Why faith in relationships is over-rated

The best way to have wonderful relationships is to do two things: never expect anything from it or from the other person and always respect the other person’s choice.

When we expect someone to be what we want them to be, we are not respecting the person as a special, unique individual. Where expectation comes, respect goes out, and agony comes in! Much of the problem in marital or personal relationships is because there is an expectation of faithfulness. While it is important that deceit or cheating must be avoided in any relationship – so honest, open conversations are always the best way forward in such situations – the nature of the expectation of faithfulness is an indicator that we have stopped respecting the other person. To be faithful cannot mean living someone else's Life. Or you cannot insist that someone live their Life as you want them to for you to be able to call them faithful. To be faithful means to be true to yourself, first doing what you want to do as long as it will not harm anyone else. When all people in a relationship are true to themselves, and don't harm each other, a harmonious environment is born that respects each individual in it. That's when relationships become meaningful and stand the test of time.

Osho, the Master, argues this perspective immensely well: "Who are you to demand faith from anyone else? Demanding faith is like demanding slavery. There's a misconception in people that love must be permanent. Only stones are permanent. To ask for faith is wrong. There was a season__the spring, the faith, the love arose in you. You did not create it. It was just a happening. Just like a breeze it comes and just like a breeze it goes. When it comes, rejoice. And when it goes, say good-bye. Millions of couples in the world know there's no love between them anymore. But for the sake of society, reputation, for respectability, they go on pretending they love each other. This pretension is the real sin, the real crime."

This is not to conclude however that love cannot be eternal between people. It can, as long as there is respect for the other person and there are no expectations, while being true to yourself first in the relationship.

You carry a hurt only as long as you think about it

By letting go of your hurt, transform it into forgiveness!

Bollywood actor Tabu’s new movie Fitoor (Abhishek Kapoor) is releasing this week. She apparently plays a bitter, vengeful character. The New Indian Express’ Anita Britto asked Tabu, as part of a pre-release interview, if, in real Life, she was as vindictive as her onscreen character. “When hurt and deeply betrayed, only revenge can give you happiness. The great concept of forgiveness is not easy. It is great if you can forgive, but you are in a place to forgive only when you don’t feel hurt,” replied Tabu.

While I don’t agree that revenge can give anyone happiness, I do believe that forgiveness happens when there is no hurt.

It is important to understand why you feel hurt when someone lets you down or causes you pain, injury and grief. Of course any form of pain – physical or emotional – will hurt. But a hurt festers in you because you allow it to. The truth is that you hurt only when you allow someone’s action to stay with you, in your thoughts. When you let go of your anger, of your suffering, while the source (or impact) of pain – as a person or event – may remain, you will not hurt anymore.

You can reach this level of evolution if you understand the futility of hurting and being vengeful. What is the point with either? Someone has wronged you. And they have done it only because they saw it as right. Your getting even with them will only make you suffer more. It is not going to make them any better or realize that they have wronged you. Instead, they are going to retaliate. And then the process of vengeance is will go on and on, never ending.

Osho used to tell a story that so beautifully illustrated the need to replace hatred and vengeance with love and forgiveness.

One of the greatest Sufi mystics was Rabiya al-Adabiya, a woman who was known for her very eccentric behavior. But in all her eccentric behavior there was a great insight.

Once, another Sufi mystic, Hasan, was staying with Rabiya. Because he was going to stay with Rabiya, he had not brought his own copy of the holy Koran. He thought he could borrow Rabiya's holy Koran.

In the morning he asked Rabiya for the holy Koran and she gave him her copy. He could not believe his eyes when he opened the Koran. He saw something which no Muslim could accept: in many places Rabiya had corrected it. It is the greatest sin as far as Islam is concerned; the Koran is the word of God according to them. How can you change it? How can you even think that you can make God’s teaching better? Not only had she changed it, she had even cut out a few words, a few lines – she had removed them.

Hasan said to her, "Rabiya, somebody has destroyed your Koran!"

Rabiya said, "Don't be stupid, nobody can touch my Koran. What you are looking at is my doing."

Hasan asked, "But how could you do such a thing?"

She replied, "I had to do it, there was no way out. For example, look here: the Koran says, ‘When you see the devil, hate him.’ Since I have become awakened I cannot find any hate within me. Even if the devil stands in front of me I can only shower him with my love, because I don't have anything else left. It does not matter whether God stands in front of me, or the devil; both will receive the same love. All that I have is love; hate has disappeared. The moment hate disappeared from me I had to make changes in my copy of the holy Koran. If you have not changed your Koran, that simply means you have not arrived in the space where only love remains."

I have not read the Koran. I am not even sure if this story is true. But I believe that its essence is unputdownable. The story reminds us to replace hurt and hatred with love. For ourselves and for those that let us down. You carry a hurt as long as you think about the person that caused it as someone who has wronged you. Instead think of that someone as one who is lost in Life. Who knows not what he or she is doing. And then watch your anger, your hurt, transform into something beautiful and liberating – forgiveness!

When you don’t know what to do, just be

The only way to get rid of anxiety is to not give it any attention. 

In some situations in Life you may just not know what to do. Anxiety may then feed on your helplessness. You know that feeling anxious is not a solution __ but you go on fretting, fuming, worrying, fearing, because you don’t have a concrete action plan, a set of certified things you can and must do. This can be both habit-forming and debilitating. You are robbed of your inner peace and, over time, you become a complete wreck.

