Seethayascharitham Mahat:

While writing Ramayana Sage Valmiki has written as it is story of greatest saadhvi Seetha and it contains killing of Paulastya ie., Ravana. Seetha displays exemplary character and shows the way for women of the generations on how to carry one self. This writeup is just an effort to give a glimpse of it with the small little knowledge I have of Ramayana.

Scenario1: Seetha’s Marriage:

Like lot of us misunderstand Seetha’s marriage is not Svayamvara where she has chosen Rama to be her husband. It is King Janaka, Seetha’s father who has announced Seetha as Veeryasulk ie., to get Seetha’s hand as prize for being able to handle Siva’s bow. The moment Rama has done the feat, she is declared as wife of Rama. Rama may be superior prince at that time who is handsome, strong, educated, and rich but Valmiki writes down in Ramayana that Seetha did not love Rama for the above qualities. She just loved him because of only reason that he is her husband.

Scenario2: Rama’s journey to forests:

Seetha’s husband, Rama who is destined to become next king has been instructed to go to forests for long duration of 14 years and to lead life like a sage.

Aspect1: Seetha did not utter any word of displeasure to Rama when his cards are down and has relinquished thrown to travel to dangerous forests. It may be easy to love husband when he is having time of life but how many women do not utter a word of insult when husband’s chips are down? This is what she has to shown to the world on beahviour.

Aspect2: Rama was asked to leave to forest and he has recommended Seetha to stay in the kingdom until he returns. In the choice between struggles of forest and comforts of stayin in palace, Seetha chose the former to stick with her husband during tough times and give him comfort of her company.

Scenario3: Ravana’s torture:

Seetha was kept in Asoka vana and Ravana and his rakshasa guards kept torturing her with words regularly. She has a choice between keeping faith in Rama to comeback and succumb to persuations of Ravana. Ravana’s offer looks tempting to any ordinary women as he has promised her power, luxuries and sense gratification where as Rama’s comeback has lot of elements of doubt associated with like whether he will be able to locate where Seetha is, whether he will be able to gain victory over Rakshasas and their King Ravana. But Seetha showed extrodinary grit and refused Ravana asserting firm belief in her husband.

Scenario4: Hanuma’s offer:

When Seetha was frustrated by the torture being subjected by Ravana, she found relief in the form of Hanuma who has informed her that Rama is safe and will be coming in search of her. At this point in order to relieve her of the torture Hanuma gave her an offer that he will take her at once back to her husband. Seetha simply declined it citing many reasons like she might fall in sea while Hanuma was fighting Rakshasa’s or Hanuma might have to face lot Rakshasa’s challenges while taking her etc., But the major reson she cited was she does not want to touch any other Purusha apart from her husband while in full consciousness. Will there be any other women who in such situation decline the offer holding up pativrata Dharma?

Scenario5: Rama’s Dharma:

Seetha is the wife who has understood her husband Rama thoroughly and his Dharma Vrata. Two occasions Rama was and is continuously under criticism that he has made a mistake testing seetha’s chastity through Agni Pariksha and sending her to Valmiki Ashrama. But on both occasions too Seetha did not make Rama any blame as she knows Rama stands by Dharma and Dharma Sukhma is so difficult for other folks to comprehend. Seetha did not blame Rama on these two occasions or run for support to other people, instead she silently obeyed what her husband asked her to do.She did not question Rama's Dharma despite being at receiving end even though rest of the world questioned it.

Selfishness

Every one in the word has selfishness to some extent or other. Selfless people are very rare to find on this planet. Then what is the big deal about being selfish for a human?

The highest kind of people are the ones who are willing to sacrifice their selfish deals for higher morals or universal benefit or fellow beings. King Sibi who has torn himself into pieces to save life of a pigeon is an example of selfless individual. Similar is the case of King Ranthideva who parts with one meal that he gets after a gap of 48 days to satiate the hunger of poor beggar. Sage Dhadhichi also falls into similar for the way he sacrificed his life to give a weapon that can do universal benefit by helping Indra kill Rakshasa Vrutasura.

The average kind of people are the ones who help others after they, their families and near & dear have been looked after well. These are available in moderate mass in today’s context, These people do not go out of the way to help others but will try to help others based on convenience.

The worst kind of people are the ones who do not hesitate to ruin others life for selfish benefit of their own. They do not have even remorse that they screwed up life of other in order to get their selfish benefit and are available in today’s world in huge numbers.

Dhrutarastra

Some might be wondering why my attention suddenly turned from an ideal King Janaka to King Dhrutarastra. I can assure you up front I am no fan of Kauravas like some movie director who names his movies after them. Few reasons why I am choosing this topic is

a) Dhrutarastra as a parent is someone who can teach us how not to be
b) As mentioned in one discourse by Malladi Chandra Sekhara Sastry garu we see so many parents who resemble Dhrutarastra by nature.
c) As Galileo famously quoted “I have never met a person in my life who is so ignorant that I cannot a learn anything from him” Similarly to inspect one positive trait of Dhrutarastra


Dhrutarastra is a striking example for a person who lost all his sons because he failed to admonish/abandon one bad son. He is an example of how excessive love for kids and not curtailing their cruel deeds can lead to complete destruction.

