Humanity First

                These are times when India is facing a bit more number of threats to its sovereignty than we’re probably used to. At least as far as my knowledge goes, I haven’t seen the media report Chinese and Pakistani incursions or any other threats from these countries at the same time. Also, the internal security challenges aren’t on the decline either. It’s as though we’re disintegrating, we’re recognising our differences but these external threats are keeping us somehow weakly glued. I recently read in an article the divide between Hindus and Muslims, North Indians and South Indians and between other social groups is increasing. The ‘Unity in Diversity’ has been remained to a bookish phrase. Is this a problem? I say yes. Is there a solution? Yes, but trying to forget our differences and suddenly unite won’t help. It will never even happen. If the branches start to dry up, perhaps the roots need to be diagnosed.

                As a kid I had a read a story about two pen pals, one from India and another from Japan. In one of the letters, the Indian friend writes that in India, people are Indians first and then Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Jains, Sikhs, etc. It’s a good start and we can go a step further. The BJP too should be appreciated for positioning themselves as a party of development instead of religion and caste (I am not a bhakt). I think instead of saying that we are Indians first and then whatever our religions may be, perhaps we should not talk about our religions at all. Religions were not created by a God. They are human inventions, meant to moralise the society. They are just a guideline to living but they’ve now become fearful forces. As long as I respect you, does it matter how I do it? By bowing down to you with my hands folded or with a handshake? As long as I don’t eat from your plate and leave you starving, does it matter what I eat and how much of it? Does it matter what I wear or how I speak? It actually does matter, though it shouldn’t. And it will continue to matter for as long as we have multiple religions in the world. This is one of the fundamental flaws of our society. The other being the root cause behind division of Earth. Well, it’s needed for administrative purposes, but that’s not the reason it was done. The real cause behind this division is greed. Greed of one particular person or a handful who’ve managed to brain wash the masses into believing their so called just cause. Now, one can’t really eradicate greed, it’s a part of human nature but what one can do is be a human being before being any other thing. By putting humanity before nationalities and religion will help solve a great deal of our problems. Believing that we’re human beings first and then Indians, Pakistanis, Chinese, Americans, etc. will reduce the number of wars to a great extent if not erase them completely. Would we really need religion then? Wouldn’t it make God happier to see that we’re following the principles of humanity, we’re doing what basically every religions asks for instead of praying? Or his God so egomaniacal that he/she would punish us for not praying? And when we think of God, wasn’t he/she created by us humans too? The basic problem lies in our incapability to accept opinions different from ours. We classify everything into good and bad, whereas opinions are just opinions. But this is a deeper problem, perhaps at the DNA level and hence it’ll take us centuries to even try to resolve it but we can find a common ground today. The common ground of all of us being human beings. Because what really classifies a person into a particular religion was created by humans. It did not occur naturally. The clothes we wear, the languages we speak, our names, our grooming habits were all created by humans. What did occur naturally was birth of a human being. A baby isn’t born with a particular religion, he/she is just born a human being. Perhaps it’s time to look back at our roots, look back to what really defines us, our humanly created differences or the common ground of humanity.

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.

THE SUPREME RELIGION

There has been growing religious intolerance in India which is a matter of high concern. It’s more of an issue about self-expression but I’ll stick to the religious front for now. So, as you can tell by the title of the post, I am going to be talking about my religion and I know that it is the most righteous and supreme religion there is. Let the judging begin!

First, let’s understand religion. A religion is an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence (Wikipedia). Notice the use of the words beliefs and views. Since when did beliefs and views start being right or wrong? There always is a context in which a belief or a view is right and there always is a context in which they are wrong. My perception will depend on the context I place that belief or view. Thus, if I decide that a particular belief or view is wrong/right, there’s no problem with the belief or view, there’s a problem with my context. I may choose to follow/not follow a belief or view but at the same time, I need to be aware that there is always a different context in which the same belief or view must not be followed/followed. This is what my religion preaches. Also, by the given definition it is clear that religions are made to guide humanity; they are made FOR humanity and not vice-versa. This implies that if a particular custom or tradition no longer benefits the society, doesn’t advance it or make the society a healthier place to live in, then that particular custom or tradition should be done away with. It’s good to ask why; Newton did it and look where we are today. This is what my religion preaches and no, Newton isn’t my prophet. My religion asks me to listen to both sides of a story before arriving at a conclusion. It says that if I do not do away with my tradition of observing Earth only from the ground, I am never going to change my context and discover that the Earth is round and not flat. At the same time, I have to respect the person who believes the earth to be flat because he/she has never gotten off the ground.

