Note:
This post came about from effects of a discussion on FB about ongoing changes in Indian governance by Narendra Modi.
Thanks to Jyoti R. Shah and Ravindra Nadkarni for sharing their views on the matter.
I thought it proper to only include my thoughts on the matter in this post as their views helped crystallize much of what I've written here.
This post came about from effects of a discussion on FB about ongoing changes in Indian governance by Narendra Modi.
Thanks to Jyoti R. Shah and Ravindra Nadkarni for sharing their views on the matter.
I thought it proper to only include my thoughts on the matter in this post as their views helped crystallize much of what I've written here.
Learned Helplessness : http://waynewu.wordpress.com/2009/02/08/learned-helplessness
“When elephant trainers in India catch a baby elephant, they tie one of its legs to a post with a rope.The baby elephant struggles and struggles but it can’t get free. For days the elephant pulls and strains at the rope. Gradually it learns that struggle is useless and it gives up.
When the elephant grows up, the trainer keeps it tied to the same rope in the same way.
And even though it can now break the rope and get away, it stands passively and waits for the trainer to come and get it.
It has developed what is called learned-helplessness.
It has learned that the struggle is useless as a result of repeated failure experiences earlier in life, the elephant has learned a self imposed limitation.”
This is an anecdote but today found that it IS a valid training/domesticating method used by Mahouts and Zoo-keepers : http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/7796/can-an-elephant-be-trained-to-be-lightly-leashed
The Elephant Boy:
Hasthyaayurvedam:Though this chaining method is crude it's used commonly, apparently there are more subtle and gentle ways to train elephants as per "Hasthyaayurvedam" (Elephant Ayurveda) but this may be a lost art now : namboothiri.com/articles/hasthyaayurvedam.htm
I remember reading a story book from Kerala called 'Chatu The Elephant Boy'.
It's about a Royal Mahout family that falls from grace when the King's dearest Elephant goes into Mushth and kills the Royal Mahout due to callous treatment by one of the assistant mahouts.
The normally kind and gentle elephant goes berserk and runs away into the forest. The Mahout's son/nephew Chatu vows to find the elephant and bring it and the Royal Mahout status bestowed by the King.
Chatu is aided in this impossible task by his grandmother and her hermit brother and the family's best kept scriptures on Elephants written in ancient Sanskrit.
The book truly delves deep into what an Elephant thinks and feels, what affects its moods and rhythms. How a good mahout must go beyond brute-control and become a true-friend to the elephant. It even talks about the use of marmas and herbs to help control and heal elephants. Ankushas then become merely ornamental or to be used in dire-situations as a mere touch or even glance is enough to direct the elephant. It becomes more of a partnership than master-slave relationship.
Chained Baby Elephants, Mind-Blocks, License Raj and Development :
Common man is the most powerful person who doesn't know his/her own power.
What the removal of red-tape, and setting up of good-governance does is to simply free the common-man from the chains of bureaucracy and unnecessary authority!!
Like the baby elephant who's been chained since childhood the concept of freedom and the fact that it is no longer small but a full grown elephant will take some time to sink in.
That is why young people who are not conditioned by years of repression do so well in taking advantage of changed circumstances. They simply do not have the mental-blocks and respond to changed conditions instantly and naturally.
Successful Indian children in US have 3 things that help :
1) Parents helping/egging them on
2) Resources to fulfill their potential.
3) And of course lack of mind-blocks/license-raj as in India.
Nature vs. Nurture:
US being an extremely 'individualistic' country doesn't believe in enforcing values on children. They must struggle to find their own way which is good if they manage to do so.
Indian parents however have very clear idea about what constitutes success. They ensure that the child will succeed whether it likes it or not.
An in-between path where parents are open-minded and have resources to evaluate and help children find their own path this will lead to successful as well as happy children.
If Indian society becomes more open from restrictions we may see such explosion in growth at individual and societal level here too.
Narendra Modi is the first Bharatiya Pradhaan Mantri born AFTER Independence from British Raj.
His Independence Day Speech 2014 was radically different from those of preceding PMs : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOwD2S3oHjU
The country is having the highest young demographic in the world. ALL these youngsters (including myself) are born AFTER independence. However India being a conservative country the transference of mind-blocks is quite high across generations. The lack of self-belief is passed down from generation to generation. However it gets watered down in each subsequent generation.
Especially the generation of tomorrow is growing up in a land of plenty compared to it's predecessors.
How will this affect the self-perception of a young nation wanting to achieve and succeed?!!
There is much to Hope for Bhaarat the evergreen land!! My motherland!!
A very well written blog. The part about Chatu, his grandmother and their family scriptures about elephants reminded me of a book by Shirley McLaine ( it is either Dancing in the Light or Dont' Fall of The Mountain) in which she has written about the closeness she has felt with elephants and how she could understand them and communicate with them.
ReplyDeleteThere is much truth in the fact that we are like the chained baby elephants who even when granted freedom are hesitant and in equipped to know our full potential, just like Hanuman who had to be reminded about his powers. Limitations are sometimes such a part of our psyche that it takes generations for their effect to get watered down as that has become part of our DNA. Generations that have had the good fortune to grow up in freer environments probably go there faster, but somewhere, sometimes they too feel curbed by an older generation that has to tread the domain of freedom more cautiously!! Wiping out the total effects of such limitations requires meditation and the use of affirmations to get thrown out of our systems. Man must hasten to find the worth of his "SELF' and learn to use it's unlimited powers and begin to trust in esoteric practices advocated by our scriptures and realized masters!!
Agree totally. Most of the time a sadhaka struggles and gets frustrated.
ReplyDeleteOver time I've come to realise that this is what is karma/niyati. When the time is ripe the things will fall into place - "Maali since sau ghada ritu aye phal hoy."
All the struggles will bear fruit or at the very least make one appreciate what one gets. No amount of struggle will help yet one knows that hard work will pay off sooner it later. Key is to realise and Stop struggling and start seeing it as a learning experience.
So idea is to keep coming back after each setback or break. To see if this time something yields to constant pressure.