Importance!

Very Important Person.... (a prefix of ... 2 “Very's” increases our worry!)

When the intrinsic qualities fail to impress, they force the importance by a red-beacon-light, stop 'ordinary' people on their way using power plus force, etc...

We lose the significance of the word importance, often due to people who 'seek-to-become-important'.... they inadvertently or intentionally also happen to usurp the very application of the word...

Even when the present computer is in a perfect working condition, it becomes 'obselete'... Another VIP comes in.... it performs at a better speed, keeps too much in present-memory, and stores lot more in its past memory... (And oldies, in whose life that computer came too late, find it so 'painful' to treat the just-yesterday's computer as something old/junk/obselete etc... They are scared of 'accepting' that ........ importance decides “Obsoleteness”... it tells me quietly, but very effectively that “You-are-in-the-queue”!!!

Time is important too! But, perhaps, often, only with respect to the 'timing', not otherwise...

Time is precious, time is invaluable, and yet, its importance is perhaps only about the 'timing'...

A spiritual Master is very much concerned about the 'timing' when the disciple is 'just-ready'...

usually, they seek the timing to coincide with cosmic-timing, in emperical sense, though not in absolute sense!...

Thus, the concept of 'Muhurat' when nature supports to a great extent (the phases of moon, the effect of powerful wave-radiations from distant stars, etc)... Some evolved spiritual giants even create a 'timing' when other parameters beyond their limitations are already suitable!

Priority and importance seem to overlap, only because, we perhaps lack that 'adequate-respect' for neither of them!... The importance of 'concepts' catches up later on when the kid fails to cope with the ever-changing-job-situation, when he fails as an adult at job, only because the priorities of competing with an erroneous examination system overpowered his natural curiosity, suppressed it, dominated it, and his sense of 'attributing importance' even... got fractured, became disabled, apart from having lost the due-importance to be given to values of concepts!... (And we try to find out 'why the present youngsters fail to respect “anything that is old”... be it religion, elders, gadgets, or even the dish on that dining table!... The way things are presented, too often, the kid presumes that the 'present' is relevant only in a temporary sense, and has not much importance in relation to a 'future, and in any case, not of least relevance to the past!... Somewhere, even the emotional values become temporal too!... The importance is already lost, even when it is 'presently-relevant'... The value of 'this too shall pass' loses its intrinsic worth, when it now looks like, “this too shall pass, and then, nothing else remains!”, instead of “this too shall pass, but what sustains thereafter shall remain of eternal value, and is therefore important !”)

“Why is it so important that I should firstly finish eating what you prepared for breakfast, and only then, the tasty packed-snacks?” the kid asks... the mom now thinks... how to put it... meanwhile the 'timing' is fading out.. time is slipping by... She finds it difficult to impress the importance of 'health' (the kid is not sick... so, he is 'obviously' healthy, right-now!), nor is she able to claim the taste of hand-cooked dish to be superior to that packed-junk... Meanwhile, the horn of that school-bus honks to claim 'importance' above all other present-topics/matters! The bus-drivers expression matches the 'claim-of-importance' (“send your kid quick, or I rush on that busy road, and your kid runs the risk of my-rash-driving...”... the 'look' on his face says so much, )...

“Spicy food” does not now include all varieties of spices... the chilies dominate... and decide even if that side dish suffices to complement the staple food item, rice, roti, etc! Chilli is important !

Number of views/comments is important, to decide the worth of a blog!... Not the worth of the blogger, the viewer, the commentator, or the contents, thereof, by them!

Nothingness! The grasp of it, might perhaps keep evading a person pursuing meditativeness, till he also pursues to seek the importance of knowing how important it is to understand the word 'importance'!... (The earliest lessons, that a spiritual teacher often tries to impress upon a student is the difference between important organs, and vital organs... whereby the disciple learns afresh to give importance to the vital organs, which in turn enhances the functionalities of the important organs as an incidental benefit!)...

Unimportantly yours,

psn (27th December, 2013)

Justification of Judgements!

Looks connected? Maybe....!!!

(I wouldn't hurry your mind any further, and further complicate it!)...

But, we often 'explain' things.... The 'why-do-we-explain' part of it, let it rest aside for a while, for the very same reason—not to end up complicating it....

But, it is relatively safe to discuss about 'how we explain'.... (the safety is about remaining 'on-to-the-subject', and not being diverted...)

Researchers and scientists have to engage their mind into 'explaining'... a lot many times, avoiding that inclination to 'justify' anything that they themselves 'explain' ... (this reference to a 'scientist/researcher'... I presume, helps to calm our own temptation, to justify even the “tendency to justify....)”

.....

Why are you late? (Please see, our 'explanations'... is looked at as... 'mere explanations' or as 'our-own-justifications'!)

A candidate was late for job-interview at a large company involved in public transportation business... He was told... (amounting to, he-was-asked), “you are late for the interview”...

The candidate 'explained' (amounting to, he offered justification), “I traveled by your company's bus... which was running late”... (needless to add, he was appointed, as other parameters were okay!)...

....

'Explanations' are sought through 'charge-sheet', 'show-cause-notice', etc to 'delinquent' employees...

The letter seeking explanation carries a tone of threat usually... 'please tell us why you should not be punished...'... thereby suggesting that “we have already decided/concluded, that... you deserve to be punished”... only that the law imposes a fair chance to be given to explain oneself!... Even here, the “law” presumes (or assumes... for what ever it is worth—the difference between presumes-assumes....)... the law contemplates an ideal situation that the 'authority' is an equitable one, and just that some-error-of-judgement, or some 'inadequate-application-of-mind' happened, and therefore,.... if the employee merely 'explains' , ... it would facilitate a re-assessment, and proper judgement ! It rarely happens thus in real life! Therefore, the employee usually ends up offering only 'justification' and even hiding the 'real-explanations', at times!... (What happens to 'jurisprudence' and its concepts, is anybody's guess!)... I am reminded of a 'reverse-example' to 'explain' this .... Justice V.R.Krishna Iyer, an eminent jurist, it seems, once baffled everybody, even the defendant, (the defendants lawyer knew, the law was not in their favour!), when he pronounced a landmark judgement, upholding the very purpose of a 'provision' which was invoked to defeat a defendant... He said, something to mean thus: 'Even though the defendant does not hold the necessary qualifications needed for doing the work entrusted to him, and therefore the act of 'having entrusted him' also being against the provisions thereof... I can see from the evidence produced that the defendant had performed far better than even those who contest against him, with better qualifications than needed, and more so, when the beneficiaries of such performance are our esteemed guests from foreign countries, who have voluntarily and very generously praised the performance of the defendant.... I hereby .... uphold the act of having awarded the contract to conduct the business in favour of the defendant!” (we had this as an example in our law college classes, for jurisprudence lectures!)...

