Show your mettle and prove you are different

Most of the time people feel content with their day to day rituals and work.  The life pattern follows a steady path except on certain turmoil occasions when it sinks in the indolence of murky situation. This of course goes away because uneven anxieties which arise and dissolve as a passing phase. No sooner, you and I encounter this type of unwanted and unforeseen situation, we pray to God to recover us from the said monstrous condition and once it is controlled, we return to the steady path of life.  By way of following this trend, we become a part of the crowd instead of distinctively earmarking us.  Most of us do not want to take that little bit extra pain to seclude us from the crowd.  We always ruminate that what is the need for separate identification and instead prefer to lodge with the crowd. 

There is no need for doing any extraordinary thing except to heed to some frivolous and trifle issues which most of us ignore because the same do not need any focused attention.  They feel that is the rule of the law.  But it is not true.  By following some basic criteria and keep concentration on mundane issues, you can identify yourself as a different human being altogether.  And over a period of time, because of maintaining these criteria, you will be earmarked in your professional and social life.

1^st Criterion: Do the obvious things religiously, even the same are not of that much importance.  For example, you might have noticed that at the airport, people arrive at the check-in-counter with their baggage kept on the trolleys. Immediately after check-in, they either proceed to the lounge or for security check without managing to place the trolleys in a safe place. This disorganized behavior of most of the people brings tremendous inconvenience for the fellow passengers. If you follow the practice of keeping the trolley in its place, then not only you are bringing the comfort of your fellow passengers, but you also discriminate yourself from the crowd and identify yourself distinctively. By doing this obvious thing, you separate yourself from the crowd.

2^nd Criterion: Without hurting anybody’s sentiments or ego, you can explain all your desires to your acquaintances, colleagues/friends and family members what is being expected from them. You should not braggart.  Even you are intelligent enough, but if you are accustomed to the behavior of profanity, you will be treated as arrogant.  On the other hand, you may not be that intelligent, but if you are not showing any profanity and at the same time you are able to get the things with others, then you will be different from the crowd.

3^rd Criterion: You must learn the technique to cut your coat according to your cloth. It means that if you are extravagant and always survive on money borrowed from others or credits or loans to meet your unwanted demands, then it is seen that you exploit all your energy to blame others for your parlous and pathetic condition of bankruptcy soon.

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On the contrary, if you restrict your expenses under your  control and save money for unexpected and unforeseen events, you are different from the crowd because most of the people follow the path of extravagant disproportionate to their income and inviting disastrous condition in the event of emergency.

4^th Criterion: People tend to preset their mind and take action or react on the basis of preconceived conviction. Mirror of your inner world is the reflection of your outer world.  For example, it is seen that people react very sharply at a comment or a bad gesture instigated to them by others.  Most of the time reaction is out of proportion.  Logically, if the situation at which the reaction is made, is analyzed it will be found that the reaction of losing the calmness for the opposite party is not at all worth.

Many a times, I have observed in the crowded bus plying in my hometown at Kolkata, tremendous skirmishes took place just for frivolous issues of falling down of one person to another making lethal discomfort for the others. But after thorough scrutiny, one can easily find that because of sudden brake, momentum loses of one person lead to the disbalance of another person.  And, this should not have transpired to a fracas at all, but quite often it is the common scenario in the crowded bus in Kolkata that unruly scene is evolving. But if you decide to be calm and cool in this type of situation, then definitely you are out from the crowd. 

5^th Criterion: If you exercise your skills, knowledge and perform your duty to the highest level of perfection whatever may be your profession then you are one step ahead of others.  For example, you are a shop-floor supervisor for a particular shift in an engineering company and responsible to produce components for pumps.  You are able to manage your workforce to comply with the quality norms and also able to produce targeted quantities with a negligible percentage of rejection as compared to your other colleagues, then you are different from the crowds. 

6^th Criterion: People do not remember the name of losing candidate say in the Presidential elections in India.  Once the name of the winning candidate is announced, no one keeps a track of the losing candidate.  But, if you are in a position to recollect the name of the losing candidate, even after a substantial passage of time, by exercising your skill of memory power, then definitely you are out of the crowd.

Similarly, people come across an eye catching advertisement between a television serial, but most of them are engrossed in the story, music and acting of the stars of a particular serial.  People are normally so much attracted to a serial that hardly they notice the advertisement campaign.  Even otherwise, if they notice, they do not remember or recall. But, if you are in a position to recall the contents of the advertisement based on the sharpness of your memory power, then again you are out of the crowd.

