just this one thought...

New Year 2013!

Dear Readers and Friends,

Wish you a very happy NEW YEAR 2013! There are times in life when we must contemplate but there are moments when we must celebrate too. Celebration is one way to wake our selves from sleep, examine our thoughts and processes, make necessary course corrections and carry on with new vigour towards a more contented life!

Some one asked me the other day whether it is important to be happy or to be content. Interesting question. To be happy implies that we have got what we want and perhaps have received more than what we aimed for. To be content implies that we have found that what we have been looking for actually has always been in us and this realisation sends a warm exilaration through our selves.

Now to be happy or content is the way we look at life. The sum total of our experiences and perceptions will dictate which way we will look. Both are needed in their own right, let me assure you. Some times we must seek and get happiness (in small things) but for the most part we must seek to be content.

Contentment is not compromise. Contentment is being. It is to be what we are and to accept it without conditions and pretences.

If  you ask me, for the time being I am content to share this thought with you. Should any of you decide to contemplate and in the process be happy to have contemplated, well, that is a matter for me to be happy too!  

Festival of Lights!

Deepavali aka Diwali, the Indian festival of lights is today.

Lore says that Lord Krishna slayed Naraka Asur on this day. The Asur's mother, hearing her son's fate was overwhelmed with sorrow and ran into the battlefield in a state of despair and tremendous wail. Krishna's heart melt at her plight and He told her that while her son met with his fate that he deserved, she may ask of any boon to soothe her soul. The mother asked that wicked as her son may be,now that the darkness of his sins are over,let there be lights in remebrance of him. Thus began the tradition of lighting lamps that symbolize the end of darkness and the beginning of light and hope in our hearts of the good things that light represents.

There is yet another story that Lord Ram returned to Ayodhya on this day and the citizens welcomed him with lights to celebrate his victory over Ravan, the greatest of all Asur kings!

Either way, today represents the day when darkness will be slayed by light and a new beginning will be made.

Asathoma sath gamaya (from the untruth, lead me to the truth)
Thamasoma jyothir gamaya (from darkness, lead me to the light)
Mrithyoma amritham gamaya (from death, lead me to eternal life)
Om shanthi shanthi shanthi! (let there be peace, peace and peace!)

What we need to understand is that light is the other side of darkness and life the other side of death. They can not exist in isolation and if the positive has to triumph, the negative must exist. So do not despise the negative. Just control it so that the positive shines. Enjoy life responsibly, love others and if you must face unhappiness, look to the other side.

There is Deepavali everyday. We just have to stop, appreciate and indulge!

Happy Deepavali!!


 

Celebrate your being!

Long time ago, a professor of English Literature said that not withstanding the achievements and the consequent laurels that we may receive in life, if we learn to enjoy small things in life, we would be happy. It was on the occasion of our graduation in the college. As is with every other young man graduating from college anywhere in the world, our eyes were full of hope and hearts were full of dreams. Someone wanted to be an engineer; someone a chartered accountant; someone else a lawyer and yet another, an army officer or an IAS. Dreams, hopes and tons of anxiety too. We all wanted to succeed and have hoards of money in the bank; a Fiat at least if not a Mercedes; since miss worlds were relatively unknown, a wife like the heroines of the movies of our time; and a palatial bungalow to live in! Small things in life? Come on professor, how can we live our dreams if we are content with small things? Big, bigger and the biggest, if you do not mind, please.

The professor laughed and we thought he was being funny. He went on to tell us that one thing which he thoroughly enjoys – every Sunday, early in the morning, his wife gets up and after completing her bath prepares a simple breakfast. [Those of us from traditional families in Tamil Nadu know that taking a head bath (an indianised word for shampooing your hair!) means using herbal powders to rub your scalp and hair clean and then drying it with the smoke from ‘sambrani’ powder put in a coal brazier. As is customary, filter coffee (aahhh! the very word is soothing to the soul of Tamilians!!) is then prepared along with the traditional breakfast of idlies, coconut chutney and the quintessential sambar] Oh, sorry, I got lost. Let me get back to the professor!

With a tray containing idlies that are as soft and white as jasmine flowers, sambar with small onions and the heady aromatic filter coffee, the lady goes to wake up the professor. In his own words, even as she opens the door of the bedroom, unable to resist the drool, he jumps out of the bed, brushes in a jiffy and dives into the bowl of sambar! He then goes ahead putting the soft idlies into the bowl of sambar and drinks it like as though there was no tomorrow. The filter coffee can no longer be resisted then. He even wipes the tip of the glass clean with his tongue, burps happily like a new born, pecks a kiss at his wife’s cheek and then…..curls up and goes back to sleep in a state of bliss. Tenderly his wife pats him on his cheek, pulls the cover over him and leaves the bedroom, letting him snore!

The professor, with an impish but sincere smile, told us that he actually lives the six days of the week only for the Sunday morning. Every thing else in his life revolves around his Sunday and his loving wife ensures that he has it that way!!