Kids initially try with 'innocent-explanations'... We adults often treat it with distrust, and then the need to 'inject' a dose of 'justification' arises... that injection immunises the kid for a life-time even.. Like some of our gadgets that come with 'life-time-guarantee'!... And when such a mind, seeks to know spirituality some time later, out of sheer curiosity even.. how to stop the interference of this mind's eagerness to 'justify its own conclusions/judgements?'...

What has all this got to do with spirituality?

Who knows?... Only spiritual Giants can 'explain'... or even 'justify'!... (Somebody it seems asked the 'supposedly' greatest ever teacher... about 'the state of tranquility'... and the teacher closed his eyes, ... obviously, to look at it afresh, experientially, and then talk about it... but the disciples had to wait for some 84 years to see those eyes getting opened, and only thereafter, to expect that teacher to even 'talk-about-it'... this went on for several times (the story goes thus...)!... If this story is even conceptually-true, then 'what to say' about the 'explanation' of that 'state'...!

It seems, the spirit within, only witnesses... neither explains, nor justifies, not even 'listens' to these two! If spirituality does not deal with 'spirit' ... we are dealing with a wrong 'person' then!

Bah! I am no good to talk about 'need' for justification, explanation, or the difference between the two... let me 'explain' why.. (now, I am trapped into my own web... see? That's the game!.. That 'explain & why'.. is a crude mixture of both... explanation and justification ... a justification-of-judgements... every sentence we speak, every thought we generate in our mind, is a conclusion, a judgement, one-way-or-other!!!... I am eager to learn if it is other-wise!!!)...

I dare not even ask for a humble data: 'What is for breakfast today?' (What I get in reply, is worse than the breakfast, quite often, when it is about 'digesting' it...!!!... That is how 'good-governance' works at my home, and the 'governess' has her way too... about it!... By-the-way.. we have self-governance at home...)

Justifiably yours,

psn (24th December, 2013)

Mistaken Appreciation!

“Beta, don't do it... you know your Pitaaji ka Gussa isn't it?”

“Beta, you don't know your Pitaaji ka real Gussa.... I suggest you refrain... rest is your choice”

We get to hear at times these kinds of suggestions often...

The idea is, better learn to 'appreciate' the worth of something...

But kids, learn to appreciate instead... the 'goodness of Gussa'... they get fed, quite inadvertently, that 'Gussa works' ... and they slowly learn how to get angry... if it doesn't work initially, they feel that they did not do it 'the right way'... and the persuasion is 'to better it next time'... !!!

And then when it is already too late, some learned doctor pronounces a 'link' between that BP trouble and the Gussa (anger!)... and the middle aged adult does not remember where the knot got started, to untie it..!

Such mistaken appreciation often gets us into trouble...

I was quite amused to read an article...

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-miscellaneous/morgan-freeman-mistaken-for-mandela/article5481094.ece

“An Indian owner of a billboard dedicated to Nelson Mandela was red-faced on Thursday after the discovery that a photo of actor Morgan Freeman was used instead of one of the anti-apartheid hero. The billboard was erected on the side of a road in Coimbatore as part of memorials across the world to Mandela.

But Freeman’s face loomed large in the billboard over small images of Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa and Mahatma Gandhi. “We should be proud that we were part of an era when they lived,” read the Tamil message on the board. Cloth merchant Chandrashekhar, who paid for the board in a private capacity as a mark of respect to the former South African leader, said it was a mistake by the designer. Morgan Freeman played Mandela in the 2009 film Invictus . — AFP...”

“Lord Krishna uses 'Colgate' toothpaste”... declared a kid, adding “and I will compromise for nothing less” ... after seeing the commercial break while viewing the TV serial 'Mahabharat'...(the same actor's face made a very impressive impact on the kid... at both the places, the serial-story, and the ad'..!)

...

Is it not the 'perception' level that decides how we appreciate initially, and then this appreciation grows into craze, and then into imbibed-craving/traits/ habits etc... (the release of cigarette smoke into curls, circles in the air, for instance, makes such an appeal when the hero does it, and the heroine flashes a charming smile at that 'capability'!)....

Ah... now the spiritual teacher has quite a task, when all this does not work... to first undo that 'very faulty and erroneous way-of-appreciation... and only then, to try and induce an approach for 'trying' to appreciate 'that' ... that-which-evades even perception itself, only thereafter, to even think of an appreciation!

Appreciably yours,

psn(20th December, 2013)

Absence of a Contrast

Coming out of that Eye hospital, into the bright sunlight on the road, “my eyes were hurting” too badly!....

But, for no fault of my eyes....! The eyes themselves got hurt with that light!... That is when I realised, and a bit experientially too, what that 'dilation' means, ... it is not just dilution of the subject (the eyes)... the object 'becomes concentrated' (the light)... effortlessly! The 'adjustment' takes a painful four hour period!

The eye doctor is magnifying the 'contrast' in the eyes to come to a conclusion!

Small trends, small errors, small way of doing things wrongly, look small too, when we are also small (a kid)... it gets magnified, when we grow in all our dimensions (physicality aspect mostly)... and these small traits get magnified, ... now everybody else is like that 'eye-doctor'... they can easily see, what is wrong with us!

Elephant goes berserk when the 'lens' of its eyes moves aside a little, and it sees other at their 'normal' size ('they' say....)... and then we see... that it goes 'mad' like (we call it 'mad-elephant'... while, possible, it was madly gentle all along, and it is now, that ... it is normal!)....

Are we 'stuck' to an enhanced level of grasp, or that learning-receptivity, ... only... when there is a contrast?... Are we not capable of 'visualising' a situation without the constraints of physicality? These were my doubts about myself, when I was on the 'journey'... I tried to look at various situations of a contrast...

