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Making Life Meaningful : Birendra P Mishra

Dr.Birendra P Mishra, Kathmandu. I hold life instantly as a riddle. It may be debatable but its relevance can hardly be denied.  There are people to whom life in not an important subject to talk or debate about. What is important to them is how to live. However, there are people who think it proper to debate about life, as it may be the first or the last or one in the chain of lives. In the journey of life, it is difficult to know whether s/he leads life as per own will or as per the compulsions of a situation s/he is placed in. One has to choose one’s way of life carefully by defining his goal of life for leading his own life.. One, who is dependent on situations, surrenders himself to the external factors and leads his life mechanically.

Life is full of struggles. In other words, struggles mean life. Sometimes, even after hard struggles for achieving a goal, one fails in his attempts, and at times; one unexpectedly achieves some thing, without any proper efforts or even without his imagination to acquire it. The happenings of life have made me perplexed as I have failed in explaining those events, which I have not expected at all. The reader, with scientific temper, may not agree with me, but the mystery of life remains to be solved, as before.

Steve Jobs, former Founder and CEO of Apple Computer while delivering his commencement addressed on June12, 2005 at Stanford University, said, “Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards 10 years later. Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something–your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

I am lured to quote a part of his address, first, to establish a relation between philosophy and life. Steve Jobs, who died of cancer on October 5,2011(after six years of his address), had his own impression about his life that he shared with the young graduates through his address, reviewing the ups and downs of his life to arrive at the conclusion. Second, we cannot lead our life like an animal without taking care of our future based on our past experience and present situations. It forces us to formulate our own way of living based on the aim that we choose in course of our life.

Modes of life:

There are two ways in which we can view our life: common and academic. Ordinarily, every individual leads his life in accordance with the way he determines by his thinking or philosophy, which he develops in course of his life based on his own experience and his beliefs and conditions of life. There are academic philosophers, who develop their own principle (philosophy) based on their critical thinking in order to explain the world and live accordingly. Some of them live in accordance with the philosophy they have and some do not take the trouble to adopt it in their lives, as they treat it merely as an armchair thinking. Philosophical thinking, as a guided mental mechanism, is one of the ancient rational acquisitions of mankind. There seems to be no concrete achievements, as it does not provide any substantial material gain to them, who are busy in such speculations. Interestingly, there is no unanimity among thinkers about its origin. In the west, philosophical thinking is held to have originated out of curiosity and wonder, where as, in the east, it is commonly considered to be the product of actual need of life to get emancipation from sufferings, providing a mode of life. Thus, it is a rational interpretation of life on the one hand, and a path to lead one’s life, on the other.

Defining relations leads to science and philosophy:

It seems that approaches to life change with the development of mind and body. A child, after his birth, is not only surrounded by his mother and other members of his family, but also by other things including an environment in which he is being brought up. A child cannot realize his being or existence, although he lives or exists, because his self-consciousness is not duly developed to realize his existence. Here lies a contradiction between his being and his knowledge/consciousness of his being. His being has no knowledge and his knowledge has no existence for all practical purposes. The issue has both ontological and epistemological implications to be taken care of. At the earliest stage, he does not recognize any one but gradually starts recognizing his mother and other family members. He starts adjusting himself to the environment he has been placed in, for which he is not responsible. With his gradual mental development, he tries to identify himself, and starts defining his relations with other (living and unliving) things and conditions including his family members. In defining his family relations, he is generally guided by his needs, emotions and feelings. With his growth, he encounters many things and both natural and artificial conditions around him. While confronting them, he defines and determines his relations with them. At this stage, he is now conscious of his existence as to how these objects and conditions affect his very existence. He takes interest in them and starts knowing more about the things around. The curiosity and necessity both lead him to develop scientific mindset and reasoning capacity to have deeper studies in those subjects. Thus, sciences evolve and scientific studies grow.

