Life

It's quite interesting to go a little deeper into our thoughts and intentions to understand "where are we coming from". When we have sympathy with a beggar and give him a note of ten rupees, where are we coming from? Do we feel "guilty" after seeing that beggar? We are having money while so many are dying of hunger, and just want to get rid of that guilt by paying that note to him? Or we have a deep desire for recognition as a "good human being," and we donate to get that recognition in the eyes of the people with us. Or are we deprived of the "respect" and when we give that ten-rupee note to the beggar, do we get that "reward" in the eyes of that beggar? If he refuses to take, and we can watch our reactions, that will reveal the truth about ourselves. Often, that does not happen in our lives, and we live under an illusion of being compassionate. Even if there are one or more such instances, we conveniently ignore them because knowi...

People like Kabira and Buddha will try to give till their last breath to society, while there are many billionaires who can do anything for money. We have people like Dadhichi who will give his bones to Indra for saving the world. On the other hand, there are people like Hitler who can kill millions of people just because of their madness. People like Bhagat Singh will give their lives for love and freedom, while on the other hand, some people will throw acids on the girls, they are not able to grab. Where does this grabbing mentality come from? From deep insecurities within? Yes. But why would these billionaires feel insecure? Why would Hitler feel insecure? Because they never contemplated the meaning of life, and made a winning formula to handle their insecurities. Winning formula in the form of money, power, or a relationship. However, as we are well aware, everything in this world is fleeting. The more people accumulate, the more they become aware that all their possessions are fra...

There was an advertisement, "Ye Dil Mange More," wherein the hero has an insatiable desire for the cold drink. Of course, the company wants to promote its product by superimposing the image of the hero on its product. But whenever I get to meet the entitled people who have almost everything in life and see their insatiable thirst for more and more, I do remember the advertisement. I often get surprised to see their lack of gratitude for what they have and their immense capacity to crib.  What happens when a king attacks the weaker kingdoms to expand the boundaries of his kingdom? He feels entitled to have more. He feels that it is his right to do so. Duryodhana did not want to give even five villages to the Pandavas. Ravana kidnapped Sita. Bali took away all the rights of Sugriva and threw him out of the kingdom. Kaikeyi not only snatched the crown from Rama but also threw him out. I feel that the worst thing that can happen to a human being is that they get something that th...

We all have unique experiences in life. The country in which we are born and brought up, the culture, society, parents, friends, relatives, and, on top of it all, our own life journey, make us what we are. Change any of these factors, and we will be different. Suppose a child is born in China rather than India, he will be different. If we were born into a different family, we would be quite different. Thus, our thought process and our personality are just a product of all these factors.  We identify so strongly with our personality and thought process that we don't take time to judge others without realizing that the mind that is sitting in the "seat of judgement" is also a product of its circumstances. I was born and brought up in a family of vegetarians and used to judge the people taking non-vegetarian food till I reached NADT, where I found people from all the regions and religions, and when I mingled with them, I realized that food habits are largely dependent upon r...

Man is a child of his destiny. Nothing is in our hands. We just live our destiny. We hear all these words and often get confused about whether everything is predetermined and why we work so hard. We should leave everything to fate, sit back, and relax. Yet people make choices almost every moment. Do we use our faith in fate as a tool to calm down our minds? There is no doubt that it has utility, but I am not sure whether it is supported by reality. If everything is destined, that means the entire theory of evolution is wrong. I have studied Astrology and carried out quite extensive research on almost all the division charts of at least a few hundred known people. My understanding is that the 9 planets in Astrology represent the 9 forces of nature. Astrological prediction is like weather prediction by the meteorological department. The horoscope of a person can tell how these 9 forces will be acting inside. Based on that, certain probabilities may be computed. For example, if the Lagna ...

