The Everlasting

To be immortal and never to die,brings on such grief.The beauty of death is underestimated by the ignorant world.

"The Everlasting " is a movie about a family who discover the spring of immortality.The movie portrays the sorrow of the family who see everyone die,but they somehow have to live on for centuries.There is one scene in the movie, where they protagonist tells a girl about the wheel of life.The beauty of life according to him lies in change.The constant rejuvenation of birth and death is what makes life so beautiful.

Death has the ability to wipe the slate clean.

There is also a mythical story on the same lines from a European legend.It tells the story on a old man who has the ability to see death.He one day captures death in a bag and keeps death under house arrest.The whole world was first in joy at the sudden disappearance of death.Then people started crying on his doorstep to release death.They wanted to be reborn and start again.

The movie "The Everlasting " was inspired from a book with the same title.

The importance of Silence

Silence is such a vital part of everyday life.Without silence,our minds wont be able to comprehend the vast sector of information which is given to us daily.Appreciation of silence should be taught to everyone, from a very young age.When the external noise is switched off,the mind does not become automatically quiet.The battle to quieten the mind, just starts.The only reason people shun away from silence is that, it brings all the emotions which we have kept hidden.

Fear,loneliness,despair,joy and issues about identity can come with a force when we are silent.

There is no way to deal with everything at the same instant.Sometimes you have to just let it pass by.

What does Success Mean to You???

A very tough question to crack!!!!

Success is a multifaceted, personal concept. By defining what that concept represents to you personally, and by taking the time to write it down, you will automatically move your life in that direction.

Taken from http://advancedlifeskills.com/blog/what-is-success/

I try to realize that I should not get threatened by other's priorities.From a very young age,I have seen people who shove their views about success upon others.As a undergraduate,I was told how being a software engineer was a mark of success.I was ostracized by well meaning adults who thought that, I was making the biggest mistake of my life not attending software job interviews.I am glad I followed my heart and did other things which fulfilled me as a individual.(Art,Astronomy,Music,Literature)

Many of my friends laughed at me when I spent hours pouring on books in British Library. But those experiences have made me a better person.My affirmations everyday used to be

"I wont make deals with the devil " ...."I wont sell my soul for pieces of paper."

It is so important in life to chalk down priorities which give us happiness.If you want to be financially stable,then it is necessary to write down a hard number which gives you a sense of security.

I dont say that it's going to be easy journey.But a hard look at yourself will save time from chasing the mirages which promise happiness.

Tailoring Your Own Education

I am a firm believer that we can learn on our own.

I started to wonder why do we need universities in the first place???

Universities existed for a long time.Nalanda university in India can be compared to MIT in the present world.The methods of teaching have come a long way.Now a days with open source text books and lectures available online we can equip ourselves with greater amount of knowledge.

But real life problems cannot be solved alone.We need to connect with people who have treaded the path before.As Scott Berkun says in his book "The Myths of Innovation" ,the lone inventor has to stand on the shoulders of earlier inventors.Most of the time its not a lone inventor...But a bunch of people (hundreds of people) working towards a solution.

We have to build our lives in a world which is filled with people who have different ideas.IQ alone cannot help anyone.So a degree in any profession can be helpful if we are lucky.

I am indeed very grateful to few good professors I had met during my undergraduate and graduate courses.(Even though there were few ,who made my life a living hell)

The input from people you work with is such a important factor in our lives.

Reminder

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high,
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action– into that heaven of freedom,
My Father,
Let my country awake.

Rabindranath Tagore

Leadership

These are few links I found on Leadership

Wanted: Courage, Compassion and Character - Round Table Conference at Stanford University (Link Courtesy :My Husband)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTRcPlNfynA&feature=player_embedded#!

Solitude and Leadership

http://www.theamericanscholar.org/solitude-and-leadership/

Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp0HIF3SfI4&feature=related

Kavita Ramdas at TED

http://www.youtube.com/user/tedtalksdirector?blend=1&ob=4#p/u/20/n9Z_pccScW0

The Mythical Hero's Journey

It is never evident in our teenage years what plans life has laid down for us.I do not believe in a fatalistic view of life,but I do believe that life has its goals which somehow get fulfilled through the individual experience.When I look backward and connect all the dots,some experiences make perfect sense in the present moment.But looking forward or imagining where the chips fall would be bad idea.To be prepared for the storm is fine by all means,but lets not predict its exact moment.The journey each individual takes is so unique.Books, road maps,amulets,gurus,secret incantations,beauty,power,ambition,luck,intelligence ...nothing can prepare us.None of these, will save us from the blows which life would give.Lets choose the battles wisely.The hero has to return to the starting point.The sacred circle of return would be marked by a change,which would never appear on the outside...but would be deep within the inner realms of his/her soul.Too much time is wasted fighting other's battles,or taking detours with topics which don't matter.Once we know what matters most,we focus,learn and evolve....