A 'tough' or a strict teacher just leaves the class... the very next class is by a very very kind teacher... small crimes like 'talking to the next classmate' is not even 'noticed' by the teacher! The teacher 'just goes on' with the blabbering quite unmindful of receptivity... What a contrast! Kids love such a teacher! In government offices, where 'sab kuch chalta hai'... only that poor aam aadmi finds 'kuch hota nahi hai... phir bhi why... and how? Sab kuch chalta hai?.. He “is” a contrast... he lacks that vitamin 'M'...

A person sent to far north... or far-south.. where the staple food is a contrast... returns home to find that humble insipid base-staple-food, ... even by-itself,... to be so 'heavenly'!!! (“Arey! Sirf sookhi roti aisey hi kha rahe hain?.. Kam se Kam... daal tho parosney deejiye”.... pleads the spouse... but our dislocated hero is cheerfully humming within.. “Bade acchhe lagte hain.. ye roti, ye bhook, ye bhaasha... A-u-r... TUM!' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pN7sITXVyk )...

15th August 1947.. onwards... we are still 'looking' for that contrast!... Some of us feel, 'arey... iss sey tho woh Angrez behtar thei (The British rulers now seem to have been better, than these politicians.....!)

Suddenly that loud TV is switched off... Ah! The silence suddenly gets 'noticed'!...

That lecture by that 'Maha... maharaj ji... ' did not really go through the head.. most of it went above the head.. still, we feel a little 'peace'... as if that 'Shanti-madam' has given a side-glance at us... while, in reality... in all probability... during the entire lecture, all we were doing is to silently keep looking for those bits of stories, jokes etc... with concepts interwoven in between, subtly... not realising that our own 'gadbad-wali was wailing for lack of attention, and the mind quietly got quietnened, unawares to itself , and by us too!... And that 'peace-prize' goes to... “(we know)” !!! (Even that Maharaj ji might not have been too sure of what he was talking.... some material gathered from here and there, remember the right 'authentic-quotes' scare people with unpronunceable jargon, and impress them!... Spri-tuaal-tea (spirituality) sells to well! Chaandi-hi-chaandi hai! (silver coins, later era of 1500 A.D. +)...}

Absence of contrast... if we just manage to do without it for a while... the logic within us might calm down for a while... The intuitive aspect might brighten up without 'side-effects' that the contrast brings along, and we begin to 'see' kuch kuch subtle things, in a 'much-much' better way!

Contrastingly yours,

psn (11th December, 2013)

Lacking of Liking!

We look out for a chance to do something that we like to do the most!

It is not exactly about a 'priority'... (if it were so, we all would practice 'running' to a break-neck-speed, even at a very young age.... so that during emergency, we can run away from risk, threat, danger, task, responsibility, accountability... why,... even to catch that running-train or a bus!... It is not 'exactly' about running alone... we would 'equip' ourselves too well,... and running after something is what we dislike most... 'door-delivery' is the in-thing now!... or, there is an 'on-line' getting of things/done...).

We thought, we like 'movies' a lot... but most of us got out of that movie-going-habit, when life itself unfolded like a suspense movie! (Will I get up on time, will the breakfast be ready on time, will the bus arrive on time, will the boss not fall sick at least today.... Cashiers are privileged to enjoy that 'sinking feeling at the pit of the stomach' .... described by GB Shaw, in his essay, 'How I became a public speaker'... when the final physical cash amount and the book totals are being matched to see if 'all is well'! GB Shaw said, he always had that 'feeling' when he tried to face an audience to speak...)

Now, the TV movies are working like sleeping pills for quite a few of us (anyway there will be a repeat telecast very soon!)...

So, it is not 'that-kind-of-interest'...

I used to ask, (some neighbour aunt...)..'why doesn't your son like brinjals?'... She says, 'He does not like it 'that-much''.. I am now tempted to ask, 'Then how much... which-much... if not much-much, .... kuch-kuch?' (the answer feels so evasive... with that 'that-much'!)... There was a time, when most kids never dislike any vegetable... maybe they eat a little extra when that 'roast-able' dish like aloo, sweet-potato, etc are well-roasted... having the crisp-crunchy outer surface, and the gulpable-sweet core soaked with spices!

My 'liking' for a jaggery-porridge(payasam), amused the elders, when I was just going to be two ... It used to arrive at 10 pm... the village used to sleep at 8.30pm (or soon after)... No electricity there.. After dark, only the dim light of a hand held oil lamp can be seen from a distance... the person carrying it was 'identified' from the sound he makes with his foot-steps... 'Ah, it is the priest!'... A temple priest, whom I used to observe very keenly all through my childhood, used to fetch the left-over of prasadam... just two handfuls, enough for a kid that I was (others have only a teaspoonful... abstaining to taste it was un-religious-act, likely to invoke the 'deity's anger even!).... it was rice, jaggery, enriched with Ghee, and other aromatic ingredients.. it used to get cooked in a small firewood stove right inside the temple complex, taking its own time to boil and cook, when the priest used to attend to 'deity' worship intermittently.. ... this item was the last offering of the day, before the temple closes... so, the cohesiveness of jaggery permeating into the core of the rice grain, taking along with it, a little fragrance of other ingredients, over a couple of hours, made that dish 'heavenly' to taste! (My grandmother later narrated, she was amused to come to that tiny mat where I was to sleep till the bed was unfolded, at 10 pm, and announce 'Kaavu prasadam-P-a-y-a-s-a-m'... and I would stir, they help me sit, and feed small morsels of that 'superb-sweet-dish', while I maintain 'eyes closed' but enjoy chewing the dish... and reward them with a mini-smile, when the taste permeates into the mouth... ! Little did I knew, that it constituted--very incidentally—into a training to eat with focused awareness! Eyes closed, mind almost disengaged... awareness, invoked by that familiar taste!... Almost like a blessing for 'sweet-filled-dreams'! The next sleep-session was a bit more with hazy-awareness... truly a blessing!)

That priest was perhaps, the earliest of my spiritual 'benefactors'.... I still wonder, why and how he took a 'special liking' for me! What did he like in himself, that attracted me into that liking?... Logic failed to surmise the reasons! He hardly talked to me, even when I grew towards the age of 5 and thereafter! But his glances towards me were quite mystic, for sure! And my reply glances, blank stare into the unseen emptiness of his eyes! There was nothing to be found in his eyes!.. (that was yet another strange query within! Why do I keep looking at a pair of eyes, that do not 'speak' but seem to say a lot?'... That mystic-liking taking shape within me! (Not that I really could recognise all that was happening with me!... It was just kuch-kuch of much-much! (little, little of a lot more!)...