Why is it so rare to be aware? Why is it so difficult to find somebody like Buddha, who was born in a palace and yet made a decision to leave the comforts of the palace? Comforts make us feel good. When it is scorching heat outside, the cool air of the AC makes us happy. Why would somebody leave the comfort of a lavish home and go to the forest where even food is not assured? The forest is full of dangerous animals and is quite unhygienic.  Probably this is because we have never examined the meaning of comforts. You make a sportsman sit in the AC for a week, and he will be almost mad to go back to the ground. Why? Does he dislike comfort? No, he also likes comfort, but he likes something more than that. He likes the sport he plays more than those comforts. That's why he becomes desperate after a few days to return to the field. All of us like toys when we are young. We fight with our friends over those toys. But as we grow, we lose interest in those toys.  When our awareness o...

What is the responsibility of parents towards their kids? What is the responsibility of a husband towards his wife? What is the responsibility of a wife towards her husband? We keep discussing these things in society. Most people glorify the concept of "responsibility towards family" to hide their inner hollowness. Did Buddha not carry out his responsibilities towards his family? Was Rama running away from his responsibility towards his wife when he decided to go to the forest to respect the words of his father? Did Rama not fulfil his responsibility towards Lava and Kusha?  I feel that the first and foremost responsibility of any and every human being is to understand the meaning of life. It is because if we do not understand the meaning of life, we will live life within a limited frame and will not be able to utilize the full potential of our body and mind. Not only this, but we will also end up passing on that faulty understanding to the children, and they will also live a...

We all keep passing through different moods. We feel excited when we get what we desire, miss someone when we are unable to share our thoughts with them, experience grief when we lose someone very close to us, and feel proud when someone close to us receives an award. Feelings are very powerful. They may motivate or demotivate us. Feelings are not permanent. They change quite fast. Even the gravest of moods may change when we share our feelings with a close friend who can understand our feelings. Then why don't we share? All of us have so many relatives. Children have their parents, siblings, and friends. Adults have their spouse, colleagues, and friends. Then where is the problem? Why don't we share? Why are there so many psychological diseases among adults as well as children?  Sharing has two prerequisites. First, a person should be willing to share. Second, the other person should be open to listening. Both of them have their own share of problems. All of us are literally o...

Many people refuse to grow beyond their frame. We meet them after several years, and they will utter a sentence, and you will understand where it comes from. First, this society makes us insecure, then we try to cope with that insecurity and make our winning formula to come out of insecurity. We work hard to develop an identity of a "successful" businessman, "topper" student, "powerful" bureaucrat, "caring" husband, "dedicated" wife, "faithful" employee, "pious" person, or an "intelligent" person. We enjoy these "masks" till we are comfortable. The more we hide behind these masks and the more we disconnect from our real face. In fact, when some day the mask is off, we can not recognise our own face. There would be a demonstration of "out of the world" love in almost every marriage. The same relationship turns into an ugly battlefield in the court of law shortly. Where has that "love...

What do awards and rewards mean to us as a society? Jesus was crucified by society. There were many attempts to defame Buddha. Krishna was called Ranchod and Chaliya. There was an allegation about the character of even Sita. Mira was forced to drink poison, and Socrates was killed by being forced to drink poison.  When society recognises "good work", I feel what is quite important to understand is whether that "good work" is playing to the gallery or actually doing something that will benefit society in the long run. For example, a child suffering from pus in his leg is unable to walk and is taken to the doctor by his parents. The child cries in anticipation of the pain due to the surgery by the doctor. He wants to run away from the place. The first doctor holds him tight and carries out the surgery, and the child cries and curses the doctor. The second doctor is very emotional. He cries with the child and sympathises with him. He does not operate on the leg and all...

