Part 21

ETHICS AND RELATIONS

Compassion

Seeing another's suffering clearly, knowing, from one's own self-knowledge, that the sufferer is not ultimately the fixed, bounded ego they take themselves to be, and acting to demonstrate this. Compassion does not validate the ego while reducing its suffering; it addresses the source of suffering, which is the ego itself. Without self-knowledge, compassion collapses into mercy.

Mercy

Acknowledging the sufferer's reality, validating their suffering, and working to reduce it without disturbing the egoic structure that generates it. Mercy is kind. It is also, in the long run, incomplete. It treats the symptom. The framework does not dismiss mercy; it notes its limitation: mercy can relieve, but only compassion can dissolve.

Teacher

A mirror and catalyst for the student's ego-thinning. The teacher does not confer liberation; they facilitate conditions in which the ego can encounter itself honestly. Authority is extended to the teacher incrementally, based on the student's continuous assessment of whether this relationship is genuinely serving their dissolution. The teacher's role is complete when the student no longer needs it.

Student

An ego devoted to its own dissolution. The devotion that appears to flow toward the teacher is, correctly understood, the ego's devotion to its own freedom, reflected toward the teacher insofar as the teacher serves as its instrument. As the ego thins, the teacher-student duality dissolves: the voids become similar, and what was a relationship of guidance approaches a common ground.

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Q - how can compassion and mercy differ in our daily practical life ?

Q - Why doesn't a real teacher fit our definition of teacher and what are the consequences of it ?

The comment section is all open ,share what stuck you today .

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This quote and my understanding " i always feel incomplete and try to grab everything so I can feel complete , for this I change my identity every time "

But I wanna know the highest meaning of this quote , whoever has read the camus deeply can answer it because i have only read "the stranger" .

And I've heard a lot about sisyphus.

The comment section is all open , come and engage .

It’s an astounding fact that animal agriculture takes up to 80% of the world’s agricultural land and provides just 18% of the world’s calorie needs. Yet most national policymakers tend to ignore it.

To fill this void, organisations like Plant Based Treaty and cities like West Hollywood, California are stepping up to sway their constituents’ eating habits and cut emissions. West Hollywood adopted the treaty in late 2024, increasing public outreach and organising community food events to help cut land, water, and carbon footprints.

The timing couldn’t be critical . Livestock are accounts for 30% of the greenhouse gas emissions and the way the world currently eats is enough to push warming past climate goals.

But it got me thinking - should climate really be the only reason to choose a plant-based diet?

I recently came across an insightful line by Acharya Prashant in his book Is She a Food to You?: “Turn vegan in your own self-interest. You’re not killing the other; you are killing yourself.”

It made me realize that environmental arguments only cover half the story. If we aren't alright internally, we will keep making choices that harm both ourselves and the planet.

When we already know what is right and what needs to be done, what is it within us that actually stops us from making the right choice?

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Consciousness

A dualistic phenomenon: ego at one end, object at the other. There is no consciousness without this duality, no awareness that is not awareness of something, from the perspective of some center.

Claims to 'pure consciousness' transcending this structure are, in this framework, either philosophical confusions or the ego appropriating a prestigious metaphysical identity.

Duality

The fundamental structure of consciousness as experienced: subject and object, ego and world. In this framework, the duality is ultimately illusory, not because Brahman stands behind it as the real, but because both poles are the ego's operation.

The object as-known is already shaped by egoic projection; the subject that knows is the ego. Both ends of the duality are the ego's own construction.

Non-duality

Distinct from classical Advaita non-dualism.

The framework does not posit Brahman, a positive non-dual ground, behind the apparent duality. It holds that both ends of the duality are the ego's operation, and deals in absences: when the ego is seen through, what remains is not characterized.

Any positive characterization immediately becomes a new egoic object.

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Have you ever thought why the popular religions focus so much on Brahman ?

Part 12 of AP framework

THE BODY AND THE UNIVERSE

Body (as problem)

The ego's birthplace and primary substrate. The body arrives in the world with evolutionary baggage: tendencies, fears, desires, and distortions accumulated over millions of years of biological adaptation.

The ego arises from the body's physical separateness and subsequently uses the body, its appearance, capacities, pleasures, and pains, to validate and inflate itself.

Body (as instrument)

The same body that is the ego's birthplace is, when the ego steps aside, the universe's instrument. The body then operates with a natural intelligence that requires no desire as fuel.

