Mulakat Khud Se

Din ki khamoshi mein
Raat ke sannate mein
Mulakat hui khud se, jo rubaru hua
Jana kitna tanha chhod diya tha khud ko
Jisse dur bhaga, wo hubahu hua

Mili mujhey khushi aise
Kaha ho apna kisi ne barso baad jaise
Ayi sharm gham ka thaame haath
Jab pehli baar khud se pyar hua

Raund deti hain hawayein zindagi ki
Unhe jo bheed me chala karte hain
Jee to raha tha saalon se main
Khud se milke fir bhi naya janam hua

Bohot tha dar aane wale kal ka mujhey
Wo kal jise mujhey hi banana tha
Jo dekha kal ko khali kitaab sa
Toh jo maine likha, bas wo hua

The New Age

When most people talk about emergence of a new age, it’s quite niche to a particular field or industry. They talk about a new age in science, or food technology, or fashion, transportation, etc. But this article is quite general, encompassing all the aspects of society and all elements that govern our lifestyle. Just like with any change, adaptation will be the only mode of survival.

We can classify the different ages that the human race has gone through as follows:

1) Stone Age

2) Agricultural Age

3) Industrial Age

4) Information Age

5) ‘The New Age’

The Stone Age was dominated by people who knew how to use stones or rocks for different purposes. These people were the most powerful and thus most sought after. The nomads, who could use stones as tools to hunt, make fire and carve, were the leaders and gave direction to human civilisation. Duration: thousands of years.

The Agricultural Age was dominated by people who were good at farming. They got paid a lot, held power and respect. Resources were abundant and humans had realised that the hunter and gatherer model wouldn’t work for long. With the discovery of seeds sprouting into crops, humans stopped consuming seeds directly and instead cultivated land. This helped in human settlement and emergence of civil societies. Duration: a few hundred years.

The Industrial Age was dominated by factory workers. They were in high demand and almost everybody had some income coming from factories. Anybody who wanted to progress in life, had to start his/her own factory and manufacture. Duration: A few decades.

The Information Age is the present age we’re living in. It is believed to have started in the late 1980s with the birth of evolved computing and the Internet. Today, anybody who has information holds power. Data is what all the businesses are after.

But the Information Age isn’t going to be the last age in human history. This has partially to do with the fact that humans haven’t been on Earth for a very long time yet and we are clearly still undergoing evolution. And this evolution is not limited to physical attributes; it also includes evolution of the mind, which is evident from the fact that apart from technological and lifestyle advancements, humans have brought in numerous societal reforms and have started to realise the existence of an unexplored being within themselves. Religion is being replaced by spirituality which points to the fact that humans are no longer willing to follow practices blindly. Instead of looking ‘outwards’ for answers, solutions, peace, etc. we are looking ‘inwards’. It would be fair to say, thus, that the material needs are soon being replaced by the emotional and spiritual needs.

Information today is available abundantly. Just a few days back I had read that PhD thesis are available for Rs.30000 in a market in Delhi. Well, if not that then Google’s always there, right? Therefore, although, people having information are powerful today, but their exclusivity is diminishing fast. Due to this, automation is catching up and everything that includes routine tasks is and will be automated, from accounting to medical diagnosis, everything is being automated. The ‘App Revolution’ is a testimony to this fact. There are numerous sources to gather news – newspapers, TV, internet, specialised apps, radio and thanks to the ever evolving communication systems, people can spread news much faster than ever. Information sharing in form of text, images, videos and sound makes sure that information doesn’t lay hidden in one part of the world. In fact, such rapid and abundant sharing of information around the world is laying grounds for the next age which is just a couple of years away. Many businesses have already recognised this and have altered their marketing strategies and many are in the process.

So, what is this new age and what will it bring forth? Like I just pointed out, the ground work for the next age is almost already laid out. People are not just sharing facts now; they are also sharing opinions and viewpoints which always come hand in hand with emotions. The new age will therefore be dominated by people who can commercialize emotions. Duration: I don’t know yet. This age will place those people quite high in demand who can understand human emotions the best, can empathize, are story tellers, designers, all in all great artists. There will be high demand for artists as people would already have all the information they need and thus would jump to the next stage of evolution where the mind will open up to new vistas beyond the structural elements. People will look for and find hidden meanings in everything around them and to do that, one needs to be a true artist. Businesses will need to be able to design marketing strategies which can touch the emotions of their consumers. They will need to back their offerings with high quality designs as competition would’ve already armed its offering with all the functionalities needed. They would need to tell stories through their offerings. For example, if 2 competitors are offering the same drink but one of them says that their product is based on a recipe invented by a little African girl and by buying their product consumers are indirectly helping that little girl earn for her family, which product do you think consumers would prefer? It doesn’t matter what the ingredients are because they are the same in both but it’s the story behind the product that sells it.

