MANTRA YOGA CHAPTER 1 POSTING # 6

[Guest guest]

This Relative World and the Relative Nature of Pleasure

More importantly, though, one’s pleasure is almost always defined relative to our kith and kin and our friends and the circle of company we keep. It is never an absolute experience. It is one that we feel relative to how others are feeling.

This is well illustrated by a hypothetical example.

The thrill of winning a million-dollar lottery would soon fade to dust, even disgust, if every single soul on this planet also won a million dollars. The market would adjust make our conception of the world and our purchasing power, the same as before. It is only if you, are one of the chosen few, maybe even the only one who won the million dollars, will give you anticipated elation. Your joy is at the ‘expense’ of those, who have not received this money. You may not know all who did not win the money; the fact that they did not win, may not even hinder their peace or sense of well-being. Nevertheless, it remains an unalloyed fact that your joy rests and rides on their backs.

The sad fact, as can be seen, is that in this world, our happiness or unhappiness is almost always defined in relative terms, relative to the happiness in others. If others are relatively less happy, we are by definition, happier. We may not enact all this in a conscious way, and few of us would dare admit we do, even if we do!