My religion doesn’t make terrorists. I know you believe yours doesn’t either but have you really been following your religion? We all believe that terrorists are people who kill other people in the name of religion. So, are those people who kill other people in the name of cow slaughter not terrorists? People who kill other people because they ate another animal for dinner, or consumed alcohol legally not terrorists? They are all idiots (there’s a much different word for them in Hindi, starts with C). Aren’t those people idiots who choose to kill a guy and a girl just because they were holding hands, despite being of ‘different’ castes? Or worse, decided to marry each other? We all know who these people are, but there are a lot many, whom we do not know. There are a lot many who do not know themselves either. Do we understand what killing is? Death is just a step, before the last one, in the process of killing. Killing starts with desire, an intense desire to get away from a person. The second step is intention, in which desire manifests itself into a strong belief. Then comes decision, which encompasses planning, followed by action. Death follows action and the last step is to erase that person from our minds, soul and spirit, completely. If you have tried to avoid a person with a long beard, you’ve completed the first step of killing and become a terrorist. If you’ve judged a person with a turban, you’re a terrorist. If you have had any apprehensions about anybody based on their appearance, beliefs and views, you my friend, are a terrorist. I know you’re not causing death but like I explained before, smaller steps before death, lead to it. It’s good that you stop at the first step but you did take a step, didn’t you, however small it may be. A story isn’t complete unless you’ve read every word of it, however small it may be. An engine won’t work unless it has all the required parts, however small they may be. A drop will enrich an ocean, however small it may be. A negative thought will corrupt the mind, however small it may be.

Before the big bang happened, everything was collected at one singularity. After the big bang, that singularity exploded into different parts of the universe but all those parts were actually one before. The earth, moon, sun, all the asteroids, water, plants, animals, you and I, we were all one. Consider a cake is kept on a table. Looks delicious doesn’t it? You want to eat it? Go ahead cut it. Now, the piece that you’re holding, is it a different cake from the cake that’s on the table? If I cut the cake into 10 different pieces, are those 10 pieces different cakes? Now, I place each piece in a different room, have they become different yet? They are all the same cake, aren’t they? Then how are you and I different? We were all one cake billions of years ago, weren’t we? We look different because we got cut differently, or because perhaps you got the cherry on top and I didn’t. But we’re the same. There is an energy that is holding us together and it’s this energy that doesn’t let us cross the first step of killing. Sadly, some people can’t feel that energy anymore but we can all try emanating that energy towards them, can’t we? The energy called, love. And love, if is not unconditional, it’s not love, it’s a contract, an agreement. This is what my religion preaches. My religion called, Humanity.

THE EMPTY AND MEANINGLESS LIFE

Do you ever wonder how life got so complicated? Do you ever wish for simplicity in life, just like it was when we were kids? By the way kids today have a pretty complicated life themselves so, just think it over, but you get the point, right? I sometimes think about my purpose in life; how the universe is perhaps trying to teach me, train me for a better life ahead. Do you think about it too? Do you also try to understand the meaning of it all? If yes, you’re complicating life, my friend.

The day you were born, life started to become complicated. You were told you were born on a particular day of the particular month of the particular year. Who made these days, months and years? You were told that the building you were born in is called hospital. You were told that you came out of a tiny hole called a vagina. You were told that your name is this or that. You were told that going to school, respecting elders, loving one another, following etiquette, etc. is expected and is good. You were told everything. Do you remember questioning a lot of these rules as a kid? But then you stopped, because you started to make sense of it, rather, you started to get the ‘meaning’ behind all this. If there were things that couldn’t be explained with logic, you assigned the meaning of supernatural or religion to it. But everything had to have a meaning. There’s a little voice in the back of our heads that just can’t stop creating meaning out of everything. Even right now. As you’re reading this article, your little voice is asking, ‘Where is this article going?’, ‘Is the writer going to make any sense at any point at all?’, ‘What does all this mean?’, ‘What am I thinking now?’, etc.

