Pleasure and Pain

We have been going through a world of dissatisfied human beings, living in different continents. The unfortunate fact is that nobody knows the reasons for their dissatisfaction. They only know that they are not able to get satisfaction from the commodities they possess and the positions they hold. Still they try to accumulate more and more of commodities and positions. They simply forget the fact that satisfaction is a state of experience a person gets through one’s performance of actions. It is not the positions that leaves one pleasure or happiness or satisfaction but the performances of an individual holding such a position that gives him pleasure or happiness. The case is the same with commodities we possess. It is not the number of vehicles one possesses that gives him pleasure but the way he makes use of them that gives him satisfaction. A dissatisfied human being will always be trying to get more and more as a means to satisfy his need. Naturally the need develops into greed. The market economy creates human beings of a dissatisfied lot devoid of satisfaction. The dissatisfied mind always broods over intolerance. Greed and intolerance are the first cousins of market economy, which is being driven by the forces of maya. The world that is being driven by the forces of maya is technically known as ‘sansara’. The ‘Advaitha’ System is meant to help the individual cross over the ocean of sansara through the practise of self-regulation. There is no role for a market economy driven way of life in a world that is being regulated by the self-imposed discipline. What we lack now-a-days is the self-imposed discipline. The various systems of religion which are expected to inculcate a sense of self-regulation in the minds of individuals have proven their inability to do so. This is one of the reasons for the onslaught of market economy on the various aspects of human life. That is why it has been argued that even religions have become a product and process of market economy. This has to be encountered by the human souls over the world. No systems, including religion, can go on cherishing the market forces. It needs a self-regulation by individuals and systems. The efforts to take self regulation are the beginning of the attainment of wisdom. This has been termed as ‘jnana’ by the ‘Advaitha System’. ‘Jnana’ or wisdom can be attained only by exercising the power to discriminate between what is necessary and what is not. Necessary means necessary for the sustenance of one and all together because it is impossible to imagine the existence of a single individual alone in this world. The power of discrimination leads one to know how things can be shared with the rest. Things can be shared with the rest only if one thinks that the minimum that he fixes is enough for him. So the moment one starts self-regulation, one automatically tries to fix his minimum. The fixation of the minimum by oneself is contradictory to the philosophy of the market that always aims at the maximum.