Fear or aversion towards losing something?

The one that has fear towards losing something loses everything

Those who have certain position and power to be making crucial decision that could impact the general welfare of a particular area in the world, as well as be given the precious opportunity to be igniting certain awareness in the ignorant minds towards the ignorance in themselves, even with the initial good will of trying to do something right for oneself and many others, hoping for a less corrupted world deriving from corrupted thinking, belief, values and practice, which led them to be gaining that position and power by fighting very hard against corruptions, however, due to fear towards losing that position and power, they are reluctant to be doing the right thing, in order to harvest more support to keep that position and power, and even if they get to keep that position and power by not doing the right thing, they will still be losing everything, in the end, being the 'slave' of those who don't support those who would do the right thing due to ignorance, while forgot about all the others majority who had been supporting those who would do the right thing, which led them gaining that position and power in the first place.

There should be no fear of losing any position or power, for those who truly want to do something right for themselves and for the world.

It's about making good use of that 'impermanent' position and power to be doing the right thing as much as possible, particularly the upmost important thing to do with that position and power, is to be igniting awareness in the minds that are under the influence of ignorance to be aware towards the ignorance in themselves, which is the main reason why there are so much corruptions existing in that area. The only way to reduce or eliminate corruptions in an area effectively, is by igniting awareness in the minds to be aware of the ignorance in themselves. Just by criminalizing, prosecuting, punishing and imprisoning those who are corrupted, doesn't help the area to have less corruptions, as the root cause is still there.

Corruptions or impurities are like the countless leaves that keep falling down from a tree to the ground that will never come to an end. One will be restlessly cleaning up everyday and leaves will still be falling down everyday. There's no need to keep cleaning up the area full of 'corrupted leaves' by uprooting the entire corrupted tree from the root. There's no longer a 'corrupted tree sprung from corrupted root' that generates 'corrupted leaves' endlessly. And that root of all kinds of ignorance and corruptions in the society, is in the minds under the influence of ignorance and egoism.

The only one that can uproot the root of ignorance from the minds, is the mind itself through self-awareness being aware of the ignorance in itself, and many minds might not have that tiny little bit of self-awareness to be aware of the ignorance in themselves under the thick layer of ignorance being conditioned by ignorant egoistic thinking, belief, values and practice, however, under the help of a selfless reflector, awareness can be ignited or reflected in such minds, regardless of how thick layer is the veil of ignorance, as even that layer of ignorance is conditional and impermanent. Ignorance is conditional because it can be increased or reduced, and even be annihilated, depending on the many factors that can be influencing the degrees of ignorance.

But, the reflector, especially a clear one, not a dusty and shattered one, needs to be available. All kinds of leaders in the world, are unintentionally a reflector for the mass that are under the influence of ignorance. That's why they need a leader that make decision for them as they can't make decision for themselves, that tell them what they should do and shouldn't do. Those who are free from the influence of ignorance, they don't need a leader to lead them. These world leaders can be a corrupted reflector selfishly and ignorantly, or they can be a clear reflector, if they want.

Unless they are completely selfish and ignorant, the leaders in the world, who have a little tiny bit of self-awareness, who don't just want to make a successful career out of that position and power, but with a tiny little initiative or goodwill to help the world to be less corrupted, to have less corruptions, they must make use of that precious opportunity to be igniting awareness into the minds that are lost in ignorance.

Such position and power loses its meaning and power, even if one gets to keep that position and power, by being a 'slave' of the ignorant ones in order to keep that position and power, empowering ignorance in the minds. One will be swallowed by that position and power, in the end, by empowering the ignorance in the people, that is similar to be breeding a large group of uncontrollable monsters in one's home.

Inquire the truth of everything.

My life stories - Part 15 (Letting go)

My life Stories – Part 15 (Letting go)
Stories from my past memories – childhood, family, friends, growing up, poverty, integrity, dreams come true, finding peace and happiness, Buddhism, Yoga, and now…

Here we are. In France, in this present moment.

