Chapter-2 : by Acharya Mahapragya

Jain Vishva Bharati

Dynamics of Attitude

The comprehensive education must aim at enhancing and developing the positive attitudes and inhibiting and subduing the negative ones. The conventional academic education is totally incapable of achieving this. A graduate in all the branches of the conventional educational courses cannot enhance his ability to cope up with the emotional stress and mental tension by a single point, cannot develop his power of mental equilibrium and cannot develop positive attitudes unless he has been also educated by Science of Living. It is supplementary education designed to achieve all the above virtues by awakening and developing man's own inherent powers. It has the capability of creating a personality which justifies man's claim being the highest product of evolution. It aims at not only physical and mental good but total good. Suggestions and proposals are often made to include moral education in the school or college curriculum. It must, however, be kept in mind that purely preaching oriented education has very limited influence on development of good character. This is because preaching by itself has little capacity to create conditions which fight the forces of primal drives. Practical training and regular practice is also essential. It is obvious then that moral education should consist of theoretical as well as practical elements. The latter alone can reach the regulatory system which produces mental states and behavioural patterns.

It has now been established that the secretions of hormones from our endocrines (ductless glands) are responsible for our mental attitudes and behaviour. The hormones interact and control various functions of our nervous system, particularly the autonomic nervous system. Enormous stress conditions and resulting tensions have forced our endocrines to be overloaded and their products have been vitiated. The homeostatic balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic components of the autonomic system has been destroyed resulting in sympathetic dominance. This is the main cause of negative attitudes dominating the minds of our scholars and learned persons. If the secretion of hormones by the entire endocrine system (sometimes called the endocrine orchestra) is harmonized, a more balanced equilibrium between the two opposing components of the autonomic nervous system can be established. Then and only then the various problems discussed above can be solved. The curriculum of Science of Living is a step in this direction.

It prescribes a comprehensive course for achieving social health. It is believed that physical and mental health of the individual primarily depend on emotional health and only when physical, mental and emotional health of the individual are achieved could it give rise to social health. All the four are interdependent and complementary to each other and constitute an integral whole.