 On the contrary, in dealing with his relations with family members, society, communities, religious groups and political alignments, he has to look within first and sets himself as to what he is for himself and for others. Ordinarily, he defines himself as a son of his parents, grandson of his grand parents having a proper name to be called and addressed by. When he gets maturity, goes further to define him and is vexed with questions like the purpose of his birth. His experience of suffering, pain and old age, ultimately prepare him to face his death from where he cannot return. These questions force him to define what actually he is? Is he the body he carries or his body is he? Is there something within him that is different from his body? What is inside his body that experiences pain and suffering? Or are these questions irrelevant to his curiosity or investigating mind? These questions lead him to think deeper and deeper in search of suitable and convincing answers. And these subject matters form the starting point of any philosophical speculation. Perhaps, in this context Lao Tzu rightly says, ”Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is enlightenment.” With the advancement of age he becomes both subject and object of the knowing process. Like an individual, human civilization too has developed gradually from the ritualistic stage to meeting the practical needs of society to exist and flourish.

Frailty of life:

Human life has evolved in course of millions of years. Plants too have evolved and their growth and decay are the natural conditions of plants. Similarly, Birth (life) and Death, which are the two natural phenomena of human life, are equally and invariably related to any living being including animals. Animal mind might feel the agony of life by way of facing challenging in meeting the needs of life, but cannot explain and express it in the way human beings can feel, grasp and express it. However, whatever explanations there might be, these have tormented human mind since humankind started thinking about life.  To explain a situation is to provide sufficient and appropriate reasons for it. Human mind gets bogged down as no logical ultimate explanation comes forward in explaining these two. Generally, an individual’s birth can be explained in terms of parents responsible for it and death can be explained by a state when the living being ceases to have consciousness. The biological sciences are engrossed in finding its final cause and have succeeded in furnishing some explanations. However, the ultimate cause of life and death remain indefinable, at least for the time being. Finally, their unexplainable nature makes life meaningless. There are several absurdities pointed out by many existentialist thinkers. The concepts of life and death are interdependent, as we cannot have the notion of death without an idea of life. Similarly, the concept of life has no relevance without any reference to death. As anything that has beginning must have an end, life and death are related to any finite being.

Life is like a road. It is already there. It is up to us to use it for roaming or with an objective or a mission to reach the goal or fulfill the mission of completing our morning walk or meeting our friend or whatever we decide for ourselves. Thus, in spite of the limitations we come across in life, we can lead our lives as per our wisdom based on well thought out plan to make our lives meaningful. We have no control over our lives, but we try our best to improve the condition of life. However, since it may be difficult for many of us dedicate our lives to the service of humanity, we can, at least, make our lives meaningful by making even one person smile for a while by caring for his need, which he does not expect from you. Human efforts should not be confined to the interest of human beings but should be broadened to save all living beings and the atmosphere in which we all breathe to survive. Hence, man should not be the measure of all things (Homo Mensura). He should own responsibility towards all being and all existences, living and non-living.

We can view our life either philosophically or ordinarily, as we lead it. To live is to act and to act is to choose and to choose is to create value. Creating value is to make life meaningful. Meaningfulness is not abstract; it is always related to some, other than the doer or to which it is meant for. To make life useful, it has to be used in the sense of betterment of at least one person or in the condition in which s/he is placed. To achieve the objective, it seems to be better to adopt the following three principles. First, do not put your interest in the forefront while taking any decision on the matters involved others including yourself. Secondly, treat every body as important as you are. No body is inferior or superior to you. Do not leave any thing to be done by others that you can do yourself. It entails that one should not use another as a means to attain any end, be it his own or others. Thirdly, try to make others smile even for a while by helping him unexpectedly. If he seeks or expects help from you, the help is limited to giving his smile. If one is helped unexpectedly, his pleasure or happiness is unlimited and his smile is unbounded. By making some one smile, even for a while, is like performing a Yajna, worshipping God and serving the humanity as a human being. Of course, attempting to relieve any one from pain and suffering is also equally important. It can relieve the aggrieved person from pain but it may not lead the person to smile.

Dr.Birendra P Mishra, former election commissioner of Nepal

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