The Superhuman Within!

Central Chronicle, Jan. 28,2010

                Many people died in the devastating earthquake in Haiti. The media report the toll to reach over two hundred thousand people losing their lives and a large number of people loosing their homes and families. But it is a great matter of inspiration that many were discovered alive under the debris even after a week. The rescue operations are still on. Just imagine a person who is not sure whether s/he will be rescued or not, yet incredible spirit of hope and entrenched will power to live, is not only worth noticing but a great inspiration for those who are easily disheartened with small difficulties in life. Their courage is to be greatly praised.

          There is nobody whose life is only bed of roses. Everybody, one or the other time, faces challenges and situations of trial and tribulations. There is sometime when one finds oneself in a condition where one feels totally vulnerable to the situations around. Things seem to move out of control. And yet, in spite of so much distressing state, we survive, we undergo it sincerily and come out of it successfully. There is something extraordinary within human beings that makes them different from other beings. This ‘extraordinary self’ expresses itself in various ordinary ways.

           Superman or superwoman is somebody we imagine, having extraordinary powers and abilities, but the fact is the special powers we attribute to these imaginary beings are actually possessed by us. Each one of us has a superhuman within us. At times this superhuman surfaces according to the need of the situations. Sometimes we ourselves force it to come up and be active in us, and sometimes it comes up on its own. Sometimes even the environs around us make it to show itself.

            When one has strong will power great things can be achieved. What seems impossible can be turned into possible. Only thing is, one needs to convince oneself that what one wishes to achieve and the abilities required to achieve it, are already within oneself.

- B.Johnson Maria

Do Good to others

Why are we here?

Published in Central Chronicle Jan,19,2010
"Weekend" issue of Free Press, Indore Jan 24, 2010.

           Human life or whatever life on this planet is a gratuitous gift of God. Human beings owe more than any other creature to God as they have been granted the finest and the highest form of life as numinous beings. The Holy Bible says ‘God created human beings out of His free will and in His own image.’ The Vedas say ‘human life is attained only after going through about 84 million lives of other grades;’ even the gods long to be born as human beings on earth. The potential divinity in the human beings is universally accepted by all; or in other words, all believe in the presence of God within the human beings. Hence, it is meant to be lived as a noble life. Nothing can equal the worth of human life.

Now the question rises ‘how do we live a noble life, or how do we make the human life as meaningful one? The answer is: by doing noble things! The only way to find contentment and meaning in human life is to do good to others as much as one can. Do you know from the world history or even from the history of India, the persons who are remembered for doing good deeds? The history is filled with the examples of such noble people who lived this principle of doing good to others to their last inhalation. Some of the stirring examples of such people are Mother Teresa, Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and the list goes on. One thing is common in the lives of these great people ‘They lived for others.’ The real meaning of human life is to do good to others and be ready to lend a hand to others.

         Why one should do good to others? There is sufficient reason to live for oneself, one’s family and children etc. Is it not doing good to others and being of help to them? Just fulfilling your social obligation is not doing good. The good should be done to those who cannot reimburse the good done to them, and then only one receives the apt recompense for it. The Bhagvad Geeta says ‘do what is to be done, without expecting the fruit,’ in fact that is the true service.

          Mother Teresa never thought that by wiping the tears of millions of pitiable and suffering, she will be called ‘saint’ or she will turn into a great person. She did it only because she realized that God dwells in every person and she had to love that person for the same reason. The teachings of Swami Vivekananda were not meant for himself, but to teach the world to do good for others and comprehend the real worth of human life, and that’s why he has become ‘swami’ of many.

            One must become conscious that human life is not given again and again, hence to make this precious life meaningful, one should constantly aim to do good to others as much as one can because God dwells in all and because that is the purpose for which God has fashioned us out of His love.

                                                                                                                                                                     - B. Johnson Maria

Suicide is not the Solution!

Thinking of Suicide!
(Published in The Central Chronicle, Bhopal/Indore 13/01/2010
Weekend issue of Free Press, Jan.31,2010)

          It is said, “Man is the crown of creation,” which means that human beings are the best part of whole creation. We can measure the numerous heights, achieve great things and materialize our great dreams. Human beings have ‘reason’ that no other creatures have. We have memories and emotions; we have faculty of emotions that makes us the unique beings on the earth. However, all the capabilities and boundaries of human beings remain so far undiscovered. Nobody has so far set a limit that a man can do only so much. We have not yet learnt to use all the human faculties fully. Most part of the brain of an ordinary human being remains unused. We have powers that lie hidden and dormant within us.

          One of such wonderful faculties that we possess is our ability to re-live our past moments or live in advance the moments yet to come. We can feel the joy and feelings of same happiness as we had when there were moments of joy in our life but absent at present. We can re-collect all the joys and gladness and give ourselves an experience of same joy and happiness even when it is only a memory. We can also feel the joy of some incident yet to occur, just by mere imagination of such event. Such wonderful is our ability. On whatever we focus, that determines our inner state.

         It is also true with our negative feelings and emotions. We can experience constant pain, sorrow, and disturbance by just remembering our moments of trouble and agony. We can undergo pain and agony of something that hasn’t yet occurred. Inferiority complex is one example of such thinking and imagining in advance.

         In spite of being so superior and unique, there are times in one’s life that one forgets all the uniqueness that one possesses and situations force one to make a choice that should never ever be made in any circumstances. Due to momentary tension and depression, misunderstanding, failure, infidelity on the part of our loved ones etc. one decides to put an end to such beautiful human life. Alternatively, putting in other words, sometimes a person may become blind by some temporary forces that s/he decides to commit suicide. Very often, they do not realize the gravity of the choice they make. It is illegal and morally wrong. It is unacceptable.

