August : Osage County

If I like the slow and subtle movies, this one was such an opposing experience, that it left me with something akin to a disturbed hangover. It’s intense, explicitly vituperative and darkly  funny as Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts take you through depths of intense, strong and seemingly ambivalent emotions. The acting is exceptional all the way round, but predominantly woman energy most of the way.

It’s about three sisters, with families, meeting up at their home for the funeral of their father who has committed suicide. They've all grown into their own complex and highly distant lives, and it's all about how they each relate to one another and more to their dominant dysfunctional mother (played brilliantly by Meryl Streep). Everyone seems to be digging claws into the other, and its so explosive, that not just the house, but even the plains of Oklahoma with their stark empty expanse starts to be claustrophobic.

With each caught up in ones own complexities of life, the coming together brings out the most tumultuous and worst of each of them. You could walk away from the movie, glad and relieved that nobody you know is in as bad a situation, but I suppose it also gives you a peep into whats potentially there beneath the surface in anyone too, like if truth be told. 

There was one instance which caught my attention: On the way to receiving their fathers body, Julia Roberts, at that point likely facing death of a close one (she's her fathers pet) for the first time, is telling her fourteen year old, ‘don’t die before me, whatever you do, don’t. You can live whatever life you want, get into trouble, lead any life you want, get messed up, but survive, just don’t die before me….please’. A touching moment there.

And the very next sequence is at the funeral lunch, when soon after the funeral, the same daughter rushes into the house to turn on the TV, and Julia Roberts loses it with her saying ‘you actually were rushing through the funeral, and were so anxious to not stop for a soda I wanted, just so you could make it back to watch phantom of the opera on TV?. And the daughter throws back a nonchalant ‘maybe’. And we get to the farthest from the touching moment of sentiment and liberation to, 'where is your character going? How insensitive are you? Is this what you're learning?' The contrasts of emotions in relationships.

Another sequence that captures depths of anger and remorse, is between Meryl Streep's sister (Margo Matindale) and her husband. (Chris Cooper). They have a son, around mid twenties, a laid back, soft spoken loser kinds, nice loser types, with Margo belittling and humiliating him, and Chris says ‘we’ve been married thirty eight years, and I wouldn’t trade that for anything, but one more mean thing from you and we won’t see through the thirty ninth year.’

Thirty eight years, and a moment of truth to identify and acknowledge a wrong behavior pattern that breaches tolerance thresholds.

Well....it's Relationships, Marriage, Parenting, with its built in drama, suppressions and contradictions maxed out.

A poignant hangover after a tumultuous ride is what this movie was. Either for the emotional complexities of relationships or the brilliant and powerful portrayals, I'd say it's a worthwhile watch.

Our Very Own Cherry Blossom Fest

The city's turned from the brilliant yellow to a pretty pretty pink…..differing hues of pink. All these pictures from the drive home from work yesterday. It’s so pretty that I had to put it in here, like for posterity too.

I'm in total awe, maybe because I'm yet developing a renewed relationship with Bangalore and these apparently little things just so add to the already deeply felt connection. Also, I somehow associate pretty pink flowers with little plants and shrubs. but to see these huge marvelous trees with only pink and not a single leaf is just jaw dropping beauty !! Whoever said, look to nature to see god....I so hear you.

Magical Search for Co-incidence

I post the write up on the purple flowers yesterday morning, and my thoughts are quite naturally flowing in the direction of what it is that makes simple wants come true. Does the thought actually go out there to explore, initiate and steer a course of action? Does a process get going?

Looks like yes. Because the creeper wasn't there earlier, and that's about how long it would have taken for it to grow in.  So if I wanted to be a believer, I'd have to say, it turned direction when I started to want it, and it took these months for it to settle in and now it bloomed. There was a process, it's just that it wasn't me working on the process. The want was working on it.

What's the medium through which thoughts transmit?  What makes them happen simply and what complicates them? A small anecdote comes to mind, one which was sent to me by Prakash, a friend, (thanks there pal) way back, almost twenty years back, which was my first ever exposure and initiation into the power of the mind. 

It was about this woman who was figuring out the kind of guy she wanted in her life. She was like...I want him to be intelligent, I want him to be trusting, I want him to be charming, I want him to be witty, I want him to be good looking, I want him to be a dreamer, I want him to be compassionate.....and in the end she would be like, gosh, this guy is so perfect that I'll never get him. And that one negative thought was the most powerful because while the rest were all wants, the last one was backed by belief, or rather disbelief. So while all her wants were well placed they would not come to be, because she had no faith that they would. You need to have faith in your wants.