Several of us have ended up living Life like zombies – just going about things, wearily, while being held hostage by our own anxieties. It all began at some time with not knowing what to do. And it continues to be so, not knowing how to live and what to do about getting rid of our own anxieties!

There’s a way out. That way has always been there for you, in front of you, but you have not seen it because you have been preoccupied. Finding that way and getting on that path requires a simple appreciation and understanding of how Life operates. And how our human mind works.

First, know that there is no guarantee that every problem you face can and must be solved by you. So, accept that it is perfectly fine not to know what to do in some Life situations. Second, understand that your anxiety is always about non-existent stuff. You may be anxious about the past – having done something that you regret. But the past is over. It is done and dead. So what’s so intelligent about grieving the past and being anxious about it? Or you may be anxious about the future – which has not happened, so, in effect, it too is non-existent! What’s so intelligent again about worrying of a future that is unborn? But the human mind thrives on anxiety. It loves the past. It thrives in the future. And so it simply prefers to stay anxious. And you, if you want to get over your anxieties, you need to break that mind pattern of yours. You need to bring your mind to focus on the present. It is only in the present that the mind becomes powerless. It is only when you are living in the present moment that you will be free of all anxiety and you will find inner peace.

Bringing your mind to focus on the present and for you to gain mastery over your mind requires no rocket science. Osho, the Master, often told a Zen story to teach how ingenious some solutions to this universal problem can be:

Bokuju, a Zen Master lived alone in a cave. He would sometimes say loudly, “Bokuju” — his own name, and then he would answer, “Yes, I am here.” His disciples used to ask him, “Why are you calling ‘Bokuju’, your own name, and then saying, ‘Yes sir, I am here’?” Bokuju said, “Whenever I get into anxious thinking, I have to remember to be alert, and so I call my own name, ‘Bokuju.’ The moment I call ‘Bokuju’ and I say, ‘Yes sir, I am here,’ the anxious thinking disappears.”

Asking this question to yourself, calling out your own name, works. Because it breaks the circuit, it interrupts the anxious train of thoughts that are speeding through your mind’s highway. I have devised a simple variation of the same concept. I often tell myself, “AVIS, Steady! Steady!”  Or I repeat a simple mantram (this is what I learned from my guru Eknath Easwaran) or an easy-to-recall inspirational quote. Those approaches too work.

Use whatever method works for you and helps serve as your circuit-breaker. Once the debilitating chain of thoughts is broken, your mind, momentarily, arrives in the moment. Just hold it there, just be, and you will be free of all anxiety. So, in situations when you don’t know what to do, try just being! And feel the difference!

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. 

No more Manic Mondays: Make them Magical!

Your Life flows in the direction created by the choices you make

There are no right or wrong ways to live your Life. Live it your way. After all, it’s your Life!

What caught my attention over veteran Hindi actor Sadhana’s passing on Christmas day was that she died alone in a hospital in Mahim, Mumbai – losing her battle with an undisclosed ailment. Her close friend and actor Tabassum told The Indian Express’ Sonup Sahadevan that Sadhana, 74, was “very ill and very sad”. Sadhana’s husband R.K.Nayyar had died in 1995 – the couple had no children. Sadhana apparently had no relatives and was also embroiled in a bitter legal case over the house she was living in as a tenant in Khar. Her eyesight in recent years had been affected by hyperthyroidism.

Picture Courtesy: Internet

Now, here was a woman who was the heartthrob of millions in India all through the 1960s and much of the 1970s – her famous films included Mera Saaya (1966), Woh Kaun Thi (1964), Gaban (1966), Mere Mehboob (1963), Ek Musafir Ek Hasina (1962), Hum Dono (1961), Rajkumar (1964), Waqt (1965), and Ek Phool Do Mali (1969). She was considered a style diva and her hairstyle, that was aped by many, was popularly called the ‘Sadhana Cut’.

Did such a memorable icon deserve such a forgettable end? This is one question that some of the people writing, commenting, opinionating on Sadhana’s Life and times, have asked over the last couple of days.

Interesting question. In trying to answer it, we must consider that Life is all about the choices we make. And we must remember that Life’s basic principle is impermanency. Nothing is permanent. What goes up, comes down. What goes down, comes right back up. So, fame, fortune, friends and family – everyone and everything, will, at some point, fade away. The choice to live your Life alone is entirely yours. The choice to perhaps fight a court battle – or whatever – is entirely yours. The choice to be sad is entirely yours. Just as the choice to be among people you know, to not fight a court battle and to be happy is entirely yours!

I am not here pontificating whether Sadhana made the right choices in her Life. I am only saying that her choice to do what she did was purely her own. Just as it is with each of us in the context of our Life’s stories. Osho, the Master, has explained a simple, practical, way of making decisions and choices in Life. He says, when decisions come from your head – from the way you are thinking; emotionally, rationally, whatever – you will often not enjoy the outcome of your decisions. He says you may even suffer from your choices. But when your decisions come from your being, he says, when they come from who you really are, then no matter what the decision is or what outcomes follow, you will be at peace. So, who are we to judge how Sadhana made her decisions, her Life choices? Maybe she was at peace living alone and fighting her court battles, even as she battled failing health. Maybe, if Tabassum’s perspective is brought into focus, she was not. In fact, with Sadhana gone, it does not even matter now.

