Decoding Ambition and Greed

Are our desires just an un-quenched hopes or an unmediated paradox?

Why the tag of “materialistic” or “greedy” is sulked upon, whereas “striving” or “ambitious” is pompously parroted and applauded everywhere? Why we believe that yearning “more” is our greed and not an ambition? Where are the catalogs to define the logical difference between achieving “enough” and desiring “more”?

Have we imprinted an erroneous line between Ambition and greed to satisfy social morality?

Is it just matter of our individual perspective? Is it just matter of semantics? Is it something much subterranean then what is nonchalantly differentiated? Or ambitions and greed coexists because they define one another.

Are both a mirror image?

It is incredible to draw the line. May be what I call as ambition, you may call it greed. It is so relative. May be what is serenity to me is arrogance for you. Even if there is a fine line between the two, we have insensitively and inappropriately often expressed it so loosely that the distinction is smudged.

Dhatrashtra, as the King of Hastinapur, was all the time undecided between the ideologies of Dharma and his ambitions/ greed. Therefore, should we reflect on Duryodhana as the creation of Dhatrashtra’s emblematically “blind” vaulting ambitions/greed?  Likewise, we all have read about Macbeth. Shakespeare crafted the character to exemplify how ambitions/greed can metamorphose an exceptionally heroic and dependable person into a horrendous slayer. Even in most of the religious scriptures the word “greed” and “desires” are used interchangeably and ‘greed’ is defined as mother of all the sins. Psychologists explained it as just an ‘extension-lead’ of survival instinct. It is a primal tendency in us to accumulate enough resources for the expected difficult times. It is a deep rooted manifestation of malicious cycle of our unattainable goals.

We all believe that ambition is a quality of character, an essential “growth-fuel”. Ambition epitomizes earnest striving, untiring resolve, and disciplined courage, essential for anyone to accomplish his dreams. Ambitious people are hardworking and are ready to make obligatory sacrifices for the attainment of the goal. Ambitions have priority. Whereas random desire for power, money, position, status, is greed. How come desiring more is undesirable? How ambition differs from having greed or hunger to achieve distinction in life? How come ambition is legitimate desire but greed is not? We have learnt to view greed with negative connotation. Is it just the matter of positive or negative outlook? Just because ambition reverberates as honorable and unapologetic. But greed…is it so obligatory on our part not to crave for the more?

Why we are not happy?  

Is it when enough is…actually not enough?

 I am inquisitive about a fundamental question:

Is the spring of all our unhappiness is in our blessings?

I define greed as an unrelenting process. It is difficult to consummate our greed. It keeps on outspreading. Greed is not circumscribed by ethics or character. It is external. Greed is artificial. Uninhabited greed diverts our rational thinking. It is anaesthetic. It is an illusion to our mind. It is a deceitful fantasy. It has no foundation. It is an obsessed passion. Greed is when we unceasingly looking for something more or something different. It is elephantine and compulsive. It has no pattern. Greed is when we do not want to share. Greed is when we do not want others to achieve similar gains. The problem of greed is in its abuse.

For me, most relatable question is “whether greed is malicious or… the object of greed is at the root?”

Very recently I twitted @babayagnik, “Ambition without a method is greed.”  Each one of us has that choice to decide on whether we are happy living with insatiable greed or not. Insatiability cannot feed us. There is something perverse about greed. It is all the time at other’s cost. Greed is merely an emotional response to yearning more of what fetches us pleasure. Osho said, “Greed is because of our internal emptiness”. Greedy is responsible for our imperativeness, our hurry to snatch everything, and manipulating our surroundings to accomplish more speed in life. But it is very delicate to renounce the greed. We are all the time exasperated and in rush to not to miss something which is so arbitrary. We do not recognize that greed is corrupting our thinking and approach.

Ambition contours purpose in our life. Ambition proliferates positivity in us. It flourishes our energy and strengths to build our own distinctive character through our contributions.

Ambitions are reflection of our dreams. It offers us to channelize our ultimate direction of life. But… when ambitions are gambled, we descent into the murky puddle of greed. When ambitions grow into irreconcilably self-centric hunger, it is greed.

It is not imprudent to conclude that in a continuum of life, a stage where “programmed desires” unfastens to float on illusions…at that very stage,  ambition mutates to greed.

I am departing from you quoting D.H. Lawrence…

“All people dream, but not equally.

Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their mind,

Wake in the morning to find that it was vanity.

But the dreamers of the day are dangerous people,

For they dream their dreams with open eyes,

And make them come true”

What do you reflect…?

Awaiting your commentaries?