Loyalty does not come easily to people in India. Is this too sweeping a statement? Perhaps not if you look at how we operate as a nation. Secrecy and playing to the orders of power is how we train ourselves to relate with people. The desire to "keep options open" is not necessarily a bad strategy, but when it becomes an excuse so we can avoid being truthful, then surely we compromise the character we should be building for ourselves.
In all that I do, I think it is always the smallest areas from where we need to begin. The family and the home become the best litmus tests of whether we are capable of delivering the ideals of philosophy that we preach. Closed doors of private spaces often hold the worst dirty linen that in fact actually needs to be washed with more open awareness so that it gets cleaned once in for all!
Every time we excuse our misconduct as mere mistakes we perpetuate the denial we live in to examine our philosophies with more clarity that allows us to make the necessary changes that address the root of our problems. It is no coincidence that public service sectors in India are so full of rot. This comes from the prevailing attitudes we knowingly cultivate that keep us from affiliating ourselves with what we know to be the right and honest position to take despite what the "prescriptive" may suggest. Because we know that the prescriptive is often altered by compromised standards. However the question then is that do we really care?
I continue to want to hold gratitude as an important factor within my life. It is good to teach oneself to reflect and to find where the light has shone on ones journey; and to acknowledge this with no reservations to oneself and to others. The chain of life is infinite and holds some links more vital than others. I know in my life which those links are, and I hold them as dearly precious at all times. In doing I learn more about who I am.
It is wonderful to be able to recognize the links, those who are worthy of trust and love.. We often commit errors of judgement in our relationships with others, sometimes we value too much, sometimes insufficiently, our expectations are very rarely met, the right balance rarely achieved.
ReplyDeleteGreat to be back with my comments,wondering if they are worth any appreciation; But as I had said before, the reward is this fantastic opportunity that has been given to me to express myself on your blogspace, for which I will always be grateful.
Last week was blood-giving day in my neighborhood. What could be more precious than this vital fluid without which life would end instantly? Though I was there at opening time, there was already a queue! Great to live in a society in which no part of the body has any mercantile value, be it a kidney or an eye!
ReplyDeleteOne has to admit that the hygenic conditions in which such donations are made are optimum...and this takes me to the fatal day of 1987 when my cousin died after donating blood via his college in mumbai...He would have been 48 this 17th May had he not succumbed to Hepatitis caused by an infected needle!
I hope sincerely that in India one can continue to donate blood without that inward fear that this kind act could cost you your life.
Today I went to the hospital to see my second cousin on her deathbed... After a battle of more than twenty years against that terrible enemy called cancer, she finally succumbed to it. As we all solemnly waited our turn to bid her farewell,(not more than 2 allowed at a time), one could not but be in awe at the way, with the use of morphine, all pain had been suppressed, so that the end was peaceful... In many countries patients are compelled to bear the unbearable due of lack of means or because of moral values...
ReplyDeleteIt is my wish that in every part of the globe, a dying man in gnawing, physical pain, should have the right to use any therapy which would allow him to prepare for the great journey in the best condition possible.