How to be composed when there is unrest around you?
In search of the truth.
As a child, when I went out to play and hang out with a couple of friends, we would establish certain rules for the game; Who would play first? Who would play next? and so on, decided by everyone as fair. At times when the framed rules wouldn’t be in favour of the majority, it was questioned and changed right away. The rules were flexible enough to get amended as long as the majority of the members were satisfied.
Today as an older and mature individual I have come to notice that the fabric woven by society is much more complicated, the culture and rules are based on beliefs rooted way back in time, most of which are baseless and fabricated for the community’s benefit.
I see riots and agitation based on beliefs that erupt and destroy the existing harmony and peace.
If only people could question their beliefs and turn the source of these thoughts into newer belief systems. If only people had the will to change for the better, the world will become a better place.
I understand how difficult it can be as every individual’s action is what he or she believes and one’s character is framed based on these beliefs. Our brain is not wired to self inflict pain and therefore we do not expose our beliefs and thoughts for open criticism.
The very notion of upbringing a culture to keep a community happy and satisfied is scary. When communities of different belief systems clash, conflicts arise and their very foundational beliefs wreck them.
My Journey so far in search of the truth has made me realise quite a few things, which I’m elaborating through these examples.
- The tastebuds sense a variety of flavours to help us feel the entire essence of the food. Imagine we never used these tastebuds! Let’s say we miss out on sweetness, then we would be devoid of all the sweet delicacies nature has to offer us.
- Our body houses many chemicals. Different chemicals are secreted to sense and perceive different experiences. For instance, a feeling of anger when another person inflicts pain, the joy when you see your beliefs reshaping and strengthening, the fear of losing someone or something you care for, the feeling of love towards someone who is an integral part of your life. How can one live a life devoid of any one of these emotions? Wouldn’t that be unfair?
For an individual to feel complete, it is important to have all these emotions. The proportion and frequency in which these emotions are experienced are what define the character.
The notion of ‘one should be happy’ fabricated by our society and our world is the cause of unrest as everyone approaches happiness through different means, each of which will ultimately clash with another.
We must learn to accept emotions as a way to perceive the things that happen around us, a way to understand how our individual beliefs and rules correspond with each other and if possible change them for the better!