Therefore, the new age might make the MFA the new MBA. There’s no point following the herd when you now have the chance to lead one. 

The Philosophy of Science

If you’ve ever felt that the reason for your existence is much more than just the chemistry and biology governing natural organisms, you have at some point pondered about the purpose of life (most probably in the shower). And this must have got you a little excited and in that tiny moment, epiphany strikes and you have got yourself the ultimate life goal. It fills one with energy and one starts to question everything one does. Everything, every activity, has to push one towards that goal. One can already see oneself as the leader of the masses (or a cult), changing the world and making it a better place. But that excitement and energy vanishes with the moment (or lasts for as long as one is in the shower). But history can’t stop boasting of stories in which this excitement and enthusiasm lasted for much longer periods of time, long enough to change the world.

Not all eureka moments have to do something with great discoveries and award winning inventions. The greatest invention on Earth is life and the greatest discovery for any living organism would be to find its purpose. To quote Buddha, ‘The trouble is, you think you have time’ when the fact is that time is passing by every second. A second doesn’t seem like a lot of time when we think that we have hours, days, months and years to live. But it becomes dangerously significant if we think about what can happen in a second. A sperm cell may take a day or so to find the egg, but it takes about a second to fertilise it, thus creating life. When the baby comes out of the womb, it takes a second to cut the umbilical cord, detaching the baby from the mother and welcoming a new creature in this world. The baby can spend years trying to learn to talk, but it is in that one second that the first word is uttered and one of the most powerful tools, speech, takes birth. Same goes with walking and other chores in life. It’s in a second that rings are exchanged and two people become a couple and it’s also in a second that life finally leaves the body. People (including me) waste a lot of time. The amount of time people spend on doing something they love are like moments compared to amount of time spent on doing something they’re not passionate about, or worse, even hate. A passionate musician might have to work as an accountant to support himself but should it be considered a waste of time if he/she spends a minute dreaming about him/her playing an instrument that is moving and touching people around him/her? I’d say working as an accountant is actually a waste of time. Because that way, the musician will never be inspired to use all his/her energy to spend life doing what he/she truly loves.

It is sad to see people thinking that life is about birth, education, job/business, supporting family, dying. Every human being has the responsibility to live a passionate life. And science has sort of started to believe it too. According to quantum mechanics, the state of an electron (particle or wave) depends on the act of measurement or observation. During the double split experiment (please google it, details of this are beyond the scope of this article), the dual nature of electrons was discovered. But what was also discovered was that the electron happened to change its nature depending on whether it was being observed or not. Another surprising discovery was that, whenever and wherever the scientists tried to find the electron, it appeared there and when they didn’t try to find it, it was nowhere. It was as if, the electron existed everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. This means life presents itself the way we want to see it, as a wave or as a particle. Life is everything we believe it to be and is nothing else whatsoever including all the joys and pains. Now, if you apply this principle to your life, you will always find what you really look for and when you’re not looking, there’s nothing to be found. So if you feel that there’s no way that you could follow your passions, look again at yourself. Why can’t you live passionately? Look for that metaphorical electron called will in yourself and you will find why you can and you should.

Now, following one’s dreams seems like a big risk due to fear of failure. What if I don’t make it is the one question that has destroyed more lives than wars. But there’s science here too. According to another concept called entanglement in quantum mechanics, there’s a pair of electrons which are entangled to each other. If separated, even by the distance equal to the width of the universe, the entanglement is strong as ever. This was found to be true in an experiment in which the electrons were separated by a distance of 143 kilometres and were subjected to different physical instances like rotation, movement, stress, etc. The effects on one electron had an effect on the other as well. No matter the distance, the result was the same. One of the reasons behind this could be that before the Big Bang happened, everything in the universe was condensed at one single point. Everything was actually one. The explosion caused the condensed mass to disintegrate and spread away. It’s like a single cake was cut into different pieces. But that doesn’t mean that the pieces are different types of cakes. They are all one. Similarly, everything in the universe is connected, entangled. Every little action we take has an effect. So be afraid, but not of failure. Every action taken towards one’s dream, towards living a life full of passion, will have an effect. Doesn’t matter whether you see the results immediately or not, but the only result that matters is the satisfaction you will receive and the peace that you will experience. You will live a life that you love and love is all that the world needs.

SUREST WAY TO MIRACLES EVERY MOMENT

How many of us believe in miracles? Don’t worry, it’s not going to be a teenage girl’s journal entry. So, how many of us believe in miracles? I guess most of us do, or have started to. The world around us has changed quite dramatically (for the better or worse, depending on perspective) which isn’t so short of a miracle. But how many of us just can’t stop experiencing them every moment? A lot of hands have gone down, haven’t they? (Sorry, I write as if I am speaking to a live audience).

