Having Progressive Psyche with Pleasure of Contentment

There are two philosophies of leading one's life. One says that a person must work for progress and on this path there is no need for him/her to stop. Currency coins of this philosophy are words like 'competition', 'dynamism', 'advancement', etc. Henceforth, we would be calling this way 'progressive philosophy'. Another lifestyle philosophy advocates developing a feeling of satisfaction with what has been achieved to enjoy life. Although, this seems to be the objective life is meant for, it is opposed by progressive philosophers on grounds of developing complacency, hence is counter-productive. We term this 'contentment philosophy'.

The contentment philosophy has been the hallmark of religious and spiritual preachers throughout human history, but for others only. They themselves have been found involved in amassing unlimited wealth, authority, luxuries, etc for themselves through doing business of virtual commodity of God. Although, these exhibitionist preachers seem to have massive following in common innocent people but none of the followers follows what is preached to him/her in his/her practices of real life. Hence, for the followers being faked like the preachers themselves, we keep them out of our preview through this discussion. Even then, the contentment philosophy doesn't lose its luster of bringing happiness to human faces.

In practice, we enjoy water when thirsty, rush to grab a meal when hungry, we stop taking these after our needs of these are satisfied, and feel contented. This doesn't mean that we would never again enjoy taking water, or rush for a meal. This is where and how the contentment philosophy is pursued by everyone even without any preacher or even being aware that we follow a philosophy day-in and day-out. We need no exhibitionism for it, it is purely instinctive in all forms of life. Even with this universal pursuance of contentment philosophy, we are not rejecting the progressive philosophy for its immense contribution to progress and development of human civilization.

Two above-said philosophies may be graphically depicted as shown below.

 

Two Philosophies of Life

From the above discussion, it appears that the two philosophies have their exclusive fields of application in human life, and these can't be mixed up. These two exclusive fields of life may be named as 'home' and 'work' using contentment philosophy and progressive philosophy, respectively. This is what I propose to counter here. Two philosophies may be made complementary to each other with accrued benefits of both for every individual.

Pause in between to Enjoy

The third philosophy as hybrid of the two outlined above is to have pauses in between progress efforts to enjoy gains of the progress already made. I would like to name this philosophy of life as 'Propause Philosophy', depicted in the diagram below.

Propause Philosophy of Life

Specific steps of pursuing this philosophy are -

Plan for making progress efforts with a fixed short-term and conveniently achievable target for reaching in the step,

Pause on reaching the target, review the progress made and enjoy until you feel rejuvenated for the next bout of efforts,

Plan for the next step of efforts with another specific target for achieving,

Continue the process of efforts and pauses mutually sandwiched, … …

With pursuance of this philosophy, it appears that time of pause goes waste during which some more progress would have been made, which is not the case in reality for three solid reasons. Firstly, the wholesome purpose of life, efforts, progress and achievements is to find happiness. Unless you have it through pauses, whole process of living remains a waste. Secondly, each pause rejuvenates the person to make efforts with higher efficiency for getting better results with lesser efforts, the the rate of progress at each step is enhanced, adequately compensating for the loss of time during the pause. Thirdly, every pause provides an opportunity for reviewing the past efforts and results thereof suggesting what might have gone wrong as a lesson for the future steps. This further improves performance. 

Process of Ageing

Time stamps a lasting impression of everyone's body and mind. In the first quarter of century, both grow and get enriched. Second quarter of century witnesses slower rate of growth of body coupled with higher rate of growth of mind. Third body growth is stagnated but growth of mind continues with enhanced rate. Fourth quarter of century finds the body maintaining status quo and the mind continuing to grow.

Ageing Process

Ideally speaking, the process continues and may cover a few centuries until the body begins to decay reaching the terminal stage some day as depicted above. It all depends on how an individual maintains his body and mind in healthy and active state with key being discipline in all aspects of life with rejuvenation in between through pauses as stated above. Human experience of Vaidic Era informs us human lifespan may go up to about 500 years.  

Considerations for Age Factor

With age of a person going above 50, steps of efforts and target need be designed with consideration of ageing on the body and mind. Firstly, the person must engage him/herself in more of intellectual activities coupled with reduction in physical exertions. Secondly, the steps of efforts and targets must be gradually reduced with aim at enjoying life, rather than destroying it with hard work.   

