Don’t judge others; especially, when you have not walked their path

We must completely avoid judging, or at least opining and commenting on, the lives of people whose path we have never walked.

Shreekumar Varma
Photo Courtesy: The Hindu/Internet

Our good friend, the acclaimed writer and poet, Shreekumar Varma was abducted last fortnight in Senegal, in Western Africa. He has since been freed and is hopefully back home in Chennai. Shreekumar had, it appears, been to Senegal to sell an original painting of Raja Ravi Varma. Interestingly, Shreekumar also hails from Raja Ravi Varma’s family. The story of his abduction broke a couple of days ago in India and his subsequent release has been going viral on social media. What baffles me is the way people are judgmental about Shreekumar and his predicament.

Some of the questions being asked or judgments being pronounced are:

·    Was a ransom paid for his release?
Was the painting itself the ransom?
Shreekumar was a fool to be lured to Senegal to sell an original Ravi Varma painting
Something’s fishy about his visit and the whole story
I wouldn’t ever sell a Ravi Varma original
Maybe he was selling the painting without his family’s knowledge

Now these questions and points of view may be arising out of curiosity because Shreekumar’s story is in the public domain. But is it necessary to pass judgment on matters that don’t concern us directly or of which we have no or limited knowledge. Just because you are on social media, and there is an opportunity and space available to air a comment, don’t opine on people and events that you don’t know anything about.

People who know Shreekumar and his wife Geetha will agree that they are surely among the most genial people on the planet. We have known them only over the last three years, but we have immense regard for them. They conduct themselves with so much humility – despite their lineage and all their accomplishments – and dignity. No one I know knows under what circumstances Shreekumar made that trip to Senegal. I personally don’t think it is relevant. He got into a messy situation there. And the local Indian Embassy, the Ministry of External Affairs and his family worked on securing his release and safe passage back home. Simple. And period. There ends the story. I don’t think anyone has the right to dissect, analyze and pronounce judgment on a matter such as this – especially when they are so totally removed from the truth and the facts.

We have seen how social opinion colored and condemned the passage of justice in the Aarushi case – the Talwar couple serve a jail sentence when there’s not a shred of evidence against them! Vaani and I have also been at the receiving end of unsolicited public pronouncements and judgments. So, we surely know how it feels. We have learnt to be detached from what people have to say about us. But sadly not everyone may have that ability.  

Let us understand and appreciate that people – that includes you and me – do things in Life with their own rationale and logic. Sometimes, things go horribly wrong despite all the intent and planning. So, people do end up in a circumstance that they never quite believed they will ever be in. Everyone’s story has only one truth. And unless you know what that truth is, don’t speculate, don’t opine, and most important, don’t judge anyone. Apart from puncturing the morale of those you judge, it is, quite honestly, a total waste of your time and, seriously, none of your business! 

Drop your sense of self-importance, just be!

You have to do nothing to take care of your Life. Actually, Life has always been taking care, is taking care, and will take care of you!

At a coffee shop the other day, two friends were catching up at a table that was very close to mine. I was immersed in checking Facebook on my phone. But something one of them said to the other caught my attention. He said, “My Life is not in my hands anymore. I have to take care of my family, my parents, my sister who is going through a divorce, and I have to work by butt off trying to achieve my targets at work. It is insane, but I am no longer living my Life. I am constantly running, earning, providing for and serving others. I feel so lost, so overworked, so stressed – all the time!”

Many of us may well be in this person’s position. We may have the same feeling that we seem to be alive only so that we can provide for other people. And perhaps we are tired of such an existence. Some may even be suffering. To be sure, this is a very natural feeling when we are overwhelmed by the challenges we face and the responsibilities that we carry.

The way to deal with this situation, if you are feeling this way, is to stop giving yourself too much importance. A fundamental belief that comes in the way of our living our lives fully, totally, is the view that we have to take care of ourselves and of others ‘dependent’ on us. There’s this huge protector-provider role that we all have self-imposed upon ourselves. Or a better way to say it is that we have self-assumed this role. And so we go about our lives obsessed with an avoidable sense of self-importance. We believe every problem around us needs our immediate, urgent attention__and resolution. That everything from money to succor, in our immediate circle of influence, must be provided for by us. And when it doesn’t happen that way, as it often may not, we feel something’s wrong with us, or with creation, or both and so we grieve, agonize and suffer!

Osho, the Master, says, and only he could have said it so well: “If the whole existence is one, and if existence goes on taking care of trees, of animals, of mountains, of oceans__from the smallest blade of grass to the biggest star__then it will take care of you too. Once you have started seeing the beauty of Life, ugliness starts disappearing. If you start looking at Life with joy, sadness starts disappearing. You cannot have heaven and hell together, you can have only one. It is your choice.”

So observe what’s causing you stress just now. And let it go. Let go of your self-assumed need to be problem-solver, protector and provider. Instead just be. And then you will discover that creation will take care of you, and all that you call your own. 

There is no strategy to live Life: just be useful!

You must simply live your Life, and carry on living, not worrying about either strategy or success!

