Life

Just watched the movie Assi . A very well-made movie. The movie is about the rape of a teacher who is raped by 5 men in a moving car while coming back from the Metro at night. The movie is all about the tough fight the victim's lawyer puts up in court. Apart from other things, the movie shows the dirty face of the institution called family . How people try to protect the victims of rape in the name of respect of family in society. How families carve out settlements for the girls who are raped by marrying them to the accused of rape. How the family of the rape victim tries to convince them not to fight the battle in the court, and tries to get a settlement done out of court. What have we done in the name of love? I fail to understand how the institution called family can be so divisive vis-à-vis the rest of humanity. There is no doubt that we have formed the institution called family so that a few people can take care of each other during tough times. If a family member falls ill, o...

Where does communication get lost? So many problems in this world arise due to a lack of communication. Relationships get spoiled because of misunderstandings. There may be times when semantics matter because different words carry different meanings across cultures. It may also be because a person may carry a wrong understanding of the meaning of a word and use it accordingly, while the other person may not be able to understand that "personal meaning" of the word. However, these are minor communication errors and can be easily corrected. The more serious problems in communication stem from inauthenticity and a lack of integrity . By inauthenticity, I mean a conflict between our conscious intentions and our unconscious drives. For example, a person may invite his boss to a family function, even though he does not like him. In this situation, he will welcome his boss when he arrives, but a "little voice" at the back of his mind will urge him to send the boss away q...

We often feel hurt. We feel that so-and-so person has caused us harm. He has deceived us or cheated us. There remains a lingering pain in our heart regarding some event where a friend did not support us in a bad time, children did something that we did not expect them to do, a trustworthy colleague revealed something that we told him in confidence, or there is a breach of commitment by somebody close to us. It's difficult to bear the pain. Especially if we continue to live with the person, the hurt is all the more difficult to bear because every time we see that person's face, we recall the incident and feel hurt again and again. So far so good. Going by the same logic, Lord Ram should feel hurt by Mata Kaikeyi every day he spends in the forest. He should feel hurt when Mata Sita is kidnapped by Ravana , and he has to go through the entire rigmarole of searching for Sita and attacking Lanka. It means every minute of his Vanvaas of 14 years, he should feel hurt. Had that been...

 Do we see widespread violence in the name of love ? People say that they love, but actually, they want to possess. Parents want to raise their children to earn a medal for having brought them up well. If children deviate from the path that their parents have carved out for them, parents feel threatened. If the children do not marry within the caste or religion that their parents want them to marry, they feel threatened. Parents will do all this violence in the name of the welfare of their children.  Different types of violence exist in different relations. Once you get married, the centre of existence has to shift to family. Your aspirations and ambitions do not matter. While an industrialist toils day and night, his family often complains that he has no time to take them on vacations or spend time with them. I have experienced this phenomenon firsthand while meeting some of these families during raids conducted by my Department. All the people who have excelled in any field ...

 If two individuals have different loci, can they ever form a good companionship ? What if one feels that the locus of life is entertainment and fun, while the other feels that the locus of life is the welfare of the family? One feels that locus is excellence, while the other feels that locus is getting good marks. One feels that locus is achieving the target, while the other feels that locus is following the rules. One feels that the locus is wealth, while the other feels it is social service. One feels that locus is spiritual evolution , while the other feels that locus is materialistic development .  The conflict will be visible in almost every conversation and every decision. It is because we are the sum total of our thought processes . Our thought process reflects our understanding of life. I found the following video of Dr Alok Pandey from Sri Aurobindo Ashram to be quite interesting: https://youtu.be/UtF4OLUptWE?si=Qax7lhKqwU7nnuHf All of us have quite different view...

I don’t know why life has become so busy. Everybody is running around, as if trying to achieve something great the whole day long, yet feeling depleted and dissatisfied at the end of the day. Organisations have become mad places to work. Almost everybody is busy pursuing multiple targets at the same time, without knowing whether any of them are relevant to the organisation's growth. People want to become the kings of social media with millions of likes and followers, without ever contemplating the true value of these likes. People want to have thousands of friends on Facebook without ever realising what friendship really means. People just want to attend one party after another, without ever thinking that the happiness of attending the last party did not last even 24 hours. Why have we become so mindless? Probably because this is a significant difference between the word "Pre 2000" and today’s world, which is full of electronic devices, like mobile laptops, Video games, ...

It is difficult to appreciate something we have not experienced. For example, it is difficult for a layperson to appreciate the hard work an astronaut puts in, especially when they have no idea of the processes the astronaut must undergo before entering outer space. It will be difficult for us to appreciate the dedication and hard work of the scientists who carry out research to unravel the secrets of nature. It will be difficult for us to appreciate what Buddha must have gone through while being in the forest searching for the truth. There would always be a few individuals in society who would continue to strive to excel beyond the norm. On the other hand, the narrative of the society will always be set by the average intelligence. Therefore, it will be almost impossible for the masses to understand these outliers. They will always be considered weird or strange. This weirdness will be a generally accepted attribute of the outliers. However, it is also true that whenever society prog...