This is not mysticism; biological organisms freed from egoic overlay exhibit remarkable wisdom, economy, and responsiveness.

The operator, not the operated-upon, is the determining variable.

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Brain

Described in this framework as the representative of the entire universe within the body.

The brain's complexity, its self-organizing capacity, and its deep entanglement with the total environment make it, when freed from egoic commandeering, an expression of the universe's own intelligence operating locally.

When the ego commandeers the brain, it harnesses this instrument for the ego's small purposes.

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Evolutionary baggage

The inherited tendencies, fears, and desires that the body carries at birth, prior to the individual ego's formation.

These are not chosen by the individual; they are the substrate into which the ego is born.

The ego then borrows from and amplifies these inherited patterns, which is why egoic patterns often feel biological, compulsive, and impossible to simply choose away.

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Q - Which evolutionary baggage do you think is amplified in your personality because you have borrowed them ?

Suggest me all worth reading books of Camus , so I can purchase them and fill my library, obviously I'll read them. (The stranger I've read and a little bit of sisyphus and nothing) .

So I want suggestions because I'm new to existentialism.

I recently came across this image about Acharya Prashant's book Ego.

The line on it says: "Kaam bigaad de sirf 6 seconds mein." Basically, your ego can mess things up in just 6 seconds.

And honestly, that made me think. We usually think of ego as something obvious. Someone being arrogant. Someone showing off. Someone thinking they're better than everyone else.

But I think ego shows up in much more ordinary situations. Someone says something that hurts you, and immediately you want to reply. Someone ignores you, and suddenly you feel like ignoring them back. Someone disagrees with you, and you start trying to prove that you're right. Someone points out your mistake, and instead of looking at what they said, you start thinking about how to defend yourself.

Nothing major has actually happened. But inside your head, a whole story starts. "How dare they?" "Why should I be the one to apologize?" "They need to understand what they did." And then you react.

Sometimes it takes only a few seconds. Later, when you're calm, you look back and think: "Why did I even do that?" That's the part I find interesting about ego. It doesn't always feel like ego. It often feels like self-respect, justice, or simply doing what is right. And because it feels so reasonable in that moment, we don't stop to question it.

Maybe the real challenge isn't getting rid of the ego. Maybe it's simply noticing that moment when you are about to react and asking: "Am I responding to the situation, or am I just protecting my image of myself?"

I've started finding that question surprisingly useful. Have you ever reacted to something in the moment and regretted it once you had calmed down?

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6. Philosophical Anthropology: What Is a Human Being? 🧍

- A human being, in this framework, is an ego-body complex, a biological organism (with evolutionary history, neural architecture, and physical separateness) that has organized its experience around a felt sense of bounded selfhood.

- The ego is not added to the body from outside; it arises from the body's own structure, particularly the skin boundary that establishes physical separateness.

-The human being is distinguished from other animals not by the presence of an ego (animals have rudimentary egoic structures) but by the complexity, narrativity, and reflexive capacity of the human ego.

-The human ego can examine itself, which is both the source of the problem (the ego can elaborate its own distortions indefinitely) and the source of the solution (the ego can, in principle, see through them).

The same body that generates the ego is also, when the ego steps aside, the universe's instrument. Brain and body, freed from egoic commandeering, operate with a natural intelligence that exceeds anything the ego can deliberately engineer.

The highest human possibility is not the ego's triumph over the body but the ego's sufficient thinning to allow the body's natural intelligence to express itself freely.

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🌸7. Aesthetics 🌸

The framework's aesthetics follow directly from its "via negativa axiology"

Beauty is defined as the absence of egoic distortion, and art, accordingly, is great when it is produced in the ego's absence. This does not require the artist to be a realized person in every dimension of life; it requires the artist to have access, in the moment of creation, to states of genuine ego-absence.

- Sustained creative work involves oscillation: moments of ego-absence in which something genuinely beautiful is made, and the ego's return, which produces the work that connects those moments.

-The practised artist learns, in editing, to distinguish between what was made in the ego's absence and what was made in its presence, and has the honesty to honour that distinction.

The reception of art is also ego-determined. Two people may weep at the same music; one is having their ego confirmed and enlarged, the other is having their ego loosened. The external behaviour is identical; the inner direction is opposite.