Someone I know told me recently that he does not understand what I gain by blogging, Vlogging, delivering Talks and holding free, inspirational, public events. “There’s no meaning in this. You are not making money,” he said. I smiled back at him and said, that doing all this, makes me useful – even if not successful in a worldly sense! “It is liberating to share, unlearn, learn…,” I explained. But my friend said he still could not see any meaning in my “strategy”.

I did not try to justify any further. Because there’s nothing to explain. There is really no strategy to Life and living.  Life cannot be lived fully when we are nailed down by negative, debilitating emotions like doubt, anger, jealousy, sorrow and fear. It cannot be understood too when we are held hostage by our ego and our wants. It can only be understood when we let go of what cripples us, what worries us and what scares us. Only when we practice detachment__from what holds us and what we hold on to__can we be useful without reason, without “strategy”.

When the ‘what’s-in-it-for-me’ ceases to be anything material, your Life is filled with abundance, grace, happiness and, well, magic!

Thanks to our conditioning and to our upbringing we are encouraged to start running a race, as soon as we begin to make sense of our world, and are taught that Life’s meaning is to come first, to win, to acquire, to accumulate, to conquer. In this context, by always wanting to win, we don’t realize we have to willy-nilly ‘vanquish’ or ‘deny’ others the opportunity to win. Or when we try but when we don’t win, we end up feeling depressed and despondent. This is when we start looking for a strategy to employ in Life. Then, a time does come when even that ‘winning strategy’ becomes meaningless. So, we end up seeking meaning when we discover that despite all the winning, all the conquest, all the accumulation, we are still missing something __ the essence of Life, of simply being happy.

In Viktor Frankl’s 1946 epic book ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’ __ chronicling his experiences as an Auschwitz concentration camp inmate during World War II __ he concludes that, as time passed and as he looked back at all that he had been through, the gut-wrenching experience he had in the camp was nothing but a “remembered nightmare”. Even his desire to kill his tormentor was now gone. He awakens to his Life’s meaning which is “to help others find theirs”.

In summary, as I have discovered it__and I am still learning__Life has no meaning. You bring meaning to your Life by being useful than merely wanting to be successful. It is not that wanting to be or being successful is wrong. But the pursuit of success often blinds us and takes us in the direction of being successful at the cost of others. Whereas, being useful, is what true success is all about. 

‘Karma’ or no ‘karma’, simply take Life as it comes!

Your being good or having integrity does not necessarily mean you will not have to face Life’s upheavals.

I am often asked if karma has a role to play in our lives. Honestly I don’t know if karma works the way people believe it does. Karma is best understood as the law of action – of what goes around coming around. But I am not sure if the law works the way Hinduism and Buddhism profess it works – that it is “the sum of a person's actions in this and previous states of existence, viewed as deciding their fate in future existences”. Since no one I know, who has died, has ever come back to tell their tale, I prefer only taking this lifetime into view. From what I have seen, experienced and learnt, yes, what goes around often – may not always – comes  around. So, if this is karma, then it works. But if you ask me if we carry over credit and debit balances from previous births, and into future births, or states of existence, well, I have no first- hand experience. Nor do I know anyone who has one!

Then how does one explain “goodness” in Life being met with or “rewarded” with pain or tragedy? Or simply, why do “good” people have to go through Life’s trials and tribulations?

My answer to both these questions is that there’s nothing called “good” or “bad”. Who says anyone, or anything, is good or bad? It is a human point of view – this good or bad argument. It is society that sticks the label on an event or a person. Or it is a person who does it to himself or herself. If things go your way, you call the going good. If they don’t you say things are bad. But look at Life from Life’s from point view. There’s a design and the design is playing out. All the problem is arising only because we humans don’t have access to Life’s design – to the Master Plan. So, we analyze and theorize and come up with karma and such related arguments. None of this, in the larger scheme and design of your Life, or mine, really matters. Consider it objectively. Of what use is it knowing if you are paying for actions of a previous birth or existence? Or what use is it to be forewarned that you may pay for your actions in a future existence? Seriously, such awareness and information is purposeless. What matters is, are you present in the now, in this lifetime of yours, are you living in the moment, fully?

Mohammed Thahir with his parents
Picture Courtesy: The Hindu/Internet/M.Vedhan

Here’s an interesting case in point. This morning I saw a story in The Hindu of a 33-year-old man, Mohammed Thahir, who had given up his seat to an elderly couple in an unreserved compartment on a train two years ago; within minutes of his “good deed” he was pushed out of the overcrowded coach and the train ran over his legs. The doctors had to amputate both his legs. For the last two years, the man and his parents have been running from pillar to post to file an FIR and claim a compensation from the Indian Railways. To no avail. Leave alone the apathetic system we all have to fight from time to time, even if you ask a simple question – did a genuine good Samaritan gesture by Thahir deserve such a heartless treatment at Life’s hands? – there is, and can be, no rational, logical answer. The two events, in Life’s scheme of things, are unrelated: Thahir’s show of respect to an elderly couple; and Thahir being involved in a freak accident. If you leave the two instances unconnected, there will be no problem. But how can you suppress the human urge to analyze, to theorize, to bring in God, to bring in karma? Simply, isn’t it only because we connect the dots and try to over-analyze that we complicate our lives, right?. So, who’s to blame for all the confusion – us humans or Life?

