Why Do You Want To Change Me? - Santosh Jha (good non fiction books to read txt) 📗

in modern contemporary societies, relationship troubles in familial, societal and workplace domains are number one troubles of humanity. We all have a responsibility towards not only us as an individual but also towards all of us in the society we live. We, as aware and responsible citizens of a nation and societies, need to own every action and behavior. We already see the world we live in utter chaos, conflict and violence. Nations and societies need to be collective domains of wellness and excellence. They are not in contemporary world as this happens only when each of us consciously own and be responsible towards each of our actions and behaviors; not only two percent of them.

When we understand and accept that in our usual consciousness, we are seldom aware of our actions. Most of our actions are very generic actions as we are usually in control of our generic subject. This has to change. We need to be aware of our bodies, and always be in the higher consciousness state, where the specific subject takes control and owns every action and behavior. The contemporary culture also makes us behave and act in a generic way. The pop culture pampers the generic subject. This needs to change. We are humans, we have the facility of higher consciousness, which separates us from a baby or an animal. We need to stretch our consciousness by being consciously aware of all our decisions of actions and behavior. We are humans with faculty of a super consciousness, which makes us, a definitive sense of we as a body, to hold back our instincts and emotions, assess their utility in a larger sense of collective wellness and excellence. A decision, when processed in a non-reactive and receptive mode, in a holistic-assimilative-integrative perspective by our super consciousness, the specific subject within us, shall be far more amenable to our own wellness and excellence and that of the society and nation. We are in our perspectives and our perspectives are in we. Therefore, if we all understand and accept the singularity of the utility of the above-mentioned perspective in prioritizing all our actions and behavior, we shall ensure larger wellness and excellence of not only we, as an individual, but also the collectivities of society and the nation. We continue to talk about this desirability of change in all of us in the coming passages.

Now, the same ideas we need to understand also from the perspective of the ancient wisdom, the traditional Oriental wisdom, explained in terms of kaaya (Body), maaya (external world/milieus), karma (Actionable duties) and karta (Subject). There is huge commonality, even as the symbols and means used in explaining these terms vary. The ancient wisdom also explains the dualism of consciousness and minute details, elaborates how there is a mystical causality between the kaaya, maaya, karta and karma, which decides cognition of the consciousness. In some way, scientific explanation may not be very conducive for average person’s understanding as we are still not used to many ideas of the modern science. Average person’s age-old faith mechanism also makes science a bit less acceptable in the subconscious mind. Let us delve into the old wisdom’s perspective on 3Cs – Consciousness, Causality and Cognition –

The consciousness is a stupid engineering. Its mechanism is so intricate and mystically multidimensional that it keeps people in constant state of flux; engendering layers of realisms, not amenable for linear understanding of individuals. The elements of milieus outside body-mind mechanisms keep interacting with disposition of consciousness within. This action-reaction cyclicality engenders information, which mind stores as intangible experiences and memories in the subconscious.

The totality and wholeness of it is a person’s culture, which sets the boundaries of his thought-action-behavior domain. As the milieus change in the course of life’s randomized journeys, the patterns of its interactions with disposition alters synchronically. This energizes the incessant cyclicality of learning and unlearning, which keeps an individual’s overall culture of consciousness in continuous flux. This flux has the energy of creation and destruction, making and unmaking going in an intertwined way. This cyclicality of changes in personal milieus, which makes a person’s subjective perspectives and personality change and in turn the later altering his or her inner milieus, creates a dualism, which is tough to understand if the person is not aware of the mechanism of cyclicality. It is only the higher consciousness, which understands this dualism and deliberates on a desirable poise for larger wellness. We are talking about it right here from the perspective of ancient wisdom, as we have already dealt with scientific perspective.

The ancient wisdom talked of the desirability of a higher consciousness in every person as chief aim of life and living. This was considered essential as only this state of higher consciousness or the ‘super consciousness, could be a vehicle of larger wellness of the person and his or her personal excellence. The ancient Oriental wisdom said: There is a super consciousness within, evolved through discipline of body and mind, which enables the self (an individual) to decide the matrix of all decision-making of action-behavior, independent of the innate instincts and subconscious mind. Usually, for an untrained and unattained mind – an average person with no mind-training, it is either his or her instincts or the prevailing popular culture, which decides the benchmarks of right and wrong of any action/behavior and this happens almost unconsciously. However, one has to attain this facility of being the ‘conscious decider’ of what should ideally present oneself with his or her decision-matrix at any point of time in life.

For example, suppose, a man and a woman are madly in love with each other. The man in an emotional state, picks up a pebble from the riverbed and gifts it to his beloved saying, he is also like a pebble, non-egoistic yet unworthy. The woman in extreme gesture of love says, she values it more than a diamond as it is given by the man she loves more than any possession of life.