Even so, there’s a learning here for all of us. Our lives are flowing in the direction created by the choices we have made. And, as I see it, there are no right or wrong choices. A decision is a decision. A choice is a choice. And each choice leads you through an experience that you again learn from. This is how Life flows…and flows….until it ends…possibly when it merges again with the source?

Are you “sad sad” or are you “happy sad”?

When you feel sad, celebrate your sadness. When you feel happy, celebrate your happiness. This is Zen!

Picture Courtesy: Internet

In R.Balki’s extra-sweet ‘Cheeni Kum’ (2007), the little girl Sexy (Swini Khara) asks Amitabh Bachchan, when he comes back disturbed and confused from work, if he is “sad, sad” or “happy sad”? Although it seems like an innocuous, well-written, line for the movie, understanding and answering the question can simplify Life phenomenally!

Are you “sad sad” or are you “happy sad”?

Nobody wants to be sad. Yet sadness is unavoidable. It is a natural human state, an emotion, that you will feel when you don’t like what is happening to you or when what you don’t like happens to you. Life is not in your control. So there will be times when you will feel sad. When you feel that way, hold that feeling close to you. Examine it. Dissect it – Who or what is causing your sadness? Is there anything you can do about it? If you can, fine, go ahead, do it. If you can’t, ask yourself, is there a point in continuing to feel sad? The moment you come to this level of clarity over whatever’s making you sad and what you can do about it, your sadness will disappear. This is what celebrating your sadness really means – when you are willing to accept it for what it is and move on!

Celebrating happiness is easy. We all know how to do it. We share. We beam. We spread cheer and goodwill. Sometimes, we party. Interestingly, the same approach will work for sadness as well. Surely, a party to share your sadness will work as well as a party to share your joy! We don’t know it works because we have not tried it. Why? Because society has conditioned us to restrict celebrations to happiness and has associated sadness with a state of mourning. Osho, the Master, has a beautiful perspective to offer here: “Celebration is unconditional; I celebrate Life. It brings unhappiness – good, I celebrate it. It brings happiness – good, I celebrate it. Celebration is my attitude, unconditional to what Life brings.”

Life’s really about experiencing what comes your way. And over this you – and I – have no control. The real question is, how do you want to live your Life? Do you want to live it lamenting that nothing’s in your control? Or do you want to celebrate the fact that because you are not in control, because you don’t have to control, you are free?

I choose to celebrate this freedom every day. I ask myself when I am confronted with a situation, and an emotion connected with that situation: Is there anything I can do about this? If I can, I go do whatever I can to fix the situation. If I can’t, I let it – the way I feel about the situation – go. And I remind myself, in either context, not to sweat over the situation or the emotion it brings along with it – and, instead I smile! This is my learning from Life: celebrate it for what it is, the way it is, as it comes! So, no “sad sad” for me anymore, just “happy sad”!

Why this kolaveri, kolaveri….?

Ambition is fine. But never let it blind you, consume you.

In a reflective conversation with Vaani over coffee this morning, I discussed the pointlessness of trying to overachieve in order to be successful in Life. The papers have been full of news of jazz pianist Madhav Chari’s untimely passing. Here was a man who gave up a PhD in Mathematics at the University of Illinois to make music in Chennai. I never knew him. But to me, his obituary, much like the perfectionist that I believe he was, reads perfect: he followed his bliss and went away, perhaps too soon, having lived a full Life. Osho, the Master, made imminent sense when he said that between a choiceless birth and a certain death, this Life is nothing but drama, often a comedy too. What he meant really was why do we take Life so seriously, why are we trying to acquire, amass and struggle to cling on to material stuff – stuff that we can’t take away with us? I think Madhav Chari’s Life is a good Life to live. Do what you love doing and leave when you must.

Honestly, I was never this way – simple, spiritual or sensitive!

As I confessed to a young journalist the other day, and as I have shared in my Book (‘Fall Like A Rose Petal’; Westland, August 2014), I once had this kolaveri, this murderous rage, brazen, belligerence to earn money, to be successful, to be famous. But over the years, I have slowed down. I realize the value of faith (in oneself, more than in an external reference point) and patience. I understand that it is more important to take in the scenery than only worry about getting to a destination. And, of course, I believe that while you have a right to be ambitious, don’t ever let that ambition possess you to the extent that you can’t enjoy the process of getting what you want.

Ambition is good as long as it nurtures your sense of purpose, gives you a direction to move in and helps set the pace. But ambition must not ruin your sleep. It cannot make you jealous, restless, angry, belligerent and obsessed. Being competitive is fine. But learn to compete with a champion’s attitude – wanting to do better than your last effort. Don’t let the pettiness of winning at the cost of someone else consume you!

Let me clarify that ambition and belligerence need not pertain only to for-profit endeavors. Even if you are leading social change, if you are engaged in a purposeful endeavor to make the world better, don’t let your do-gooder ego drive you nuts. The same principle of following your bliss and moving onward with grace applies here too.

A lifetime that has been lived fully, every moment of it, by touching lives, is far more inspiring and relevant than working overtime, to create an awe-inspiring resume that no one has the time to read, or worse, remember. In the end, you will have two ways to review your Life – with gratitude for a time well-spent here, or with regret for having had this murderous rage, this kolaveri, to overtake, overachieve and win. Make sure, you never have to ask yourself this: “Why this kolaveri, kolaveri…?”