.....

We miss... to look at what is lacking, when our 'liking' (to 'be-at-something' that we desire to have, become, etc) does not do its job!... And when it is about spirituality, we don't even know that we are missing-to-know... that a 'unique kind of liking' is needed to pursue it intensely enough!... I even used to wonder, 'how do people miss to know that they ought to have liked-to-know about themselves very well?... Is it not the very fundamentals of life?... Does it not help to be-led by 'life-itself' ..... entrusting ourselves to that 'life-within' to take us along the 'life' happening all around us?... (Oh! ... The ability even, to frame this questions into words, could creep in only when the urge to ask was no more!... Now it is only of 'nuisance-value' when I am tempted to really ask this to somebody face-to-face!... No time, quality-time, to allocate for such non-urgent matters!)...

Do we like .. .... adequately enough... to maintain our health (not just remaining out of 'dis-ease', ill-health... or just 'managing somehow' those chronic ailments?.... I wonder, if at those MBBS classes, they demonstrate with a live-healthy-person, about what 'health' means, or looks like... the little that I could see was in the movie, “Munna Bhai, MBBS... where the frantic search was only for a 'body'... and we enjoyed the comedy when it was a live and reasonably disease-free body!)...

Do we like... adequately enough .... to look at how we emote?... there is no structure in place (by whatever name..), to really train us into maintaining a 'well-balanced-emotional-state'... what ever the provocation from the outside situation!... Even when the body is dis-eased... we call it, 'I am unwell'.. time to get out of that 'well'!... (it is okay to continue to say so 'I am unwell'... but, we need to be aware, it is 'just-the-body' that is well, unwell, at-ease, dis-eased, comfortable, in-dis-comfort, under -a spell-of-some-craving, etc..... 'I am hungry' is okay, but let us know, that 'we feel hungry, ... really'... and it was not just that the stomach became empty, when the digestion process was over, and the poor stomach is busy with its own best-of-likings now... cleaning the 'system'!!!

Now, before a dislike to read creeps into a reader, and further takes over, let me click my 'liking-finished'... right here!

Likely-to-be... yours,

psn (7th December, 2013)

Baby thinks?

There was a beautiful question...

What do babies think?

I was amused at the very 'assumption' that everybody has to think.... something or the other... all the time!... Maybe, a non-thinking spell... duration... period really scares!... It does not even occur that when we restore our 'being' in a deep sleep state, there could be a few moments of an utterly thought-less state!

The moment we open our eyes, we know what we are looking at... For most of us, the very first thought would be 'what time is it now?'.... How does it matter anyway! Just get going...!!!

Every object that the eye beholds, rests upon, or even spans-across, gets identified at a tremendous speed! (In that movie, 'The Godfather' the owner of a prize winning horse, was given the chance to look at the chopped head of his dear horse, the first thing in the morning! Don Corleone knew how to mimic the 'early-bird'...!!! Our ancient Masters too knew 'how to'.. they prescribed that we look at our palms... open palms, ... just watching it, for a while ... kuch-kuch-zaroor hota hai... and then run it accross the face downwards, gently... the face gets freshened up with that 'gaze-energised palm'... the first gaze comes from a fresh, single pointed, well focused, and a relatively-unconditional mind ! May be the day begins a bit better!... no harm in trying it out... If the itch to try something else is there... may be start with trying to find out if we are still breathing, even while the eyes are yet to open! .. I assume, we wake up first, and then open the eyes... not the other way!)

Anyway, the question was amazing...

What do the babies think?

Really, ...... it is anybody's guess!

I tried out what I felt, could be a closer possibility, dismissing the very assumption that 'babies too have to think...!!!

Well, it looks like... it hit the mark!....

The remark/comment says it all....

That polished, sophisticated way of putting it... 'your interpretation'... clearly hints, that we tried to interpret the concept of 'answer' itself.... and made it into a reply, through an appropriate response... thereby.... making it(that 'assumption') redundant & also making it   a bit obvious! (At home, we know-too-well... when we ask a 'simple-looking-question'... like, 'is the breakfast ready?'.. ... if it is asked, when the day itself began a bit late for that family, and the question is timed earlier than the usual/normal day... the answer gets interpreted into a loud noise of the very next vessel that is being handled inside the kitchen, and invariably, everybody else 'understands'.. clearly too... the reply/response... not a word need be spoken more!)

It is quite another matter, whether the implication of what constitutes a 'wonderment' what a wonder-(really)-meant... had tried to occur to the other person.... (Maybe, it deals with the need to float yet another question!)

How about trying to wake up the way a baby does, most of its time... most of its waking hours?... with a 'wonder' on the mind... and therefore a wonder-full-face!

Wonderfully yours,

psn (5th December, 2013)

quote:

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20131127230402AA7uZKH

What does babies think in their initial growing period?

Q.1. I was wondering what small babies would be thinking during their initial period

of growth?

Q.2. If we are not taught anything and we dont learn anything at all during our

growing period, then what would be thinking when we are grown as adults?

My answer:

Most of the time, babies keep wondering... that is why they look wonderful!

Grown up people stop wondering, unless they see something very strange, and do not

know what it is... they wonder, "Hey! I wonder what this could be... I wonder what

this is... I wonder why this is like this?' etc...

Asker's comments:

i love your interpretation..

False Humility

"False humility is what slaves show to their masters. Slaves know that if they do not

obey their masters blindly, if they do not show this kind of outer humility, the master will punish them."

Sri Chinmoy

...

http://www.livinglifefully.com/humility.html

(What do we 'the aam aadmi' do, when facing a policeman, Incometax official, Municipal Corporation clerk, Court-Judge, Political Neta, A goonda, An RTO license-Giver, that boss who is powerful enough to show us the door, but not competent enough to assess our worth.......and all those Government people where, it is safe to 'play-a-little-humble'!)

And then when it comes to a really safe area, where we can afford to be a little gentle, little kind, little mild..... the humility is overtaken by that suppressed frustration of having 'played-humble' and we let off the steam at those who are meek, submissive, helpless, and perhaps really humble while looking at us! In effect, one set of relationship is corrupt, and the remaining one get spoilt, often by the residue of having borne the brunt of those corrupt ones!