The obvious other extreme of the explanation is 'co-incidence'. 

Soon after I post, I'm making my way through all these thoughts, and how they work and stuff and for no known reason I open TED talks and casually browse and I chance upon this talk titled 'magical search for coincidence'. I click on this link. Seriously I wasn't consciously searching, they were just vague thoughts, and it amazed me. I almost felt like I was led.

https://www.ted.com/talks/helder_guimaraes_a_magical_search_for_a_coincidence

Don't know enough about magic to know how it works, how much is manipulation, how much hallucination, skill, hypnosis or whatever, but I do know its as fascinating. I've dabbled a little in magic, the sleight of hand kinds, as a child. Maybe for that, or maybe for the surreal energy based possibilities it enables, it's always been a favorite, even the word itself ... m..a..g..i..c. Love it. And today it seemed to spring out of the laptop and say, 'Ask and You Shall Receive'. Even if it's just gyan, because at that moment I was just looking for, well....direction for thought. Simple wants :)

Simple Joys.....Huge Thanks

Guess it’s the pleasure from the unexpected.

These purple flowers…..these flowers are off a plant that’s growing on a small street abetting my garden. When I moved here I could see the flowers over the fence at a distance, and I so loved the purple that I scoured all possible nurseries to try and get the plant for the garden, but absolutely no luck there. 

So imagine my joy when I wake up one morning to see the flowers blooming way inside the garden. Well,  guess the creeper happened to grow right in through the last few months, and voila, its suddenly blooming in here. Talk about wanting something, and it happening all of its own. Sure brought in the smile....... the simple thrills and joys....and the thanks of course :)

Yet another SELCO story

This is a story of Kumar, a petty vendor, who had a small kiosk selling very basic stuff. 

SELCO facilitated an Integrated Energy Center, enabling him to supply lights to a community of migrant workers. Kumar has expanded this business from an initial 40 lights, to 70 lights within six months, 90 in a year, and to a current 120 lights.

He has also expanded his range of products to include a mobile charging station, a solar freezer and a projector. The freezer enables him to stock milk, curd and cool drinks, and the projector to show movies twice a week.  

He is now a proud and successful business man earning a monthly profit of over Rs.15,000, and rearing to grow, and what's more, all this within 2 years.

The growth story of Kumar’s Enterprise in pictures:

First conversation with Kumar

                                                          Kumar listening intently

Solar Panels on the expanded store

The store after

                                                    Kumar at business

Kumar showing his batteries

The Solar Freezer which enabled a huge shift in status and business

The king of his castle

Crucial Conversations: The What and How of It

All conversations are not equal. Some are Crucial. What makes them Crucial? 

No, not the importance or criticality of the issue.  It’s a conversation which has conflicting opinion and where emotions run high . 

AlSwitzer consultant and coauthor of the bestseller, Crucial Conversations says:

These are conversations that have a disproportionate impact.

Here's an excerpt from a talk of his: An instance in example of disproportionate impact:

In America two million people each year suffer from hospital acquired infections, and fifty thousand of them die . (Can't imagine what that number in India might be). The secret to resolving this was found to be Basic Hand Hygiene. 

However,  knowing the solution didn't resolve it, as the ones who didn't comply were mostly the people in authority, in power, plus it’s a private act so hard to build in accountability. Most hospitals managed a 50% compliance.

One large hospital decided to implement a simple three rule mandate:

· Wash in and out – each time you step into, or out of a patients room you wash your hands

· Accountability – ask when you see (if you see something say something)

· When Reminded, say Thanks and Wash up. Make it safe for people to tell you.

With just these three simple behavior changes, the compliance went up from 50% to 90%.

Disproportionate Impact of a Set of Simple Skills. Also true of crucial conversations. 

There are 3 things we can do when a conversation gets into the crucial mode:

· Avoid, avoid, avoid 

· Face it, and do it badly 

· Face it and do it well

Avoid: while this may seem the simplest, and easiest way to compliance and peace, what we lose in the process could be valuable inputs and diversity.  It’s typically done when we value relationships over results. We maintain status quo by saying good enough is good enough. What it really does is lower the bar. 

Its like having an automobile which can fire on eight cylinders actually fire on five.  

Face it and do it badly: There’s never a perfect balance of power, some people have more power but all people have some power. When you use your power inappropriately, either through position, expertise or even will power, others react the way they can. Feeling belittled, suppressed can have consequences like gossip, sabotage, and such.  In short there are negative consequences.

Face it and do it well; Here's five tips on how

1. Identify when: Notice when the shift is happening, when a conversation is going from a difficult or tricky one into a crucial mode. Observe when the emotions kick in, you'd typically know your own symptoms.  Learn to identify them as they happen. 

