Coward

 Hiding your eyes to see what you don't want to see but you must see to resolve the issue is not an act that will let you reach a certain decision. And if I have to attribute such mindset, I will name it as 'being the coward'. We all often succumb to escapism for momentary comfort which, in reality, amplifies the problem with each passing time. Our escape for momentary comfort turns into a nightmare and before we understand what is happening with us, we are caught in a whirlpool of negative emotions which finally leave us depressed, indecisive and broken.

Since 'being the coward' was the reason for such disaster, 'being the brave' is the only solution to get out this misery. We need to arm ourselves with confidence and fight the negativity that has plagued our lives. A decision has to be made. What I have personally realized that being indecisive is far worse than making a decision, even it turns out a wrong decision. A wrong decision can teach you something but being indecisive will only drain out your happiness by keeping you overwhelmed with confusion. Being indecisive is analogous to a situation when something is stuck in your neck and you don’t know if you should swallow it or spit it out and you are not able to do any of these.

The beauty of the world is often explored through the darkest caves and bottomless valleys. 'Death' is the only fear in this world. All other fears are just its reflection. Remembering death makes us realize the mortality and insignificance of our life. Death is very similar to fire - deadly but useful. Death makes all problems in life so minuscule and meaningless. Only by accepting and realizing the impermanence of life, we can be brave enough, be honest, and truthful to us and to others.

Misanthropist

There are moments when I find myself no less than a misanthropist, especially, after a rough timing with people. The innate selfishness driven with opportunistic trait attributes the majority of people and it often creates a doubt whether all those people who we see as good and others as bad have just difference of opportunity and fear. Morality often seems to fall apart falsifying the universality and Sat, Chit, Anand view of Human character. It is intriguing to see how we construe our own code of morality, though, limited in domain to exploit profit without having guilt of contradicting the larger aspect of morality. And there is where ‘Ethics’ comes into picture. After having many encounters in the past some days with people ranging from doctors to Rickshaw-wallas in the streets of Varanasi, I can say to some extent that we, human, are socially and emotionally controlled but selfish people. No doubt, there are instincts quite natural required for our survival who inadvertently lead us to selfish behavior but there are also social needs and emotional feeling like empathy, kindness which regulate our selfish motives. When survival becomes crucial, a person loses all the characteristic of being human. As study suggests, in the time of famine there are certain hormones secreted inside human body which make human to do everything for survival, even killing other people without any remorse. When the rules in the society along with innate kindness of people override these selfish instincts, society become safe and secure. Reducing the insecurity of people for survival and increasing the dependency among people could help in such scenario. 

Time Derivative Of Life

Gazing outside the window from the first floor of scientist hostel, I could feel the wet and cold sensation of wind blowing against my face. The feeling itself has a magical pull which brings myself in present, time and again whenever my mind drifts away in remembering the past and dreaming about future. With each passing time, I am loosing this place and within a month, I would see the place placed just in my memories. These three and half years of my life have witnessed many aspects of life which I am very sure have helped me to get an abstract meaning in rather meaningless world. Success and failure are too vague to define these periods of life as these event of "success" and "failure" consist of many dimensions, in some, they are antithesis of what they are perceived in another.

Little do we know about the end of journey when we start it. With each steps forward we discover a new path promising us to give another view of life. We are presented with the choices we cannot avoid. Choices might bring misery but without choices our journey would be just horizontal. We invite choices rather choices invite us. And it needs persistence and hard work to be awarded by choices. Choices are like twigs of trees where each twig will help us to move upward on the tree. Even though I am sceptical, if there  really exists any scenery other than what I see now. However, I find it as worth trying for at least, it would make my life derivative a non-zero.

Very often, the memories of past defines the path we are about the follow. They impress our mind with EXperiences and sometimes they change our perceptions too. That’s why we don't live a moment, we live a life where past and future are equally present.

I don't know where my thoughts got headed from the time I realized the cold sensation of wind against my face. Perhaps, it became bit philosophical. Though, I would be glad if  it would paint the picture which I was looking at while writing this post.

