Our Planet Should Be Our Priority!

Who would have thought a few years ago that we humans had the capacity to consume copious amounts of useless information everyday? Information which doesn't add any value is shovelled daily into our heads. The surprising part is that we ourselves acquire the means (or the devices) to access information and then slowly we lose the right over what, where and when of it. I guess it all happened gradually & we got ensnared in it all. First it was Facebook, Twitter, then Instagram, Whatsapp and now there are things that I do not even understand.

I happened to quit Facebook more than a year back when I lost a bet. Strangely, I didn't miss it. I still don't. I was reassured by Facebook that all my data would be intact so I can come back anytime. Yet I didn't feel like going back, not even once. Probably all I was doing 'Facebooking' was hurting my eyes and increasing my screen time or rather decreasing my productive time. Yes I cannot deny that it was very addictive but I could get over it so easily was something I had never imagined. It is a relief now that I lost that bet. I use Whatsapp only nowadays and that too on a private number with only my first family so that at least I think that I am in control. I get calls from my friends to know my whereabouts, whether I am on the same planet or somewhere else. They think I am lost ever since I uninstalled Whatsapp on my regular number. So if you are not reachable on any media other than a 'telephone', people call to inquire if you are lost or something? Earlier we would not find time to talk to each other for days or months together but now the new normal is to hear what all our friends have to say first thing in the morning. So if someone is not on Whatsapp, then it feels like you heard from them ages ago even if you spoke to them last month only. But since friends know us better than we know ourselves, they leave me alone.

But that's my story. I could afford to avoid it at my age. But when you are younger, peer pressure matters a lot. To be a part of the peer group, you have to do certain things. Or rather you end up copying your peers without knowing what is it that 'you' really want. Now it is not so important because youth is when you explore and make mistakes the most. The sad part is when it starts shaping your personality for worse. I am not hinting at the obvious mistakes that young people make like drugs etc but those subtle ones that on surface are harmless but slowly become detrimental to not just them but to the whole planet.

Social media changes the way we identify ourselves. We are exposed to hundreds of undesirable concepts floating on it. A major concept which has some rub off on us all in various degrees is that it gives us un-achievable consumerist goals. People are scanning each other's activities 24x7 on social media and setting high standards of life for themselves based on what their peers do. A few million years ago, man could live in dens, eat raw food and wander without clothes. Yet he was not this dissatisfied as we are today. We have so much more than the cavemen but it is not enough. This does not just apply to the younger generation but all of us. Nothing is enough ever. We want more and more, here and now. There are more luxuries available so why not experience them. To worsen the situation, everything gets reported on social media so that no one is spared. Unless you have a head of your own, it is easy to get absorbed by it all. And it becomes the objective of our life - how to maximize pleasure.

When I was working in London, I had a colleague who told me she is saving her meager salary to buy Chanel No.5 someday. I could not digest it back then. Here is a whole generation of kids who are making their parents save for bigger smart phones. No picture is taken without pouts and it is absolutely a sin to repeat your dresses. On the face of it, all this sounds quite normal and as I said harmless. It doesn't matter so much if you shop a lot! But behind it all is a machinery working incessantly to provide the comforts people seek. That machinery is nothing but various lifestyle brands making luxury accessible and affordable as well. Everyone wants a big phone, a better pair of jeans or heels, regardless of their social status. So this machinery is busy churning out products that suit different pockets. They are not doing us a favor, they are only interested in profits.

If the GDP of a country is not growing year on year basis, its ratings fall. I am sure a lot of it is to do with how consumerist are its people and how businesses are leveraging those opportunities. But have we ever thought how our own actions, however small they may be, have an effect on the planet. We want a nice pair of jeans, but something that fits our budget. There is a businessman somewhere who can sense this opportunity and will find ways to capture you as his customer. He will find cheaper raw material, cheap land and cheap labor. Who thinks about how the waste produced by such factories gets disposed of. It all gets dumped in drains, rivers and land sites. And who bothers about workers rights or safety. It is the profit that matters. Who has seen the future? We all want it all, here and now.

I am in no way saying you stop buying phones, clothes or cars. But everything is good in moderation. I will sight a few examples of how we get fooled by corporates. And how the influx of updates about our friend's vacation on social media make us insecure.

