Let go and simply walk away when you must

When you can’t create value anymore or when you are not enjoying what you are doing anymore, simply walk away!

Graphic Courtesy: PTI/Internet

M.S.Dhoni surprised the cricketing world yesterday by retiring from Test Cricket. As India’s most successful Test Captain ever, everyone believes Dhoni has a lot of cricket still left in him. But the man himself thinks that he’s played enough of that format, having won 27 Tests for India and having led his team to be the # 1 Test side in the world, a slot the team retained for 21 months. Dhoni has always been remarkable – for being able to deal with victory and defeat with equanimity. His ability to stay unmoved in the middle, amidst all the action and chaos, has earned him the title of “Captain Cool”. But with his decision to retire from the oldest form of the game, Dhoni teaches us something far more valuable – he’s telling us that we must learn to let go and simply walk away when we must.

If you examine your Life closely, you will discover that much of your grief comes from clinging on to stuff – people, opinions, positions, things, money and such. The more you hold on to something, the more you will suffer. Such is the nature of Life. Life is in a perpetual, never-ending flow. To imagine that your Life should or will remain unchanged is downright foolishness. Trying to control Life is like holding on to water in your palm – it will simply flow away!

Each of us has a season in the sun just as we have our dark spells in Life. In our chosen vocation or in a field of interest, or in Life in general, we will have our own triumphs and travails. Yet we must never see any of this as permanent. We must learn to move on with time. We must also be willing to accept and appreciate that the generations that follow us will be smarter at doing whatever we believe we are currently best at. So, the intelligent way to live is to make way for others and for Life itself. Coming in the way of Life, by holding on to anything that you imagine is your own, is sure to cause inner strife and suffering. A simple rule of thumb can help here. In any situation, in any context, ask yourself if you are able to make a difference and create value? If the answer is no, walk away. Ask yourself if you are enjoying what you are doing or saying or whether you are enjoying being with someone? If the answer is no, walk away. It is that simple. Really!

Life often opens newer avenues when you let go of something or someone or some situation. Even if it immediately doesn’t, the very act of letting go is liberating. Clinging on is always about being under pressure, about wanting to prove a point – sometimes even to yourself.  But when you let go, there is no proving anything to anyone. When you let go, when you walk away, you are actually telling Life that you are open for new possibilities and opportunities. You are setting yourself free. And only when you are totally free can you be in bliss! 

You are a freak if you think you control Life

When your Life’s design begins to go against what you have planned, recognize that it is yet another affirmation that you are not in control.

Someone wrote to me a while ago saying his failing business was causing him much grief. He said he was consumed by worry and fear. He wondered if his business would ever be back in his control? I am not sure I can say how things may work out for my friend. But a simpler way to deal with Life will be to stop believing or imagining that you are, or were, ever in control of anything!!

We humans make a virtue of our ill-founded belief that we are in control. You want your mind, your body, your spouse, your children, your employees, your neighbors and your government to work according to your whims and aspirations. Nothing wrong with the want per se. Except that it will not be fulfilled! Your mind cannot be in your control unless you anchor in silence (the practice of ‘mouna’) for at least an hour daily. Your body cannot be in your control unless you have your mind trained to being still. People, and governments, will continue to do what they want despite what you think or expect of them. Still we kid ourselves into believing that we are in control? Someone does something rude, nasty, harsh to you, like a colleague quits in a huff leaving you and your project stranded, you begin to wonder how-dare-he? This thinking spurs another thought that you must avenge this act. That leads to yet another thought that makes you plot and want to wish the worst for your detractor. So much negativity. So much grief. Step back and ask yourself, is this all worth it?

What do you, or I, control? You can’t even control your heart beat. It beats so you are alive. Can you control its stopping to beat? And what if it chooses to? Can you do anything about it? Fundamentally, you are a freak if you think you control Life. This doesn’t mean you and I should feel diffident about Life and resign ourselves to a master controller’s actions. Instead learn to act in the given moment with the circumstances that have been delivered unto you. Accept what is, do what you think you can best do in the situation with peace and joy, and just do it. Then deal with the next moment similarly. And so on. If each time, the thread is pulled away from your hand and cast on the floor, pick it up again and wind it up, slowly, peacefully. Be patient. Be accepting. Believe. Be. When you live Life this way, Life may not exactly be what you may want it to be, but your ability to be in bliss will be sufficiently enhanced and enabled!

What others think of you does not really make your Life tick!

Learn to accept that people have a right to their opinions. Don’t resist either the people around you or their opinions. Simply move on.                                                                                                     

A lot of our quality time is lost in giving credence to other people’s opinions. From experience I can tell you that this is an absolute waste of time. What others think of you does not really make your Life tick. Period. Only when you give an opinion attention does it grow to be a problem – as in something that you have to deal with. If you just view an opinion as a mere statement, a string of words, and choose only what you want to internalize and discard the rest, there will be no problem.

Consider this example. I give you a pen as a gift. If you accept it, who does the pen belong to? It belongs to you. If you choose not to accept it and say that you don’t take gifts as a matter of principle, who does the pen now belong to? It belongs to the giver, me. Now instead of a pen, if it was an insult or an opinion, you have the same option. You can leave it, the “gift”, with the giver and not take it. You grieve only when you accept the opinion or insult and agonize over it in your mind – she said that, but why?; how dare he do that to me?; I need to teach them a lesson; I need to show them who I really am and such. The more you grieve the more you suffer. And that’s why most relationships end up withering away – simply because you don’t have the ability to let people have their opinions!

Opinions are of two kinds – serious, honest feedback and frivolous, even destructive, criticism. You have a choice to internalize and learn from the first kind. If you do, don’t let your mind complain about it by chewing on it endlessly. Someone said something you can learn from. Learn and move on. The second kind of opinion, the destructive criticism, just ignore and move on. Now, moving on is not always easy. The legendary Bollywood film-maker Yash Chopra would take weeks to recover whenever his films flopped. Obviously the reason why a film flops is because of audience opinion. Chopra would lock himself up in his room and step out only at meal times. For weeks he would do this until he “healed” from the criticism and until he “learned” from the feedback. So, like Chopra, choose your own method for dealing with opinions. But whatever it is, don’t grieve and agonize, and resultantly suffer, over what others have to say.

