Human values | Annual Women Economic Forum – WEF 2022 India

What are values?

When we talk about values what do we mean exactly? Well, values are basically individual beliefs that motivate people to act in one way or another, and mostly subjective to each individual, or a collective individual such as any particular culture, society, or tradition. Values are concepts we hold dear and they serve as a guide for human behavior, like an internal compass that makes us act in certain ways, and not in other ways.

Where do we acquire our values?

Generally, people are predisposed to adopt the values that they are raised with, and tend to believe that those values are “right” because they are the values of their particular culture, tradition, or religion that they have come to believe as truth. Humans have all kinds of values in place, like traditional values, family values, religious values, social values, moral values, personal values, etc. which are strongly influenced by the culture one is brought up in. Your personal values are usually defined by you based on your roots and life experiences. And what shapes your life experiences? Your beliefs. Beliefs sponsor behavior. And what defines beliefs? Your culture. And what if that culture is dysfunctional filled with prejudices? Ba da boom! You are doomed! Haha not really!

Cultural brainwashing

So, what happens when an entire culture is dysfunctional based on unhealthy values that the society holds dear? To give you an example of such a dysfunctional culture, let’s take the example of Venezuela in South America, where I lived for two years. In that society a woman’s beauty is so exaggerated that every second girl on the street is carrying an artificial implant in her body to augment her assets because she doesn’t feel enough in her own skin. And I’m not exaggerating here when I say “every second girl on the street” has some form of figure or feature correction, be it through plastic surgery, liposuction, breast implants, laser carvings of bodies, etc. I use the word “correction” because it’s the collective assumption of this society, that a girl is born with inadequate assets hence needs to go under the knife to correct her figure. In fact, it is often gifted to them by their own parents on their 15^th birthday, called quinceañera, as they step onto adulthood, or more precisely womanhood. Girls as young as 13, 14, 15, butcher their bodies to meet the societal standards of beauty. It stunned me to see an entire nation swept by a culture of inadequacy and brainwashing. Even low income households prioritize aesthetic surgeries over domestic expenses. What values are those parents teaching their children? What are their sons learning about the feminine gender? What is a daughter learning? That she is not enough? That her body is not good enough? That she has to go under the knife, implant artificial objects inside her body at the risk of her own life in order to feel good about herself, or be sufficient for a man? What values is that relationship based on? Is there any real depth, bonding, meaning, intimacy or love in such connections, or is it just based on how well her body is shaped? How is power distributed in such relationships? What is the energy dynamic of the masculine-feminine consciousness playing out at a macro level? What kind of generation is this producing? What belief systems and values is this creating as a society? What inner sentiments drive a young girl to carry out such atrocities on her own body? At what level of consciousness is this playing out? Is it a reflection of an evolved or unevolved society? Does any of this matter? It should, you know! It is an entire culture mired in dysfunction, disempowerment, and debilitating conditioning that it’s downright crazy—a society brainwashed by plastic standards of beauty and inhuman values!

And that is just one culture, one example! There are many such societies across the world brimming with unhealthy, immoral, unethical values that are damaging to the population of that society, directly or indirectly. What about in so many Asian countries where fair skin is considered as a beauty parameter for girls who go to extreme lengths to polish, lighten, whiten, de-tan their skin in order to look “beautiful” for the opposite sex? Does this pronounce a society imbibing healthy values to its denizens? You know, like here in India we have a fairness cream called Fair & lovely, in Africa there is a cream or soap called Dark & lovely. They celebrate their skin color whereas we disown ours. And here, I was just talking about one aspect of life: beauty. I especially picked this topic of beauty because we are standing here at the Women Economic Forum trying to empower women worldwide, and one of the highest valued form of self-definition for a woman revolves around how she looks externally.

You see, real human values don’t necessarily come from culture, education, tradition or religion; in fact, often times those are more detrimental than beneficial. Parents cannot teach healthy values to their offspring if they themselves haven’t learned, or must I say, defined what is healthy or unhealthy for them. Certain values can be so damaging that they literally need to be “unlearned”. But how to discern which values to keep and which to discard? Well, it’s not always so easy to know especially if one has held a particular belief as his/her personal truth throughout one’s entire life. And that damaging belief might be doing more harm without them even realizing it.

How to inculcate healthy values?