Have you ever observed that Dettol runs ads for its liquid soap saying, it is better than soap bars. It gives the logic that soap bars pose threat of germs traveling from one pair of hands to the other. If it is true, has Dettol stopped making soap bars? No it hasn't. Those who use soaps are dying of diseases? No! It is only fooling those it can fool. How does it matter? It matters, because just to create another profitable category, they are selling liquid soaps which come in plastic bottles which add to the household waste. We end up using more soap when using liquid soap so that more water is used to wash it off and more waste water is entering our rivers. What for? Only profits. Ask experts they would deny that liquid soap does anything better than what soap bars do. Even if there are some benefits, they definitely do not justify the pollution it causes. It is nothing but convenience that they sell and we buy because we think we are very important and so is our time. Only a little effort of rubbing soap on hands will save the Earth from getting polluted further. See how a small change on our end makes a big difference?

Let's take another simple example of how we buy our veggies. How many of us remember to carry carry-bags with us when we go veggie shopping? None of us. That's that, what I see is that people don't let the vendor put beans, ladyfinger and peas together. They want them in separate poly-bags. All the comfort is worth it but do we remember to carry the bags from home. No, never. We want fresh carry bags every time, and throw them away mindlessly. After all what does it cost? Nothing. What does it cost the earth to absorb it back, a lot. A lot of marine life is dying because the polybags get deposited on the floor of the ocean choking the life beneath them. I get tears writing it. But there are people to whom all this does not matter. People like you and me, not the illiterate ones. Not that they are not aware of it but it takes conscious effort to make these changes. And what does it take to separate beans from ladyfingers? Only a few minutes, which we want to save so that we can find time to catch up on Whatsapp and see what our friend is wearing today or where are they vacationing. No wonder the caveman was happier and more satisfied.

As for the economy, even if these plastic bags making factories get out of business someday, there will be some other business opportunity up for grabs. Why do things which harm the Earth and later on harm us as well in the end of the day. It is up to us to make sensible decisions. What is the use of all the information if we don't make wise choices and understand the role we play in global warming. 

working mother vs. stay at home mother

A few days ago, I called to congratulate an old college friend on becoming mother to a little boy. She was delighted exhausted nervous and grateful all at the same time. She said she feels blessed holding her son in her arms.

She was a very bright student with a charismatic personality who went on to hold high posts in the corporate world early on in her career. She heads the marketing division of a large insurance MNC now. When I had met her long back, she was upset with her mother in law because she was expecting her to start a family soon. My friend was of the opinion that marriage is not = babies. She said she doesn't find the idea exciting and doesn't want to go through the trouble. I was surprised but I kept quiet. There are a certain things you can't question people on. I just said you'll know only when you have a baby. I'd seen my nephews and niece by then and I knew how it transforms your life completely when you have a baby. And that too for good. You wouldn't find anything quite like it ever again.

Years later when I saw her message saying 'cleared all the three trimesters' to welcome my son Meer. I was pleasantly surprised. I wanted to meet her and congratulate her in person but since it wasn't easy, a phone call was all I could manage. She said she was unsure if she would ever be able to leave her son and go back to work. She said everyone has done it, I will also try. She sounded anxious. Till then I'd not realised how traumatic it is for a mother to even think of being away from her new born child. And to actually do it is another thing altogether even if you're leaving her behind with your mother or your in-laws. But after three months when I called her on a Sunday she announced she is going back to work on Thursday, ending the sentence with sigh. Next time when I called her, she had developed a rhythm and started enjoying the challenge of being a working mother and optimizing her schedule to fit in maximum time for her child. She now wrote a blog for all the new mothers how to cope with work pressure and how to prioritize when something as elemental as sleep becomes a prize.

That got me thinking if this new phase of separation right for the baby or the mother. The mother had toiled years, in fact more than a decade to be where she is in her professional life. It would be criminal to expect her to give up everything all of a sudden now that she has a child. From the child's perspective it is cruel to separate her from her mother. What should be done then?

Who has the right answer? Who can help both of them strike a balance?

I feel guilty because my mother gave up her job for me. I wish she had continued working and achieved what she dreamed of. But a mother is a mother after all. No one can be what she is to her child. Even if she entrusts her child with the grand parents, they can't replace her.

Sorry I've no answers.

In a post on akkarbakkar.com, a working mother writes to a stay at home mother justifying her stance. I read all the comments below to see how the general public is reacting to it. One of the working mother says I want to give a better life to my children than what my parents could afford. She sounds okay but if you think deeper, her parents succeeded in making her an independent career woman with whatever little they had, she doesn't need extra finances for the success of her children. I say why be guilty of continuing to be who you are even after having a child?

