Cyber Relationships Ruin Real Ones....

With more and more people turning to the online world for comfort, real relationships are being sidelined...........

Chatting, Pinging, Emailing, Twittering and texting - the cyber world is throwing newer forms of connecting with people, every other month.  Innovation, something that usually took years to develop, is now literally taking place with a snap of a finger.  While it is great for technological progress, is it really that great for relationships?

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Many being online interactions with no serious intent except to connect, have fun, network and 'be around" as they put it.  "If you aren't on Facebook you're pretty much an old hat and better relegate yourself to a tomb," say the with-it, who are always connected and available.  "What! You've got to be kidding, you don't know how to twitter?  Get a life babe/dude.  You'd rather have been born in the 16th century," is yet another common perception.  With comments like these, youngsters, who may not be web-savvy, are literally arm-twisted into being "connected'.  They fear that if they don't, they'd be looked upon as 'un-cool" and be the odd ones out.

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What starts off as a way to get familiar with people eventually turns into a dependence of sorts, with people freaking out if their Internet connections are down for even a few hours.  It slowly veers into personal space where couples who usually "communicated" inter-personally, now prefer to sit silently next to each other, busy with his/her laptop "communicating" with an unknown stranger.

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Often, the ramifications on relationships aren't too evident.  Over time however, it eats into special time and before one knows it, one has transgressed into an emotional connect with an online person who "listens", makes no judgments, completely accepts you for what you are and allows you to vent.  Since virtual buddies don't live with each other, it makes it easier for them, to be more accepting, accommodating, tolerant and less complaining about peculiarities.  In this safe haven of anonymity and total approval, people don't even realise how and when they slip into an emotional attachment with a stranger.

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This new age phenomenon of emotional connections in the virtual world is here to stay.  But we have to safeguard ourselves from falling into trap, that to an undiscerning eye, shows no evident threat.  It is a hazard so severe that, if not taken care of, could spiral into something that you can't control.

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As simple as it may sound, developing a solid relationship with your significant other decreases the probability of "online infidelity".  A unifying bond between you two, and putting your faith in similar ideas of loyalty may help you draw boundaries and around what is acceptable and what is not - in both the virtual world or in reality.

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Keeping each other in the loop about to who you connect with and who you interact with on various sites, could be another method to keep a check on yourself.

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Those who swear by the concept of "individuality" would exclaim, "Are we supposed to share everything about our lives with our partners..."  But isn't it a healthier method to share everything with each other, so that you don't fall prey to temptation?  If your intentions are clear, what's there to hide, right?...............

      ..........THE WRITER IS A PSYCHOLOGIST WITH LILAVATI HOSPITAL, MUMBAI..............

FINDING GOD .. the Gandhian Way

A part from being the father of the nation and the driving force behind our freedom struggle, Mahatma Gandhi was also a man whose faith instilled a moral compass of the highest order in not just his followers but anyone who performed public service.  If one observes the Mahatma's life, he or she would understand that spirituality was at the centre of every action undertaken by him.  Liberating the country with his concept of ashima (non-violence) and tolerance, the Mahatma had imbibed the highest ideals of faith in his followers, urging them to renounce the use of force to prove a point and treat each faith with the same respect that they would afford their own.  And it is a well known fact that Gandhi's commitment to religion did not mean commitment to a single religion.  
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Every faith had full freedom and complete equality, and in his prayer meetings his Gita has the same space as the Holy Quran, the Bible and the Guru Granth Saheb.  He spoke of a Ram Rajya because Lord Rama was an ideal, an image that most Indians could identify with, but there was no propaganda in his concept of divinity, and there was always equal space for all faiths.  When Gandhiji was asked about his opinion on God and spirituality he said, "The Truth is my God."
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And it's that universal truth which has inspired the likes of everyone from Martin Luther King Jr to Nelson Mandela.  That truth laid the foundation for the way in which Bapuji conducted his life.  He never really considered himself a religiously or communally inclined person.  Nevertheless in his morning prayers and even in his last breath - his belief in the truth being a manifestation of God was unwavering.