The framework holds that what is called "taste" is, in large part, the ego's preference for art that serves its own project.

Animals also have ego but why aren't they violent as human beings? What do you think about this ?

What's the difference between negativa axiology and positive axiology?

So, Recently watched Into the Wild (2007), which has surprisingly left my mind filled with quite a lot.

Here, Christopher McCandless gives away almost all his money, leaving behind his degree, car, family and the life he had built, and heads towards the Alaskan wilderness🐾

**At first, it honestly looks like freedom. No society, no expectations, no roles to play. Just him and nature! ☁**️

But he still seemed unhappy..

may be because changing places, people or lifestyles can be a huge “external” change while something within remains untouched.

I saw how , even “I don’t belong to this society” or “I am free because I live differently” can quietly become another identity.

And then there’s another part of the film that caught my eyes.

Chris meets people who genuinely want to connect with him, yet keeps moving away. It made me wonder whether relationships themselves bind us, or whether it is our expectation from them that creates the bondage.

Upon observing closely , it reveals the problem is not in relations but the expectations of the the “one” that desperately wants to get something from a relationship.

Saying “This is mine , This person should complete me ” or relation with any person/ object held onto to fill an inner sense of lack, that very relationship is nothing but bondage.

Alsoo, Near the end, he writes:

“Happiness only real when shared.”

I’m not sure the film is asking us to choose society over solitude or vice versa. But what I see, is it asking something more uncomfortable:

When I want to escape from my life, am I actually escaping the situation or am I simply taking the same ‘me’ to a different place ??

Can you see something similar in your lives too? If yes, comment. I’m curious to know!🤓

Here it is on YouTube: Big Oil Saw the Nepal Floods Coming - Public Citizen - Sept 15, 2026 (YouTube)

Description: The devastating floods in Nepal were caused by the collapse of a glacier melted by years of historic heat — a climate disaster that Big Oil companies knew would happen decades ago, but did nothing to stop. ~:~ Learn more: citizen.org/topic/climate-energy/fighting-climate-change

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Aaron Regunberg is director of Public Citizen’s Climate Accountability Project, where he leads efforts to hold Big Oil companies legally accountable for their climate crimes. Aaron holds a JD from Harvard Law School and served as a law clerk to Judge Mary McElroy of the US District Court for the District of Rhode Island: citizen.org/about/person/aaron-regunberg

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Here are the latest r/ClimateNews posts with keywords: Big Oil ~:~:~ Nepal ~:~:~ Public Citizen

I recently came across Albert Camus line:

One must imagine Sisyphus happy.

I knew the basic story of Sisyphus, but this time I started looking at it differently.

Sisyphus is condemned to push a huge rock up a mountain. Every time he reaches the top, the rock rolls back down, and he has to start again.

There is no final achievement. No I've made it. Just the same thing, again and again.

Camus response is interesting. He doesn't say Sisyphus should escape from it or pretend that his situation is meaningful. He says we should imagine him happy.

For me, the point seems to be: if the struggle itself is unavoidable, why make your happiness dependent on finally reaching the top?

And this is where I started thinking about Advaita Vedanta.

Advaita seems to ask a slightly different question.

Instead of only asking, How can I be happy while pushing the rock?

it asks:

Why am I pushing this rock?

Because isn't this what we do in everyday life too?

I'll be happy when I get the job.

I'll be happy when I earn enough.

I'll be happy when this person loves me.

I'll be happy when people respect me.

We keep pushing.

Sometimes we reach the top. We get what we wanted. There is a little satisfaction.

And then the rock comes down again.

A new desire appears.

So we push again.

Camus seems to say: see the absurdity of this clearly and still live.

Advaita takes the inquiry somewhere else: look at the one who is demanding all these things. Who is this I that constantly feels incomplete and therefore needs to become something?

That's where I see both philosophies meeting, but also taking different directions.

Camus is primarily confronting the absurdity of existence and the absence of any given ultimate meaning.

Advaita is not merely asking how to live meaningfully in an apparently meaningless existence, it questions the very I that is seeking meaning.

Existentialism, at least in Camus case, seems to confront the problem of meaning:

What do I do when the universe doesn't provide the meaning I am looking for?

Advaita asks something more fundamental:

Who is the I that is looking for meaning in the first place?

Maybe the difference is something like this:

Camus: The rock may keep falling. Know this, and don't stop living.

