The other day I posted a blog titled: the Great Indian Rat Race (GIRR):
http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2010/10/great-indian-rat-race-girr.html
Things were no better at MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts (Autocrat's Boston) 150 years ago: (Don't ask me the meaning of Latin words below: your guess is as good as mine);
Enjoy!
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That word 'Enjoy', Webster tells me means: 'to have a good time'.
Fine.
But in Vedantic parlance of the Upanishads, man is advised to lead his Life as if he were an Actor in a Drama, pretending to go through his cycles of good fortune and misfortune without really being touched by them too much.
Here is Radhakrishnan's English rendering of a famous verse from the Mundaka Upanishad:
Two birds, companions (who are) always united
Cling to the self-same tree.
Of these two, the one eats (sweet and bitter) fruit
While the other looks on without eating.
So good times and bad times are supposed to be 'Enjoyed' sportively.
In the very first verse of the first Isha Upanishad Radhakrishnan uses the word 'Enjoy' piquantly:
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While translating about 500 Upanishad verses into my mother tongue Telugu at my mother's behest a decade ago, I used the word 'Bhog' for 'Enjoy' in the above verse and was criticized by the Telugu Pundits and MAs; but I stuck to my guns.
In Bengali they use the verb: 'Bhog' in this equanimous sense for Enjoy. My Ph D Guide SDM, an out and out Sylhet Bengali was once talking to me about the ups and downs of his career and life and used this word; 'Enjoy' in this equal sense and looked at me and explained his use of this word thinking that I was unfamiliar with Upanishads (he told me that whenever he visits his elder sister (Didi) at Gauhati he reads her collection of Upanishads).
I kept quiet: "A gentleman is one who has never heard a joke or a story".
In my teaching profession, communication is my business and so when someone talks about things I know, I never give away but Enjoy their way of saying it and learn a lot.
Anyway trust Bengalis to preserve the good things of life:
Cling to the self-same tree.
Of these two, the one eats (sweet and bitter) fruit
While the other looks on without eating.
So good times and bad times are supposed to be 'Enjoyed' sportively.
In the very first verse of the first Isha Upanishad Radhakrishnan uses the word 'Enjoy' piquantly:
Know that all this, whatever moves in this moving
world Is enveloped by God.
Therefore renounce and enjoy without coveting
what belongs to others.
world Is enveloped by God.
Therefore renounce and enjoy without coveting
what belongs to others.
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While translating about 500 Upanishad verses into my mother tongue Telugu at my mother's behest a decade ago, I used the word 'Bhog' for 'Enjoy' in the above verse and was criticized by the Telugu Pundits and MAs; but I stuck to my guns.
In Bengali they use the verb: 'Bhog' in this equanimous sense for Enjoy. My Ph D Guide SDM, an out and out Sylhet Bengali was once talking to me about the ups and downs of his career and life and used this word; 'Enjoy' in this equal sense and looked at me and explained his use of this word thinking that I was unfamiliar with Upanishads (he told me that whenever he visits his elder sister (Didi) at Gauhati he reads her collection of Upanishads).
I kept quiet: "A gentleman is one who has never heard a joke or a story".
In my teaching profession, communication is my business and so when someone talks about things I know, I never give away but Enjoy their way of saying it and learn a lot.
Anyway trust Bengalis to preserve the good things of life:
Raadha Rhymes 42
Hilsa is a fish
Bengal's famous dish;
Art and culture
Song and sculpture
Bengalis nourish
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Hilsa is a fish
Bengal's famous dish;
Art and culture
Song and sculpture
Bengalis nourish
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Over to the Autocrat: .
http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/751/pg751.txt
"....So you will not think I mean to speak lightly of old friendships, because we cannot help instituting comparisons between our present and former selves by the aid of those who were what we were, but are not what we are. Nothing strikes one more, in the race of life, than to see how many give out in the first half of the course.
"Commencement day" always reminds me of the start for the "Derby," when the beautiful high-bred three-year olds of the season are brought up for trial. That day is the start, and life is the race. Here we are at Cambridge, and a class is just "graduating." Poor Harry! he was to have been there too, but he has paid forfeit; step out here into the grass back of the church; ah! there it is:-
"Commencement day" always reminds me of the start for the "Derby," when the beautiful high-bred three-year olds of the season are brought up for trial. That day is the start, and life is the race. Here we are at Cambridge, and a class is just "graduating." Poor Harry! he was to have been there too, but he has paid forfeit; step out here into the grass back of the church; ah! there it is:-
"HUNC LAPIDEM POSUERUNT
SOCII MOERENTES."
