Growing Up in Today's World

Growing happens under certain conditions. Our lives are lived within an incubation, and incubation means the conditions under which something grows. Another word I have found is matrix. It comes from the Latin word mater. The word "mother" also comes from "mater," which again means "womb." It is a kind of incubation in which something grows.

Let us look at the incubation and the matrix in which our lives are lived, in which individuals, societies, and countries grow. Visualize the entire globe, planet Earth, covered in one huge matrix. What are the conditions within that matrix today?

We need not go back thousands of years in history. We can travel back fifty or a hundred years and ask, what did we not have then that we have today? The answer is a no-brainer. It is digital.

A matrix within a matrix

We are now entering another cave, another incubation, another matrix within a matrix. It is the world of technology, the mother invention of all inventions, within which we have artificial intelligence and everything else. We have entered the cave, and there is no looking back.

It may be deliberate, scripted, or designed innovation, but it is becoming more like a vector. You enter a huge matrix within a matrix, and it covers you. There is no escape. These are the conditions under which children and adults are growing, if at all they are growing. I have a big question mark there too.

This digital matrix is directly affecting us physically, mentally, culturally, and socially. All of us are hooked to gadgets. There is no denying this. Anyone across the planet, irrespective of a white-collar, blue-collar, red-collar, or purple-collar job, whatever one may be doing in life, is hooked to the internet.

There are some interesting studies and numbers that give us a perspective on the kind of life we are living and the matrix in which we find ourselves. An individual spends 6 hours and 51 minutes a day on devices. This is across laptops, mobile phones, and other devices. Of these 6 hours and 51 minutes, 4 hours and 37 minutes are spent on the mobile phone alone. Of those 4 hours and 37 minutes, 2 hours and 23 minutes are spent on social media. This is the global average, which means that in some countries it could be more and in others it could be less.

The so-called Gen Z is spending an astounding nine hours or more on social media. Another study says that we unlock our phones 96 times a day. During our waking time, this translates into unlocking the phone roughly every ten minutes. That is the kind of attention digital technology, the internet, and social media are taking away from us.

The kind of content we consume is showing a direct impact on the physical brain. Structural MRI scans show that certain portions of the brain are getting affected. The grey matter connected with the executive functioning of the brain is on a decline. The orbitofrontal cortex is getting affected, as is the amygdala, which is responsible for our emotional response. Many other areas within the physical brain are also being affected.

There is something called digital dementia. The more I speak to people, the more I hear about memory loss. We are forgetting things. The impact is already there.

Then come the human eyes. In the early 1990s, the percentage of teenagers with myopia was around 20 percent. Today, across the world, it is close to 40 percent. It is becoming a myopia epidemic. Every third or fourth child I see is wearing glasses, especially after COVID. We hardly blink while looking at social media screens, and that puts strain on our eyes.

Our necks, shoulders, and hands are also getting affected. These are not casual observations; these are peer-reviewed studies. It is not looking good at all, and we are talking about 2026. Imagine how it is going to be as we move ahead.

Our lives are now under a cave, a matrix that is increasingly digital. There were changes in previous eras too, fifty or a hundred years ago, but those changes did not directly affect the body and mind as much as the changes we are living through today. What we are facing is unprecedented. This is the kind of matrix we have created for future generations.

At what cost are we making progress?

At the same time, we are very proud that we have evolved and progressed. Digital is what we consider to be progressive living. Words such as economic development and progress are highly subjective.

Have we made progress? Yes, I would say that we have. We are not pessimists who always look at things negatively. There is absolutely no doubt that we have made progress. But I would look at another parameter: at what cost are we making this progress? At what cost is it coming?

I am concerned with human consciousness. Is this progress coming at the cost of our cognition? Is it coming at the cost of our attention? Are we so gullible that we present ourselves to be manipulated by social media feeds and their biases? The number of biases we live with today is far greater than it was many years ago, thanks to algorithms. Our decisions are now being outsourced.

All this is shaping us. Is that growth? It depends on what we mean by growth. To me, growth is becoming a better version of oneself. That is growing. That is evolving. Are we really in that realm, in that ascension?

Digital technology has consumed us, but when it comes to growing up, education, and schooling, the systems have remained static. They are still the same. Can we not have both worlds? Can we not have a better physical body, mind, cognition, and attention, as well as whatever is needed in technology? We can have the best of both worlds, and that is the direction we must take.

For this to happen, we need attention. Wherever our attention is in life, that is what we become. An ordering of life is required.

An ordering of life is required

Where would we place dharma in today's time and age? If there were a matrix through which we could measure it, would dharma be at its full strength? Think of the bars that show the strength of a Wi-Fi or mobile network. If it is 5G, all the bars are prominent on the screen.

Dharma had four bars according to the four yugas: Satya Yuga, Treta Yuga, Dwapara Yuga and Kali Yuga. In Kali Yuga, there is only one bar. Dharma is at its lowest possible strength.

Dharma is that which holds things together. It is ordering and harmony. It helps us evolve and become stronger. Today, that hold has loosened. We can see it through its lakshanas, its attributes: deceit, corruption, and not being truthful. We find these imprints everywhere, in products, services, and human relationships.

The entire focus is on money. When money becomes the guiding force, it sees nothing. Kali Yuga is disguised as money. Anything that corrupts and debases can be found in every institution, in economics, politics, and ordinary public life.

Gen Z and Gen Alpha are not Indian terms

This Gen Z and Gen Alpha business is not Indian. I would extend that and say it is not Eastern. We do not relate naturally to these terms. Is there a deliberate attempt to generalize cultures across the globe?

A twenty-year-old in Europe cannot be the same as a twenty-year-old in India. Their circumstances, situations, cultures, and upbringings are different. India is a civilization. China is a civilization. Iran, or Persia, is a civilization. These are not countries that are merely a hundred years old.