We create our own problems by wanting people to be different from who they really are. It is because they are a particular way that they have opinions such as the ones they make. Accept people for who they and know that they are entitled to their opinion, just as you are entitled to yours. When you remind yourself of this empowering perspective, every time you hear an opinion contrary to your own, you will find the energy and the ability to drop the opinion, to not judge the person who delivered it and to move on!

Learn to live unsoiled by the world

Don’t be distracted by what’s around you. Look within and discover the way to live unsoiled!           

There are enough and more temptations and distractions out there. And we are not talking about materialistic objects of desire alone. Or of ruinous addictions like alcohol, tobacco or drugs either. While these are deterrents to intelligent living, most certainly, what we need to be wary off are the myriad ways in which we get dragged into banal situations on a daily basis. Think deeply about this. How often in a day do you worry about a future event __ someone’s terminal illness and impending passing, a child’s graduation, someone’s wedding or loans to be repaid? How often in a day do you grieve over the past __ having experienced someone wrongly, an irreconcilable loss, a mistake you made or a hurt you caused someone? How often do you lose your patience or temper or both daily __ on a child or spouse or subordinate or with just someone on the street? Each of these episodes takes us away from living. Every time we worry about the future or fret over the past or get dragged into anger spells, every single time, we die a death.

The ultimate goal and measure of success of intelligent living is not to change your external environment and make it incapable of causing you worry or making you feel guilty or angry. It is about engineering your inner space and insulating yourself from the vagaries of the world. This is what the Bible says ‘living in the world but not of it’ and what the Bhagavad Gita advises – ‘of living in this world but being above it’. The Buddha enlightens us, making this perspective simpler and easier to hold, using the metaphor of the lotus, “As a lotus flower is born in water, grows in water and rises out of water to stand above it unsoiled, so I, born in the world, raised in the world, having overcome the world, live unsoiled by the world.”

Strive to be like the lotus. The lotus grows often in a dirty pond but rises above it and lives spreading its beauty by keeping itself ‘above the muck’, remaining unsoiled. You too must avoid letting yourself be dragged into the petty squabbles and muck of everyday Life. And live, unsoiled, in bliss! 

Understand. Don’t interpret.

Let’s understand first and not rush to interpret each other. Most situations turn messy and most relationships get knotted up because people don’t want to understand. And instead they have interpreted others.

Osho, the Master, shares this story of his favorite character, Mullah Nasruddin. Mullah was coming back, totally drunk, in the wee hours of a morning. As he passed by a cemetery, he saw a signboard above a bell, which read, in big letters: “Ring for the Caretaker”. So, Mullah did just that. He rang the bell. Of course, the caretaker woke up with a start! He rushed to the main gate, sleepy and in a state of shock at having been woken up rudely. When he saw a drunk Mullah Nasruddin there he became even more angry. He asked: ‘Why? Why did you ring? Why did you call for me? What is the matter?” Mullah looked at the caretaker in disbelief, then looked at the signboard and then looking at the caretaker again, blabbered loudly, “Now, I don’t get this. Why can’t you ring that goddamn bell yourself?” The caretaker looked at the signboard again. It was written: “Ring for the Caretaker”. And so, now, the caretaker knew, why Mullah had rung the bell! This is the issue we are all confronted with. We interpret instead of understanding each other. Did Mullah understand what was written there or did he interpret it? For if he had understood it, he would have rung only if he wanted the caretaker to come and assist him with something. But because he interpreted the message on the signboard, he rang the bell for the caretaker!!

How often are we guilty of behaving with people and situations like the way Mullah did in that story? We don’t even listen most of time. We rush to conclusions even as someone is saying something. Even before someone has finished speaking our minds have formulated a ‘fitting’ reply. If we will listen, we will understand. But if we don’t listen, if we don’t pause to think after reading something, we will interpret. And most often our interpretation is completely wrong. Because everything in an interpretation is an analysis of what that something should be, could be or will be. It is never an acceptance of what is or never about just being!

Take any of your Life situations __  a vexing relationship issue, for example. Ask yourself if you have tried to understand that person or have you interpreted her or his actions, words and thoughts? If you had understood, as you will discover, there would not be an issue or misunderstanding! So, now, you know what to do! Don’t you? Stop interpreting. Understand. And peace will follow!

Parimala and the art of humility

The best way to live is to live humbly, being who you are and enjoying who you are!

Parimala Srinivasan

I read a story in today’s Hindu, on someone we knew closely, Parimala Srinivasan, who had passed away, at 81, earlier this week. Chennai historian and columnist V.Sriram has penned the beautiful tribute to Parimala, who he calls “an ardent aficionado” of Carnatic Music. While my wife and I have known Parimala for 20 years now, Sriram’s piece surprised us – we discovered so many unique aspects about her Life that we ended up wondering if we at all knew the “real” Parimala. To us Parimala was the simple, doting mother and grandmother with the ever-benign smile. She was the epitome of warmth, compassion and enthusiasm. The only line in Sriram’s piece I could relate to instantaneously, for instance, is this: “To her, Life was an extraordinary celebration.” Until I read Sriram’s piece this morning, I didn’t know that Parimala was taught music by the legendary Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar; I didn’t know that the other maestro of Carnatic music G.N.Balasubramaniam was her mentor and guide; I didn’t know that ace violinist T.N.Krishnan was more than just a musician-friend – he called himself her family member; I did not know that she held a record for attending concerts as a rasika for over 58 years at the Music Academy during the annual Madras Marghazi season; and I didn’t know that she ran an all-women sabha called Raga Tharangini for over 40 years. How would I know all this about Parimala unless she told us any of this? The truth is, she never spoke about herself. She was always in awe and admiration of people, Life and events around her. And so this is my key takeaway from this wonderful lady’s Life – stay humble and simply enjoy who you are!

