Essential Purging of Habits for Better Humanity

In this post, let us look at some issues which are becoming a menace in the world around us. These are 4 simple habits around us – Smoking, drinking, excessive non-veg consumption and extraneous, excessive sexual interaction. We cannot openly talk about the fourth one but nevertheless, there is a need to spread good light on the area. There are many other bad habits we can list but let us look at these four in this post as I feel there is an air of heightened addiction to the first 3 habits in these times. I would like to use this space, the readership and leverage any power of the blog to voice my strong dissent against these habits. The idea is always to make the world a better place by turning people on the wrong path to good ones and make them lead far better lives. It is always a timely interjection or intervention or good words which will make a world of difference to anyone who desperately needs one. The frightening proportion of people seeking refuge in these habits makes the world a bit scary. It is always good to spread the nectar of purity or sincere words of preaching around our area of influence to bring a change in the hardened people clinging to these bad practices. The topic for today is simple but had a profound, significant effect on billions of people affected by these vices. Let us make a progressive shift towards the better; embrace virtues by replacing vices; take a holy dip to cleanse the past and navigate into a better future. When an individual makes a shift to a correct path, it spreads to a host of other individuals. When a group of individuals change, societies change which will in turn change the cities, states and countries. When the countries make a shift to the right path, the world and invariably humanity will be sailing in pure waters. For any grown-up individual, is there any better way to purge the self than giving up on these four habits.

Let us look at a simple story to deal with these simple bad actions. Once upon a time, in a bustling city, there lived a wealthy businessman. He was deeply concerned about his son’s bad habits. The young man had fallen into a pattern of behavior that worried his father. 

Seeking guidance, the businessman approached a wise, old scholar known for his insights. The scholar agreed to help and set out to meet the young man. Together, they strolled through a lush garden, the sun dappling the path with golden light. 

As they walked, the scholar stopped abruptly and pointed to a tiny plant sprouting from the earth. “Pull out this sapling,” he instructed the boy. 

The young man bent down and effortlessly uprooted the small plant. “See?” he said, holding it up. “Easy!” 

The scholar smiled knowingly. “Now,” he said, “let it grow.” 

The young man was puzzled. “Why would I do that? It’s just a weed.” 

The scholar’s eyes twinkled. “Bad habits,” he explained, “are like this sapling. When they’re new, they seem insignificant—easy to remove. But if you let them take root and grow, they become stubborn and hard to change.” 

The young man pondered this. He realized that his bad habits were like those tiny weeds—insignificant at first, but gradually gaining strength. He vowed to break free from them, to pull them out while they were still young shoots. 

From that day on, the young man worked diligently to replace his bad habits with good ones. He learned that it wasn’t enough to stop doing something negative; he needed to fill that void with positive actions. Slowly but surely, he transformed himself, nurturing virtues and shedding vices. 

And so, in the garden of life, he tended to his habits like a skilled gardener—pruning away the unwanted growth and nurturing the blossoms of virtue. 

The moral of the story: Replace bad habits with useful ones. It’s not enough to stop doing something; you must also fill that space with positive actions. Remember, our choices shape our destiny. Let us tend to our habits with care, for they are the seeds from which our lives bloom. 

Now let us tackle each one of the four habits with some startling facts. 

Smoking: This has become a big menace in recent times. The ‘smoke shop’ entity has become fashionable and after I came to U.S. there are quite a few that has cropped up in my locality. If the situation has been so bad and reached my neighborhood, it is a microcosmic representation to convey it has reached everyone’s doorstep. Everyone in the world is affected by this heightened activity of smoking in these times. I doubt if a single unknown person is responsible for this making this viral trend to smoke. 

Tobacco kills more than 8 million people worldwide each year, including an estimated 1.3 million non-smokers exposed to secondhand smoke. Approximately 1.3 billion people are considered smokers globally. An estimated 28.3 million U.S. adults smoke cigarettes, and about 2.80 million U.S. middle and high school students use at least one tobacco product, including e-cigarettes. Each year, nearly half a million Americans die prematurely due to smoking or exposure to secondhand smoke. 

The two countries with the largest populations in the world also have the highest total number of smokers – China and India. China had more than double the number of smokers as India. In 2019, a total of around 341.3 million people in China smoked compared to 130.7 million in India. It is estimated that in China up to 35 percent of deaths among men can be attributed to tobacco use. Needless to say, more than 1 in 3 deaths in the world’s most populous country can be attributed to this unwanted habit. 

Not just this, with these millions of users, it can be said 1 in 4 around the world is habituated to smoking. More than one-third of men worldwide smoke. These staggering numbers underscore the urgent need for tobacco control efforts. We are drowning our world with the smoke released by this habit. Just imagine how good it would be if a magic wand eliminates smoking around the world. There is a need for right-thinking people to work towards a smoke-free world and replace it with a far better alternative.

It has become funny and fashionable these days to smoke and leave the vapours signifying some heroism. The opposite culture to resist smoking is always simple yet powerful and much more heroic.