Accept your Life for what it is – and simply go on living

Does it really matter if there is such a thing as fate or destiny? If whatever will happen, will happen, then why analyze it, why agonize over it?  

In a conversation we had with a friend yesterday, we ended up discussing destiny and free will. My friend held the view that trying to understand how destiny works or blaming it for everything is simply futile. “Can your belief in or knowledge of fate, destiny, karma – whatever name you give it – really help in undoing, or changing, your Life’s course,” he asked.

And I agree with him.

What are we going to do by knowing that our lives are preordained? That really doesn’t change anything. Instead, the simpler way to look at Life – and respond to it – is to know that while you can’t do anything about what’s happening to you, you can at least act in a given situation diligently, with full commitment to living! People call this opportunity free will. I call it living. Just be, just live. Or, to further simplify, while you can’t do anything about what happens to you, do whatever you can in any given situation to make it better. And the best way to live through, endure, any painful situation, is to immerse yourself in the moment and to live it fully.

So, don’t dwell on whether your Life is preordained or not. It’s meaningless, it’s futile to do so. The fact is that you have this Life, a gift called this lifetime. You have no control over what happens to you. But you can and must do whatever is possible by you to live your every moment fully. You have that option, and no one can deny it to you, so use it fully.  

Osho, the Master, calls the fate-destiny-karma logic defeatist and escapist. He says when we try something and don’t get what we want, we conveniently blame fate. “What can I do, I am trying but my fate is such” is a common refrain we all hear or even use at times. Osho urges us to stop this blame game! He says don’t dump the responsibility of your Life on fate. Some people also dub fate as “God’s will”. So they dump the cause of their Life’s course – and their attendant miseries – on this, unknown, unseen, God. Osho asks, “You know why you blame God for all the things that happen to you that you don’t want happening? You do it because it is so convenient. God doesn’t talk back, you see. God doesn’t ask you how dare you blame me for your Life? So, you go on dumping your Life on God and you wallow in the comfortable cesspool of ‘my-fate-is-such’ thinking.”

Osho makes a powerful, unputdownable, point. Blaming Life or karma or God is of no use. Your Life – and mine – will unfold, go on, happen, in spite of you - or me. No matter what. This is the nature of Life. The only way to live this Life therefore is to accept it for what it is, the way it is, and simply go on living…!  

Simply be. Drop this urge to constantly become this or that.

Life simply is.  There is really no objective to Life; there are no goals to be achieved, no responsibilities to be fulfilled. Nothing. You are born. You live. You die. Period. This is the truth – so simple, so uncomplicated. It is only society that brings in expectations of goals and outcomes, and labels of success and failure or joy and sorrow. You take away the social denominators from Life – starting with money – and suddenly Life simply is.

The other day, we were sitting at a coffee shop. I was thinking of something I had seen on Facebook, I was looking up from my phone and I was smiling – staring blankly into space. A friend walked up and tapped me on my shoulder and asked, “Wow! What are you thinking deeply about? What next creative idea are you pulling out of your hat?” I replied, “Hardly…No creative idea or such…I am just in the moment, enjoying it, savoring it.”

Our friend, and his wife who was with him, were hardly able to comprehend what I meant. They smiled and waved their goodbyes and walked away. I can understand what they must have been thinking about – “how can anyone not be doing anything?” And they are not alone. I believe the whole of humanity thinks this way and so is missing this beautiful opportunity to just be in the moment – because everyone is trying to become someone, by trying to do something or the other.

I am not saying you must not work or that you must not earn money or that you must not raise a family. But don’t get so caught in earning-a-living that you miss the opportunity to live itself. Look at nature around you. The trees, the birds, the flowers, the river, the ocean, all of them simply are. They have no concept of time nor do they have any targets or goals to achieve. It is only man who has time-bound goals in focus. Nothing wrong with that. But if the same goals start haunting you, when they make your Life miserable, then you have a problem. Earning money is not a problem. But complaining or worrying that you are not having enough is a problem. Working is not a problem. But feeling stressed out over your work is a problem. Having a family is not a problem. But sweating over the behavior of your family members is a problem.

Osho, the Master illustrates this point with the example of a rose and a hundred-rupee note. “Life is not a logical process. It is poetry, it is a lovesong -- without any meaning, yet it is utterly beautiful. In fact, when something has a meaning, it can't be beautiful – it is utilitarian. The rose is beautiful because it has no utility at all. Its sheer being is enough; it need not have any other significance. But a hundred-rupee note has no beauty; it has utility, it has meaning, it is a means to some end.”

The nub is this: to live your Life fully, celebrate each moment. Simply be. Drop this urge to constantly try and become this or that. Don’t try to desperately make a meaning out of your Life. Meaning is a social requirement. Life doesn’t care about any meanings. So, why don’t you also live your Life for what it is, as it is? Don’t seek meanings. Don’t get keyed up. Don’t complain. Be alive, be with your Life – as is!

Patience is the way

If you have learnt to be patient in Life, with Life, you have mastered the art of living!

