child in a home looked after by two
extremely loving parents who made sure
they gave me everything that they could
not have in their lives which means
everything was available to me as and
when I wanted everything was
deterministic everything had to happen
at the exact date at the exact time and
at the exact moment that I had my cell
decided and written down on a piece of a
long chart paper and pasted it against
the wall of my own study and it had the
chronology of events that I must follow
in order to fulfill my dream of becoming
a medical doctor and I kept on thinking
that probably that is the kind of
chronology which I could control nothing
could ever move out of that neat
progression of events that I had
designed for myself I had begun to
believe that probably life is
deterministic and time is nothing but a
linear progression of all those events
and it continued that way it continued
till the time I finished my pre medical
tests but then as usual surprise
surprise so I want to ask you all a
question
can any human life ever be exempted from
the conflict or the challenge of the
frosty and divergence of two roads
diverging in a wood and he choosing the
one less traveled by I feel that little
it Robert Frost knew or maybe he did how
his idea of two roads diverging in a
wood and he choosing the one less
traveled by could provide something so
central to human existence my tryst with
conflict came to me when I finally
joined medical school and I think my
world fell apart because I did not end
up liking medicine that fights neat ball
that I had woven with a lot of
chronological events just fell on the
floor and broke into a thousand pieces
and that is when I began to wonder so
what to do now
what do
choose should I drop medicine should I
choose something else the possibility of
choosing something else and and taking
that up fell so polarized at that point
that I would wake up with that fear
every single morning wrapped around my
heart and probably that is when destiny
forced me with utmost desperation to
pursue the reason behind and the purpose
behind human conflict and I kept on
thinking that why does conflict exist
today when I look back as a trans person
or psychotherapist and probably less as
a medical doctor I feel that I could
have also said and side like Frost that
I chose the road less traveled by and
that has made all the difference but in
doing that there is a fallacy which I
coin as the Frost Ian Fork fallacy so
when we choose something we focus a lot
on that choice we don’t focus on the
other choice that was available to us
which could have been equally alluring
and at that moment we also forget that
even before I made the choice the
conflict was the beginning of that whole
scheme of things so I kept on wondering
why this conflict exists is it like a
part of human psyche or is it like a
regular eventualities like that like
crisis like emergency which could just
come at any moment of time without any
preamble and although I guess my love
for philosophy did provide me a lot of
theories which I could you know lovingly
accept and take back to my grave but I
think it was my love for cosmology which
finally gave me an idea that I’m going
to share with you today about why
conflict exists so this idea is
something that I call as the polarized
earth idea so you know that earth is a
polarized planet which means everything
on earth isn’t pair of opposites high
and low you and me light and dark male
and female everything is polarized
so if everything is polarized everything
is in pair of opposites then there are
two ends of a thing these two ends are
called extremities and if there is
extremities then there is measurement
you can measure length you can measure
breadth you can measure height so you
have dimensions I am not including time
here because again time is debated to be
the fifth dimension along with space and
until and unless I and you are looking
at our watches we don’t know what time
it is so I’m talking about the three
dimensions that you perceive and the
three dimensional biological body that
we have and therefore since there are
extremities there is also something in
between these extremities and what is
that that is variations so as evolution
proceeds from one extremity to the other
extremities every species is an
improvisation of itself through
variation so you know that variation is
the seat of evolution variety is the
seat of evolution and as variety exists
evolution does so we are the products of
that same earthly evolution which
started with polarization how can we be
devoid of conflict polarizations exist
hence conflict us it’s because of
polarizations therefore we face this
conflict but while focusing on conflict
as an evolutionary burden we are missing
out a point and that is if conflict did
not exist how would opt ins exist if
options did not exist how choice exist
if choice didn’t how would free will
exist although any neuroscientist
sitting here which i think is not owe
any neuro scientist sitting in any part
of the world would not accept this
blatant autonomous idea of free will
they say that there is no free will
right but what I’m trying to say is the
perception that you have that I can
choose this chair over that chair is my
idea of free will and that idea wouldn’t
