Collectivity versus Individuality
Throughout history, people have sought the divine entity in many different forms. Through many rites, rituals and practices, they have attempted to know the sublime. In many cultures throughout history, this relationship between the supreme and the individual was of the most primary importance. However, in today’s world that relationship, in most vaeshyan countries does not seem very important. Of course, there are religious individuals who consider it important but in the main media of the culture, you find the divine entity replaced with a god of material gain. If you buy the right toothpaste, own the right car, know the right people then you will be successful and happy. The happiness and success in life occur through material gain. When you have a family, you must have all these things or you are not providing well for your family. In this society, this sentiment is very dominant. Those who seek an individual personal relationship to the Great are ever fighting the cultural norms. They are ever in a clash with these dominant societal values. The battle is not simply outside of themselves but it becomes a battle inside of themselves as well. It becomes a battle between a part of you that wants more emphasis on a comfortable material life and a part of you that wants emphasis on spiritual development.
Those people who by grace and some favorable karma are in a place where material gain comes easily feel less strain in this direction. They get a brainwashing by society in continual commercials that urge them to buy, buy, and be happy. Meanwhile, the whole social network of the society has broken down as if attacked by a cancer. That cancer attacks the social fabric, the extended family, the nuclear family, all the fundamental emotional relationships and support systems for human beings. All have broken down. Grandma is old now; put her in a home. Who cares? Children are young; send them off somewhere. Who cares? Baby is crying. Put baby the other room and that way you won’t hear the crying. They will fall asleep eventually. Who cares? Who cares? Just focus on the bottom line. You need things to be happy, good televisions, radios, furniture, house and a fancy car. You must put all your time into this. There are institutions to take care of problems.
Naturally, everyone is living in terror because what happens when they become a problem, old, sick, a person who cannot win the game of material gain. Everyone must live in fear! Where is the collective? Where is the capacity to operate collectively? The spiritual people get together and how well can they operate collectively? The collective becomes secondary to the individual's personal gain. Why is this? Where have these values come from that do not foster the integrated cohesion of society? Have they not come from materialism? When there is this emphasis on the individual, emphasis goes to buy, buy and buy. Even though you are alone, if you have more, you will be doing better and better. The very fabric of the society has broken down. With developing technologies, the value of human relationships becomes secondary. Yes, I love my family. I love my parents and my friends but I need my job three-thousand away. I will fly back and forth to see you every now and then. The pull of money and status come first in the values in the culture.
Values of family, friendships and community are secondary and entire breakdowns occur. People are lonely and very vulnerable. When the time comes that they are not able to make the grade in terms of being a good worker in the society, they are very vulnerable. Everybody goes along just like it is happy party, but in their hearts they know, "One slip and I might not make the grade." Get sick and you might be one of those. Get old and you might be one of those. Then what will happen? You have to go to a nursing home. Everyone knows this but they cover it up and live their life in a happy way, enjoying wealth and prosperity. What happened to the relationship to the Great? Not only has that relationship broken down but the valuing of others has broken down too. The values of family, clan and community have broken down and even the nuclear family doesn’t look too healthy these days. So many breakups, marriages, single families, blended families, lonely people. What to do?
Society has lost its balance, its prama, its equanimity. It is off base because it is the end of the vaeshyan era. The vaeshyan mentality has dominated to the point where it has disrupted fundamental human needs. Human beings need clan and family, need to love each other, need to depend on each other, in interdependent, interwoven relationships. That is the strength of human society. This materialism has grown to a point where it is a cancer in the human society. It is a cancer in the western societies; and it is coming now into the eastern societies as well. They have adopted it in a hungry way, thinking, "They have something in the West we don’t have," and now in their hunger they adopt everything, swallowing it all, making it their own. What happens? They will also swallow the disease.
One cannot say it is merely western culture now. Around the world, materialism is reaching its ultimate end and growing as a cancer in the human society. What to do when society is out of balance and populations are growing? What is the next age after the vaeshyan age?
