Survival of the fittest

Each one of us belongs to a different religion and has different views regarding religion, so do I. Two years back I also had common belief regarding religion, but because of some people, situation and circumstance which has created a huge impact on my life, my thoughts gets modified and I started thinking on broader level. One such incident has occurred which I am sharing on my blog.

Few days back I met an old lady; she calls herself very religious and follows her dharma to the core. I am not writing here to which religion it belongs, as I am focussing on some other issue. During the conversation she said,

“Beta humne pichhle janam mein bahut ucch (highest level) karma kiye honge, tabhi to humein is janam mein ye dharma mila. Aur dekha tumne hamare samaj mein kitne kam log hai, kyunki isme janam lena hi bahut badi baat hai”

Above sentence of her touched both my mind and heart and then started a roller coaster ride in my head and had so many thoughts about this statement which I am elaborating here point by point.

1)    Following a particular religion is an individual’s choice. It has no correlation with in which religion one is born.

2)    Even if someone follows a particular religion, he himself mould it according to his own comfort zone (Its true whether we accept it or not)

3)    No religion is high or low, it’s the quality of one’s own deeds which makes him good or bad.

4)    Following a particular religion to the core sometimes makes one coward, reason being logical decision making shifts to predefined myths and conceptions which changes according to time.

5)    When we go into depth of any religion, it focuses completely on an individual’s thoughts, perceptions and karmas and thereafter comes the society.

6)    No religion can help one to attain Nirvana, Every one of us have their own way of finding their own path, journey and destination and that is what is called as IKIGAI in Japanese.

7)    We i.e. Humans only can create their own environment whereas animals adapt to their environment which means any religion to which we belong is actually an environment created by people having same values, perceptions who follows a similar path.

Now coming back to old lady point, I tried here to analyse why there is lesser number of people in a particular religion and what are the factors to flourish any religion in any area. There are basically three major reasons to flourish any religion:

1)    Marketing :- Marketing word sounds weird when it comes to religion, but its fact that proper marketing needs to be done to spread procedures, conceptions , systems, notions etc of religion so that same can reach to the masses.

2)    Climatic Conditions :- Yes, Climatic conditions is one of the most crucial factor to flourish any religion in any particular area .For example , if a religion strictly prohibits consumption of alcohol and eating of non vegetarian food then there are very less chances of survival of that religion in European countries where in consumption of alcohol is must to keep your body warm and vegetarian food is either costly or not easily available.

3)    Entry Barriers:- Most of the communities don’t allow other communities to mingle up For example restrictions on inter caste marriage in most of the cases not allows the mixing of culture thereby stops transferring of thoughts and culture.

Here we can very well relate Charles Darwin theory of Survival of Fittest. According to Darwin “” Survival of the fittest means, better designed for an immediate local environment” Not the strongest.

So , if any religion has to be flourish then its notions should be in according with the condition prevailing in any particular area thereby allowing people to accept it with their maximum comfort zone.

Moreover one has to do more good and not just follow what others have already said. Sometimes when you blindly follow masses, ‘M’ becomes silent. 

Sant Kabir ne kaha hai 

" Jab Mein Tha Tab Hari Nahin‚ Jab Hari Hai Mein Nahin

                      Sab Andhiyara Mit Gaya‚ Jab Deepak Dekhya Mahin"