A dear friend died the other day. And when people die the moment is one for reflection. To realize that there is a circle to life. We all have our time - to come and to go. In between we do our share of service to ourselves and to others. Joy and sorrows are a part of life. Our life begins with joy and laughter from others as we come out crying and we exit when our time is done with laughter in our hearts and leaving shimmering tears in the eyes of our loved ones. What a reverse? But such is life. And so are the ups and downs that characterize our life on this earth. For us to be living a fulfilling life with the least amount of stress we need to accept the joys and sorrows that cross our path with equanimity. The circle of life will have to be enacted for life to flow as it should. Circumventing it will bring conflict and sorrow. The young will grow to be youth, progress to the grey years and finally make our exit -- some say it's a passing over, some say it's death. The experience and wisdom reaped in the life lived will be what drives, energizes and sustains the generations that will come after us. An awareness of this dynamic is essential for us to feed the future with the stuff that will make tomorrow better than today. It is this awareness that will lay the foundation to love and social harmony rather than confusion and conflict.
In our sphere of family, education, health, and even governance, the circle plays out its ecological role. Learning, experiencing and discharging accumulated wisdom is the path life leads. A parent cannot be younger than the child, the teacher than the student, and the leader than the led. Wisdom builds on itself to make each successive group of human beings richer in knowledge and experience. To the degree we use this gift of Providence with abandon will lay the foundations and sustenance to a harmonious future.
January 16, 2012
January 10, 2012
Celebrate the home island
My last visit to my home island brought sadness. The Male model was being enacted piece by piece. High rises were beginning to raise their heads above the digga trees, few cars plied the coral streets compacting them to an impermeable base that sealed and pooled falling rainwater into deep muddy puddles that stagnated, few motor cycles on languid rounds during the day, transformed by late night into a noisy horde rushing around with pillion-rider girlfriends. Will history have to repeat itself, and is this the only model of urban development we have to follow? Let’s go into a national reverie of refection and not be in a hurry to follow the leader.
True, being an island nation, our tropical environment has been a boon for the rise in our wealth over the past close to forty years. Yes, it’s been that long since our tourism boom began. The value visitors attribute to Maldives is its pristine beaches, the lush palms and the balmy environment – a sea change from the cold and grey winter weather and skies of Europe; that was the beginning. Of course later, as Maldives became a famous travel destination, other countries too joined in the rush, and it was no more to get away from the grey skies but just to enjoy the sea and sand and the corals for what it was – bounty in the tropics.
So our sustenance quickly became tied to the value of our environment. The price the tourist paid for the visit was the peg of value they attached to it, which was very high given that some pay thousands a night to spend under our star spangled skies. The wish for their resort to be as natural as one could possibly be, for most don’t want a repeat of the plush hotel environment they left back home. Our most sought after holiday berths may perhaps be our most naturally inclined in decor and surroundings. These hotels manage their solid wastes, their water and their sewage in ways that hurts the surroundings the least. For the owners, it is about managing their bottom line. More value for money. For the tourist it is the difference; a celebration of what they didn’t have at home.
The irony is that the rest and recuperation others come flying into Maldives for a thumping fee can be had by us for a trifle, if we could only learn to appreciate the potential for health and wellbeing available in our own home islands. If we can for a moment appreciate the fresh air, the stretch of open space, the close feel of family and friends, and the relaxed mood of our home island surroundings; not let it degrade into muddy puddles we have to clean up now by ourselves because we have opted for a democracy that places the onus of such responsibility only on us – not on a government in Male (if democracy and decentralization is to be comprehended in its right sense). True, there is a natural draw towards what is different and that is perhaps why most of us are drawn to Male, our urban square mile of chaos. Just as those tourists are drawn to the difference of the environment that Maldives is to what they left – for a while, I would hope that the stay in Male for many of us would also be a sojourn rather than a re-location.
With decentralization, the move to the islands must begin – to make our Councilors accountable and the governance system viable. We need an enhanced sense of responsibility to make the land we were born in a place of reverence, so that we can bring up a new generation of Maldivians to love their surroundings as if it was sacred. For regional development, following the urban chaos of Male should not be the choice. We need to think anew by reflecting on why following Male’s development model would be a folly. Reflect and confirm in our hearts the advantages, not just of the economic but of the social and spiritual that will be gained by our proximity with our loved ones, our home communities, and the priceless bounty of our environment. We need to build the social and cultural ties that bind us as a nation; not be just gung-ho on the economic wellbeing that inevitably brings competitiveness, envy, jealousy, division and conflict.
