Getting out from the departmental store with my shopping bag, i was loading them in my car when i noticed a motorbike parked nearby. A crow was sitting on the petrol tank of the bike, and with a surreptitious look around, he delved into a pouch that was fixed on the bike and pulled out a goodie; a pistachio shell!. He looked around again, noticed another crow nearby, and quickly put the nutshell back again and nonchalantly started to look elsewhere. I am almost sure he also caught my eye!. With another look at the other crow, he seemed to be debating what to do, and then decided to carry the war right into the enemy camp. He flew to the place the other crow was sitting, and chased it away. The poor chap did not know what was happening and with a furious caw, flew away, probably cursing the chaser but deciding to leave the battle scene!.
I did not stop to see whether the crow came back for the nut shell (ironic isn’t it, all this was for not even the nut, just the shell!), but was thinking about how we humans and crows are so similar in our interpersonal relationships. I have seen this happening so often in the corporate jungle. People vie with each other for positions and power, and very often than not, the rules of the game are not followed; if they at all are, they are conveniently bent to suit the needs of the few who know how to win. The winning is all that matters. So these games are played out, in board rooms, in conferences, at meetings, and in cabins behind closed doors. The chase is subtle but it is persuasive. The victim either decides, like the crow in our story, to leave the scene but carries with it anger and resentment and even feelings of being victimised and being a scapegoat. Or he decides to give it a fight, and then the real battle ensues.
These feelings, if not handled constructively, become the emotional baggage that the person carries; and this feeling of having lost out may permeate into his other areas of living, sometimes making relationships also very dysfunctional. See the whirlpool effect?
I think it all boils down to fighting right: even in personal relationships. Squirrels have to bury food: so they do. But it is not seen as ‘hiding’ it away. It is acting in character to its species. But on second thoughts, i think the crow also acted in its nature? Don’t they say crows are supposed to thieve?? But do we humans act in our true nature? Are we not essentially supposed to be ‘good’ ? Then why do we deliberately push down, degrade other fellow beings, all for money, power, position? If we let go of the need for greed for power and control, i think a lot of our interpersonal conflicts can also resolve itself. Most of them start with power struggle: If the need for being in control: of others, not of self, is examined, and saturated not by controlling another human being, but by renouncing the need by itself, then i am sure life would be so much more fulfilling.
Mohana Narayanan