Anyway I have been trying to think from both the sides and I feel there's another underlying cause because of why we cannot blame the working mother.

Since we keep evolving, every new generation as a whole is smarter than the previous ones. Thanks to industrial revolution, a lot of work now a days is done by machines, so we have spare time to pursue different goals which people couldn't think of a hundred years ago. That slowly made us even more smart. With our minds becoming sharper and smarter, we stopped finding interest in menial repititive tasks which a stay at home mom has to do. Doing household work didn't satisfy our restless minds anymore and we started needing more stimulation to feel productive and engaged. With it came women's education and empowerment. They started expressing  their individuality and demanded equality on all fronts.

That or something else somehow lead men to stop respecting women for their contributions as much as they did in the past. In my parents generation the relationship between a man and his wife was much more cordial. There was proper division of labor at home and both the sides respected each other since both specialized in their area of expertise which the other one couldn't do. Now there are no boundaries, women do what men do and vice versa. There is a lot confusion and the dynamics at work and at home are undergoing massive transformation. So who should sit at home to raise the kids?

That's the price of modernization that our children have to pay. With her parents not around, the child has to be really lucky to receive good values and become a stable and mature individual.

God has made the earth in a way that if we do well in one area, some other aspect of our life gets compromised which adversely affects the most vulnerable area. Like industrial revolution meant we had lot of conveniences so that we didn't have to toil to do our daily tasks and so our health deteriorated. Plus it caused pollution and is threatening the existence of many life forms. There are countless such phenomenon happening now a days.

But to me the key take out is that we bring our children into this world, they are our responsibility. How we choose to take care of that responsibility is completely our own choice. We can't say what is right or what is not for anyone else. Yes but if those kids who get neglected become a headache for the society then someone has to do something about it and that can be no one but both the parents who must actively contribute. 

Men = women?

How did it all start? Men and women were equal. They roamed in jungles and hunted together. They loved each other's company and life was hunky-dory when suddenly kids came into picture. That changed everything slowly and forever.

Strangely even if we are the smartest of the earthlings, we human beings remain dependent on our parents for a long time, both physically and emotionally. So one parent has to be around physically to take care of them. And since the child needs her mother more, women stayed at home while men went out hunt. The more time that the mothers spent at home and with children the more they understood their needs and developed nurturing instinct. The more men remained outside the more they developed spatial skills needed to be good hunters. That's how we human beings remained for millions of years and evolved into who we are now. Women managed home front better than men and men were better outside. Both respected each other for their contributions.

When we started settling in cities, men didn't need to go hunting anymore. Civilization mean that education was the power needed to prosper which both men and women could easily acquire. That's when the battle began. Education put both of them at same level. Both are now equally capable of achieving most of the tasks. So who should stay at home now? Managing families and households is messy. Since women have been doing it for ages they are expected to be doing it like always.

In between something somewhere went wrong and stereotypes started forming. Women were now considered the weaker sex and man started dominating them to the extent that they decide how women should live their lives. What was it that lead to women losing the equal status, I can't pinpoint. Till my parents generation men and women respected each other for what they did. Not anymore. Since women don't get treated fairly now, they rebel.

And anyway why should women stay at home if they are equally qualified? Yes the children do need them as much as in the past but that can be outsourced. So why stay at home and get our hands dirty with the mess. This new phenomenon broke all the rules and changed the situations which lead to our particular evolution. For millions of years what was normal is not normal anymore. Women, as much homosapiens, are equally intelligent and are becoming bread winners much like men. Who is then to be blamed if a woman doesn't want to sit at home and keep doing repetitive menial tasks? Who is to be blamed if men fail to accept women doing as good as them at what was once their forte; if men don't know how to process this change in their head; if a powerful independent woman hurts their ego; if women seeking liberty from being tied to the house gets them confused?

No one. God has created us extremely dependent on our parents that is what started it initially.

But someone has to run the household? Someone has to be around the kids to give them the right values they need to grow into stable and emotionally secure individuals. Who should do it?

First this new scheme of things has to sink into our minds. Sadly we don't have a million years to undonghe effects of the old system. The change is needed here and now. It is just one life that we live and one life only to fulfill our aspirations. And yet something which has carried on for years cannot be undone in a hurry.