I think whether there is karma or there isn’t karma, you must take Life as it comes. Let your response to what happens to you not depend on how you believe Life’s treating you. Do your bit. Face your bit. And just keep moving on.

For your guru to appear, you must first be a seeker

“When the student is ready, the teacher shall appear.” – The Buddha.

A conversation over coffee yesterday veered around the subject of gurus.  Do we really need a guru? Does someone else’s guru have to appeal to you? How do we choose a guru?

These are very pertinent and normal questions that arise in a seeker. But before attempting to answer them, we must demystify the word guru itself. In Sanskrit, ‘gu’ means ‘the darkness of ignorance’ and ‘ru’ means ‘the one who removes’. So, anyone, absolutely, anyone who makes you become more aware, who dispels the ignorance in you, is your guru. For instance, my daughter’s friend, Aneesh, is the one I turn to for all geeky queries. I just send him a WhatsApp message and pat comes the reply. In every sense, he’s my guru when it comes to tech issues. Or for all matters pertaining to law and legal strategy, we turn to our friend and mentor of several years, S.Vijayaraghavan – he’s our guru there. Or for anything related to music and sound engineering, we lean on a young composer and studio owner, Kumar Narayanan; he is always helping us learn something new every single time. So, in essence, this whole belief that a guru is a saint, a religious figure, matted hair, orange robes and such is, to put it bluntly, all rubbish.

Fundamentally, if you have the readiness and willingness to learn, your guru will appear before you. There is no need to search for one. Seek. Just seek within. And you will be connected to someone who can, at that moment, clarify, educate and make you more aware. There’s a difference between seeking and searching. There is always a frantic quality to a search. But seeking is subliminal. There is a yearning. There’s a pining. Not in a painful way. But with the curiosity of child, the thirst of a desert-weary traveler.

I have always found that when you seek deeply, within, with all honesty, someone comes to help you along. Always.

I remember, a few years ago, when things were horribly, horribly bad, on the financial, legal and business front, we were in our hotel room in Navi Mumbai. I had a series of workshops to run that week. But I had no energy, no inclination, to do anything. I was seeking a way to understand myself better, I wanted to know how to cope. That’s when one of the managers from the company that we were working with came up to our room and told me and Vaani the story of how he had survived 95+ % burns in a ghastly fire accident. He said, “You simply have to believe. Non-believing is not a choice. When you believe, you are at peace. When you are at peace, you can think with clarity. With clarity anything is possible. With confusion, and depression, and despondency, nothing is.” So, to me, to Vaani, that day, this manager was our guru. He removed the darkness of ignorance. He made us aware what believing really meant.

This is who a guru is. A genuine guru has no pretensions, peddles no methods and makes no promises. It is just someone who makes you aware of whatever you must know. But for a guru to appear, you must first be a seeker – ready and willing! 

A simple, fervent prayer for my Republic!

A simple, fervent prayer for my Republic!

Where the mind is without fear,

Where women are not abused (physically and emotionally) but are respected and empowered,

Where garbage is responsibly disposed and recycled,

Where people obey traffic rules - wear seatbelts, helmets, give way to pedestrians, don't honk and don't speak on their mobile phones while driving,

Where people don't drink and drive

Where people don't watch pirated movies,

Where people know their own elected representatives (panchayat members, councillors, MLAs, MPs) by first name, have access to their mobile numbers and demand accountability,

Where human Life, and sentiment, is valued more than community, caste and religion,

Where clean professionals like you and me are willing to enter the mainstream of governance - executive, judiciary and legislature,

Where eco-consciousness is a responsibility and not just an idea,

___________________________________________________

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into that very practical, possible, realistic realm, O! Mother India, may you arise!

* If you like it, please feel free to fill in the blanks by adding your aspirations to the prayer as comments to this post

** With much respect and heartfelt gratitude to Rabindranath Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi and to all those who soldier on, dutifully, despite the odds, so that we can post "Happy Republic Day" on social media today!

*** I don't know the name of any of my elected representatives and I know that's a crying shame!

‘Letting Go’ is the way!

There is no way or method to ‘Let Go’!

In response to my blogpost of yesterday a reader wrote to me wondering if there was a method to letting go: “I find it very, very difficult. The more I try to let go, the more I feel the urge to be in control. I feel that we have been given a human mind only to solve the problems we are faced with. And letting go, without attempting a solution, or in spite of attempting a solution, is counter-intuitive to being human! Is there a progressive approach to letting go?”

Honestly, there is no easy explanation to this conundrum. Because truly the benefits of, the value in, letting go cannot be explained. It has to be experienced.