Today, I realized something quite significant. We feel bad when we don't get justice. We are either exploited or we don't receive our due share of credit. However, we feel worse when we receive credit that others deserve equally or more. Something within us does not feel good. It feels guilty of not raising a voice.  All feelings have a center of origin. For example, the feeling of pride. One will have pride in something if he identifies with that strongly. For example, a mother will take pride in the success of her son because she values that parameter of success and also loves her son. If she does not value that parameter, she will not be proud. For example, son may become the biggest don of the city, and if mother is conscientious, she will not take pride in that achievement of her son. Similarly, even if her son gets elevated to the highest position, she will not take pride if she does not love her son. Again, it depends upon our awareness of the frame. For many, recognitio...

The sense of "I" is so central to our existence. We make choices and set targets based on what "I" like. What is this "I"? If I were born in China instead of India, would this "I" be the same? If I were born in a different family, would this "I" be the same? We don't have the right to choose our parents, or perhaps we do, but we are not aware of it. Someone enters the game of chess with an elephant, a horse, a camel, and a queen, while the other person enters the game with just one soldier. What choices do they have? Whatever the first player does, he will win the game, and whatever the second player does, he will lose the game. But, what if the purpose of life is not to win the game of chess, but rather to develop a new game? Then what we have at the beginning of the game does not matter? All these things are just meaningless. The greatest of the people in this world discovered that new game they wanted to play. We know the story o...

The human mind has a typical problem. The belief system is quite hardwired. The belief system takes over the sense of self, which is why it's quite difficult to challenge one's belief system, especially if it's not done at an early stage of life. When we discard our beliefs, we are uncertain about life. A vessel full of beliefs has no space to receive anything. But an empty vessel may receive anything. That's why that emptiness without awareness is quite dangerous. Awareness of what? In that domain, everything is unknown. We are not sure. We may easily mistake hallucination to be some real spiritual experience, and that's what happens to many people who move along the path. That's why the role of the Guru is quite emphasized. However, Gurus come with their own set of risks, and often Gurus manipulate more than provide the right guidance. Most popular Gurus have commercial interests, and that's why it is difficult to get the true guidance there. That's wh...

I watched the movie Sparsh. A wonderful movie with very appreciable acting skills of Nasiruddin Shah and Shabana Azmi. Nasiruddin Shah plays a blind man who is the principal of a blind school, and Shabana Azmi plays the role of a widow. She starts doing the volunteer work at the blind school, and in the process comes close to the principal. The principal develops an inferiority complex and breaks off engagement. The widow also has a complex that how she can justify her second engagement and therefore tries to give their relationship a color of helping the cause and serving society. There is a lot of food for thought in the movie. We can mirror our own justifications and complexes by watching the characters on the screen. One of the most prominent phenomena responsible for the spoiled relationships is an inferiority complex. An inferiority complex gets formed when we feel inferior to somebody and don't do anything about that. There are two major components of the inferiority complex...

Watched the movie "Don't Look Up" on Netflix. The storyline of the movie is quite interesting. Two scientists discover that a comet is going to hit the Earth, and the comet is big enough to make life extinct on Earth. When they go to meet the US President, initially she does not take the news seriously, and the two scientists approach the media, and they are trolled by people for being fussy about some possibility. Slowly, the Government realizes the seriousness of the event and, to take political mileage, sends a mission to destroy the asteroid. The mission is called off because one industrialist convinces the government to make huge gains out of the minerals available on the meteor. He develops a mission to send some rockets to the meteor and break it into pieces so that those pieces can reach the Earth, and those minerals may be exploited commercially. This is a story about the reaction of people in extreme circumstances. It reminds me of our tryst with death. Every da...

Yesterday I watched the movie "Masoon" directed by Shekhar Kapoor. What a wonderful film, and I was surprised to see the maturity of Indian cinema in the 1970s. The character of DK played by Nasiruddin Shah has a happy family with two daughters, with the Character of Indu played by Shabana Azmi as his wife, and with two little daughters. Everything goes well until he gets to know about his son Rahul from a relationship that he had when he visited Nainital. The mother of the child died, and now he has to take care of his son. When his son comes home, his wife goes through a very tough time. She rejects Rahul and constantly insults and one fine day, the son finds out about his father and gets broken inside. What pinches him especially is that his father is not able to accept him socially. One scene that especially moved me was when he said sorry to Shabana Aajmi.  https://youtube.com/clip/Ugkx21N2o-4Kts29ExXS-f-U4SPv7whv3E4B?si=UjMzi7Xie3UCh6Zs Why does that young kid have to s...

