We are losing it !

 We definitely are losing it ! How can we explain what is going on in the world otherwise ? 

Till when the issues across borders and even inside the stupid boundaries made on the earth by humans will be settled by killing each other ? 

Till when will we be killing not just each other but also the beautiful ecosystems made by nature ? 

How difficult can it  be to understand what Prof. Carl Sagan said ? Everyone who is in the position of power, decision making on behalf of masses should be made to watch this repeatedly till the futility of their actions gets into their heads ! 

We all should be meditating on this till this simple but beautiful message starts to make sense to us !

https://youtu.be/GO5FwsblpT8?si=NZGg_pfhKB8OHXJI

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

Limitless Human Stupidity !

 How more stupid it has to get ! Three essential basic needs for human survival- air, water and food are poisoned by our own actions ! We are busy fighting with each other over our assumed superiority of caste/religion/ skin colour/nationality. 

It is ironic that so called "the smartest species" on planet Earth doesn't know what is good for itself that too in the age where they have not just their own brains to think but an additional one of AI too ! 

Our legacy

Should it not be our utmost concern ? A planet with polluted air, contaminated water, adulterated food

and people not just divided over shallow differences but becoming intolerant of each other ! The fact that this is what we are going to leave for our kids and their future generations scares me to no end ! 

Outlook and outcome !

May we be able to appreciate how deeply we all are connected and how superficial our differences are ! May we have love, peace, harmony, kindness, empathy, compassion and acceptance for each other as we are !

A successful year without being on social media and away from news has helped me immensely to grow inside. We literally stopped watching news on television since last three years, no social media for more than a year, no newspaper for last six months and a strict no for news on internet for five months now, I doubt if I missed on any thing at all ! I wonder if I am not a well informed citizen of the world ! According to me the only thing I missed out on and am very glad that I did was getting scared and overwhelmed with not only the real chaos in the world but also the projected chaos through all these mediums ! I must tell you the 'projected' chaos is much more dangerous than the real one !

Not feeding my mind with the junk thoughts that arise from the information shelled out by these mediums gave me an opportunity to have some clean and healthy food for my mind  (my perception) .

Pema Chodron( a buddhist teacher) , Carl Sagan ( an astrophysicist), Alan Watts( a philosopher), J Krishnamurthy ( a philosopher), Gail Brenner ( a psychologist) are the prominent ones who helped me to expand my conscience. I am almost in love with reading. I am trying to grow my own food. I have more control over my emotions. I feel I am a better and stronger(emotionally) person in comparison to the person I was ! For me this is a good enough reason to continue on the path I am on !

Wish you all a very happy new year !



 

Life matters !

I am quite puzzled by the question I was asked last night by my twelve year old one,  after he killed a cockroach while I almost screamed in urgency asking him to do so.

"Why did you make me take the life of a living being that did no harm to me? Why?" He was quite disturbed to see the way the cockroach tried to escape as he could not kill it in one go. Even I felt bad but it was late to change the decision after urging him to kill it ! For some moments I had no words to utter ! We both looked at each other blankly. As it was his bedtime, I was told I made it difficult for him to go to sleep. We closed with a discussion on how to keep them away and letting them live their life !

 I might not have answers to such innocent but very meaningful queries but it makes me happy, sad and anxious at the same time, happy, as I see such moments as manifestation of being successful at my attempts, sad as I know he will suffer a lot and anxious for, if, I would be able to nurture and help him retain the attitude to respect life forever  !

A disturbing thought.

Our world, that is driven by the law of maximizing profits and drowned in consumerism, is certainly not going in the direction needed for the harmonious coexistence of the entire life on the planet.

Our  world, where the distinction between 'needs' and 'wants' is slowly disappearing, is sowing the seeds of destruction for the life on earth.

Our world, where greed of some is acceptable over the needs of many, is certainly steering  in the wrong direction. 

My wish for the New Year !

May all living beings have the strength to go through the motions of life.
May all living beings have patience, kindness and contentment.
May all living beings be able to accept each other as they are.
May all living beings love and be loved.

Simple rules

Isn't it strange that the same simple rules work for both - to sustain life means our existence on this planet earth( in a broader sense) and our own personal happiness.

Respect and appreciate life in all forms and banish the narrow limits of religion, caste, colour , region, nationality.

Ability to distinguish between our 'needs' and 'wants'.

It is easy for one more reason, it has to start with me only !

