10th Board Over - Noble Truths I Learnt.

The only exams in student life, where an intelligent and an idiot carry the same pressure on their shoulders is Boards Examination. One of the very decisive exams of an Indian student is Boards, because from that's where that fellow starts analysing his past, present and future. In this stormy ocean of life, board examinations are one of the very first jerks and twitches we newcomers combat.

Well, your comrade Daksh Parekh has just recently finished his 10th boards' year. Therefore today he has decided to reflect back into his past and share whatever he learnt. Note that it will not just be me telling my own tale, but both of us getting something out of it.

1. Consistency is the key. It shows your courage and devotion to the goal.

One of the very first elements we need to start up any work, there is a term called "Nishtha" we need. Now if there is a lack of Nishtha, you are sure to leave that work undone or poorly done.

In my early days of boards, I was into everything except my own syllabus. I strayed here and there, making videos, reading all sorts of books, writing blogs ofcourse and so on. All this was happening besides my acedemics. Do not get me wrong, I was the same student then, eager to learn, perfect in acedemics, best in concept-clarity. But I used to take all this carelessly. I knew its importance, I knew I had to be atleast 10 steps ahead in this, still, I paid no heed priorly. I lacked "Nishtha" and this is what I call "half-heartedness". I should have been making notes of learned topics, doing extra miscellaneous sums, which could have helped me in the final moments. 

"Do not dream half dreams,

Do not fantasise half hopes."

-Khalil Gibran Khalil

2. Pain of discipline is better than pain of regret.

I think the above written quote beautifully explains what I mean to say. You see, its always the first leap that demands strong will, which is the hardest step. At times, I had made wonderful plans for study, you too may relate to it. What used to happen is that this body never supported my plans!

To speak plainly, this body is a mad elephant. It needs the strong will of my mind, which, like a mahout, will fight against the frenzied elephant called body and control it.

I learn just this - thoughts and action must be in sync. Retain poor thoughts, it is okay. But optimistic thoughts and slacky actions is worse, because it mentally kills oneself.

Now, these were the lower truths, factors of a well-managed life which I learnt. The next truth will be more philosophical, and yes, it hit me the hardest. That truth is a higher truth, a fact of larger schemes of life.

3. Monkey Mind and its Immortality Projects.

Why does the society put so much emphasis on boards? Why do students hanker after these exams? To get good marks. To get a heavy-numbered eye-catching result. Why so? To be "certified learners".

Think this carefully. From our very birth we have kept learning and learning. When we looked around, we realised that oh, we need 'schools' to learn, cuz that's where they put a stamp on our head, as it were, that we are learners. Then in course of learning in schools, we realise that we students learn, not to learn, but to earn, to get a job, a stable future. That's where the entire polarisation of the learning process gets shooked up. Because no more are you interested in learning for knowledge's sake. Now you have made it secondary.

From our very birth, we willingly get stuck into the cobwebs of life. Our only goal - self preservation. How? We worry the most about securing proper food, proper home, proper family and relationships. Isn't that self-preservation?

The very motto of our lives becomes self-preservation, because most of our energies are spent in it. Look how nervous we become if we lose something, if something unpleasant happens. Then, at our death-door, the Lord of Death, Yama, snitches our neck, and asks,

"Aye rascal, this was your 1,89,736th birth, tell me, did you learn anything from life or this time too you were stuck in your own shit?"

There is a well-known book called "Denial of Death" by professor Ernest Becker.

In that he elegantly shows how we deny death, so to speak, hide it under a carpet all our life, repress it, ignore it, till it knocks us out.

He explains how we struggle for self-preservation, forming cobwebs in life around activities, people which always keeps us engaging, or I should say, entertaining.

He jovially calls them our "Immortality Projects" where we think they are sufficient enough to do timepass with.

Confusing? Let me bring Vivekananda into our conversation. He says in one of his poems,

"The thirst for life, for ever quench; it drags

From birth to death, and death to birth, the soul."

I learnt true meaning of renunciation here. What is renunciation? Giving up false hopes and attachment towards objects which are already impermanent and of which you have no control already!

"Live without the fear of pain and search for pleasure. Give both of them up."

And as always, we shall have our closing remark of this blog too, with Swami Vivekananda's quote, which perfectly sums up the entire blog -

"Unto him everything who does not care for anything. Fortune is like a flirt; she cares not for him who wants her, but she is at the feet of him who does not care for her. Money comes and showers itself upon one who does not care for it; so does fame come in abundance until it is a trouble and a burden. They always come to the Master. The slave never gets anything. The Master is he who can live in spite of them, whose life does not depend upon the little, foolish things of the world.

Live for an ideal, and that one ideal alone. Let it be so great, so strong, that there may be nothing else left in the mind; no place for anything else, no time for anything else."

Thanks,

Daksh Parekh.