Gratitude

Today, I expound the doctrine of the Attitude of Gratitude, as I attempt to further explain what I started writing in my article titled, “Responsibility and Gratitude”, dated May 8th, 2018.

Gratitude is a feeling of appreciation in response to the kindness shown by a specific entity. Indian Culture categorizes and details the 5 vital entities that play a part in human life. Our life is owed to these entities and while the purpose of life is ‘Ultimate Realization’, the path to getting there is through deliberate, conscious and thereby sub-conscious acknowledgement of their benevolence and gifts.

There are five entities: God; Ancestors and Parents; Every Human Being; All the Elements and Forces of Nature including Water, Fire, Air, Earth and Ether as well as all the other living beings including Plants and Trees, Animals and Birds, Sea Life, etc; and finally, the Great Seers of the past that have passed down our Great Culture, that we have the Civilization that we are a part of.

And Gratitude as a way of life, that is extended to these five entities is called “Pancha Yagna”: ‘Pancha’ for Five and ‘Yagna’ for the Attitude of Gratitude.

Attitude of Gratitude is not merely expected. It has been codified into a prescriptive lifestyle, that has come to be called Sanatana Dharma.

Gratitude, in the Indian tradition has been defined, explained and institutionalized to a point where there is no escaping the inevitability of bringing it into ones experience; very different from a set of rules that one hopes everyone follows or a directive set of guidelines that are left to interpretation. And this is the single reason for the Great Indian Culture to have withstood the ravages of time; the onslaught of faith mongers and religious fanatics over the millennia.

That said, the Culture itself lives through tradition. Fail carrying tradition through, and the Culture starts to die.

I write these details in an attempt to take an exception to bullish mindsets that have foolishly branded this Great Code for a Higher state of Existence as another Religion. I hope that my readers understand what it is, as opposed to what it is made to seem; that the Tradition may be followed; that the Culture may live!