I come from a family where bragging over hollow achievements is a favorite pastime. In fact my awakening to remain modest was spurred my utter distaste for some of family members’ tendency to insensitively blow their own trumpets. So, when I discover now that the lady we were so close to, was not just a doyen among Carnatic music rasikas, but was a celebrity in her own right, I feel so blessed. I remember the day, two Decembers ago, when I delivered my “Fall Like A Rose Petal” Talk (based, like my Book of the same name, on the lessons that my wife and I learned from a Life-changing experience – a bankruptcy!) Parimala was in the audience that evening. When I finished my Talk, she called out to me and my wife. She held our hands and said, “The greatest joy in Life is to be able to live and face it together. You both are blessed to have each other. You will overcome your problems and come out of this crisis soon.”  She had tears of love in her eyes as she touched our heads in a blessing.    

To stay humble is an art. Because even if you want to stay humble, your mind will push you to believe that you are causing all your achievements. Only a truly evolved person can, craftily, dismiss the mind’s seemingly well-reasoned claims and simply be. Simply being means to continuously look at Life with amazement and wonder. It means to know that whatever good is happening to you, whoever is praising you, whoever is flocking to you – everything and everyone is transient. (To be sure, the opposite is also true – and is transient again.) Simply being means choosing to be unmoved by Life’s colors and flavors. Parimala, to me, personified humility – a trait that all of us can aspire for, and someday soon, with inspiration and blessings from her, possess.

I drink alcohol…and I am spiritual

Just because you don’t like the message, don’t shoot the messenger!  

A couple of days ago I received an email forward of a media release purported to have been issued on behalf of Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and the Art of Living organization. I don’t know if the release was indeed issued on Sri Sri’s behalf. I hope not. The release attacks, albeit in a veiled manner without naming them, director Rajkumar Hirani, actor Aamir Khan and their movie PK, for “projecting sadhus (Hindu saints) in bad light”, for “promoting dargahs (Muslim shrines) and putting down ashrams (Hindu monasteries)” and for “influencing young minds”. The release also says that the makers of PK have been funded by a terrorist to put down spirituality.

I find the content of the media release preposterous. And the charges against Khan, Hirani and PK baseless. Whoever authored that release and whoever authorized its circulation neither understands spirituality not do they understand PK’s message.

Spirituality is the flowering of inner awareness. It is the realization that comes from within that you are the divinity that you seek. Spirituality is deeply personal, it is intense and it is liberating. It sets you free. Religion, on the other hand, tries to achieve the same result but ends up making bad spaghetti out of a good recipe. Not because there’s anything wrong with the recipe. But because the cooks, the high priests of the various religions (as the PK character says in PK, “the managers of the various companies”), have hidden and divisive agendas; they promote ritualism and hold gullible people – like you and me – hostage! In the movie, in one brilliant scene, PK picks up a new born baby to inspect if the baby is born with a “stamp”, a means of identification, that he or she was actually created (“sent down”) to be a Hindu or a Christian or a Muslim. The message is stark and uncomfortable: that our religion has been thrust upon us. We are born free to simply be human. But the label of Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Sikh, Jew and such is stuck on us as an afterthought. Our family and society force us to follow the religion that they have chosen for us. To add to the confusion, people who are self-proclaimed leaders of the various religions, induce fear among their followers saying that if you question what is being told and practiced, you will be punished by your God! PK makes another important, uncontestable point – the God, he says, that created you and me, is different from the God that we humans have created to suit our convenience. God, the creator, is compassionate, loving and is ever present – within us. The God we have created, he says, is forever elusive, being “managed and protected by agents and managers” and making people fearful. The truth is where there is fear, there is no faith. And when there is faith, there can be no fear. Faith is like light and fear is like darkness. You can bring light to drive away darkness. But you cannot bring darkness into a room which is well lit. You cannot, therefore, claim you have faith in a God, your God, and yet be fearful of either God or Life or both!!

The media release makes one other ridiculous, erroneous point. It states that people who consume alcohol are not spiritual! Spirituality is totally unconditional. Being spiritual means just being. You can be whoever you are. You don’t have to abstain from anything, you don’t have to fear anyone, you don’t have to fast, you don’t have to pray and you don’t have to follow any rituals. You just have to be who you are and enjoy being who you are. Spiritually empowered people employ this freedom, this fearlessness, this faith – that they will be taken care of and provided for by the Universe – to live in bliss. To them nothing is a sin. And nothing is forced. They live simply – seeing the divinity in themselves and in everyone and everything around them.

I seriously hope Sri Sri’s ashram did not issue that release and that the mail I received was just one of those hoax forwards. If it was indeed a genuine communication, I pity those who put it out – for they are missing PK’s central message and shooting the messenger, Aamir, just because he’s seen, per worldly definition, as a Muslim.  PK is not about Hindus and Muslims. It is not about Hindu Gods and a Muslim God or a Christian God. It is about you and me and how we are allowing ourselves to be trapped in the vicious cycle of religion, rituals, godmen and fear. Watch PK if you can and care. And even if you don’t want to watch it, raise a toast when you drink tonight!! To Christmas, good health and happiness. My toast, however, is to the authors of that redoubtable release: “Hey, I drink alcohol…and I am spiritual”!   

The only time to live is now

Be constantly aware that you have to die someday. Only then will you, hopefully, live your Life fully! 

This morning we visited a friend who had lost his mother on Monday. It so happened that the funeral rites were being performed just when we visited their home; the body was being prepared for the final journey to the crematorium. We had known our friend’s mother well. She was a person who, despite her husband’s passing away 15 years ago, was full of Life. She celebrated music and the arts and kept herself busy in the company of her family and friends. Although she was in her eighties, and surely had her share of physical ailments, she was always cheerful and dressed very elegantly. To see her lifeless body, draped in a white cloth, was definitely a numbing experience. That’s when it struck me that however much we may understand death, or may have seen it happen around us, when it arrives, yet again, to claim someone we know, it always urges us to reflect on our lives and examine how we are living it.

In the end, all of us have to die. And our lifeless remains will be, hopefully I suppose (after MH 370, anything’s possible), cremated by our family and friends. Now, none of us can be sure of the time when death will come calling. But we surely know that it is inevitable, inescapable. So, the best time to live, the only time to live, is now!