The very emotion and idea which made the woman accept a pebble as diamond; inspired a worth and utility of value of a diamond in a useless pebble. The woman truly and deeply felt huge joy about its possession. This way, the woman’s ‘super conscious’ prevailed over her instinctive and cultured self, which would have otherwise thrown away the pebble in disgust. This state of consciousness engendered a novel matrix of a decision-making, independent of and beyond her intelligence, disposition and instinctive nature, which otherwise would never ever accept the utility of a pebble at par with a diamond.

Within our consciousness, there is a culture as well as an innate judgment mechanism, which usually assigns values and decides the utility of an entity. They would usually have decided that a pebble is worthless and a diamond is precious. However, the super consciousness of the woman in love overruled all fixed parameters of her conscious and subconscious minds and came forward as the ‘conscious decider’ of what should ideally present her with her decision-matrix at this point of time in life. Her super consciousness aligned with continuous and immortal intangible entity – intimacy and compassion in this case, renouncing the mortal value and utility of the tangible matter.

This is something available to humans only. This facility is your super conscious mind. This facility is essentially a function of imagination, which is duly supported by memories of experiences we have. Early humans succeeded in evolving fast and better by using their power of imagination to win over all obstacles. We have the facility to imagine ourselves out of the body and even out of the milieu to intangibly position ourselves in a situation, which is virtual and then weave possibilities to turn this virtual realism into a largely realistic one. In Indian spiritual philosophy, the ancestors prescribed a mechanism to be in exalted state of this super consciousness.

Science also explains the same mechanisms but uses different terms and frameworks. The Indian spiritual philosophy maintains that there is a continuous and complex interaction always going on between nature (external milieu) and human mind (internal milieu). It defines nature as drishya, something, which is seen and observed. It constitutes of two parts – the first being the tangible factors in external environment, which includes the contemporary culture, in which a human being lives. The second part is the intangible factors of body’s intrinsic nature or disposition. This intrinsic disposition has three attributes – sato gun (receptive mode), rajo gun (action mode) and tamo gun (inertia mode).

These three attributes are simultaneously present in all humans, even while different people may have different mix of the three attributes. Even science says, people can be identified as of a particular shade of consciousness, depending on amount and intensity the three attributes of reception, action and inertia in a person. One single person can be in different shades of consciousness, at different stages of life, as there are changes taking in the quotient of the three attributes. The society or larger physical milieu, we live in, also has these three attributes of reception, action and inertia.

It is self-evident that in a small and simple society, where material pursuits are very limited and small population naturally has larger proximity and intimacy between them, the predominant attribute of the milieu shall be reception. This shall make the society and its people in larger internal wellness but external discomfort.

However, in the unmanageably large and complex societies, we live today, where there is a deluge of material pursuits to attain, the predominant attribute of milieu shall be action and such societies, there shall be physical comforts for people but there shall be larger conflict and competitiveness among people in the society, economy and politics. In many societies, where physical comfort and personal attainments have become high, or in such societies where knowledge and development are miniscule, the predominant attribute shall be inertia. It is only natural and self-evident that such later societies shall have more conflicts, larger competitiveness, greater violence and less tolerance and stability but better external comforts. This is so self-evident for all of us.

Every attribute comes with an associated package of societal culture and individual behavior-action. A person living in a society where reception is predominant attribute shall behave differently than a person living in the society where predominant attribute is action or inertia. It is empirically observable to all that the drishya (nature or milieus) is a realism, which is in continuous change as the attributes and elements constituting it are mutually contradictory in nature. Modern psychology too accepts this. A person, who has a dominant consciousness of action, may eventually realize its futility and shall accept the utility of reception mode in later stage of life. A spendthrift may eventually start practicing the virtues of misery after indulging sometime in former mode. The vice-versa is also possible. The same is true with societies. It is our mechanism.

In contemporary American society, the predominant attribute is action, even while large part of it has inertia, because of larger availability of comforts. It is only natural that many there are fed up with existing milieu and look for a life in reception mode. Indian society has largely been in the dominant attribute of reception. However, as material well-being is rising, it is going the old American way and now attributes of action and inertia are taking over. This change is cyclic with newer elements being introduced in every new cycle. This is why we all behave in a way, which a dominant culture prescribes to us. Societal personality becomes an overriding consciousness for most of us. The popular benchmarks become a rule for us. This is why ancient as well as contemporary wisdom tell us to rise above the populism and be your own conscious decision-maker.

Ancient Indian wisdom called the consciousness as drishta, a virtual agency, which sees and observes the intelligence of a person, which his or her current consciousness lands him or her in. The consciousness has been referred to as