Simplyfy life - 2

What sister Shivani says, I am trying to put it down for myself to rub it it in more effectively.

What happens on the surface is- We face a situation and respond to it.

What happens inside is- A situation creates a thought, the thought creates a feeling and that feeling leads to the action- our response.

But all this happens so fast that we(most of us) don't even notice it. Our responses are automatic and very fast.

We do not even think if we had a choice to act differently. This type of automated response is reaction. As most of the others around us also act in a similar way we not only justify but accept our reactions as the only possible way of responding !

What it leads to is- feeling of powerlessness, no control and blame game.

The gap between the changing situations and our response is widening which leads to set of negative thoughts not only for the self but for others also.

We underestimate the power of self - after all what will change even if I do, how can this much change make a difference ? But the point is, not to get overwhelmed by such thoughts as for sure it will make a difference to you and the entire universe !

The idea is- a thought is a seed which grows into our action in general, our response here. We need to work very consciously on this step. We can start with situations which have passed and stop and analyze it in steps of thought-feeling-action and prepare ourselves.

We must realise and accept that the outcome which generally is pain does not come from outside, it is our own creation. 

In nut shell - out of the fight between the situation and the self, the point of focus and attention should be self- something which is in our control.

Simplify life - 1

The way life has become in this age of fast change, in spite of so many comforts, we feel some kind of pain, discontentment. This is an attempt to analyze and help myself to come out of it with the help of sister Shivani. I try my hand at reproducing what sister Shivani has to offer in her self help management series.

What actually happens in our day to day life is- we face different situations, small/big in both professional and personal life. It may be as small as your house help not arriving without notice, getting stuck in a traffic jam or much more serious as separation, relationship breaking, loosing a job or worst death of a loved one !

What is common in all these situation? It is the change, change from the state we get so used to !

Our general response to any of the situation is - discomfort, pain, to a different extent for different situations. Our ability to handle the situation dwindles down when we are in pain. The situation appears much more serious and big than the actual when we are in pain.

Why this happens? Because we focus too much on the problem/situation, which most of the times, is out of our control !! Instead,  if we focus our attention on the solution or even better our own response to the situation, we shall fare much better. This is where, we need to work mostly on.      

My response to the situation is the key point to ponder over and start with !
 
A nice thought I read this morning

Life is really simple but we insist on making it complicated- Confucius

My beacon of light !

Being a female by gender of species homo sapiens, I play several roles- a daughter, a sister, a friend, a wife, a mother, a daughter in law , a student top the list. Being all of these simultaneously often leaves me in difficult situations which make me wonder actually 'what really is the meaning of all this?'

Sometimes I feel it is better to be numb to all this and just be lost in the flow of life even if it is all materialistic(something that makes me uncomfortable, not that I am a saint with no wishes, but I do have my limits) ! One thing is obvious to me certainly I am not the one born with this clarity but I am one who wish to have this ! This implies pain to some extent but worth undergoing !

On my way to find myself and my purpose following are the people, resources which have been of help at the various levels. I would be happy if someone else also finds his or her way through one of them.

1.) This is the latest but something which is teaching me the real way to be kinder to myself and gives me explicit method of healing and helping myself and in turn others. This just reinforced my belief that to heal others first heal yourself.
 It is in Hindi but you can find some other videos on youtube in English and some videos of this series with English subtitles.

http://www.awakeningwithbrahmakumaris.org/self-management

2.)The great ones whose teachings I can understand and appreciate to some extent-

A.) Swami Vivekananda (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivekananda)

If faith in ourselves had been more extensively taught and practiced, I am sure a very large portion of the evils and miseries that we have would have vanished.

Swami Vivekananda

B.) J Krishnamurti(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiddu_Krishnamurti)

Among the legends what Hitler and Mussolini were only the primary spokesmen for the attitude of domination and craving for power that are in the heart of almost everyone. Until the source is cleared, there will always be confusion and hate, wars and class antagonisms.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

3.) It makes sense to me what Dr. Marshall Rosenberg has to say.

http://www.nonviolentcommunication.com/aboutnvc/aboutnvc.htm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dpk5Z7GIFs

Shouldn't peace, love and harmony be also included in the list of our basic needs and we all should  strive to achieve these? They are a priority on my list and hopefully on yours too :)

Being human !

One of our serious lacking as human beings is our inability to accept others as the sum total of good and bad together. We label people as good or bad. Being judgemental comes very naturally to us.