Perhaps, that 'acceptance' might work .... Suppose, during our visit to a large zoo, somehow the latch at the lion's cage got loose, and the King came out for a walk, and we happened to come into his way there... Humility does not work (like it works with our Minister saab!... )... We simply do what we can... There is only that fear... once the danger is over (some zoo keeper manages the King and his route is routed back into the cage)... the danger is over, the fear subsides, and we have a hearty laugh over it... now we are a bit more-confident even, with that spouse! (Asli sher ko dekh liya aamey saamney, tu kya cheez hai!).. There is a subtle 'acceptance' about what can be expected out of an hungry, ferocious lion... still better, what cannot be expected out of a lion (that it would allow us to shout at it, stare at it, etc...)... Where as, while dealing with other human beings, we often fail to recall, or remember that .... only in human species, there is a possibility of too much of varied and reactionary-behaviour pattern(instead of animal like 'instinctive-response-only')... It is this failure perhaps, which.... over a period of time, affects our ability to remain our true-natural-self ... At villages, we still find people to be a bit-more-humble, than our metro-counterpart.. may be they deal less with pretentious people, and therefore, 'happen' to offer less vulnerability to contagiousness associated with dumping of frustration !

If so, .. if these reasons seem to be a few of the possible contributory ones, to force us into pretended-humility, and its adverse consequences/side-effects, then ... obviously, the true humility becomes an 'effort' (and, we are somewhere driven towards trying-to-be-humble, when we know what we are really lacking!... it is the inner fight within us, to further suppress that frustration, and we try to 'become-kind' and gentle... it comes no where near a genuine kindness, and it now looks like 'false-humility'... the other person repels at this... often the 'other-person' is one with whom we are too-much inter-dependent, and hence knows us a bit too well!)... Maybe, honest confessions might do better...! But, it has to accompany a firm resolve to dissolve such residues right within ourselves better and better each time! Seek help to strengthen that resolve, instead of seeking a tolerance for that 'sorry, I had a very bad day today!'... It strengthens the bonds better, and our spirit gains dominance over our weaknesses.... The spirit when, it can afford to manifest itself better, always radiates a true-humility... naturally, no other way!

Humbly yours,

psn (3rd December, 2014)

Becoming Angry, becoming loving, but only carrying hate (Part-2)

(Lengthy blogs tend to test the 'patience' of a reader.. so I had tried to put 'extras' as comments at: http://www.speakingtree.in/public/spiritual-blogs/seekers/science-of-spirituality/becoming-angry-becoming-loving-but-only-carrying-hate

Here are those 'extras'!

Quote:

(1)Chai thandaa ho gaya... phir se garam karoon kya?
Nahi fresh banao... waapas garam karna ... taste achha nahi lagta...
Anger thanda ho gaya...!!! (thermos flask hai kya?)... Mujhe hasao mat... gussa utar jayega... gussa hokar bolunga tho woh seriously sunega!
Psn

(2)Anger Management!
May be! When Management Guru's say so.. it must be true....
For me it was just like that steel tumbler with hot chai... too hot to hold... put it down!... Cannot gulp it...
Anger manages us... we cannot even manage ourselves... how are we going to Manage-Anger-ji!...
When a kid, I remember, my mom managed her anger when we were at our ancestral home at that village .. Only my grandmother had the authority to 'show' anger at me (fortunately, there were very few occasions.. the items of daily use were sturdy... not use-and-throw.. not once-use-only... so no serious breakages to warrant some anger from elders!
At school, we had a Hindi class... the lesson was about 'kahaavat'... Thus came, that 'aag-baboola Hona!'.. it left us non-hindi kids clueless... Teacher told us it was 'Krodit hona' ... During lunch, we were curious... one of us volunteered, to become 'aag-baboola' (fiery looking)... the poor kid could not hold it for too long... he said, "Arey jaldi kuch karo, mere aag-baboola hone ka... jyada der pakad ke nahi rakh paoonga, yeh aag!'... it was yet another stupidity of ours when we non-hindi-kids attempted to help each-other as a group, at least one should have been a shudh-hindi-wala... we were as stupid as any other of that group!
...
Today, anger is available in the air itself... doesn't matter if we cannot even carry it! Even that routine monotonous 'good morning' at the work place... almost as compulsory as the signing of the attendance-register... has a whiff/fragrance of some subtle anger (crowded bus-travel, burnt-bread-breakfast.... etc)... it is rarely with the warmth of a smile, a genuine smile! So, yes.. may be... we now can manage anger, like we manage the 24-hour-Airconditioned room/office that we live in!
psn

Becoming Angry, becoming loving, but only carrying hate

Way beyond the linguistic appropriateness, I was quite impressed by the emotion we know as anger!

We can become angry, not needing to carry it like a luggage.. Where as that hate, we have to carry it... Fortunately (or not, I don't know), but quite often the carrying of that hate or having it with us, in us, is as light as the credit card in our wallet... We can avoid 'showing it off' unless the mind announces 'match found' on the outside! ... Somebody spends a lot of money on a palatial house, but is unfortunately required to 'negotiate' the drive out of that place through a stinking street where stink comes out of an ill-maintained, but heavily used public toilet, this person actually builds the stock of hate for that stink, if this person is basically a that-stench-hater ... being required to pass through that street for even jogging/morning walk etc... (if the enemy of this person is living at the corner of the street, the hate-stink is subtle but much-more-stronger within!).. And yet, it (the memory even, of this hate for stench) does not really interfere with enjoying the stay at a 5-star-hotel, where the attached toilet is as clean as a good-kitchen (this person does not remember even that the hotel too has a toilet which is 'effectively' for public-only!)...

Not so with Anger-Maharaj... Anger blends to enable us to 'become' M/s.Anger ... the mom tells the kid, 'Don't go near your dad right now... he is...'..!!! (We affect even the people whom we love when we 'become' angry... where as, when we are exclusively talking to a person whom we love, we almost forget the other fellow whom we hate... the hate for the other person is sitting inside our wallet of negative emotions, like that credit card!)...

When we 'become' a loving being (not just on a part-time-job), even the person whom we hate finds us a bit mild, when he approaches us ... that person has to work hard afresh to invoke the hate at that original boiling/melting-temperature in us... We have jealousy, and feel we 'become-jealous'..