We had no idea of how, what, and where, at the time when we decided that we wanted to go somewhere else. We only knew that we had to leave this place and go somewhere else. We knew that we needed to organize certain things that needed to be done that allowed things to be happening. We had been living on our savings for the past two years, and it will be running out soon. We needed to make use of the remaining savings to seek opportunity somewhere else, to be in a place that welcomes us, that allows us to be making an honest living, that enables us to live a simple life.

It's not an issue for me at all, to let go all our 'things', to leave a familiar place that we have been living in for many years, or to go somewhere else to start a new life where there are many things that I am not familiar with, that I have to learn or relearn, and to make adjustment, adaptation and accommodation. As I never have strong attachment towards places, things, activities, cultures, food, or people. And I'm always open and ready for learning and experiencing something that I'm not familiar with, that I've never come in contact before. I am without any expectation.

In the beginning, we were considering about moving to Taiwan. We like, and want to support the democracy and freedom of expression that exists in Taiwan.

My husband had a few years of experience in teaching young children in a school when he was living in France many years ago, and in the beginning when he moved to live with me in Malaysia, he mentioned to me that he was interested to do a TEFL course.

I encouraged him to take up an online TEFL course in May 2021 during the prolonged lockdown in Malaysia, as there might be possible opportunity for him to find an English teaching job in Taiwan. Investment in education or further studies is always the best kind of investment one could have, that is never wasted. The knowledge and skill that we learned will always enhance our life in certain ways, even if we don't make a professional living out of it.

At the same time, I encouraged him to keep an eye on any job opportunity anywhere in Europe, especially France, as we both love many things about France very much. He lived in France for twelve years in the past. He had many years of experience in the field of hotel and restaurant management, on top of our many years of teaching yoga and running retreats. It doesn't matter if the salary is just enough for us to survive, we just needed to be opened, and seize any opportunity that allows us to start a new life, somewhere, anywhere, it doesn't matter.

Not long after we considered about moving to Taiwan, news came about the political tension building up between China and Taiwan, as well as the border closing not receiving any foreign teachers at that time due to the pandemic, which made us reconsidered about many things, and decided not to go there at this time being.

And if he didn't manage to get any job offer by the end of December, we will just buy a one way flight ticket to enter France via Paris, and then we will decide where we want to go in France, especially somewhere in the south, as there is where we would like to live in, even though we still didn't know where exactly and whether he would be able to get a job, or if we would be able to do something for a living. We also knew that it might not be easy for my husband to get a job at his age and during this crazy pandemic. But I said to my husband, "Just try, and see what happens." My husband would prefer to have certain degrees of certainty to feel 'secured', but I have no fear towards the unknown. All I know is that just follow what life brings to us, be opened, and see what happens. France is also very close to Ireland. My husband's parents are a lot older now, and their health is not as good as before, and so, it will be easier for us to visit them in the near future.

I just needed two months time to give notice to terminate the apartment's rental agreement as well as to organize everything that needed to be done before we leave this country. I needed to sort out any thing that is related to legal paper works that deals with the different government departments, both this and the other country, on top of clearing everything out from the apartment and selling my car, while doing our best not to contract the virus, so that we can fly out on the departure day. I had no idea of how things should be done, but I just did it one by one, as I went along.

Even when our landlord and some other friends asked us where were we heading to, we told them that nothing is confirmed, which was true, and they all couldn't understand and puzzled, "What? You are leaving Malaysia but you don't know where you are going? Really?"

Things didn't fall into places until the last minute.

In the beginning after my husband sent out many job applications for vacancy at hotel and restaurant, there were no replies. My husband was a little disappointed and felt down about himself. I said to him, "It's not that you are not good enough, and your age is not an issue, but things didn't happen as it's not the right timing." And it doesn't matter if he couldn't get any job, as I will think of something that I can do to make a living. I also told him that he should put his past 16 years experience on practicing yoga, teaching yoga and running yoga retreats, as well as Yoga Now Malaysia's profile into his resume. And then, great things started to happen.