Doesn’t your mind start racing if your girlfriend/boyfriend doesn’t call you when he/she is supposed to? Some of us are relieved but some are having crazy thoughts too, right? We are trying to ‘connect the dots’ like Sherlock and trying to arrive at a logical decision. Did you know that the word decision has its roots in the Latin word cide which means to kill off? So when we make a decision, we’re actually killing off all other options, all other views, all other possibilities. If one day your boss starts to treat you nicely, what does your mind say? It may say a lot of stuff but it can’t stop assigning a meaning to it. And that’s where you get all of life’s complications.

Quantum physics has proved that everything is an illusion. In many experiments it’s been found that an electron is not present where it is present, but where the scientists look for it, i.e., they saw the electron wherever they looked. On a macro level, it means that life doesn’t exhibit what’s true; it exhibits what we believe to be true. We see what we want to see, we hear what we want to hear, we feel what we want to feel and we live what we want to live. Take a second, let it sink. You would now realise that life isn’t controlling you, you’re controlling life, I mean the little voice in your head is. Terminator: The Judgment Day put it quite rightly, ‘NO FATE’ (well said James Cameron, well said). Do you see that life is what you make of it? It is what you create. You will always see the electron where you want to see it.

So what happens if the little voice in your head is no longer controlling you? I say no longer controlling because it can never shut up, unless you’re dead. So, what happens if you stop making stories, stop assuming stuff, stop trying to create meaning out of everything? What happens if you stop looking for the electron? What would you see? Think for a minute before reading further, because if you get this, you’re going to be a changed person. So, what do you see if you stop looking for the electron which appears to be wherever you try to look for it? Nothing! You see nothing. On a macro level, if you stop creating meaning out of everything, life becomes simple and simple and simple unless it comes down to Nothing. And that’s what life is, Nothing. Without self created meaning, assumptions and guesses, it indeed is nothing. Life is empty and meaningless. It sounds sad but it is actually true and the most joyous realisations of my life. Now that I know that life is empty and meaningless, I have all the space in the universe to create whatever I want to create. Of course I will listen to the little voice in my head and create meaning but I would no longer be bound by it. I would always be aware that in the end, there truly is Nothing that exists. Therefore, you are what you want to be. The meaning of life that you had been searching for all your life is yet to be created and guess who is the creator, YOU!

A STUDENT'S KRYPTONITE

I spent four years trying to understand the significance of treating students as lambs and teachers as shepherds. Well, corrupted shepherds of course. And what I understood is that there's nothing to understand. Authorities may continue to speculate modern classrooms as ancient ashrams but that doesn't change the fact that teachers today are no Valmikis or Vyass and no student is an Eklavya or an Aruni. There are exceptions of course and in such cases, the speculative student-teacher relationship need not be enforced; it builds up by itself.

It just feels wrong when a teacher repeats what the books say but behaves as if it's their own hard work of million years, by yelling and mocking students. Whatever happened to, "learning is a two way concept" and "teaching is learning twice".

A teacher's entry in a classroom has become synonymous for dozing time for me. He/she is like an agent armed with notes, mostly digital these days, an authority and the most powerful weapon, the attendance register. No matter how hard you're hit by the sleep bullet, you have to cut off your eye lids or risk being killed by shortage of attendance, a student's Kryptonite. Wouldn't it be a lot better if teachers and students were more like friends? Because c'mon, we all have that one teacher who we all know, including himself/herself, needs more tutorship than his/her students. And the true, learned teachers might become the best friends we ever had with their moral support and guidance.

If colleges really want to create intelligent and independent professionals, how about some independence from the learning stage. Sure we'll screw up but it's the screwing up today that helps you make up a "screwed-up"less future. 