2. Use your Best skills: The moment you identify it as a crucial conversation, consciously use your best skills. Don’t withdraw, sulk or yell.  Ask, Listen and Diagnose. 

3. Time out and Reengage: If you keep doing what you’re doing, it’s not going to get you out of there, it could easily go into a negative spiral. At that point it's best to disengage. Let the adrenalin out of your blood. It could take 5 mins, 10 mins , might even need a walk, but come back in ten mins or whenever, and when you come back think of what you really want. Think of the healthy goals. Its not about being right, making peace, its about getting to the goals you want. 

4. We tend to say things the wrong way: Common incorrect approaches - Avoid,  Small talk, Bad Time, Emotions and Conclusions.

Lead with observations and a question and not with emotions and conclusions. It’s a mistake a lot of people make. Our approach presupposes our own conclusions. Lets be open.

5. End the conversation well: Ending well is important to avoid baggage accumulation. Bring in clarity.

All relationships will have problems. The difference between the good and best are how rapidly and how respectfully the problems get solved.

Too Rapid: Happens fast but compromises respect

Too Patient and Empathetic: Happens smooth but compromises quality 

Anytime you see yourself stuck, it means there's a crucial conversation you are not holding or not holding well. Remember, when you see something, say something. Try it, it will be worth the results. Just work on getting it right :)

Sound of Music

The hills fill my heart with the sound of music…….

Just that first opening line...that first scene up in the Austrian Alps, with the brilliant composition from Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein can literally fill your heart and lift it to such a high….

I must have watched this movie, and singing along too....so many times through those growing years, that when I watched yesterday I found I knew each scene and dialogue by heart, yet I enjoyed the movie all over again. 

Some of these creations are just made to last. Julia Andrews and Christopher Plummer, put so much real into the movie, that  though a lot of people think it's sugary and syrupy, I still feel it makes you believe in all the good things in the world.

She waltzes on her way to mass and whistles on the stair, she’s always late to chapel but her penetance is real…

That’s what one can wish for at any point, right? To be oneself in whatever one picks. To be able to find yourself and your meaning in whatever you do.......even when faced with a choice of the heavenly and serene love of penance or the earthy and passionate one for the captain that Maria chooses between. 

It's also got some brilliant poignant and beautiful moments. One of my top favorites and I'd say one of the most romantic by far, is one during the party, at the ball room dance when Julie Andrews is dancing outside with the younger son and Christopher Plummer comes up from behind with a 'May I' and then the dance itself, so much subtlety and depth there. It's one of those.. nothing said.. but everything palpable kinds.

Everything's done so gracefully that you don't get mad at even Eleanor Parker, the Baroness. Even her manipulations seem graceful. I know I'm going overboard, but then it is one of my forever movies :)

There’s an authenticity and quiet confidence in the characters that makes you believe you can..... 'climb every mountain, ford every stream, follow every rainbow........till you find your dream' 

Existentialism

A while back, a casual whats ap chat with a friend, and she’s like, ‘Know what?…. I feel like dying, committing suicide kinds.'  I’m still trying to figure out what to say and she’s like, ‘don’t freak out and all okay, I’m not sad or anything, you know I’m strong like that. Its just that everything seems so purposeless, I'm thinking about it in a nice and positive way only.’

Intense for sure, and lonf as they don't actually go wrong, they are potentially powerful moments of truth and growth.

Sure they are stretched and scary as they push you into new depths and stuff, but I also believe they can be huge enablers. The process of overcoming them is a catharsis of sorts.....an opportunity to question, to seek .......else how do you find. I personally believe that real learning does also come out of deep cathartic moments like these that enable opening up of more layers of oneself, and the opportunity to higher self awareness. It's definitely worked for me.

The discussion then was of course as existential as Existentialism gets.

All of us at some time or the other hit those spaces, right? It comes out of the basic question of…What is life all about? What is the point of existence? Guess some of us go by without asking, some find their own answers, some don't find answers. A formal asking and some profound philosophical thought thereon was what got labeled as Existentialism.

Existentialism was an intriguing branch of philosophy, and it’s while studying it that I fell totally into fascination with Sartre, Nietzche and Albert Camus. If Advaita and Buddhism gave the spiritual direction, it's Existentialism that enabled the creation of ones identity from solely within. That Camus himself eventually committed suicide only added to the ardour at which one devoured existentialism.

                              

Existentialism is defined as a philosophy that emphasizes individual existence, freedom and choice. It is the view that humans define their own meaning in life, and try to make rational decisions despite existing in an irrational universe.