A four star hotel under a big name, as well as two other hotels, a 5 star boutique hotel and a 3 star hotel chain replied, and they were interested to have an online interview with him. He chose to go for the interview with the four star hotel as it is located in the Alps which is a very nice area to live in. During the interview, he just needed to be himself, a very warm, kind and friendly person. He went through three separate interviews with different managers, and he was given the job in the end. Even though nothing was actually confirmed until the moment we arrived and he signed the work contract.

It was a challenging process with a few hiccups from the preparation of the journey of moving until we arrived at our final destination, especially organizing things that needed to be done and travelling during the pandemic amid the surge of 'Omicron', but we managed to glide through all the obstacles one by one.

We wanted to let go most of our stuffs and just keep some important documents and few things that worth nothing but are important to us in our life. We packed our things into three small boxes to send by post before we left, and then another 2 suitcases and 2 backpacks with mostly heavy winter clothing and some important documents to come with us into the flight.

We knew that during the pandemic, it's not easy to give away our things, not to say, to sell some of our things that are still in very good condition. Thankfully, three of our yoga students would take all of our yoga stuffs. While there were some charity organizations in town that were interested in receiving certain household things, but they wouldn't come to pick up the stuffs.

And then one day, while I was waiting at the dental clinic as my husband was having his teeth cleaned up, I asked the receptionist for a recommendation of a lorry driver, that I have household things to clear out from the apartment. Just happened that a lady was there to accompany her uncle for dental work and she over heard our conversation, and was really excited to introduce her uncle to me, where this uncle who is a chicken seller at the morning market has just received his new low cost apartment, but he has no budget for buying furniture and household things for his new home. This uncle was very happy to take some of our stuffs and he would organize a lorry to come to pick up the stuffs from us. We also gave away the remaining of all our things to the Nepali security guards and the Indonesian and Bangladeshi cleaners at our condominium. They were very happy about it.

We wanted to get our booster vaccination before we left, if possible. We were being told that we needed to wait for our appointment given by the health ministry which won't be happening until after the end of February, however, on the last week of December, my husband found out from twitter that we could call the hospital and ask if we can walk in on certain day. We called the hospital, and they gave us an appointment date on the 31st of December. And so, we went and got our booster shot on the last day of 2021. We were so lucky that we could get that done before our flight because of the vaccine mandate in France, as one day later the Malaysian government announced that walk-in was no longer available.

I also found a second hand car dealer agent to let go of my 19 years old car that had significantly improved the quality of my life, that had served us and the retreat guests nicely over the years. I signed the selling contract a few weeks before we left, but I could keep using the car until the day before we left. The agent told us that he was very 'touched' when I asked him about how much petrol I needed to keep for him on the day of delivery. He said just a quarter tank would be enough, but in the end, I left him with almost full tank of petrol.

And then, just a few days before we moved out from the apartment, the kitchen's floor tiles shifted and mounted, where underneath the tiles was completely hollow due to poor quality of the building construction, which we informed the landlord immediately. For that last few days, we couldn't walk over those tiles, and we were like walking on the edge of a cliff whenever we wanted to use the kitchen. Anyway, we cleaned up the apartment and did a video recording of checking everything in the apartment on the last morning to prove that everything is in good order when we return the apartment to the landlord. We were glad that we did.

After we sort out everything regarding the apartment with the landlord, and received our deposit from him, as he was satisfied with the apartment was in good condition apart from the mounted kitchen's floor tiling which was not our responsibility, we moved to a hotel in town for our last few days in Penang. We were very careful to keep social distancing with other people until we got our PCR test done on the day before the flight, and we were glad that we had a negative result. But, hiccups had just begun.

Even though our first flight was in the evening, we arrived at the airport just before 2.30 pm for checking our supposedly confirmed connecting flights from Penang to Kuala Lumpur to Dubai to Paris. Again, we were glad that we did. The representative at the check-in counter told us that the flight that we were supposed to get on from Penang to Kuala Lumpur in that evening didn't exist, and the last flight available had just left. We didn't receive any email about changes of flight detail from the airline. They told us that they couldn't do anything to help us and that we needed to contact the airline directly to arrange a different connection. They said that we could try to get the airline to change us to another flight that goes to Subang Airport, but then it will be another long transfer from Subang Airport to KLIA. We really didn't want to risk ourselves exposing to too many individuals during the pandemic. Or else, the airline could change our flights to another day, but that is not possible for us because the immigration department had decided to end my husband long term social visit pass on that particular day, even though the initial expiry date was in March and we had asked them to end the pass on a few days later so that if anything happens that we couldn't fly out on that day (knowing that anything can happen during the pandemic), we still can have a few days time to do something about it.

