The entire government employee network is totally insincere and for sale as is basically every Indian. We blame the Government for the cheating in exams BUT IT IS US who are doing the cheating and parents paying for it. This in every field and line of work. Medicines, Food supply, Manufacturing. For instance the tailor ruining a dress worth thousands by using cheap thread.

Indian will become great when we adopt the MERIT mindset.

Till then this is how it will be.

Quo Vadis Education.

I speak with the wisdom gained by starting to teach French to College students in 1967. Then later Higher Cambridge students. Later running the French Academy as a correspondence institution in which I introduced learning thru cassettes for the first time in India. By 1980 the continued interference politically was making a mess of school education and by including B.Ed. as requirement the whole thing took a mafia hit and high school certificates became a commodity to acquire by cash/crook. Education became secondary. The quality of graduates coming out and the quality of teachers started going south incrementally.

I opted out into international business Liaison and left education behind.

One thing I noticed that our Indian friends cannot relate easily outside their circle, cannot talk or interact/ communicate. They are not even interested in the big wide world. When others talk they do not understand. When they talk we do not understand. Their writing is not understood and they do not understand our writings. This puts them at a serious disadvantage but they expect to be accepted because they "think" they are ready to take on the world.

Anyway all said and done we are at a point that this paper chase of certificates will become redundant. It will be back to the early 20th Century standards - YOU KNOW, Have SKILLS or you are out. Formal Commercialised Education has become disaster-prone.

Why alone higher education? The disaster will start in the lower education. The question is if higher education will have any meaning left with AI standing by you to answer all questions and robots to do all bidding.

Today our guru is the newspaper and the TV ( screen- whatever the size). There is more information and knowledge in a paper of one day than you would have found in a year 100 years ago even if you searched for it.

But the question is what has happened to the minds? Why are they not learning and reacting to the information that is coming to them?

For instance take the deaths on the highways due to speeding, breaking road rules - it does not seem to deter anyone.

Take the news of Fake paneer, but people continue to buy.

Take the fires from short circuit and electrocution but none seem to be taking it seriously.

The scams on internet always finds customers.

Young ladies fall for young people without knowing who they are and where they come from. Then avoid sharing the info with their families and get into serious situations including getting murdered.

But nothing, nothing at all seems to activate anything in the brains of people!!!!!

Before the guru can come, the mindset of a "learner" has to emerge.

The present generation is all what you say. But poor things how we have failed them. In the name of education we threw them to the wolves of comercialised education which is really non-education and industrialised nutrition and medical care. We have failed to nurture their minds, emotions and body.

There is an awareness of this failure with an anger in the spirit. The adults are going to pay heavily for this mismanagement and lack of devotion by the parents and the officer class.

Let us hope the children of now will become more conscious of responsibilities and will do a better job when their time comes.

The Psychology of the Government Employee.

The government employee from the lowest to the highest is psychologically a little underdeveloped because of the security in his life the job provides along with the machinery of the government to protect them.

They know that there is no chain of action reaction operative like in the life of the man in the street. He is secure if he works, takes responsibility or not. He can always pass the buck. There is no anxiety to keep him on his toes. There is no need to look for solutions and find ways and means by hook or by crook to keep his family fed and lodged.

So his first attitude is to avoid taking any decisions so that nothing ever comes back to haunt him or trouble him.

Even the judges are not immune to this malaise.

Slowly over time they lose all power of mind to feel the necessity to do anything except shuffling files and delaying things as far as possible as long it does not come to need them to sign an order. All they are waiting for is the day they will safely retire.

No orders means no risk of any untoward incident coming back to bite them.

This becomes the guiding light and permanent nature of a government employee. Normally there is no mechanism in the government to check if there is any work being done? Who will check? They are all busy saving their skins.

In India specifically when this is added to our indolent and insincere natures, only the worst can be expected. To incentivise them the commercial world started bribing them which has now become the main reason for anything getting done.

This is why India is in such a corrupt mess.

And I do not see any change coming.

The internet has opened an imaginary world that is difficult to close. The shift of education to online makes it impossible to control the exposure the children are getting from the debauched American influence. I did not want to give my child a phone but had to after the Covid episode. This has washed all my influence under the bridge. But I hope my example and the rest of the upbringing time before the age of 16 will eventually win over.

PS: Junk food now available 24x7 thru the phone is creating sick and weak bodies.

Home is now just a place to park the bags. The age 16 to 20 needs a very delicate balance when parents are dealing with their children but unfortunately the old authoritative style is all the parents know and their knowledge is truly deficient in worldly matters.

The 20 to 26 age is dangerous. We have to be careful to not create any resentment in them otherwise their first thought is to leave home and get into further messes. May the Lord help me keep my child away from miscreants and drugs!.

Siddhi Temple

We spend so much energy trying to change our circumstances.

What have your circumstances been trying to change in you?

P. K. Maheshwari

Why would the circumstances change you? Do you even matter to them?

You are where you are and you have to make the best of the situation you are in. Your effort is written in your destiny. You have been given a mind and body. You are expected to use them and advance your case.

The question that changed everything for me wasn't, "How do I get what I want?" It was, "What am I in service to?" What question has changed your life?

P. K. Maheshwari in reply:

You will soon be facing more changes because deep into the occult field you will see this question is an error. You are not in service or to serve anything (This is a shadow of the western concepts in vogue). The next question will be "what beckons me and how am I am not letting myself reach there?

Dilip Kumar Roy

The greatest gift a parent can pass on to the child is not good food, good clothes, not even a great education, but a healthy sense of self.

An entire generation with a poor sense of self now craves for attention and validation through high visibility, even out and out vulgarity.

Watch closely the videos of their mutual interaction within their own eco-system and you will realise that narcissism reigns supreme.

P. K. Maheshwari

I would like to chip with my little bit.

The present Z is rudderless thanks to the ignorant parenting it has received. It is looking for meaning. It is highly influences by the online culture and the media that it is seeing from all over the world, mainly from the western countries. Most of the serials I have seen focus on the incongruities of society and there is always some character who is shown as dissatisfied and opposing even vulgarily the establishment (family head or school rules or traffic rules and such). The audiovisual media plants seeds easily in the minds of people. And the Z are repeating out these influences without any idea of what is happening.

They have good reason to be so blatantly angry and they have seen gentle words are making no effect.

I am seeing a direct correlation between the attitudes with the parenting.

The governing is equally bad because these people who are the parents are in the governing seats.

The education they have received is worthless by today's needs. What are they to do?

All these agitated states are based in deep subconscious depression and despair for at heart all know that the parent's income won't be there forever.

Depression in our young ones

It is due to our loving doting parenting. First we cuddle them out of breath. Then we don't let them learn by doing everything for them. + like helicopters we are hovering on them and doing their thinking for them. As the parents control the purse strings the children have no options. When they grow up they are NOT ready for the world or anything literally.