True, being an island nation, our tropical environment has been a boon for the rise in our wealth over the past close to forty years. Yes, it’s been that long since our tourism boom began. The value visitors attribute to Maldives is its pristine beaches, the lush palms and the balmy environment – a sea change from the cold and grey winter weather and skies of Europe; that was the beginning. Of course later, as Maldives became a famous travel destination, other countries too joined in the rush, and it was no more to get away from the grey skies but just to enjoy the sea and sand and the corals for what it was – bounty in the tropics.
So our sustenance quickly became tied to the value of our environment. The price the tourist paid for the visit was the peg of value they attached to it, which was very high given that some pay thousands a night to spend under our star spangled skies. The wish for their resort to be as natural as one could possibly be, for most don’t want a repeat of the plush hotel environment they left back home. Our most sought after holiday berths may perhaps be our most naturally inclined in decor and surroundings. These hotels manage their solid wastes, their water and their sewage in ways that hurts the surroundings the least. For the owners, it is about managing their bottom line. More value for money. For the tourist it is the difference; a celebration of what they didn’t have at home.
The irony is that the rest and recuperation others come flying into Maldives for a thumping fee can be had by us for a trifle, if we could only learn to appreciate the potential for health and wellbeing available in our own home islands. If we can for a moment appreciate the fresh air, the stretch of open space, the close feel of family and friends, and the relaxed mood of our home island surroundings; not let it degrade into muddy puddles we have to clean up now by ourselves because we have opted for a democracy that places the onus of such responsibility only on us – not on a government in Male (if democracy and decentralization is to be comprehended in its right sense). True, there is a natural draw towards what is different and that is perhaps why most of us are drawn to Male, our urban square mile of chaos. Just as those tourists are drawn to the difference of the environment that Maldives is to what they left – for a while, I would hope that the stay in Male for many of us would also be a sojourn rather than a re-location.
With decentralization, the move to the islands must begin – to make our Councilors accountable and the governance system viable. We need an enhanced sense of responsibility to make the land we were born in a place of reverence, so that we can bring up a new generation of Maldivians to love their surroundings as if it was sacred. For regional development, following the urban chaos of Male should not be the choice. We need to think anew by reflecting on why following Male’s development model would be a folly. Reflect and confirm in our hearts the advantages, not just of the economic but of the social and spiritual that will be gained by our proximity with our loved ones, our home communities, and the priceless bounty of our environment. We need to build the social and cultural ties that bind us as a nation; not be just gung-ho on the economic wellbeing that inevitably brings competitiveness, envy, jealousy, division and conflict.
January 6, 2012
Where have all the grandparents gone?
Among the vociferous and tumultuous changes that are happening in Maldives on the physical, political and economic fronts of Maldives, very subtle social changes are also in the offing here perhaps quite unawares to us. That is about the changing role of grandparents in Maldivian society. Are they still the moulders of our society or just sentries guarding vacant households we have left behind in our home islands in our rush to inhabit this congested square mile of our Capital Male?
The past generation, I would assume, will perhaps recall quite vividly, the engaging tales our grandparents related to us. We would be snug in their laps listening to the tales of days gone by, intrigued by the wonder of the mysteries of the life that was unfolding in those formative years. Their stories touched on the heroics at sea and land during the harshness of the heat, rain or wind, exposed us to the wonder and miracle of how a little sluggish and scary worm transformed into a beautiful butterfly, the excited pursuit together of the meandering trail of a hermit crab on the cool coral sand of the morning, the sprouting of tender coconut fronds emerging through the eye of a buried coconut and the succulent cotyledon that filled its shell, or the strange yet sweet and watery taste of it melting in our mouth. Or the fairy tales that rang of life's lessons or the mesmerizing tales from the Arabian Nights that transported us into the delights and dramas of heroes and monsters, of dreams and visions of what could be awaiting us in life -- those that signaled the potential for what we could be if we set our minds to be what we want to be. Alas for me, those grandparents are long gone now, but their memories linger on just as it was yesterday. For many of us, the past spent this way has made our lives ever richer from those life lessons we imbibed. It has made our futures so much more meaningful than it would have been otherwise, to have us well grounded in the reality of who we are, what we stand for, and the reason why we are here on this mother Earth. These magical personalities left us with a piece of themselves that enabled us to understand our connections with our fellow citizens -- connections that epitomize our humanness. That life is to be lived more for others than for ourselves; that we must also leave something wondrous for the generations to come.
