Neev Community for Self Inquiry & Sustainability
People who get sensitive to the problems of the world often try to resolve the world problems by systemic interventions like politics, social entrepreneurship, environmentalism or religion. In this response to a question, I ask whether any system can resolve human conflict, or one has to go deeper and understand the very nature of thought which invents these systems.
We all live with the shadow of different fears. We invent a dozen strategies to suppress this fear, overcome it or to deny it. Yet it is there. In this response to a question, I go into the root of psychological fear and ask whether one can live life without a trace of this fear.
Society is all about competition and success. Since childhood we are schooled to achieve status, power, wealth and fame. My response to this question looks into this whole ethic of toughness society cultivates in us and whether it has any real value or virtue.
Why is it so challenging to know yourself? It is certainly a challenge to know oneself, perhaps the rarest things that human beings do. Since childhood we are trained by our parents, schools, society, religions and politicians to follow. We are never encouraged to question. Questioning is considered a threat to the authority of all […]
Is it important to identify yourself with any particular thing or image? Let’s look at the larger question: do we ‘need’ to identify our self with anything at all? So it’s not about it being important or unimportant but to understand this whole business of identification. We identify with any one or anything for security […]
Do you ever think about how you think? This is an interesting question. I would like to ask the question, is anyone thinking differently? Or is the thought of humanity the same? Technologically, man may be thinking differently from what he was thinking in the past. There is an increase in knowledge in different sciences, […]
How tough it was for you to achieve inner peace? This question assumes that one is trying to achieve anything? One is not trying to achieve anything because one has seen that trying to achieve anything, whether it is peace or money, brings about conflict in oneself. Let’s try to understand the whole movement of […]
Did you ever try to walk the path of Brahmacharya? How successful were you at it? What caused your failure or success? Why should I walk the path of Brahmacharya? Do I want to achieve something? What is it that I want to achieve? Some state of enlightenment? How is trying to achieve enlightenment something […]
What are the shortcomings that you perceived about yourself, and how did they restrict your strengths? Both, what you perceive as your shortcomings and your strengths are respective to a certain standard you have in mind. So instead of looking at shortcomings and strengths, let us look at how we come to create such standards […]
At which stages in your life did you start questioning your own self? Depends upon how you are asking this question. Are you talking about questioning yourself negatively, as someone who is failing in some aspect of life or are you asking this question more as an inquiry into yourself, as to who you actually […]
What is the best way to get self-feedback? Your relationships are the best way to get self feedback. By relationships I mean, relationship to your work, to things, to people and to ideas. Your relationships will show conflict in different forms. All your feelings arise in relationship. You feel fear, desire, anger, hurt, pride, failure…..all […]
How do I keep my intellectual growth constant? We stop growing in our learning because our brain loses energy. The modern life is very complex and demanding. We have no time for leisure, and without leisure the brain gets exhausted. It gets no time to rejuvenate ourselves. We are constantly running on this treadmill of […]
What makes you think that you have it all figured out? This is an interesting question. Let’s look at the question itself. Let’s try to “figure out” the question itself. The biggest thing that needs clarification in this question is the smallest word “it”. What do you mean by “it”? Is it life, some subject, […]
How exactly do you avoid fooling yourself? Fooling oneself happens whenever we follow anyone. This anyone could be your parents, your teachers, your friends, a political system, a nation or a religion. Because whenever you follow someone you give that person authority to decide what is life for you. But as you can see, to […]
What is love? Can love be defined as “it is this”? Can there be love when there is hurt, possessiveness, anger, jealousy, competition etc? A look at some of these questions in a dialogue
Neev Community for Self Inquiry & Sustainability