have been there if conflict existed you
know if conflict didn’t exist so that’s
the
free will and and and and we go on
focusing on the idea of free will so
much more because free will provides us
with power conflict does the opposite
when we can choose something over
something else we feel powerful and
conflict us the exact opposite I’m going
to explain this to you by an example so
I think most of my life in abroad while
I was doing my Master’s I guess was
spent in visiting Walmart and then
deciding which milk to buy because there
are twenty different varieties of milk
so there is hemp milk there is soya milk
there is rice milk there is fat-free
milk there is double tone milk single
tone milk and whatnot and you go then if
you keep on wondering okay which milk to
buy so whether you have made the
decision beforehand which milk you are
going to buy or whether you are making
the decision after you reach the store
doesn’t matter because you may give
yourself ten different reasons to do
that one of them could be I want to lose
weight therefore I’m gonna buy two
percent fat free milk
I want to gain weight and I want to have
delicious here and therefore I’m going
to have full cream milk and and at that
moment even though you’ve given all
those conjectures to yourself you may
sigh much like Robert Frost again that
oh I chose the milk that helped me lose
weight and that has made all the
difference I chose the milk which helped
me make delicious kheer at the same time
I gained weight and that has made all
the difference so so you could also do
that and at that time you are not aware
that you are using your freewill and
feeling so powerful about the fact that
you could choose that option it didn’t
matter that all those 20 choices existed
you could choose something and that made
you feel powerful and that is what we
call as the illusion of choice and it is
this illusion of choice which is used by
well all ad agencies all companies all
brands all industries to to guide us to
affect
affect our freewill so they provide us
with a lot of option and then when we
choose something we feel powerful at
that moment and at that moment we go
back to frost in folk fallacy again
because while making the choice we again
forget that conflict was the first thing
that existed on the first place and not
the idea of freewill
hence conflict is ubiquitous it is
pervasive and it is the seed of all our
experiences without exception conflict
is plays a catalytic role in every
single decision that we make and even in
the consequences it emerged from our
choices conflict is as real and as
complex as Karma gravity entropy someone
talked about karma here today yes so
well it doesn’t matter whether karma is
a belief system gravity is a practical
reality entropy entropy is a law that
doesn’t matter what matters is conflict
is an undeniable part of your collective
consciousness which you cannot evade
because if conflict did not exist in the
first place
evolution wouldn’t have been a
possibility and we as humans probably
still boiling in some held in soup in
some obscure mountain and or sea so so
that’s that’s the point about conflict
now at the same point of time we don’t
want to face conflict we defy conflict
all the time we don’t want to be become
a part of these internal fights will
happen everywhere so you get up in the
morning in the and and then your voice
goes like should I go – should I go to
gym should I exercise should I quit
smoking should I eat vagin from today
onwards should I drop my boyfriend
that’s quite usual I believe so so yeah
and and you may like to imagine that at
that moment all these 10 different
voices are emerging in your in your head
but in truth these are your various sub
personalities different personalities
which are sprouting in your emotional
internal landscape and that makes me
wonder that is this the only purpose of
conflict to make us feel so choiceless
so miserable to ravage our you know
emotional landscape to cause internal
fights between all these sub
personalities and create a lot of chaos
perhaps not it was only in my fourth
year that I finally understood that the
fabric of no destiny could ever be
devoid of conflict waiting to be
discovered at it seems my conflict came
as a liberation to me from that
tight-knit ball that I had done myself
it it came as a reminder of the symphony
of possibilities and the freedom of
options that exists in our life which
makes our life so much more livable
it adds thrill to our life it adds
adventure to a life and it is because I
went through that experience in college
that’s the reason I can say that I am
finally free free to choose whatever I
want at any given moment of time so if
you and I could set apart our judgments
about the consequences that emerged from
our decisions and our choices we could
begin to look at conflict in a
completely different light maybe maybe
more as a reminder of our choices
possibilities and opportunities and less
as a cause of our misery and suffering
I’m sure in the end when Robert Frost
went to grave he went with the knowledge
that the greatest satisfaction of human
life doesn’t lie in choosing the road
less trouble by but in facing that
conflict and finally understanding that
you are free free to choose anything at
any given moment of your life thank you [Applause]