CHANGE

All we need is a change sometimes
A break, a void from our daily crimes

When the stinking carcass of love
That we didn't deserve
Rots amidst lacerated hearts
Look within your soul
Abusing a gifted control
Perhaps there still lie purer parts

On no food we feed
Driven by our greed
Wealth the new deity in Godtown
With betrayal the new blood
Killing is a cud
We do it easy, with no frown

But karma is a bitch
Pushes you into a ditch
Like a buffoon you start to wonder
What went wrong
It was merry all along
And you blame Him for your blunder

But our soul has a sinless side
Something we all like to hide
If only we uncap its shine
Acknowledge the beauty so sublime
Because all we need is a change sometimes
A break, a void from our daily crimes

PARENTS - THE REAL GODS

Almost every Indian must have watched the movies Baghban and Rajiv Bhatia a.k.a Akshay Kumar's 100th movie, Waqt. This article's something like those movies.

A 20 year old boy went up to a sage of high repute and said to him, "I'm tired of this mortal world, I want freedom from the circle of life. Please help me attain enlightenment and I promise I will give up all worldly distractions and take haven in the Lord's feet for He's the only one I seek." expecting a pleasant and proud smile from the sage, the young lad bowed his head and touched the Brahmin's feet.

"Then why are you running away from Him," replied the sage, "He lives right with you in your house and you have come to me seeking Him? Your old parents need you at this stage and if you support them He will come asking for you. So, don't be a fool, go back and serve your parents as they are the ones because of whom you exist."The lad was surprised and dejected. Naturally, he had to leave having learnt a BASIC lesson.

There are four reasons why parents are equivalent to God or sometimes greater than Him too:

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  God helps those, who help themselves. But parents do and will always help you no matter what you may or may not do.
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  God is the creator of all things including you. Parents are my creators and if it weren't for them, all creations of God would've been a waste for me as I wouldn't have existed to relish them.
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  You have to pray day and night rigorously to please God. It's very difficult to please Him and He has a tendency to sometimes answer our prayers a bit late when it's no longer needed. But parents are there for you whenever and wherever you need them. You don't have to do anything to please them, you don't have to fast for days or make any sacrifices and unlike God they never doubt your affection by testing you at every stage of life. Parents don't write down your faults and mistakes anywhere and then evaluate you at the end of the day. They understand that you're human and as long as you are learning from your mistakes they never bother you with your faults, so unlike God.
• 
  
  If we are all children of God, why does he have to make us and then see us suffer through our lives and then put us under the fear of whether we're going to Hell or Heaven? Why does he rejoice in killing his own children and even when he knows what is going to happen next, he sits in Heaven and just watches the old movie over and over again? If he really is so powerful why can't he destroy the evil and rid the earth of so much nuisance. Further more, why does he have to, in the first place, create demons and other evil structures? He loves it when people cry out His name in agony. He's just a selfish arrogant piece of our imagination. Does any of this hold true for the beings addressed by the first word of the article's title?

Another name for Him comes from the phrase, 'the one who forgives' but is it really true? When you see someone suffering they say he's paying the price for his/her misdeeds. But if God really forgives all the sins why not this time? Why do all things He does which we cannot comprehend have to be covered up with the blanket of the word Maya? Why can't he uncover all his mysteries and let us know about them if we really are the dearest to Him? Why does he have to disguise himself if he ever comes down to earth? What's the harm if we see him in his true avatar, don't we deserve to see our true parent?

There are hundreds of more questions which scream that God is just an imagination and His true form exists only in parents. They may not know any magic or cast any illusion upon us but they are the only ones who have sacrificed their blood for us and for those who are a staunch believers of God, all holy scriptures give account of the holiness of one's parents. Even Lord Rama used to touch His parents' feet.

The relation between a parent and the child doesn't end at any stage of life. The souls of the parents and their children are connected with a such a strong bond that it may be weakened but it's impossible to break it completely. There have been instances of people killing their parents but it's an undeniable fact that they do regret it now or will at some point in the future because nobody has the capability to love you as much as your parents do. No matter how strong a person is, his/her child(ren) are always his weakness and it's the duty of the children to be their strengths too. We shouldn't be a liability, we should be an asset.