While there may be many ways to do this, one of the best ways to recognize one’s garbage programming is by travelling. Yes, travel, see other cultures, experience other belief systems and prejudices across the world, live with local people in their homes, attend their religious functions, try out their costumes for size, and perceive life from their shoes. And then you will see that what is right in one culture, is wrong is another culture. What is polite in one country is rude in another country. What is respectful in one region is disrespectful in another region. What you think is good, another thinks bad. So, where do you draw the line? How do you define your sense of self when life’s idiosyncrasies startle you? You see, cultures, traditions, religious beliefs and practices vary widely and wildly across the world. You need to get out of your culture to get a more objective perspective, although true objectivity does not exist and your perspective will still be subjective to you, it’ll broaden to hold a larger reality, a greater understanding of humanity.

I always tell women that if there is something about their bodies that they don’t like or that is not approved of in their own culture, then to look upon another culture for approval. Like in India, I am sneered at for my darker skin tone, whereas in Europe and America my very skin color is worshipped. What is ugly in one society, is beauty in another society. When a woman puts on weight, she is considered fat in Asia, whereas in Africa it adds to her curves. In fact, the fatter a woman is there, the more curvaceous and gorgeous she is considered. You see, what I mean when I say cultures vary widely and wildly, and along with that our values too?

The concept of good or bad, right or wrong, polite or impolite, beauty or ugly, are all cultural. Even spirituality is cultural, medical practices are cultural, diseases are cultural, ageing is cultural, how one recuperates from a disease is cultural… like here in India, if you get a cold, grandma gives you ginger tea or turmeric milk and you instantly get better because you believe in that, you value grandma’s wisdom! Whereas in America, if you get cold, you will have to take the flu shot and isolate yourself until you get better. Do you see how two cultures treat the same disease in totally opposite ways? And it all depends on what they value and believe in.

When you travel, you observe life, you observe humanity, as you live across different cultures and feel the oneness of humanity, see their struggles everywhere, and perceive the common human story of strife and grime, you realize that there is something that transcends all these cultural, religious, traditional definitions; you realize that life is an act of faith! We cannot know the root cause of anything, but when we can live our life with faith, we connect with something larger out there unto infinity, we get a glimpse of eternity, we connect with divinity. We begin to see all of humanity as a part of the self, not apart. We fall in love with people, with life itself. Loving someone literally means taking another person as a part of yourself. When you can do that, you won’t need to be taught any values by anybody. Your real values will automatically fall into place as your inner moral compass will guide you to your personal truth. Nobody has to tell you that killing or lying is wrong. You will know it intrinsically because you will know the person in front of you is a part of you and hurting them in any manner would be essentially hurting yourself.

People are scared of each other, scared of the unknown, scared of death, scared of life! But once you can change that thought your reality begins to shift. The world is not a scary place as it is cracked up to be, rather it is a friendly place. Sit with that thought. Contemplate. Life is on your side. Do you believe it? Then it is true, for you! And that will play out in your reality becoming your your personal truth. Now define your values from that sacred space of conscious awareness!

Connect with the larger universe

The world is in this state today because most people in positions of power have lost their connection with the larger universe, their true purpose of being here on earth. They don’t see the bigger picture that the human story is painting here on earth for thousands of years paving way for the future generation and evolution of human consciousness. And so, in order to feel good and powerful, they think that taking away power from another will raise their power, so they can control others. However, the exact opposite happens! People who do that are in a perpetual state of fear as they constantly try to gain more and more power over others in order to feel secure about themselves, but in the process feel less and less in touch with their true essence—love and freedom. Their values are all misplaced. They are always stressed, always insecure, always doubting, always strategizing how to gain more power over others… and such a baseless pillar can never stand tall so a fall is inevitable. You see, Hitler committed suicide!

In order to feel secure and true inner power, we need to connect with the larger universe that guides us through signs and synchronicities on our destiny path, as we seek meaning and purpose to our lives here on earth. Once we can connect with that state of awareness, our values will sharpen and fine tune to hold all of humanity and its collective story in our hearts.

My new book, Life Is Abracadabra, recounts 21 magical stories from my travels across the globe that will make you look at life with new eyes, perceive reality from an altogether new dimension of synchronicity, and make you believe in magic & miracles. An experiential documentation of how to transcend the ordinary into extraordinary outcomes in alignment with our desires, it contains true anecdotes of hope and faith, of meaningful coincidences and miracles that demonstrates a two-way communication with the universe and how life has our back at all times, if only we’d believe… And when that happens, when one can connect with All That Is, trust life, and take others as a part of the self, one’s own values and belief systems will automatically expand to accommodate a greater truth, a grander vision of humankind. Because true human values cannot be taught; they are intuited!

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You might also like to check out my other sessions at the Annual WEF 2022 India, held at the JW Marriott hotel in Aerocity, New Delhi between 27 and 31 December 2022.

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