But lost in the maze of our everyday lives, we are missing this opportunity to live. We are steeped in worry, anxiety, fear and insecurity. Or we are victims of our ego and are trying to control others and our own lives – with little success though. This is leading us to become frustrated or depressed. And before we know it, the years have flown past. Youth has made way to middle and old age. Arriving in the evening of our lives, we want to live better, but we have not much time left. This is why we end up becoming even more frustrated and feel guilty for missing this opportunity called Life. To rephrase British evangelist Leonard Ravenhill (1907 ~ 1994): “The opportunity of this (instead of the original ‘a’) lifetime must be seized within the lifetime of the opportunity.”

If we treat death as a constant companion, and not as a distant event that awaits our approval to occur,  we will live better and fully! When we live fuller lives, we will live, and don’t merely exist! 

For heaven’s sake, it is not ‘zindagi ka suffer’….!

Suffering is self-inflicted. If you are suffering in any situation, you have only yourself to blame.

Yesterday a friend texted me his predicament. He said he was unable to reconcile with my thoughts, which I share in my daily blogposts, on a “practical, real Life basis”. “While I agree in theory to what you say every day, I simply can’t believe that you can be happy without money. Means to earn a living, having money for everyday needs, to me, is a critical pre-requisite. I am suffering because I have no job and no money,” he confessed.

I can empathize with my friend. I have been in his shoes too with regard to postponing happiness by imposing pre-conditions on Life. I have suffered too for weeks, months and years. Until I realized that you suffer only when you set conditions on Life. How can you? How can you insist that Life deal with you in specific manner when you don’t even know how Life works and thinks? The problem with such condition-setting is that whenever Life does not conform to your expectations, which will be ever so often, you will suffer. Today, I am still in my friend’s shoes – I have no work and no money too, but I have learnt not to suffer. Because I have accepted my situation unconditionally. I keep trying harder every single day, with my wife, to put our business back on track but I don’t say anymore that I will be unhappy with what I have, and my Life, unless my business turns around. Resultantly, while there is intense pain – if you are living or have lived without money, you may feel my pain – there is no suffering.

I am reminded of that beautiful song from the Hindi movie Safar (1970, Asit Sen, Kalyanji Anandji, Indeevar, Kishore Kumar, Rajesh Khanna, Sharmila Tagore) which talks about the inscrutable nature of the journey of Life. The lyrics go…’zindagi ka safar, hai yeh kaisa safar, koi jaana nahin, koi samjha nahin…’ Safar in Hindi means journey and zindagi means Life, but, ironically many are living their lives and humming this song as ‘zindagi ka suffer…’ This is not intelligent punning. This is the reality. Many, like my friend, are resisting their realities and that’s why they are suffering.

To summarize, you suffer only because you have chosen to suffer. Accepting your reality, the Life that you have, cannot solve your problems. It cannot take away your pain. But it surely can help you not to suffer. It is only when you choose not to suffer, will you be able to attempt better solutions to your problems. Remember: you have been given this Life, this zindagi, for you to journey (safar) through, experience and learn from this lifetime, and not to suffer! So, whatever it is that you are dealing with, accept it and journey on…with a song in your heart!

Get off the “becoming treadmill”, just be!

Stop competing, drop all comparisons, and you will live happily ever after!

We were having tea with a friend who was visiting us with his family after many years. Our friend was schooled at the famous Rishi Valley School, founded by the thinker-philosopher J.Krishnamurti (1895 ~ 1986). It’s a school that spurs the spirit of inquiry in children and lets them enjoy the process of learning than drive them to acquire knowledge that can showcase them as achievers to society. Our friend told us how much he valued the Rishi Valley way and said that his whole Life and career had been blessed by his experience of learning at that school. Naturally, we asked our friend’s children, who were in high school in Doha, Qatar, if they ever wanted to go to Rishi Valley School. Our friend’s daughter answered that question. She said: “I love Rishi Valley and the ambience there. But I don’t think Rishi Valley prepares you for the real world.” Her mother, our friend’s wife, piped in, “Well, schools like Rishi Valley don’t make you street smart.”  

What could have been an intelligent conversation sadly ended there as samosas and dhoklas were served and everyone got distracted in the direction of all the food and tea.

But I couldn’t stop thinking about the observations that were made that afternoon – one by a child and the other by a parent! And I wondered if we really need to be street smart and prepare ourselves for the real world?

Think of what the real world really is: a place where everyone is busy running a rat race, where the spirit of inquiry and learning is stifled very, very early on in Life and people are only keen on their GPAs and placements, where top draw salaries are a means to acquire all material comfort and where innovation and enterprise and sacrificed on the altar of quarterly earnings and wanting to be seen as the number 1 and not necessarily striving to be the best! Competition has become the very basis of Life. No doubt competition, like in sport, brings out the best in a person. But to obsess oneself with competition, being street smart and constantly compare with others can ruin the joy of living. In fact, Krishnamurti has said, “Real learning comes about when the competitive spirit has ceased.” And he has also said, “The ability to observe without evaluating is the highest form of intelligence.” So, in effect, in the so-called real world that we have created today, there is no more learning. We have lost all our learning ability trying to grow our earning potential. And, obviously, at the cost of not employing our intelligence, we have begun to love, and therefore cling to, things and use people, whereas, it should be the other way round!

It is this obsession with comparing with others, with competing with a desire to vanquish others, that has made our world, this real world of ours, such a cold place to live in. Driven by the hunger to be successful you have stopped celebrating your uniqueness. Instead of just being, you are on this ‘becoming treadmill’ – wanting to become someone else or wanting to become like someone else. Running on a treadmill has an inherent pitfall – you keep running harder no doubt but, in the end, you are still at the same place! Comparison with others, being in continuous, endless, competition, breeds ambition. No problem with being ambitious. But when ambition makes you combative, restless and subconsciously violent – where you are fighting continuously with who you are because you are wanting to be someone else – then your inner peace and happiness are destroyed.

