Since the time man started walking on this earth and evolved from his cave man days to the present times where he is now jet setting across the globe throwing his weight and presence around the world in a matter of few hours, his evolution has been through hypersonic speed. With this evolution has evolved his way of looking at the world and interacting too. But down below all these interactions he has been guided by the famous theory of ‘Charles Darwin’, the noted scientist cum biologist who propounded the ‘Theory of the survival of the fittest’. It is this theory that has been at the center of his tectonic rise in the overall ecosystem of ours as well as the myriad problems that he has been beset with.
The cut throat competition that has now become the ‘Nom de guerre’ of his existence has now enveloped him in an environment that he finds difficult to escape, since it is his own doing. If that be the case then what is the way forward for him to keep pace with his outward progress with his inner compass of morality? The centrality of making a nuanced balance with both of his inner and outer world is what makes this write up of mine all the more important. It’s a difficult subject to deal with and easier said than done. Be that as it may, since the man himself is the driving force in all his endeavors it is but natural that his own very being be altered to tailor the needs of his outward world and become co-terminus with his inner self. This is where the need to evolve a definite mechanism that could deal with such contradictory issues bedeviling him.
The need to evolve a definite ‘Self –culture’ is what will see him through his present trials and tribulations. This concept of ‘Self –culture’ is not all that easy to mastermind and put to use in daily lives of ours, except though by way of concerted efforts. A man to evolve into a self-cultured individual will have to go through the nuances of different cultures viz, ‘intellectual culture’, physical culture, aesthetic culture& finally the ethical culture. Of all the above cultures that impact him most in maintaining his outward needs with that of his inner quest of equanimity, it is the ‘Ethical culture’ which will impinge upon him the most.
Ethical culture includes and embraces all other branches of self-culture as mentioned by me above. Ethics teaches the whole duty of man. It is the sole mistress of life. All your thoughts and actions belong first and foremost to the domain of ethics. Your thoughts may be ethical or unethical; so ethics penetrates into the deepest recesses of your personality, your actions may be good or bad, and all of them are moulded and judged by ethics. Ethics may further be sub- classified into personal ethics involving individual and family and state-ethics which treats of the state and its institutions. Since a man is a typical ‘Microcosm’ of the world at large this fixation of template of ‘ethical culture’ on him personifies the entire gamut of things connected to both his inner and outside world.
Though there are myriad ways to let this ethical culture seep into your being, it is the individual himself who has to take the final call in getting himself associated with this culture. Self-culture breeds earnestness in an individual. The earnest man is simple and temperate; he is also conscientious. He regards his trade and profession as his sphere of social service and not merely as a source of income. But does this ever happen in our today’s world where every action of ours is guided by self-avarice? Avarice pervades our society as water saturates the stalactites and stalagmites in lime stone caves. The acquisitive instinct, which is praiseworthy within its proper limits, has been allowed to attain disproportionate dimensions.
Material things called as ‘wealth’ tend to crush and strangle human personality. The devils of possessions have come to possess our souls and no religion seems to have the power of driving them off from us. Avarice leads them to burden themselves with many external objects which are unnecessary for our personality or even detrimental to it. They suffer from what John Dewey has called ‘externalism’. They do not tend to grow in virtue and wisdom like true men and women, but rather take pride in the virtues of well-caparisoned donkeys carrying heavy loads of furniture and clothes and cash and bank notes. Avarice works havoc with progressive movements. Freedom from this avarice is the essential condition for the birth and development of new movements. If you are not in the grip of avarice you will choose a profession or a trade those appeals to you as the means of self-expression. Does this ever happen in the modern world of ours? Your daily duty is not merely moneymaking drudgery; it is your contribution to social progress and the path of personal development. If you have conquered avarice and hedonism, you may think of devoting your time and energy entirely to some progressive movement.
Across time and history the self has been debated, discussed and fruitfully conceptualized by different thinkers in philosophy. With the advent of social sciences, it became possible for new ways and paradigms to re-examine the true nature of self. In contemporary literature and in common sense, self is equated to being separate, self-contained, independent, consistent, unitary and private. The role of culture is to reduce the anxiety of an individual since culture based routines enable predictable behaviour which in turn keeps anxiety level low. Culture provides structure and meaning to our lives. But what happens to this structure and meaning in our lives when the same gets de-structured by the forces of avarice? This eternal conflict of maintaining the structured self with a constant bombardment of forces of avarice is what comes into being a self-cultured environment. Though there are various theories propounded by social scientists like Freud, Jung etc , the closest that comes to defining self-culture is that of ‘Maslow’s theory of hierarchal needs’.
An individual’s self-culture is closely intertwined with his society that keeps on metamorphosing with age, time and his growth of needs. The typical theory of ‘Hierarchy of needs’ as enunciated by world famous American psychologist Abraham Maslow starting at the base with ‘physiological needs’ to include breathing, food, water,shelter, clothing and sleep overwhelms an individual his need of assertion of self-culture. His sense of independence becomes subservient to his physical needs for sheer survival on this planet.
This sense of independence is primarily the reservoir of inculcating an environment of ‘self-culture’ of which the ‘ethical culture’ is a mere sub-set. It is only at the last stage or the last tip of the ‘Hierarchy of needs’ in the form of ‘Self- actualization’ that a human being comes closer to his goal of ‘Self-culture’. But then how many of us do ever reach this pinnacle of ‘self-actualization’? A very miniscule few.Hence in other words very few ever reach the level of ‘self-culture’. The panacea for all our ills in the society lies in inculcating this culture.
(Author is a retired army officer and RK Columnist. Feedback: [email protected])
