KVE301/KVE401 Universal Human Values and Professional Ethics

Chapter 6: Harmony in Self – Understanding Myself

Unit 1

Unit 2

Unit 3

Unit 4

Unit 5

Appendix

Activities in Self

Human being is the co-existence of self and body. The body is the instrument of self and self is the seer, doer, and enjoyer. Self is continuously active to fulfill its need for happiness.

Why Should I Study Myself

Knowing ourselves better helps us in the following ways:
    1. The self is the basis of everything we do. All the desires and expectations we have are all there in self. For example: to be famous, to get good marks, get great job, having good relationships in our family or wanting ‘Rasgulla’, etc. Hence, it becomes important to understand these desires, thoughts, and activities in self to know whether they are right.
    2. To understand happiness better and the causes for unhappiness because happiness and unhappiness are states in self.
    3. It helps us have more clarity about how we are within. This helps us become self-confident. It also helps in establishing proper synergy between the self and the body.
    4. Study of self unable us to know our weaknesses and how to remove them.
    5. The more we understand ourselves, the more we understand other people as well and our relationship with them.
    6. It helps us to better understand our program, i.e. what is valuable to us, or what we ultimately want, and how we fulfill them.

Getting to know the Activities in Self (‘I’)

The self is conscious in nature while the body is Physico-chemical in nature. The interaction between the ‘I’ and the body is in the form of exchange of information. So the focus of attention is on two categories of attributes of the self, namely, the powers of the self and the corresponding activities as the manifest outcomes of these powers.

1. Power

This means the basic capacity in the self (‘I’). They are desires, thoughts, and expectations.

DigitalG1 Activities in Self - Natural Acceptance

2. Activities

The activities are imaging, analyzing, and selecting/tasting. The activity of analyzing means breaking down the image into various parts or to open it up. Selecting/tasting is with the expectation of fulfilling our desires with the expectation of happiness. The activity of selecting/tasting is the basic level via which the self interacts with the body.

Activities in self are related

There are two possible flows of the activities and both keep taking place:

DigitalG1 Activities in Self from outside to inside

From outside (the body) to inside (in ‘I’)

    1. Self receives sensations from body tasted in ‘I’ e.g. our self see a car through the information via ‘eyes’.
    2. Based on taste, thought could be triggered e.g. we start thinking about the car.
    3. Based on these thoughts, desires may be set e.g. when we starts thinking about the car it forms an image that we are leading a good life by using a car and this way a good life by having a car becomes a desire.
DigitalG1 Activities in Self from outside (the body) to inside (in 'I')

From inside (in ‘I’) to outside (the body)

    1. When desire is set we start forming thoughts about fulfilling this desire. E.g. with the desire of a good life via the car, we start thinking about how to get the car, what is the cost of the car, how can I have that car, etc.
    2. Based on this we make selection to fulfill these thoughts e.g. we choose the car its shape color etc and then end up buying it.
DigitalG1 Activities in Self from inside (in 'I') to outside (the body)

Together we call these activities as imagination. Activities in self are continuous.

DigitalG1 Continuous Activities in Self
DigitalG1 Activities in Self
We make choices with the external world based on our imagination today.
Imagination = Desire + Thoughts + Expectation

The Activities in ‘I’ are Continuous

This activity of imagination in ‘I’ is continuous and not temporary. The power may change but the activity is continuous. The object of the taste may change but the activity of selecting/tasting is continuous. Also what we analyze may keep changing the activity of analyzing is continuous. E.g. my object of taste may change from Rasgulla, to engineering or nice looking bike, etc. similarly I may analyze about my personal life at one moment and about my surrounding at the next moment and may start thinking about my relationships.

These activities keep going on in us irrespective of whether we want them or not. This is what happens when we say “I was going to the exam and that song kept repeating itself in me, it was so distracting”.

Summarized by – Dr. Niyati Garg

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