Drinking: This has become a menace too in recent times. It seems many a men around the world are drowning in a pool of wine. I don’t know about others but the environment I had been living in in the past two years certainly portray this picture of embracing bottles of beer closer than any other important thing. Once night kicks in, most of the guys gather around to revel with a few bottles of ‘goodness’. This happens on most days which is the prevalent culture that I am tired of and feel sick about. This is a normal activity and culture in most parts of the world as grown-up men spend time in the company of bottles to wind down. But leave about others, atleast from what I saw for a long time in close quarters, can these guys give up on quarters, fulls and take up some other good activity to unwind. It is a serious shift in the guard I would like to make in the surroundings but feel helpless with my little abilities. Deep down, I would see it as a failure if I cannot replace these unwinding sessions with much better habits after mutely observing for very long. Though it is normal, I feel there is a sense of enhanced activity of drinking in these times because of one unknown person and I don’t know who that person is.

European countries lead in per capita alcohol consumption while China leads in alcoholic consumption by volume. In 1990, alcohol use was the 13th most relevant risk factor for deaths worldwide; in 2019, it has risen to the 8th most relevant risk factor, responsible for over 2.4 million deaths from various alcohol-attributable causes. Alcohol misuse was the leading risk factor for death and disability among people ages 15 to 49. If you remove smoking and drinking habits from adult population, you are negating the highest risk factors for diseases and deaths in these age groups. We are consciously injuring and destroying our own physical self by these habits.

Eating excessive Non-Veg: The world today eats astronomical amounts of meat by slaughtering millions of animals every day. We kill 900,000 cows, 1.4 million goats, 1.7 million sheep, 3.8 million pigs, 11.8 million ducks, and more than 202 million chicken, 211 millions of fish each and every day. 140,000 chickens are slaughtered every minute. This means for every 40 days we are killing more chicken than there are people on the planet earth. 8 billion chicken for every 40 days – the same number as the population of humanity. The scale of humanity’s meat consumption is enormous. 360 million tonnes of meat every year or 3.6 lakh million Kgs. U.S. is a huge presence in this arena. More than 55 billion land and sea animals die annually to support the U.S. food supply. To put this in perspective, during World War II--the deadliest conflict in human history--more than 60 million people were killed over 6 years. The same number of animals die in support of the American food supply every ten hours. While there are courts at major levels from local to supreme and international level for a human murder, where is the justice for billions of animals beings openly slaughtered without any name and shame. This meat consumption is highly unsustainable and cannot continue this way for long. Humanity definitely needs to seriously consider a tectonic shift if there is a minimum moral conscience left within us. India is the leading nation by share of vegans, with a total of nine percent of the Indian population being vegans. In even the most developed Western markets, this figure only reaches two to three percent.

Extraneous and excessive sexual intercourse: Let me make one statement on this fourth habit according to my deepest beliefs - Sex should not go beyond marriage, before marriage and beyond the necessity of reproduction. No more explanation required. How many of you felt a shock by looking at this statement. Ideally, humanity should practice Brahmacharya or celibacy most of the time and should only participate in sex for the purpose it serves. This is the conservative and a correct view, but which is not practical in the modern day world. Being conservative will at least help moderation in this extreme world. Practicing the statement by at least a handful will have a remarkable impact upon many lives by shifting our actions and outcomes.

There is a need to increase the count of humans who do not kill any living being, who do not steal, avoid improper sexual intercourse, do not lie and avoid intoxicants. This might be considered bland but at least purge our erratic actions of the past many years. Humanity in this form will be taking shape in the future after the deviations of the present day are numbered. It is more a necessity than a choice, considering the way our habits are taking us along a wild ride. But what is the way forward – replace all the bad habits with good ones. Cultivate good habits and put them in place of the bad. Habit replacement is always good over habit resistance. Among various good habits, devotional good habits are especially empowering which resist and reject the bad habits easily and quickly. One quick example is the story of Valmiki – the author of Ramayana. Valmiki was not always the sage we recognise him to be. He was once a robber, known for his ruthlessness, dwelling in a forest and robbing those who dared to traverse his path. His life was steeped in sin and violence, yet destiny had other plans for him. One day, Valmiki encountered Narada, a great sage, and something within him stirred. He found himself questioning his life choices and, in a moment of desperation, asked Narada how he could find redemption for his sins.

Narada, seeing the sincerity in Valmiki’s eyes, advised him to chant the name of Lord Rama, a deity known for his righteousness and virtue. Valmiki, determined to change his fate, retreated to a solitary mountain and began his penance. Valmiki went on to compose the Ramayana, one of the greatest epics in the world, narrating the life of Lord Rama, the very name he was supposed to chant during his penance. Thus, keeping ourself busy with the good will put a stop to our bad actions. This is the shift which needs to take place for progress and enlightenment. Even if not, it will at least save many of our hearts, lungs, livers and many animals.

Statutory Warning: Cigarette smoking is injurious to health. Don’t smoke.