A person can win all the wars but the war he/she fights against his own child. Akbar, one of the greatest emperor's in the history of India lost to his own son Jahangir who went on to be defeated by his son Shah Jahan and Shah Jahan in turn lost to Aurangzeb. Even in Mahabharata, Duryodhan was able to manipulate his blind father, the king of Hastinapur, at his own will. We having read and understood a lot from history should be knowing what we ought to do but that really is not the case. We tend to forget our parents once we find a good job and settle down with our families. We forget that our family is incomplete without our parents, we are incomplete with our parents and we owe our lives to them. Today, it becomes a burden for a person if he/she has to take his/her ill mother/father to a doctor everyday forgetting that his/her mother woke up the whole night when he/she was sick during childhood. A person can go on tours with his/her wife/husband and children but will never take his/her parents with him/her. We have to realise that all visits to places of pilgrimage are useless unless we learn to respect and love our parents. Then there wouldn't be any need to take up any such visit as God is residing right with us under a common roof.

So it's time we realise that our parents are priceless and no matter how much we do for them, it's never going to be enough. They are the real God we should be worshipping.

Lord Rama tells Sita at a point in Ramayana: "Obedience to parents is the greatest Dharma".

WAKE UP!

We all do believe there is some super natural power controlling the whole universe. There is something undiscovered by and probably beyond the reach of science that is manipulating the universal objects.

"Space weather forecasting is still in its infancy," said director of NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center in Colorado Mr.Thomas Bogdan (for details click here). Well, considering the vast expanse of the universe and its hidden, but open, chambers of secrets, weather forecasting will never attain puberty. I'm not trying to be a pessimist here by downgrading Mr.Bogdan, I'm just trying to make a point that some secrets, some cycles, some elements and some phenomena are beyond human capability......right now. We humans have the capability to uncover all secrets and hidden messages, but is it really us? Is it really our own intelligence that is helping us become the most powerful species ever in the history of Earth? Is there a possibility that someone is only manipulating our lives and we're nothing but mere pawns of the game he's been playing with us since our advent on this planet? Here are some facts which say we're just a bunch of over rated mammals.

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  We hardly have any idea about extra-terrestrial life.
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  There are many unsolved mysteries about our home planet itself.
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  There are loads of uncovered mysteries about the HUMAN BODY.
• 
  
  We maybe the most intelligent species on earth but there's no denying the fact that we're making rapid progress towards our own extinction.
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  We're are the only species who kill for purposes other than food and defense (can someone forward this to Osama?).

No matter how advanced we are, if the earth has to come to an end in 2012 or if the blackout in 2013 has to occur, we by no means can stop these phenomena just like the tsunami of 2004.

These facts coupled with some more like, our inability to gain knowledge of man-made or natural disasters before they occur or atleast take precautionary measures, make us just another species to rule planet earth like the rulers of the jurassic period. The only difference is that they had physical strength and we have brains. But are we really using our brains effectively?

Is it too late to shed our ego and live with nature, not as its counterpart, but as its part? It's never too late (exceptions are always there guys). It would be a bit difficult to cut down on carbon emmision, a bit tiresome to plant a tree once a month, a bit 'anti-religious' (to all so called jihadis) to not kill anyone and a bit strange to live up to the meaning of 'Humanity', the word which sounds so hypothetical today, but c'mon we all have the incredible ability to adapt to any given situation. A few weeks of following 'Humanity' will turn us human and who knows, maybe the next Satya-yuga, from the Hindu scriptures, is just round the corner. If we all adapt to the actual meaning of 'Humanity' there would be a majority of us treading the right path and the minority will we compelled to follow us. This requires initiative and in the beginning there would be some resistance but isn't a peaceful world desired by us all? To quote Gandhi, "be the change you want to see in the world."

I know what I just said is nothing new and it's something realised by all long long back, but that's exactly what I'm saying. We have only realised what we ought to do but we've not acted on it. Maybe it's high time we stop dreaming, of daisies swaying along with the wind in spring, the sun shining turning everything its light touches into gold and children playing happily in the fields like there is nothing they have to be worried about. Artists have been dreaming about a world like this since ages. They have shown us our destination and it's time to wake up and catch the first flight for such a world. The soldiers fighting in Iraq, in Afghanistan, on the Indo-Pak border and at many other parts of the world have a life too. They have a family who prays each moment for their father, husband, son, brother to come home safe, let's give them that. There are still babies taking birth with disabilities and defects in Japan, thanks to the nuke missile from US. Imagine your child or sibling without a limb, imagine him/her without an eye or imagine the worst case of a child born dead. This could all happen to anyone, we're all vulnerable.