Q. Kshattriyan age.
A: Yes. How does that come about?
Q. Shudra revolution.
A. Yes. What is shudra revolution?
Q. Shudra revolution takes place when classes exploited in the vaeshyan age rebel against vaeshyan dominance in a forceful way to break the vaeshyan grip on leadership, primarily of kshattriyan elements.
A. Yes. Who is most suppressed?
Q. The vikshubdha shudras. They are vipras and kshattriyas, primarily vipras, who are highly disgruntled by their situation, who feel very suppressed.
A. Who are these disgruntled vipras today? What are their professions?
Q. They are professionals, teachers, healers and some religious people.
A. Who are the largest group of these disgruntled vipras in today's world? Where are they?
Q. Middle East.
A. Yes. They are in the Middle East. What do they want?
Q. They want to re-establish the golden age of Islam. They call it the new caliphate, looking back to a time when they had prominence in their values, when their religious values had prominence in society.
A. Yes. Where is another large group of these religious dogmatic individuals?
Q. In America, they are religious fundamentalists and are very threatened by the secularism of the vaeshyan era and the potential threat of labor movements.
A. Yes. They are suppressed vipras. Their dominance of mind is through religious thinking, whether you believe their beliefs or not, their dominance of mind is through religious thinking and they do not like materialism. They feel their authority is suppressed. This is true particularly for those who have ancient history and times with no suppression to their authority. They feel that their way is true and their values are suppressed by materialism of the West. They are the largest group to fight this. Naturally, many intelligent people around the world realize the predicament of the society and want to march forward to a new future. They are not intending to return to the past. Both groups are vikshubdha shudras who want to overthrow the vaeshyan age. Only their ideas are a little different. One is dogma-based, the other spirit-based. For the dogma-based, trouble is that time does not march backwards and the past cannot be recreated. The spirit-based people are harbingers of an age that will heed the call of spirit to deeper personal association, to the relationship that once was very great and will be great again. You are harbingers of that mentality.
Sometimes you think, "What am I doing? This work is going nowhere. What is this about?" But, you see, an idea whose time is come is the most powerful weapon in the world. You have ideas whose time has come. It is time to put your ideas forward. Millions of people are turning to meditation today to renew their personal relationship with the supreme. It is happening because they are cancer victims. They are victims of the society, realizing, "This isn’t working. I am lonely. My wife left me. I live three-thousand miles from family and what is my life?" They realize that this way is not going very far and that a good job and lots of money isn’t making them happy. They want something more. In this realization, many are seeking an intimate relationship with the Great.
The feelings of stress and strain, depression and anxiety that are on a mass scale today are because society has lost prama, lost balance, it suffers a disease. Naturally, people suffer under those circumstances. They may have their bellies full and live in palaces but they suffer because they are not meeting their basic human needs. Materialism has disrupted their relationship to the divine and each other. The people will break out of this confine. There is restlessness within. The realization, "I am not happy" comes and they search. Now, by the droves, by the tens and hundreds of thousands they are turning to spiritual life around the globe.
This movement needs no leader, no organization, is spontaneous, is responsive to the condition of the human society. The human heart is yearning to find the way out of darkness. In today’s world is conflict between the vikshubdha shudras and the vaeshyans and this clash will only worsen. There are ideologies in the vikshubdha shudras that are dogma-based and spirit-based. It may appear at first that dogma is more dominant than spirit because the spirit base is like a wave rising from the depths. It has no leader, no organization, no history but an ancient history. It has a personal, individual experience but is rising in society like a wave bringing the desire to change the society in a positive way. This wave will grow in magnitude. That is why I say an idea whose time has come can be a greater force than any weapon. It can change the world. So do not become discouraged about your efforts for dharma. They are all well spent. Do not think, "Oh, what does it matter?" You are pounding on the wall with your little hammer and chisel and thinking, "The wall is a thousand miles long and a hundred miles high and I am sitting here pounding with these other people and this little hammer and chisel. I have been here for years and years. This wall is very big. I am never going to get anywhere." It is easy to think this way and say, "Let me throw down this hammer and chisel and just go take a rest." But you know, one day one person makes a little tap, one little tap, and the whole wall begins to crack and crumble. You never know which tap it’s going to be. Are there any questions?