Even so, let me attempt to share what I have understood from my own experience of learning to let go. When we are confronted with a problem situation, we want to solve it. We believe that either we can solve a problem or at least we believe we can find someone who can solve the problem for us. Well, if we can solve a problem, or if someone can solve a problem for us, surely, there is no problem. But there will be Life situations when no one can solve your problem. Life – and time – alone can solve your problem or heal you. Ask, for instance, those people who lost their dear ones in the MH 370 episode. Or ask the Talwar couple who are in Dasna jail in UP. Or ask me and Vaani – and we will tell you what it means to be living with a problem that refuses to get resolved despite all our efforts.

But that’s not the only way to look at problems of an enduring kind. Look at them another way too: No matter what you do, how hard you work, what you wish, whatever has to happen alone will happen. So, when you realize that something’s not in your control, when you are unable to control the flow of events in your Life, don’t resist it.Just let it happen. You simply learn to go with the flow.

My late grandfather, my father’s father, used to say, in chaste Palaghattan Tamizh: “Nadakarthu ellam nadakarapadi nadakattum.” Meaning, let everything happen in its own way. It also means don’t come in the way of Life. Because in reality, Life has been happening in its own way – whether you liked what happened or not, whether you like what you are getting or not. And if you elevate yourself to see Life from a spiritual plane, there are no problems. There are only events. Mere incidents on your journey called Life. You call something, which really is a simple event, a problem because you don’t like it, you don’t want it in your Life.

Letting go is not a call to inaction. Letting go is wisdom. If you like, you can call it an advisory which says that despite your best efforts, if you don’t see the results that you want, don’t agitate, don’t despair, just go with the flow of your Life. Which is why the spiritual perspective that there are no problems to be solved, there are just events to be experienced, is very valuable. When something is an experience, whether you like it or not, you have to learn to live and deal with it. It is only when you label something as a problem, that you feel you must solve it!

If you observe your Life or that of those around you, apart from all the challenges that Life throws at us, we create a fresh one for ourselves by seeking methods to deal with Life. We have become so method-driven that we now want to know if there is a method to intelligent living, if there is a method to inner peace, if there is a method to happiness and if there is a method to letting go. Life doesn’t work on theories or models or constructs for methods to work for, or in, Life. In my humble opinion, and from my experience of this lifetime, there’s no way to let go. Letting go is the way!

Let go and let Life take over!

Please Note: This Blog will continue to feature my daily blogposts. In addition, on Sundays, public holidays and long weekends, I will feature The Happiness Road Series and my #HelpYourselfToHappiness Vlog Series!

Here's today's blogpost - not posting a Vlog today, though it is a Sunday!!

Life never lets you down. You always get what you need.

A major part of today was spent in clearing papers and documents that had got accumulated over the last 7~8 years – this is the time that we have been going through a bankruptcy, acute pennilessness at most times. Some of this documentation had to do with our medical records as a family. A substantial chunk also dealt with the under-grad education of our two children Aashirwad and Aanchal. Aash graduated with an Economics degree from the University of Chicago in 2012. And Aanch graduated last year from the University of Madras with a degree in Psychology – today, in fact, was her graduation day ceremony! As Vaani and I worked on the papers, separating them chronologically and subject-wise, we saw a beautiful pattern emerge. We realized that everything that we needed has always come to – perhaps not in the form we were expecting it to come, but it always came, often in the nick of time!

As we organized the papers, we revisited some of the most painful and stressful times we had gone through as a family. The fortnight prior to Aash’s graduation – I have elaborated this story in my Book “Fall Like A Rose Petal” (Westland, 2014); the week of Aanch’s admission to her under-grad program; the repeated times we had defaulted on fee payments; and the number of times our children have come close to being placed under suspension because of their tuition fee accounts being overdue….these scenarios played out vividly in front of our eyes. The replay left us humbled and overwhelmed. We realized that our children have made it through college – not because of us, but despite our grave financial circumstances; because Life willed it so, because of the kindness that people around us have showered on us as a family.

When Vaani and I came together in 1987 – we married in 1989 – we shared a common vision for our family. It was a beautiful dream, that brought alive in our minds the spirit of this song from Tapasya (1976, Anil Ganguly, Parikshit Sahni, Raakhee, Kishore Kumar, Aarti Mukherjee, Ravindra Jain, M.G.Hashmat). 

But when the bankruptcy arrived in December 2007, our dream lay shattered in smithereens. Aash had just then secured admission to the prestigious University of Chicago. Aanch was getting into High School. How would we put them through college? How would we fulfil their aspirations? Where will the money for their fees come from? These and more nerve-wracking questions would consume me and Vaani on a daily basis. To be sure, we came up with no answers. But each question placed us on the horns of a painful dilemma every single time. Should we go the way Life is taking us – in the direction of letting go, and letting Life take over – or should we go our way, humanly trying to solve and control an unsolvable, uncontrollable, money problem? I have no logical, rational explanations to offer why we chose the way we went. But we certainly felt flowing with Life more meaningful. So, we let go, and went with where Life took us. At our dining table this morning, as we sorted those papers, we discovered how compassionately, how beautifully, Life had arranged for the education and graduation of our children. Each time, when we came to the edge of a precipice, with regard to their college dues, a messiah arrived in our Life, a helping hand showed up and we were hoisted up – and Aash and Aanch made it to their next academic terms.

