{"id":33724,"date":"2016-11-26T13:08:46","date_gmt":"2016-11-26T12:08:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dandavats.tumblr.com\/post\/153681607611"},"modified":"2017-01-26T14:27:19","modified_gmt":"2017-01-26T13:27:19","slug":"life-is-shortvaisesika-dasa-i-met-a-pathologist-recently-who","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/?p=33724","title":{"rendered":"Life is Short!\nVaisesika Dasa: I met a pathologist recently who…"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Life is Short!
\nVaisesika Dasa: I met a pathologist recently who works with cancer patients. She explained to me that there is a certain kind of pancreatic cancer that is most deadly and that one who contracts it can survive only a few months, at the most.
\nShe said that because of the often-depressing nature of her job, she and her colleagues have a way of speaking among themselves to lighten the emotional impact when they receive bad news about a patient\u2019s prognosis.
\nFor example, when they read a patient\u2019s lab results and find that the patient has developed the most deadly strain of pancreatic cancer, they speak about it to one another in a somewhat indirect way.
\nAmong pathologists, a conversation might go like this:<\/p>\n

\u201cDid you read the lab report for your patient?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s the result?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I can tell my patient not to buy the big tube of toothpaste the next time she goes shopping.\u201d<\/p>\n

My first impression upon hearing this was that the pathologists\u2019 conversation was almost too glib for the circumstances. After thinking about it a while, however, the phrase, \u201ctell her not to buy the big tube \u2026\u201d stuck in my mind and their conversation began to seem more profound and it also made me question my own life and priorities:<\/p>\n

What am I investing in and why? (Am I buying the \u201cbig tubes\u201d?)<\/p>\n

What people, things, and abilities that I already have, am I taking for granted?<\/p>\n

I can also imagine a conversation among higher beings who, upon hearing about my very limited duration of life, might say among themselves: \u201cTell him not to buy the big tube of toothpaste.\u201d<\/p>\n

Life is Short Indeed, the bhakti scriptures clearly and repeatedly tell us that our human lives are shorter than we think! They say, therefore, that we should take excessive care to use every moment for advancing toward the highest goal \u2013 going back to Godhead:<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter many, many births and deaths one achieves the rare human form of life, which, although temporary, affords one the opportunity to attain the highest perfection. Thus a sober human being should quickly endeavor for the ultimate perfection of life as long as his body, which is always subject to death, has not fallen down and died. After all, sense gratification is available even in the most abominable species of life, whereas Krishna consciousness is possible only for a human being.\u201d Srimad-Bhagavatam 11.9.29<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Life is Short!
\nVaisesika Dasa: I met a pathologist recently who works with cancer patients. She explained to me that there is a certain kind of pancreatic cancer that is most deadly and that one who contracts it can survive only a few months, at the most.
\nShe said that because of the often-depressing nature of her job, she and her colleagues have a way of speaking among themselves to lighten the emotional impact when they receive bad news about a patient’s prognosis.
\nFor example, when they read a patient’s lab results and find that the patient has developed the most deadly strain of pancreatic cancer, they speak about it to one another in a somewhat indirect way.
\nAmong pathologists, a conversation might go like this:<\/p>\n

“Did you read the lab report for your patient?”<\/p>\n

“Yes.”<\/p>\n

“What’s the result?”<\/p>\n

“Well, I can tell my patient not to buy the big tube of toothpaste the next time she goes shopping.”<\/p>\n

My first impression upon hearing this was that the pathologists’ conversation was almost too glib for the circumstances. After thinking about it a while, however, the phrase, “tell her not to buy the big tube …” stuck in my mind and their conversation began to seem more profound and it also made me question my own life and priorities:<\/p>\n

What am I investing in and why? (Am I buying the “big tubes”?)<\/p>\n

What people, things, and abilities that I already have, am I taking for granted?<\/p>\n

I can also imagine a conversation among higher beings who, upon hearing about my very limited duration of life, might say among themselves: “Tell him not to buy the big tube of toothpaste.”<\/p>\n

Life is Short Indeed, the bhakti scriptures clearly and repeatedly tell us that our human lives are shorter than we think! They say, therefore, that we should take excessive care to use every moment for advancing toward the highest goal – going back to Godhead:<\/p>\n

“After many, many births and deaths one achieves the rare human form of life, which, although temporary, affords one the opportunity to attain the highest perfection. Thus a sober human being should quickly endeavor for the ultimate perfection of life as long as his body, which is always subject to death, has not fallen down and died. After all, sense gratification is available even in the most abominable species of life, whereas Krishna consciousness is possible only for a human being.” Srimad-Bhagavatam 11.9.29<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10650,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33724","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recent-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10650"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33724"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33724\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36529,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33724\/revisions\/36529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}