Do we really own something?

Yesterday me and my friend had a brief discussion regarding possession. While describing our wealth, we proudly tell about our properties, cars, and ornaments, and we claim to own them. So our basic concern was to find out "Who possesses whom?".

Don’t worry, I haven't gone mad. I am yet quite sane.

Let's assume a person, who became a millionaire couple of years back, owns a BMW car. Along with the fundamental expenditures of the luxury class car, he has to maintain his status according to the car. He can not drive his car too often due to the fear associated with the car's status. He has to keep a tight vigilance to ensure it's safety. He cannot park it at random places to keep it away from streext vendors and kids. So to park it, everyday he strolls for an hour to find a better, and spacious parking place which might be 200 meters away from his house. He cannot park the car in the market where it is susceptible to scratches and thefts. So still do you think this millionaire owns a BMW?

Similarly, we all book a flat with the help of a bank, and keep depositing the bank's EMI for the entire life. We cut our expenditures, we reduce our desires, and we halt our life, but we live for our home. Do you see yourself as a king, after buying the home which already has owned you?

Further let me take the example of my own house. After moving to the house, my dad has stopped travelling. He says, it is unsafe to leave it unmanned even for 1 day, so at-least one person must stay at home. Hence they do not travel anywhere. He is always worried about the small cracks in the roof. So instead enjoying the house, he is more worried about it. So I do not think that my dad is owning it, rather the house has become the master of our lives.

If we sit down and look back our purchases, we feel the burden of these purchases first and later realize their importance, and advantages. So it is better to do something you like, instead of, owning those non-living things, which are possessing us.

Why do we Love Mahabharata?

I was listening a podcast in which narrator is narrating the great Indian epic Mahabharata. I was listening to the episode where war has broken out between the two armies. The objectives of these two armies have a clear demarcation i.e. One army, i.e. Pandavas, is fighting for truth and righteousness whereas another army, i.e Kauravas, is covered under the cloud of lies and Adharma.

As per the narrator the reason to love this epic is knowing the results at the start only. He tells that the person on the side of Dharma is going to crush others with the help of god, and this reason is good enough to love the epic, which has such an elaborate description of the war between Satya and Asatya. If we  adhere to the reason of narrator, we all must love every Bollywood movie which starts with two guys who are on the different sides of Karma.

Though I love this podcast and love his way of delivering the artifacts about this enormous piece of scripture, yet I differ from his reason. I love this epic for various satisfactory reasons. Few such reasons are mentioned below.

1. This epic demonstrates the human life. A man fight for the Land, and the honour of ladies. Man has to retain the honour which is compromised by ladies during some worthless debates. As man's life revolves around a female protagonist, similarly Mahabharata has revolved around different ladies. All these ladies shared their part of glory in the epic.
Shantunu falling in love with a lady and leaving the complete nation in chaos to have her.
Bhism abducting princess for his impotent brothers.
Dropadi commenting on her brother in laws and giving them a reason to write such a history.

2. Even though this epic is similar to human life, but still it does not lose supernatural substance to maintain our interest in the story. These supernatural characters intervened at times to spice the story up. Few demonstrations of such super powers are as mentioned below.
Krishna killed all Ashuras in his childhood.
Krishna showed entire universe in his mouth.
Lot of Rishies and Munies chanted blessings and curses at the start to impact the final consequence of the story in the end.
Most funny yet the most interesting story is about the length of the Dropdi's sari.

3. This epic has elaborate description of the war. Writer has concentrated on each and every character of the story. Writer has made sure that anyone supporting Adharma does not go unpunished.

4. Bhagwat Geeta is also important part of the epic.

Though I can list more reasons to invalidate narrator's point. yet most profound and satisfying reason is the similarity between epic and human life. This reason provokes me to know and to read the epic with greater interests.

Ghandhi's Ji about Beggers

Yesterday I was reading Gram Swaraj written by Bapu. In this book, Ghandhi has advocated about the self-independence of villages. He has stressed the idea of model villages, where each and every village is dependent on none other than itself. He has laid out some guidelines to make the village independent which are helpful in eradicating the existing problems in the society, and bring best character of the Indian villages.

Though he has dictated lot of problems and suggested solution to all such problems, but his stern stand against begging is quite surprising, but contradictory to my opinions.

Ghandhi has always stressed that everyone must be employed. In his opinion, a person must eat only after working for sufficient time and earning his food gracefully. Other means of getting food/eatables must not be accepted to society. As per Ghandhi begging is heinous crime, and the person who is supporting or assisting in begging is also partner in crime. As per him, any one should not give anything to a person who is healthy enough to earn his/her livelihood. Society leads itself to destruction by supporting or promoting such individuals.

According to him a society must not help physically handicaps. As per his views, it is government's responsibility to build houses/places to support such individuals. None, other than government, should take this task in their hands and interrupt someone else's work.

My Take/View
Ghandhi Ji was optimistic about Indian society, so he assumed that everyone would follow fundamentals of humanity, but even after 65 years of Indian independence people are still hungry and greedy. In current circumstances, it is really difficult to adapt these strict measures. When everyone wants to run from his task, then let society do something for humanity with the fear of God.

Anyway after reading Ghandiji's view, I will stop assisting any person who can work and earn, but I will not stop assisting other category of people.

Interpretations

Interpretation is always associated with mind set and mood at the given point of time. We interpret based on the facts available to us, and while judging the incident or statement our direction of judgment miss intricate details of the surrounding. X person state or act based on the people/problems/difficulties around, but person judging at other side does not even consider those small, but important matter. Such different interpretations create problems between families or couples or friends.

If people interpreting or judging can hold their thoughts from wondering for some time, and discuss the views with other person in person, it can surely help to erase some impulsive problems in relationship. Some times impulsive interpretations make life unlivable and miserable, but another thought and small discussions make the world wonderfully beautifully.

Let's wait and think, but believe me it helps our thinking, and demonstrate the respect and love for us in other person's mind.

Wish I could follow my own writings forever.

Winning Or Loosing

Life is not about winning a competition. You achieve more satisfaction when you put up a fight without caring about the results. Just to concentrate on winning the game, most of the times we miss the pleasure of playing it.

Just now, I was arguing with my friend, and at the end of discussion I told her that she won. She asked "Does it matter to you who won?". I was dumbfounded and thought "Do not we make life more miserable by judging on the parameters of winning or loosing it."

Let's play to please ourselves instead play to win for others.

Society

Why are we scared with society so much? Society is not to restrict good ideas, but it is to promote good ideas among themselves to make our life better.

Every second person thinks about society before taking any action, whether it can harm. Why can not some one take a step of reform and guide others to move out of orthodox and obnoxious traditions?

It will not only help individual, but also to society for implementing and spreading better ideas.