Japanese writer Haruki Murakami has said: “Whatever it is you are seeking won’t come in the form you are expecting.” I totally agree with him. But there’s something I would like to add, from our experience, to this perspective. Which is, Life may often never give you what you want. Yet it gives you what you need, not the way you think you need it, but the way Life thinks you need it. So, while all our human plans, projections and methods to somehow get Aash and Aanch to graduate existed in theory, on paper, and in our fervent prayer to Life, the way they have got past their individual under-grad programs is purely the way Life has willed it.

Vaani and I believe the best way to live is to live in a let go! Make your plans, put in your efforts. But let go of expectations, let go of wants, and let the magic of Life happen. When you do this, and let Life take over, you too will discover that Life’s indeed compassionate – you always get what you need! 

Sunny Leone is more spiritual than most people around us

Important Note: This Blog will continue to feature my daily blogposts. In addition, on Sundays, public holidays and long weekends, I will feature The Happiness Road Series and my #HelpYourselfToHappiness Vlog Series!

Here's today's blogpost!

Spirituality does not impose any conditions on your being. It is the flowering of inner awareness that brings you to be present in whatever is.

Sunny Leone
Picture Courtesy: Internet

There’s this whole song and dance, well we can call it drama too, over Bollywood actor Sunny Leone’s interview with CNN-IBN’s Bhupendra Chaubey. I have not seen any of Sunny Leone’s movies nor have I dug up her footprint, as an erstwhile porn star, online. I have also had no interest in any interview she has given up until now. That’s when my friend BG’s story on the actor and her interview appeared in The Hindu this morning. Now, BG’s someone I respect a lot. And his concluding line, “…Until now, she was a small-time actor, the interview made her a heroine.”…caught my attention. So I googled and pulled up Chaubey’s interview with Leone and watched it. I not only concur with BG’s perspective but I go a step further: I don’t just think Leone is gorgeous-looking, sexy if you will, I believe she’s very, very, spiritual too.

I have no comments to offer on Chaubey’s interviewing style or the quality and tone of his questions. That’s his way of Life. So, my perspective here is not because I disagree with what Chaubey asked or did, but is here because I agree with, and can relate to, everything that Leone said. It takes an evolved person to say that I have no regrets about the past. And Leone does not just say it, she says it with a deep conviction. She says, “ …Everything that I have done in my Life, has led me (in)to this seat…it’s a chain reaction that happens…everything is a stepping stone…when you are young you make decisions that lead you to who you are as an adult…” To me, Leone’s interview offers an unputdownable lesson in spirituality. It left me admiring this young lady for her ability to hold herself up with dignity, when so many people are hell bent on judging her. Watch the full interview here:

I make no comparisons here. But interestingly, at the recently concluded Hindu Lit for Life event, ace photographer Raghu Rai, who was in conversation with renowned art editor Sadanand Menon, said something very similar: “I am just a sum of all the experiences I have been through in Life. Everything that I have done in my Life has made me the person that I am today.” Everyone who heard Rai share with Menon came back feeling reflective and spiritual.

And truly, that’s all there is to Life. We all are a product of the time and the experiences we go through. There’s nothing right or wrong about the choices we make. Each choice leads us to another one and that one leads to yet another. And through choosing, falling, crawling, getting up, flying and falling again, we learn to choose better and cruise along in Life. Leone’s choice of opting to be in the porn industry was not very different from my choice of having been a salesman early on in my career or Rai’s choice of being a news photographer for several years. In the end, really, no experience is a waste and no experience is bad. Each one teaches you something, provided you are willing to learn.

As I see it, there’s a lot I can learn from Leone. She displays humility, acceptance and a keenness to just let things be. For instance, she says that she has neither been “haunted” or “held back” by her past. She tells Chaubey that she does not want to think of a future – of acting with a big star like Aamir Khan – that is not yet born: “At this moment I don’t know (about the future) any better.” I wish, instead of bringing a hypocritical sense of morality into play, that people pause and reflect on Leone’s interview for the honesty she inspires through it. That and her ability to be who she is, celebrating herself, without any regrets of a past that is dead and gone, and without any anxieties over an unborn future, are very spiritual qualities.  To me, those qualities make her more spiritual – and not just sexy – than most people around us are. 

A Life lesson in minimalism from Comrade Bardhan

Important Note: This Blog will continue to feature my daily blogposts. In addition, on Sundays, public holidays and long weekends, I will feature The Happiness Road Series and my #HelpYourselfToHappiness Vlog Series!

Here's today's blogpost!

The best way to be happy and content is to want nothing, cling on to nothing and just be!