Krishnamurti urged us to look at nature. He used to say that the flowers bloom for the joy of blooming; the trees don’t compete with each other, they simply enjoy each other’s presence and growth; the sun rises and sets because it simply has to – there’s no attitude to nature’s magnificence. Osho, the Master, went a step further to clarify: “All that is divine is non-competitive – and your being is divine. So just sort it out. The society has muddled your head; it has taught you the competitive way of Life…when you are non- competitive, only then can you be yourself. This is simple.”

So stop trying to become – something, someone. Just be. Then, whether in the real world or not, whether street smart or not, you will always be happy and at peace with yourself! 

If you want rain, carry your umbrella

Keeping your faith in times when everything is going the way you have intended them to is easy. Obviously it is a lot more challenging to keep the faith in times of stress, self-doubt, pain and suffering.

There’s a simple way in which you can overcome this challenge. And that way requires you to ask yourself: 1. What are the most precious things in Life that you still have and treasure? 2. How often have you been let down by Life for you to give up your faith now? 3. Define ‘let down’: Does ‘let down’ (to you) mean not getting what you want while still getting everything that you need? 4. By giving up on your faith, do you think you can solve your problems? When you sit calmly and answer these questions to yourself, in the context of your own Life situation, your faith will be restored.

Faith here does not refer to a God or a religion or a belief in an external entity. Faith really means the ability to trust Life, which gave you the gift of this lifetime, without your asking for it, to take care of you and help you to reach the shore despite your treacherous and turbulent circumstances. Faith also means refusing to get trapped in the imagery of your current circumstance but to believe that every dark night will be followed by a beautiful dawn. 

Here’s a story that illustrates this the best. There was once a small village, which was suffering from a severe drought. The crops were dying, and the villagers and their animals had very little water to drink. One day, to try to find a solution to the drought, the village priest called the villagers to gather at the village square to pray together for rain. He told them to bring along a token of their faith, so the prayer would be done in sincere faith. And so, the villagers gathered at the square bringing with them tokens of their faith. Some brought the Bible while others carried small crosses as tokens of faith. Others brought the Holy Quran and still others carried the Bhagavad Gita. They all prayed aloud with great faith and hope. Sure enough, within a few moments it began to rain. The whole crowd was overjoyed and danced happily. The priest noticed that among the joyous crowd was a nine-year-old boy, the only one holding open an umbrella as a token of his faith. The priest admired this little boy who had brought an umbrella in total faith that his prayers would be heard and that it would rain.

Learn from, and live inspired by, the little boy! What token of your faith are you willing to show Life today? 

What a Siddha yogi and ‘PK’ taught me about ‘my’ God

Learn to value and celebrate the divinity within you. It may not solve your problems but will show you a better way to live with them!

Yesterday, I heard of the demise of a good friend of mine, Kavi Rajan, who was a Siddha yogi and was only 47 years old. We first met him 10 years ago when we had gone to him “seeking solutions” to our debt problem. He said, rather simplistically: “Embrace your debt. Love it. It is a guest in your Life. It has come to teach you something. It will go away just the way it has come.” Initially I resisted his advice. But, over the years, I found his call to “accept Life for what is” very meaningful. This drew me and my wife closer to him. We met him probably once or twice in a year. But each time we came away enriched and energized. He was not the bearded, saffron-clad yogi. No, he was not a Godman. He wore a lungi, a sleeve-less vest or a shirt, smoked a beedi and led a normal, worldly Life with his wife and two young children. But he was a man who, according to me, certainly had realized his God. He would tell us: “Don’t make me a guru and don’t think I am your God. Realize the divinity within you. I am only a means to your spiritual awakening. Once you are awakened, you won’t need me.” My wife and I will miss him in his physical form but we are sure we will always feel his presence in our lives.

Aamir Khan in 'PK'
Picture Courtesy: Internet

I only wish many of the seekers out there get an opportunity to be guided and awakened by evolved souls like my friend Kavi. What is unfortunate is that almost every religion’s preachers today claim to find “solutions” to people’s problems and in turn make them fearful and confused. In the name of helping them reach or connect with God, those who have made religion their business, exploit gullible people of their money, time, resources, emotions and faith. This is the central theme of a beautiful movie I saw yesterday – Aamir Khan’s PK (2014, Rajkumar Hirani). Khan’s character PK makes an impassionate appeal to all of us. He says, that there is no problem with the creator, the one who created the world and its people. The problem is with the God that man created. That God, he said, was a hostage of individual religions and the self-proclaimed custodians of these religions are exploiting mankind. PK urges us to snap out of our stupor and awaken to a more meaningful way of living our lives! He makes a pertinent and sound case for a world without religion, where all people are equal – just the way they are created – and who respect the divinity in each other.

Indeed there is a divinity in each of us. This divinity is nothing but the Life energy that is powering us – because of which we are alive and are capable of experiencing the abundance in our lives and in the Universe. But we miss this abundance because we don’t realize this divinity. We are trapped in our self-defined world of limitations – our anxieties, insecurities, grief, guilt and fears – and in our elusive search for a God outside of us. Only when we break free from our limitations and look within – a journey which can commence through self-realization and awakening – will we find lasting inner peace and happiness.

When you realize yourself, you will appreciate and celebrate the fact that there’s no greater God than the one you see in the mirror every morning. You will understand that there is no better way to live than to accept what is or whatever is happening to you. You will then value each moment and begin to live your Life fully – without fear and without expectations!

Find your center … keep the faith … soldier on in peace!

The faster you find your center and anchor in it the more peaceful and happy you will be.  

Yesterday, I read a beautiful op-ed piece that was carried by The New York Times last week. Titled “Abundance Without Attachment”, the piece, written by author and President of the American Enterprise Institute, Arthur C Brooks, encourages us to move away from materialism and find happiness, abundance and inner peace through detachment. Brooks uses the metaphor of the wheel of fortune, rota fortunae, to explain how as people, as a race, we have all been conditioned to cling to the periphery of Life, holding on to the material aspects of our lives – power, wealth and assets; and so when the wheel of Life turns, as it surely will, you are pushed down if you are on top and you are pushed up if you are down. Per ancient Roman philosophy, the Goddess Fortuna, rotates the wheel which has the picture of a king on top and a picture of the same man as pauper at the bottom. This basically means that as long as you are on the periphery of Life you will have to deal with the ups and downs, with the highs and lows, with gain and loss, with success and with defeat. But, says Brooks, if you move inward, to the center of the wheel, you could be unmoved by all that happens to you in Life: “Fixed at the center was the focal point of faith, the lodestar for transcending health, wealth, power, pleasure and fame — for moving beyond mortal abundance.”