Quotes:

Often when we are at the verge of success and failure we can see the big lie of glory and much hyped fear of failure- Amit

Time derivative of life, when tends to zero.. Boredom is imminent- Amit

Quotes

1. If you have not made any mistakes in your life, you would not have anything interesting to make other's laugh.
2. Choices engender confusions. But, often out of the confusions, we come to correct decision.
3. The image, we see of others, is always tinted with our own colors.
4. Experience is the additional lens; life rewards us to see the subtlety of life more clearly.
5. In hindsight, justification is often driven by rejection.
6. Happiness and sorrows in life are like poles and zeroes of control system. If positioned correctly, they       make life more happening and responsive.
7. Uniqueness lies in diversity. 
8. Efficiency : Meaning :: Adam Smith : Karl Marx :: Machine : Human
9. To me, an author is just an instrument who amplifies the thoughts and ideas filtered out by his consciousness. The 'bandwidth' of consciousness is critical in such scenario as it largely decides what thoughts and ideas it would amplify. 

Anonymity

Anonymity is a great blessing. It gives you freedom and let you truly be what you are. Even though there are people, who enjoy such freedom in the most conspicuous way, most of the people are not so fortunate to have upbringing which can strengthen them to have ability to face society and culture while being original. For them anonymity is a bliss no matter how cowardly it seems.There can be many argument against anonymity as it somewhat passive and subjective way of living your life without pushing or rebelling against the system which imposes many layers of artificiality over our true being. But the truth is that the labyrinthine structure of social tradition weighs us down and ruins  our confidence to be ourselves. It is not surprising to see that many people don’t even realize how their behaviour is accustomed to the norms of society. From the very beginning of our life, we are disciplined to certain norms. We are told to behold the certain distinction of right and wrong. Little do we know that these criteria are neither absolute nor permanent.  Time comes when we are left to ponder over the contradiction of what we believed and what it really is.

It is said that when we can’t fight, we should hide. I don’t find any feeling of shame in accepting the veracity of this statement. Fighting against system as a person would never have as impact as fighting it with an Idea. Anonymity protects one as an individual and provides a platform where one’s idea can grow, spread and influence the society. This little anomaly in form of idea has the potential to bring out truth by foundering the orthodox norms of society.

Phantoms In The Brain

As an observer's point of view, the world- from a tiny atom to a vast galaxy, seems no less than mystery and apparently can only be comprehended through 'something'that is more mysterious than  mystery itself and when we search for this ‘something’ , nothing seems more reasonable than  our brain- A three pound jelly type structure consisting billions of neurons. There would be times when most of us ponder over the purpose of existence, the feeling of ‘I’ emanating from the deep inside, the observer sitting inside the brain going into a recursion and many more abstract aspects of life. It would not be exaggeration to say that since advent of the existence, these fundamental questions have been searched and what we see today as religion, belief and philosophy are merely by-products of this mysterious expedition.

Some weeks before, I got familiar with the work of the one of most sought neuroscientist of contemporary world, V. S. Ramchadran through his lecture-video on TED where he was describing his experiments with the patient diagnosed with different brain disorders in an attempt to unlock the mystery of brain. It was quite intriguing and interesting. To understand brain is more like a crime investigation where every clue, however small and trivial, should be logically deducted to conclusion with logical consistency of assumption. If someone, Ramchandran’s video on TED and his book “Phantoms in the Brain” made me remember, it was Sherlock Homes and it would not be an exaggeration to crown him as “The Sherlock Homes of Neuroscience”.

A world where the line separating real and imaginary, feeling and substance seems blurred and enigmatic, the book “Phantoms in the brain” not only stimulates with the questions but also provide answers, very much like a scientific explanation with logical consistency that unveils the long-hidden facets related to reciprocity of mind and body.  The simplicity of writing with systematic elucidation is riveting. Once I got hold of book, it took me into a mysterious world where I could relate my electrical circuits very much to the functionality of mind. The question whether the technology is abstraction of mind or understanding of mind is mere widening of our understanding of electrical circuits (pattern-finding-behaviour) is similar to much notorious question- which came first, the egg or hen.

The case-studies of numerous patients described in the book will not only provide the deep insights and complexity of brain but also provide the glimpse of inevitable and indisputable link of mind and body and consequently, it kindles the possibility of a new kind of therapy in medical field in coming future. And, no doubt it emergence in near future might create a paradigm shift. 