A.B.Bardhan (1924 ~ 2016)
Picture Courtesy: Jitendra Gupta/Outlook

Three weeks ago, veteran Communist leader (CPI), A.B.Bardhan, passed away. I am not a communist. But I admired Bardhan’s simplicity, integrity and down-to-earthiness greatly. Even so, I was surprised when I saw a picture (see below) going viral on social media. Shot by someone called Bhupinder and shared by Bardhan’s close associate Vineet Tiwari, a writer from Indore, the picture shows the only possessions that Bardhan left behind: a rusted almirah, some clothes, a pair of shoes and a red suitcase that he used while traveling. Bardhan, I gleaned, did not even own or rent a house – after his wife Padma passed away in 1986, he moved into the CPI headquarters in New Delhi, Ajoy Bhawan. I have never known Bardhan personally. So, I am not sure if he was happy or what his idea of happiness was. But going by the tributes that flowed upon his passing, I believe that he was a much loved and respected man.

Picture Courtesy:
Bhupinder/Internet/Vineet Tiwari

My own admiration for Bardhan grew exponentially when I saw the picture. I have learnt from Life that minimalism – the art of living with bare essentials – is the key to happiness. Isn’t it a great idea to live with just a few sets clothes, and perhaps a passport if you love traveling, a mobile phone and a laptop with high speed internet connectivity? You may want to consider owning a house if you can afford one, or perhaps just rent one. After all, at the end of the day, you just want a roof over your head, meaningful work to do and some food to keep your body nourished and healthy.

I am reminded of a Zen story. A visitor arrived at the home of a Master. The home was just a small hut. It was absolutely barren. No furniture. No bed. The Master sat and slept on the ground. He ate fruits from the orchard in the neighborhood and drank water from a stream nearby. He had one robe which he washed and re-wore every day.

The visitor was intrigued. He asked: “Master, how come you have nothing here. How do you live without anything – no furniture, no utensils, no clothes?”

The Master looked at the visitor and said: “Sir, you too have come empty-handed – no furniture, no utensils, no clothes!”

The visitor was surprised with the Master’s remark and exclaimed: “But I am just a visitor!”

The Master, beamed a big, glowing, smile and replied: “So am I!”

That’s what we all are. Mere visitors on this planet. And to live here – and be happy – we need nothing more than the bare essentials! For almost 7 years now, my wife Vaani and I have been following a simple principle: anything, barring our passports and important documents, that we have not used, we have been giving away – every six months. This process helps us sustain a free flow of positive energy while keeping our home clutter-free. This energy, we realize, is the key to inner peace and happiness. Each person’s idea of peaceful living and therefore their version of the bare essentials will vary. But our experience has been that the lesser we want, the lesser we cling on to, the happier we are.

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Live! Don't Exist!! - A Life Lesson from 'Charlie'

Refuse To Get Stuck With Pain

Your Idea of Life is Never Going to Happen

Unhappy Marriage = Zero Relating in the Relationship

Beyond 'earning a living', make time for living!

Why do we do precious little to nurture, develop, grow and protect all those things that come free in Life while ending up working 60+-hour weeks ‘earning a living’ and trying to cling on to, protect stuff, that in the end are impermanent, dispensible, unimportant, forgettable and replaceable?

Happiness is accepting what is available to you

What time is your appointment with Life?

Launching "#HelpYourselfToHappiness - Inspirational Reflections for Everyday Living"...This is a video blog series which I will post from time-to-time.

Today's post is on an appointment that we unwittingly miss ever so often - "Our Appointment With Life"!

Excerpt: "Vietnamese Buddhist Teacher Thich Nhat Hanh writes: 'Our appointment with Life is in the present moment. The place of our appointment is right here, in this place.' So beautiful!"

(Kindly bear with the video quality and editing - still new to the medium! :))

“Is it too late now to say ‘Sorry’?” No. Never!

A friend posed this question: Is the English word ‘sorry’ adequate to repair a relationship or heal a wounded heart – especially when you have caused the hurt, and want to repent, redeem and rebuild?

The simple answer is that as long as you feel sorry, genuinely sorry, and the feeling is arising from within your inner core, it doesn’t really matter what language you use. Language is just a medium of expression. It is the feeling that matters the most. And feeling sorry requires you to be brutally honest with yourself: you must drop all analysis, justification and judgment. When you have realized that you messed up, just own the accountability for what has happened and apologize. Period.

But willingness to apologize is often accompanied by two more, often debilitating, emotions: grief over what happened; and guilt over how you have contributed to what has happened. I have learnt that anyone genuinely repenting a mistake often gets caught between grief and guilt. You begin to ask yourself the same question that my friend has posed – is saying ‘sorry’ adequate? This is when you should refuse to hold on to the grief and guilt for too long. Yet don’t resist the grief or the guilt – it will then persist. Instead, examine your grief and guilt. See the futility of holding on to them. Forgive yourself for your indiscretion or transgression or misdemeanor and move on. Chances are you will be forgiven by the party that you hurt. Chances are you may not or never be forgiven. Remember – you can never control another person’s thoughts or actions. Whatever be the other party’s stand, be clear that you must forgive yourself – only this can restore your inner peace.