Fear too, is something that we carry... even a kid carries it... the earliest of negative emotions to manifest, even while a child... is that fear.. In fact, it is the fear that goes into a fast-forward to have or become other negative emotions... (The positive emotion is just love, which translates into joy, humor, smile, help, accommodative-ness, flexibility, amenability... etc when the situation needs us to emote... Alone on an island right from birth, a person might just evolve into a loving being, but the expression might not show off... a stone-like face.. waiting for somebody to help to emote (like that Jane, who taught Tarzan... how to smile... even while helping the heroine, the expression on the face of Tarzan looks 'blank-like'... Tarzan knew love from nature, and other wild animals who tamed him, and while at it, became tame with him!... It is just a story, a fiction, but allows us to imagine in that direction a 'possibility'!)..

Yours, in becoming,

psn (1st December, 2013)

Experience is what it does to us, when we do with what happens to us

“Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him.”... said " Aldous Huxley" !!!

I was quite impressed by this 'quote'...

so I tried a...

a crude translation ...

"मानव के साथ जो होता है 

वह अनुभव नहीं कहलाता 

बल्कि जो हुआ उस से क्या करता है "

why not in that 'tough' malayalam too!

മനുഷ്യൻ നേരിടുന്ന സംഭവങ്ങൾ അല്ല അനുഭവം 

 അവൻ ആ സംഭവങ്ങൾ കൊണ്ട് എന്തു  ചെയ്യുന്നു എന്നുള്ളതാണ് !

Very often, we find that a long forgotten 'happening' resurfaces within us as a 'deep experience' only when we 're-live' that event even long after it had really happened! (For instance, we 'understand' why our parents 'scolded us' so severely, only long after they have 'gone'... while we had barely managed with that 'surge-of-hate' that had overpowered us at that event itself, when it was 'live'!)...

This experience, if it is deep enough, tells us how to deal with an event in future...

Only a well-balanced-mind can manage to squeeze the 'most' out of even trifling incidents!

Those who happen to 'settle' down (really) into deep meditative states,

(just sitting quiet, doing nothing, eyes closed......)

or,

even those ... just watching one's own breath ...

among them... those who improve the very quality of watching their breath...

these two....

know too well... no incident is a trifle... every moment of life enriches us in many ways!

(To such people, who are prepared to look at 'happenings' thus.... shall we say, “welcome to spirituality” ?... For a very long time, I found myself trying-hard... to play that dual role... of a host saying 'welcome' ... as also that 'reluctant-guest', struggling to tell myself, “May I come in Sir?”... :)) }...

Experi-mentally yours,

psn (21st November, 2013)   

Silent Mode

That 'mobile' remains all the more noisy, but right within only... when we turn it on 'silent-mode'... it vibrates perhaps.. and if placed on a hard surface, it might even spoil its 'vibrant' nature (the temper that affords the vibration...)...

Very much like our minds....

(I wonder.. 'is it because of that internal vibration, suppressed by outer-situation, on our forced-silent-mode, that we succumb to stress-related-ailments! Dunno!)

We claim to be able to remain silent, for a while (calling it very fancifully as 'meditation' even, at times of course!)... But the internal turbulence is now even greater (and so the drop off rate, relatively, from that wonderful meditative-spiritual-practice!... Some of us who manage to sustain, are in for a bigger surprise... they become 'aware' of the non-verbal thought forms/processes... and this shakes off a lot more, when they try to hang-on holding the steel rods of that speeding bus of spirituality, and fall off soon!.... Only a few manage to stay on... and then, they need not hold-on... “it” holds them, on-and-on!)...

There was a joke! (Long ago, I read it in “Readers' Digest”... That 'Mom' narrated it in first-person!

She insisted to her son “I ask you ... this instant.. SIT down”

The kid,.... sat down, ... but added, “But inside me... I am still standing” (and the mom burst into a laughter!)...

(That was 'standing alone' on a 'silent-mode'!)...

The 'being' makes more noise perhaps... after we are into a 'grave-silence'... and therefore the 'ghost-voices/noises'... thereafter... but the same repetitious tunes only.. until a flexible form is re-acquired!

Silently yours,

psn(18th November, 2013)

I am retired, Don't tag me now!

I am retired, Don't 'Tag' me now!

The 'format' seemed to say...

The format of 'Create-blog' carries a 'default' tag... 'Sachin Tendulkar'....

And the cursor is allowed to 'escape' from that 'tag' box.... (until the 'default' nature of that tag is disabled...!)...

Or else... the tag sticks to anything else said in the name of 'blog'... as a tag of that pure-being-'Sachin'... (He is the 'available-pure' among us... so we need not try to find the available-small-impurities in him, to just find 'some-fault'...

I was looking at post '14 November 2013' blogs... all of them carry that 'Sachin-tag'!... (like our politicians who take the 'tag-credit' for everything good that happens even naturally in our land!)

The Tag...!

The tags we had.... tags along with us! (We carry a lot many of these tags!... The grand-mother is no more 'grand' when she tags around a child, replacing that 'live-mother'.... instead of complementing her functions... the 'mother' tag that remained unfulfilled when it was 'official' now seeks to fulfill it depriving a 'real-mother' to do it 'her-own-way'... and the kid 'announces'... “my daadi gave me the permission”... and the 'daddy' looks puzzled at the kid ! (The daddy-jee had communicated the 'don't allow that kid to tamper with it' only to the 'Mummy' ... the 'grand' in all its grandeur, mummified that mummy into a silence, silently too!)....

Somewhere it is the tags that we carry... that acts like a 'non-stick-tawa'... when we try to cook spirituality into us! (At the hands of a 'genuine' teacher, it pains a little right from day-1, when the teacher surgically removes those tags embedded in us).

(All I try to do is to keep a little distance from tags... and people now use a different tag, yet again... 'humble'... No! There is no humility at all, when we seek to be a bit effortless... it takes so much effort, to move into that 'effortlessness'... Tags!)...

Meanwhile, if possible, please click the 'x' sign on those blogs about which our dear Sachin is genuinely innocent(at speakingtree.in   ... He too is 'retired' now.. (like me!........ while the going was still 'good'... there is a saying ... 'stop singing while the humming still-sounds-good'... not when the voice is hoarse!).

Taggedly yours,

psn(18th November, 2013)

Migration

“Migration Certificate”....

That is how I got initiated into this concept of 'migration'...

