Thread by @mmpandit

A small thread on what constitutes living in Dharma in the context of today’s existence and what may happen to the Hindu way of life.

The world we live in is extremely fast paced.
If you look at 100 years ago, life in the villages was almost standing at a similar point it was for the last 1000 years and maybe even more.
In the last 30-40 years, Hindu way of life has almost changed to a point of no return.

If you look at India, there was remoteness in quite a few places in India which were uninhabited, where people would go and do meditative practices and never be disturbed for 40/50 years.
In Pune, jungle started near Aundh. Today that’s totally overrun with people.

Let’s go further and see what globalisation meant for India. (Lot is good, a lot is not)
Eg: Letters were a fantastic means of personal communication... you needed to think and write words deliberately... pen to paper made it deep and personal... that is gone.+

+ now, I see people literally abuse each other in texts... and they don’t even know why they are abusing someone. This is the impersonality of the keyboard.. pen to paper is gone... no thinking remains. It’s instant, it’s fast but a lot of it has very little deep meaning.

People wrote some magnificent books and their readers took the time to understand them and spent time understanding what those magical words meant. Now, even if a good book is written, very few spend time trying to understand it because too many things impede their concentration.

The enjoyment of solitude is now limited.. neither the external solitude is possible because there are very few areas like that, plus for internal solitude .......you must take time out for internal contentment and contemplation.
All very good but what has this to do with Dharma?

You see, everything is to do with Dharma. Dharma starts with restraint... restraint in thoughts, in words and in deeds. But for that restraint you need solitude and contentment.
And where will any of that come from if your mind is continuously reacting to outside stimuli?

People with reactive deeds do very little in life. (Maybe destructive but eventually it destroys them)
Every action needs a Dharmic input and where will that come from of one knows not what Dharma is?

Look at that Acharya who has spent 12 years learning Vedas. He will come to be 24 years of age and be abused left right and centre by people who have ZERO idea of anything.
The poor guy will tremble before them and fold hands. They will make fun of him..

It is said that one should live with reality or reality will come to live with you.
This is the situation of those learned people ... neither will a woman marry them nor will anybody understand them (because to understand Vidya one needs focus which nobody has)...

Some chutiya will make make fun of that learned person on the road.. the soles of that person’s feet will be having blisters and his throat parched with thirst and his ears full of the abuses he has heard from people, the stomach with no food.
Dharma?

In 40-50 years, there will be very few people to manage the places of worship and if the rituals are not performed by those sort of people with the right Vidya, what will happen to Dharma?
Dharma?

We talk a lot of Kaliyuga and that it will bring a loss of Dharma. I am afraid that the progressive loss of knowledge is now so deep that in 50 years, many people themselves will have very little idea about what Dharma is.

People are taught that Brahmacharya is stupidity... let me tell you clearly that 99% of the time, without Brahmacharya, shraddha alone will have very little meaning. The whole of spirituality stands between Yama/Niyama and Ishwara Pranidhana.
Take one away and the other goes.