An integral concept of existentialism is Alienation. An alienation from the world as a whole. Camus brings this out well in 'The Stranger'.... how we can feel a stranger in the world. You can’t connect. He delves into how you give life meaning, or you consider suicide and its as meaningful or meaningless as you make it out to be. 

Sartre would say 'existence precedes essence...so we are free to define ourselves as we choose. And Nietzche with How to become who we really are. 

Existence precedes essence for humans essentially means that, in contrast to a designed object such as a penknife – the blueprint and purpose of which pre-exist the actual physical thing – human beings have no pre-established purpose or nature, nor anything that we have to or ought to be. Sartre was an ardent atheist and so believed that there could be no Divine Artisan in whose mind our essential properties had been conceived.

Most importantly, it is the arbitrary act that existentialism finds most objectionable..........that is, when someone or society tries to impose or demand that their beliefs, values, or rules be faithfully accepted and obeyed. Existentialists believe this destroys individualism and makes a person become whatever the people in power desire; thus they are dehumanized and reduced to being an object. Existentialism stresses that a person's judgment is the determining factor for what is to be believed rather than by arbitrary religious or secular world values.

Through them, he opposes the view, which is for instance that of the Freudian theory of the unconscious, that there are psychological factors that are beyond the grasp of our consciousness and thus are potential excuses for certain forms of behavior.

The beauty that comes out of this space is ‘Humans are radically free’

And there’s real freedom when you can live without appeal to anything external, no pointing fingers at the outside. Take full responsibility and find your meaning, and then you’ll find all resentment, the negative fall away.

It's summarized well in Camuss': My Revolt, My Freedom, My Passion.

My Revolt : revolt against anything external, against norms, against nothingness, even against suicide

My Freedom: with central theme being Choice.... assigning my own meaning

My Passion: when you make your own choice, you will draw in a passion, even in the very being, it comes out of awareness and choice and responsibility (no place for self pity as its your decision)

An individual living by these would naturally lend himself to a lot of charisma...a lot of positive, of energy, of faith.

Its about Carpe Diem. Seize the day and be in the moment. 

If you can actually get there, it's such a high authentic zone that life becomes a literal love affair.

Zoopharmacognosy

Strange sounding word? It’s a new (atleast the terms new) field which studies how animals self medicate.

When I watched Madagascar , I was intrigued by one conversation between Melman, the giraffe from the NY zoo and a giraffe in the African wild. If you recall, Melman is a hypochondriacal giraffe who is always getting scans and tests done, and is perpetually on medication, so Melman couldn’t imagine a world without doctors.

Melman: What?? You don't have doctors here? Additional Giraffe: No, we don't. Melman: Well, what if you catch a cold? Additional Giraffe: We go over to the dying holes and we die.

                       

Maybe giraffes don’t self medicate, or maybe that’s how much we know of what they do :)

And today when I read about Zoopharmacognosy, it’s interesting…..like a relearning of preventive medicine that we, as humans, need to level with. 

We’ve all seen (atleast those who have lived with pets), how they clearly self medicate. When they have an upset stomach, they will go and seek out a particular kind of grass, and that's clear indication of something not being right, as dogs or cats otherwise don't even eat grass. Apparently, this grass induces vomiting, and also for that day they just totally stay off food. They seem to naturally understand the issue and its therapy.

Animals seem to know the natural solutions to their problems and even apply them in their daily lives. Several studies have documented survival strategies like these in birds, bees, lizards, elephants and chimps. Yes, a wide range of animals self medicate.  They not only know the illness, they also seem to know the therapeutic constituents in plants.

Apparently, though the evidence is circumstantial, examples are aplenty. It’s like animals have their own pharmacy right in their neighborhood. Red and Green Macaws eat clay to aid digestion. Baboons eat leaves of a certain plant to combat flatworms. Elephants eat certain leaves to induce labour. The monarch butterfly lays its eggs on milkweed, which has anti-parasite properties.

Scientists working in this field are convinced that the future of pharmacy lies here. It’s time we looked at nature more. It seems unfortunate how far away we've moved from the alternate nature based treatments like Ayurveda and Unani. 

In this context Ravi Mantha (heard him when he came to speak at Google) comes to mind. He speaks of the first step in the practice of preventive medicine being the understanding of our bacteria. He argues the case for a unified symbiotic theory of germs and humans, where we see the symbiotic germs not just as partners but as extensions of our own body, fit to be accorded the status of a vital organ. He talks of how most bugs (bacteria) are not just harmless but powerful allies that constantly work to keep our body and mind healthy, and how we seem to be forever on bacteria killing expeditions, be it through sanitizers or disinfectants. 