             There is no human being in the world that has no problem at all. The only people who have total peace and serenity are the ones who lie in the tombs. Only because they have no life. At this point one may be reminded of the story of a woman who wanted her dead son to live and she was asked by Lord Buddha to fetch some grains from a house where there was no sorrow at all. The woman failed. The story teaches that pain and suffering, joys and happiness are but indivisible part of human life. At the same time, it fully depends on us as to how we choose to react to these. They are not above life; not even equally valuable to life. The life is much valuable than these few bundles of emotions and feelings. To get rid of our negative feelings we cannot trade with our life.

          On the contrary, one should remember that we are not machines or robots that we choose our emotions and reactions. When we are depressed, we calculate and choose the button to react. We are human beings and sometimes vulnerable to these emotions. One should never forget that it is very difficult sometimes to withstand the failures, the tension, the pain of the betrayal of the one whom we trusted most and had been faithful all the life. It is very difficult to live on when one is misunderstood by very own loved ones, when in spite of so much hard work and effort one meets with failure. Such moments make one to think that the very purpose of life is lost, it is of no use to make the life miserable simply and drag on, so why not to finish everything and retire to eternal rest, end the life itself. This is what a defeated person, who sees suicide as the best way to get rid of all troubles, thinks. Ending one’s life seems the best solution available to solve the toughest problems of life. However, such person, before committing the heinous act, must give a little thought to the following things:

• Before ending the life, just remember and recollect as from where you got this life? Is this life the result of the efforts of yours alone?

• Take such step only when you are 100 pc sure that there is nobody in the world who has no more sorrow, pain and suffering than you; when you are sure that you are the most unfortunate person in the whole world.

• Remember the persons whom you love most and just recollect the happiest moments spent with those persons. Also, remember the persons who love you most.

• Just give a little thought to the sincere smile of your parents who have brought you up from the very moment of your birth, even before birth. Remember the sacrifices they made to make you able and educating you.

• Remember some of the people who attempted to commit suicide but could not succeed and what happened afterwards?

• Even you decide to end your life, just imagine the pain your body will have when it has to part with life untimely and unnaturally. The pain your lungs will undergo when they are deprived of oxygen, the pain your neck will have when it is broken in case you hang yourself.

• If you shoot yourself or destroy by some other means, just imagine how much blood will be spilled all around, who will like to clean that blood? Would you like your body of which you took care so well, lies uncovered before the public?

• Remember the people who are related with you. How much agony and mental torture they will undergo when they are asked hundreds of questions by the police and various people after the suicide?

• Would you like people talk hundreds of things about you, which are not true, and you cannot prove them wrong because you will be dead and gone.

• Above all remember the fact that if you channelize your grief and give a different direction to your life, you can make the world a little more beautiful place to live. You feel your life is of no use to you, than can it be of no use to others? There are people who changed their life for others and did wonders.

• Can you use your life for the good of others?

• Remember that there is always somebody who loves you, who needs you; you just need to discover that person.

          Human life is most valuable and most unique, it’s free gift of God and we have no right in any case to reject this gratuitous gift. Nobody can presume that by taking such step like suicide, one can please others, or God or even him/herself. Ending life is not the solution to problems but facing them courageously certainly is.

                                                                             

                                                                   - B. Johnson Maria

What happens when we forgive others?

Why forgiveness?

(appeared in the Central Chronicle, Indore/Bhopal on 05, 01,2010)

           Human beings are multidimensional beings. We have social dimension that gives us the identity of beings that live in society; we have spiritual dimension that specifies our relationship with our creator – God; we also have psychological dimension that helps us to relate with ourselves as well as with others. Being in the society, we have to co-exist with each other and relate with each other. We cannot imagine a life totally independent of others. The food one eats, has reached to him/her with the help of many hands; the language one speaks, is not created by him/her, the clothes one wears are not one’s own creation. Putting it in a nut shell, one has to depend on others for a successful human life.

                Love is the only dynamic force that binds everybody together and that helps everyone to relate with each other in a meaningful manner. This love may be in different forms, viz. love of parents towards their children and vice versa, love of master towards servants and vice versa, love of God towards human beings and vice versa and so on. When this Love is missing from our life, our life becomes totally dry and meaningless. We find no satisfaction in life. The opposite of love is hatred, and hatred comes when we have something against somebody. When we do not forgive others we cannot live a peaceful life. Since we depend on each other, it is of utmost importance that we live with each other at peace.

               The attitude of unforgiveness brings lots of tensions and disturbances in one’s mental, spiritual and emotional life. When our heart is not at peace, we fall victim to many sicknesses. Many sicknesses are born because we are not at peace with others and consequently with ourselves. William Johnston, in his book Silent Music- the Science of Meditation, says “assuredly it is acknowledgement that up to eighty percent of modern sickness is psychosomatic in origin, or has a psychosomatic origin.” (Page 107). When we have no peace within, we are overcome by sickness, and peace within will be attained only when we treat others as we treat ourselves, when we have no grudge or anything evil against anybody, in other words, when we forgive those who offend us.

              It is very difficult to forgive someone who has hurt us, and it is still more difficult to ask forgiveness. When we forgive, we feel we are the losers, we are cowards; we are put down, but the fact is, when we ask forgiveness we not only become the winners but make others also winners. Suppose the other person is not ready to forgive, than you do it, you forgive the other person for not forgiving you. You will have peace, you will have well being, and you will find joy and happiness. Now it is time to begin to recollect whom you have to ask pardon and whom you need to forgive.

- B. Johnson Maria