Well, let me tell you, miracles happen every moment. The degree of impact may vary but they do happen. I’m going to give you two examples here of “actual” miracles and then explain how these happen all the time.

Example 1: It’s the peak morning time and as usual I’m waiting for my train at one of the railway stations of Mumbai. The train arrives and before it can halt, people have started jumping in. Now, I am not new to this Sparta like phenomenon and hence I try to get in too. But I’m pushed aside, so hard, that I fall on the platform. I get back up and with the same resolve, I get inside the train and guess what, find myself a seat. A true miracle, any Mumbaikar would say.

Example 2: I and my flatmate have rented a new house in Mumbai. The owner asks us to meet him at short notice. Due to his insistence we leave early from office only to wait for him for 2 hours at the meeting point. He arrives with a list of questions (literally) and the viva begins. From his questions it’s clear that he thinks of us no less than a bunch of underground gangsta rappers. His broker brings up a clause to be included in the rent agreement which I and my flatmate are not comfortable with, but will doubly protect the interests of the owner. He asks his broker to not force the clause on us. A miracle!

Now, these 2 incidents may seem like a miracle because as laymen, we understand miracles to be unexpected welcome events which do not happen all the time. Well, by that definition, isn’t the non-occurrence of certain events which do not happen all the time, miracles too? Non-occurrence of earthquakes or other natural calamities? Non-occurrence of a terrorist attack at some place? These do not happen all the time and their non-occurrence causes a welcome event. Imagine your flight is about to land and there’s an earthquake on the runway. This is not a miracle, it’s an unfortunate event. But the non-occurrence of such an event would cause a welcome event of a smooth landing. But yet, we don’t call a smooth landing a miracle either. That’s because, we give far too much importance to rarely occurring welcome events as compared to others. The significance of common welcome events is so less that we’re not even aware of them. Isn’t it a miracle that you’re breathing right now? You’re not aware of it, you’re not even trying, but you are alive. Isn’t it a miracle that your dog, who’s probably stronger and more agile than you, is your loyal friend and not a predator who can eat you when you’re sleeping? Yes, dogs are programmed that way by nature (and genetic engineering) but aren’t all miracles? Isn’t it a miracle that the human race is still going strong, after two world wars and so many others? Isn’t it a miracle how Earth has all the life supporting elements in the exact right amounts? Isn’t it a miracle that you’re on the beach and there’s no tsunami? Isn’t it a miracle that your breathing doesn’t suddenly stop? Or despite all the terrorism, which has been occurring since decades, you’re feeling safe right now?

We’ve never acknowledged these things, have we? Why? Because we take the present for granted, despite it being a very serious thing, the only true thing. We’re obsessed with the future. It takes a major event, a jolt perhaps, to make us realise the importance of the present. The present is the only moment we have all the control over. We’re losing control every moment and we don’t know if we’ll still have it in the next. But in the present moment, we are completely in control. It’s not bad to plan for the future, but to live in it, that’s terrible. That’s like Virat Kohli worrying about the ICC 2019 World Cup because he may have to lead the Indian Cricket team then. One doesn’t make 24 international hundreds in 161 innings worrying like that. Even this is a miracle.

To conclude, miracles are happening every moment because every moment is happening for us. There would be no miracle if we were dead. Being alive is a miracle itself with all the wars, terrorism, diseases, stress and so much more. The only way to witness miracles every moment is to live every moment. Mere acknowledgement of every moment will surely cause a miracle, because miracles don’t happen once in a while, they happen when you look for them, just like the electron in the double slit experiment. Sorry, getting off topic here. So, the surest way to witness miracles every moment is to acknowledge every moment by being in the present.

THE HALLUCINATING HUMAN BEING

So, I was watching Bajirao Mastani last weekend and just when I was about to doze off, as the climax approached, the last scene of the movie really connected with me. Now, before some of you start to defend the movie, let me just clear the air by saying that I am not going to write a review of the movie. This article is not about that. I respect your opinions if you liked the movie (I am not intolerant, you see?) and agree with you if you think a 30 minute story was over-stretched into a 2 and half hour movie. So, let’s get to the point, shall we? Warning: Spoiler alert!