Nothing sounds so interesting to me when a book which defines the humour in neurological way and also illustrates the possible reasons behind having a sense of humour exclusively in human-beings is quoted as one of the most funniest and original book (Guardian, Newspaper). The simple experiments devised by V. S. Ramchandran outlines the illusory nature of self. Through intriguing relationship between perception and conception (Blind-Spot), he delves into utter mystery of existence. With Various references of philosophers and scientist like Freud and Darwin, this book provides insights from various dimensions.  

 Read this book, it may hammer your notions of GOD but I am sure it will give you sense of humility- the ultimate purpose of religion, for being an inevitable part of cosmos. Somehow, this book points towards a window from where, I firmly believe, one day we would be able to discern the mysticism and spirituality which are hitherto been perceived as incomprehensible.

Those Umpteen Years

Deep inside my skins

The bluish veins were carrying

My life...cold and entrenched

Equivocally dead

Laughter subdued into restrained

Hollow smile

An innocent heart was seeking to be guile

Belief, hope, trust and love

Seemed just a fantasy...perhaps a pun

This tiresome, tedious and treacherous run

 Was it worthwhile for just a minuscule fun?

Then one day, it knocked my door

It entered; I was lying on the floor

I was pulled apart into two

Detracted into Me and him

I saw those numb dead eyes

I felt the void, the emptiness

Perhaps...in those umpteen years

When it was carrying me

I never loved him...

And in turn, not loved by him.

Swelling Technology & Waning Spirituality

In this era of technological revolution, our efforts are merging towards an absolute control of everything. Just push a button and apparently, everything from lighting, AC, TV or even opening and closing of doors are at our finger tips. Sometimes, I wonder what would be the end of this revolution. Would it be like as we see in Hollywood movies in which they repeatedly show the control of humanity by human-made ROBOTs or would it just start mitigating as everything in nature does after reaching its peak. I cannot say if the evolution followed by revolution is cyclic or linear but a little observation in the changing scenario can provide a substantial clue for coming future.

From the inception of Mankind, religion and science are the two basic structures which have been supporting humanity. If Science feeds you, religion gives you the taste of food. Both are distinct but inevitable for Mankind. The lack of anyone would create havoc in the system.If we go slightly deeper into the realm of science and religion, we acknowledge that comparison of science and technology is pointless. Religion is just an application of spirituality as technology is of Science. Science is journey of outwards and spirituality is of inwards. Science is pursuit of discovering the things which are...But just hidden. It is just like demystifying the unknown. Technology is the exploitation of this hidden knowledge for our use. In a same way, spirituality is a journey of knowing our inner self...the purest form which is aptly described in scriptures...Satya- Chita- Ananda...Religion guides us to embark the journey of inwards. Prayers, worshipping and scriptures are just few applications of spirituality to lead us towards inner self.

Somewhere, in the high decibel and dazzling development of technology, we have become oblivious to the basic structure of technology....Science. On the other side...Religion is also contaminated by preposterous and dogmatic thought which has blurred the true purpose of religion and more often, it is appearing devilishly in the form of war and genocide.  No doubt...Technology is providing a lot of things...But also taking a lot of things...More things are coming in our control...Less controlled we are getting. The incessant pursuit of technology has overshadowed the inquisitiveness of mankind and hence, pursuit of science.

So, where are we leading... towards a path of glorious Mankind or doomed Mankind? It is hard to envisage the future of Mankind but with little interpolation of swelling technology and waning spirituality in the wake of nuclear Bombs...it would not be an exaggeration to say that if your light, AC and door can be controlled by a push switch, presumably the life of whole planet could also be at someone finger tips...and we, who are losing our own conscience in imparting intelligence to steel-bodies...it would be really disastrous and might be, the culmination of Mankind. 

