Readers Response

Readers Response

Letter of the month

An encyclopedic endeavour

The cover story for the June issue, A bird in the sky, by Shivi Verma is a work of substance. Her statement. “When whispers of the Divine within become your lodestar, you have made a move towards liberation” speaks for the writer’s honesty and sobriety.

I loved Rajini Menon’s comparison of the role of grace in liberation with the titration method of the chemistry class, where it is the last drop that transforms the substance. I also liked Guru Naushir’s remark that the highest level of mental purity is the key to liberation.

Life Positive readers invariably wait for treats like this in the monthly LP issues.

– Shiv Kumar Hastir, New Delhi

From the lower to the higher

The article, Hello, Stranger, by Suma Varughese in her column in the June 2016 issue of Life Positive, was an honest piece of observation from the heart centre; it also throws an opportunity to realise the consequences of living life from the mind centre. In the scriptures the mind is called lower nature and the heart, higher nature, apara and para prakruti. Maintaining balance between the two is the measure of living life with wisdom and discrimination. How much to depend on para and apara prakruti cannot be defined by preaching or making a template. Each human soul is uniquely positioned in this world. But all human beings need to understand the two natures to live in peace and bliss.

Ramdeo Choudhary, via the website

Shalom, Rabbi!

Life Positive has managed to help the reader meet great souls in the past few months.

The article, The Pluralistic Rabbi, in the June 2016 issue is the latest of the explorations. The rabbi’s terse statements: “European enlightenment equals liberal democracy; Indian enlightenment is the triumph of the wisdom of the non-dual over the dual”, are exemplary. He doesn’t feel shy in stating that learning Vedanta has developed his capacity to understand and articulate the truth.

Shiv Kumar Hastir, New Delhi

Taking advantage?

This refers to Letting go, Letting God, in the May 2016 issue of Life Positive by Bhaavin Shah. Is dependence on others justified when one is not really in need? There are so many who are really in need and who may not be helped as they don’t have that easy access to people from the middle class as the author probably had, and who obliged him when he told them his story.

The fact that the author even ‘saved’ money to go back to Mumbai on an AC train is, in my view, against the rules of such an experiment.

Maria Wirth, Dehra Dun

Bhaavin Shah responds: I thank Maria Wirth for her views. An AC return ticket instead of a sleeper return ticket was God’s return gift that I didn’t choose to deny.

In case of bhiksha, the giver benefits as much as the receiver, if not more. I have also remodelled my financial life to give to the  needy without thought of profit. This is enough proof that their gifts haven’t been wasted.

Corrigendum

In the article, Go with God, in the June 2016 issue, Inspector Balwant Singh was wrongly referred to as Inspector Walia. We regret the error.

-Ed