I watched the latest season of the series "Panchayat" today. There were many issues worth discussing. But I was really impressed with the direction of that scene wherein the supporters of Kranti Devi and Manju Devi cross each other, and there is some tussle. At that time, Kranti Devi alleges the wife of Vikas to be in a relationship with Prahlad. The wife of Vikas gets quite disturbed and cries and lot, and similarly, Prahlad also gets quite disturbed. I just wish to discuss two aspects. What makes people do this type of small talk, and why do the people being talked about get disturbed? https://youtube.com/shorts/ezTTM2hiiJA?si=Qa-HnjUb40Ai8bhh In fact, this phenomenon has far wider ramifications. All of us have childhood memories of being talked about. That's why we do not dare to follow our hearts. That's why students end up choosing career options that they are not passionate about. That's why people compromise with the choice of their marriage partner to suit...

Suppose this universe represents the human mind; there are around 200 billion galaxies, and each galaxy contains 100s of billions of stars. Let us assume that each galaxy represents a human being. Each human being is different. Each galaxy has billions of stars and planets representing diverse thoughts. We are constantly jumping across the planets. One thought to the other is what we do throughout the day. One worry to another. What will happen to my kids? Today is their exam. How will they perform? What about my medical tests? Appointments with the doctor, installation of the LIC, electricity bill, shopping list, work at the office, news of an incident, social gatherings, and so on. We are all the times busy jumping from one thought to another. While we are busy with one thought, our entire existence gets limited to that. We get worried about the future, develop performance anxiety, and become restless. The more we become anxious and the more tightly we hold on to that thought. We los...

Human life is not bondage to any relationship, be it whatever relationship. Parents invest a lot of time and energy in bringing up their kids. Naturally, they have concerns for their kids. Whenever they feel that a certain course of action or certain decisions may be harmful to their kids, they advise them. But that does not mean that if the parents fail to grow, the children will not also grow. Children may soon outgrow their parents, and then take their own decisions, some of which may not be acceptable to the parents. In fact, any sort of parents would encourage their kids to live their lives. Parenting is not an investment in kids that they have to repay with interest in the old age of the parents. Parents are the choice made by the parents out of their sweet wish, and once that choice is exercised, the parents take care of the children until they become independent. And that's why it is the duty of the parents to help their children grow independent quickly.  Coming to the rel...

Childhood conditioning is quite deep-rooted. A boy is born into a family where everyday expenses are a struggle, and he looks at his father and mother working tirelessly to support his education. He feels helpless for several years and then sets a target to take care of the family by getting a good degree. Even that degree does not help, and he realizes that society does not give due respect to the parents, and toils day and night to get a position of power. He is coming from a highly exploitative society and has been a victim of exploitation. He has made his position a winning formula. His entire identity is built around those achievements. If these achievements are taken away from him, he would be the same helpless child again. Would such a child ever be able to drop his identification with these achievements and positions? If not, would he be able to understand the nature of reality? Another boy comes from a broken family. He has not experienced that bonding in the family. Nobody ca...

What is dropping or detachment? Is it about running away from something? Would detachment from the material world mean escaping from it? Probably, we need to look a little deeper. Every thought has two layers: one that we are consciously aware of, and another that remains unconscious. For example, our attachment to family may be driven by our childhood conditioning that over-glorifies the concept of responsibility. While on the surface, we may think we love our family. Similarly, suppose we want to run away from our family. In that case, it might be due to ambitions related to our careers, unwillingness to take on responsibilities, or a desire to enjoy life freely. While on the surface, we might believe that we have become spiritual and are dropping the family due to Vairagya. We need to scrutinize the underlying movement. We are often not conscious of the movements within the unconscious. The problem with analysis is that since it is our own mind that is doing the analysis, it is ofte...