My friend and I had a creative and spiritual disagreement a few days ago. My friend argued that you cannot be patient when the whole world is impatient around you. The boss is breathing down your neck. The guy behind you is honking. People rush into elevators instead of filing into them with order and decorum. Your colleague is pressurizing you to finish up your part of the work fast so that she can get her job done faster. So, patience, really? It doesn’t work, my friend protested: “You live in a Utopian world, AVIS. Here, in today’s world, if you are not moving at the speed of light, if you are not overtaking slow-coaches and laggards, someone else is going to overtake you and them. The one who is moving fast, has the advantage. Patience does not work anymore today!”

Yet, despite my friend’s well-reasoned pitch, today’s world requires patience more as a must-have quality, a necessity, than as a rare virtue which, when available and used, can create value! Because patience alone can lead you to a Life of peace, personal well-being and prosperity.

Patience comes from a deeper understanding of Life. We are impatient with people, events, circumstances, service, technology, and with Life, because fundamentally we want things to happen our way. But that’s just not going to happen. Despite our living in a time of instant gratification – WhatsApp, Facebook and Twitter surreptitiously aiding and abetting it – Life works only in its own way, at its own pace. You can have your way only if you are patient with and in Life.

Osho, the Master, often narrated these three lines to help people understand Life better. He would say:

1.     Everything comes in its own time

2.     Everything comes when you are ripe

3.     Everything comes when you deserve it

Now, review your own Life in the context of these three statements. You will find that anything you have got so far from Life, stuff you have welcomed and have wanted, has come only per these three dimensions of Life. You may have wanted something and may have even been frustrated. And it has never come. You know your story better than anyone else. So, think back, and ask if you got anything you wanted any earlier or any later than when you needed it – when you finally got it? Were you not in total receiver mode to have got it? And you only got something when you truly deserved it, right?

Patience is about simply understanding these three dimensions of Life and reminding yourself of them every time you mind grieves or when frustration sets in. Simply, there is a no way to be patient; patience is the way!

"Rise In Love" - A film inspired by "Fall Like A Rose Petal"

In early 2008, AVIS Viswanathan and Vaani Anand - soul-mates, friends, husband-wife, business partners - were staring at a bankruptcy of their Firm. A series of business decisions had brought them to the brink of penury. AVIS wrote a Book "Fall Like A Rose Petal - A father's lessons on how to be happy and content while living without money" which was published by Westland in August 2014. The Book shares, through letters AVIS wrote to their two children, Aashirwad and Aanchal, the spiritual lessons that the family learnt through their Life-changing experience - of hopelessness, of fear, of court cases, of police complaints, of insolvency, of pennilessness. Also of faith, patience, love, companionship, abundance and soul. 

'Rise In Love' is a film made by a young film-making student Shalu C. She was inspired by AVIS' Book and was keen to explore how "true love thrives in the face of adversity". In a world ridden with dysfunctional relationships, Shalu discovers that a rare magic and chemistry between Vaani and AVIS has helped them both deal with their complex, numbing Life situation strongly, even as it has kept this small family of four together, despite a storm ravaging their material lives.

The film is based on a series of conversations Shalu had with Vaani and AVIS and with people who know them very well. It's a film that teaches you to appreciate the beauty of companionship, that inspires you to be happy despite the circumstances, that tells why relating between people is more important than the relationship itself, that motivates you to face Life squarely and that shows you how you too can 'rise in love'!

PS: This film is not a complete re-adaptation of AVIS' Book nor does it attempt to portray all the challenges that Vaani and AVIS are faced with.

There is great joy in living dangerously

Don’t ever fear living dangerously. Simply focus on the living, for you can do nothing about the danger!

Neerja Malik
Picture Courtesy: Facebook

The other day we were at an event to launch a book based on the Life of Neerja Malik, a two-time cancer survivor. Titled ‘I Inspire’ (Jaico, written by Megha Bajaj), the book tells Neerja’s story – of grit, of letting go, of acceptance and of being happy despite the circumstances. At the launch, Neerja, just as the way she always is, was beaming and radiating abundance. She personified being joyful! Without any prior notice, finding me and Vaani in the audience, Nina Reddy, of Savera Hotels, who was the chief guest at the event, invited me to share some perspective (perhaps given our own experience with dealing with a Life-changing crisis) on how “it is possible turn a crisis into an opportunity”.

I talked about how ancient Chinese philosophy and literature support this belief that the word “crisis”, when written in the Chinese language, is actually the sum of two other words. One meaning ‘danger’ and the other meaning ‘opportunity’. So to the Chinese, crisis always means danger + opportunity. The import for us is this – whenever you see crisis, don’t get overwhelmed by its inherent dangerous nature. See the opportunity. To be sure, there is opportunity all around, everywhere, and every step of the way.

Osho, the Master, takes the Chinese argument one step further. He says Life is intrinsically fraught with dangers. Each moment is an encounter with the unknown. He says our academic education, social conditioning and the availability of economic resources makes us believe, actually kids us, that we know what outcomes can occur each time all necessary and sufficient conditions are fulfilled. But every now and then – when an MH 370 disappears into thin air, when you are faced with a debilitating ailment with no cure, when a close relationship sours irrevocably because you have stopped relating to that person – you realize that you are controlling nothing. That only Life was, is, and will be, in control. You discover then that you are a mere pawn. So, when this realization strikes you it can be very unsettling. You thought you were the boss, the king. But now, Life’s telling you are that you are just a cog in the wheel, a nobody who controls nothing. Osho says that instead of feeling depressed and powerless, celebrate the joy of living dangerously. Since you can’t do anything about what happens to you in Life, since you have no idea or control over what dangers lie on your journey ahead, simply let go and be happy!

