No Self
Prologue:
Why not go in for an expanded version of the brief question… So I felt…..
Let me tell you a very small bed-time story. Only that, now we spend that bed-time in front of a Monitor, eyes wide open! So, the timing is still perfect.
Once upon a time, there was a carpenter….. (my father told me during my kid days…)
Though not very poor, he managed a reasonable income, sufficient to nurture his large family. Being the only ‘earning’ member and also the head of the family, he had that moral responsibility to ensure reasonable care for the family.
He regularly used to tell his wife “Please make sure that children don’t become hunger-stricken”…
She was a very obedient and humble wife. She had great trust in the carpenter’s wisdom. She took his advice a bit ‘too literally’ and made sure that none of her children went hungry. As parents, they ate what ever was left over after the children finished dining.
Over a period of time, the carpenter and his wife started ‘thinning’ into lean health. The work load became too unbearable for the carpenter with lesser and lesser ‘fuel’ for health.
He eventually died.
With no bread-winner anymore, soon the family came to know what is poverty and hunger.
It was then, the poor wife realized what he had meant when he requested her “please ENSURE that children don’t become poverty-stricken” ! The carpenter was too modest a person, and felt embarrassed to ask for ‘full-stomach’ quota while dining. He instead chose to put it very mildly, when he said “ensure that children don’t BECOME hunger-stricken” (that is, eventually …)!
(Here, the small Story is over)
This is what happens when the “concept” of self-less-ness is not properly understood!
We have those legal ‘entities’ as iconic examples. Big companies, joint-stock companies which look like a very big “SELF” without any tangible human form! We are taught to share a bit of that company, serve that company, asked to remain loyal to that company, defend, represent, and what not! Yet, there is ‘no self’ in that company, the way we experience our “selves”! Take good care of that large company and it rewards the staff, the stake-holders, its customers, the country and everybody well! But try to thrust our own ‘well-being’ right into the heart of that company as a top-priority, and we have that huge 150 year-old company collapse(like L.. B…), triggering a Global-economic-meltdown!
Actually, for me at least it appears thus: managing that ‘self’ getting inflated too much is not that big a problem in the present day situation. We are centered around just the money, more than anything else. We forgot to respect knowledge, virtues, etc. There is hardly any jealousy when somebody becomes wise, knowledgeable, skilled etc unless that person is also “stinking-rich” …. !!So, it is a bit easy too, to just keep that ‘tab’ on money, or it’s getting too much into our head.
(End of prologue).
(This is what I had started off with, before I squeezed in that prologue, given above):
There is that virtue of selfishness too.
We people are often confused with these contradicting terms. There is also that ‘self-less-ness’ being extolled as a virtue.
Quite natural that somebody does ask its day-to-day use, lest one may miss the ‘practical’ utility, waiting(wasting) life-long for that clarity.
For me, it looked as simple as playing the ‘given’ role.
I wonder if our Malayalee friends had managed to look a bit deeper, when they so casually use these words to even respectfully address others as “ Ad-dheyham” (Aa = that, dheham = body, symbolizing in a deeper sense, the omnipresent spark of divinity, presently manifesting through “that” body !!!!!).
Psn (4th June, 2009)
http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090602043211AAijcqW
The question:
How does the concept of "no self" help us in our day to day lives?
My reply:
Aha..
When you say "concept", then we have to look a bit deeper.
'No self' helps us to recognise the 'inter-dependence' of human beings, mutually as also with everything around. Out of this understanding, we evolve, and then move towards a 'no-help-seeking' attitude. When people start giving out more than what they receive or 'expect' to receive, then this 'no-self' affords merging with everything around. It resolves most life-problems, especially those that we created like this economic meltdown, recession etc!
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