Worst-Governed and Most Corrupt State of India

Within 3 year rule of Yadava-Muslim junta government in Uttar Pradesh (U.P.) has become the most backward and the most corrupt State of Indian Union. People of the State were fed up with this government within one year of the government in office, hence they voted in large numbers to BJP lead by NaMo when an express promise to dismiss the corrupt and religion-based government was made by Modi's representative and election manager in U.P.. But after coming to power, not only the promise was forgotten, Modi extended his friendly relationship with the Yadava head of the government, and a personal relationship with Mulayam Singh Yadava, the seed of corruption in U.P. politics. Now, any official, person or organization can get any benefit from the government after paying commensurable money to politicians heading the government for which all rules are sacrificed.

Contradiction

While the present government of U.P. has raised salaries and allowances of State Legislators from INR 55,000 to INR 99,000 per month, pension provided by the same government to senior citizens is INR 300 per month. minimum wages for a regular government employee comes to about INR 30,000 per month while Planning Commission of the Nation has estimated that INR 28 per day is enough for survival of a family of common people. Can there be more Aristocratic rule than that is going on in India with the label of Democracy in the State of U.P. Since the Authorities have usurped all the powers in their hands to deal with the people in any way they like, the Autocracy can't be fought out by the suffering people under legal framework of the Nation. Unruly bloodshed of those in power seems to be the only option available to people to correct the situation.

Electricity Supply Administration

Chief Minister of the State is also the Minister Incharge of Energy Department, and is credited to make it the mst corrupt and the lmost deficient in in supplying electricity to people of the State, except to constituencies of Yadava family members and some Muslim dominated areas of the State. For all others, particularly to rural areas, the supply is often in minutes. While the officially declared roster is for 12 hours a day, the average supply duration remains 5/6 hours a day, with the rest diverted to sponsored thefts of electricity for apparent personal gains of officials and administrators of electricity distribution management. Here is an example - Electricity supply during night of 11/04/2015 had been for about 30 minutes to the Author's village Khandoi, for 20 minutes during daytime of 12/04/2015, and for 10 minutes during night of 12/04/2015 up to 6 am time of writing these lines.  A complaint was sent to Helpline and MD of the Discom, but with no results. This reminds me of days of Mayavati rule in U.P. when every complaint used to create a flutter in the officialdom concerned. Yadavas have no regard to public grievances.

Politics of Vote

India's distorted Democracy based on victory of maximum votes rather than real Democracy based on victory of majority votes, usually a political party gets elected to power with support of about 30 percent of the population. Yadavas got elected to power last time with votes of Muslims, Yadavas and some related classes only, and they plan to return to power in the next election too with the same support. For this, their concern is limited to Muslim and Yadava voters only for whom they are doing everything under their control - even with use of all sorts of unfair and mean means. All State funds are being provided to these communities only to retain their support with total neglect of the rest of the population of the State. All public resources of the State are being directed to legislative constituencies dominated by Muslims or Yadavas with a single point program of retaining their support. As a result, about 70 percent population  of the State is miserably suffering under the present government in U.P. State.

Triple-Attributive Human Nature

Swastika

We learn from Vaidic scriptures that the Nature in its virgin form is balanced with two parts of goodness (Sattwa), one part of defensive spirit (Raja) against evils, and one part of destroying the evil forces (Tama). With this balance, everything remains calm, quiet and in order for the evil forces remaining fully controlled and goodness prevailing the environment. This applies to every society or any other naturally-evolved system. Same balance is present in personality of a newly born baby working fully under control of his/her natural instincts for survival and growth.

Then come formal and informal education into play, with grasped part of it by an individual called his/her intuition. Major parts of both the education and the intuition being artificially maneuvered by seniors of the person may be right or wrong, having one or more of the above-said trio of attributes deficient or in excess. Hence the balance may not exist, causing disturbances one way or another, whether it is a social order or an individual's personality, or a medicinal material. The disturbance is the cause of all the motions.

Under balance of three attributes, everything remains calm and quiet, materials remain non-reactive, society peaceful, and individuals just survive through procreation. The situation is what is often called the Nature (Prakriti).