I completely relate to Brooks’ perspective. You can too. Just look around you. You will not find one human being who is not touched by this wheel’s movement. Around you and me are millions of stories of people who were once blessed with health, wealth and reputation who are now struggling with none of these. And you will find millions more, who were unknown, unheard of, making it to the limelight, gain wealth and living an abundant Life. The only thing constant about Life is this change of position if you are at the periphery. But if you choose to be detached, if you choose to let go or reach the state of willingness to let go, you will be unmoved by everything and anything that happens to you. Whether you are up or down, whether you are gaining or losing, whether you are on a high or a low, nothing will matter. Because at the center, you are untouched, and, therefore, unmoved.

Through the experience of our bankruptcy and from being penniless in Life, I have learnt the value of finding my own center. I realized that I am not my bankruptcy; I just happen to be in a bankrupt state. This does not mean that I am poor. I reasoned that I am rich with my experience, with my expertise and with my learnings from Life. It became clear to me that it just so happens, that for an extended period of time now, I don’t have money. This clarity emerged in my mind when I understood the power of finding my center. I found my center thanks to a quote I read that is attributed to Swami Vivekananda (1863~1902): “Live in the midst of the battle of Life. Anyone can keep calm in a cave or when asleep. Stand in the whirl and madness of action and reach the center. If you have found the center, you cannot be moved.”  Until I read this quote, I would be consumed by anxiety and worry, I would snap at every provocation and break down for the smallest of reasons. But Vivekananda inspired me. I took to the practice of mouna (observing daily silence periods). And through that practice, over a few months, I found my center.

I still live, with my family, in the throes of our abject and challenging financial condition. But I must report that I have learnt to be at the center of my Life’s wheel. And, let me add, it’s a blessing to be at the center. Living at the periphery always has this feeling of inbuilt insecurity – what if you are blown away? But living at the center means you know you will be provided for, taken care of, and will be given all that you need. Being at the center also means, therefore, keeping the faith.

If you are struggling with an imponderable – a health, money or relationship situation – try finding and moving to your center. That’s the only way you can soldier on in peace!

Simply be….in love!

Understand that love is just being and that’s more profound than being in love!

The moment you read that first line of today’s Thought, I bet, your mind went to the definition of love as we commonly understand it__an attraction between the sexes! That’s been the whole challenge in the history of mankind. This idea of categorizing and justifying love. To imagine that love is different between man and woman, then different between parent and child, between siblings, between people of the same sex and so on. But that’s a socially convenient way of misunderstanding what love truly is and perpetrating that misunderstanding over generations. We are all guilty of it. When a boy and girl play together as a toddlers and infants we say, “How cute?” When they want to be together as teenagers, we say, “Oh! My God!”

Love, in reality, is a feeling of deep friendship for another__whoever it may be__and wanting to place that person’s interests above your own. It is about caring, not necessarily comforting. It is about being there not about being overbearing. It is about relating and understanding and not so much about the relationship or wanting to be understood. Most people often wonder how people of the same sex can love each other and even seek physical intimacy. There’s this amazing 2010 Indian film ‘Memories in March’ directed by Sanjoy Nag and starring Deepti Naval and Rituparno Ghosh, which demystifies homosexuality, and in my opinion, offers an enlightening perspective on what love truly means. Love is also about serving without seeking returns and without expecting even a ‘thank you’. This is what Mother Teresa taught the world when she cleaned, clothed and fed the sick and the dying for decades on the streets of Kolkata.

All the beauty in this world is lost for you when you start to look at love as conditional, when you demand that you be understood and when you strip it down to a banal physical satiation of the senses. There was a huge uproar in India a couple of years ago triggered by an overzealous Narendra Modi, who was then Gujarat’s Chief Minister, and who’s single, over how much Shashi Tharoor ‘loves’ his wife (Sunanda Pushkar – who is unfortunately no more), who was his girlfriend for several years. I believe that even the question is misplaced. How much ever you love a fellow human being is just not enough. Because there is so much more beauty between us human beings that’s capable of having us love each other – more  than all the apparent differences that divide us! It’s fine if you cannot accept this point of view immediately. You may often wonder if it is possible to love your detractor. It is indeed. Just send positive energy and leave that person alone, even if that person has not been amenable to your reason when you tried. Don’t insist that you get even, don’t try to pronounce that person guilty. Just let that person be. And you be too.

Osho, the Master, tells the story of two women:

“Nancy was having coffee with Helen.

Nancy asked, "How do you know your husband loves you?"

"He takes out the garbage every morning."

"That's not love. That's good housekeeping."

"My husband gives me all the spending money I need."

"That's not love. That's generosity."

"My husband never looks at other women."

"That's not love. That's poor vision."

"John always opens the door for me."

"That's not love. That's good manners."

"John kisses me even when I've eaten garlic and I have curlers in my hair."

"Now, that's love."

Explains Osho: “Everybody has their own idea of love. And only when you come to the state where all ideas about love have disappeared, where love is no more an idea but simply your being, then only will you know its freedom. Then love is God. Then love is the ultimate truth.” Here’s hoping your own ideas about love disappear over time and you too, simply, be….!

Our compassion is urgently required – to heal the world

If you have been able to live today doing something proactively for someone, which cannot be repaid to you, then you have led a meaningful day.

This morning, while on our walk, we spotted a home, outside which someone had drawn a beautiful kolam (a design, a.k.a rangoli if it is drawn with colors, drawn on the ground using rice powder – a prevalent daily practice in south India and used in north India on special occasions). A hungry crow pecked merrily on the rice powder oblivious of the walkers who rushed past. My wife paused to admire this beautiful sight. She remarked to me: “Look, how meaningful is this ritual of drawing a kolam using rice powder. It serves the purpose of beautifying the front of the home no doubt, but it works as a simple method to feed ants and birds.”