Harnessing our inner bacteria he calls it. Interesting stuff there. You can read more on www.ravionhealth.com

Bangalore Emblazoned Yellow

It’s almost like God sprayed a yellow paint brush over the city. It’s simply spectacular, and you just can’t miss it............yellow full bloom trees across the city skyscape.

I’m sure at one point or the other, its captivated even the most non discerning eye........ brought a nice feeling into every Bangloreans heart, not just that of the avid tree lovers that Bangalore is also famously known for.

The yellow is so yellow…..full of brightness and energy that it just gets into you and lifts the spirit.

It’s the Tabebuia Argentea…also known as the Tree of Gold. Apparently, it's the European curators of Lal Bagh, William New and John Cameron, who introduced the tabebuias as exotic flowering trees to Bangalore in the late 19th century. We sure have reason to be glad and grateful !!

Being Kind – Ever UnderStated

'The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.' - Samuel Johnson

If there’s one thing that just applies anywhere and everywhere I’d think it’s about ‘being kind’. Just as a way of being.........wherever, whenever, with whoever..... it’s one of those few unconditionals which can only bring about positive. 

One of those sutras that children seem to get to directly and naturally, and one which we, as adults, need to get to consciously. 

When Dhruva got admitted into school in Hyd, in class 3, ( it was the year DPS began in Hyderabad), he gave the inaugural speech in school, and first on his list of what he expected from the school was ‘I want that the teachers be kind’. Back then I thought it was too simplistic, but he was adamant. Now I get it.

The Dalai Lama says: "Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible".

That’s as deep as its simple.

Food for thought…why does it take a ten year old and a Dalai Lama to be telling us this???

Social Influence is Super Powerful.......IF You Let It Be

Here's a nice article on the extent to which Social Influence Impacts Us.

If your best buddy jumped off a bridge, would you jump too? Too often, the answer is yes.

Patients die because nurses and doctors who know better go along with bad decisions. Planes crash because crew members go along with plans they know could kill them. Organizations fail because employees sit on their hands in meetings—going along to get along. Social influence can turn geniuses into fools. However, there’s an easy way out of this trap.

                          

This was demonstrated through a classic conformity study : They had seven teenagers sit around a table and asked each in turn to answer a very simple question.

“Which of the three lines on this poster—Line A, B, or C—matches the line on the other poster?” The answer was very obviously Line C. It was the only line that was even close.

But here’s the trick—the first teenagers to respond to the question were confederates. They were planted there by the researchers . . . and were told to give the wrong answer. They all picked Line B.

This answer was obviously wrong, but the purpose was to see how the group’s answer would affect the final person. The actual subject was not in on the trick. What would the subject say?

Nearly two out of three subjects went along with the crowd. They picked the obviously wrong answer. Afterward, they were asked whether they knew they were picking the wrong answer and they said, “Yes.” They knew the answer was wrong, but they went along anyway, “because everyone else was.”

This is not dissimilar to what Solomon Asch found with adults; we tend to go along with the group—even when we’re confident that the group is wrong and even if we’re fairly certain that our conformity will come back to hurt us! Social influence is tough to buck.

In the next round the confederates were asked to express polite doubt about the group’s answer. The confederate said something similar to, “I might have seen it differently. I think it’s C.”

This polite doubt had an astounding impact on the results. In this condition, nineteen out of twenty subjects gave their actual opinion—they were honest!

We have an innate fear of being shunned by valued groups. But it turns out that even small dissent can provide powerful permission to the silent concerns of others.

You don’t have to risk being an outcast in order to test your concern. You don’t have to scream and yell. You don’t have to call others names.

The quiet, polite expression of doubt can turn the rest of the group from zombies into thinkers.

The Authenticity Paradox

We all have pretty strong images of ourselves, what we call ‘me’. We believe in and talk of growth and evolution, but we like to stay loyal to a core. How often do we actually allow our own image of ourselves to limit us.

                                  

There’s behavior which we are comfortable with and totally identify with and then there’s times we’ll find ourselves behaving in what we like to call, Atypical fashion......saying, that was really not me, so unlike me, I don’t know why I did it, such an aberration....... or in certain situations, you want to behave one way, and you'll find your mind saying....I couldn't do that, it’s so not me.

Really?

How is it that we forget how much situations can influence behavior, and maybe if we let go of this image that we need to stay loyal to, we could flow in some variance in given situations. After all, that’s also what evolution is. Where our bigger learnings might happen. After all, being ourselves in normal situations which are time tested is easy, can we be that in the newer ones? Are we willing to meet that ‘me’?