Advaita: Before accepting the rock as your destiny, investigate why you think you have to carry it.

I find the second question particularly uncomfortable.

Because maybe my problem isn't that I haven't learned to carry my rocks well enough.

Maybe I've spent years collecting rocks and calling them my life.

Still trying to understand this, though.

How do you see the Sisyphus story? Do you think Camus and Advaita are pointing toward something similar, or are they fundamentally different?

This article addressed one of the biggest issues . Fear for exam ☠️.

Having shared this journey there was something which was my constant reminder that fear is merely biological . Fear will be there ,you do which you must . That's why I have addressed my fear and divided it into 2 types .

Natural fear and unnecessary fear .

"It's absolutely true that we fear the imagined danger more than the actual danger itself."

Lemme I share with you my experience . From panicking to conquering the exam by becoming a topper again .

Fear of failing the exam is a strange yet so common fear among those who prepare for any exam.

There are two aspects to this fear. One is: it will make your preparation better by haunting you. The other is: this fear will ruin your exam , if you allow it to overcome you .

The choice depends on the examinee.(🫠 I experienced both) . Okay so let's talk about the second one

The second one arises because when I seek security and a tag after clearing the exam or maybe I wanna prove myself to my relatives that I'm a genius guy . 🙃

"My very existence depends on the exam results." 😭😂

From this point on, unnecessary and unwanted fear starts coming into my head, and rather than living in the present and finishing my chapter, I start living in the future and overthinking starts.😑 🤦

Then one thing I do is ask, "Why is this?" I started enquiring,

am I not aware of the difficulty of the exam ?

Haven't i solved enough PYQs ?

haven't i done sufficient writing practice?

Wasn't i honest enough while attending a lecture ?

IF YES

and then it's gone. It doesn't take much time. The only method is questioning the fear itself.

Ask a couple of questions from the fear itself . I'll be gone .

I want to know - what do you do when this fear starts to overcome you, just before your exam or when your exam is nearby?

Sharing an article by Acharya Prashant which gave me inner clarity, I’m sure it’ll help others too.

https://acharyaprashant.org/en/articles/how-to-overcome-fear-1\_7d2c7cc

What is the problem with the binding of the book 🙂 ,I ain't getting this . I studied this book for 3 months and now my book has reproduced 3 more parts from itself . 😂

Ecipl is just 600 pages lengthy and what about TAX 🫣 .

ICSI should print books with reasonable page length like this book can be divided into 2 parts . ie ECL and IPL

Because bulky books are prone to this type of accidents .

Has this happened to you with your book as well?

Have you ever seen anything like this before?

Please share your thoughts in the comments below!

🔺 Video taken during the HIDP event conducted on 29th August in Goa with Acharya Prashant.

One of the most fascinating things about The Stranger is how uncomfortable Meursault makes us.

He doesn’t cry at his mother’s funeral. He doesn’t pretend to love Marie in the conventional way. And when society expects grief, guilt, religion, or remorse, Meursault often refuses to perform those emotions just to make others comfortable.

But does that make him emotionless?

Or is Meursault actually one of the most honest characters in literature, a man who refuses to lie about what he feels?

By the end of the novel, it almost seems that Meursault is judged not only for killing a man, but for failing to behave the way society believes a “normal” human being should.

What do you think? Was Meursault condemned for his crime, or for refusing to pretend?

Spoilers for The Stranger are welcome in the comments.

Wanna start reading this masterpiece 🔥.

Confusion ,

1 .is there any translation problem with different translation editions of The stranger ?

2.Which translator should I rely on ?

3.anything important which I need to focus on while reading this masterpiece?

Hoping for a great discussion

Yes , it's possible with some amount of discipline. It's my third semester in college (although I haven't gone to my college since semester 3rd has started on 1 August). Will continue from September.

Although only 3 marks have made me pass this group. 💀😂

Also I have shared this post to tell people, you can study for CS with your college . (2 to 3 hours college and then I studied for 7 to 8 hours for CS in college library and at home from January) . I had backlog 😭of 10 days because I was reluctant but yes 🙂‍↕️passed.

Preparing for group 2 December attempt now .

One question, cafm was really tough in the June attempt? Because I'm from a commerce background with good catch in accountancy. So I didn't feel that subject much hard .

i haven't received this type of hospitality from CBSE , NTA , DU .

💀 ICSI = giving reminders 😂 for your result .