It starts with the egoistic idea about what we can do as individuals. Relying on our personal effort, we brave the world and accomplish a lot by worldly standards. It makes us proud.
To further boost our pride, we acquire things that are material in nature. It starts off as a matter of necessity, for one’s survival, and then expands beyond what one needs or his family’s. Before we knew it, we had already amassed so much, even taking advantage of others to accomplish our itch for acquisition, far beyond what we and our families would ever need for a decent survival—the basic necessities—and some savings put aside for future exigencies reasonably expected for emergencies.
Later, we realized there are always others who are better than us, whether in the area of amassing wealth or in mental expansion through learning to gain respect or to have power over others.
So we exert more effort to achieve more and the process goes on and on as it becomes addicting, to the extent of sacrificing our mental and physical health. Then the problems start manifesting and visits to the doctor or psychiatrist, often juxtaposed with visits to the lawyer, become more and more frequent.
But to have a shift in thinking about acquisitions and mental expansion is considered crazy. We were brainwashed to make it, or to be successful, in life. To have more and to achieve more.
Then we end up in a place where we are boxed in. We ask ourselves, what are all these for? To feed our pride? This often comes when a lot of problems confluence to force us to think beyond ourselves, to search beyond individual limitations.
Such will keep building up until it ends in surrendering to the Supreme Creator. It is called so many different names, from place to place, from group to group, or by different religions. Yet the essence is the same. And therein lies what we had been looking for in the wrong places—PEACE OF MIND or HAPPINESS.
Such (surrender) is what we should aspire for through our personal New Year’s resolutions.**