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Tag: selflessness

Baby time

A lot of babies nowadays are raised not by their parents, but by their nannies.

Whether it’s feeding the baby, cleaning the baby, changing diapers, clothing the baby, carrying the baby, burping the baby, talking with the baby – you name it, and it’s done by the nannies.

The rationale is of course sound – couples in nuclear families have to manage the house and their office work. How can they possibly get time to fit a baby in as well?

Nannies get baby duties, while the parents continue to enjoy their favorite pastimes, whether sports, TV shows, movie outings, friend outings, eat outs, music concerts and a variety of other events. “We are still young. If not now, then when?”

Spending time with the baby is most critical during its first few years. If time is an issue, then why have a baby in the first place? As a wise elder in my family remarked, raising children is all about one and only one thing – Sacrifice. The parents would need to sacrifice their lives for the future of their kids. And when done well, when the sacrifice is out of love rather than lack of alternative, it earns the highest blessing.

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Tough times

There are times when it might seem like everything is going against us. It is good to take on any adversity head-on though with this one thought that occurs to only the most spiritual of beings – “Thank you God/Universe for putting me in this position rather than anyone else. Because at least I will be able to bear this situation and it’s consequences, while those around me if subjected to the very same thing, may not survive.”

At other times, those close to you might be going through a tough time. This could be deep rooted karmic retribution at play. Who can really tell, except perhaps those who have truly Realized? In any case, it might seem like there is nothing we can do to help alleviate the pain. At least physically, yes.

But mentally, and emotionally? We can do many things. One, paramount, is prayer. A wonderful opportunity to not just pray, but pray for someone other than always selfishly for ourselves!

There’s a brilliant video I came across recently. A barber got to know that his client was diagnosed with cancer. The client’s hair had begun falling, thanks to chemotherapy. As the client begins to get his head shaved, the barber intermittently shaves his own head too. What a lovely way to show that he cares! The client is moved to tears.

The tag at the end of the video sums it up beautifully. “That’s not your barber anymore, that’s your brother.”

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Praying for

Vedic Astrology is considered a perfect science, even though the astrologers themselves may be far from perfect. My limited experiments in this unbelievably vast field have taught me an important thing.

Whenever I learn a new concept, I try to apply it to my own chart. Why? Because I know my own life history the best – and will be able to figure out whether what I’ve learnt actually works, or whether it needs further tweaking.

What is interesting though, is when it comes to predictions for myself, my report card is abysmal. This despite attempts at birth time rectification, using conditional dashas, various varga chakras and what not. However if I’m doing this to help someone else, without expecting anything in return, purely to alleviate their misery even in some minor way if at all possible, then I’ve realized that often even the exact birth time or other granular details are not required.

Thinking about this more deeply, I realize that it is no different from praying. When I pray for myself, the prayer may or may not work. It’s hard to tell. Maybe it has to do with selfishness. I’m always asking for more and more for myself, without even knowing or caring what might really be good for me, or what the consequences might be, of the things I’m asking for.

But when the prayer is for the benefit of others, for mankind, for all the good kind selfless but suffering souls around me, the prayers seem to get answered much more convincingly. This gives me 110% conviction in my Guru’s idea of always praying for others. This is genius – not just materially, but spiritually too. Because it helps rid us of our ego. Instead of focusing on ourselves alone, we can focus on others. E-go to e-gone.

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