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7^th Criterion: You may be extrovert and you are engaged in a profession of marketing.  As per the norms of the profession, you are a smart talker, capable to present your products, their quality features, and other attributes to your customers very effectively and also you are in a position to retain your customers by way of extending effective services. At the same time, during marketing / sales discussions with your prospects, apart from the gift of the gab, if you also show your attribute of good listener which is a quality mostly prevalent to introvert type of people, you are different from the crowd. 

There may be other criteria by which separate identification is possible, but above are the prominent one in my mind, as a professional, who is always fond of researching human psychology and its influence on others in today’s nucleolus pattern of living.

Be flexible in life

The common people think that if  they focus their thoughts most of the time for Brahmn, which is  the source of energy, how they will be able to attend their worldly affairs?  In that case, a vital question comes how one can  be flexible in life so that  after discharging  worldly responsibilities, one can focus attention to Universal Consciousness. This universal consciousness is nothing but the knowledge of Brahmn. Though it is not everybody’s cup of tea, but at the same time,  it is not that difficult to perform both the things provided you can have a control on your mind.  The mind is the best friend of ours and it is also our enemy.  Our flexible approach is always getting impediments from our duality.  And mind only puts us in the circumstances of duality.  When this happens, we become confused, which one to attend and why?  In this duality, either we perform many functions half-heartedly or ignore the one at the cost of the other.  Most of us prefer not to forego daily chores of lives and ultimately, we get bonded in the shackles of the worldly affairs. We forget to focus on universal consciousness, which is very important to purify our mind, body and soul through various positive thoughts related to spiritualities.

 To accept the dogma of universal consciousness, you need not to be a sage or hermit and remain confined in a forest or live in the seclusion of the mountains.  You have to  be only flexible to maintain a right kind of living enriched with every manifestation of Brahmn.  This right kind of living includes proper behavior; follow higher level of morality, showing neither jealously nor anger and also not taking the path of desperate love for materialistic things. In the course of daily life, you have to follow the above pattern of living.  You have to attend all your worldly affairs on the above line of thoughts. You live in an ocean of unlimited opportunities.  Only thing, you have to accept the challenges, transcend all barriers and then reach the desired path, as envisaged by you.  In this endeavor, you have to always remember the energy, means Brahmn.  This energy is always within you.  The only paradox is that people are not able to perceive the same and deviate from the ideal course of living and embrace upon the wrong and evil deeds.  You have to choose the right course of actions to suit your prosperity in life. In the midst of tremendous volatility, your mind will become restless to run behind the allurement of grandeur.  So, you have to sedate the tottering mind to focus on the universal consciousness.  Train yourselves in the ideal of the lily flower, who blossoms in the mud and survives for its existence day in day out.  Being in the mud, it has to struggle to overcome the shocks of muddy water and the force of storms. Despite its struggle, it never forgets the moon above. It shows its love for the moon all the time. This flower has not much recognition like rose or marigold.  Neither it is adorned much nor used by people to decorate their vases. There is nothing extraordinary about lily flower. Yet this flower has a terribly romantic relationship with the eternal beauty of the moon. It focuses all its attention on the moon.  In the same way, even you may be a very ordinary person and you struggle day and night for your two square meals, yet if you always show your reliance on the supreme one, you are happy at least spiritually. Keep all your focus on Him.  Be flexible and accept both happiness and distress in the same way and like the most ordinary flower, lily, do not forget to remember Him.  You have to integrate yourself with Him in your thoughts. Introspect deeply into the most of infinite love.  And then, you will not be bogged down fully in your worldly affairs.  No matter what you do, no matter what is your professional status and no matter what is your living standard, you should not lose the sight of His presence.  Whatever you are able to accomplish, think that based on His blessings, you have done so.  If you embrace upon this postulate, no one can degrade you in life.  If you rely your faith on Supreme being and take the same as the ideal thoughts of your life, the meanness, jealous thoughts and tenacity to do evil deeds will not be there. If you  carry out worldly affairs with vested interests and always focus for your own advantages, you will develop a low samskaras created by crude vibrations and you have to suffer through your rebirth.  So, you need to arouse higher vibration in yourself.  King Bharata, who was otherwise leading a noble life, had to take rebirth as a deer because on the eve of his death, he was very much concerned about a fawn.  Precisely, that is the reason; you should not cling to your profession, family, social or financial very much and in the midst of all these, you think only for an ideal life of higher vibrations.  Do not follow a step, which does not provide you an ideal path. You must take the path of  eternal bliss, which is like a utopia

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Whatever be the consequence of your past deeds, your upward movement is guaranteed provided you have a steadfast attitude to attain Universal Consciousness.  For that, you have to look forward only.  Accept only the loftiest entity for your contemplation. You must have a flexible attitude and your love for Him must be from the bottom of your heart. Then only, you will be in the exuberance of bliss and at that state, whatever pain you receive, will be nothing.  So, if you want to be propelled by Divinity, you need to remember the words “Be flexible” and your movement must be towards the Supreme One.

