Why is that when eash of us, as adults, and part of the rat race, are becoming very much self-centered?  How is that in big cities, we do not even know the names of the people who reside in flats on the same floor?  

Are we so busy, that we cannot spend a few minutes to introduce ourselves and get to know our neighbors on a Sunday?  Or better still, introduce our children to their children, and allow them to interact, freely, as children?

There are cases when the children become very close friends, but for some strange reason the adults do not even know who lives on the same floor, and who is the mother or father of whom.

Well, there are association meetings, but most skip such meetings and do their own, without the slightest of worries or caring for the other people.

Why, why and why should all this happen?  Can't we, as adults, slip into our own natural selves, at least get across to those in ouur neighborhood and exchange a few words, find out common interests and so on?  Why can't we break the jinx?

It is not that we need to break it, but need to break it urgently too.

By not reaching out to relatrives and friends and neighbors we are sending the very wrong signals to our children, particularly in the cities, as our children are already overburdened with the so-called Education System, and have become robots.  They have, by and large, learned how to be very selfish and self-centered.

When people -- our own relatives come from our ancestral villages, our children do not respect elders and tend to mock at them.,  They do not relish any friendhship with neighbors and feel that any conversation is eating into their chatting time and what's up time.  They have become very selfish indeed.

Some small picnics with neighbors, some amount of caring by taking our children to the orpahnages, old age homes, is very much part of our attempts to be our natural selves.  It is in our human nature to care for others.  It is very much part of human nature to be kind, at least give a patient hearing to others and so on.  It is very much a part of our natural selves to reach out to people.

Yet, we put on a mask in our rat race and forget to see the realities.  We tend to forget the world around us, and never reach out to people.  We have forgot how to laugh loud and never ever even make the smallest of phone calls to our own cousin brothers, who live in the very same city.  We never bother to even make enquiries about a person who is sick in the neighborhood or visit those in hospitals, even if they are our own kith and kin.  

Marriages have become occasions to say "hai" and "bye".  In the seventies and even the eighties, marriages were more personal, more intimate in terms of relationships and more focussed in terms of developing relationships.  Today, they are occasions to just say wish our relatives, give the present to the bride or bridegroom and then have the food that is available and quietly move out.  

Once again, even if our children are teenagers or college-going children, we are sending the worst of messages.  Human compassion, ability to reach out to others and tolerance of the idosyncracies of others and the ability to listen -- each one of these are quietly being forgotten.

We cannot and should not do this.  We need to take the marriages seriously, call up our close relatives and friends, and at least call on them, once in a while.  The "hai" and 'bye' culture smacks of crass commercialism.  It simply means that we are so much bothered about money.

Of course, the tendencies are not always so bad, more so, if there is one or may be two, very rich relatives in the close circle.  We make every effort to reach out to them, and find out what we can get out of such rich people -- money, influence, new contacts or whatever. 

This is a horrible state of affairs.  This is the other extreme of selfishness.  We cannot have one value for rich people and another for poor people.  Our children naturally learn a lot from us, and happily ape us -- with disastrous results.

A very common fallcy is to think that the very rich are also the very happy people.  We just do not understand that in the very rich business families, the caring between the husband and wife on the one hand, and between the father or mother and the children, is very little.  They have their own worlds, and unless the mother is a very balanced person, things start falling apart. 

For instance, if the mother is one who take advantage of the money that is very much available and spends more time in kitty parties and beauty parlors, as is often the case, the best thing is to try to avoid such contacts or friendships or relationships to the extent possible.  For, our scope for finding out role models in the woman of the household, would not be there.

Not all families are lite this and this is a big fact.  There are very rich people who go all out to help others, to reach out to each relaitive and treat every single relaitve or friend, in the very same way, and be very humble about their wealth.  They would also do substantial social work, and take excellent care of their servant maids.  There are superb role model familites and we could visit them, more so, if they respect us and seek our friendship or relationship. 

We need to get back to being natural, expressing ourselves in subtle ways that show the better side of a human being in terms of caring forr others, taking time off to spend with relatives and close friends, and coming out the of the selfish circle, which we have even unconsciously built around us. 

Let us forget the mask that we wear so often.  Let us get back to being our own natural selves.