21 December 2001, 12:05am IST
Siddhartha Singh Thakur.
We seldom think about the fundamental questions of life. we have been conditioned in a way that we do not realise the importance of comprehending certain truths, vital to human existence. an individual fails to grasp the significance of primary factors that govern human behaviour. the philosopher j krishnamurti said all human actions emerging from an unaware state of mind is governed by fear. it is the manifestation of an unaware state of consciousness. according to him, this awareness is the actual understanding of all mental and physical processes, conditioning, formulations and responses. how will we gain a truer understanding of the complexities of life? our education system has failed to inculcate in us the ability to ponder over such issues. it has failed to educate and enlighten us in the true sense. the education mechanism which is widely followed accentuates and propagates deep-seated primal conditioning. it does not encourage initiative in an individual. true initiative helps an individual to be free from imitation. an individual imitates others because he or she is afraid of standing apart from the crowd. such an education system breeds insecurity and fear. this fear has many manifestations. it seeks expression in violence and rapaciousness, lust and avarice, intolerance and narrow-mindedness. it is necessary for us to free ourselves from fear. fear smothers intelligence and sensitivity. first, fear has to be understood and then uprooted. mere accumulation of knowledge must not be the purpose of an individual seeking education. borrowed knowledge fails to provide answers to the most significant questions. this knowledge may have a functional utility but it is of no importance to human existence. one must possess the ability to think and find answers. this is the sign of true intelligence. this civilisation is facing a crisis of unprecedented proportion. this crisis has actually emanated from the suffering that each individual on this planet is undergoing. the mitigation of this suffering can begin solely on an individual level. however, we have been conditioned to think in larger terms. we see ourselves as components of larger groups such as societies, religions and nations. the individual has been subsumed into a larger mass. it is believed that there is safety in numbers. a crowd has a certain collective consciousness. it acts instinctively and this guiding instinct is always archetypal and primal in nature. every individual has fear gnawing at his or her heart. this vulnerability accentuates the need for self-preservation. it is precisely this that makes individuals seek solace and security in organised religions and creeds and nations. this all-pervasive fear propagates the formation of social coalitions. this fear is the source and the cause of all violence. the primary purpose of education is to free an individual from fear so that he or she becomes truly sensitive. freedom from the bondages of conditioning and deep-seated primeval instincts must be the endeavour of life. the effort to see fear for what it is must come from an individual. any attempt to seek solutions through political, economic or any other means is bound to fail. these ad hoc solutions fail to reach the roots of a problem. rather, they aggravate the maladies they propose to cure. a deeper understanding of these complexities is possible when the mind is completely free from ideas because ideas distort reality. the elimination of fear is the first step towards the truth. if this civilisation is to survive then all illusions have to be eliminated. existentialists like jean paul sartre and albert camus asserted that an individual leads a meaningless existence in an absurd and useless universe. each man is responsible for and is the sole judge of his own actions. sartre said that each human being is in a way free to choose his or her own raison d’etre or justification of existence. all self-aware individuals have the ability to grasp their existence and freedom and they must not allow their choices to be constrained by anything, not even by reason or morality. a human being can attain true happiness merely through true awareness. the human being is programmed by society to be unhappy. the desire, ambition and inability to accept the truth is the real cause of all sorrow. one of this century’s greatest masters osho or bhagwan rajneesh said we have been conditioned to think that happiness can be attained. the truth is, that happiness is our very nature.
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