Hands on Experience

As a electrical engineer,I feel I am blessed to have a job where I get to see how strategies are employed.I am there from the start. ... A rough model is got by brainstorming,converted into a reality by experimentation and then placed into the product and validated.It not a one "person" show.It involves around a hundred employees doing their best.When I graduated the mindset I had, was so different.I existed in a world which was idealized and complex models existed as mathematical equations.In the real world no such thing exists.The toughest thing is not to solve the mathematical or logical questions.The hardest part would be to make everything work.It requires understanding human Psyche,and being non judgemental.It requires understanding other's perspectives.It requires knowing that even though you may have a advanced degree you are not advanced than others..You are like everyone else...with faults..with fallacies which come out unexpectedly like everyone else.

A skill which we use our own hands to built stuff is necessary for everyone.When humans first evolved they used their hands to build everything.Somehow we are losing touch on the elemental fundamentals.I am not saying that we should treat automation as a bane.But we need to understand the pain that people take to build stuff.Everything comes out of some one's sweat and it may be invisible but it is still there.Even though I have not perfected the art of not judging other professions.....I am improving...

Every job is noble and has its own worth...Who am I to rate it as better or worse...But the teachers have told that if I fail,I may end up doing the menial jobs..But to unlearn this program in my mind..it may take me some time..

Taken from New york Times Article...

The visceral experience of failure seems to have been edited out of the career trajectories of gifted students. It stands to reason, then, that those who end up making big decisions that affect all of us don’t seem to have much sense of their own fallibility, and of how badly things can go wrong even with the best of intentions (like when I dropped that feeler gauge down into the Ninja). In the boardrooms of Wall Street and the corridors of Pennsylvania Avenue, I don’t think you’ll see a yellow sign that says “Think Safety!” as you do on job sites and in many repair shops, no doubt because those who sit on the swivel chairs tend to live remote from the consequences of the decisions they make. Why not encourage gifted students to learn a trade, if only in the summers, so that their fingers will be crushed once or twice before they go on to run the country?

http://prayatna.typepad.com/education/workbased_learning/

The Unlearning Curve

Education gives you knowledge for a particular skill.It makes you a specialist in a field.Gives you a comfy job,by which you make a living.

Wisdom on the other hand does not depend on these narrow limitations.It cannot be taken for granted that a person who has degrees from the best university,highest number of letters has the most amount of wisdom.It is such a difficult unlearning curve for me.I take it for granted that... Education= Wisdom.A poor person ,a person who is illiterate,a person who begs on the street may still have the wisdom which I lack.Kabir was an illiterate weaver.

Why is it so difficult for me to love tribal music?

Why does the melody which stirs my heart is refused by my mind... as not good enough???

Why did mythology which has so many avenues to wisdom was rejected by my scientific mind for such a long time??

What conditioned bias do I hold inside me which refuses the divinity of tribal gods and embraces the modernity of sophisticated philosophical theories??

Only time can help me unravel my own difficulties of accepting the vast manifestations of creativity which lies in each of us.

References

Deep Forest - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtgcmLS6B8E&feature=related
Bare Foot College-Bunker Roy Talk
http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail783.html

Social Reform

Other than having interest in social entrepreneurship,my life long ambition is to be a part of the social reform process in India.I never knew the deep diseases which the Indian society suffered till I stepped into the realm of higher education in India.This is a common sight among lot of professional colleges in India,where there is a steady influx of all classes of society(lower,upper and middle)
If higher places of education have so many problems,it really shocks me even to think the problems faced by the dalits in the improvershied areas.

The upper class maintaining its strong hold on wealth,were no different than the lower and middle class.They suffered the same bias.The engineering classes became a lecture in tribal hierarchy formed by the so called "mini adults".I call them mini adults as they reflect the environment in their homes.As I studied in Hyderabad,I can write more clearly about the problems which trouble the girls there.I was outcast(I am a Tamilian!!!! and to add another layer of discrimination a veggie loving Iyer)
Dowry,skin color discrimination,second rate citizenship on basis of gender and to be treated as if "being born as a girl was a curse !!!!!!" was few of the things which I could see as on a regular day to day basis.
A assistant professor in Electrical Engineering coming to the class and encouraging the boys to study more hard so that they can fetch more dowry in the future.(The college I studied was branded No 1 that year for Elec Engg...)
The problem which bothers me even now(so many years after I have graduated)...is that those girls thought it was normal to be treated badly.Their hope lied in getting married, giving birth to sons and redeem their position in the male dominated world...I could see how female feticide was a big problem clearly after I heard these reasons...(Rajasthan had the highest number of female feticides in the last decade)
This is one of the things I love about USA...People get treated most of the times(99.9%) as a equal.I dont see any discrimation on such a deeper level like India.Workplaces and educational institutions command respect and the professors behave with maturity.There may be a random bad fruit in the bunch,but on the whole "HUMAN DIGNITY IS PRESERVED"...