Humanity moved differently from keeping the natural balance through gradual evolution of individual intellect and social civilization to add comforts and conveniences to human life - for producing more results with less effort. With every individual trying to find more comforts and conveniences, they began competing with each other, leading to exploitation of less resourceful by those becoming more resourceful. This added more distortions to human education systems, hence more disturbed individual intuitions. In the din of disturbances, the balance of three attributes was forgotten.

Female and Male

Every individual being has attributes of both male and female. A person is commonly known to be a male or a female based on what attribute dominates in his/her body. But what we mean here by male and female are the basic attributes constituting a persona. Female attribute is the procreative force (Prakriti) attained through balance of three attributes of goodness, defense (of the self) and destruction (of the enemy). For this balance, the female attribute is not active, hence needs external support for protection of the self.

In contrast with female, the maleness has an unbalance of the three attributes of goodness, defense and destruction, with one or more attribute dominating the personality. This imbalance eliminates his procreative capability, and makes the person active, and principally work as procreator through the procreative female. Thus, the male can't procreate by himself but needs a female body as medium of procreation. Conversely, the female can't procreate without the active male. This mutual dependence of male and female attributes for procreation makes the two complementary to each other. In-spite of complementation, the male attribute is always an active ingredient while the female attribute is its passive complement. This also supports my earlier derivation 'whyhumanity is male-dominated'.

Genesis of Attribute Thesis

The above-said three-attribute thesis was framed during Vaidic Era through study of 4 female personalities of those days - Swastika, Seetaa, Lakshmee and Saraswati, wives of four sons of Purooravaa of Deva race - Brahmaa, Raama, Vishnu and Lakshmana, respectively, the founder of the first Nation on the Earth on Indian subcontinent. Until that time, only city states existed. Brahmaa was not only the seniormost but most innovative theorist and scientific thinker. With unprecedented development of the Nation, many wild races came to land with malicious intentions of establishing their political domination on the land and people for their exploitation. Four prominent of these wild races were Yadu, Asura, Dravida and Yavan forming a junta against the Deva race. Their leaders killed Brahmaa. This raised a thunderous revolution in minds of Deva race people for getting prepared for defense of the self and destroying the enemy, as only their goodness was not enough for moving on their mission.

Lakshmee

While Seetaa and Saraswati took charge of Goodness attribute (Sattwam), Swastika took charge of Defense attribute (Raja) with form of Durgaa, and mighty Lakshmee took charge of destroying the enemies with form of Kaali. With this organizational setup, they continued on the path of development with crowning of Chandra Gupta Maurya as the Emperor of Indian Nation. Thus, the three-attribute thesis was established and materialized. 

  

An eBook Relevant to Each of You

The Self of a person is neither his/her body nor his/her mind, neither his/her physical health nor his/her mental health, neither his/her intrinsic characteristics nor his/her extrinsic conduct, but a sum total of all such things forcing him/her to think and lead his/her life maintaining his/her social relationships. Thus, 'The self' is the overall constitution of the person under consideration. It is even more individualistic than the person appears to be for the external world for each of the constituents of the self is individualistic too. If we want to pinpoint one thing that is the closest to the self is the individuality of the person that isolates him/her from all others yet makes him/her part of the society and environment surrounding him/her.

Psychology is the study of a human-being the way he/she thinks and relates him/herself with the external world through his/her speech and actions. Thinking of a person is most often different from his/her conduct, but still depending on it. This proves that the person intentionally creates this difference between this thoughts, words and actions. The psychology takes care of this fact of human life and incorporates in itself reasons of this differentiation.

This makes 'Psychology of the Self' a study of the wholesomeness of a person, leaving nothing to be discovered, to be developed, or to be deployed. Hence the study has to be vast, exhaustive and detailed and go through the minutest information on the person. This is possible only when an individual is specifically studied. Therefore, the eBook 'Psychology of The Self' doesn't deal with the specific information of any individual but paves way for reaching that information when the concepts provided in the volume are applied to a specific individual.

Such a vast study can't be carried out or written about in specific time-frame but goes on for a long period with new frontiers coming to light. The Author had been working on this project for 14 years and writing articles every now-and-then. The eBook is the collection of such articles of the Author written by him on the subject.