Many people will pledge many things around this time.
Some will keep them. Some will not.
Like, losing weight, and stuff.
I do not want to start the New Year with any promises that I won’t be able to keep.
This is a hard choice. This is not easy for me. My ego has always been a baggage for me. Recently, I’ve noticed that it’s become a major burden.
I want to shed it. I want to get rid of it.
Ego is not pride. Pride is something different. Pride gives you a reason to live. Pride gives you an identity. Pride keeps you with your history and heritage. Pride attaches you with your genes, your traditions, your religion, your belief system, your ideology. Pride helps you to love the people you want to love.
But really, ego does not give you anything. If you think of it, it is almost unreal. It is fake. Ego is not synonymous with pride. The more ego you have, the more unproductive you become. Because you’re running after the shadows of ego all the time, when it is just that: shadows. The shadows do not have a real face. They do not own a substance.
I love my prides. Pride is my birthplace Calcutta. Pride is my root in Bengaliness, and in my Indianness. Pride is my accomplishments from an impoverished childhood to a somewhat economically stable fifties. Pride is my Hinduism. Pride is my school years, my college years, my university years — both in India and in the U.S. Pride is my ability to wade through all the muck and morose, to live a more or less honest, upright, and greed-free life.
Ego, on the other hand, is truly meaningless. It’s baggage you can get rid of anytime, anywhere, free of charge. I’ll give you a simple, real-life example. Like, as if I’m driving on the correct lane at the correct speed, following all the rules and regulations, and then suddenly a rash driver flouts all the laws and ethics, and cuts in and almost hits me and speeds away, leaving me with this enormous urge to challenge him, and follow him at high speed and cut into his lane and throw verbal fist fights. It’s that element of my life that I do not need, and can easily part with. It does not give me any peace. In fact, all the egotistic acts I have done in my life — one after the other — have only made me more troubled and irked and irate inside.
Or, suppose, I desperately want to know how many readers hit my blog, or how many Facebook friends liked my updates. Meaningless…truly, absolutely meaningless. Ego…and nothing else.
I do not want Mr. Ego in my life. I am what I am, without him. I am no less than what I am, sans that vice. In fact, I am a much better and happier person, without him.
I know that my writing on this subject is not going to make the world ego-free. Those who have the maximum arrogance and show-off, like those rash drivers and corporate profiteers commuting on their helicopters across Wall Street will keep flaunting them one way or the other, and keep making the world more difficult to live.
But this promise is not to make the world a better place. This promise is to make my mind a better place. My peace is at stake because of those people. I do not want them to destroy my peace.
I want to pledge in 2015 that only I, and nobody else, can destroy my peace.
And an ego-less me will not let that happen.
Peace and Prosperity to All. It has been a wonderful, productive and blessed year.
Hope to keep in touch with all of you, and talk heart to heart, free of that ego.
“Om Tat Sat.” All that is the Truth.
Sincerely and Honestly,
Partha
Brooklyn, New York
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An Ego-less 2015
I also make no resolutions for the New Years, either. The habit of making plans, of criticizing, sanctioning and molding my life, is too much of a daily event for me.
The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers, wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less, we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families, more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense, more knowledge, but less judgment, more experts, yet more problems, more medicine, but less wellness.
We drink too much, spend too recklessly, laugh too little, drive too fast, get too angry, stay up too late, get up too tired, read too little, watch TV too much, and pray too seldom. We have multiplied our
possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.
We’ve learned how to make a living, but not a life. We’ve added years to life not life to years. We’ve been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet a new neighbor. We conquered outer space but not inner space. We’ve done larger things, but not better things.
We’ve cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul. We’ve conquered the atom, but not our prejudice. We write more, but learn less. We plan more, but accomplish less. We’ve learned to rush, but not to wait. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but we communicate less and less.
These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion, big men and small character, steep profits and shallow relationships. These are days of quick trips, disposable diapers, throwaway
morality, one night stands, overweight bodies, and pills that do everything from cheer, to quiet, to kill. It is a time when there is much in the showroom window and nothing in the stockroom. A time when technology can bring this letter to you, and a time when you can choose either to share this insight, or to just hit delete…
So for me just not the New Year but all Year around and for past two decades I spend some time with my loved ones, because they are not going to be around forever. I say a kind word to someone who looks up to you in awe, because that little person soon will grow up and leave my side. I give a warm hug to the one next to me or to a complete stranger, because that is the
only treasure you can give with your heart and it doesn’t cost a cent. I say, “I love you” to my loved ones and pretty much to everybody but most of all mean it. A kiss and an embrace will mend hurt when it comes from deep inside. I hold hands and cherish the moment for someday that person might not be there again. Give time to love, give time to speak! And give time to share the precious thoughts in your mind.
Please try that Partha da, it really works. We Indians are not very expressive to express our feelings either in romantic or emotional ways. Especially the ones, born, before 70’s.
I wish you and your family a fabulous 2015. And seriously hope to meet with you sometimes this coming year.
Cheer, happiness, love and to a strong friendship always …
~ Luna