The question remains

It bothers me..
Why should it bother me...
When it does not bother those girls..???
Change comes from within ...It cannot be forced...
Is social revolution possible in India???


Reference

Found this video ...A debate on skin color NDTV(We The People)
Not just skin deep prejudice

http://www.ndtv.com/news/videos/video_player.php?id=1143397

Moral Principles

In olden days "Religion" was a mixture of legal code,medicine,idle superstitions,wise direction and dirty politics.In recent times, we do see a division of all these disciplines in a country.The lines between all these divisions are blurred and for a ignorant few,they don't even exist...

To solve our moral dilemmas using ancient texts would be wrong move.Firstly,they may have value in their era.Once these texts have been displaced to our time,they lose their contextual laws.Trying to use Laws of Manu(in the case of women rights) in recent times, would be a grave mistake.Like a river washing away ancient debris,moral debates should be solved with fresh perspective.They should consider the socio-political and economic conditions of the present time.Historical texts should not be discarded,but they may be used as a pointer to better alternatives.

Sacred Text Archive

The link to all books on mythology and religion all over the world is available on the site.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/index.htm

I wanted to dedicate a whole post to this one link...It has all the books which I ever wanted to read:)

Interpretation and Assimilation

To appreciate fully the sacred and romantic literature of India, we should follow the advice of Robert Louis Stevenson. "To learn aright from any teacher," he wrote, "we must first of all, like a historical artist, think ourselves into sympathy with his position." And if in endeavouring to understand the religious conceptions of the ancient forest sages, we, at times, find ourselves in difficulties, it may be that "if a saying is hard to understand, it is because we are thinking of something else"--we are looking on India with European eyes and with European prejudices. "There is always", said Stevenson, "a ruling spirit behind the code of rules, an attitude, a relation, a point of the compass, in virtue of which we conform or dissent."

Taken from Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie [1913]

The link to the book and various other books will be given in the next post.

This is a common problem which I had felt for a long time.Being colonised by British and being stripped off our ancient modes of thinking,our country may be at the center of misconstruction .The important thing to remember is the context.History cannot be seen without today's prejudices.Whenever a ancient text or any study on comparative religion or mythology is done,a effort should be put to study the history during that era.Every law or every belief which existed sprang out of a necessity.Even humiliating beliefs like Sati and other animal sacrifices which are common all over the world were invented to quench the thirst of a particular age.Pulling these scriptures and beliefs and adapting it to present day should be done with lot of care.Any comments on any particular form of belief should be backed with background research of the seminal ideas which germinated in the ancient people.A high quotient of compassion is required which will be obtained only by a person who spends some time understanding different scriptures and their associated archaeological research.My own study on comparative religions has evolved so much over the last few years.From being a biased reader who wanted to fit all beliefs and tribes into narrow boxes which were created to present day requirements........I have become less judgemental...
My husband gives particular importance to time-lines and thinks that they give a clearer picture to understanding a theory in archaeology better.I still have to adapt this idea when I read some scripture.

So the scope of this blog is going to be broadened to include the various readings of mythology and comparative religion.The reason being that the birth of spirituality and our primal desires can be understood better when we dig through ancient modes of thought.A compassionate view of the world can be established when we see a cross pollination of ideas.They may also lead to the higher goal of unity which has been mentioned in all religions.

I would also try to add the anthropological studies of various tribes and folk lore.For now I am going to concentrate on India and then may be expand it to include Egyptian and Greek cultures.My interest in Egyptian religion started at very young age.The Mayans are also fascinating people.Lately I have been influenced by the native Indian shamanism and their history.One of the blog readers few years ago had sent me a link which had various books on spiritual shamanism.I was busy with my pursuits of Indian philosophy and could not do justice to that material.So in the future I may try to add few articles on Native Indian Spirituality.(I completed watching Ken Burns "We Shall Remain "(4 discs- 4 hours) which is a must see documentary for any history buff.)

I will still try to upload lot of spiritual articles which are in my draft folder.