Where are those grandparents for our kids of today? Have they been replaced by loveless handhelds and senseless Ayas from foreign lands? Where is the quality time given to these budding minds if not by grandparents, by parents who but spend their time doing double duty to earn the living which they spend on the glittering luxuries of life unawares that they are forfeiting the biggest luxury of their lives - their children who will soon grow up and move away to re-enact that modern cycle of life yet again on their own kids. Can we ever be the grandparents of yore again! Alas, our children lament; where have those grandparents gone!!!
Sadly, the increasing trend in Maldives is our separation from our grandparents who were the anchor to our realty (and to our dreams too). Positively, this seemingly hopeless yearning can be realized yet gain if we only take time from our ever engaging mental and telephone chatter and reflect and meditate on life and its consequences. It is for us to leave a legacy of worth to our children -- a legacy not of material, but of morals.
The past generation, I would assume, will perhaps recall quite vividly, the engaging tales our grandparents related to us. We would be snug in their laps listening to the tales of days gone by, intrigued by the wonder of the mysteries of the life that was unfolding in those formative years. Their stories touched on the heroics at sea and land during the harshness of the heat, rain or wind, exposed us to the wonder and miracle of how a little sluggish and scary worm transformed into a beautiful butterfly, the excited pursuit together of the meandering trail of a hermit crab on the cool coral sand of the morning, the sprouting of tender coconut fronds emerging through the eye of a buried coconut and the succulent cotyledon that filled its shell, or the strange yet sweet and watery taste of it melting in our mouth. Or the fairy tales that rang of life's lessons or the mesmerizing tales from the Arabian Nights that transported us into the delights and dramas of heroes and monsters, of dreams and visions of what could be awaiting us in life -- those that signaled the potential for what we could be if we set our minds to be what we want to be. Alas for me, those grandparents are long gone now, but their memories linger on just as it was yesterday. For many of us, the past spent this way has made our lives ever richer from those life lessons we imbibed. It has made our futures so much more meaningful than it would have been otherwise, to have us well grounded in the reality of who we are, what we stand for, and the reason why we are here on this mother Earth. These magical personalities left us with a piece of themselves that enabled us to understand our connections with our fellow citizens -- connections that epitomize our humanness. That life is to be lived more for others than for ourselves; that we must also leave something wondrous for the generations to come.
Where are those grandparents for our kids of today? Have they been replaced by loveless handhelds and senseless Ayas from foreign lands? Where is the quality time given to these budding minds if not by grandparents, by parents who but spend their time doing double duty to earn the living which they spend on the glittering luxuries of life unawares that they are forfeiting the biggest luxury of their lives - their children who will soon grow up and move away to re-enact that modern cycle of life yet again on their own kids. Can we ever be the grandparents of yore again! Alas, our children lament; where have those grandparents gone!!!
Sadly, the increasing trend in Maldives is our separation from our grandparents who were the anchor to our realty (and to our dreams too). Positively, this seemingly hopeless yearning can be realized yet gain if we only take time from our ever engaging mental and telephone chatter and reflect and meditate on life and its consequences. It is for us to leave a legacy of worth to our children -- a legacy not of material, but of morals.
January 2, 2012
Public health measures make for a healthy community
Happy New Year to you all! May 2012 bring you joy, love and peace.
Today I was surprised by an article I was reading that confused public health with health services received at a public facility. In fact, to me, this was quite astonishing, for having worked in the administration of public health programs now for a very long time, had never come across this delicate inference ever. Perhaps this perception of public health should not be taken too lightly for I now believe this thinking may indeed be more pervasive than I thought it to be. So here I am putting this on blog in an attempt to make the concept of public health a bit clearer.
From a health promotion point of view, clarity on this is absolutely necessary. Public health is about health related actions that address the public’s health as a whole, as contrasted with health service or care received that usually benefits one person at a time. This is called individual health care. For example, if we provide clean water to the masses, or dispose of solid wastes that our cities produce every day as a mass effort, or individual efforts that contribute to a mass effort, then these activities are termed public health related actions as these contribute the making a whole lot of people healthy in one go so to say. If we all have clean and safe water to drink, a lot of people will be kept from getting all kinds of stomach bugs, and if our garbage is removed from our homes and our cities, we will not have the flies and roaches, and smells that make us sick. Remember that flies and roaches and rodents carry the germs into our homes and on to our food that will make us sick. Actions such as these will make us all experience good health. But even if our streets are filthy and water contaminated, we can still go to the doctor and get well for a while from the medicines we can take. But of course this cure would be a very temporary measure. We will soon get sick again, and we have to make another trip to the doctor. This type of service is called private or individual heath service.
