Life Is Meant Not For Collecting And Consuming But For Connecting And Contributing Gita 05.21

Transcript

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Life is meant not for collecting and consuming but for connecting and contributing. We live in a materialistic society where we often consider a successful people who can collect the most possessions and who can consume the most enjoyable sensations. As collection how many gadgets, how many cars, how many houses, how many things does a person have, that is considered one parameter of success.
Another is consumption. Okay. What is the kind of food somebody eats? What are the kind of sexual partners they have? What all are the kind of things that they are able to consume? If somebody is able to watch movies which are expensive, they think they are having a very good time.
But neither collection nor consumption can touch our core or address its need. Whatever pleasure they produce is superficial and external, like titillation of our physical self. But that pleasure is similar to the pleasure of tickling.
And if we keep tickling ourselves we might get some pleasure but it’s pointless ultimately. Similarly those who just live only for collecting and consuming soon find their life becoming boring and stripped of meaning. Life has a higher purpose and that purpose is connecting and contributing.
We need to connect with ourselves at a deeper level. We need to connect with people around us at a deeper level. And we need to connect ultimately with the deepest reality that is the divine who is the source of everything.
Such deep, such connection that takes us below the surface is what gives us substantial satisfaction, not just superficial titillation. The Bhagavad Gita urges us to connect at a deeper level when it states in 5.21 Putting aside external pleasures putting aside even the pursuit of external pleasures, turning away from them One who gets joy within Such a person is Such a person is spiritually connected, spiritually situated, seeks a connection at a spiritual level They experience unending happiness Sukham Akshayam Imperishable and exhaustible happiness. Once we connect with the core of who we are the things that truly matter for us then that makes our life meaningful.
And then when we bring out what matters to us into the world in the mood of service and contribution then we can make a positive change even if it is small still it is significant for us We are all meant to contribute in the world when our existence makes a positive difference in the lives of someone else and ultimately our existence contributes to a cause bigger than ourselves and that gives existence a blind meaning The Bhagavad Gita explains that when we connect with our core then we understand that we are souls who are parts of the whole that whole Krishna is the well-wisher of everyone as Bhagavad Gita 529 states and when we connect with him then we work for the welfare of everyone 525 states that we work for the welfare of all living beings so thus when we live for connecting and contributing then we find life’s supreme satisfaction