It really did not afford a 'smooth' migration at all! Instead it was 'in essence' a certificate of “Good-riddance” from one set of Masters (yes, at school, they are the Masters of 'our universe'... some elder tried remind it when a lazy cousin of mine overslept, with the dialogue “Quick! Your Master has come, Get up!!!' and that kid scrambled up in the bed only to a 'wide-eyed' discovery that it was the cozy comforts of a home, and not that mid-day-mandatory nap at the school!)... This migration certificate just says that this idiot is good for nothing, and hence we have 'no-objection' to his going elsewhere to continue sleeping in the class-room! (There was even no questions raised, when I needlessly obtained a migration certificate after the graduation also! That certificate is encased inside such ignorant set-of-procedures!)...

Migratory birds, are cheerful perhaps, because they look at the places of dwelling only as 'shelters' (Gharonda), and not as 'homes', 'apart-ments' , or 'f-l-a-t's' (where some of the males are usually a 'sleeping-partner-only' in the family-business, with the women folk, kept busy after-and-before working hours too!... the males find it so tiresome to 'migrate' from one couch to the another, when the spouse requests, 'May I sweep the dust underneath this one... please...?)... But, when somebody teases me with a new found freedom that now he is 'as free as a bird', I retort saying, 'Ah! After all, those high-flying birds can only hop, once they are 'grounded'... they cannot keep flying for ever after all, while I can keep walking at will, all my life, to reach only a bit later to where they can fly apart!'...!!!

At work place, some of my colleagues carry their chair to the new table (rotation of duties), rendering themselves to 'migratory only along with their chair'... ! (They are a bit limp to one side of their shoulder, and the missing rubber shoe of that chair helps maintaining the balance, parallel to table-level, while working!)...

Yet some others simply migrate just their pay-scales, not their work-pattern, when they are automatically-promoted, much to the embarrassment of their new bosses, who find that 'junior-attitude' to be of no use or productivity at enhanced/widened set of responsibilities!

The bride migrates physically to the groom's house, but her 'thoughts' linger around the mother's home yet.... and the adjustment seems to take the whole of youth away, and the onslaughts of old-age to be too-late to migrate-now! (there is another candidate, the daughter-in-law with similar starting-troubles!)

The 'being' often forgets that it has migrated into this physical body, only with a work-Visa, and not a guest-type-visa alone, and is sent back too often to dissolve all the 'specific-work-visa's' acquired during the previous visits! It is much later that we get into 'earn-while-you-learn' mode! When the Visa manifests a 'vision' and we just-begin-to-enjoy... it is already too close to the 'expiry date of the visa and the passport as well!'....

So, better to learn the 'technicalities' of migration at subtle levels, loosening up even, if needed our physical comfort-zones, to afford us into meaning-full migration into any kind of migration! (As if to give an 'indicative reference' to this aspect, that grated-cocoanut, when migrates into a dish yields distinct kind of flavor, taste and fragrance even, depending upon how we crush, chip, roast, grate, grind or even squeeze its milk out.... and then add it to the dishes!.. But, like the cocoanut, we need to first break our head over it!)

Migrantly yours,

psn (7th November, 2013)

Changed Pattern!

Cheeni kitne leti ho chai mei?
(How much sugar do you take in your tea?)
Changed pattern!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQR6cB1DXzY

.....

I was amused to find, this short documentary ends with the same "tea" item!

Storm in a tea-cup...   !

"Response" to a repetitious pattern of eve-teasing...   made the difference...

We need to respond thus to 'our-own-patterns'...  a bit boldly!  The internal-eve-teasing...   needs the 'purushaarth' in us to wake up and defend/protect the feminine grace in us! (call it  by any name...   in essence, it is spirituality!)

Dunno, how long this link will remain...   the video link!

psn (7th November, 2013)

Mind Game

I never imagined that our dear Speaking Tree forum would provide such amazing examples of mind game, to give an 'actual' but really 'virtual' demonstration of our mind-game on spiritual path!

How to click the "more" button, on that drop down menu of 'Notifications'?

This is exactly the type of experiences during a spiritual program...    We find the location of 'More' , to share, after the program, when we try to tell, how beautiful the 'inner experience' was!!!  We know, it is somewhere 'down' there inside us...  It does not just 'click'...   and the mind runs about like a 'mouse' trying to reach it...!

If a mouse cannot reach it, who else can?

That Hubby, who ran to hide under the cot, when his stout spouse came menacingly with that proverbial rolling pin, and asked, "Hey! Are you a man or a mouse? come out.."...  and he cheerfully replied, "I am the 'man of the house', and I can remain where ever I like to, in this house!"...   

psn (5th November, 2013)

(Dear Good Karma,  

Please find a way to pardon me....    really, I have no complaints at all with this 'inadvertent' bug... hopefully, it might be a freak instance due to contributory negligence of the operating system/ or the browser.. that I use...  But I was so excited with that rare occurence, that I was tempted to quote it as an example of 'unreachable layers of our mind!'...  Thanks!

http://www.speakingtree.in/public/spiritual-blogs/seekers/science-of-spirituality/mind-game-242564

Patterns and Us!

'Tea or coffee?'

I was asked, and I tried it thus (once, long ago...): Both!

And I could get to see a 'bewildered look' in the eyes of the host as well as others present! (What I chose, not to tell them was... I even tried mixing both, very privately and it tasted unique... I was not too sure, if it is good to do so often, and hence dropped the idea... not 'my-pattern'...)

....

It amused me often to look at people around as patterns, with the same basic human-design! While animals derive a pattern according to the situation, plants undergo modification at 'design' levels even retaining hard to retain the basic design (for instance, we are advised to 'try' that cucumber, which looks same, but some are bitter... and if we do not 'test-taste' the whole salad gets spoiled!)...

Men usually go for plain or 'checks', parallel lines etc for shirts, and even pants/trousers at times, while trying to keep the latter ones in dark shades usually... It is the patterns of ladies that calls for 'selection' when they decide upon going in for something 'new'... (I tried a shirt out of a beautiful design called something like 'forest-fire' from a 'saree-material' by a branded name, Garden Vareli .. I had a very tough time, to get the 'permission' from my bossing-spouse, to even buy that piece of cloth! The shirt looked great, and was liked by all the colleagues, not because of its pattern itself... more because I looked very comical in that shirt, and as long as they are not wearing such funny stuff, they do not mind appreciating or applauding it!.. Now it is lying beneath a large heap of old shirts, though not at all worn-out... There is a tension around the house, ... Yes, the moment I name that shirt, our home becomes a house... 'house of commons' like, and sparks are in the offing already! I am 'allowed' to wear it only when I go out to meet 'non-issue' kind of people, that too 'patlee-gali-sey' ... I still am a fan of that design... err... pattern!)...