To call a place healthy or health promoting, both these types of health services must be available. The services of doctors in our clinics and hospitals must be available for the individual care we seek such as getting the medications we need for a disease we contract. Let’s not forget, they also provide public health services such as immunizations, and health advice that can benefit a whole community’s wellbeing. While these public health services available at the doctor’s clinic may not amount to too much as compared to the individualized services they provide, to be healthy as a community, we truly need to keep our neighborhoods clean of the garbage and sewage we produce, have safe drinking water and safe food (from the markets and restaurants) available. And of course we ourselves must practice good hygiene and safe practices such as washing our hands regularly, using our household chemicals in a safe way, not spitting about on our streets, covering our mouth and nose when sneezing and coughing in public, refraining from risky life-style behavior, and not smoking.
So, public health is about the type of actions and services that keep the whole community healthy; not about whether we get our health care from a public or private service outlet.
Today I was surprised by an article I was reading that confused public health with health services received at a public facility. In fact, to me, this was quite astonishing, for having worked in the administration of public health programs now for a very long time, had never come across this delicate inference ever. Perhaps this perception of public health should not be taken too lightly for I now believe this thinking may indeed be more pervasive than I thought it to be. So here I am putting this on blog in an attempt to make the concept of public health a bit clearer.
From a health promotion point of view, clarity on this is absolutely necessary. Public health is about health related actions that address the public’s health as a whole, as contrasted with health service or care received that usually benefits one person at a time. This is called individual health care. For example, if we provide clean water to the masses, or dispose of solid wastes that our cities produce every day as a mass effort, or individual efforts that contribute to a mass effort, then these activities are termed public health related actions as these contribute the making a whole lot of people healthy in one go so to say. If we all have clean and safe water to drink, a lot of people will be kept from getting all kinds of stomach bugs, and if our garbage is removed from our homes and our cities, we will not have the flies and roaches, and smells that make us sick. Remember that flies and roaches and rodents carry the germs into our homes and on to our food that will make us sick. Actions such as these will make us all experience good health. But even if our streets are filthy and water contaminated, we can still go to the doctor and get well for a while from the medicines we can take. But of course this cure would be a very temporary measure. We will soon get sick again, and we have to make another trip to the doctor. This type of service is called private or individual heath service.
To call a place healthy or health promoting, both these types of health services must be available. The services of doctors in our clinics and hospitals must be available for the individual care we seek such as getting the medications we need for a disease we contract. Let’s not forget, they also provide public health services such as immunizations, and health advice that can benefit a whole community’s wellbeing. While these public health services available at the doctor’s clinic may not amount to too much as compared to the individualized services they provide, to be healthy as a community, we truly need to keep our neighborhoods clean of the garbage and sewage we produce, have safe drinking water and safe food (from the markets and restaurants) available. And of course we ourselves must practice good hygiene and safe practices such as washing our hands regularly, using our household chemicals in a safe way, not spitting about on our streets, covering our mouth and nose when sneezing and coughing in public, refraining from risky life-style behavior, and not smoking.
So, public health is about the type of actions and services that keep the whole community healthy; not about whether we get our health care from a public or private service outlet.
December 27, 2011
More health care but less health!
A contradiction of our present times is the fact that we have a huge proliferation of health care facilities in the form of clinics and hospitals which house ever more sophisticated diagnostics that can detect every bit of an anomaly in our bodies. Yet we continue to be mired in ill health indicated by the never ceasing streams of lines and throngs in emergency rooms of hospitals of the booming medical industry and medical tourism that we witness. Why is this happening? Are we nations of hypochondriacs; or sheep that just follow the shepherd in blissful compliance? In a world where information is rife on everything, where one can Google anything from how to make chicken noodle soup to the side effects of a heart valve replacement, we have the means to know also how to keep ourselves healthy. Is it that we just want to know and not do? Do we want some one else to give us our health on a platter? Do we want someone else to force us to stop our smoking even when we know that it eats up our insides ever so insidiously, even as we are knowingly carried away by the crafty advertisements that show the seeming coolness or trendiness of the portrayed smoker? It may be too late when we realize that the cilia lining our bronchi and trachea have died and become dysfunctional and we are in for lifelong emphysema. Or that we are into advanced stages of lung cancer before reality kicks in and discover we have spent a fortune making cigarette companies rich for making us sick.