But we have to start somewhere. Since women are the ones who suffer the most, and mothers have bigger onus of passing on good values to their children, it is upon us to create an equal environment for our kids in the first social settings for them which is our family. A mother must teach her son to respect women and not to objectify them. It has to become a part of her own value system. How she behaves with other men and women in the house, how others behave with her, everything becomes a standard for her child. And it's not just about how the mother behaves but also about making every child help her in small chores around the house so that the child appreciates how much of an effort is it to keep a house in order and to keep everyone well fed. The father of the child also takes a big responsibility by being appreciative of the mother's contribution, by helping her in the chores, by treating her with respect. But how many men are like that? I assume none at least in this part of the world. And why should they bother for the betterment of humanity going forward. It takes lot of effort to do all that a women does round the clock. They are in a comfort zone, why would they want to jeopardize this position.

Well honestly that's a lot to expect from Asian men at least. Instead of recognizing their importance, men try to dominate women by openly abusing them emotionally, verbally and physically. Just yesterday it was in news that a girl was stabbed by a man from her neighborhood all because she complained against him for stalking her. He was apparently provoked by his mother. And a news from the highly developed nation of Japan where women don't prefer to settle down or procrastinate getting married because if they are not expected to work after they've kids. And if they do continue to work afterwards, they're labeled as cruel mothers. This is really appalling. Because in a society where it is known that a female employee is not going to be working after she becomes a mother, no one would want to take women seriously or groom them for future important roles.

Women will have to rebel and create a level playing field for themselves. And rebel is not easy. It will take toll mostly on women themselves and for a while on children but there is no other way you can teach the society to shake off its prejudices. 

the dry spell

Nursing a broken tail bone has reduced my pace & made me dull. Don't know how the two are related but I feel disconnected from God in this slowed down pace. I struggle to meditate. Every time I try, I'm hardly able to concentrate and my mind becomes very restless. I can't help it even though I'm fully aware that my mind is the one creating trouble.
I've sought various plausible theories to stop its continuous blabber but they have been ineffective. I've had such spells in the past but they have been brief. This time it has prolonged way more than I can handle. Even going back to The Geeta also didn't help this time.

I do know it well that Lord Krishna says if you are after the bliss that you derive from Bhakti/devotion you are veering off the goal which is to seek Me. If you want Mukti or Nirvana then also you are not seeking 'Me'. He says those who seek only Me, see Me everywhere & find Me in everyone, and perform all their actions as an offering to Me are very dear to Me and they attain Me.

I fully appreciate it yet here I'm, ungrateful and shallow, absorbed in pleasing my senses all the time these days. I'm sure God has a message behind it. I'm trying to read that message from all the situations I face so that I can get my devotion back in place.

Today I had to attend the condolence meeting of a neighbor who was a young businessman and a father of two little girls. It is numbing to even imagine the pain the family is going through. There is very little anyone can do apart from sympathizing. No one can bring him back. No one can replace him ever. Time only will heal their wounds slowly and that too partially. It's nothing new for me, I've also been through it but I'm trying to see it in new light to find my answers seeing the photograph of this man garlanded and kept on one side of the prayer meeting. It is so easy for me to write all this. And it must be so difficult for them to even accept that he is no more. It will take them years to even say the words that he 'died'. Till day I say I lost my father. Why is it that we don't feel other people's loss as much? Why is that apart from the grieving family all seem normal? Life is the same for everyone else!

This feeling of continuity is actually a sham. We all come into this world with an expiry date. Each one of us. Yet the world seems to be continuously moving forward and progressing. What if we are told that we all will die tomorrow? What would we do? I guess we would want to meet everyone we love and care for, make merry, pray to God and live every moment till that time comes. Knowing our collective end is near would bring us all closer and kindle our hearts with warmth for everyone not just our own family and friends. But why does the fact that we all will not die tomorrow make us selfish. If not tomorrow some other day some other time but die we will.

I'm sure there is a better answer to this question as death is not what we work towards or look forward to but there is another aspect to it. I believe God has created this world in a way that it is not easy to seek Him or know very obviously that seeking Him is the right thing to do. The inevitable end of everything is disguised behind the sham of newness and the continuity that this world offers. If we could see what is coming, we would live our life very differently. But because we don't know what lies ahead, we please our self with whatever means we have and behave selfishly. If we believe that this day is the best time to remember God, to be grateful to Him for what He has given us, to love everyone, to be good to others, to be honest and giving, it will make it so easy to reach out to Him and He will Himself show us how. We just have to train our minds to regularly pull out from our daily rut and observe that the world is transient. And that God resides in each one of us. As much in you as in me. Hurting anyone is hurting God Himself, loving everyone is loving God.