We had tried to call different numbers of the airline for about an hour, but there was nobody answering. It was about 3.30 pm, and we needed to be in KLIA before 9.00 pm. I said to my husband, we could either get a rental car to KLIA immediately, or we could see if there would be some other flights that could get us to KLIA or KLIA2, regardless of how much it would cost us. We just needed to get things done.

Luckily, there was an AirAsia flight to KLIA2 departing at 4.30 pm. The representative was very helpful to immediately get us the ticket and checked us in by 4.00 pm, and we were running so fast towards the security check and then running to the gate which was located at the very end of the departure hall, even though they said that the flight would wait for us. What they didn't tell us was that the flight was delayed about 15 minutes. Anyway, we had a few minutes to catch our breath before boarding. Our seat numbers given were 32, which didn't exist on that plane, as they had changed from the initial bigger plane to a smaller plane. We were told to wait at the end of the cabin watching everyone coming on board. After everyone were on board, they gave us the priority seats in front of the plane. We were thankful to AirAsia and the friendly helpful staffs. Did the hiccups end there? Not really.

After we arrived in KLIA2, we got our checked baggage and took the train to KLIA, which we shouldn't be doing if we had had our connecting flights all the way from Penang to Paris as what it supposed to be, but it wasn't.

Anyway, we got to KLIA, and went to the check-in counter to complain about what happened, even though it wasn't check-in time yet for our flight from Kuala Lumpur to Dubai to Paris. They said they couldn't do anything, but they could check us in at that time, and we could drop the baggage afterwards when the counter reopened for our flight check-in.

I always have travel sickness issue since young. We also haven't been travelling since the beginning of the pandemic. I also happened to be menstruating during those few days. I thought I did well after taking the taxi from the hotel to the airport, and then taking the flight from Penang to KLIA2, and then taking the train from KLIA2 to KLIA, but I wasn't. I guessed the underlying stress from dealing with the 'non-existing flight' and 'rushing for boarding the first flight' had been accumulating in my body. I vomited for a few times on the first flight and couldn't drink or eat much in order to stop the vomiting. I apologized to the lady who sat beside us for causing any disturbance. Luckily, I felt much better on the second flight, and I was fine after we landed in Paris. Although the handles of one of our baggage was damaged when we went to collect our baggage, but the wheels were still functioning fine, and we were so grateful that we finally arrived in France, safely.

We stayed two nights in Paris to get a good rest from the long journey. My husband also needed to get some clothing for his new job. Somehow, I lost our empty Yoga Now tote bag along the way, which I had to let go as well. We had two beautiful sunny days in Paris before we took two train rides to the Alps. We had enjoyed our very nice first meal in Paris. We had the super tasty Gratin at Le Bistro des Augustins. We also got very nice croissant and pain au chocolat from the bakery.

We went to the train station after checked out from the hotel. As scheduled, we boarded the train and were waiting for the train to go on time, as what it supposed to be. We would have about an hour 15 minutes between the two trains, thinking that we could have our picnic lunch outside the train station before catching our second train, as eating and drinking was not allowed on the train at that time. After waiting for about 30 minutes while watching all the other trains departed from the train station, but our train was still in the idle mode, we were told to move to another train. The next train arrived shortly and we had to wait for another 30 minutes for it to depart. Luckily, we still had 10 minutes to catch the other train.