Neerja epitomizes that spirit. It’s her joie de vivre that’s helped her conquer cancer not once – but twice! It’s her zest to live that spreads so much positivity and cheer among all those she touches. She doesn’t make living this way seem easy. Living this way is easy because she lives each moment fully – with awareness, with joy! There’s indeed great joy in living dangerously. If you can find some time from your worrying and fearing and fretting and fuming about the ‘dangers’ you are currently dealing with, believe me, you too can feel – and be – that joy! 

A friend, the RBI Guv and why nothing’s right and nothing’s wrong!

In any situation only do what you believe in and what you are comfortable doing.

Yesterday, I met my dear friend RU. We coincidentally ended up at the same coffee shop. We spent a few minutes like most good friends do – catching up and sharing notes. In a context that both of us have had to connect in the recent past, RU and I started talking about right and wrong. RU brought up an almost Osho-like perspective – one that I love, believe in, and live by – on right vs wrong. RU said, “Right and wrong are so relative. To someone something may appear right and to someone else the same thing may appear wrong. So, society sees it in a certain way. And the law sees it in a certain other way. In a legal context, you can’t debate much; you just follow the law. But in a social context, you don’t always need to keep debating right and wrong. You just do what you have to do. And do what you are comfortable doing.”

Interestingly, Raghuram Rajan, the Reserve Bank Governor too shared a similar perspective, more in the context of economic policy when he announced a 50 bps rate cut earlier this week. He said, with the air of someone who was not just a subject matter expert, but also a thought leader, these famous words: “Everybody and his uncle has a theory on how to run the economy and what the RBI should be doing. There are savants and idiot savants available to give you advice. So we hear a lot of advice. There are people who say interest rates should be zero. There are people who say cut your lending rates and raise deposit rates…I don’t know what you want to call me. Santa Claus is what Latha (Latha Venkatesh is an anchor with CNBC-TV18) called me earlier, you want to call me a hawk; I don’t know, I don’t go by these things. My name is Raghuram Rajan and I do what I do.”

There’s great value in the discussion that RU and Rajan bring to the table.

The whole world obsesses over what is right and what is wrong. If we get caught in splitting hair on this debate, seriously, no one will ever win. Because what is right to one may really appear wrong to another. And it is only because it appears so that people have differences of opinions and disagreements. It is this divergence in thought that leads to quarrels, fights, messy legal battles and often times a lifetime of acrimony. And it is this same right vs wrong argument that spawns crime, hatred and intolerance.

I have learnt from Life that the best way to live is to only do what you believe in – no matter what. If you don’t believe in something but have to do it to please other people – often, family, friends, bosses or colleagues – you will be very unhappy with the entire experience. Now, when the experience is as trivial as attending a family dinner with folks that you have poor chemistry with, you can get over it once the meal is over or, at best, you will put it behind in you a couple of days. But what do you do when you have to keep toeing the line in a work situation with an autocratic boss in an anarchic system? What do you do when you have to sell your soul in a relationship where you are treated like a doormat? Well obviously, being the nice person that you are, you begin by adjusting, accommodating and working towards making the other party see reason. But when you end up having to suffer day in and day out, at some time, you will conclude that you can’t handle it anymore. You will then do what you must do – like walk out of a relationship or quit a job or refuse dinners with family members that you can’t relate to. When you do take a stance, in your own interest, people will make it appear as if you have sinned. They will say you must “grow up”. And this whole debate on what is right and what is wrong will erupt – and rage on.

In any situation, four perspectives will be thrown at you. What is right, what appears to be right, what appears to be wrong and what is wrong. All four are relative. Simplify your Life. Rather than suffer yourself while pleasing other people, do only what you believe in, and what you are comfortable doing. This is the only way to inner peace. When you are at peace with yourself, magically, your world, and everything in it, falls in place!   

If you can soak in Seetha maami’s wisdom, you are home!

You come with nothing. And you will go with nothing. Then, as Osho, the Master, asks, “Why all this drama in between?”

Kapoor's Bean in Chicago and the Karamay imitation
Photo Courtesy: The Economist

Our son studied at the University of Chicago. We have visited him on a couple of occasions when he used to live in Chicago. One of the many attractions of downtown Chicago is a sculpture in Millennium Park called “Cloud Gate”, nicknamed the Bean, by celebrated India-born British artist, Anish Kapoor. It’s a fun sculpture, though it is a very serious artistic creation too, for tourists because of its brilliant photo-taking opportunity – given its unique reflective properties. We have also been there in front of the Bean and shot our pictures as a family. So, I was rather intrigued to read in a recent issue of The Economist that a city called Karamay in western China was unveiling a sculpture very similar to Kapoor’s Bean later this month. This has apparently left Kapoor fuming.

Kapoor’s reaction surprised me. The Economist reports: ““In China today it is permissible to steal the creativity of others,” he (Kapoor) said, vowing to take his grievance to the highest level and pursue those responsible in court.  Mr.Kapoor expressed hope that the mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanuel, would join him in his crusade for his copyright. Yet Mr.Emanuel took a very different view of the Karamay version of the Bean. “Imitation is the greatest form of flattery,” he (Emanuel) said (and added), “And if you want to see original artwork…you come to Chicago.””