Can you ignore the power of God?

When you do  the wrong things or engage yourself in evil deeds,  you try to cover up the same with a hope not to be exposed. Once you ascertain the situation and feel confident that no one is able to catch, you get relaxed. You become somewhat addicted to performing many wrongdoings. Gradually, a time will come that you will always give preference for wrong against right. It becomes your habit. But one thing you will never understand that you can be spared by everybody, but not by God. You  cannot  sneak away from Him. He is watching you all the time, whether you know or not. But these types of people do not believe in the power of God. They disown the theory of God’s illuminating power. They don’t accept that if you pray to God wholeheartedly, He will assuage you.  As per them, the traditional notion of God is simply theoretical. They say that human beings can create their own destinies by their  own power of work, diligence, intelligence and deceiving others. They think that if they perform wrongly, God cannot do anything. Our societies term these people as atheists.

Most of us, of course, are believers of the existence of God. They may not openly accept, but they always take His shelter before performing any important work.  A logical debate always crops up that one can accept  the power of God, but  for that matter, he need not to be religious or a believer of any religion in toto. One can accept the nitty-gritty of his religion and can focus on the creeds of the same and remembering God in all his endeavors. The atheists argue that some of the great people of the world did not believe in God. In support of their statement, they say that very many heinous crimes and some of the worst deeds are committed taking the shelter of God. The iota of the truth is that people do all  evil deeds in churches, temples, pilgrims and holy places.  These non-believers of God argue with logic that how can we continue to accept  God as our trouble shooter when there is no scientific proven theory of  His existence.  They say as the child grows, he leaves his childish clothes and so, why can’t we leave our psychological, emotional and mental dependence on God?  They say that the concept of worshipping God by performing Pujas, taking His blessings and remembering Him in distress and happiness is all creations of our ancestors. 

Just to make the people frighten and not to deviate from the path of moral living, this type of mythological and psychological dependence was created.  For example, if there is a heavy rain with thundering and lightning, the elders in the family start praying to save everybody from the disaster. And after a passage of time, when the calamity stops, the believers get elated that God has stopped the disaster. Those who worshipped a particular God or religion, formed a group and the members of the same group would help each other to engage in conflicts with other groups of different religions just to get the major share of various resources starting from food to shelters including clothes.  As per the Indian history, where the religion and casteism is very much predominant, the  nepotism, favoring  and forming groups with the relatives, friends and close associates will be always there.  This religious bonding is always encased in the name of God  to take the advantage. The atheists make a protest to this behavior. Though their numbers are less, but whenever they get a chance, they express negative feelings of Godhood in their forum.

Now-a-days, it is quite common that one religious  group and its sub-groups are cleverly getting engaged with other religious groups and sub-groups  in quarrels, fights and sometimes killing the people making the existence of God  maligned.  The stronger religion has a larger follower  and act their power on the weaker religions. These weaker  groups are less in numbers and the oppressed one.

                                                                       

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Fanaticism, blindly supporting, unquestionable dogma and unflagging faith have become the benchmark of any religion. People become fanatic and depend on a religion and if someone passes some odd comments, the situation turns into hatred, fighting and sometimes creating violence. If you study all the religion’s main creeds and read the preaching of the noted spiritual masters like Buddha, Mohammad, Mahavira and Jesus, you will not find any differences.  These masters always see oneness amongst various religions.  Some of their mean minded disciples and followers only created differences and subverted their teachings to bring division and quarrel. Almost all the differences, fighting, less friendship is because of wrongly construed of various religions and its tenets. The fundamental crises between the Hindu and the Muslim and the rise of IS and the killing of various rationalists in India and neighboring countries by the Hindu and the blasphemies are because of misunderstanding of the religion and religious books.  No religion, ever teaches to kill each other. On the contrary, they teach to remain together and to show respect for all religions.  In fact, religion must be a central focus for human beings evolved. Instead of that, it now acts as a threat because of these fanatics and their over enthusiasm. 

So today a religion, which is otherwise a sacred thing, gives rise to a threat to the civilization. It is not centered on the humanity, but is focused on the fanciful of some obtrusive religious leaders who drastically misinterpret the religious outlook.. Under the shelter of religion, they carry out their evil deeds, kill the humanity, destroy the civilization and increase the rampant nepotism. Ultimately, these religious miscreants spread their wrong activities in the light of religious cum political improvisation and become a hero for their followers. Many environmental and social scientists vehemently objected these types of activities and term this as a violation of a moral code of conduct and ethical living.  That is why; some people are completely averse to accept God and His presence.  They feel that in the name of God, when people can carry out all wrong doings, what is the need to accept Him and seek His blessings?  Under this logic, they don’t believe in the power of God and His presence. Do you accept this philosophy?      