Bharatatattva :Course in Indology

There are two volumes which I had purchased at Ramakrishna Mission in Chennai.
These two books have articles dealing with Ancient Indian Society/Politics/Literature/ and lot of articles about lineage of different kings.
These two books gave me a gist of the Ancient Indian life.After every scholarly article,there is a reading list.Both the books costed me 160 Rupees(They are published by Ramakrishna Mission).But the information from all the Indologists is priceless.
The books are

Bharatatattva :Course in Indology Volume 1
Bharatatattva :Course in Indology Volume 2

One more site that I found -Archaeological Survey of India

http://asi.nic.in/

Discipline

Why should we follow a particular schedule?
Why should everyone conform to a particular idea.
Why does society gives accolades to people who do the same thing every day.
Control gives rise to guilt.It causes so much stress in us,to think that we have to achieve all these things...or else we are doomed.
One of the main reasons I believe discipline is stressed so much from a young age is because society itself, is a mediocre institution.To run a mediocre construct you need one leader and million followers who worship him/her.If a person sits down and analyses the model in which many of the civilizations were constructed,then there would be a new world for that person.This new world does not change the whole environment around him,but it just changes his relative position.

Jiddu Krishnamurti in his book "Think on these things" writes about discipline...

Questioner: What part does discipline play in our lives?

Krishnamurti: Unfortunately it plays a great part, does it not?A great part of your life is disciplined: do this and don t do that. You are told when to get up,what to eat and what not to eat, what you must know and not know; you are told that you must read, go to classes, pass examinations, and so on. Your parents, your teachers, your society, your tradition, your sacred books all tell you what to do; so your life is bound, hedged about by discipline, is it not? You are a prisoner of do's and don'ts, they are the bars of your cage. Now, what happens to a mind that is bound by discipline? Surely, it is only when you are afraid of something, when you are resisting something, that there has to be discipline; then you have to control, hold yourself together. Either you do this out of your own volition, or society does it for you - society being your parents, your teachers,your tradition,your sacred books.But if you begin to inquire, to search out,if you learn and understand without fear, then is discipline necessary? Then that very understanding brings about its own true order, which is not born of imposition or compulsion.

Do think about this; because when you are disciplined through fear, crushed by the compulsion of society, dominated by what your parents and teachers say, there is for you no freedom, no joy, and all initiative is gone. The older the culture, the greater is the weight of tradition which disciplines you, tells you what you must and must not do; and so you are weighed down, psychologically flattened as if a steam-roller had gone over you. That is what has happened in India. The weight of tradition is so enormous that all initiative has been destroyed, and you have ceased to be an individual; you are merely part of a social machine, and with that you are content. Do you understand? You don't revolt, explode, break away. Your parents don't want you to revolt, your teachers don't want you to break away, therefore your education is aimed at making you conform to the established pattern. Then you are not a complete human being, because fear gnaws at your heart; and as long as there is fear there is no joy, no creativity.

Becoming Civilized

I remember my teenage years and also my pre- work years.When as a idealist I saw no differences in people with respect to race,gender or wealth.To me the potentiality latent in every human was so vast.I knew it deep in my heart that everyone was unique and life has to give someone the gift of opportunity and people will deliver with the highest standards in any field.Now that I have entered the work force and become a part of a societal construct, every single day my idealism's are being challenged.I love my job and enjoy every bit of it.But I do see inconsistencies when I compare my benefits with others in a less ideal world.People struggling to see life in a more positive way humbles any person, who are caught in the circle of pride.To have the courage to stick to the same principles with which, I began to introspect into my nature of human existence is a tough job.Sometimes I feel these ideals just slip away and I feel empty.There are other times when I am caught up in my own personal existence that I don't remember the bigger picture.But may be these are the acid tests for every idealist.To find solutions to complicated problems and remember what each of us started with.The beginning shall never be forgotten.

Balance

Balancing everyday work with spiritual discipline is difficult.One way to look at this problem is to apply spiritual principles to everyday actions.That is a far cry for many of us,who have yet to master taming our own thoughts.Actions are secondary to thoughts.Lot of energy is wasted thinking about useless things and getting tangled in negative thoughts.The circle of past,present and future also haunts us to an extent making our day to day existence miserable.
My goal for a long time was to meditate two hours a day.It is not a lofty goal.... It is achievable.I manage only one hour per day.I miss out on few days... sometimes few weeks because of work/stress etc.When ever I feel too tired to meditate..I watch this video...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S06oMxdt40A
Video of Marathon monks(Japanese Buddhist Monks)

Sometimes just plain inspiration can remove all our discomfort.