As we continued on our walk, I reflected on the thinker-guru, Eknath Easwaran’s (1910~1999; it’s also his birthday today) book The Compassionate Universe that I had read some time ago. Easwaran had written: “My grandmother lived in a Universe filled with Life. It was impossible for her to conceive of any creature — even the smallest insect, let alone a human being — as insignificant. In every leaf, flower, animal, and star she saw the expression of a compassionate Universe, whose laws were not competition and survival of the fittest but cooperation, artistry, and thrift. . . .The earth was our home, she would have said, but no less was it home to the oxen that pulled our plows or the elephants that roamed in the forest and worked for us. They lived with us as partners whose well-being was inseparable from our own.”

And so, this morning, I learnt the value of the ritual of drawing a kolam with rice powder. Most people of today’s generation have given up on this practice as they perhaps find it boring or irrelevant or both. But this is a practice, as I understand it now, that sows the seeds of compassion early on and helps you to not just think for yourself but to think for the entire ecosystem. To be compassionate is to do something meaningful, proactively, selflessly, in such a manner that it can never be repaid to you. Compassion is when the love within you – for creation, for the Universe, for all beings – overflows. Even if you can’t do anything physical for anyone, just sending them positive energy is compassion.

Being compassionate in these times needs more intent than just reason. And our compassion is urgently required to make this world a better place. There’s something compassionate you and I can do today, right now, apart from possibly drawing a rice powder kolam outside our homes – we can send positive energy and a long distance hug to all those parents and families in Peshawar who lost their children in yesterday’s dastardly Taliban attack. If misplaced passion, as in the case of the Taliban, can continue to cause destruction, our compassion can and will heal the world! 

Your experiences count – make them memorable

Between experiences and achieving goals or buying things, choose experiences. At the end of your Life, those experiences will matter most – both to you and to those you have had those experiences with!

Last evening, while on our walk, we crossed a young man walking with his two sons – one of them aged 6 and the other possibly was 9. The father was ribbing his boys and the three were having a good time laughing as they walked. I reflected back to the time, 15 years ago, when my own children were of that age. And I could not recollect a time when I had taken them on a walk like this. I was busy building my business and was chasing a dream to create a global consulting Firm. So I worked 18 hour days. And I worked on weekends too. If I was at home, I was either trying to relax watching TV or was going over mails and reports from my team members from all over the country. I remained available to my colleagues and my clients, 24 x 7, more than I was ever available for my own family. So, I missed my kids’ annual days and sports days at their school, on most occasions, though I never missed a client’s board meeting or Annual General Meeting of shareowners. Not that I was bad spouse or father. I tried to be the best provider but I guess I never made myself available. The only time I did something like “create a memorable experience” was when my son, then barely 17, suggested that he and I travel to Rajasthan – he decided not to join my wife and daughter who were going to the US to be with my wife’s sister who was having a baby. That four-day Rajasthan trip, when we visited Jaipur and Ajmer, remains etched in my memory. The year after that “father-and-son vacation” my son went away to pursue his undergrad education in the US. And he comes home barely once in two years. As he builds his career and grows his family, I guess we will be seeing him less frequently at home and for shorter stays. Awakened by my learning of missing much of my son’s growing up years, I made amends as my daughter went into high school and later to college. Whenever she has the time, I make it a point to goof off with her or share and learn from her. I have realized – ever since our Firm went bankrupt and we lost all our money – that achieving goals and buying things are important and relevant – but only momentarily. Our experiences create our memories. And the more beautiful experiences we have to reflect on, to lean on, the more fulfilled we will feel about the Life we have lived.

Earning money, buying a home, having a bank balance, saving for retirement – all these and more are important. But they are not more important than living your Life – everyday, fully, doing what you like doing and doing what’s more meaningful to you and to those people who you call your own! You are never going to be the same age again. With each passing moment your Life is growing shorter. Remember - every moment that you are living in drudgery or worry or insecurity, you are missing out on experiencing its magic and beauty.

Do this exercise. Take your age and multiply it by 365 to arrive at the number of days for which you have been around on this planet. Ask yourself how many of those days have been memorable. Now, if you start thinking, you have lost the game. You ought to be living each day of your Life memorably. That’s why you have been created. If you believe that your most memorable days have been only those when you vacationed or when you celebrated birthdays and anniversaries, you have lost the plot. Completely. But don’t despair. It is never too late. At least from now on concentrate on experiencing your Life fully. Even if it is about work – choose to do only meaningful stuff where you can enjoy yourself, create value and touch lives daily. And never, ever, miss an opportunity to be with your family – never kid yourself that you are working hard so your family can enjoy what you have created/provided for them. If you don’t believe me ask your family – they will much rather have you around than have all the things that you buy for them!

The most important point to remember in Life is that our experiences create the memories that we will need to last the evening of our lives. Let’s make sure that those experiences give us joy, are meaningful and memorable. 

Employ ‘ahimsa’ for your inner peace

Learn to deal with your detractors with love and forgiveness. See how this approach helps you remain peaceful.

Ever so often we encounter detractors. Neighbors, colleagues, bosses, family, kids__everyone, at some time or the other, tries to throw a spanner in the works. Wantonly, inadvertently or even deliberately. And we immediately snap into the 'How Dare You?' mode. Our minds instantaneously start spewing negative thoughts, abuses (we may not always physically express them, but the mind goes on jabber-jabber) and we become, well, terrorists – albeit of a different kind. We start shooting off our mouths indiscriminately__at all and sundry__because one person has upset us. The issue__the reason why we are upset__is no longer important as the person that caused the upset becomes our enemy number one.

Gandhi championed and practised a process called 'ahimsa' to deal with such situations. Popularly misunderstood as his theory of non-violence, 'ahimsa' is today dealt with as a sexy ideal – something that you want to flaunt but don’t know how to practice. Many even believe 'ahimsa' is impractical. Actually, 'ahimsa' must be understood first for it to be practised right. What I have learnt from the thinker-guru, the late Eknath Eswaran (1910~1999), is that 'ahimsa' actually means the absence of violence. Which is, the state when even violent thought is absent and true love, our native state, prevails.

