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In India, one gets a job after tough competition. When he is successful in competition and getting the job, he becomes very happy ( since it is hard-achieved) and enjoys the life. In the course of time, he sees people going abroad ( especially to US) and always hears exaggerated news of this wonderful 'dream land' and the thousand comforts this land offers to them. For one, there is no way to assess things sitting there, since thoughts are always biased. There is no way to get a clear picture of US life as the major sources of information in India are friendsand films. Information getting from the former are always coloured and biased, that from the latter always waste and stupid. Finally he decides flying to US without having a precise idea as to why he is going and for what. Sometimes, he is going since his friends in US inspire him and invite him, sometimes he is going just to make some money in a short period of time, sometimes he is going for better life and style, sometimes just to make his elders happy, sometimes just for the sake of going to US. The problems start at this point which I try to analyze in following paragraphs. we don't view our life as a whole. With this statement, I do mean that we don't have a clear cut idea as to what exactly we need in our life. We all need pleasure and comfort, for which we live, but what brings pleasure varies from person to person. It is very difficult to define things that bring pleasure since these are highly subjective and also are determined by your philosophy. Money is widely consided to be the thing that brings pleasure, however, it is not true. Money can solve thousands of problems simultaneously and can offer great many comforts to you, still, it is only an agent. That is, money doesn't make you happy in its own account, instead, it represents comforts indirectly. ( I exclude certain misers and business tycoons, for whom making money is the pleasure, not the comforts that money offers!). If you are longing for comforts of this sort, you must need money, otherwise you don't need money. Nobody will ever say that (at least I hope so) ancient indian ascetics were all unhappy because they had had no bank balance. The incapability of seeing this truth in youth, as well as the incapability to view the life as a whole,I think, are the chief sources of pain and disappointment in later life. Therefore, I think, we need some training to identify certain things that make us happy in the life. An enlightned few can identify certain things for them clearly and precisely, as depicted in these lines: Here with a loaf of bread beneath the bough A flask of wine, a book of verse and thou Beside me singing in the wilderness And wilderness is paradise enow For a poet, these are more than enough, however, for an IT professional, these are hardly enogh. We need credit cards, we need ATM debit cards, we need modern cars, we need all consumer items that our friends purchase,we need at least a six drive CD player in car, we enjoy music in maximum volume, we should dance in parties. We should have to speak endlessly of the new features of our cars and should convince others that ours is the best available model. We should have DVD, music system, cell phone, tripple a membership, lap top and what not. Without these things we may be considered as lesser beings in US. Since we are lesser beings, we run around to get all these things without knowing what we need and what not ! Therefore, once we identify what we need in life, it would become easier to be happy or be unhappy in the sense that if we do have those things we are happy, otherwise we are unhappy. Technology teaches you how to make money, however it doesn't tell you how to derive pleasure out of that; humanities don't teach you how to make money, they tell you how to derive plesure out of that. The ratio of these two determines one's fate. If you think that great amount of money will make you happy, and if you find it is not possible to make that much amount there, you can leave for US and make money. Since your aim is making money, you can compromise with certain things here. You know with what amount you can be happy ( at least you must have a vaugue idea ) and as soon as you get it, you can go back and start another life that you have been longing for . The period in which you were working to make money contributes much to this life. Also, you can enjoy that period since happiness is not always at the end, but in means as well. If something undesirable happens during this time, you have to face it; such things are beyond your control and will happen irrespective of your presence or absence. If you think that money doesn't make man happy, and you are not at all pleased with materialistic pleasures, you can lead the ordinary life in India, you will never get worried when seeing people going US since you know very well that US can offer nothing to promote your happiness. If you think that you don't know what is to be done; that is to say, you don't know which is better, then you need the sort of training of which I discussed above. It is a human tendency to think against the system in which he finds himself. The negative side of the present system always strikes us since we experience it, and so is the positive side of the other system since we don't experience it. There are people who live in utter poverty, still they live. They dream only of a very meagre amount of money with which they can buy roti to supress their hunger. I read in newspapers before a couple of days that in Pakisthan, a father burned his eleven year old daughter alive for the mistake of asking a roti after five days of continuous starving. According to my terminology, I call this situation " really painful' and the situation depicted in your mail "virtually painful'. ( Yes, we have virtual memory, virtual reality, virtual cards and virtual pain). That is, one should know before leaving his homeland, for what he is doing so- to get an extra bed room or to avoid a bed full of thorns. Now remains the question 'Was all this worth it?'. For an answer, one needs to look inside; not outside, and if there are hundred persons, there will be hundred and one answers!!!
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