What if we're unable to curb our activities harassing the environment? Soon there would be air for sale, 20 bucks for a little bag of Oxygen? Why not? We're selling water today and we've been selling food since ages so why not air? All this feels like a night mare, right? But we can prevent it and nobody needs to tell us how. We're the most intelligent and powerful species on earth and we know we can make the dream of an artist's world come true through a basic action to convert our dreams into reality......wake up!

Love Success...Then Live Your Dreams

So, how many of you love, I mean have a real passion for, what you do? If you are an engineer, do you love being that? If you are a doctor, do you cherish every moment of being a doc? The list can go on. If you love your work, this article is not for you. This is for those who are forcibly, monotonously and reluctantly doing their job. I pity them. Some of them do it for money, some for honor and some are too afraid doing something different. But are they to be really blamed for this? I don’t think so.

Majority, if not all, of the engineering students pursue a career in it only because if the pay at regular intervals or because of their families and parents. I can say this with complete liberty as I am an engineering student myself. It’s all about following the tradition. In our nation, an engineer always dreams of his child becoming an engineer and when he realizes that it is not going to be so, he is heartbroken. Children, on the other hand, are taught to do what their parents tell them to and hence follow the old custom of becoming an engineer or a doctor depending on the tradition of the family. C’mon stop it! India already has the third largest pool of engineers and doctors in the world. There are other fields too like arts and sports, when are we going to raise our standards in them? Imagination is the mother of all invention right? So who can imagine better than an artist? So parents please stop pressurizing your child, let him/her do what he/she loves, because mental satisfaction is the thing we all thrive for and you are always mentally satisfied when you do what you love the most. There is like a war going on between the parents to decide whose child is more intelligent and more likely to do well in science, and the victims of this war are the children. Students should not follow the old traditions if they do not suit them, don’t be scared. Your parents just want you to be successful in life and trust me, if you do what you love you will always be successful. Ask Bill Gates, the man because of whom I can type this article!
But this doesn’t mean children can laze around the whole day saying they love that. Look for a talent, it’s there in everybody you just have to discover it and you will find it while doing your daily chores. But be careful as to not to ignore it. Because when in need, everyone and everything comes handy.
Secondly, people spend their life doing a monotonous job. When they die, they are remembered by their friends and families. But for how long? One year, two years, three years at the most five years, that’s it. Have you forgotten Leonardo-da-vinci or Wright brothers? Have you forgotten Jesus Christ who lived 2009 years ago or king Ashoka who lived 2000 years before Christ? Well, if you ask me these numbers are a little greater than F-I-V-E. Get up, do something so that the world remembers you even after you die. Leave behind a story worth telling, writing and listening. Let your successors live with pride, become their identity. Let your name become immortal, let people name their babies after your name. Let yourself dream of making it big one day. You can do it, everyone can. All you have to do is trust your abilities and yourself. Remember, every stone has the potential to be carved into a masterpiece and every sculptor has the potential to carve it into one.
When you try to do something different, something risky, the society mocks at you. If you still continue, the society tries to make you ‘understand’. If you continue yet, it tries to stop you by hook or by crook. And if you still go on my friend, the society calls you mahatma (great soul). Don’t be scared of being famous and popular, it’s not a sin. You don’t have to be celebrity though. But there are ways of becoming a big person and ultimately popular enough to leave a mark behind. Jack the Ripper was famous and so was Mother Teresa. Hitler was famous and so was Mahatma Gandhi. Do you get my point?
Now, if you combine my above mentioned points, you can become a big person by doing what you love. It is very much possible, just requires patience and hard work, something you require to become an engineer and a doctor too. You have examples from William Shakespeare and J.K Rowling. This proves that if you do what you love you become a great person and you even earn very much. So, I would end up by adding two things.
Do something to make your name immortal after your death and do what you love, otherwise you will end up loving what you do.