I have talked about my experiences with feeling genuinely sorry, and overcoming grief and guilt, in several contexts, in my Book “Fall Like A Rose Petal” (Westland, 2014). One incident that I haven’t shared so far, however, pertains to a conversation that I once had, many years ago, with my dad in the lobby of Hotel Connemara in Chennai.

I have for long had a poor chemistry with my mother. On one occasion, the acrimony between my mother and I was really suffocating. I wanted to somehow try and force her to see reason and consider my point of view. So, I decided to talk to my dad in private, hoping to involve him in communicating with my mother on my behalf. We met at the hotel lobby and sat there for over an hour. I first shared what I wanted to. My dad did not say anything. He was just silent. I implored him, then I tried cajoling him, then I threatened him – demanding that he commit to telling my mother to “change her ways”. But my dad was deadpan. He continued to remain silent. In that entire hour, only I spoke – pleadingly, menacingly, softly, loudly. He never uttered a word. When I realized that this approach was not working out, in utter frustration, I blamed my dad by way of wrapping up the monologue and by way of a summary: “Appa, you are a vegetable (I used a stronger, stinging word by way of an aphorism but will not quote it here); if you had put Amma in her place long ago, there would have been peace and we would not have such a fractious environment in the family.” My words must have stung and I am sure my dad was hurt. But he said nothing. He just wiped his eyes, smiled at me, got up and walked away. Years later, perhaps on account of the spiritual awakening that I have had, I realized that the only way for me to handle the relationship I (don’t) have with my mother is to be both silent and distant. I concluded that she just cannot change; or see reason; at least in matters concerning me! When this realization dawned on me, I could not help but agree with my dad’s approach of employing stoic silence. I felt ashamed, angry, guilty and grief-stricken for the way in which I had hurt my dad. The hurt lingered on in me for a long time – until one day, I apologized to him in person. Again he said nothing. He just smiled back.

‘Sorry’ may seem like one word but involves a lot of hard work. This is what must be fundamentally understood: Do you genuinely feel the apology that you want to offer? Are you willing to first face and then let go of the grief and guilt that may arrive with your saying sorry? Can you accept a situation where you can live with lack of clarity on whether you have been forgiven or not? And unlike what Canadian singer Justin Bieber wonders in his recent chart-topping single ‘Sorry’, it is never too late to say a sorry. If you feel it, simply say it. And, no matter what follows, just forget about it! 

You can never win fighting Life! So, Let Go!!

Fighting Life, by resisting whatever is happening to you, is a just not worth it. Every which way, you stand to lose.

But the human mind, driven by ego, wants you to believe that you can and must do something in a Life situation. So it will goad you to fight. To resist what’s happening to you. And that’s how, through such resistance, you invite misery into your Life.

Let’s understand this better. There are only two kinds of problems. One set of problems are those that you can solve – either on your own or through a third party resource, expending money or through other means. The other set of problems are the ones that are, humanly, unsolvable. Only Life has to solve them over time. When you are faced with the second set of problems, the best thing to do is to let go!

When you let go, your problem may still be there. But it won’t torment you. It will not cause you any misery. You become miserable only when you attempt doing something that you are incapable of doing or don’t like doing. Let’s get this straight – Human beings do things. Life simply happens. These are the only two realities. When you can’t solve a Life problem by doing something about it, let go and allow Life to happen to you – in total acceptance and humility! Just let it happen. Let go of your desire to control, to solve, to do.

So, when you find that your doing something about a situation is of no use, simply flow with Life. Float like a piece of wood does on a river. Don’t worry about where Life is taking you or about why is it taking you wherever it is going or ask when will this journey end. This does not mean inaction. The choice of allowing yourself to ‘float’ is significant action in itself! Don’t, however, analyze and form opinions about outcomes and possibilities. Don’t reason what consequences will follow an outcome – if you end up here, this is what will happen or if you end up there, this is what it means. Let Go = non-reasoning, non analyzing, non-questioning! Let Go means living spontaneously!

Living in ‘Let Go’ mode is not difficult. It is intelligent living. Because you are doing the most intelligent thing after trying to apply your intelligence to solving the problem or Life situation. When you live in a ‘Let Go’ you may have to live with your problem, your Life situation – but you will live in peace, in bliss. 

Why forsake your freedom for someone else’s folly?

Some people you meet in Life will be cantankerous, scheming and unethical to the core. Let them be.

Recently someone we know worked in a despicable manner against our interest. It was hurting to see how we were treated and how our self-esteem was trampled upon. We did not protest. We did not whine. We did not rant. We did not fight. We merely exited from the relationship.

10 years ago, I would have kicked up a ruckus. I would have fought. I would have wanted to get even. I would have pushed hard to justify ourselves. I remember during one ghastly episode (which I have shared in my Book “Fall Like A Rose Petal”) with an unethical client, in 2003, I launched a 45-minute tirade against the CFO of the client’s company over the phone. It was a monologue – only I spoke, actually, I howled non-stop for those 45 minutes! When I was tired and done, and could bawl no more, the gentleman at the other end of the line calmly said, “Never waste your energy banging your head against a wall, AVIS. Not worth it.” But I did not heed his sage counsel. I threatened him and his company of dire consequences. For weeks on end, I tried to pursue options to sue them in international courts (they are an MNC). It was very late in the day when I realized I had I wasted precious time and inner peace on a dead cause.