He then asked everyone of us to talk about something in our life that we actually enjoyed doing. After hearing his story we ended up wondering whether we actually thought of ‘enjoying’ life. Yeah, even after thirty years of this event, I wonder whether I have understood what the professor actually meant. I have remembered and recounted this incident to a variety of people – my sons, wife, friends, students and some casual listeners. Everyone liked the story but I do not know if the meaning ever struck them. I do hope so.

It is easy to say that enjoying today is more important than living for tomorrow. What if I do not have a house? What if I have no money in my old age? What if my neighbours think poor of me because I have not educated my children in Yale or Oxford? What happens to my honor when my neighbor drives around in a BMW and I eke it out on a Maruti Alto? What happens when I do not retire with a million dollars in my savings? What happens?

Actually nothing. Nothing happens.

We may have everything and yet unable to enjoy a moment of unrestrained peace. Wonder what ‘unrestrained’ peace is? Take for example that you are on a holiday at Phuket. Good hotel, food, beach, your wife at her romantic best and then your mind is stuck on the one deal that you need to make another million dollars. Hope you know how the holiday would pass? That is what I mean by ‘unrestrained’ peace.

Let us live for those small moments that actually fill our life with joy. Whether it be with family or with friends; whether it is prayer or manual labor; whether it is to give or to receive, let us find that which makes us vibe with the Universal Self for it is the embodiment of all joy, the source of bliss!

                              LIVE LIFE. CELEBRATE YOUR BEING!    

Love me if you can...

What do you do when you want to say something?

Just say it!

Pretty simple it sounds but not quite so. Saying things that affect no one like “I am hungry”, “I will go home”, “I am tired”, “can I sleep” are simple and you will say them a thousand times without batting an eyelid. Try saying “I hate you” and you will realize how difficult it is to hate a person. Funny it may sound, but try saying “I love you” and you will find your conscience asking ‘do you, really?’

Petty differences arise everyday with people we live and work with everyday. It is so very difficult to agree with everyone at all times and then there are moments when you have to say NO not only to an idea but to some person also. You may even think that it is not possible to accept the idea or the person ever again. Stop for a while in such situations before declaring ‘universal hatred’. Think whether you also may be seen in the same light by that person and ‘hated’ so. Do you really hate that person or just his ideas?

I was going through Jalaludin Mohammed Rumi’s Masnavi and Fihi ma Fihi. Rumi incidentally is accepted universally as the founder-philosopher-saint of the school of Islamic thought that we know as Sufism. He asks if a saint who is immersed in God slaps another person, is it the saint or God who has slapped the person? The most common repertoire would be to say that if he is a real saint, first of all he would not slap. Secondly, why are we dragging an invisible God into the acts of a human? It is the saint and he must repent his action.

Think again. If he is a saint and has renounced his worldly likes and dislikes for the love of God, there is no reason to suspect that he would slap a person for something as silly as personal dislike. Secondly, if someone ventures and manages to tread over the virtuous to an extent that even he would give a slap, then our man deserves the slap and it is indeed the and of God that gave him the slap. The faithful and sincere devotee is actually a manifestation of God and His love for fellow humans. Hate and mischief towards such a soul is actually mischief towards one’s own self. Hatred therefore is mischief manifesting itself towards own self. It is difficult to hate your own self. That is why it is very difficult to hate (in real terms) some one else too.

Well the question then is, why is it also difficult to say ‘I love you’ so easily?

How many of us actually ‘love’ someone or something? Will we do beyond the call of every compulsion, fear or temptation what the ‘love’ actually demands of us? Will we sacrifice everything that we have, including our honor and wealth, for what we love? Will we simply surrender ourselves to that which we love? If the unconditional answer is ‘yes’, perhaps we could say that we love that person or thing. If not, then perhaps what we have towards the person is a strong ‘like’ or ‘desire’ which are matters of emotion. Love is a matter of the spirit.

The best example that I can think of quoting is that of the most favored of all of Lord Krishna’s Gopis, Radha. In one of the bhajans by Hari Om Sharan, there is a line:

US WAQT JALDI AANA   (when the time for my soul to depart comes, you [Krishna] must appear before me quickly)

RADHEY KO SAAT LAANA (bring Radha with you)

NAHI SHYAM BOOL JAANA (hey Krishna, do not forget to bring her!)

Those of us familiar with the stories of Krishna will know that He is the incarnation of Vishnu, Lakshmi is his spiritual consort and even as Krishna, He had two consorts, Rukmini and Satyabhama. So why ask him to come posthaste but with Radha? There were a thousand Gopis in Mathura but they had their role only in his childhood. They played with him and by His grace, received the good fortune of being His play mates. Why not ask Him to come and be present by Himself or at best with His actual consort?

