As Good As It Gets

 

It is interesting that people always think their time is worse than the "innocent" time that went before them.

If you actually read Ramayan, Bhagvat and Mahabharat, you can see how nothing has changed - everyone's time is just as complicated, cruel and manipulative as now.

Was Druva's father and step mother any less careless, cruel or negligent than parents of today ?

Was HiranyaKashyap any less mean and manipulative than corporate leaders of today ?

Was Sahastrarjun any less greedy than our politicians of today ?

What Vaman did at Bali's yagna, was that any less shocking than what many minorities do today - ie ask for a small concession and than swallow up the rights of the majority population ?

We can see that Dashrath's family life was as complicated as any depicted in TV serial of today.  Kaikey, Manthara or Shurpankha would give any female vamp in our films a run for their money.  Vali, Sugriv, Ravan, Kuber and Vibhishan can be scripted by any film director as antagonistic brothers.  Cruel, twisted, cold and unforgiving citizens of Ayodhya would make any villain cry with shame.

Yadu and Kuru kul went gone beyond what is considered "decent" even by today's standards.  Their men and women were more daring, more audacious and more unconventional than people of any other time.  Kidnapping, eloping and love marriages in Dwapar yug can put our modern kids to shame.  Heroes and villains of Mahabharata were cruel and kind in equal measures.  Just like us, they too constantly defied the Gods and modified religious conventions to suit themselves.
I am not even looking at Ven and Pruthu to consider the kind of crazy rulers we have had in the past !

 

So - let's not bang on about our lives being more complicated or less conventional than before.  Let's not presume people were any different to what they are now.  People have always been people and you get the good, the bad and the ugly in equal measures in everyone's lives. 

 

Let us look our own lives and work towards transforming that into Sat Yug.  Even if that's just in our own home to start with.  Let's accept that life "IS" as good as it gets.  Let's work on the life we have HERE and NOW.

 

© Bhagwat    [email protected]

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