Fluttering-Flames

The fluttering-flames of the candle-light

Was making me breath in and out

As her sparkling face was swinging to shadowy-unknown

An explicable beauty was flowing

Like mesmerizing-rays of dawning sun

When I looked into her deep-dark-dazzling eyes

Could see the burning flame fluttering with her disheartening-sigh

And, the tears, dammed to blaze the flame for long

I know the flame might smoulder my flammable-feelings

Despite... it is the light of flame that shows me a path

A path of purpose, a path of love...

And trust me; even your flames would burn me...

You have my tears...dammed in your eyes

Beauty and Real Beauty

Have you ever felt what sets wings to your emotions as you suddenly exclaim,” What a beautiful thing this is!” For us anything can be beautiful, irrespective of person, place or emotion. Even a tragic movie ends, leaving tears into our eyes and our heart wells out saying it.... beautiful!!

So, really, to define beauty is as difficult as to define ‘point’ in mathematics. However, I would say everything, beautiful which is the object of happiness. But remember, not the source of happiness. The difference of object and source must be understood to appreciate this definition. Let me explain it through example:

When we meet our loved one after a long-time, our eyes become full of tears. We cry...But we feel happiness...I would call it beauty....
But how am I able to witness this beauty? It is because I have already bore the pain of being away from her.
The source of happiness is the pain. But Pain itself is not the happiness.

May be for one person, the clamouring of birds is just noise and for other it is the music of existence. For a same person, a flower seems an ordinary thing at one moment. And at the next moment, it starts appearing a beautiful gift of existence. 

Does it mean that beauty is only in eyes of seer?  Does it mean it is psychological? Does it mean that we have to squeeze the beauty by being in complete awareness? Well, I feel it is.

What makes TajMahal beautiful? What makes a golden sculpture more beautiful than iron sculpture?

When we see an object, we perceive an image in the reflection of many things. Like if we are seeing a historical building, its history and mystery is as important as its infrastructure in judging beauty. 

Even gold and diamond are regarded as beautiful, not only because they are but also due to rarity and usefulness. For a child, I think marble and gold would not make a difference in terms of beauty.  

What makes a woman/man beautiful for man/woman?

It is his/her desire, in the shadow of which they define beauty. Well, sex is an important aspect but it is not the only one; care, compassion, security and many other things plays a vital role in judging the person beautiful. 

He likes SRK( actor) but his liking is just projection of his subtle desire to be like him. He likes Aishwarya because consciously and unconsciously he wants to posses her.

One calls Mother Teresa beautiful, not because her appearance but due to her philanthropic works.

One likes Ferrari not because it looks but it would fill his subtle desire. Now this desire is also product of many things (human instincts).

Why do people consider fairer people more beautiful?

I think it is just conditioning of mind. Black people had been subjected to slavery, humiliation and disgrace for many centuries. Consequently, people’s minds have been conditioned to accept this bitter and atrocious fact even today. It is imperative to ponder as there are some communities where measurement of beauty is just reverse of general thinking. Even Krishna, who is considered as the most beautiful person on earth had dark complexion which itself shows dark was beautiful in the past. Society fills our mind with prejudices and dogmas, in the reflection of which we judge beauty.

What I conclude is when we see an object we judge it according to its attributes in every dimension like history, mystery, pain endured, rarity and usefulness. Beauty is a function of those attributes which are just projection of our desire. 

World would be always discriminated in two parts- beautiful and ugly if we did have desire and conditioned mind. 

Real  beauty...?

As I have not experienced what real beauty is, so at most I can give a hypothetical explanation of real beauty. When one sees an object without any judgement of good or bad; without any history or mystery; without any desire, I think the emotion he feels at that very moment would be Real beauty. And beauty of this assumption lies in the fact that in this way everything would be beautiful. An eternal beauty would be in one’s eyes. This might be the beauty which is explained in our scriptures and is felt by very rare personalities like Buddha (after enlightment).

This is my entry for participating in The Yahoo Dove Real Beauty Contest. Click below to vote me if you liked the post.

