Human Behavior

Recently I went on a trek, with few friends, I met a couple of new people and spent the day with friends. The place was beautiful, the environment was amazing and the ambiance was spell-bounding. Scores of cascades, chaparral ways encountering stunted trees, shimmering rain, were a perfect recipe for an awe-inspiring trip. Coming back, I was, hammered by a couple of thoughts, the way, my friends & I, reacted to, the situation, the environment, and the various pranks played by us. Why was it so, that every one, behaved in a totally different manner, reacted in a unique way.

Contemplating on the situation, I thought of human behavior with respect to situations. When I talk of behavior, I actually connote the manner of acting in a situation or controlling oneself. Yet again, manner & control are an integrated part of human beings, which are largely controlled by our nervous system. Since childhood, the way we react to things has changed dramatically, which happens, mainly due to external reasons. In my perspective, there are three major spheres that affect our behavior, first one is, the child, second, the elder and third, the aspiration.

The child inside us awakes, when we are happy and the environment supports our happiness, say snowfall while we are on a hilltop. The child gets active, subconsciously, and overtakes the weathered, matured person. The child reaction is, generally, an unexpected reaction from us, but this is the reaction that was got inoculated in our mind, during our childhood. This is a way, in which we want to react, when we feel happy, but often don’t, because of the elder behavior.

The elder inside us, often, tries to overtake the child. This elder is impregnated in our conscious mind, by, as expected, our elders. We are tinctured with the perspectives of our elders, who are majorly, our parents, family members, teachers and other elders, with whom, we spend time. Since the elder, apparently, is in our conscious mind, we consciously, react to situations in a manner we are told to and gradually, the tellings infuse in our sub-conscious mind and become our behavior.

The aspiration is more of individuality. Everyone does have a role model, or wants to reach heights in life, it’s that aspiration, which makes him behave in that fashion. If we idolize someone, then we try to behave in the way, our idol would have behaved. It’s the desire to be like him, which gives us pleasure in reacting to the situation.

The child in us, makes us happy and gives us joy, it’s important, to keep it alive to lead a happy life. The elder teaches us discipline and the way we must behave in society, so as to thrive, by pleasing others. Last but not the least, the aspiration, carves our path to success.

Falling In Love

Not a while ago I was trying hard to garner sweet words to find an alternative to “I Love You”. To all my efforts, I couldn’t cross any word, except aroha, “A strong positive emotion of regard and affection” ,which, casting me down, proved that English language lacks expression of Love. More over the word “Love” has been made so versatile, that for young lovers, it is losing its essence. We love our country, our parents, our girl friends, games etc., have different emotions for them, but surprisingly the same word “LOVE”.
Excogitating for hours, I came up with, a cliché, heard thousands of times in hundreds of movies, “I am falling in love with you”. Now there’s one thought that has been hammering my mind, the word, fall, in English has a negative connotation, still, to fall in love, means, to experience feelings of love towards someone. After my mind wandered around for possibilities of the same, I was stunned to remember a game called “Trust”.
Trust is a team game, which teaches confidence and faith towards your partner. The game has a team of two partners. The first person has to stand ahead of the second one and then needs to fall back. The fall should be a free fall and the other partner standing behind would hold his partner and prevent him from falling.
It’s never easy to fall free on your back, specially, because we cannot see what’s at the other side. There’s an inner instinct that stops us from falling and provides a resistance. Overcoming that resistance requires a mammoth effort. The only way to bypass the resistance is to imbibe in the subconscious mind, the confidence that something would hold us and would not let us fall.
Yes. My mind struck, that’s where the answer lies. It’s not about falling, it’s about falling with the faith in heart that there’s someone who would hold us. That’s what love is. Love is nothing more than trust and confidence that there’s someone who would protect us.
So, falling in love suddenly showed me a different perspective of love. It means having utter confidence in your partner.

EGO

EGO has been a word, which derived a negative connotation in the recent past and has been used to define a negative quality of humans. The problem is not with ego, but with the thin line that we cross, and unknowingly hurt others and in the long run hurt us. Self respect is not ego, neither is sticking to values is, but self pride is and so is being dogmatic to one self. Ego takes us to a level, where, we start feeling as if everything is being conspired us, even the beautiful nature seems to disturb us, let alone the imperfect human surrounding.

Not long back, I encountered a colleague, who seems to be at a high level of ego. She cannot bear any one, needs people, including the colleagues, to take appointment to meet her. In an organization of open door policy, she wants people to knock at door. People like her become a big source of negative energy, and they dissipate negative energy, just by confronting with people.

None of us is born with an ego. For the first nine months, we are totally dependent on our mothers, we had no ego and no tensions, for a very simple reason, we were too inane to understand things. Once out of the womb, for the next few years too, we are not bothered by any worldly tensions, but thereafter, when we start contemplating things, understanding things, we tend to develop a mentality, “Since we know it, we have a right on it”, and that’s the point, we are haunted.

This does not mean that we should stop contemplating things, but that; we should not feel any binding with them, since binding restricts our vision.