And a no brainer would be how this can cause conflict.....conflict between how I have behaved, or felt, versus how I ought to have....per myself.

So there’s this image of ourselves that’s restrictive, and the double whammy, there’s our image of the others image of us which will again strongly influence how we behave in certain situations. The pressure of losing credibility. Again source of conflict.

So much pressure from images.

Socrates famously asserted 'the unexamined life is not worth living'

Enlightenment philosophers secularized ideas of selfhood, but it took the 20th century's existentialists to question the idea that some original, actual, ultimate self resides within. One's choice of action creates the self—in Sartre's words, "existence precedes essence." 

Dan McAdams, a Northwestern psychology professor who has spent his career studying life stories, describes identity as “the internalized and evolving story that results from a person’s selective appropriation of past, present and future.” This isn’t just academic jargon. McAdams is saying that you have to believe your story—but also embrace how it changes over time, according to what you need it to do. Try out new stories about yourself, and keep editing them..

Most of us have personal narratives about defining moments that taught us important lessons. Consciously or not, we allow our stories, and the images of ourselves that they paint, to guide us in new situations. But the stories can become outdated as we grow, so sometimes it’s necessary to alter them dramatically or even to throw them out and start from scratch.

Increasingly, psychologists believe that our notion of selfhood needs to expand, to acknowledge that we "contain multitudes." An expansive vision of selfhood includes not just the parts of ourselves that we like and understand but also those that we don't. Our headspace is messier than we pretend, they say, and the search for authenticity is doomed if it's aimed at restricting our identities to what we want to be or who we think we should be.

"Whether there is a core self or not, we certainly believe that there is," says social psychologist Mark Leary of Duke University. And the longing to live from that self is real, as is the suffering of those who feel they aren't being true to themselves. Feelings of inauthenticity can be so uncomfortable that people resort to extreme measures to bring their outer lives in alignment with their inner bearings.

Another reason we're not always true to ourselves is that authenticity is not for the faint of heart. Accurate self-knowledge can be painful. "Our self-images can be highly biased, But in the long run, accuracy is almost always better than bias."

In order to realize an authentic life, says Kernis, one often has to set aside hedonic well-being—for eudaimonic well-being, a deeper, more meaningful state in which gratification is not usually immediate. Sissies need not apply.

Becoming authentic, then, means accepting not only contradiction and discomfort but personal faults and failures as well. Problematic aspects of our lives, emotions, and behaviors—the times we've yelled at the kids, lusted after the friends spouse, or fallen back on our promises to friends—are not breaches of your true self, Moore insists. They're clues to the broader and more comprehensive mystery of selfhood. "In fact," he notes, "we are all very subtle and very complex, and there are forces and resources within us that we have no control over. We will never find the limits of who we are.

Let Self Awareness take that leap...... let not images restrict....open ourselves to the more dynamic self within........keeps the zip and adventure alive :)

Busyness of Life

This Friday evening  I was talking to a friend, and telling her how the only thing in life I’d want to change right now is to get Saturdays off, and she’s like….. I wish I had work on Saturdays too, …. I hate my work, but  I’d rather work than be at home.

Another older conversation with a friend who lives in Bombay; we’re discussing how she spends four to five hours a day travelling, and when I sound appalled, she’s like ‘ghar jaake bhi kya karna hai yaar, baate suno, kaam karo, I'd rather do this.

Both of these, while seemingly shocking, are fairly common place.  It’s filling in time with busyness. 

So how do we gauge if its good busyness? 

There are those who believe it's about being productive, about utility,  about meaning,  about potential.........different kinds of busyness....what really is it? 

                                        

A water colour by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in The Little Prince

It's about making friends with your busyness. You either create your busyness by choice, which is an ideal, or accept the busyness that exists by finding its positives, being aware that you're opting to stay there. It's the perception of lack of choice, the resentment that’s demolishing. It's sad to be bitter, which comes from holding deep rooted resentments. The feeling that life’s gone by and one hasn't really gotten a good shot at it, hasn't done what one wanted to, the it's been unfair. 

Can we accept that there was always a choice, and the 'no decision', or 'no choice' was also a choice? Maybe that would help make peace with the existing situation.

Make a choice, change or accept. Do not stay in the space of resentment. That's the killer.

“How we spend our days,” Annie Dillard memorably wrote in her soul-stretching meditation on the life of presence, “is, of course, how we spend our lives.” And yet most of us spend our days in what Kierkegaard believed to be our greatest source of unhappiness — a refusal to recognize that “busy is a decision” and that presence is infinitely more rewarding than productivity. I frequently worry that being productive is the surest way to lull ourselves into a trance of passivity and busyness the greatest distraction from living, as we coast through our lives day after day, showing up for our obligations but being absent from our selves, mistaking the doing for the being.