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Once he was asked about the relevance of the phrase Hey Ram in his life.  And he replied that he felt the same degree of peace and contentment when he uttered the phrase that another individual would feel uttering the name of Mohammed.  If both names were capable of invoking a similar effect - that of utmost calmness and fulfilment - weren't they one and the same thing?  It was just one of the pointers to how secular Gandhi was in his outlook.

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On the eve of India's independence, when Sardar Patel and Pandit Nehru unfurled and tricolour at the Red Fort,  Gandhiji was nowhere in sight.  When Bapuji was questioned about the same, he said India would not have achieved true independence until the day the Hindus and the Muslims learned to co-exist in harmony.  He literally lived by the mantra of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, which means the whole world is one family....

................THE WRITER IS THE DIRECTOR OF THE GANDHIAN STUDIES CENTRE AT BHAVNAGAR UNIVERSITY.....................
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MORE THAN A CENTURY AFTER MAHATMA GANDHI, THE FATHER OF THE NATION USHERED IN THE ERA OF A SPIRITUAL AND HOLISTIC APPROACH TO POLITICS AND SOCIETY, HIS PHILOSOPHY FINDS A MODERN DAY RESONANCE IN ALMOST EVERY ASPECT OF LIFE............

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.............'''''''''If one observes the Mahatma's life, he or she would understand that spirituality was at the centre of every action undertaken by him'''''''''''''''........................

Only a few people in the world are capable of being silent, meditative..Osho International Foundation

FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE says:  All that is needed is to know the art of listening.  Listening to the winds and listening to the clouds and listening to the dancing trees, the falling leaves - utterly in silence, you mind weaving no thoughts, no thinking - is the very foundation of listening.

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It does not mean you have to agree.  There is no question of agreement, because a man like Nietzsche is not so mean that he wants you to agree with him.

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He simply wants you to understand him, and then it is up to you what you do with it.  Agree or don't agree - but at least listen!  There are only very few people in the world who are capable of being silent, meditative, capable of listening.  It is a strange phenomenon: if you can learn the art, it is not a question of listening to my words.  It is a question of the art of listening.  It is within you.

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BEST SILENT IS MEDITATION

Said differently, I call it meditation - just being silent.  Even listening does not give you the accurate description of the state that is needed for you to find the truth of your own self.  But listening is certainly one of the easiest processes of meditation.  And as you become able to listen, you listen to the winds and the rain and the clouds and the whole heartbeat of the universe.  In that listening, you will open up; your bud will become an open rose.

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"I KNOW AND YOU DON'T KNOW" IS INHUMAN

The very idea that "I know and you don't know" is inhuman.  It is uncultured, it is uncivilised.  It may be that I have experienced something that I can share with you, but I cannot denounce you as ignorant.  I can only say, "Perhaps you have missed it, perhaps you have bypassed it.  Perhaps you are innocent and you have not looked at it."  I cannot call you ignorant and propose that I am the knower and you are ignorant and take your dignity, your freedom, your inquiry, and ask you just to believe.

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TRUST IS ANOTHER NAME OF LOVE

Love yourself and love all that is all around you.  there is no need to create chains, there is no need to create prisons.  Love is enough.  But love is not a belief, love is a reality.  It is in your very Heartbeat, it is your experience.  It is not in the scriptures; it is not Christian and it is not Hindu, it is not Mohammedan.  Love is the blossoming of your inner being just like a rose....

                                                                                 Courtesy Osho International Foundation.......

Conquer Ego, Conquer Death.. J.S.NEKI

A great existential truth is the certainty and inevitability of death.  This frail body is destined to be overtaken by age.  Youth comes, but soon departs; when senility descends, it never departs -  only its victim does.  Guru Tegh Bahadur observed, "One might become anxious should something unexpected happen.  But on the worldly pathway, nothing is stable or permanent".

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Yet, we live in this world ignoring the transience of life.  We want to live it the way our whims dictate.  Even the thought of leaving the world in which we have invested our desires, plans and programmes becomes a dread for us.