The hotel management was very thoughtful. They had arranged someone to pick us up from the train station, prepared a very nice and comfortable junior suite room for us to stay temporary until we find our own place to live. That was a great surprise to us, as we thought we would be staying in a double room only. The three boxes that we had sent from Malaysia were already placed in the room. When we arrived in that evening, it was 0 degree, and we haven't eaten anything yet. But the room is comfortably warm, and there's a simple equipped kitchen in the room for us to prepare our own meals as well as there's a dining table. It makes things easier for us, as we wouldn't be able to afford eating out in France. We walked to the nearest supermarket and got ourselves some fresh bread and cheese, fruits and cherry tomatoes, and went back to the room and had a very nice first meal in the Alps.

Since we arrived, everyone that we met, especially all my husband's colleagues in the hotel, were all super friendly and nice. There's no sense of superiority or discrimination here. My husband told me that any kind of discrimination is against the law in France. There are pavements everywhere, and cars actually stop to let pedestrians crossing the road. In Malaysia, we have to put out our hand to stop the cars in order to run across the road as fast as possible even when it's green light for pedestrians to cross, but in France, cars naturally stop for us to cross the road, and in return, we give a hand gesture to say thank you.

On the next day, when the sun has risen, we realized that the view from our hotel room was absolutely incredible. For the next few days, we had very nice sunny days, where we went out to explore the town and further out of the town, to get a feel of where things are, before my husband commits to his new job. I only know very few french words at the moment, and would need to depend on my sign language for certain things. That's okay.

Another important reason why we decided to leave Malaysia and move to Europe is that as a citizen of Malaysia, I don't get much social security or retirement benefits from the government, not to say, as a foreigner, my husband won't be getting any social security or old age retirement benefits from the government for being married to me and living in Malaysia, and for sure, we are now gradually transitioning towards old age. Our old age retirement is very much depending on our savings, which is being highly affected by the pandemic and the long term consequences of it. While as tax paying Europeans and their spouse, they are eligible to be living and working anywhere in Europe, and are eligible for social security, health care and retirement benefits from the government. And most importantly, is about the presence and absence of humanity, freedom of expression, non-discrimination and equal rights.

We had some hiccups along the way, but we also received unexpected helps from somewhere whenever we needed it. We were so grateful for everything. We met very friendly and helpful people. We managed to file a complaint to the airline under the help of one of the airline representatives in KLIA, and the airline responded and would give us back the money that we had paid for the flight getting to KLIA. We also got some compensation from the train delay.

Even though we can't afford to eat out, but the cost of food here in France, particularly in the supermarket, is surprisingly much cheaper than in Malaysia. We always like to have our own home cooked meals. There are many things that my husband wants to do, and food that he likes to eat, are accessible and affordable to us here in France, which it's not the case while we were living in Malaysia. We have been eating well. We sleep well. We have been well looking after. Life is very kind to us. 

Thank you.

READ ON

Rejecting subjugation and yearning for freedom is basic instinct in all living beings

Yearning towards all kinds of freedom and rejection towards any kind of subjugation being imposed onto oneself is part of the basic instinct in all living beings.

All living beings want total or maximum freedom for themselves, however, there are also human beings that don't mind imposing subjugation or restriction onto other beings that they disagree with or dislike, either by themselves or by others. These minds want all kinds of freedom for themselves, but they disagree with or being dissatisfied with some others having their own freedom.

In the teachings and practice of yoga and buddhism, one doesn't impose subjugation or restriction onto any others, but, only through one's own freewill, one imposes subjugation or restriction onto oneself, to discipline oneself, to have self-control, in order to annihilate ignorance, egoism and impurities in oneself, to attain the highest freedom of existence, which is free from the inevitable restless suffering of names and forms that is subject to selflessness and impermanence, of a perceived worldly life existence deriving from the modification of the mind functioning under the influence of ignorance and egoism. 

Coming from the conscience of this mind itself, yearning to free itself from ignorance and the consequences of ignorance, so that the existence of this body and mind, its thoughts, actions and speech wouldn't cause any painful suffering onto the others in the surrounding environment.