And it's said, one of the best treatments of the subject is also among the oldest: Roman philosopher Seneca’s spectacular 2,000-year-old treatise On the Shortness of Life— a poignant reminder of what we so deeply intuit yet so easily forget and so chronically fail to put into practice.

'You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire… 

He talks of the dual demon of distraction and preoccupation — as an addiction that stands in the way of mastering the art of living:

No activity can be successfully pursued by an individual who is preoccupied … since the mind when distracted absorbs nothing deeply, but rejects everything which is, so to speak, crammed into it. Living is the least important activity of the preoccupied man; yet there is nothing which is harder to learn… Learning how to live takes a whole life.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given his own occupation, Seneca points to the study of philosophy as the only worthwhile occupation of the mind and spirit — an invaluable teacher that helps us learn how to inhabit our own selves fully in this “brief and transient spell” of existence and expands our short lives sideways, so that we may live wide rather than long. ' This one I love for obvious reasons....:)

So you must not think a man has lived long because he has white hair and wrinkles: he has not lived long, just existed long. For suppose you should think that a man had had a long voyage who had been caught in a raging storm as he left harbor, and carried hither and thither and driven round and round in a circle by the rage of opposing winds? He did not have a long voyage, just a long tossing about.

Nineteen centuries later, Bertrand Russell, another of humanity’s greatest minds, lamented rhetorically, “What will be the good of the conquest of leisure and health, if no one remembers how to use them?”

Let's use these wake up calls. Step back and ask ourselves. Use it to drop any negativity there might be........ A renewed acceptance or thoughts of change....either's good

40 glimpses of old Hyderabad - Precious !!

Precious…..Nostalgic and Wonderful

Here's 40 pictures of bygone times of Hyderabad

When Diksha showed me these pictures, I could tell even she was touched by them, though she’s never seen Hyderabad anywhere like that, but that's what it does....... this nice feeling of longing or wonder for a time that was.

There are three anecdotes from three different generations that come to mind. Mine, my mothers and my grandmothers.

1) I’d moved to Hyderabad from Srisailam, class 6, and it was my first day going to school alone. Four years in Srisailam, and I was as is quite scared of the city. Maybe because of that fear (which I can recall even now), I couldn’t find the way to school, though I thought I knew it. So half way through, decided to take a cycle rickshaw. I call one, and say Rosary Convent, and he’s like ‘Baara Aana’. I had no clue what that was.....it didn't even sound like currency to me. I ask twice, thrice and its the same. And I go, ek rupaiah. (to those not familiar with aana and paise, I was offering more than he’d asked for) Pretty foolish moment there....brings a smile now. 

2) My mother and her sister would take a cycle rickshaw to college each day, (which, by the way, is the British Residency Building in these pictures…The Koti Women’s College, and for those who've read The White Mughals.... it was also Kirkpatricks and Khair un Nissa's house and it still has her picture there).  Each time they passed the purdah gate of King Koti Palace, they had to maintain absolute silence, you weren’t allowed to even talk..... the royalty couldn't be disturbed you see.  Non negotiable rule. You'd think subjugation.....but she takes so much pride in her Mulki status, you can hear it in her voice when she tells me these stories. Something about those days I guess.

In fact just last week when we were driving to Warangal together and we saw this lake with a lot of cranes, she was saying their house in Barkatpura was a conglomeration of five houses at one end of a huge lake just like this one, and with so many cranes and other birds. 

3) My grandmother.....her story dates back even further. Early 1900's I'd think. It was the time when the plague hit Hyderabad. Back then all their houses were penkittillu ( tiled roofs) and there were only a few scattered cemented houses. So when the plague hit, because all penkitillu just had lots of rats, and rats were the medium for the plague, they had to all leave their houses and go live in a camp outside the city. And where was this outside? In Nallakunta!

I had to stretch to imagine Hyderabad like that, Nallakunta outside the city......Barkatpura with a huge lake full of cranes, and a gollodu who brought around sheep for grazing on the banks, and penkittillu all around. So pretty huh? Well 'progress' will happen :)

A huge thanks to whoever put those pictures up, enabled a lovely walk down the nostalgic road !

The Essence of Things

How hard it is to Just Be

It was a wonderful morning, brilliant after thunder shower weather, and I spent a good amount of time in the garden, as the plants and flowers looked so happy.