           

            In the last scene, the sick Bajirao runs in the river (I think Godavari) on seeing a cavalry approaching to kill him. The horses are running on water like it’s a small puddle and suddenly there are even flaming arrows coming from the skies. Bajirao is hit by a few of them and they light fire on water. He is also cut with swords by the men on horses. It’s real, quite real for him. He has in his hand his metallic belt like sword swaying and is fighting the cavalry but in vain. His attacks have no effect on neither the horses nor the men sitting on them. He swings his weapon on one of the enemies and the horse just passes through to an unclear destination, like the warrior in the river didn’t exist. Bajirao tries to fight and avoid the flaming arrows but they hit him but don’t really hurt him. He stops swinging after a while. At a distance, his wife, Kashi, looks at her husband swinging his sword madly at an invisible object. The whole world is peaceful except her husband. Bajirao soon realises the truth and the cavalry disappears. The arrows and the fire on the river disappear too. Bajirao is laughing. He is laughing as crazily as he was swinging his sword at, well, nothing. He’s realised the truth and that how crazy he was before. He is liberated and quite literally soon after, from life. Wouldn’t you feel liberated too? What if the job that you hate so much but have to do it every day, was a hallucination? Would this knowledge liberate you? What if the fact that your father doesn’t understand you, is just a hallucination you’ve been making real? What if your financial problems were a hallucination? What if that nagging girlfriend was a hallucination or that insecure boyfriend was? Not only your problems, the good stuff in life can be a hallucination too. That iphone worth almost half a lac (50,000), your dream house, your bank balance, the care free life that you enjoy, it’s all a hallucination.

            So why is it a hallucination? Feels pretty real, doesn’t it? It feels real to everybody else too, so how is it a hallucination? The answer to this is in the question, what’s real? Nothing is real. Nothing is absence of everything. I know it’s a basic definition and there’s nothing epiphany-like in it but have we really tried to understand this definition? Do you know when you get nothing? Alright, I’ll give you nothing right now. You ready? Just imagine this and go slow. The chair or bed that you’re sitting on isn’t there. There’s no table either. There are no walls around you. The clothes that you own, including the ones that you’re wearing right now, don’t exist. Your glasses (if you use a pair) don’t exist either. There are no bed sheets, pillows, blankets, footwear, bathroom supplies, food, trees, plants, animals, other human beings, grass, insects, birds, buildings, vehicles, not even air. There’s no Earth or other planets and satellites. This computer isn’t there either. It’s just you in this entire universe. You look around and it’s all dark, black. There’s no sense of direction or speed as there’s nothing to compare these two dimensions with. There’s a black out and that’s all there is, forever. You’re floating but you don’t know whether you’re moving or not and if you are then towards what or in which direction. Is this Nothing? No. Now, imagine that you don’t exist either. Now we have Nothing. Everything is absent, nothing is present. This is real. A blank canvas, an empty notebook. The moment you paint, the moment you write, is the second stage of hallucination. The first stage being, your existence. The moment you acknowledge your own existence, you start to hallucinate. This is so because, you start to create meaning out of your existence. Of course, you’re a baby initially so you accept the meanings that are told to you by others and as you grow, the basis of meanings created by you, are the ones that you had accepted before. Nobody is born an Indian or a Hindu or Muslim but these identities are labelled upon us and we are taught, really well, how to hallucinate. Some hallucinate about engineering, some about medicine, some about flying a plane and more. We create meanings as if they are permanent, we create rules as if they have been the governing force of all mankind, as if the ‘Gods’ want us to follow these rules. We also create a God and worship our creation as if it is our creator. It is all an hallucination.

            So, if this so and nothing is real, then how do we get out of this hallucination and reach that reality? There is just one way, death! All the great saints, sadhus and babas are aware of this hallucination but are still a part of it. This is so because we are not meant to escape this phenomenon and neither should we try to. We are meant to realise that we’re hallucinating but we can’t escape it. But the realisation does put our hearts at ease, doesn’t it? Knowing that everything around us is not real, it is all a figment of our own imagination and creation, gives us some degree of power. The fact that your partner is upset with you, is your own creation and thus you can change this fact. How? That’s a question only you can answer as it’s your creation but nothing is permanent. You create everything and you have the power to create whatever you want, it’s your blank canvas, your empty notebook. You may not know how to paint and write yet, but practice and you will be a great painter like Buddha or a great writer like Krishna, Christ or the Prophet. We call them Gods but they were all just normal humans like us, hallucinating but always aware of this fact and they created what we know about them today. They knew that they can’t escape the hallucination but what they could do was hallucinate about what they desired. And this is exactly what we need to do today. This doesn’t mean that we sit all day just imagining stuff. When you hallucinate, the hallucination is so real that it alters your actions. Therefore, whatever we desire, should reflect in our actions. If you want to be rich, your actions should be such that you’re getting richer. Rich people work hard (unless you’re Mukesh Ambani’s son) and they plan everything amongst a lot of other actions that they take. If you want to be famous, do something that makes you famous. Whatever it is that you want, take actions to hallucinate about that reality. In the end, none of it is going to last but for as long as you’re lasting, create for yourself that you wish could last forever.