I did get this message from God today but the joy of the knowledge of His unconditional love for me still eludes me.
The peace that the knowledge of Him being everywhere, in the past, present and future is still what I crave for. I wish am able to dispel this spell soon. Else everything seems a waste.

The birth of compassion

'Whose birthday is it today?' This question invariably pops up in my head on certain days of the year. Usually it is in the months of July August and October. But this time it was repeatedly coming to my mind in May. I jogged my memory and remembered an old friend whose birthday falls on May 12. I decided to wish her.

On 12 May night I opened my old Yahoo account and searched her name and sent her birthday wishes. As was expected I got a prompt reply the very next day. She was delighted to get my email and about the fact that I still remember her birthday. I could imagine how she must've looked when she saw my email. She was one of the prettiest girls in my MBA class, tall and slender, sharp featured, pearly white teeth and a beautiful smile, bubbly and lively, always gesturing with her hands when talking, her eyes wide open with excitement. She was an excellent dancer. Very hard working with boundless energy. She had it all in her yet she wasn't popular. It was something in her personality, what was it, I can't say. A year after our MBA she sent an email with her photograph from her wedding day announcing she was married. What a pleasant surprise it was. She looked stunning, a perfect bride. She could've given competition to any ramp model. A close friend of hers told me later that she married her childhood sweetheart who is a hot shot in the corporate world now.

Anyway she wrote she was glad to be back in touch and that she had two beautiful kids now and was back at work after taking break for a few years.

Come to think of it she had it all that any girl could dream of. But I was not green! I mean green with jealousy!! I didn't want to be in her shoes. I'm not a saint. I exercise all the negative and positive emotions of life in varying proportions. But it was something about her which didn't make me jealous. This latest interaction explained it well.

Once she had shared her bit, it was normal for her to be curious about what I was up to in the last decade or so post our MBA. I told her where I was based and sent her my number asking her to add me on chat. Strangely she insisted I write to her about myself in detail first. She said she would chat with me later. I was a little amused. I'm not a prospective match. I'm an old friend trying to reconnect. Was it some sort of a check before extending a hand of friendship again?

Anyway careless that I'm, I ignored it. Instead I was in two minds if I should share with her the highlights or rather the 'low' lights of my life which unfortunately I've had many!!
But now that I've made peace with my past, I decided to briefly share with her whatever I had been through. Especially since I had shared it all recently with my hostel friends. And they were all non judgemental as they are one hell of a loving set of people. They were sad and some were even furious that I stayed away from everyone for so many years and suffered all of it alone. They were like what are we for? Only the good times?
I assumed I will get a similar reaction from this friend as well so I wasn't hesitent in sharing it with her. Plus I feel if we start a relationship with honesty, it builds trust even when sitting miles away.

We exchanged a few eager emails in a span of 3 days. As decided, I wrote briefly about myself this time, and that I'm happy that she's back at work and sent love for her littlies. But even before I sent this email I had a weird feeling that some thing is amiss. Not that I'd written anything wrong or inappropriate. But I'd a feeling this is headed nowhere.

 That is what happened. She read my last email and chose not to respond. I sent another email asking if all is well at her end but I didn't get any response to it either even after two months.

I was sad and shocked initially. And yes I was furious. I decided to write to her but then I realised it's not my duty to remind people to be empathetic or to be non judgemental but I felt it is pertinent that I do something about it so that people see this world with more compassion. For that first I had to have compassion for the ignorants.

A normal person with a normal happy life when suddenly hears something like this about an old friend is first shocked and surprised. Then relieved that nothing like this happened to themselves. And the third reaction is of either sympathy or of a certain degree of triumph, that now they're better of than that person. In the latter scenario, you look down at them, you don't hold as much respect for them in your hearts. For her it wasn't just respect, she chose not to interact at all. Someone who hasn't experienced it cannot understand pain. And the normal reaction is to look down at people. What is in your heart comes out in your words or actions someway or the other unknowingly. That's what happened in her case.

It gets me thinking what is a comfortable life worth if it disables empathy in your heart. What is a good fortune worth if you can't put yourself in a friend's shoes. Maybe that's why she wasn't popular. Anyway that's not why I'm writing this post. It is to find an answer to the question - why does it happen? Why do we lack compassion?