It all started with this single full bloom of a pink ganneru (don’t know it in English), one of my all time favorites, especially for its fragrance. Its subtle and intoxicating. And I kept going out for it, and diksha's like, what are you doing ma, you’re actually going out these many times, just to smell it??? And that’s when I realized it was actually putting me into a meditative space. It was just so beautiful in itself.

That’s when a strange journey began. I looked around and saw so many other flowers, almost like for the first time. Why first time? Because behind each of those flowers was a story, and I’d been so caught up in the story that the stories I think had become bigger than the flowers. I almost felt like I’d completely missed the essence.

This flower was my grandmothers favourite. Kanakamburam.

This one had a symbolism in its stamen or pistils or whatever, the five red ones for the pandavas and the hundred yellow ones for the kauravas

This was from a little twig I'd picked up on my first walk to LalBagh

This one I put up against resistance because folks said this should not be kept in houses as its a graveyard flower. And why? Its fault being that it blooms easily , anywhere and all through the year, doesn't need much care. And its for all those reasons that I liked it and wanted it too :)

This one because I'd done some extra caring when it got infested and even blogged about 

The learning? How much of 'me' do I need in anything to really connect. And more......how much of the 'me', in terms of stories and labeling is actually taking away from it's essence. And what's more, there's almost a belief that the personal stories actually enhance the experience. I learnt differently today.

Extrapolating to within. How much of our own image of ourselves, or others image of us, builds layers around how we connect to ourselves. Doesn't any image become a limiting factor? Minus all the layers, in silence and in stillness, maybe there is that little extra chance that we connect deeper within......

A New Earth - Eckhart Tolle

“I have lived with several Zen masters -- all of them cats.” ..........there ends my need for a guru :)

I read this somewhere, likely Eckhart Tolle. On later life influence from books, I’d put Eckhart Tolle pretty much on the top. And in addition to what he actually has to say, I had this huge other learning from that read……your learning does not necessarily get articulated or imbibed as you read…..you could be absorbing bits and pieces, and they'd be sitting in your subconscious for however long, and right place..right time..(internally) and voila.....they'd all fall into place in that one cataclysmic moment.

Capture those aha moments, and you'd be on your way. You'd even be left wondering how you didn't know it all this while. To me this realization from Eckhart Tolle came two whole years after I’d read him.

This came to mind again yesterday when I was talking to a friend who is attending a series on the Bhagavadgita, from a fairly prominent spiritual guru. To being asked how it was going, he said, 'it’s nice, interesting and all, and I'm attending regularly, but I don’t see any of those concepts being directly related to my life'

These are pretty basic and fundamental concepts of life, not some radically new technological breakthroughs, so at some point and in some form we've been exposed to them, and so the feeling of familiarity and disconnect at the same time. But in what form have they been perceived, interpreted, understood, comprehended, imbibed, internalized....that's where the difference lies. A reiteration helps. Remember, repetition does not spoil the prayer.

Like for instance when I first read Eckhart Tolle, I was like, I've read this in Buddhism; this one is from Advaita, this one from Zarathustra, and I’ve done so many years of this that I shouldn’t need Eckhart Tolle to come and tell me these. So much ego huh?? It's crazy how much mind restriction and conditioning act as filters to knowledge, or rather awareness.

That was till the book slowly got into me, and I saw that it’s not about a radically new concept, it’s about processing, context and articulation at one end, and my being ready to comprehend and internalize at another. It's only then that  I acknowledged how big a part in life it had played.

Eckhart Tolle draws from several religions or rather thinkers, and gives it to us in a form that is easy to identify with and absorb. He puts it in the form of attitudes and approaches in ones daily lives. He inspires one to a spiritual journey to find our true self and reach the ultimate in personal growth. 

Some of what he says; 

“See if you can catch yourself complaining, in either speech or thought, about a situation you find yourself in, what other people do or say, your surroundings, your life situation, even the weather. To complain is always non-acceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself into a victim. When you speak out, you are in your power. So change the situation by taking action or by speaking out if necessary or possible; leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness.”

“Any action is often better than no action, especially if you have been stuck in an unhappy situation for a long time. If it is a mistake, at least you learn something, in which case it's no longer a mistake. If you remain stuck, you learn nothing.”

“It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living.”

Calls for a high degree of self awareness for sure.

What Eckhart Tolle does is to enable an existential experience of those intellectual concepts;  as he writes, he extols one to feel and not get stuck in the words. As the essence of the thought or the feeling is concealed in the gap between perception and interpretation. Sure we need words and thoughts, they have their own beauty, but long as we stay aware that we do not get imprisoned by them. Use them as the finger that points.

The Good Earth was one book which had a deep influence, yet as I write I realize where I've moved away. Guess it’s time for a re read...