Many people would think and believe that 'democracy' or 'power to the people' is 'freedom from being ruled by others', or what people think and believe which will give them 'the power' that gives them 'the freedom' that they desire, where people have the power to choose and elect a group of people that represent them to form an authorization that will 'serve' them and 'give' them what they want, the way that they desire. But, 'democracy' is only 'sort of power and freedom' to a group of people who make up the majority, and not to the other groups of people who aren't the majority, because not everyone has the same interests and desires towards a world run by a particular system that they prefer and don't prefer. Meanwhile, 'the majority' with the similar interests and desires are not necessarily those who are free from the influence of ignorance, egoism, greed, possessiveness and selfishness, as well as those whom 'the majority' chosen and elected to represent them and form the authorization to serve the people, also might not necessarily be free from the influence of ignorance, egoism, greed, possessiveness and selfishness.

A 'system' that is generated and run by a group of corrupted minds that are functioning under the influence of ignorance, egoism, greed, possessiveness and selfishness would be hurting many innocent common people who just want to live a simple honest life, and hurting the surrounding living environment more than to be 'protecting' the benefits and welfare of the people indiscriminately, or to be 'looking after' the welfare of the surrounding living environment.

That's why the teachings and practice of yoga and buddhism emphasized on the attainment of self-realization through self-conscience, self-freewill, self-effort, self-discipline, self-control, self-purification and self-inquiry to free one's mind from ignorance and the by-products of ignorance, allowing a world that is self regulating under the law of nature, where all beings are self-initiated to free oneself from the influence of ignorance and the by-products of ignorance, where all beings don't need to be regulated under a humans generated 'system' to be or not to be in certain way, or 'be so called protected' under the 'system', where liberation from ignorance and egoism in the beings will efficiently contribute to peace and harmony among all beings in the world of diversities. Then, either with or without a 'humans generated system' in the world, it's neither good nor bad, if the world (the people and the authority that serves the people) is free from ignorance and the by-products of ignorance.

Liberation from ignorance and egoism can never be achieved by the discrimination, regulation, oppression, disciplinary, control, and threat imposed by others, or by receiving so called 'blessing' from 'someone or somewhere', but only through self-initiation and persevered self-effort to discipline, purify and silent one's mind.

It's never about out of self-righteousness based on a particular thinking, belief, practice, values, interests and desires to teach, judge, oppress, control, discipline, change, prosecute, and punish the others that are different from oneself, that one disagrees with and dislikes.

It's not about achieving a world that is preferable to a particular group of people of a particular thinking, belief, practice, values, interests and desires, by running the world under a particular humans generated 'system of law and order' to regulate all and everyone to be and not to be in certain way according to a particular thinking, belief, practice, values, interests and desires.

Under the so called 'democratic system regulated under specific law and order' to be regulating and controlling the people in the world to be and not to be in certain way, some really good leaders with good intentions and great ideas that would benefit the overall welfare of the world also can't do much to free the world from ignorance and the consequences of ignorance, due to being 'restricted' by the 'system of democracy' itself. It's not that 'democracy' is not good, it's just that real freedom for all and everyone without discrimination doesn't come from 'democracy'.

Above all, 'positive thinking' and 'optimism' also couldn't remove the ignorance and the consequences of ignorance in the world.

Inquire the truth of everything.

Democracy - People's power?

Most people want and support democracy, or even fight and sacrifice their lives for democracy, where 'people' could have 'the power' to choose or elect a leader or a government to lead them.

Democracy is neither good nor bad.

If majority of the people are unselfish and wise, being free from ignorance and egoism, then probably they might elect a leader or a government that will benefit all and everyone, unselfishly, that would promote more peace and harmony in the world.

If majority of the people are selfish and under the influence of ignorance and egoism, then most probably they would elect a leader or a government that doesn't really work to benefit all and everyone, but has certain agenda that only benefits certain group of people in favorable to their own liking, that would generate more prejudice, discrimination, unrest and disharmony in the world.

The world or the society doesn't really need any leader or government. The world or the society would most probably run more smoothly without any particular leader or government that complies to certain idea or vision of a particular world or society to be in certain way. Even an unselfish and intelligent leader of the world also cannot go against the law of nature and the ignorance of the majority of human beings.