Don't be violent with yourself

Today’s world is full of violence.  You never know when people will become violent. Whether violence takes place because of an argument or because of animosity or simply because of improper provocation, our society often passes through acrimony, which ultimately polluting the environment.  This violence affects your body and mind as well.  A child may hit himself or throw whatever he gets when his demand is not met.  In the similar way, a young person may take steroids just to make his body a little bulky and  become little more charming.  There are many other examples by which you can provoke violence for your own self.  For example, you are aspiring to get a promotion, but your colleague supersedes you and you start consuming liquor to vent your frustration; then you addicted to a drug knowing that it will cause a health hazard. Similarly, you are a middle aged person and have a sweet tooth and despite your having diabetes, you are not able to get rid of sweets. Then again, you get deceived in love affairs and  decide to commit suicide.  All these happenings of life are quite common.  People sometimes are not able to accept the same and start torturing themselves. Violence or torturing makes us miserable physically, psychologically and also spiritually.  We always want to be loved by others, but when it comes to love ourselves, we become a miser.  Why it is so?  Because we believe that others are only supposed to love you.  But it is a myth.  A person who cannot love himself, who is not able to understand himself thoroughly, cannot love others.  If you want to help others, to give company to others when they are in distress and want to love others, then you must stop torturing yourself and be sensible to you first.

We give much importance to the hedonistic needs of our living. Our mind propels us to search for various comforts, accomplishment of material desires, name, fame and status quo, so that we can brag for the same and get prominence in the society. When we are deprived of these things because of reasons not in our control, we become gloomy and show despondency.  Ultimately, we start ignoring ourselves, means we start haphazard living and we don’t care for ourselves.  Due to these hedonistic needs, which are mostly of illusory nature, cause us more harm than benefits. The person who pursues these needs, ignoring the positive aspects of self and ultimately starts torturing himself.  He then contemplates to obtain quick pleasure and not able to tolerate any pain.  At this stage of life, the person becomes dysfunctional. His attitude becomes self-centered and if anybody criticizes for his odd attitudinal behavior, he gets furious and retaliates.  Often the positive criticism of others turns into a hostile negativism for him.

One of the important aspects of life is that we want to carry an ideal image of ours. We want to prove that we are good, we  possess good mannerism, well behaved, and in a position to discharge our duties and responsibilities efficiently.  However, because of many external functions, we fall short of this ideal situation. To obtain an ideal scenario in  life is not so easy.  Because of many ups and downs, constraints, obstacles and impediments, which we face in our life, sometimes we are not able to cope up and we get disgusted with our lives. All these increases, our self-hatred. Instead of palliating the problems, we succumb to the same. To get rid of this self-hatred situation, we give weightage on various trivial issues as a quick fix and bypass the larger goals.  Though it looks to be a solution, but in the long run, it develops psychological impulse and instead of reducing the self-hatred, the same gets escalated.

To eliminate self-hatred and not to torture your own body and mind, you need to build a storehouse of love and affection within yourself.  It is not so easy, but you need to practice this behavior. Once you are able to love yourself, you can expand the same to others. Then you can show a compassionate approach for all your surroundings.  You will rarely develop a feeling of jealousy, animosity or bitterness.  The storehouse of love inside you will energize you and you will be able to identify yourself and that way, development of self-awareness will arise.  Then you will be able to bury the wrong notions, which you have created and your tenacity for self-violence will not be there at all.

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People must develop empathy for their complete being with respect to their mind, body and consciousness and focus to its various requirements. You need to forego the trivial issues, unless the same is must for you to discharge and then introspect for the better things to vitalize the life. Once you are able to dissociate from the trivial issues, you will be able to open your real self, which is hidden below the layer of restless mind and provocative thoughts.  People will also afflict you with their negativities and if you continually mingle with them, you will tend to become a negative person.  Why is it so? Because the negative pattern of thoughts is deeply rooted in their own subjectivity.  You have to analyze their uttering, thoughts and expression before you get influenced by their behavior and attitude.  You become steadfast to yourself and don’t get carried away with other person’s negative thoughts. Unless you analyze and evaluate the realities, don’t accept the same. Self-work and self-analysis is a painstaking  effort and a long journey and it requires a lot of patience.  Keep peaceful and to maintain the peace all around is an art. To master this art, you have to ensure to love yourself wholeheartedly to avoid the self-hatred and violence.