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TULSI-PRAJNA
an alternative model of social development which could liberate man from the blind folds of arbitrary and independent economic forces
Regarding the glorification of bedonistic consumerism by modern economics and sociology, Hanpah Arendtii aptly observes that there is a tendency to glorify "labour,” that "everybody today thinks in terms of a 'job' or 'work' and not in terms of making a living. And what we confront now is the prospect of a society of labourers without labour, that is, without the only activity left to them."
In fact the glorification of labour and the rising standards of consumerism as the measure of human happiness and social development form the two facets of the same coin, i.e., the dilemma of one dimensional man who has no other option but to choose either of the two ideals.
This problem or the dilemma of man imples one to reflect upon the concepts of "work" and "leisure" also. Work and leisure in fact constitute the two ends of the same continuum of man's life-world, In addition to looking at them as the structural properties of a society, we could see them as properties of the human consciousness also. While "work" as a force of extroversion impels man to act in consonance with the vita activa, leisure corresponds to the vita contemplativa, i.e. to a withdrawal from instrumental life.
Pie per 18 has tried to perceive leisure" as a form of silence" or perfect inner tranquility of the mind. This state of mind is not merely idleness or inactivity of the mind but an active affirmation of the self's agreement with itself. It is as Pieper remarks, the celebration of the cultus" the spirit divine. Uprooted from the cultus it is idleness. On the other hand labour' is a metabolic process of the human body and 'work'a ceaseless labour directed towards utilita. rian ends. Thus the ultimate end of leisure is to unite with one's own authentic self, not merely in recreation through sense pleasure which when once institutionalized and structuralized as that is society functions as the chief source of "conspicuous consumption's i.e , consumerism and mass-culture.
Leisure could, thus, be perceived as a chief component of man's self transcendence or vita-contemplativa and also as an structural opportunity to realize one's instrinsic freedom or the real selfhood in society The perfection of buman action or work does not dwell merely in the ceaseless pursuit of work or in outer success, i.e., matecial achievements, but in transfiguring the meaning of action itself and subsequently uniting man with his own source of authenticity,
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