Probably this has to do with the way we are brought up. Our culture thrives on the basic principle of win of good over evil ! I have nothing against this but I am certainly against the idea of labeling someone as God/good and the other as devil/evil ! I believe no one is either. Everyone is a mix of the two and we act under the influence of dark and light under difference circumstances of life. Sum total of that constitute our lives. What varies for different people is the number of times we stray into the dark or the light side.

What we need to acknowledge is this, what makes our lives, is our behavior, our way of being. How I live, how I behave certainly gets affected by the society around me but if you see the society behaves like I do. It is a circle. It comes to you and it goes from you. Let us focus on the part that goes from us. The other part which comes to us will automatically change. 

I end this one of my favorite dialogue from one of my favorite movie-Harry Potter. Albus Dumbledore puts it very nicely for me -

We have all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act upon. That 's who we really are.
 
and I add to it- And to stray into the dark side sometimes is very much part of being human !

Happy New Year !

Let all beings be happy; let all beings be peaceful; let all beings be blissful- Swami Vivekanand.

This says beautifully my new year wish. Wish you all a very Happy and prosperous new year.

The year ended with a visit to a museum, Ice House, Chennai. (http://www.vivekanandahouse.org)where Swami Vivekananda stayed for sometime in 1897. It is a small museum in size but surely much much larger in leaving the impact on you. I wonder where and how did we lost track of the vision Swami Vivekanada had at that time ! The vision which is as much relevant today as it was then !!  Of course, without doubt the loss is ours as humanity not only as a nation !!

My humble suggestion- to be a better human being try following these two Gurus(teachers)-Swami Vivekananda and Dr. Marshall Rosenberg(a glimpse-- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dpk5Z7GIFs).  You will not be disappointed :)

My take on the tide called AAP.

I come out with my take on various factors associated with the latest political party of the country-Aam Aadmi Party.  Why it should interest to other readers of the blog can be a very legitimate question though :) but then I doubt if it would not also, because of the common factor- being humans we tend to behave almost identically under the given circumstances, may be with some degree of variation depending upon our upbringing in the diverse cultures of the world.

I am way too excited for many reasons related to this event and am unable to decide where to begin. The reason being very simple- it gave the much needed boost to the whole nation specially the common man walking on the street, irrespective of the religion, state, language or every other division which generally plays a role in our lives being Indians otherwise !!

Let me try. The event is emergence of AAP-Aam(Common) Aadmi(Man) Party, their recent win in Delhi Assembly elections. A rather common name and an even simpler symbol- a broom!!

Let me first start with a little history. This is just an year old political party formed by some of the brightest minds in the country who finally could overcome the taboo associated with politics and jumped into this dirty muddle with a broom(their symbol). They might not be the first such collection or attempt in the history but then they are surely the first one in my lifetime and their ideology resonate with the common sense of a common man. To their credit they showed a remarkable performance(28 seats out of 70) in their debut elections in the capital state of the country-Delhi.

The other two big political parties are- the Congress and the BJP(Bhartiya Janta Party). To say the least they have been hit rather hard by this tide. The reason being- their total disconnect with the  common man. They got way too busy in making money and forgot the very basic reason they got the positions in the first place.( But honestly this is the problem of humans in general !! We have become too much money centric and politics probably tops the list of professions affected by this, given the opportunities and the scale of money involved !! let me not get distracted !)

The existing bigwigs not only ridiculed the AAP and the people who formed it, they did the ghastly mistake of ridiculing the concept !!! They got their calculations completely messed up in not realizing that Arvind Kejriwal(the leader of the party) is just the face of the resentment which has been harboring inside the nation of millions for quite long time.

What made them fall flat on their face, in spite, of having the muscle and money is their complete lack of trust in the ability of a common man. But then one shouldn't blame them for this attitude !! After all the common man did ignore them for so long and preferred to look in an orthogonal direction while these people changed the scale of misdeeds they were doing by many factors of magnitude ! No wonder we were taken for granted ! The game of division of the country into three classes- super rich, middle class and the poor(rich class overlaps with the middle and the super rich ) and the subsequent manipulations led to their atrocious scale of roguery and wrongdoings. The richness of rich increased while the big chunk of population remained poor (rather are kept poor !) and the upcoming and struggling middle class's existence hardly mattered for the political class. Or rather both the political class and the middle class neglected each other's presence in the scenario !! As a result of this mutual ignorance the middle class lost its voice and say in the country completely.  It became so bad that it led to the emergence of this class as a political party - the AAP ! Not bad to start with as one says 'late is better than never' so here we are !!

