When you were born, you came as an open limitless possibility in this cosmos. A child doesn’t have any conditioning of its own, but slowly over a period of time as the child grows up, he starts imbibing the qualities which surround him. Or in other words, a child starts to get identified with almost everything which is happening in his family and in the bigger societal circle. For e.g. a newly born baby has no sense of language inherently. Whatever his family speaks, he starts to recite the same. Same goes for other aspects of identifying yourself with a name, country, race, religion, caste & creed.

All these aspects are something which you start picking up from the society because that’s what you are bombarded with. Let’s say if you were born in a tribal family in the jungles, then you won’t be knowing the norms of the modern society, rather you would learn the rules of the Jungle and how to survive there to the best of your capability. Therefore, all the identities which you take are totally subjected to the place where you were born. The very nature of physical identity is that it is limited and temporary.

If you strongly identify yourself with something which is limited and relative in nature, then you are bound to get stumbled at some point in time in your life. From a societal standpoint it is fine to have an identity because that’s needed for the basic survival in the world, however, you should make sure that these identities are porous in nature. If you stick to these identities like a hard rock, then you are bound to crash your head on it. That’s what you see is happening in the outside world in modern times.

All the terrorism in the world is just a question of limited identity. One side of the group identifies with what’s written on their scriptures and the other side of the group also believes the same. Now when both sides meet, war is a natural consequence. It’s like when two bricks strike, one of them is bound to get cracked. In the similar situation if you keep your boundaries loose, then there is no possibility of any friction because you have respect and regard for the other side of the people.

If you really want to have an identification, then keep it as large as possible. Your identity should be all-encompassing. I would ideally recommend you to have a cosmic identity. In YOGA, we say ‘I am the cosmos’ which literally means that the entire universe is my identity. This actually implies that you consider everything as your own responsibility. When everything is yours and you are responsible for it, then there is no scope for any clashes or friction. In such a state your boundaries become absolutely porous. Whenever there is need you use them otherwise you let them go.

If you become like this, then you will see that the very way you experience life will change and the quality of life will be absolutely beautiful & blissful……!

Peace & Love!

🙂