Now, having talked about the gloomy side of ego, let’s throw some light on the bright side. A few days back, I was thinking, why people say “Think Positive”,” “Talk Positive”. The reason, for me, is very simple, EGO.

When we think or talk positive, we not only do so, but also imbibe and understand it and subconsciously get attached to it. When someone else is going through a bad phase, we would radiate positive energy by talking positive energy. And this is a point, where a complex story unfolds. When we suggest something to someone, we suggest and above all re-iterate and take up the responsibility of being positive. The responsibility ignites our ego, and this ego starts the best of its works, when we are, under a testing time. We are under the pressure of our ego and have to think positive, this pressure unknowingly becomes out habit. Obviously, this habit distributes happiness.

8th March

A society in a posh colony of New Delhi, organized a grand function and felicitated few prominent Ladies of the society. A ‘Female MLA’ was given the pleasure of being the Chief Guest. Fun and frolic, a few games and a grand lunch, boasted for the event’s effervesce. It was 8thMarch, the day marked as International Women’s Day. But, what is Women’s Day? Is it some day on which the suffering women are given all their rights? Or does that means that a husband will not indulge in any vehemence with his spouse? Or would a girl not be cauterized for Dowry? Are women a down trodden, subjugated ‘class’that they need a ‘special’ day reserved for them?

The day was coined by the UN for the alleviation of women standard in this barbarous world. But commercialization has coerced this day, to lose its essence. The day’s ‘celebration’ is tantamount to Valentine’s Day. It appears, those who least need this day, ‘lionize’ it the most. The day is marred by; exchange of expensive gifts, cards and parties. But in the end, nothing much is done for the needy, except a few politicians counting their vote bank through it.

It’s respectable to have a day for the women but along with that, we need to understand the reason of coining the day. The day is not meant for felicitation and frolic but to remind us of something, something that we forget, something that we ignore- Women. Throughout the world, there is a violent oppression of women, there are ‘special’ rules for women and above all, there is no value of women. Events like ‘Women’s Day’ are daunting reminders of the brutality on women. A day in an year, can never bring change in some one’s life. A day can only remind and not effectuate.

Don’t call me Didi

We read about good people in books and seldom meet them. People say that it is difficult to find them. Is it really difficult to find them, or we, just, don’t recognize them? This is yet again a two sided question. For most of us, after living in this materialistic world, the word good has shaped a very different meaning altogether, which would mean, serving our purpose. Now, not being selfish, there are a few qualities that we look for, ranging from humbleness to simplicity and generosity to philanthropy.

The reason, I am writing this blog is, a person, whom I met recently and she has, made a big impact on my life, given a new perspective to my mission. She’s, had there been a word in English to give respect; I would have used that, a teacher in one of the schools in Mumbai. I met her in an annual school function. Once I mentioned the name of our NGO, Anuthi, I could very well see spark in her eyes, the one that’s seen in the eyes of a child as he sees an exotic toy. Smile on face and a helping hand seems to be her mascot, which she altogether, carries very well.

Her humbleness and simplicity is very well reflected every time she says to me, “Don’t call me Didi” and “Please don’t thank me”. Her persistent efforts to get us a breakthrough, in the new step taken by Anuthi to explore a new vista of Educational Institutes in helping the Specially Abled Ones, induces a lot of enthusiasm in me and reminds me that still there are people who are ready to go an extra mile to do something for others and that too without any self interest.

At this point I understand, if you give some one respect whole heartedly, even the thought of the person becomes energizing. It’s still difficult for me to call her by name and I persistently hear from her, “Don’t call me Didi”.

Perception Is Reality

Few days back, rather I should say months, I was having a discussion with my colleagues on a very vague topic, “Perception Is Reality”, which arose from nowhere. All of us were defending, read offending, our points. In the end I was left with a few very valuable snippets of the conversation. Perception is always a perception, whether it’s a reality or not, often, depends on an individual. It is a, false yet strong, sphere that we create around our self and look the world through that sphere. It is so strong and is so indigenously imbibed in our mind that, it seems to be true. It’s a brave man’s act to break free of the perception and look the world without adjudging it. That will bring an end to our fears and anxieties. A kid is often told by his parents of a ghost, which penalizes a naughty child. The large-tree-behind ghost is so much assimilated into the child that he starts believing in the monster, it takes him courage, gathered in the next 10 – 12 years, to realize that it was just a mental image created by him. Once that perception is broken, he sees the tree as a God’s green gift for sustaining life and not as a monster home. It’s the environment, including surrounding situations, people, activities, which organizes some vague images in our mind. These situations when contemplated, even in subconscious mind, forms distinct thoughts, which are, then, taken up by us. Our beliefs and values become the links and this perception breaks the thin line to become conviction. All these steadily add up to shape our personality, our attitude and at times our faith and gradually our destiny. Whether perception is reality or not, depends on the inner strength of the person. Though it seems easy but it’s hard to persevere ones perception and it’s even tougher to break free your perception and enter into a world as it is meant to be.