In today 's times there can't be a debate on the role of media in such movements. In this particular case the media has been very cautious on being the side of the common man and the impact of the major political forces on their conduct can't be ignored. In spite of the power of media there still are a  large number of people who conduct their duties with the uprightness. I really hope and wish that media just reports the happenings in a genuine way rather than trying to play the role of a moralistic  teacher.

I must show my sincere gratitude to the team of people who made this possible, for being able to direct the anger and helplessness of the nation of the flustered people into a concrete phenomena called AAP.  Kindly continue to follow what you started with, keeping your feet firmly on the ground.

Now the common man( that includes me)- the one responsible for all this tamasha !! Let us all understand and appreciate this -to bring the change in the society and the nation under the leadership of AAP, implement "be the change you want to see in others" in our day to day life. AAP does not has a magic wand in its hand that can cleanse the system without our contribution to it. Let us not waste the chance we got of having an honest leadership by not doing our bit !

Be the change you want to see in others !!

Every time I  feel the need of changing the world around for a better life for myself and others, now a days, I get back to this- the only way is change myself ! Trying to look for qualities of honesty, integrity, empathy, compassion in others I realize that it gets much easier, in case I try to attain these rather than wishing  others to do the same.

The point I want to make is very simple/easy and difficult at the same time to achieve.

Easy - because the solution is you, yourself, nothing outside you.

Difficult -  on account of the same reason. The change has to come from within you and mind it, it is not easy at all.  Otherwise things would have been rather different by now !

In a nut shell the change will not come by demanding others to change and has to be in you ! And unfortunately we are not trained to think like this and hence the chance of getting a solution goes tumbling down.  Every time I feel overwhelmed by this thought I try to bring myself to normal level and focus only on how to change myself.

Pearls from Star Wars.

But beware of the Dark Side. Anger, fear, aggression; the dark side of the Force are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight. If once you start down the dark path, forever it dominate you destiny, consume you it will. 

Fear is the path to the Dark Side. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate; hate leads to suffering.

Death is a natural part of life. Rejoice for those around you who transform into the Force. Mourn them do not. Miss them do not. Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed that is. Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.

Do or do not; there is no try.

These are few of the profound statements made by Master Yoda in different parts of the Star Wars , one of the very entertaining series and loaded with pearls of wisdom to guide us through the journey of life.

 

An eye for an eye !

 I started this piece on the same day Kasab was hanged. After this Afzal Guru was hanged. Today Mr. Yakub Memon  is going to be executed.  My views on the death penalty remain the same. I write this because I strongly believe that the solution to any  problem of the society anywhere on this planet has to come from much more fundamental level rather than seeking answers at the superficial levels and this act of death penalty is just one of the very shallow measures.

I just could not feel good or neutral  because Ajmal Kasab, 25 year old, a Muslim by religion, Pakistani by nationality, one of the most disliked/hated human in India, who killed many innocent people on 26th November, 2008 in Mumbai got hanged. Does it serve any purpose ? Does it make life better in anyway for those who were killed, those who survived, those who would be living with the nightmare throughout or will it act as a deterrent ? I think the answer to all these questions is no. I request you to keep your judgement in check for a few minutes or rather kindly let me have my opinion and ignore it in case you do not agree. Let us all learn to agree to disagree, life will be more peaceful!


A tragedy like this demands the following.
 1.) Taking care of the families of who got killed, specially, the forces(police, army, guards ) who laid down their lives knowing fully well that they may not come out of it.

2.) A serious introspection why this happened and how to stop it from happening again.

This needs to be done not only by the government or state, we all at our individual level have to contribute to it. I do not know how well these two important requirements are taken care of by our state or by us. I doubt if anything changed in your or my life after this ! Whenever we are under the grip of fear of any such thing happening to us, we cry hoarse what should be done by the government/state/bureaucracy etc..

Hanging Kasab was one of the things which is thought of as a step in the right direction. How does this help in achieving the above two issues is something which needs to be taken very seriously.

What did the families got ? A few days attention from the media, some award from the state. But does that take away/lessen the pain they would be undergoing ? I am sure again for a day or so this stupid question would be asked to the families- How do you feel now? Shame on all of us, who ask, who expect such questions to be answered, who listen and get a feel good factor.