It’s a pity Kapoor is not getting what Emanuel has to say! I agree with Emanuel on this one. Because I come from the Osho school of thought.

This whole lifetime of ours is spent in acquiring – from a name at birth to qualifications to wealth to patents to relationships to assets – only to give up everything when leaving this planet. So, this way, living in a forever-acquiring-mode, we are completely missing the essence of Life – which is to experience everything that comes to us or happens to us in Life.

To be sure, you must never be serious about what you can never hold on to, what you have to lose any which way and what you can never save for use in another lifetime (as far as each of us experientially knows, there isn’t another lifetime; this is it!). There is no point in being so serious about what you own, what is yours and most of what you want to fight for. Even this lifetime is a gift – you didn’t ask to be born, did you? Your birth, as a (well-ordained, in most cases) human, is your biggest, priceless, gift. (And yet, imagine, so many sweat or sulk over material birthday gifts that money can buy!!!) By fighting silly battles with people and over issues that are inconsequential in the longer term of your definite-to-expire lifetime, you are squandering precious time.

Last evening, our close friend Janaki, coincidentally, shared what her mother-in-law, Seetha, has told her in the context of Life. I believe it is pertinent to quote Seetha here: “I have gone to several cremation grounds over a period of time. What I have found is that nobody has been able to take anything with them. You too look around. If you find anyone being able to take anything with them, do let me know.” Seetha’s wisdom is elementary and, therefore, unputdownable.

I think Kapoor (and his fight over the Bean) is but a metaphor. There’s a Kapoor in each of us. We are often clinging on to people, relationships, ideas, opinions, IPRs, property, money and what not. And through each act of clinging on, and with each avoidable battle we fight, we are suffering. The only way to escape all that suffering is this: soak in Seetha’s philosophy. If you can get it into you, and have it stay there, well, you are home! Enjoy your Sunday, meanwhile, this one isn’t ever gonna come back!

Junk the curse and conspiracy theory – celebrate Life’s magic and beauty!

None of us is cursed. If we count our blessings, no matter what we are facing, Life will be magical and beautiful.

        

A friend wrote to me, in a bout of depression perhaps, that he felt his Life was cursed – he was faced with a lot of hurdles in his business and career. He was hopeful though that eventually things will work out for him. “But it is the waiting that chews you up! That’s when I feel cursed and let down by Life,” he lamented.

I have felt like him before. But over years of waiting, like him, and quite like many of us do, for Life to deliver what I have envisioned, I have learnt that being impatient with Life is of no use. Life is not conspiring to fix you or me. None of us is cursed. Things just happen. Things just are the way they ought to be. It is our wanting our Life to be different from what it is that causes us to imagine that there’s a conspiracy, that we are cursed – this wanting is the root cause of all our suffering too. The best way to respond to Life is to just go with the flow. Drop all expectations. Don’t react to Life. Respond to it with acceptance. This does not mean inaction. This means learning to act with what is than demanding that the situation, the circumstance, the context be different.

Osho, the Master, explains this so beautifully: “Life is a curse if you are not aware.” The awareness he is referring to is about the true nature of Life. Which is that there is no Life any of us has other than what is happening to us in the now, in the moment. It is because we are imprisoned by the past – by guilt, grief and anger over what has happened – or by the future – by worry, anxiety and fear over what we imagine may happen to us – that we miss living in the present moment. When we are living this way we are physically present but we are not aware of nor are we in the moment.

A man was sitting on the beach brooding over his Life – his wife had deserted him and he had lost his job. It was about 4 am in the morning. Morning joggers filled the beach. Soon children, who were vacationing in summer, started to arrive. By 5.30 am, there was lot of activity. Laughter and joyful screams rent the air. But the man was nonplussed – he kept staring blankly at the horizon. He looked lost, sad and beaten. A jogger paused by him to admire the sunrise – it was a magnificent sunrise, a spectacle to behold. The jogger took a deep breath and, to share the moment with the brooding man, more out of courtesy, than with an intention to intrude, exclaimed: “Amazing sunrise, eh?” The man was shaken out of his stupor. He sounded irritable as he barked at the jogger: “What sunrise? Just leave me alone, will you?” Most of us are like that brooding man. And because we constantly keep finding reasons to bark at Life (the jogger’s but a metaphor), we miss its magic and beauty.

To deal with and overcome this mind-made theory of curse and conspiracy, just follow Osho’s prescription – be more aware. Stop and smell the roses, pause and cherish each sunrise and sunset, celebrate the waxing and waning of the moon, and feel the raindrops on your face. Each dinner that you miss with the family, remember, is an opportunity of a lifetime lost. There’s so much that Life’s offering on its menu for you. You will see and experience all of it, only if you are there. Hello, where are you?

Feeling confused and lost in Life? Relax, if you are willing, you will find your way and light!

Only when you lose yourself, can you find your true Self. Only through a confusion can you gain clarity. Only when you deal with a crisis, will you awaken to realize yourself.   

There will often be times in Life when you don’t know what you are doing. Or you will not know whether you are doing the right thing or not. You seem to be lost. With no sense of direction. Every aspect of your Life seems broke and broken. It appears that no one wants you, no one loves you and nothing that you want to work ever works. In such situations, it is not unusual to feel an emptiness – along with self-pity, guilt, anger, depression and a sense of dreariness, purposelessness.