I have known from experience that it is possible to practice 'ahimsa' in the world and times we live in. When someone tries to derail your plans or attacks you, wantonly, inadvertently or deliberately, don't enjoin in the strife. The best way to win any battle is not to fight at all. Instead, remain silent. And wish, deeply from within, that person all luck. Wish that their deepest desire gets fulfilled. If you wish so, genuinely, any opposition/opponent will melt away! I have been practising this for several years now. And with each opportunity, my ability to harvest inner peace only gets better. I have come away unscathed from physically (when there has been a possibility of assault) challenging situations and emotionally excruciating circumstances by employing this method. I must confess that there are times when I have wanted to retaliate, but my awareness – honed by my daily practice of mouna (silence periods) – has always helped me.

To me, ‘ahimsa’ is a method. It is a process. It is a philosophy. It can be your way of Life too. Try it. It works! Happy experimenting!

To anchor in peace, be in an “Is that so?” mode, accepting what is!

Does Life challenge you more because you graciously accept whatever comes your way?

That’s an interesting question that someone who follows me on twitter asked me the other day. Well, the answer really is that whether you accept it or not, Life goes on happening to you. When you don’t accept what’s happening to you, you suffer. Because suffering comes from resistance. While acceptance, of what is, can take away the suffering, it cannot stop a problem from arising, a challenge from cropping up or a painful situation from surfacing. Acceptance cannot change the Life that is designed for you. Acceptance can only make sure you don’t suffer from whatever that happens to you. So, to imagine that Life should not challenge you just because you have learnt acceptance is a naïve expectation. And, as always, expectations bring agony; they bring suffering. So, abandon such an expectation and just be accepting of whatever is!

One of my favorite Zen stories is an illustration of unconditional acceptance. Three hundred years ago in a small Japanese village Zen Master Hakuin lived a quiet, contemplative life and was much loved by the villagers. A beautiful girl, whose parents owned a food store, was his neighbor. One day the girl’s parents discovered that she was pregnant. This made her parents very angry. She would not tell them who had fathered the child, but after much questioning she at last said, "It is Master Hakuin." The distraught parents went to the Master and expressed their rage. "Is that so?" was all he would say. When the child, a boy, was born, the parents brought him to Hakuin, who now was viewed as “a sinner and an outcaste” by the whole village. They demanded that he take care of the child since it was his responsibility. "Is that so?" Hakuin again said calmly as he accepted the child. A year later the young girl could stand it no longer. She told her parents the truth – that the real father of the child was a young man who worked in the fish market. The mother and father of the girl at once went to Hakuin to seek his forgiveness, to apologize at length, and to get the child back. Hakuin calmly placed the baby in the grandmother's arms. In giving back the child all he said, again, was: "Is that so?"

There’s a phenomenal lesson here in Hakuin’s story. Don’t analyze Life. Just live it. In total acceptance. There’s really no point in wondering if Life will “challenge” you more if you are accepting or if Life will “understand” you better if you are accepting. Just live the Life you have been given. Be in Hakuin’s “Is that so?” mode all the time – accepting what is and being open to experiments, adventures and possibilities. This is the only way to avoid suffering – despite the circumstances – and anchor in peace!  

Have an ego? Try hailing an auto-rickshaw in Chennai!

When you understand ego, you will be able to deal with it and your Self better!  

Cartoon Courtesy: Surendra/The Hindu/Internet

I have come to believe that if you really want a crash course in learning to handle ego, you must try commuting using an auto-rickshaw within Chennai. No matter what your net worth or self-worth is, the auto-rickshaw drivers will cut you down to size. They will be, often without provocation, nasty, irreverent and downright greedy and abrasive. The most humiliating part, the unkindest cut if you may want to call it so, is when you are trying to tell the driver (before boarding) what your destination is, and he simply drives away – no explanations, not even a glance at you, forget a “Sorry, I am headed in a different direction!” … It can be very humiliating and surely the fastest way of ridding yourself of your ego.

Last evening, I was, yet again, subjected to such a treatment trying to hail an auto-rickshaw. And that brought me to reflect on Osho’s, the Master’s, perspective on ego. Osho says the ego does not exist. He likens the ego to darkness. He says just as darkness is the absence of light, which disappears the moment light arrives, the ego too will be powerless if there is self-awareness. He says ego is just that state when there is absence of self-awareness. If you know your true Self, says Osho, you will never have a problem with ego.

On a simpler plane, the ego is the feeling that your mind whips up that you are in control of your Life and of everything and everyone around you. So, when someone, like an auto-rickshaw driver in Chennai, behaves in a discourteous, and often obnoxious, manner your mind pumps up your ego to demand “How dare you?” But a Chennai auto-rickshaw driver cares a damn – neither for law, nor for humanity. He will simply rubbish you. Which is why I say that spending time on the streets of Chennai trying to hail auto-rickshaws, over a period of a few weeks, can help you learn to manage your ego better. To be sure, you will learn to appreciate and value the truth that you control nothing.

Understanding ego is a very important aspect of intelligent living. This whole feeling that you are in control makes you a hostage of your ego. Ilayaraja, the music maestro, was once on Radio Mirchi, talking about the ego. I remember him saying this, so beautifully: “Show me one human being who says he is the one causing the digestion of all that he eats. Everything, absolutely everything, is controlled by a Higher Energy. We don’t even have the ability to control the digestion of the food that we imbibe.” I can totally relate to that perspective. This does not mean we must become defeatist in our approach to Life. This only means that we become more aware.

Know that there’s a Higher Energy leading you and your Life. By all means do whatever you can and must in each situation – but for a moment, never imagine and believe that you are controlling the situation. The more aware you become, the more you understand ego. And the more you understand ego, the more you realize that your Life was never in your control in the first place. How do you control something that you have no control over? The game of Life will be played no matter what you do or don’t do. The best you can do is to simply play along and flow with Life – pretty much the way you will end up learning to hail an auto-rickshaw in Chennai!!!