We don't know what lies in future for anyone. Who wants to suffer? Not you, not me, no one. But misfortune happens. And no matter what you do, you can't be future safe.
Things haven't fallen in place for anyone just like that or because they'd planned it that way but because God wanted it that way. It is all in God's hands. Good or bad. Being able to see God's hand in everything is humbling but that takes lot of wisdom. What was that wisdom that my friend lacked?

Let's begin by our physical being. Our body or our physical being is on a journey of its own in this world governed by the principles of Mother Nature. Did our body check with us before gaining height or weight? Does it check with adolescent boys before it changes their voice or grows beard? Or turns our hair grey? Does it check with us before getting infections? Or cancer? No! Because it is controlled by Nature. And this same Mother Nature has fitted a brain in each one of us. That is to fend for this body we live in.

With all these changes observe that your sense of Self doesn't change whether you were a child or a man. That sense of being remains constant, it doesn't increase or decrease with time nor does it change in any situation. It remains intact even after deep slumber or unconsciousness. Everyone has the same sense of self whether they are rich or poor, cultured or uncultured, intelligent or dull.
That Self or Soul is a tiny indivisible part of the God Almighty, the unborn eternal immortal supreme power. That Self or soul exists in every living being that you see around you which means God resides in each one of us.

But when we identify ourselves only with our physical being, we let only our mind drive our actions. And since the mind is the boss of this fragile perishable body, it has the sole purpose of prolonging the life of this body. Sadly the mind has it's limitations. You must've experienced how difficult it is to control our mind. Sometimes it is peaceful, sometimes it's agitated, sometimes desirous of sensual gratification, or ponderous about future, lamenting about past, sometimes worrying about the loved ones and at other times relaxed. It is because the mind is driven by the senses and the heart. Both are restless and desirous of newer ways of gratifications always. All that gives birth to desires greed anger pride and envy which have been rightly described as five thieves. Would you let these thieves write the story of your life? Or the calm and content soul, an atom of the omniscient, omnipotent God, the creator of all the worlds who shovers His causeless mercy and love equally on all of us? Your choice completely but try to avoid greed pride anger ego envy and make way for compassion, patience, humility, and love for all. You will be surprised to see the limitless capability you have to love everyone regardless of who they are. And if you can't do that then ask yourself this question - Animals also have souls and they also fend for themselves like we do! How are we any different? What are we doing in this human body? What is the purpose of our life on this earth, is it just to live a better comfortable life that the mind asks for? I will answer this question in a different post with a different case some other day. 

Humans cant be God

On a whatsapp group of old hostel friends, I once happened to express dislike for Amish Tripathi's Shiva Triology since he wrote that Shiva became a God and was previously a normal human being in flesh and blood. My comment kicked up such a storm that I recieved accussations from all directions.  One said you're too passionate about your point of view. Another one said, "I don't have issues humanising gods. We are all godly in some way... We just have to realise it. Humans only acheive greatness. Gods are not a different species... They are just spiritually evolved beings".
Yet another one said, "It's interesting how Amish gives a perspective to the journey from being human to being god for Shiva. Read it in this light, you will appreciate it better and will help you to understand that humans have infinite potential... It's all about the direction u focus it in." And the final blow came with "Don't we humanize Gods as our belief? Who or what God is, God only knows. We make paintings and idols and books and think that that's God and we believe so much in stories we tell ourselves, yet we don't appreciate someone else's story or God."

Having had become a couch potato lying in front of TV all day while nursing a broken bone, I'd lost touch with the exact words from the teachings of The Bhagwad Geeta to answer my friends as to why I don't endorse their logic or Amish's point of view. All I knew was I find it unbearable.

This actually left me a little bewildered that I'm finding it difficult to put my learnings from the Geeta into words. And the strange part is that for days I was praying to God to break this spell of engaging my senses all day in the name of getting rest. This was it.
I had to get my head in order. So I picked my Geeta again to get answers. There is such a magic in this translation of Geeta that every time I go to it, I find my answers within minutes.

And here they are to those posed to me.

In the Bhagwad Geeta Lord tries to help us see how the world around us is perishable. Everything from our bodies to the house we live in, to the nature around us, the sun and the stars above and this whole earth comes with an expiry date. But God is imperishable. God is timeless and endless. How can something which is mortal know the immortal, how can darkness know light? Our senses, our mind, our intellect, or our 'antehkaran'. These are all perishable. No matter what we do, these cannot help us define God. Lord answers this question by saying that you cannot know me fully but if you keep trying with all your senses, mind and intellect you will be able to experience my love with the help of the soul or the Self which resides in you.