I have been through a similar situation in Life. When my Firm went bankrupt and we were plunged into a dark, hopeless, penniless phase in Life as a family, one night, I sat in my living room and was trying to swap channels. I was so disturbed that I was not able to attend to what I was doing. I was swapping the channels aimlessly not even knowing if I was understanding what was playing on any of them. At hand, apart from the TV remote, was a glass of whisky – a friend visiting us from overseas had brought a bottle of Glenfiddich some days ago. But while I drank my favorite Single Malt, I didn’t relish it either. Both the channel-swapping and the whisky-sipping were involuntary actions. I was not mindful of either. That’s when I turned to my bookshelf which was at arm’s length from where I sat that night in my living room. Almost involuntarily, I reached out to the Sai Satcharita (a book dedicated to extolling the Life and teachings of Shirdi Sai Baba). The book had been on my bookshelf for several years then. But not once had I had the urge to pick it up, or even read it. But that night I did both – without much thought or desire, I must quickly confess. I soon found the book ‘unreadable’ – the English translation is pathetic and getting past each page is sure to accentuate your suffering, especially if you love English as a language.

But two words stood out. And in the context in which my Life was placed then, they made imminent sense. Shraddha and Saburi – Faith and Patience. These two words form the cornerstones of Shirdi Sai Baba’s teachings and in a way hold the key to facing, dealing with, and living Life. Which is, keep the Faith – that is you have been created, you will be looked after, cared for and provided for. And while you keep the Faith, learn to be patient with Life – with people, circumstances and events.

Inspired by my “discovery” that night, I began to delve deeper. I embraced a form of meditation called mouna, meaning silence, where you practice daily silence periods. Through your remaining silent you train your mind to stay calm, anchored and focused. Along the way, I also turned to Osho, the Master. I found great value in what he had to say. His teachings pointed me in the direction of Zen Buddhism – I loved Osho’s practical, real-world, in-the-face approach. He always managed to distill the essence of Zen in the context of everyday living. That was indeed useful. As I explored Osho’s teachings further, and as I hung on to Baba’s two magical words, Faith and Patience, I found my Life transforming. My problems didn’t go away (they still are where they were 8 years ago) but my ability to deal with them improved greatly. Simply, I have learnt to accept my Life and whatever it brings my way, while making my efforts daily to do whatever is within my control to change my Life. But when my efforts don’t yield results, I don’t panic, I don’t grieve, I just try harder the next day. So, in a way, from being totally lost and confused in Life, I must say, I have found my true Self and have learnt that it is possible to be happy despite your circumstances.

The Venerable Subul Sunim
Abbot of the Beomeosa Monastery in Korea

Yesterday, we attended a Talk on Mindfulness at the InKo Centre by The Venerable Subul Sunim, the Abbot of the Beomeosa Temple in Korea, who is currently visiting Chennai. The Abbot made a very important point in his Talk which has great relevance to what I have shared here today: “Meditation can be compared to allowing the sediments in muddy water to settle, while Zen attempts to eradicate the sediments themselves.”

I can completely relate to the Abbot’s point of view. The muddy water is the confusion, that lack of clarity that haunts us when we feel our Life is listless or battle-weary through a crisis (a relationship break-down, health issues or even loss of a dear one). The sediments are the emotions we cling on to – pain, anger, jealousy, hatred, grief and such. So, in my case, while Baba’s two keywords, Faith and Patience, got me started and mouna helped me along, it was Osho’s teachings on Zen that helped me let go of all wasteful emotions.

To be sure, each of us is capable of reaching this state. But for that, you must let go of all those debilitating emotions that hold you hostage. Try Zen. It works. As the Abbot said yesterday, “The purpose of Zen is to awaken to the absolute and to enjoy mindful living perpetually.” But don’t rush to Zen as if it is a headache pill or because it’s a nice sounding word or the latest fad. Be hungry to explore and understand the true nature of Life. Be humble. Approach Life like a good student. As they say in Zen, when the student is ready – and willing – the teacher appears. And only a teacher, a guru, can dispel the darkness, clear the confusion and help you see your light – within!     

Get some ‘zazen’ into your day today!

To conquer the mind, you must know the soul. To know the soul, you must be silent. To know silence, you must just be.

Just being may appear to be difficult. But it is not. And to keep it simple and silly, just as it sounds, don't try to be. Just be. In Zen Buddhist practice, there’s this concept called 'zazen'. It invites the seeker to simply sit, opening the hand of thought__which means drop judgment, let words, actions, events just unfold. A friend who is going through a troubled marriage was advised by her other friend to just be an observer and not be involved emotionally in the actions of her estranged spouse. I believe she was getting the most valuable advice. How can I be an observer when my world is falling apart, you may wonder? What else can you do? By trying to control the uncontrollable__Life__you are subjecting yourself to trauma. The suffering comes from this desire to control. Instead be detached. The essence of detachment lies in being. Not doing. Not becoming. Just being.

Osho says it profoundly, "There is nothing to become. You are already that, it is already the case. Stop running after shadows. Sit silently and be. Sitting silently, doing nothing, the spring comes and the grass grows by itself." What a beautiful perspective. Try and get some ‘zazen’ into your day today!