The answer is in the word ‘love’. Think of you as Krishna. There are hundreds of Gopis adoring you and there is this Radha who completely devotes herself to your love. She dances with you, plays with you, surrenders herself to the mellifluous notes of the flute and remains ever in tearful joy and bliss of your company. Under the circumstances, even without such a girl prompting you, you would have got married to her and made her your queen. She would have enjoyed the pomp, glory and a richly deserving life of a queen as your love. In the instant case however, Radha just continued to live in her love for Krishna so much that such material rewards like being a queen had no meaning for her. She remained so much in Krishna that even Krishna came to be known as Radheyshyam than Shayamradhey. Her loves permeates His persona and even His being as God. Together, they symbolize LOVE in its truest form. The thousands of bhajans and songs in praise of Radha’s love for Krishna are testimony to the fact that ‘Love’ goes beyond the physical and symbolic – it is actually spiritual.

It is difficult to love or hate anyone, unless we actually cross the threshold of the physical and tread into the spiritual. Of course, we are guided by such sentiments in our daily lives that, at best, can only be classified as emotional likes and dislikes. Learning to love and if needed, to hate, is a matter of spiritual discovery. Like in every other creation of God, both love and hate exist but they exist beyond our emotional range. They both are a state of existence that needs to be experienced.

I am reminded of a line my professor quoted while teaching child psychology:

LOVE ME IF YOU CAN, HATE ME IF YOU MUST. BUT NEVER IGNORE ME!         

Learning to distinguish between mere like or dislike and love or hate is important as the former will keep us tied in our mundane and the latter would embark us on a journey that will transform our life!

Learning to Love

And then it happened!

We never thought we will get bitten by this bug, though both of our children have been literally after us to succumb to the 'bite'!

We went visiting our friend and laughed our guts out at his "St Bernard and 240 idlies" stories and my wife fell for one of the pups of the dashcund mother in his house.

So here she is, Olive as the kids have named and Oly as we call her, all of 75 days old, in our home!!

It has happened and the best thing is I am beginning to feel that I never knew how to love. I feel quite lost and she being a puppy, must feel quite lost too. The children are quite excited but are again trying to discover ways to get close to her. The only person who seems to be perfectly at home with Oly is my wife. Perhaps her maternal instincts are the cue.

Just pray that we learn to love and love her well, our Oly!  

For the dog lovers of the world!

The other day we dropped in to a friend’s house. It was to be a courtesy visit but turned out to be an interesting day out for us. Though we knew that this friend of ours liked dogs, we had never seen him keeping any earlier. His wife was not very keen and he used to talk about an ashram for his dogs where he would spend the rest of his life, etc…

As we parked our vehicle, we found a small shed in which an alert rottweiler was giving us the best of his stares. As the gate opened, a lively daschund mother and two 60 day old puppies wound themselves around our feet. Seeing our raised eyebrow and smiles, our friend, with an impish grin, pointed to the terrace and whistled. Two cheparapakkam hounds immediately stuck their heads out and cast their gauging look on us! ‘Wow’ said my wife and asked him how he managed. So the stories started. But the best among his adventures with his pets is narrated below.

For long he had drooled about having a St Bernard and finally got one (for a handsome price) from an acquaintance who brought a year old from Switzerland. As he proudly walked the three + feet tall, four feet long big fellow with a face as big as a cow, his wife unilaterally declared that either he (the dog) stays or she stays. (Don’t think that she is hard-hearted. She is one of the finest and affectionate beings that we have met so far. Her reaction perhaps is predictable considering the number of pets already at home!) So, a friendly query was initiated and a tea estate owner-friend offered to keep him. So the fellow was taken to the friend’s place at Ooty and necessary introductions were made. Leaving the fellow there, my friend hardly had left the town when he received a panic call from his friend pleading him to take the fellow back. The inquiry revealed that the docile fellow (keep his size in mind, please!) got scared of the sight of the mother of the friend (considering the cold climate, his mother had wrapped herself with some four sweaters, a couple of scarves and a balaclava cap when she met the dog!) had barked at the top of his voice. The poor old lady, seeing and hearing a St Bernard bark at her, had swooned requiring medical help! So, the St Bernard was put back into his car and brought back.

Since the St Bernard can not be taken home, my friend arranged to keep the fellow in his office and appointed the watchman as caretaker, soon as driving into the town. Next day, the sincere watchman rang up to find out what should he feed the fellow with. “Give him idlies”, my friend ordered.

Seeing the size of the dog, the watchman brought 10 idlies. The poor hungry fellow gobbled them in one go. So the watchman went and fetched some more. At the end of the feeding session, the now practically poor watchman rang up to say that 240 idlies have been fed and yet the dog looked hungry! On top of that the hotel from where idlies were brought had run out of dough!! Seeing a huge dog gobble down 240 idlies, a crowd had gathered and it was difficult for him to leave the dog alone to go and fetch some more idlies!!!

My friend left whatever he was doing and went running and jumping to a vet first with the dog!

My wife and I were in splits hearing these stories. Our friend kept reeling out the incidents with an embarrassing smile. And by God, our day was made.

We do not have a pet yet. Managing two sons, I suppose, is no mean feat by itself! But both of us would like to salute the dog lovers of the world. Your patience and the selfless, unconditional love that you shower on your pet makes you guys very special and better humans than many others.

God bless you all!