The solution to our health lies in prevention; the simple acts we can do on our own that will give us health benefits to last a lifetime; Walking, regular exercise, eating wisely, shunning the risky lifestyles, and learning to love our fellow human beings (to reduce our stress). There are age old methods that we have just forgotten in the mire of the glitter that we call modernization. Our Muslim prayer is undoubtedly for the holistic elevation of our spirit, mind, and body we can pursue throughout our lives. Just imagine, if done in its completeness, it is physical exercise that adds up to about an hour of body movements in poses that are perhaps yogic in nature. And the time for silence and meditation our prayers embody gives us the silence we need, away from the constant chatter of our head. And now the ever increasing chatter of our mobile phones and other handheld electronic devises that strive never to give us a moment of silence. The Yoga and meditation as special features that have come out of the need for human beings to reach in to touch the spirit within is also there to offer us time away from the stress of life.
The practice of preventive public health measures doesn’t require us to spend our monthly income on hospital bills. We can save a big portion of this by just doing what was mentioned above. We need to be wise and respectful of our bodies much more than we do now. It’s the only one we have for a whole lifetime. Starving our bodies to make us feel good because looking thin is the style of the day, may not be the right attitude for us to carry in a regime of respecting our bodies. Keeping to good body-weight to height standards because that will reduce the burden on our joints, or lessen the stress of the pumping our hearts do to keep us alive is the way to think if we respect our body. True, it’s just a tweak of mindset. But that difference in intention makes a world of difference in the way our bodies react to the cosmic request made.
Ultimately, the health of a nation must perhaps be measured by the number of people who don't have to go to the hospital rather than the numbers who visit them. Invest in public health and you will have more money in your pocket too and the government will have less to spend on for the so called medical insurance. Both ways, Maldives will benefit as a Nation.
The solution to our health lies in prevention; the simple acts we can do on our own that will give us health benefits to last a lifetime; Walking, regular exercise, eating wisely, shunning the risky lifestyles, and learning to love our fellow human beings (to reduce our stress). There are age old methods that we have just forgotten in the mire of the glitter that we call modernization. Our Muslim prayer is undoubtedly for the holistic elevation of our spirit, mind, and body we can pursue throughout our lives. Just imagine, if done in its completeness, it is physical exercise that adds up to about an hour of body movements in poses that are perhaps yogic in nature. And the time for silence and meditation our prayers embody gives us the silence we need, away from the constant chatter of our head. And now the ever increasing chatter of our mobile phones and other handheld electronic devises that strive never to give us a moment of silence. The Yoga and meditation as special features that have come out of the need for human beings to reach in to touch the spirit within is also there to offer us time away from the stress of life.
The practice of preventive public health measures doesn’t require us to spend our monthly income on hospital bills. We can save a big portion of this by just doing what was mentioned above. We need to be wise and respectful of our bodies much more than we do now. It’s the only one we have for a whole lifetime. Starving our bodies to make us feel good because looking thin is the style of the day, may not be the right attitude for us to carry in a regime of respecting our bodies. Keeping to good body-weight to height standards because that will reduce the burden on our joints, or lessen the stress of the pumping our hearts do to keep us alive is the way to think if we respect our body. True, it’s just a tweak of mindset. But that difference in intention makes a world of difference in the way our bodies react to the cosmic request made.
Ultimately, the health of a nation must perhaps be measured by the number of people who don't have to go to the hospital rather than the numbers who visit them. Invest in public health and you will have more money in your pocket too and the government will have less to spend on for the so called medical insurance. Both ways, Maldives will benefit as a Nation.
December 26, 2011
The legacy of nationhood
In a democratic Maldives, we have a lot of adjustments to make to reap the advantage of democracy. The measure of the practice of the rule of law is one of the indicators of good governance in a democratic society.