But this is the start, and here they are,--coats bright as silk, and manes as smooth as eau lustrale can make them. Some of the best of the colts are pranced round, a few minutes each, to show their paces.
What is that old gentleman crying about? and the old lady by him, and the three girls, what are they all covering their eyes for? Oh, that is THEIR colt which has just been trotted up on the stage. Do they really think those little thin legs can do anything in such a slashing sweepstakes as is coming off in these next forty years? Oh, this terrible gift of second-sight that comes to some of us when we begin to look through the silvered rings of the arcus senilis!
TEN YEARS GONE. First turn in the race. A few broken down; two or three bolted. Several show in advance of the ruck. CASSOCK, a black colt, seems to be ahead of the rest; those black colts commonly get the start, I have noticed, of the others, in the first quarter. METEOR has pulled up.
TWENTY YEARS. Second corner turned. CASSOCK has dropped from the front, and JUDEX, an iron-gray, has the lead. But look! how they have thinned out! Down flat,--five,--six,--how many? They lie still enough! they will not get up again in this race, be very sure! And the rest of them, what a "tailing off"! Anybody can see who is going to win,--perhaps.
THIRTY YEARS. Third corner turned. DIVES, bright sorrel, ridden by the fellow in a yellow jacket, begins to make play fast; is getting to be the favourite with many. But who is that other one that has been lengthening his stride from the first, and now shows close up to the front? Don't you remember the quiet brown colt ASTEROID, with the star in his forehead? That is he; he is one of the sort that lasts; look out for him! The black "colt," as we used to call him, is in the background, taking it easily in a gentle trot. There is one they used to call THE FILLY, on account of a certain feminine air he had; well up, you see; the Filly is not to be despised my boy!
FORTY YEARS. More dropping off,--but places much as before.
FIFTY YEARS. Race over. All that are on the course are coming in at a walk; no more running. Who is ahead? Ahead? What! and the winning-post a slab of white or gray stone standing out from that turf where there is no more jockeying or straining for victory! Well, the world marks their places in its betting-book; but be sure that these matter very little, if they have run as well as they knew how!...."
What is that old gentleman crying about? and the old lady by him, and the three girls, what are they all covering their eyes for? Oh, that is THEIR colt which has just been trotted up on the stage. Do they really think those little thin legs can do anything in such a slashing sweepstakes as is coming off in these next forty years? Oh, this terrible gift of second-sight that comes to some of us when we begin to look through the silvered rings of the arcus senilis!
TEN YEARS GONE. First turn in the race. A few broken down; two or three bolted. Several show in advance of the ruck. CASSOCK, a black colt, seems to be ahead of the rest; those black colts commonly get the start, I have noticed, of the others, in the first quarter. METEOR has pulled up.
TWENTY YEARS. Second corner turned. CASSOCK has dropped from the front, and JUDEX, an iron-gray, has the lead. But look! how they have thinned out! Down flat,--five,--six,--how many? They lie still enough! they will not get up again in this race, be very sure! And the rest of them, what a "tailing off"! Anybody can see who is going to win,--perhaps.
THIRTY YEARS. Third corner turned. DIVES, bright sorrel, ridden by the fellow in a yellow jacket, begins to make play fast; is getting to be the favourite with many. But who is that other one that has been lengthening his stride from the first, and now shows close up to the front? Don't you remember the quiet brown colt ASTEROID, with the star in his forehead? That is he; he is one of the sort that lasts; look out for him! The black "colt," as we used to call him, is in the background, taking it easily in a gentle trot. There is one they used to call THE FILLY, on account of a certain feminine air he had; well up, you see; the Filly is not to be despised my boy!
FORTY YEARS. More dropping off,--but places much as before.
FIFTY YEARS. Race over. All that are on the course are coming in at a walk; no more running. Who is ahead? Ahead? What! and the winning-post a slab of white or gray stone standing out from that turf where there is no more jockeying or straining for victory! Well, the world marks their places in its betting-book; but be sure that these matter very little, if they have run as well as they knew how!...."
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