In general, men are after 'logical-patterns' and women find appeal in 'non-logical' ones (what ever that means!)....

Army changes the pattern of thinking of a fresh recruit, only then he becomes a soldier ....

A bride struggles to fit into the life-pattern of the new house-hold, that she seeks to 'become-one-with'...

The work-pattern of an organisation doesn't 'feel' comfortable, for a fresher, and he is confused, into trying to find out 'what went wrong with my choice of office?' (That is, if he is already not into that blame-game-pattern of thinking as to 'who is to be blamed?'....)

Coffee after dinner is a craving due to acquired craving-pattern of the physical body... (The 'asking' for 'quality-decoction-coffee' and its different 'standards' varies according to the 'craving-pattern', when we look at the two instances: First coffee after brushing of teeth, and last coffee after dinner!).

A kid is consciously en-grooved into a pattern of induced-sleep, by a mom, when she places a specific thing/object like some towel, particular-doll/cloth, and only then the kid sleeps soon... this pattern comes handy to 'boast' that 'only I can make that kid sleep without fuss, and in a very brief time'!)... Somebody makes a 'chance-discovery' of a better pattern, which the kid takes an 'instant' liking for, and the mom is disturbed out of her own mind-pattern, and only manages a 'grim-face'.. not knowing how to 'explain' this pattern-spoil that happened all of a sudden!...

Music-pattern of certain experts finds an instant-liking with the masses, and we find people claiming, “I hear 'a broken piece of tune' and I know at once, it is Naushad Saheb”... signature-pattern!.. Anger pattern, emotion-pattern, waking-pattern... the list is endless!

Spirituality seeks to take our 'being' out of this pattern-web, and then afford us to enjoy all the patterns, choicelessly! (Meanwhile, there are sets of 'life-positive' patterns, and life-negative patterns... and the situation decides better, which of the choices makes our life to crawl, or glide smoothly!)

Patternedly yours,

psn (3rd November, 2013)

Heavy Mind-set!

The caged Lion in that zoo is a 'picnic' spot for me! That was what I thought ... only till I reached an age where I had to walk right through that zoo to even reach my school every day! (The walk-route was a bit shorter than bus route, and bus route costed bus-ticket, which we couldn't really afford then!)...

The lion grew lean as days passed by... visitors even 'sympathised' that it is ill fed...

It had no 'walking' space... all it did was turn around after a couple of steps (the cage was small!)...

No exercise possible...

After a couple of decades, I found people spending money to 'become-lean'!!! (I did not really dare to quote that deep-embedded memory of that lion who grew lean doing nothing, spending even less on food!)....

Our mindset is perhaps inclined towards anything that makes us heavy... and so the 'heavy-mind-set'.. or 'heavily set mind of ours'... We like to have both, the things that make us heavy, and also to remain lean... Now there is a 'commercially viable' scope for those who can sell the 'make-belief' ideas!

In response to my previous blog (sharing an experience), I was asked specific queries about what I did when I lost nearly 4 kilos, in just about a month... I tried to reply very honestly, though I knew, my answers do not match those famous 'weight-reduction-programs' which carry a heavy price-tag... It was then, I thought, why not remind myself of that lion, who is about 600 pounds ( a guess, from what I heard from a world famous hunter who said about the choice of death.. “I would prefer to die at the hands of a tiger pouncing upon me, with its 700 pounds of weight, which would instantly crush my bones, than an electric chair which is supposed to be the most 'humane' death-sentence-infliction by legal authorities).. That lion does not do any 'exercise' in that small cage. Today, the zoos try to provide 'natural-habitat', and what I got to see was during 1950's, when animals were given little attention in captivity!

We have to see what kind of food this body is designed for... What kind of physical activity this body is designed for... what kind of ambiance this body is designed for (fan, A/C,  apart-ments, etc is what we have... I heard a news-report that somewhere in west, in a very cold country, there was forced-power-shortage due to fuel costs, and people 're-discovered' a healthy way to live, when they willingly allowed the cold-climate to seep in within their homes too, avoiding fuel-power-heated-airconditioning!)... And in India, air-conditioning even today means, make it too severely cold inside, use thick blankets, pollute the entire city outside of homes, and boast about 'having' tonnes of 'costly A/c' (weight reduction programs are already 'within-reach' through internet!)...

A person very close to me, past 60, visited a cousin of his, and having nothing else to do (after that 'hello, how are you' etc..), tried their 'gadget' of walking at the same place, on that machine, and then cycling at the same place... he started sweating profusely... 'good' he must have thought... but the sudden flow of blood caused a heavy stress on the heart, and within a few days, he needed cardiac-related-medical assistance! The body is a wonderful machine with adequate safety-checks in place... when we are engaged in hectic physical activity involving legs, our breath becomes heavy and fast... only then, the sweating starts, as a second level warning.. when the activity is with only the hands, then that panting is very mild, and sweating becomes almost simultaneous... but not suddenly profuse... it is a kind of warning, not to go too hard and hectic on that activity!

What is amazing is, what we call as 'stamina' is delayed panting (rapid breathing), and not the ability to breath faster and yet remain normal! The 'stamina' is never at the cost of early warning signs, the safety-checks! (During school days, I practised slow running when compelled by a 'national-coach', I discovered that I could reduce the breath-rate to near normal and still keep running slowly, thus shifting that 'stamina' increase towards leg's muscular strength, instead of remaining stuck at lung-limitation! That is what exactly drew the attention of that coach to call me and teach me 'track-technique', for free!... He was impressed that my breath did not decide my stamina-limitation!).

I perhaps failed to provide 'healthy-tips' for weight reduction... I wonder what that lion would have done, if pizza, noodles, samosa-kachori, and such costly fast-foods of our style were fed to it forcibly instead of just the raw meat which was meat for its body-design! And then, provide an A/c glass cabin(rain/sun protected), cushioned sofa, a TV, and a drum of Coca-cola, and see if it would say 'Yeh dil maange more!'

Heavily yours,

psn (1st November, 2013)