True, our nature is to be free and so rules and regulations tend to stifle us. When these confront our desires we bend them, and if the strength of our emotional attachment to the desire in question, if strong enough, we even go onto break the rule. Some say that rules are made to be broken. While that adage must be taken with a grain of salt so to say, the over emphasis modern society places on rules and regulations to be the panacea for social ills is very ill placed. Often, we do little to uphold good laws ourselves as citizens of society, and of greater concern, the powers that be promulgating our laws don't provide the space to enforce these with the impartiality and sagacity required. Yet again, the ego’s call for selfish ownership comes in the way of good laws that are there to govern our behavior as a society. Where enforcement is practiced, the carrot and stick is the accepted one in most societies but more than the carrot, we are given the stick. As societies grow into urban communities, law enforcement becomes ever more complex and as the ever pervasive human foible of greed takes hold, corruptive forces sink deep to take away our dignity.
So when looking for alternative approaches of enforcement, it is not perhaps the traditional carrot and stick that will be the sustainable alternative. It has to be the good old nurturing of social values that must come to our rescue in building a caring society. Our schools and our homes must be made the support base to nurture these. We need to also come away from our assumed views that it is the government that must be solely responsible for it, yet we can’t shy away from selecting the right ones. In a democracy, it is ourselves that are the sources of the wisdom that will help our communities to be what we want them to be. We need to practice the values of good stewardship and good model behavior that our children will be incentivized to emulate. In the ultimate analysis, even our leaders are also at the same time parents, teachers and potential role models for our children. Our children can only learn from what we show them. They cannot be inspired otherwise. A good citizenry is what we must yearn to build and also hope to leave behind.
True, our nature is to be free and so rules and regulations tend to stifle us. When these confront our desires we bend them, and if the strength of our emotional attachment to the desire in question, if strong enough, we even go onto break the rule. Some say that rules are made to be broken. While that adage must be taken with a grain of salt so to say, the over emphasis modern society places on rules and regulations to be the panacea for social ills is very ill placed. Often, we do little to uphold good laws ourselves as citizens of society, and of greater concern, the powers that be promulgating our laws don't provide the space to enforce these with the impartiality and sagacity required. Yet again, the ego’s call for selfish ownership comes in the way of good laws that are there to govern our behavior as a society. Where enforcement is practiced, the carrot and stick is the accepted one in most societies but more than the carrot, we are given the stick. As societies grow into urban communities, law enforcement becomes ever more complex and as the ever pervasive human foible of greed takes hold, corruptive forces sink deep to take away our dignity.
So when looking for alternative approaches of enforcement, it is not perhaps the traditional carrot and stick that will be the sustainable alternative. It has to be the good old nurturing of social values that must come to our rescue in building a caring society. Our schools and our homes must be made the support base to nurture these. We need to also come away from our assumed views that it is the government that must be solely responsible for it, yet we can’t shy away from selecting the right ones. In a democracy, it is ourselves that are the sources of the wisdom that will help our communities to be what we want them to be. We need to practice the values of good stewardship and good model behavior that our children will be incentivized to emulate. In the ultimate analysis, even our leaders are also at the same time parents, teachers and potential role models for our children. Our children can only learn from what we show them. They cannot be inspired otherwise. A good citizenry is what we must yearn to build and also hope to leave behind.
December 19, 2011
Being good is easy when we trust our spirit
What we perceive as good always relates to what seems beneficial to us. What you feel good is what benefits you and likewise what is good for me is what I perceive what benefits me. In all these cases what is seen as good seems to harbour on selfishness. Therefore there is the fear of subverting another's good. How do we move from these nigglings of selfishness to working for the greater good? Unfortunately, even the greater good is tinged with selfishness. But we can indeed improve on this by thinking of what is good for society - ie. turning from MY good or YOUR good to OUR good. But even then this societal good is also tinged with selfishness. We just don't seem to get out of this all pervasive desire to own! Perhaps that is to be human! Yet our resolve must be to rise above the pettiness of being human and regain some of the universal spirit that is dormant within us which is our element and that which has been covered up by our years of social nurturing. While we can never be devoid of craving that is the hallmark of being human, our move towards societal good will mean a moving towards our inner spirit. And in doing so, we will be seeking the commonality that binds our seemingly separate existence. Our service to society is a way of regaining this inner essence and the universal principle that we all are ONE. Suddenly, there are no differences and no conflict. So the further we stretch ourselves towards serving another's benefit, rather than just our own, the ever closer we evolve towards our inner spiritual essence which is what we really are, shattering the mask we wear every day. That is the real homecoming!
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