Drops

In the serene-still surface of water

When a rain-drop strikes

A ripple flows towards the shore

Leaving behind the circular traces

When sun-light glistens the recurring flow

The sparkling aura seems like infinite lives

Dancing and enjoying in their colourful dresses

With humming melodious tune

Celebrating and welcoming a new one

Now, an indistinguishable part of Whole

It is now scorching rays of sun

Burning and boiling

As if disaster is pushed into million drops of life

Even the tears of all is not suffice to melt the heart of sun

They run; they protect and like a martyr

Sacrifice their life for one another

And now it is night

The cold breezy air is flowing

And letting the tiresome drops relax

And forget all the sorrows, pains and losses

Perhaps getting them ready for new dawn

New life and new fight...

A Melody

My eyes were closed
And my mind empty
Yet I could see
A life, coming in and going out
Through my nostrils, wind-pipe to my stomach
And I could feel my heart humming a melody...
A melody!!...vibrating and resonating my soul
Invigorating me to dance, sing and roll...
And my fingers moving on the key-board
Letting me out the indescribable feeling
Through the words, but in vain
The words were just old...stale...
With every word typed in...It is just past, a memory
Not the feeling...
I wonder if I could hold the feeling
Tightly and cosily
And every time, I did...
I felt the synchronicity loosen down
And my soul fastened

WRITING

Life seems to be shrunk between past and future and when such thing happens, obviously the view of present remains blurred and congested. With tumbling-walk on the road of life and in the hue and cry of expectations and concerns, life seems like a burdened rock tied to neck. It has been long when I heard the voice of myself but now, is it not too late? ...too late to rejuvenate these dead tissues.

With the last line of above paragraph, I felt my thoughts jumbled, my finger seized and emotions dried. I don’t know why and how, but it is none of my business. I just want to feel myself which never releases out due to inexplicable weight of life and I want to see something which I cannot see when I see myself in mirror daily morning.

For me, writing is like seeing and it is also one that vaporizes the grime from my soul. I believe till I can put my fingers on the keyboard or can hold a pen, I would be never blind nor would my soul be too heavy to carry my life.

My Random thoughts

It has been quite long since I have written anything for my blog. Sadly, I have written just one poem in these two months. Sometimes I wonder if it was me who has written so many articles on my blog. Today when I remember how passionate I was for writing during those jobless days I envied of me of those days. The happiness of writing was something I realized late in my life. I owe to writing since it revealed something that was unknown, hidden and suppressed with too many layers of weighing life. It was obviously not something great... if “Great” only means an objective parameter for measuring achievement and accomplishment. But it was self-satisfying, like happiness blossomed through his creative effort.  This feeling is so personal that it creates a charm for self and invigorates our self with beauty, appreciation and sense of accomplishment. Writing teaches a lot. It is the best mirror to see our self. It lets us to ponder over things which seem trivial for others, and most importantly it taught me is to think systematically. It is indeed a joy to see how a systematic approach simplifies a complex problem.

Complexity is just web of simplicity. It just depends how you look into the system. Even the most complex system can be deduced to certain integration of simple systems. Systematic thought is discrete in nature. We can easily see the chunks of independent thought woven with well defined responses of others. I love simplifying things. It is a same force of creativity which guides when a painter simplifies the complexity of countless emotions and undefined ambiance onto such a small canvass or when a writer writes intricate and abstruse feeling into words. Though, it is abstract for others but complete for them. The pursuit of Simplification has been continuing for centuries. Philosophy and science, are actually the way to simplify the seemingly complexity of nature. Formulations of scientific laws are just outcome of these attempts. “Theory of Everything” might be the culmination of scientific ways to simplify things.  But somehow, I feel the quest of simplifying things will be continued till this world exists. 

This all shows how innate the quest for simplifying things is. It is the same thing which ignites a passion for exploring things, questioning systems and facing challenges. It is embedded in Artist’s Creativity as well as scientist’s curiosity.

I have started a blog exclusively for photography. Please go through the link and let me know how you feel about it. 

Blind

It was a fine morning

The songs of birds, the warmth of sun

A divine breeze was blowing

Carrying the fragrance of heaven

I felt so blessed

And tried to open my sleepy eyes

But they were heavy

Too heavy to lift them up

I felt helpless...I cried...I wept

And when those tears rolled out...

They moistened and soften my eyes

With my fingers I pulled my eye lids up

And it was dark...absolute darkness

The warmth, the fragrance, the music

There was nothing...except that abysmal darkness

I cried,” have I become blind? “

And he laughed...No dear, you always were...