Q. A lot of us have grown up in the lap of luxury and yet we can see that we are living in a society that may be part of the problem. We wonder, "Should we stay in this society or this country that is part of the problem or should we set up bases elsewhere?"
A. Materialism has spread around the globe. The dominating values of the vaeshyan society have spread globally. You are not only in the lap of luxury as the privileged few. That dogma has been programmed into you. You think, "Oh I am so fortunate; I am so fortunate!" Are you really so fortunate? Look at your life honestly. You are also a victim. All of your lives have been impacted.
The natural relationships you would otherwise have, the securities, the love and support are all disrupted. These are disrupted because the society is not in a natural state. Those who are exploited in one place materially by excess demands from another are victims but also those consumers who are trained by television sets are victims.
Q. In the lesser developed parts of the world, isn't it true that they want materialism, are desperate wanting spirituality but also materialism?
A. Yes, everyone wants to have physical well-being. When was a time in the world when no one wanted this? Can you think of one? This is normal. This does not define one’s varna. Do you think that those who are of different varnas don’t like to have a little material comfort? Doesn’t a shudra want a warm fire and a nice bed and good food on the table for his family? Doesn’t a kshattriyan want this also? Everyone wants their material needs met but the difference is where one places the emphasis.
Q. The religious, dogma-based vikshubdha shudra in America seems to have made some accommodation with the ruling vaeshyan elements in this country.
A. It is true.
Q. It is very different than in the Middle East.
A. It is true. They have been spoon-fed the vaeshyan dogmas in the television set and they are a little confused. They are very compromised in terms of being vikshubdha shudras because they are so much vaeshyans. Their minds are split.
Q. What happened is the religious fundamentalists they talk about "Right to Life" and support a destructive administration. They talk about family values yet their policies undermine the integrity of the families. Will it come to a point where they will part ways with the ruling capitalist clique?
A. It is not possible to tell the future in those ways. One must look at what is foremost in their hearts. I do not think they are united as a group. As individuals they will part, one going this way and another that way. Are they dogma-based or are they primarily vaeshyan? They are mixed. So, as a group they may be both and may go either way.
Q. It is hard for me to see any evidence of spirit-based in either of the fundamental populations in the Middle East
A. They are not spirit based. They are dogma based.
Q. I have trouble finding spirit-based here in this country as well.
A. Yes, so many people are spirit-based. Are you spirit-based?
Q. Praise God. Yes.
A. Yes! There are so many!
Q. But the fundamentalists …
A. They are dogma-based.
Q. Dogma-based, okay. I thought you were saying we should look in those groups and we would find the spirit-based.
A. No. I am saying that in the Middle Eastern religious-based communities there is strong opposition to the material base of Western society.
Q. Yes. Right. The part that is very disturbing to me that also seems associated with all of this is the ignorance around issues of violence. That we don’t even seem to have a dialog around whether there are other alternatives. These dogma-based groups are among those that seem to have the greatest propensity for the solution of violence.
A. They want the revolution and they wish to destroy capitalism. I am not making value judgments. I am simply stating. They are not spirit-based, but they are vikshubdha shudras. They are disgruntled and highly opposed and want the revolution. They realize there are those such as you. Their leaders realize there are spiritual people in this society who themselves do not support materialism and this is the only thing that has held their hand. This revolution is inevitable. How it plays out may be one way or another but the revolution against the dominant vaeshyan approach is bound to occur and the downfall of dogma-based ideologies is also bound to occur.
The re-establishment of balance and meeting fundamental human needs by the society must and will occur. You have philosophies
to bring forward ideas in this realm. People are searching for answers at this time.