Our efforts may be motivated by three different factors: fear, greed, or love. For example, a student may study for the fear of failure, the desire for achievement, or the love of knowledge. We may make efforts in a relationship for the fear of losing the security provided by that relationship, or for the sake of enjoying some pleasure from it, or for the sake of love. We may make efforts at the office due to the fear of losing our jobs, to get a promotion, or for the love of the work at hand. When the underlying motivation is fear, there is a secretion of adrenaline in the body. When we are afraid, our body has to be ready to fight or flee. The secretion of adrenaline, at the command of our unconscious mind, makes our bodies ready for the response. The problem is that in most situations, our conscious mind perceives the situation differently, calculates, and gives a command not to react. We feel stressed due to opposite commands from the conscious and the unconscious minds. We neither...

A pig appears to be happy while lying down idly in the mud. A tiger looks happy when it is out hunting for an animal. We see many people happy in their laziness. They are using a very small percentage of their capabilities and appear to be quite happy with their lives, like pigs. On the other hand, there are many whose life is like a race, and who are always on a hunting drive like a tiger. They also appear to be quite happy. The pig is happy in the "past". It has learned the habit of lying down idly in the mud from its society, and that's why it feels happy when it lies down idly. We also feel happy when we get the food of our taste, when we feel secure, comfortable, and there is no threat. The tiger is happy for the "future" of getting the tasty meal. Achievements, prizes, awards, results, etc, make people happy. That's why they work hard for that "future". The happiness of pigs will disappear the moment they are thrown out of their comfort zone,...

This world is full of temptations. It's like a huge shopping complex. When one enters that complex, he ends up buying something or the other, whether he actually needs that or not. Even if one does not purchase anything, one ends up spending time window-shopping. Sometimes we are busy running the race in this world for the temptation of coming first, and sometimes, the fear of losing the race. There is hardly ever time to reflect on and understand the real purpose of life. Temptations take over, and exploration gets relegated to the background to slowly disappear from our attention. That's why the inner journey is lonely. Not many are interested in the journey, and whoever moves on the path has to be ready to walk alone. People have their own priorities. It is equally true that a person's continued need for external support or validation of their path suggests their inner connection with love and compassion has not yet grown strong enough to guide them alone. That's why...

Watched Metro in Dino. A wonderful movie made by the director, and wonderful acting by all the characters. The movie revolves around relationships in metropolitan cities. The movie tries to give a voice to the silent suppression of freedom in marriages. Does marriage mean that the boy and girl will never be free again, and whatever they do, need to be centered around the family? Why should a wife be denied the right to join a college reunion? Why does a girl need to compromise with her career to stay together? The doubts in the minds of the kids as to whether they are straight or not. The trust of the husband and wife in each other. The movie raises a number of issues, and I believe that parents have to guide their kids so that the kids are not confused in a relationship. The relationships are not prisons. I feel that it is high time that we tell our kids that sacrifice and compromise in the name of marriage will not keep them happy. The facade of a perfect marriage does not take us an...

 Just watched a wonderful movie, "Aap Jaisa Koi" on Netflix. It's a wonderfully directed movie. I would say that the primary theme of the movie is "judgment by society". The hero of the movie judges her beloved for being on an online chatting platform. His brother judges his wife for being in a relationship with another man. A father judges his daughter for not taking an interest in the kitchen. There is constant judgment in society in all relationships. Where is the scope for love amongst all these judgments?  Why do we judge others? Because we are so sure of our belief systems. And why are we so sure of our belief systems? Because we have closed our minds. We do not want to listen to anything new. We don't want to observe anything that contradicts our thought process. That's why we are so rigid. We form a small community of human beings that endorses the same belief system and rejects any new thought process. Anybody who forms part of that community wi...