Mercifully, I am not that way anymore. This is what Life has taught me: People will be who they are. And what they do to you, need not__and must not__change the way you deal with them. A common response we, good, ethical, warm and kind folks, have to such people is that we become depressive or angry or vengeful. This only creates more negative energy in us. And that, you will agree, is simply not worth inviting into your Life!

Here’s a Zen story which is awakening.

Two monks were washing their bowls in the river when they noticed a scorpion that was drowning. One monk immediately scooped it up and set it upon the bank. In the process the scorpion stung him. Unmindful, he went back to washing his bowl and again the scorpion fell into the river and began drowning. The monk saved the scorpion one more time and was again stung.

The other monk, who was watching this spectacle, asked him, “Friend, why do you continue to save the scorpion when you know it's nature is to sting?”

“Because,” the first monk replied, “to save it is my nature.”

So, stay true to your nature. And let no one affect it. This does not mean you must suffer in silence. There surely are other means to express yourself than to retaliate in a similar manner as the one who’s causing you pain. When you are filled with anger and act from that impulse, you breed negativity in you. When you are negative, your inner peace gets affected. When your inner peace is disturbed, you are held hostage by debilitating emotions. And that essentially means you are not living free!

Think about it: Do you really want to forsake your freedom because someone acted foolishly?

Never come in the way of your child’s Life choices

When your child makes an unconventional choice, celebrate, rather than worry!

Yesterday we met a gentleman who said he was concerned that his son, after his 12^th grade, wanted to pursue a career in art. What the man was perplexed about was that his child had never “demonstrated artistic talent” and yet he wanted to join a foundational undergrad program in art and follow it up with a two-year Master’s degree at some point.

I asked the gentleman what exactly was his concern.

He replied: “I wanted my son to have a basic qualification before he embarked on a career in art.”

By basic, what the man really meant is, doing a conventional degree in medicine, engineering, pure sciences, math, law or literature and such. And why does such a basic qualification matter? Because, as popular perception defines it, starting career plans in these fields are more stable and income, earning a living, doesn’t pose a challenge.  

But what about doing what you love doing? What about passion?

“Well,” said the man, “Passion won’t go anywhere. You can always pursue passion later on in Life after you earn some money and save enough to last your lifetime!”

The gentleman is not alone. This is how most of the world thinks, works and lives. A majority of the people believe Life must and will progress linearly. Which is you finish school, go through college, get a job, earn an income, raise a family, build a house, put your kids through school and college, retire and post-retirement you try to follow your bliss – health and time (on the planet) permitting – and, eventually, you die. Even assuming that this linear progression and its attendant monotony is sufferable, there is no guarantee that anyone’s Life progresses along this straight path. A health challenge here, a relationship issue there, a career low or a fundamental skills issue (because you have opted to do something only because it pays you and not because you love doing it) – all this and more makes your Life path look like an ECG reading, often even treacherous to survive! So, after battling Life’s ups and downs, when you finally have reached a point when you can afford to go do what you love doing, you are either too exhausted and Life-weary or you just have run out of time! 

Now, this perspective is not just about the career choices that your child may make. It is the best way forward for you – for your own inner peace – for all your child’s Life choices.

A fundamental principle of good, mature, intelligent parenting is to not try to live the lives of your kids. Simply, don’t come in their way. Don’t try to protect them. Yes, it is a natural tendency to tell them what you believe they must be doing. But say it suggestively and be done with it. Don’t impose your views. Don’t sweat over them. Don’t worry for them. Remember that they are individuals in their own right. They have an independent, intelligent mind – after all, they are your children! So, they want to go out into the big, bountiful world and experiment. They have a right to do what they love doing. And we must never come in their way.

What is the worst that can happen to your child if your child’s choice – of career or relationship or whatever – doesn’t work out? Critically time would have been lost during the tenure of the “experiment”. But how can you ever compute the value of the learning the experience will give your child? The experience of immersing in what she or he loves doing, the experience of selling a value proposition to the world, the experience of being rejected, the experience of thinking out of the box, the experience of stumbling, struggling, falling and standing up again. And how can you even put a value to whatever is making your child happy?

Yes, if a child is embracing a ruinous habit or when, for whatever reason, the child is straying on the wrong side of law or going against the principles of humanity, it is your duty as a parent to stand up and red flag that moment. But again, there are no guarantees that you will be heard or that your sane counsel will prevail. So, we come back to the same principle – suggest, advice and be done with it. Remember, in such cases, when you are not heard, you have not failed. It is just that your child’s learning curve is steeper!

I believe we can give our children only two things – roots, foundational values, on how Life can and must be lived and wings, freedom, so they can fly away. Why would you want to keep your child entrapped in your shadow? Why would you not let her or him just be, let her or him free, to fly away and touch the sky?