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There are cultural nuances that determine the intensity of this apprehension.  Someone has said, "Life is for the European a career, for the American a hazard, and for the Indian a holiday".  In the Semitic cultures, one's soul after death is believed to wander around in the dark space until the Day of Reckoning.  That is a highly despairing and frightening prospect.  In oriental cultures that subscribe to the theory of reincarnation, death is at once the beginning of a new life.  So the dread is not always as intense.

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The Sikh view is somewhat different.  It holds that at death, the body which is but dust, returns to dust; that which speaks therein is breath and that returns to wind.  Then the question arises: "Who, in reality, dies?" Guru Nanak tells us:

....What perish are man's sensorium,

His discords and his ego.

That in him, which observes all, perishes not.

And adds elsewhere:

Don't think, I have died - only the demon within me has.  The One who pervades all, does not die...

Guru Arjan Dev, in fact, believes that since atma (the soul is imperishable, no one really dies, no one really can die.

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No one dies; none is capable of dying...

The soul dies not, it is imperishable.

That what you believe dies, does not even exists.

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In the Guru's point of view, not only is life a play, even death is a play.  Isn't watching a good play until its final drop-scene, simply enjoyable?  Should it not be so for life, inclusive of its exit?  Where then is room for mourning?  Guru Amar Das asks:

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For whom should we mourn, O Baba?  This world is but a play!

The mourner is therefore reminded:

The one who now laments will also arise and depart.

When he himself was about to depart from this world, Guru Amar Das summoned his family and, as reported by his nephew Baba Sunder in his famous "dirge", addressed them in the following words:

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O my children, siblings and family, reflect in your mind: 

The pre-ordained death warrant cannot be avoided, the Guru is going to be with his Lord...

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And then, the Guru in this own sweet will, sat up and further addressed his kin:

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Let no one weep for me after I am gone.  That would not please me at all.

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Such a placid departure can be the outcome only of an insight-fully lived life.
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What, then, is insightfully lived life?  Not the one that begun crying, endured complaining and concluded in disappointment.  The aim of insightful life is to be aware - joyfully, serenely and divinely.  It does not hanker after life.
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Hankering after life also subsumes hankering after commodities.  Isn't that simply a vain aspiration?
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This weeping is all in vain; the world ignores the Lord, and weeps for maya.
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Such evils as ostentatiousness, greed, pride, dishonesty and nepotism sprout from hankering after things.  This enhances our bondage to worldliness and pushes the chances for our liberation further and further away from us.  It is such hankering that also creates restlessness and generates fear of death. 
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Those who do not cling to life and care not for its commodities remain spiritually blissful.  They not only live a blessed life, but also earn a blessed death.  Guru Nanak said:
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THE DEATH OF HEROES IS HALLOWED, AND IT IS APPROVED BY GOD.
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One might ask, who are the heroes referred to here?
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Guru Amar Das informs us:
He alone is a brave warrior, a hero.
Who conquers and subdues his vicious inner ego.
"Conquering the ego is conquering the whole world", said Guru Nanak.  This, then, is the requirement for a heroic spiritual life.
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We all think man fears death.  But, in reality, he fears himself.  The remorses and repentances of life haunt him.  One who has no remorse, nor any ground for repentance, has no reason to fear death.  Death, the most dreaded evil for many, is not so for those who are spiritually illumined.  For them it is of little concern.
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Only right living can prepare us for safe or even joyous dying.  Let us, then, be of good cheer about death and know this that no evil can happen to a good man either in life or after death.  Death, be assured, is no evil.  It is impossible that a thing so natural, so necessary, and so universal should ever have been designed by our Creator as an evil to mankind.
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Let us conclude with these lines from Karib:


PEOPLE SAY IT IS GOOD TO LIVE FOREVER,,,,, BUT WITHOUT DYING, THERE IS NO LIFE.  SO, WHAT WISDOM SHOULD I PREACH?  EVERYTHING WORLDLY IS PERISHING RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME....!