But for that we have to know what this Self is. If you observe our sense of self remains constant all our life long. We say when I was a child, when I was a tennager or when I will die, or in my next birth etc. This means the 'I' remains constant whereas the body keeps changing with time. This is because the body is mortal whereas the self is immortal. When you experience The Self inside you, you will understand that our mind is a chatter box fitted to our body to extend the life of this body. That is why if we keep listening to the mind it will make us very selfish. The Self awakens our conscience and takes us in the right direction.
However this doesn't yet answer why I don't endorse Amish Tripathi's Shiva Triology or my friends' take on things.

Lord has all the answers and I'm no expert but crudely put He says if you analyse Me with your intellect, you will not get anywhere. Whereas if you read scriptures, do jap, yog, and satsang regularly without any desire for anything, I will reveal myself to you.

And whoever says Lord Shiva became a God is grossly wrong. Shiva resides in every speck of this world and the whole world exists because it gets energy from Him. Millions of universes thrive inside Him. How can a human being suddenly become the whole of our universe and beyond? How did the whole world exist before the so called Shiva the human being decided to become a God. Everyday a new star is discovered which is farther away than the previous ones. Who knows the limits of this universe, what to talk of others.

Now for the idols and paintings, it is an attempt not at defining God but an attempt to engage our restless mind and frivolous senses with God. There is no other purpose.


Well maybe The Shiva Triology has some answers but I've no inclination because the Geeta has answer to every question not just these.. Because as Lord says no matter which subject you pick, and no matter what depths of that subject you go in to, you will find only Me.

Then the question arises how can God be in everything which is perishable if He Himself is imperishable? This is because we exist because of God. God is not because of us. How can then every human being suddenly became a part of that one spiritually evolved human being called human Shiva? Yes the demi Gods are spiritually evolved beings but not the God almighty. They may have their journeys of evolution and one can use the label of 'species' for them but I would not risk it with them either. With my limited existence I'm no one to hold opinions or make efforts to discover God. To me I know that He loves me more than I will ever know. I may get lost in my sensory world, but He never forgets me even for a second. In this world or the other. Whatever time I have I must use it to praise Him and love Him back.
And it is pure bliss. If ever I've felt truly blissful in my life it is when I praise Him with my heart full of nothing but love

I will close this one with these beautiful lines by Swami Paramahansa Yogananda in Autobiography of a Yogi

"He is the sole Owner of the cosmos, He silently showers man with gifts from life to life. There is but one gift man may offer in return - his love, which he is empowered to withhold or bestow. In taking infinite pains to shroud with mystery His presence in the atoms of creation, the Creator could have had but one motive, one sensitive desire: that man seek Him only through his free will."

Love for Dummies

Love is one of the most important things we need to survive after maybe air, water, food and shelter in the same order. Although we get a major chunk of the love we need from a few people in our life but we need it in small quantities from lots of other people for emotional security and a healthy mind and each kind of love plays an important role in it. True love variety is the hardest to find. Why is it so?

This post is an effort to uncover the mystery behind this simple question. Everyone we know can vouch for being truly in love with at least one person in their life if not more yet most people don`t appreciate and understand the meaning of love. One has to be fortunate to be surrounded by people who know how to put this all important emotion in to practice. You've to see it and experience it first hand before you can practice it. Sometimes it flows from the depths of our hearts without us knowing or having any control over it. But usually we learn to love from our parents. Their definition of love becomes ours. Here`s an effort to define it and tricks to put it to work.

First of all love is selfless. Wherever one starts bringing one`s selfish motives into it, love loses its deep red color. Yet its important to balance. A parent may not be able to sleep at night if her child is unwell and restless. And the same parent may not be able to stay awake for nights together if needed. Its practically not possible and not even advisable. That is not being selfish, that`s balancing. But when parents want to control their adult children`s life so that they don`t lose importance in their child`s life, that love is selfish. Sorry but that is not love. If you have always truly loved your child, he or she will value your presence in their life and want you to be near them and they will make efforts to be there for you physically as well emotionally. If you think your adult child is drifting away from you emotionally, it means there is a drawback in your own love for him or her so that its not needed as badly any more. Don`t blame the child for behaving the way he does. You may blame the times, the new generation, the media influence.. But times have always been changing. Your time was different from your parents' time. The same applies to your children. Love is still the same, it has the same ethos and the same meaning.

