Why do we succumb to pressure?

When I saw the picture of Divya after Ilavarasan’s death, I felt a deep pain.

Whose mistake is this? Society’s? Individual’s? Why are the grown-ups in this society not able to fight? Why do they succumb to the pressure?

I remembered how Mahatma Gandhi as a young boy asking his mother why his friend should not enter their house even though he was a Harijan — son of Hari.

Even though several stalwarts fought for casteless society, the society continues to remain divided. How many more Mahatmas, Periyars, Ambedkars and Ramanujas do we need to demonstrate that all are equal?

Does man’s brain need more evolution to understand that all are equal at the core and there is no division? What prevents man from understanding this simple fact? What is the root cause for division among human beings? Why does the society produce only a few people who are capable of fighting their way out?

One thing I feel that is the cause of all these is man’s inherent inability to become inwardly peaceful, quiet and content. Though man has been in search of peace from time immemorial, and has been following many methods to be peaceful, perhaps he is yet to grasp the correct technique.

Through his invention of god, he has ended up creating more gods; through his invention of religion, he has ended up creating more religions; through his invention of varnashram he ended up creating more varnas, more castes, more divisions. All ultimately culminate in unwanted wars, murders, and suicides.

Or is he barking up the wrong tree? Is thought, which is fundamentally ‘divisive’, incapable of grabbing that technique, as philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti said. Perhaps, the answer — peace — lies in a state of answerless awe at everything one sees.

“The sun wasn't up yet; you could see the morning star through the trees. There was a silence that was really extraordinary. Not the silence between two noises or between two notes, but the silence that has no reason whatsoever the silence that must have been at the beginning of the world. It filled the whole valley and the hills. The two big owls, calling to each other, never disturbed that silence, and a distant dog barking at the late moon was part of this immensity. The dew was especially heavy, and as the sun came up over the hill it was sparkling with many colours and with the glow that comes with the sun's first rays. ….. The delicate leaves of the jacaranda were heavy with dew, and birds came to have their morning baths, fluttering their wings so the dew on those delicate leaves filled their feathers…… And this silence spread, and seemed to go beyond the hills….. The day wore on and towards the end of the evening, as the sun was setting over the western hills, the silence came in from afar, over the hills, through the trees, covering the little bushes and the ancient banyan. And as the stars became brilliant, so the silence grew into great intensity; you could hardly bear it….” Jiddu Krishnamurti,

(The Only Revolution, p. 24)