There is a deliberate effort to uproot civilizations by planting such a lexicon in our day-to-day narrative and media. We are then expected to blend into it. Everything gets standardized and uniformed. It is a measured effort to create one culture and identity by destroying civilization-specific history and culture.

The four ashramas

According to Sanatana Dharma, our rishis organized life into four ashramas. Each ashrama can be understood broadly as a period of twenty-five years: twenty-five, fifty, seventy-five, and a hundred. We were supposed to live for a hundred years; of course, it required a certain discipline and ordering of life.

The first phase is Brahmacharya, followed by Grihastha, Vanaprastha, and then Samadhi. To my understanding, this is a beautiful ordering of life. The generational conflict we see today can also be placed within this order. A child is in Brahmacharya while the parent is in Grihastha. When the child moves from Brahmacharya to Grihastha, the parent moves from Grihastha to Vanaprastha. Their priorities and orientations ought to change. Each phase prepares us for the next stage.

Much of the complexity we see today in relationships and roles exists because no thought is given to these phases.

Brahmacharya

Brahmacharya essentially starts at the age of five and goes up to the age of twenty-five. Integral education starts at five and must continue throughout life.

We do not go to a gurukul these days. I see many schools using the name gurukul, but there is often nothing of its spirit. Brahmacharya includes physical education: training the body and the cells of the body, developing strength, stamina, and flexibility. There is so much to physical education. It includes vital education and mental education.

How does one have a conversation? How does one develop self-control, control the breath, organise thoughts and ideas, develop self-awareness and awareness of others? How does one cultivate courage, perseverance, love for progress, humility, and gratitude?

Arjuna was adept in sixty-four art forms. That is what Brahmacharya is about. It is also about leadership, although I do not particularly like the word: it is about how to lead oneself.

If the first twenty-five years are not spent developing these capacities, we remain ill-prepared for the next stage of life. If we fail to prepare, we prepare to fail. The remaining seventy-five years are then affected. We often speak only of the first twelve or thirteen years. Add another twelve years. The first phase must prepare the person for what follows.

Grihastha and Jagat Kalyan

Then comes family life and Grihastha dharma: upholding one's duty as a husband or wife and as a mother or father, earning and feeding the family. But why are two individuals coming together? Why are they getting married? What is the purpose of having a child? Ask anyone these questions, and one often draws a blank.

If Brahmacharya has been taken care of, there is clarity. One begins to live with purpose. The ordering of life happens there. That is why each phase prepares us for the next. We then know why we are getting married. When we are clear about why we are getting married, life revolves around that purpose. If we marry merely for the sake of it or take up work simply to survive another day, life finds its orientation around those things alone.

Our rishis were very smart, if I may use the word. When they spoke about work, they said that work must contain an element of Jagat Kalyan. Our work should take care of society. It should uplift the group, the commune, or the society we are part of.

Why did they say this? They knew that without this element we would become self-centered and selfish, which is the case today. We would lose our sense of the larger collective. If everybody loses that sense, we are sitting on a branch that is slowly being cut.

Vanaprastha and Sakshi Bhava

After living the Grihastha phase, one prepares for Vanaprastha, which essentially means a forest dweller. I am not suggesting for a moment that we pack our bags and go to an ashram. This is symbolic.

It means that we begin to detach ourselves from all that we have created: our children, our house, and everything else. We return to the shastras, to atma-vichara and atma-chintan. It is beautiful because we begin to live the elements of Brahmacharya again. We become students once more but are no longer attached to daily samsaric life.

This does not mean that we stop doing what is supposed to be done. We simply do not keep talking about it every day. These things cannot become greater than us. In Vanaprastha, sakshi bhava takes prominence. That becomes the driving factor and prepares us for the last stage.

The final stage

Samadhi does not mean that we sit in one place and stop speaking to people. We continue to do what needs to be done, but we establish ourselves in samata. Nothing disturbs us in the same way. It does not mean that we are not interested in anything. We have established ourselves in a consciousness that is ready to take the journey of life to the next stage.

I find this ordering of life a conscious way of living. All these stages must happen naturally. There need not be a forced effort. At fifty, one does not say, "It is done; from tomorrow I enter the next stage." Each stage prepares us for the next.

Preparing ourselves as individuals

If the foundation is not there, there is conflict. Parenting is becoming difficult because adults carry so much baggage from childhood conditioning. We have not become anything other than what we were in the previous stage.

If we have not become greater in consciousness, how are we going to guide our children? Our beliefs, conditioning, and orientation to life become dominant, and we look at the child only through them. A person who is stuck in life, who is not evolving or growing, cannot guide another person. We have gone through the same phase and now want different rules for our children.

The more conscious and aware we become, the more clearly we know what needs to be done. Social media is here. Technology is here. It is moving towards technological singularity. All of that is happening, but what is missing is the ordering of life within. Without that, all this is nothing.

We may provide everything for our children and have all the money, but without inner growth it comes to naught. This is not a pessimistic view, and I am not trying to paint a dystopian world. But we are headed towards an extremely chaotic future. There is already a divide between what AI and technology can do today and what they may do in the future. What we see now is only a trailer.

Nobody can be sure of what is happening. We can speak of AGI, superintelligence, and all of that, but we must remain aware of the impact on human consciousness at all times. We need to evolve in our roles as an acharya, a teacher, a father, a husband, and human beings. If not, then we are doomed. That is the point I am trying to bring to notice.

We need to order our lives. We need to start asking the basic questions. We cannot say that we do not have time to ask basic questions and think about ourselves. We must think, contemplate, discuss and dialogue more. That was our dialogue culture, and it is something we must continue.