If an egg is broken by an outside force….a life ends.

If the egg is broken from inside….a life begins.

HUMAN VALUES

While we made tremendous progress and advancements,

the question still remains the same!!!

Are we satisfied with the state of affairs today?

On looking into this issue, it becomes evident that we are faced

With more serious problems at various levels.

At the human level

At the human relationships in the family

At the human relationships in the society

At the level of nature

HUMAN VALUES

human level

human relationships in society

human relationships in the

family

At the level of nature

At human level, there’re issues in individuals w.r.t. to

lack of clarity on Life goals, contradictions & stress

At the level of nature, We have increasing

problems of environment degradation

We see problems in mutual understanding,

increasing mistrust, Insecurity & generation gap

At the level of human relationships in society, We see

communal conflict, exploitation, terrorism in various forms

What is really valuable to a human being?

In light of this, it becomes essential to find out what is

of value, or what is really valuable to a human being?

While technology is an important endeavour,

it is only a means to achieve what is considered

“valuable” for humans in an effective & efficient

manner.

Value Education:

The subject which deals with “what is of value”, or

“what is valuable to a human being” is called “Value Education”.

Values thus provide the basis for all our Thoughts, Actions and Behaviour.

HUMAN VALUES

Life in School and College

Through our educational subjects, we have explored our

world in certain ways & these have opened our eyes to

many dimensions of our lives and of the world we live in.

However, we find that somewhere in the process, we have

started looking at all this learning to merely be an aid towards

finding a job.

Making a career, getting a job, thus seems to summarize the

total purpose of all our Education so far!!

Is this why we have been studying??

Is this the purpose of all the education that one gets at school and college?

HUMAN VALUES

Life with family and Friends

At the same time, besides spending a lot of time in school, studying, and preparing for examinations-we have been living a good part of our lives at our home in relationship with our family and our friends.

This network of relationship – with our parents, grand parents, our siblings and our friends is an important aspect of our lives and brings to us a lot of Support and Joy.

Each one of us value the Beauty and Joy of growing up together

But many a time, these relationships turn unpleasant

and we find ourselves in conflict with the other person.

At that point we become unsure and begin to blame,

criticize the other and sometimes even ourselves.

Sometimes, we are frustrated at the behaviour of other

human beings and even our behaviour with others.

Many a time, we are at a loss to know how to handle

these relationship issues properly and it ends up

disturbing

us.

HUMAN VALUES

Life around Us

We see that the media unleashes upon us ideas of what is “right” or What is “wrong”

what is socially acceptable and what is not and it does So – by stating, as well as in a

silent way through promotional advertisements.

As individuals, we consume all of this and become more fragmented in our opinions and

become consumers of the media and the products it has to offer.The media thus

dramatically begins to influence our tastes, our opinions, and in most cases our choices.

We also live in the midst of a wide variety of animals and plants. The soil we walk on,

The water we daily consume, the air we breathe.

We may not pay attention to these things around all the time but they nevertheless

form an integral part of our lives, and we are related to, and dependent on them.

We keep hearing of issues in the environment and words like pollution, deforestation,

global etc. nowadays.

How do we interpret these issues?

What role do we see ourselves in helping to resolve these issues?

HUMAN VALUES

What about our life in the family and with our friends?

Are we satisfied and happy in our Relationship?

How do we understand relationships? Is it important to understand

Relationships?

What are my goals?

How do I understand what is important for me?

How do I use my education? What am I going to do after my education?

What is Success? What does it mean to be Successful?

Do I really what I really want? My True Calling?

In whatever I have done so far, did I decide these things for myself,

or was I merely acting under external influences?

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We hardly have the opportunity to explore these questions and to develop

Clarity and competence in this direction in our present curricula.

This course on Human Values is an aid for self-exploration and it will guide us

through a process of self-discovery & enable us to have a more complete understanding

of our own self and of the World around us in a way that is verifiable and enriching.

This course is presented in the form of a dialogue between the facilitator and

the receivers, wherein the proposals are made and these are to be examined on

the basis of reason and whether they are naturally acceptable, are truly in

reality and experientially verifiable. xxv

As we look forward to shaping our lives, it is crucial that we get a broader

perspective about ourselves, our needs and of the world.

It is essential to know what is needed to ensure Success, Balance, and

Happiness

in life and discover our full Potential.

As parent, teacher, elder, student, it is very much required that we acquire the

ability to make decisions on the basis of verifiable and universal laws.

Because the decisions we make now, the impressions we get, the perspective we

develop, will all play a major role in our life ahead.HUMAN VALUES

xxv

Understanding our “value” means understanding what our participation, our role is,

with other humans beings, animals, plants…etc..

We live in Human Society, in nature and we want to find out our Role in

this expanse.

Here are presented a set of proposals so that we may start exploring our own Self and and

our expense of living in order to better understand our life – so we can understand what is

valuable for us, what is our value in the larger scheme of the things we live in.

xxxi

HUMAN VALUES

We will explore about ourselves, and we will explore about the things around us,

the things we live with everyday.

When we look into ourselves, it turns out that we ultimately want is

something obvious:

Given that this is our basic desire, we find out, by looking at our lives, that

Human living (our own living) can be seen as encompassing the following 4 levels:

Myself Family Society Nature/Existence

On self-investigation, we find out that we want to be in

Harmony at all levels of our living.

We want

Happiness,

Prosperity and their Continuity.

Harmony in Myself (Resulting into Happiness and a feeling of Prosperity)

Harmony in Family

(Resulting into mutual fulfillment in relationship

Harmony in Society

(Resulting in trustful, undivided, universal society)

Harmony in Nature / Existence

( Resulting in being in harmony with nature, understanding the inherent co-existence)

This harmony is possible at each of these levels?? And if so, how it can be ensured ?

This harmony is indeed possible and part of the basic design.

We only need to understand this to be in it.

Nature / Existence

Given that this is our basic desire, we find out, by looking at our lives, that

Human living (our own living) can be seen as encompassing the following 4 levels:

Having known this harmony at all levels, we can identify our “ROLE” in it.

This role of Human being is nothing but his value, I.e., Human’s value is its participation in Nature/Existence.

Soon, we will see that these human values are Universal and Natural.

We would also conclude that Human conduct is thus Universal and Definite.

HUMAN VALUES - OUR PARTICIPATION IN THIS UNIVERSE