India - Documentary Archives

There are so many popular documentaries when it comes to the western world.They have archived all their knowledge in a feasible,logical manner.
India on the other hand is lacking because of the manner in which ancient knowledge has been archived.There are no popular documentaries which can vouch for the greatness of the ancient philosophical/logical system.There is a huge vacuum which needs to be filled with data from the latest research in all fields pertaining to the life of the ancient people.Mythology on the other hand has got some exposure from the mega - soap opera directors.But they have just scratched the surface.Where are the videos/books on popular Indian philosophers?What about great Indian mathematicians?
Even when I was in school,only western inventions were pushed on me.There is a need for greater awareness through print media,research and knowledgeable documentaries.

There was a article(which I read...will try to post the link) which described how Indians did not record history.They believed in a cyclic life and thought that you did not need to record something which will happen again.But Indian literature is a good filler for the lack of ancient Indian history.What I dream about is a scholarly treatment of ancient material.I am tired of watching ancient myths enacted with modern interpretations in dress,weaponry and lifestyle.I want the filmmakers to respect the intelligence of the viewer.I am sure the average Indian viewer can gulp down some serious tale rather than the regular song and dance routines.May be new market research should be done on the average Indian viewer.

Language

Words have always fascinated me.I love reading..and I can spend the rest of my life at a library.But all through my life ,I have suffered a language bias.I love the English language not because of its complexity,but because of the amount of reading material which is available.Sanskrit is the most complex and most advanced language compared to other languages all over the world(Latin etc).As a kid I remember trying to learn different languages.But all through my life in India I have been continuously taken beliefs from the outer world about the superiority of one language over other.This is not the case because of its inherent nature but because of colonial and financial constructs which run the fortunes of everyone.I do agree that Britishers colonised most of the 19 th century world and made/sometimes forced English down our throat.It has its basic advantages.Indian's.... because of the English language can survive in any part of the world.Other countries which did not have a colonial invasion have a disadvantage of having their native language being their official language.So to migrate into other countries everyone has to learn English or other Latin derived languages like French,Spanish etc.
Language is a tool for communication which can help us foster relations.But the most important use of language is identifying our roots.We lose a critical part of ourselves when we leave out the important factors which our ancestors used.No way am I suggesting a linguistic divide between different countries and different States/regions.The exercise of learning the native script will be a archaeological/historical exercise which will make us look at ourselves and connect the dots in retrospect.
Sometimes,it will help us advance the use of native language and pass it on ,thereby helping it from extinction.We can never learn about our identities through force or compulsion.Exploration of language and its use in finding our roots needs a environment of respect and admiration for other languages.My love for democracy and abolition of censorship on tyrannical grounds makes me a student of various languages.I am presently trying to learn the written script for Tamil.My next project is to re-learn Sanskrit( so that I can read ancient texts)

Creative blocks

Creative blocks happen due to the various complications in our belief system.It is a painful process to find out what causes us to leave activities which give us pleasure.Boredom,importing other people's belief and values,lack of glamour etc are the various reasons for the blocks.I went through such a block when it came to art.I was a promising young painter at the age of 21.If not for my idealistic bent, I could have sold my works for a little fortune.But for the next four years, I suffered from a lack of interest in art.I had to struggle very hard to get myself near to the canvas/paint brush.I bought lot of books on art during that period.It was as if, I wanted to hold on to the shadow of my former artistic endeavour.Those books used to rot in a corner,and I say to myself the stories of my younger artistic instinct which I lacked in that moment.But there were lot of other creative activities which I picked up during that time.Blogging was one of them.I started taking western dance lessons.I started participating in public speaking.I always wanted to take up speech craft,but lack of time and other activities somehow stole away that goal.

One of the books I credit in making me destroy my artistic block will be "The Complete Artists Way"(A Spiritual Path to higher Creativity) by Julia Cameron.

I followed all the creative exercises given in the book.I was skeptical of her claims when I started reading the book and applying what ever she said.I gave it a few months,for the wisdom to sink in.. (spiritual osmosis...)The first step after my recovery was, I took part in a painters workshop and now... I am thinking of exhibiting my painting's next year.

This book is good for overall creative recovery.You can say this is a psychological/spiritual handbook which makes you think and feel all the emotions which you try to run away from.I bought the complete set of three of Julia books.The other two being "Walking in this world "(The Practical Art of Creativity) and Finding Water(The Art of Perseverance)

There are two reasons, for me to buy this book..One.. it was on sale(i guess 3$ for three books..a great deal for a frugal person like me) and the second one being it had Artist and Spirituality in its title.