Today, as we are grappling with the definition of spirituality, especially since Superstar Rajnikanth declared his pursuit of "spiritual politics", Swami Amritaswarupananda Puri, the Vice-Chairman of Mata Amritanandamayi Math and President of Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, offered a simple definition of it at the beginning of his keynote address on day two of TNIE's ThinkEdu Conclave, linking it directly to education.
"There are two types of education - education for a living and education for life. While education for a living is studying to become a scientist, a doctor or such; education for life is understanding the essential principles of the life, nature of the mind and world. This is spirituality," he said.
Clearing the fact that spirituality is not linked to any religion, he further added that every one of us is practising spirituality without realising it as such, "It is nothing different from the world or the worldly life." So an amalgamation of both the components would result in a greater education. And with great education, comes a certain power — power of science, economics, business and more. And rather than letting the power corrupt, the Swami suggests that we use it in the service of others.
He also said that though it is not wrong to have money on our minds, it is definitely wrong to be money-minded. The Swami had a word of caution for parents, whose blinding love for their children can sometimes lead them to give in to all their demands. "This is the difference between attachment and love, while love is selfless, attachment, can be binding and just like Dhritarashtra, blinded by his love for the Kauravas, paved their path of destruction, the question is do we want to raise a generation of Kauravas or Pandavas?" he asked. And it is the collective job of both parents and teachers to encourage students to ask the right questions, "the deeper the questions, the better the answers," he says.