Kasab, a young boy from a poor background, from Pakistan(can not ignore this factor given the fact how hostile, unfortunately, the two brother nations, feel about each other), brainwashed executed this horrible act. This is not any kind of  justification for what he did but what beats me is the following.

Such an act is unacceptable from Kasab but what about the rich, people with all means, planning in cold blood the killing of hundreds of innocent people, just for the sake of power /greed from the comforts of their drawing rooms ?  What about the perpetrators of 1984 riots in Delhi, 1992 riots in Mumbai,  2002 Gujrat riots and many other such incidents ? What stops us to ask for death sentence for all those responsible for these heinous crimes, where men, women and children were killed brutally ? But in many of these cases accountability is still to be fixed. And we, the public hardly care! Why it is okay with you and me to ignore/forget these incidents ? Just because in these cases we do not have a clear, defined enemy to shout against !  It beats me why ?  How can it be more painful when the life is taken by a so called enemy than a so called friend ?  Whatever the reason might be but it is utter hypocrisy on our parts to look at the similar incidents or rather with different order of heinousness(according to me the latter one is much more grievous), with two different looking  glasses. It would be a gross mistake to ignore the circumstances, events that led to such monstrous planned crimes !

My point is what Ajmal did along with nine others on 26/11 in Mumbai is something which is unacceptable and beyond any kind of justification from any one. What happened on that night, when almost 200 people lost their lives, Mumbai was under siege of terror and the entire nation watched this horrific ongoing for almost three days, requires much more to be done than hanging the lone surviving attacker and rejoicing it.  Kasab in this case was a miniscule pawn in the hands of some people with completely distorted understanding of life.  The incidents like this are external manifestation of  a metastatic stage of  deep rooted cancer of hatred, mistrust and greed and happen all over the world. And it does require urgency in the treatment at the root level ! I am certainly not in favour of hanging those responsible for the riots or other crimes also but we do require earnest efforts to change the mindset of such people suffering from extreme case of selfishness and greed.

Taking life of someone in any way according to me does not serve any purpose to anyone ! If it does appease to some psychologically and to some gives satisfaction of justice being done in exchange to the wrongs done to them, then there is something gone wrong very seriously with our judgements, our attitudes, as a race , which should be a serious concern for you and me. As Mahatama Gandhi put it very simply "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind".

Life is fragile !

Life is fragile-first thought on my mind after hearing the news about serious illness of one of my friends, who is just thirty nine ! After struggling through a night of anxiety  over how it could not have happened or could have been detected earlier, how to be of help and comfort to them and at the same time feel less insecure about my own life, the only comforting solution to such an unpredictable situation in life that comes to my mind is that if instead of holding very tightly onto the small unit of family formed on the basis of blood relations, we have bonding and harmony with people around us, life will be less painful.  Let the feelings be less intense but with a long range. Life being just as unpredictable as it is, keeps throwing challenges big or small at us. In times like this I realise that it is just a random process, anyone any time can be next one to get hit. Also it is a matter of frame of reference again. From our frame of reference after all how much attention we pay when in a colony of ants one ends up crushing a few ! And from a much bigger frame- say top of the planet or some place further away - the entire human race will be just another such colony !! We, individually  may not matter in the grand scheme of things.  At the same time while we are in this colony things that happen around us, in our spheres of life, in our frames make an impact on our quality of life. But the only thing in our control is our reaction to the different situations. Most of the time we react much more emotionally and sensitively than required and the reason to act like that comes from our basic insecurities and fears. I feel that if we are genuinely bonded to each other based on the simple fact that we all are identical at some level and the differences between us are just on account of the diversity in nature and are here together in this journey of life with same basic needs and feelings, we shall fare much better in handling painful and disappointing events as a race as well as individually.  I do not know how much sense it makes to all but these thoughts invade my mind and give comfort and at the same time overwhelm me !

Small glimpse of the Mahakumbh 2013

One of the streets

Walking towards the sangam

View of a pontoon bridge

More people !

A difficult lesson to learn.

A time, when you feel hurt on account of the circumstances not entirely in your hands, when the ones you love, you care for unintentionally create and on top of that you feel their pain, is rather taxing. But then this is all part of being alive ! Though I would like to change many things yet again a situation where I can not fix anything but can only change the attitude to look at the scenario that makes it less painful.  It is a difficult lesson to learn but a lesson worth spending your time and energy on !