 Something struck me suddenly while having a discussion. So much pomp and show, and so much expenditure, people make in their ceremonies. For what? You ask them, after they have attended the functions, whether they are happy and how long they will remain so. If somebody dared to tell the truth, the reality would be that it was just a momentary joy. Even while coming back from the ceremony, the joy would have already faded away. In fact, for most people, it was never a joy with their hearts filled with feelings of comparison and jealousy. Still, people spend crores of rupees on these functions. Isn't it such an expensive way to get the pleasure. Each family that participates in these functions and ceremonies spends thousands of rupees, sometimes even lakhs. Lakhs of rupees spent for such a momentary joy. In fact, people save money for years, dreaming of organising these functions for their children's weddings. Years of savings spent for a few moments of joy. On the other hand, p...

Looking at the pigeon sitting on the balcony, a thought just struck my mind. It is free to fly, while human beings can't fly. Does that make human beings lesser mortals? No, we have so many different things, such as the brain, which we have created so many wonders on this earth. In fact, using the brain we have designed aeroplanes using which we can also experience flying in space. Does that mean the pigeon is a lesser mortal? No, it lives life to the fullest.  Where is the need for comparison? There are 12 houses in astrology , and when we examine the horoscopes of different individuals, everybody has some strong and some weak planets. Everyone has certain aspects of life represented by specific houses: some they have a natural strength in, and others they are bound to face challenges in. That's what makes every human being unique. Somebody will have a very strong house of Lagna and will therefore be generally healthy and decisive, while others may have affliction in the 2nd...

I don't think that there is even an iota of doubt in the mind of anybody that we know very little. We neither know about the quantum world nor about the cosmos . Our understanding of ourselves is also very limited. We still do not know the seat of consciousness in the human brain . Still, almost all of us are so sure of ourselves. We have very well-defined likes and dislikes. We are quite sure of what we want to do in our lives. Even children as young as 10-12 years have decided to take the IIT-JEE and NEET and enrol in coaching institutes. We are so sure that the acquisition of a piece of land on this planet Earth is the purpose of our lives. Nowadays, it is not even a piece of land; it is just one apartment, with no rights to the land beneath it or the sky above it. That one piece of land on the planet Earth, which is itself hanging in space and rotating around the Sun at an amazing speed. I was just reading an article in the Hindu today that says that if we travel at a constan...

I really don't know what we mean by liberty and freedom . Would a street dog like to go with a rich man to become a pet? What is more important for the dog? Material well-being or the freedom of movement? I don't know. A stray dog may not like to become a pet. Similarly, a pet may also not like to become a stray dog because it has become used to the comforts of life. He has become more disconnected from the freedom of the streets, and that's why the street's risks and vulnerabilities may be too great for the pet. Man has also got used to the comforts. The luxuries of the flats and the safety of society. Why would he dare to stay alone? That's too dangerous and risky. Who would take care of Buddha in the forest? An animal may kill him, an insect may bite, or he may not get food. He may not even get a clean toilet to use. There is no certainty of safe drinking water. He may not have any place to stay, and under the sky, he may fall ill with no one to take care of him...

 Yesterday, I had a very profound discussion with a few close friends. My friend, who is a practising doctor and spiritual practitioner, told me something that made me think. She said that a person does not die till she surrenders to death. The body will keep fighting till that time. That made me think a lot. When we encounter new unforeseen situations in our lives, why do we become so sad? Because the ego wants to maintain the status quo at any cost.  When we get cheated in a relationship, our plot of land is captured by somebody, a close relative suffers some diseases, we get a tough boss who fails to recognise the hard work put in by us, there is a road rage and somebody unreasonably argues with us, somebody takes away credit for the hard work done by us, our children do not listen to our advice, we are not able to buy the flat we have aimed for many years, and there are many more instances that make us sad. We do not want to face these situations and try our level best to...

Today, I had a profound discussion with a friend.  When we talk of change, what is it that is changing? When we say "I want to change", how can I change myself? If I am some total of my thoughts, is it that part of me is trying to change the other part? How will the first part be sure that the other part is wrong and needs to be changed? It may, on the other hand, be the other way around. The reality may be that the first part is wrong and the second is right. Thus, whenever there is an urge to change, the first question that should come to our mind is who wants to change whom? If a part of the mind is trying to change the other part, I am not very sure whether there is a willingness to change or if it is just a trick of the ego . The ego may be trying to gain social approval , become more acceptable to others, or make oneself more comfortable. On the other hand, the drive to change may also emanate from very different sources. It may come from a witness state where I am dif...

Are we competent to love? It seems a very strange statement in the first instance. Do we need any competence to love? Love seems so natural. But the strange thing is that most of us do not love even ourselves. Do we? What do we love? Our self-image, our beliefs, body, and ambitions. "I" am good, and the others should appreciate me for being good. "I" believe in a particular thought or religion, and consider myself to be a sum-total of these thoughts and beliefs. "I" and my body, and therefore want to protect the body and become anxious whenever there is a threat to the body or a disease that does not get cured. "I" also become happy when this body feels instinctive pleasure, such as after eating tasty food, doing shopping, travelling to a place "I" like. "I" am my ambitions and work hard to achieve my targets. What is love, on the other hand? Love is a complete merger. When there is no difference between "I" and ...