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.

A Meeting

A majority of people have never met themselves. They are a complete mystery to themselves and spend no time and effort to solve the mystery. I recently took a quiz to understand my ‘personality’. I don’t know what algorithm was used to discover my personality for me, I don’t know if it was reliable or even safe. Now I think that the time I spent looking outside, asking someone else about who I am and how I am, could’ve been spent asking these questions to myself. Yes, taking a quiz is more convenient and definitely time saving but is it accurate at all? Asking someone else about us, using our five senses, which are all outward looking, is it a reliable way to discover oneself? Before we dig into this, why should we even know ourselves?

Yes, it helps in job interviews but even there our answers are fabricated to suit the needs of the interviewer. I remember borrowing answers to this question from my friends. We were all honest and smart-working with an eye for detail and constantly pushed ourselves to exceed expectations. I am sure we were not the only ones. Of the many problems that such a response would create one is that there will be a vast disconnect between the job requirements and the capability of the candidate. And such responses are then mimicked in our lives as well, creating a vast difference between reality and perception. This not only leaves us confused but also suppresses our potential. A person who doesn’t know himself/herself will never know what they are capable of, what the goal of their life is, what path they should take to be successful in life. They’ll be just a broken log in a flood.

But knowing oneself, the process itself is fascinating. Well, for one, you are bound to find yourself cool. If you don’t then, aren’t you cool enough that you find yourself less cool? Get it? It’s a paradox. Just imagine talking to yourself, looking at yourself, what are you wearing? How are you feeling? How do you look? Ask questions that you would ask a stranger who you want to be friends with. Don’t think before answering, you’ll be fascinated with your own answers. That’s you telling yourself who you are, what you like and dislike, what you want to do, what you are good at and the dreaded interview questions like your strengths and weaknesses. You may write down your answers as well if you like, so you can revisit them later and remind yourself of…well…yourself.

It was one of the best meetings I had when I met myself. A lot of pretensions were cleared and I got to know what I didn’t know that I didn’t know. The ideas by which I had been living my life were shattered and it wasn’t the end of the world. For once, I faced the truth and accepted it without colouring it with my own perceptions. For once, there was no gap between reality and perception and I felt like I had meditated. It was like finding a long lost friend.

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 TRUTH

Do not dwell too deep
Discovering the secrets I keep
You may fall in love no more trusting your God
The way this world is run
If not kept an illusion
You'll find answers to questions yet asked not

An awry smile you'll bear
Which with everyone you'll share
You'll see how soulless you were before
For that enchanting feeling
Of your heart healing
Embraces as The Truth is all you implore

Do not stop your mind
Churning worries of future and behind
A spider entangled in its own web wishing to die
For to live a life of free
Close your eyes and see
The peace as you let each thought just pass by

It's in the nature of your thoughts
Seek problems and make you rot
The Truth frees you from slavery of your mind
The more you live in the now
The less to pain you bow
Not a destination,
Enlightenment is the orign you'll find

A QUANTUM OF BLISS

I haven't seen day
I know not what is sun
With grief sorrow death I play
My favorite toy's a gun

I live in smoke
And one day we'll be one
When a bullet in my blood soaks
And I'll finally see the sun

I kill people I do not know
I kill people I might like
Not knowing the name of my foe
I decide the day he has to die

I'm the one people praise
I'm the one people curse
But once my body in the coffin lays
My memory fades and disappears

Sometimes I wonder why I fight
For the sake of greedy liars
When I can help my people with my might
And raise my land from the scorching pyre

I may be tuff but not a stone
I have a home and people I miss
And before my head is to dirt blown
I pray to God for a quantum of bliss

I WILL BRING YOU HEAVEN

When thunder strikes the world

When your life is caught in swirls

When you're tired and have no cue

Don't worry I'll be there for you

When your eyes rain more than clouds

When no one hears your cries so loud

I will carry you when your feet would not

And protect you when the Gods will not

When you're drowning in sorrow

And have no hope of tomorrow

When you can't walk though so hard you try

I'll give you wings so you can fly

All your griefs I will drink

All your pains I will sink

When with hellish fires you're laden

Down to earth I will bring you heaven

LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL

We see evil

Spread all around us

We see devils

Creating unwanted fuss

A messiah we await

To guide us through sorrow

But when he gets late

We lose hope of a better tomorrow

And then we turn skeptics

Pessimism becomes our religion

We learn to be anti-optimistic

And pollute a merrier vision

But it's we who decides our fate

It's we who guides us through dark

It's we the messiah at the gate

And it's we who's to leave a mark

If poured with kindness

Life becomes beautiful

Let's make the world such a heavenliness

That we're not restricted by any rules

Let's try to be hopeful

Let's be the change we want to see

Because actually is beautiful

It just seems the way we turn out to be

JUST A DREAM

Will there be a world
When kids would laugh the fact
That humans hurt humans
When they look at us back
Will there be a world
With no manufacture of arms
Only beauty wherever you see
Getting charmed by its charms
Will the world ever witness
A boundaryless peace
The land undivided
Air void of evil breeze
Will such a world exist
Or thinking the impossible I seem
No matter if the latter's true
Because it's just, just a dream