Okay...I went back to see the advertisement today and it read like...
Little Insurance means
No Insurance, change your habit. - Aegon Religare
That's how these marketing companies are...they just highlight whatever they want to capture the onlookers attention. Mind you...it is real smartness and while a few of those sales guys write such stuff out of sheer panic, the rest of the guys know what that the attention span of an onlooker is a couple of seconds only and if they don't bring the attention within a short span, they have failed as marketing guys and their family will hungry along with them. So I have great respect for these people who have to deal with a lot of stress in using the correct words, tone, colours etc. along with the message.
Anyway, even though when I read it today, the meaning got twisted by 180 degrees, I still like it, but this time in a different sense. When I read it previously, I just thought the advertisement company was something different or against insurance companies. The new phrase also tells a very vital thing...that you cannot dilly-dally when it comes to life or death issues. It's a call for acceptance of the situation as it is now. And only by such an acceptance can there arise any change for the better. I have done this a lot of times in the past and many times I have also tried escaping the situation. It's just what Buddha said..that there is suffering in this world. If one turns the other way when coming across something too sickening to be aware of, one just is allowing an infection to start growing by just leaving it as it is and going over to enjoy whatever one feels like. Enjoyment is not a bad thing but it cannot be done when there is a problem looming over. I don't want to preach because all these things are all there in the books. But a funny thing is, the insurance that the company gives is itself a little insurance in the larger scheme of life...I mean, what all can the company cover...I find it interesting when I read the statistics which says.."X % of the world population suffer from cancer, Y % depression, Z % from road-side accidents..." REALLY...sum it all up and none of us can escape atleast any one of these things (unless ofcourse, one believes that one is privileged to be not human enough to succumb to this. But I guess then not being human enough is itself a problem). No...I don't want to sound fatalistic. Just today I came from seeing my cousin's wife whose mother died of a tumour in the brain. Awareness is very important and awareness can even dissolve a tumour in the brain. Mahatma Gandhi quoted this in one of his last messages asking someone to look at the weakest person and see if what one does helps him or her. I have used it as one of my base positions many times even though there may still be a little flaw or arrogance in it. It's because one has to realize that he or she himself or herself is as weak (or used to be as weak) as the one whom one is observing. One cannot really know what Mahatma Gandhi in mind just like one cannot know what Krishna had in mind or for that matter, someone on the street who has just given a love letter. Here, I would like to say something that Swami Vivekananda said. First, let me tell you something about him...many greats have come and gone leaving a characteristic mark on humanity, kind of like a male dog marks it scent by urine...lol. But seriously, if there is one person whose intention was only to help people help themselves, it is him. He made it very clear that the weak cannot be happy or noble or prosperous or whatever. He didn't say this from a political or religious or racist or casteist or any other supremist philosophy. He merely told the plain fact that a beggar cannot give to another beggar, using a milder language to an audience who were living in the comfort zone (which ironically itself came about from the blessings from the past good karma they had done). A beggar on the street doesn't get this facility because he or she would have to do something to satisfy the hunger, which is beyond human control. Otherwise, you tell me why someone will get his hands dirty to clean sewage. He is forced to do this by a maddening instinct to satisfy the hunger.
Ofcourse, this doesn't mean one keeps thinking about the sufferings of others and feel atleast morally satisfied that he or she is an empathetic person. This will only result in sadness which is in turn another form of weakness. A sad person can never help another sad person because his or her sadness keeps interfering with the capacity to help. The heart may wish to help but the mind or body might be too lethargic to help. While it might not be possible to feel happy enough in the present to help another like this because of one's own bad past karma, one can atleast stop voluntarily go searching for sufferings, pain etc. by doing whatever one can in a detached way, like how a doctor does to a patient. Attaching, instead of associating, oneself with sufferers and imagining oneself as suffering even when there is no cause for it is itself a bad habit.
Little Insurance means
No Insurance, change your habit. - Aegon Religare
That's how these marketing companies are...they just highlight whatever they want to capture the onlookers attention. Mind you...it is real smartness and while a few of those sales guys write such stuff out of sheer panic, the rest of the guys know what that the attention span of an onlooker is a couple of seconds only and if they don't bring the attention within a short span, they have failed as marketing guys and their family will hungry along with them. So I have great respect for these people who have to deal with a lot of stress in using the correct words, tone, colours etc. along with the message.
Anyway, even though when I read it today, the meaning got twisted by 180 degrees, I still like it, but this time in a different sense. When I read it previously, I just thought the advertisement company was something different or against insurance companies. The new phrase also tells a very vital thing...that you cannot dilly-dally when it comes to life or death issues. It's a call for acceptance of the situation as it is now. And only by such an acceptance can there arise any change for the better. I have done this a lot of times in the past and many times I have also tried escaping the situation. It's just what Buddha said..that there is suffering in this world. If one turns the other way when coming across something too sickening to be aware of, one just is allowing an infection to start growing by just leaving it as it is and going over to enjoy whatever one feels like. Enjoyment is not a bad thing but it cannot be done when there is a problem looming over. I don't want to preach because all these things are all there in the books. But a funny thing is, the insurance that the company gives is itself a little insurance in the larger scheme of life...I mean, what all can the company cover...I find it interesting when I read the statistics which says.."X % of the world population suffer from cancer, Y % depression, Z % from road-side accidents..." REALLY...sum it all up and none of us can escape atleast any one of these things (unless ofcourse, one believes that one is privileged to be not human enough to succumb to this. But I guess then not being human enough is itself a problem). No...I don't want to sound fatalistic. Just today I came from seeing my cousin's wife whose mother died of a tumour in the brain. Awareness is very important and awareness can even dissolve a tumour in the brain. Mahatma Gandhi quoted this in one of his last messages asking someone to look at the weakest person and see if what one does helps him or her. I have used it as one of my base positions many times even though there may still be a little flaw or arrogance in it. It's because one has to realize that he or she himself or herself is as weak (or used to be as weak) as the one whom one is observing. One cannot really know what Mahatma Gandhi in mind just like one cannot know what Krishna had in mind or for that matter, someone on the street who has just given a love letter. Here, I would like to say something that Swami Vivekananda said. First, let me tell you something about him...many greats have come and gone leaving a characteristic mark on humanity, kind of like a male dog marks it scent by urine...lol. But seriously, if there is one person whose intention was only to help people help themselves, it is him. He made it very clear that the weak cannot be happy or noble or prosperous or whatever. He didn't say this from a political or religious or racist or casteist or any other supremist philosophy. He merely told the plain fact that a beggar cannot give to another beggar, using a milder language to an audience who were living in the comfort zone (which ironically itself came about from the blessings from the past good karma they had done). A beggar on the street doesn't get this facility because he or she would have to do something to satisfy the hunger, which is beyond human control. Otherwise, you tell me why someone will get his hands dirty to clean sewage. He is forced to do this by a maddening instinct to satisfy the hunger.
Ofcourse, this doesn't mean one keeps thinking about the sufferings of others and feel atleast morally satisfied that he or she is an empathetic person. This will only result in sadness which is in turn another form of weakness. A sad person can never help another sad person because his or her sadness keeps interfering with the capacity to help. The heart may wish to help but the mind or body might be too lethargic to help. While it might not be possible to feel happy enough in the present to help another like this because of one's own bad past karma, one can atleast stop voluntarily go searching for sufferings, pain etc. by doing whatever one can in a detached way, like how a doctor does to a patient. Attaching, instead of associating, oneself with sufferers and imagining oneself as suffering even when there is no cause for it is itself a bad habit.