What can truly benefit the world or the society is that human beings need to free their own minds from ignorance and egoism, while allowing the world being what it is in accordance to the law of nature, and the society will be fine as it is, even if it's not perfectly the way that most human beings would desire it to be in many different ways respectively. And that's most probably unlikely to be happening. As even many highly educated, knowledgeable and intelligent human beings are also being ignorant towards their own minds are functioning under the influence of ignorance and egoism, and would have the great intention/aspiration/ambition/passion utilizing their education, knowledge and intelligence to create a world or a society of certain way according to their own preferences complying to their own certain thinking, belief, values and practice.

Democracy?

Democracy is neither something good nor bad. It depends on the states of the minds of the majority of the population of the nations in the world.

If the majority of the population are free from ignorance and egoism, they will have clear understanding about life existence, and can make the appropriate decisions and choices for the welfare and well-being of the people, the nation and the world, without being influenced by any conditioned thinking and beliefs, self-interests or selfish desires, then the world will be heading towards prosperity, peace and harmony under the system of democracy.

If the majority of the population are influenced by ignorance and egoism, they don't have clear understanding about life existence, and can't make the appropriate decisions and choices for the welfare and well-being of the people, the nation and the world, as they are under the influence of conditioned thinking and beliefs, self-interests or selfish desires, and they are easily being manipulated by other people who want to be in power and who also have their own selfish interests and greedy desires, then the situation of the world will be heading towards deeper ignorance, unrest and problematic.

It's a fact that there are not many people are free from ignorance and egoism, and there are too many people are influenced by ignorance and egoism in the present time. Even when many people think that they are good and righteous people based on what they believe is good and right, and some people think that they are somehow better and smarter human beings than many others, it's not necessarily that what they think and believe, and what they want, is the best for upkeeping the welfare and well-being of the people of the nations in the world, if they are not free from ignorance, egoism, attachment, identification, desires, craving and aversion.

Everyone has to somehow get along with what democracy brings to the world whether they agree or disagree with the good and bad decisions, right and wrong choices made by the majority of the population. They have to respect the decisions and choices made by the majority of the population even though they can't accept or agree with these choices.

If people are influenced by ignorance and egoism, they will attach strongly onto their specific thinking and beliefs, and over-powering by self-interests and desires of craving and aversion influenced by their likes and dislikes, agreements and disagreements based on what they believe what things are, and they are easily being influenced and manipulated by other people, they will fall into the game of manipulation of those who want to be in power. Those who want to be in power will give the people whatever they like and want, which are not necessarily good for their welfare or well-being, but then these people will be supporting those who will give them what they want, to be in power to be the leaders of the nations in the world.

Just like the children will be happy and satisfy if we give them sweets whenever they request for sweets, and they will say that we are good people and are nice to them. And the children will do things for us whenever they want us to give them sweets. But, that will ruin the children's well-being in long term. But people who are influenced by ignorance and egoism don't care about the welfare of others.

For example, if majority of the people like and want drugs, those who want to be in power will give them drugs, it doesn't matter when by doing so, they know that it will ruin the welfare and well-being of the people and the nation in long term. They are only interested in using the power given to them to gratify their own selfish desires while they still have the power. They don't care if the people or the nation and the world will fall apart afterwards. They let the drugs numb and dull the people's minds. When people's minds are numbed and dulled, and don't have the clarity of mind to think properly, it will be good for those who want to be in power, as they will continue to get the support and liking from the majority of these people by giving them what they like and want, and there will be less people stand against them because majority of the people's minds are already numbed and dulled and clouded by the effects of the drugs, as well as being addicted to drugs. When people are addicted to drugs, they will do anything for the people who will give them drugs. And those who get in power can do whatever they want to do with the power being given by these majority people who support them to be in power through the system of democracy. This is how the world comes to destruction because of the democracy system is being supported and influenced by the mass of the world population being over-powered by ignorance and egoism, while being manipulated by a group of selfish and greedy people.

Democracy – power to the people and the power of the people. But, are the majority of the people all wise and selfless, or are they being over-powered by ignorance and egoism?

Om shanti.