1. Dhrutarastra is an example for inferior complex and jealousy for his younger brother. His jealousy started from the time when his younger brother was given the throne ahead of him for the natural disability he has got. Instead of understanding the practical realities, he developed jealousy towards his dharmic and obedient brother. The same jealousy he passed on to his off springs as well.

2. Dhrutarastra knows very well of the bad deeds his sons are committing under direction of Duryadhana towards Dharmic Pandavas. He failed to punish his son and curtail his bad agenda against Pandavas out of excessive love he had for Duryodhana. He failed to realize the long term perspective that for sake of one son, he is losing entire bunch of hundred sons.

3. Dhrutarastra showed wickedness towards Pandavas and deliberately on his own assent went on to create troubles for pandavas. Despite the fact that Pandavas especially Dharmaraj have treated him with fatherly affection, he wanted their downfall. He is an example of a snake who is nurtured by delicious milk will still went out poison. We see so many people like this in today’s world, who try to damage persons who have done a favor to them.

4. Dhrutarastra paid no deserving attention to good sayings from elders like Bhisma, Drona, Krupa, Vidura and Sanjaya. Had he not turned deaf ears to these people he would have stopped the calamity of total destruction that came in the form of Kurukshetra war. As Maricha told Ravana in Ramayana, “It is difficult to find person who says good things and the prson who listens to these good things” It hold good even today where for sake ego satisfaction, we turn deaf ears to good things wise and/or elderly people say and eventually bring up our own problems in the long run.

5. Only good thing I can tell about Dhrutarastra is that all through his deeds he knew very well that he is doing bad deeds. Also he does get neither defensive nor aggressive (like most of us) when questioned about these deeds. He also voluntarily seeks verbal battering from his friends like Vidura and Sanjaya to get some mental relief from papa karmas he is committing. This is unlike some of us who try to do justify our actions and resort to vitarka or kutarka (irrational justification)

Frustration

Am I living? Or Is life just passing by? I tried to ask myself. I had no evident answer with me. Every person has his or her own dreams in life that one would live to realize them. But what would a person do if the dream is cut short in the beginning itself with no mistake of his? What if a plain question like above finds no easy to digest answer to one?

Dreams surely are going to be multi and not every person would be able to realize all of them. Not difficult to comprehend. But there would be a most important dream, with out which one’s own purpose of existence becomes pointless. How to react when one has that dream shattered in front of his eyes by sins committed by others? To make the matter worst the rest of the dreams take a cascading effect and begin to fall apart in front of one’s eyes, how should one react?

Never before I had known that certain types of sins exist. Never before I had known that sinners, instead of feeling ashamed of their sinful acts try to pretend that sin it self does not exist or even worse it is no sin at all. Never had I any need to confront a situation where every right deed is being questioned for selfish motives. Never before I had felt so helpless in life that my life is nothing but over because I have no more say in my life and is being controlled by someone who has no right to claim any authority on my life.

Selfishness is all pervading in the world. But never I had any hint that people do not hesitate to spoil another innocent person’s life for making their life good. They do not even question themselves even once, do they deserve the life they want to create at the cost of other innocent man? Or does the innocent man really deserves the punishment they are forcefully enforcing? I is hard to comprehend that people show no remorse what so ever for the sin committed.

Is God really present? If He is, then what is the rationale for an innocent man to suffer for sins committed by people who have no basic ethics in life while unethical people go on to enjoy sensual pleasures in life? What logic does He present for the torture innocent person is put through for no direct mistake of his?

Ethics Series 5: Dharmo Rakshati Rakshitah

Literal meaning of the phrase is “one who protects Dharma in turn gets protected by Dharma”. But is this happening practically in the contemporary world? This is the question raised by quite a few. We see dharmic individuals exploited by crooked in many ways for the selfish benefit.

Before discussing the above question, lets first try to understand how to protect Dharma and what is Dharma? Dharma is the set of rules defined in Vedas and put forward in concrete/easily accessible manner by Smriti kartas. Dharma varies from person to person depending on the Varna and Ashrama, from place to place basis Desha(country), from time to time, and also on the role one performs. A person who is performing the role of son will have a certain rules/dharma defined where as same person performing the role of husband will have completely different set of rules. A person who is a king/leader will have different set of dharma in his position. It is a dharma for Brahmin to lead a pious life and perform duties like vedic chanting and sandhya vandanas where as a person of some other varna is allowed to lead a luxurious life. Brahmins were allowed to consume meat in satya yuga time where as such an act is disallowed in Kali yuga time.

The next question to answer is how do we protect Dharma? Vishnu sahasranama states “Aachara Prabhavo Dharma” meaning practice of Dharma in spirit is what makes it prosper and continue. Over the period of time our ancestors protected dharma by establishing customs/rituals, imbibing them in educational system and enforcing them in the family and society. Elderly people have taken responsibility of protecting the dharma by being stern when required for enforcement of dharma. It worked perfectly well until the young were exhibiting respectful behavior towards elders. Later things started fading away. In the current context, if one cannot follow dharma person can be excused, provided he/she does not corrupt another dharmic individual either in form of ridicule/putting trouble.