Love is not about good times. Yes the obvious meaning is being there for each other in good times or bad. But love also means to be strict when the child is making wrong choices. This is done from the very beginning. The child shouldn't get away doing things which are principally wrong. This is important so that it creates a system where even when we grow old and our actions have bigger repercussions, we follow the right path. A simple example is when the child lies to you for the first time, you have to explain it to him lovingly but if he keeps repeating, the parent should get strict with him. And when he grows older if he lies, he feels guilty because he knows it is not right. If a mother slaps her grown up son for coming home drunk, he fully realises his mistake. If the mother ignores it the first time, the son will repeat it and it will become a habit slowly. Again balancing is important, trying to understand the reason behind the childs behaviour and working on the cause will not only make it easier for the child to fight the situation but it also strengthens your relationship with him.

Again love is not about good times only. If your child is doing well you are happy. If he is failing, you form opinion about him that he is like that only and dont make efforts to help him improve then you are most useless parent. This applies at any stage of his life, be it 4, 24 or 40 years. Good parents always strive to make their children better human beings better at everything. If you think now the child is older and he wont need you, and he wont listen to you, then you are wrong. And very wrong. God has made us human beings such that we need our parents always. Dont run away now that he or she is older and you think now is the time to only reap benefits of raising your kids. Love is a never ending process.
Partiality between children is poison for the whole family, your family will break down sooner or later. If one of your child is failing, it means he needs special attention. Its doesn't mean you favor the other child and disrespect the weaker child. Again it applies at any stage. We develop our sense of right and wrong with the help of our parents. If parents can't be just among their kids, the world can collapse for the child. You are sowing seeds of failures for your weaker child as well as the favored child.

Respect respect respect. Respect your spouse, respect your parents, respect your in laws, respect your relatives, respect yourself and respect your servants. Your child apes you. A part of loving your child is to become a role model for her. And the golden trick is to respect people in your mind as it will show up in your words and actions unknowingly.

Love is a never ending process. It starts when your child is born and ends when you die. You do bring your children into this world for your own happiness but they dont realize this. They come into this world for themselves. But you ought to live for them, strive to give them the right values, the right morals each day, every day and find time for it all regularly. You will fail, we all do, but its important to learn, change yourself and move on and never stop.

Love is a challenge. There will be times especially during the teenage when the child will rebel against your ideas and rules. Understand that with age, the challenges of love become more mental and emotional than physical as was when the child was younger. This changing age of the child means more efforts from the parent to understand his point of view and needs more warmth and care. Low points are there in any relationship. Holding on to your feelings of love for the person is important as they are under threat under such situations and can kill the relationship.

Love means giving freedom. I have sought examples of parent child relationship only till now as we all can relate to it but all of them apply to any relationship. This point applies better to a man and wife relationship. Giving freedom to your partner to be who he or she wants to be is essential. If you point out what you dont like about everything your wife wears, she will feel humiliated. If you are trying to control how your partner looks, talks, carries herself, eats, you are essentially customizing her to suit your idea of what is right. This is poison. You are either poisoning your relationship with her or you are giving slow poison to her. It will show up for sure. Love is when you love somebody for who they are, if you need to change a person, sorry that is not love. That is tailor making a partner of your choice. Yes again balancing is important. You want to see your wife wear what you bought for her, or you want to tell her how something doesnt make her look as attractive as she is, it is understandable. But if you control her wardrobe, I would suggest run away from it yourself if you cant change.
In a parent child relationship, allowing your child to pick a career of his choice is giving them the freedom. Guiding them is important as they are young but balancing is important. I know its easy to write balancing, but see for your self if your words and actions hurt the other person every time and are not bringing the kind of change you expect, then something is not right. Get up and rethink whats lacking in your understanding.

Love is universal. Love is being empathetic and sympathetic for everyone not just for your loved ones. If you only use this emotion for your loved ones, then its useless as it teaches them to only think about themselves, their comfort and their needs.

Love is a selfless, never ending process, where you keep working always to make the life of your loved ones better so they develop and grow into better individuals. This needs you to become a better person yourself everyday so that your words and efforts get validated by your own success in life as a mature grounded and stable individual. It doesnt cost anything to say a few kind words, but it takes a lifetime to get the results. Find at least one person whom you can love this way and you will do your bit for the humanity.