But from now you are no longer...

And he switched on the room’s light

 I was no more a blind.

The Day of Eternal Sleep

The Heart- wrenching moments

And the moments of bliss

 Each moment I am becoming new

Peeling out old-rusted-rotten skin

And my heart learns a new more melodious tune

After every tornado of sorrow

And when tears rolls down

They also seep away the blurriness of eyes

I can feel the old, me,

 Becoming new, more and more beautiful

Perhaps life is letting me to my most beautiful day

The day of absolute new, the day of eternal sleep.

Visit my photo-blog @ http://lenseandsensibility.blogspot.com/

Departure

Thoughts flowing through the woven words

Reflected so clearly through the dancing eyes

A life was indeed flowing

Flowing! In between two lives.

In the longitudinal expansion and compression

The silent music was vibrating in the mysterious tune

The bonds inside were loosening

And two lives were centering to a new life.

In the shadow of love, conversely,

Things become brighter and prettier

In the bond of love, conversely

Souls taste the eternal freedom

In the mirror of her eyes

First time I loved myself so deeply

First time I saw “I” vanishing into “We”

First time I felt a drop mingling into Life-Sea

My hands felt a sudden urge to touch her

I felt to say how amazing, adorable she was

But the touch, the words were so petty

Their worldly touch could defile its sanctity

Alas! The night of departure stroked

Ear got deaf and eyes got blurred

It was “Time” who tried to cut the chord

To break the mirror with its mighty sword

I cried oh! Lord

Why did you let me fall in love with her?

If you had to take her away from me

In the reflection of my own sound

I felt her inside my heart

The mirror which I used to hold,

was now dwelling inside my heart.

If Death defines life

Departure derives Love.

Nothingness

 

Fleshes, bones and skin-tones

Boiling emotions, stimulating sensations

I puzzled if I was alone

Who was prone

To this skinny-shallow-hollow perception of life.

In their sizzling-smile and twinkling eyes

Now I can see the hidden lie

That these have been sold out for a price

A price that finally evokes the prejudiced views

And let us feel the inequalities

By rating superiority and inferiority

But if our eyes go beyond this

Superficial-synthetic-simulated wall

We can hear the music of lovely heart

We can see the flowing love

We can feel the divine soul

That cannot be valued by worldly dollars

Or de-valued by being weak and poor

Our senses can be complex and dense

But true love starts from something And goes into NOTHINGNESS… :)

Contradiction

I heard soothing sound of perhaps, those ringing-bells,

Carried by perfumed wind, breezing from those far green dells

An indistinguishable-invisible life was mixed and merged

 And my ignited-dehydrated heart was somehow quenching his thirst

All of sudden, I stood up, danced, laughed and cried

People were in awe and in surprise, standing by side

I felt more incense; more soothing sound

Mesmerized I was, insisted my friends to make a round

They clapped; they sang and I danced, lying on the ground

I saw group of people, clad in white; walking silently and mournfully

Then I suddenly realized, it was not ringing bells but mourning knells

The mourning knells of one are ringing bells for someone

In life, Contradiction is often driven through the integration

 One’s dark-dreary night might be other’s bright-breezy morrow

Even flowers of happiness blossom in the roots of sorrow

Stream of Emotions

In the whirling of emotions

Things start centering inside

There were so many, implicit and explicit

Fictional and real; dirty and Neat

Words are so feeble to let it out

Heart is restless to clear this doubt

When you are delicate inside

An apparent-stoned-layer rounds outside

Might be it is a nature’s way

To resist the hurtful-feelings and to keep it away

Or might be it is a defensive approach

Which disorients your outside and inside so much

You are dumped into saddening-schizophrenic-hell

To hear your own mournful-melancholic knell

Put out the garbage that has choked the stream of emotions

And the layers that have hided your heart from the rejuvenating ray of sun

Love cannot bloom in the drenched-barren-deserted soul

And without ‘love’ you cannot immaculately enact your role

Dear friends...I am going to be again active in Blog-sphere...My Training has been almost completed now. I have been posted in Bangalore...From this weekend I would be in Bangalore...

Cheers!!