Coming back to original question of why we see people who follow dharma being exploited by crooked and corrupt people for the selfish benefit. But this is surely a scenario in the short term and if we progress a bit in long term in progression of time, we surely see the benefit for dharmic individual. A person who does injustice to a good individual is bound to face the consequence of the sinful deed but one will not know in what manner. In similar lines a dharmic individual might face some tests in life but would with stand test of time and get the reward eventually. There are example of dharmic individuals in history like Prahlada, Ambareesha in bhagavatam who have faced acid test and eventually to get protected by Dharma. Similarly there are examples of Adharmic people like Vali, Ravana, Duryadhana who hurted Dharmic individuals only to get punished for their sin. So it is enough to prove Dharmo Rakshati Rakshitah.

Ethics Series 4: Mano Vakkaya Karmalu

The thrikaranas mentioned in shastras are Manas (what one thinks), Vakku (what one speaks) and Karma (what one does). It is not unusual for humans to think some thing, say something else and do something completely different. That is what makes an individual ordinary. The real extraordinary people are those who have thrikarana sudhi, ie., all three karanas in agreement and in agreement with the righteousness. Of course the other extreme is the extreme wicked who also have all three karanas in agreement but in agreement with most wicked thing.

What it takes to have the thrikarana sudhi? Firstly one should have stark belief in the righteousness and virtue of righteousness. Then one should have strong hold on Manas which is pretty wavering material and always dragging individual towards mundane temptations and other wrong deeds. Then one should have courage to utter the right thing with out fear in front of any one in the world. Lastly one should have the will power to execute the right deed even if it has many thorns in the path.

Only those who have got the execution of the entirety of above process qualify for thrikarana sudhi. As one can easily see it does not come easily. First challenge is knowing what is right. We get easily carried away by emotions, circumstances, presumptions etc., and discard what is right and choose what is easy. Then comes challenge of convincing the manas/heart and directing it to think of good thoughts only. It is not an art that is easy to master. Many of us get carried away by mundane temptations. Also other aspect here is as there is no one who can witness what thinks, people don’t have fear factor on this aspect as one has on vakku and karma. They tend to ignore there is a sakshi called God. The challenges in attainment of vaksudhi is fear for what others feel or apprehension that others might get offended or scare that others might ridicule us for being non-contemporary. Also some people get carried away by emotion and utter all non-sense in that state. The execution of the act that is well thought and well spoken/promised gets most times hampered by the lack of will power. The action might require giving up time from enjoyment or going overboard facing hurdles. Many people usually shy away from coming out of comfort zone in doing the right karma.

Uttama purusha is the one who has conformity of thought, word and action. Madhyama purusha is the one who has good thought but fails in speaking it out or acting it out. Adhama purusha is the one who has bad thoughts and knows thatthey are bad butfails to control them. Adhamadhama purusha is the one who has bad thoughts but thinks and argues that they are right.

How to raise our Kids

Don’t get me wrong by thinking I have mastered the art by practicing it myself or I am a veteran. I have got no experience in parenting till date and like all learning we do in life for future benefit, I am also trying to observe the skill and now trying to put forward a blog summary of what I think.

1. A case for reforming oneself before putting a roadmap for the kid
The fundamental mistake most parents do is preaching what they don’t practice. This will never work in raising better kids for future. We need to preach/teach only what we believe and what we practice. Most parents create rules that will help in bright future of the kid, but I will say it is a job half done. As a parent first one needs to reform oneself and show the kid the way to live, else you cannot expect the kid to follow it. For example a smoking father tells the son to not to smoke, will the kid learn?

2. Lack of ambiguity among parents
Before teaching a kid good things, both the parents must sit together and agree up on “what good means”. This is necessary to ensure no conflicting message is passed to the kid. Otherwise one would end up with confused kids who do not understand what needs to be followed.

3. Spare the stick and spoil the kid
Out of superfluous love most parents spoil the kids and lead a miserable life. A case to prove it can be found in Mahabharata in the character of Dhrutarastra who lost all his sons because he could not control the unethical behavior of his one son Duryadhana. We find so many Dhrutarastras in real life if we observe closely.

4. No Comparisons please!!!
Understand that each kid is unique and there would be differences in skills, personalities and priorities. Healthy competition among kids might benefit them in some cases but undue comparisons will do them more harm than good.

5. Identify, Nurture and Encourage
As mentioned earlier each kid is unique. Identify the unique talent in the kid, provide avenues for nurturing those skills and encourage them to progress in those areas. It is ridiculous thinking to assume that there are only few professions that will help the kid’s future.

6. Support them during tough times
When they are down and out, support them. Sounds pretty obvious, isn’t it? In practice there can be challenges. When they fail, it can hurt parents also. In that state of hurt one needs to ensure we don’t translate the impact to the kid fully.