What do you want to do before you die?

When you contemplate on death, and understand it to be the most predictable and inevitable aspect of your Life, you will start living instead of merely existing!

The "Before I Die" Wall in Wallace Garden, Chennai;
outside Tuscana Pizzeria

This afternoon, while walking along Wallace Garden, in Chennai, we chanced upon a large, unique, black board outside the Tuscana Pizzeria. It had the words “Before I die” stenciled in a big font on it, followed by several “I want to _______________” prompts on it. Which is, anyone can write, what they want to do before they die, in the blank space opposite each “I want to” prompt. I filled the blank opposite my “I want to” prompt with “Live Fully!” My wife filled her blank with “Record a Song – Album!” Neither of us thought too much. We simply picked up the chalk piece provided beside the black board and shared our innermost feeling fluently. There was no holding back. And I believe that’s what’s most inspiring this idea – of expressing yourself freely, with absolute honesty, when you contemplate on death.

Death is not a bad idea. It is not a depressing thought. It actually is an empowering, inevitable reality. A truth that none of us can hide from or avoid. Candy Chang, a Taiwanese-American artist, is the inspiration and the force behind the “Before I die” movement. In 2011, after a period of intense grief and depression, which followed the loss of someone dear to her, she took the permission to paint the outer wall of an abandoned house in her neighborhood, with chalkboard paint and stenciled it with a grid of the sentence “Before I die I want to _______.” Anyone walking by could pick up a piece of chalk, reflect on their lives, and share their personal aspirations in public space. It was all an experiment and she didn’t know what to expect. By the next day, all 80 prompts were filled and responses spilled into the margins: “Before I die I want to… ‘sing for millions’, ‘plant a tree’, ‘hold her one more time’, ‘straddle the International Date Line’, ‘see my daughter graduate’, ‘eat more of everything’, ‘abandon all insecurities’, ‘be completely myself’…”  People’s responses made her laugh out loud and tear up. They consoled her during hard times. She understood her neighbors in new and enlightening ways, and the wall reminded her that she’s not alone as she tries to make sense of her Life.

After posting a few photos, she received hundreds of messages from people who wanted to make a wall with their community. She created a website with resources and now thanks to passionate people around the world, over 500 “Before I Die” walls have been created in over 30 languages and over 60 countries, including Kazakhstan, Portugal, Japan, Denmark, Iraq, Argentina, and South Africa. My wife and I, as is obvious, had stumbled upon the wall in Chennai. And let me confess, the experience has left me completely energized and enriched.

We must often take time to pause and reflect on our lives. The problem with today’s lifestyles is that everything is so simple – and is increasingly getting simpler, thanks to technology – yet our lives remain more complex and complicated than ever before. Despite email, no one really responds or reaches out to others. Sharing has been reduced to letting others know what inane stuff you have chanced upon on facebook. WhatsApp and text messaging provide instant gratification but no warmth. Everyone’s busier than ever before but no one knows where they are going. Sometimes it’s even difficult for people to know whether they are going or coming. Contemplating on death, therefore, is an important reflection point. In fact, it can also be the inflection point in your Life once you realize that you don’t have all the time here – on this planet – which you, unfortunately, still believe you have! The awakening moment is when you understand that you are speeding towards your death, albeit at a different speed compared to others! That’s when, you will wake up, you will throw out all that’s – or whoever is – unimportant in your Life. And that’s when you will start living meaningfully, purposefully and joyously! So, what are you waiting for? What do you want to do before you die? Answer that question now – and just go do it!

(PS: Content related to Candy Chang has been taken from her official website.)

Let your Life be your message

Set an example. Let your Life be your message.

To grow old, biologically, is no big deal. All of us will age with time. We have to make no effort. But to grow wiser, mature, and to apply our native intelligence, is both a big opportunity and a bigger responsibility.

Recently, I was out with a friend who lit up a cigarette and chucked the empty cigarette pack on the street. While I chided him for his mindless action, I also picked up the trash and reached it to a trashcan at a coffee place we went to later. Another friend drove around town without wearing his seat belt, with me beside him in the front of his car fully strapped. We drove short distances together but I prefer being strapped. It is not about being subservient to law in either instance, but to be personally responsible__and accountable__for our actions. This perspective is so relevant in India at the moment because of the Swach Bharat Campaign that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is leading and because of the new traffic laws being rolled out. One of the reasons why people don’t believe either of these much-needed initiatives will do well, or even survive, is because many expect public participation and ownership to be completely lacking. Without people changing themselves, we can hardly expect any change in our society.

Society is a reflection, a true one, of who we are. And the way we behave. So, in India, if we find our streets dirty, messy, and stinking with garbage mounds at each intersection, it is because we are an irresponsible population. If the cases of drunken driving, often leading to fatal accidents, is mounting among the younger (20 somethings) generation, it is because we parents are setting a poor example by way of our irreverent road sense. We may not always drink and drive, but we hesitate or don’t care enough to stop people__even in our immediate circle of influence__from driving without seatbelts or when they have imbibed a drink or two.

Gandhi said, with absolute simplicity, “Be the change that you want to see in the world”. He also said, “My Life is my message.” These need not be viewed as sentiments expressed by a man whose ideas were only relevant in a different era, in a century gone by. These are also not ideals that are hard to emulate. They remain as relevant as they once were and are an opportunity, in fact, a clarion call, for personal transformation. We don’t have to be leaders to set an example. We don’t have to be visionaries to have a message. We must lead though, our lives, with maturity and with a complete sense of responsibility__cognizant always of the kind of example we are setting to the generation that is following us and of the message it is reading of our Life!

Learning to live this “complimentary” Life

When you realize that Life is a gift, you will learn to stop wanting to control it!

Last evening our daughter was performing in a dance-theatre production. Several of our friends had bought tickets and had come to cheer her and her dance company. As the show was set to begin, and we walked towards the gates, my wife and I were advised, by a crew member of the dance company, to take the gate further ahead. It, we soon realized, was the VIP gate and offered the best views in the auditorium. Our friends had gone through their respective gates (depending on the denominations of their tickets) and had taken their seats. As we waited for the show to commence, a pang of guilt pierced through me. We seem to have unwittingly deserted our friends, I thought. Then I reasoned to myself that the only option we had – given our current financial situation, we didn’t have the means to buy tickets ourselves – was to celebrate the fact that we have VIP, “parents’ complimentary” tickets that our daughter’s dance company had offered us. So, indeed, the best thing to do was to sit back and enjoy the performance!

Soon the show got underway and I lost myself in it. On the way back home, my thoughts went back to our “complimentary” tickets. And as I kept thinking about them, I suddenly wondered: “Isn’t this whole Life complimentary? Isn’t it a gift we never asked for?” That realization was awakening. And I chuckled to myself. If only we held this awareness consistently in us, I thought, Life would be so much simpler living.

Most of our young adulthood is lost in “building a career” and “raising a family”. Then our middle-age is spent in “settling down” our children. And post-retirement is really about “managing to cope with our health situation” and if we live any longer, most of us treat that time as “waiting for death”.  Very few people actually manage to do both – which is get about issues like career, family, money, dealing with a Life-changing crisis and such and yet live a Life that they love living. This minority comprises those who have really understood that Life is a gift and we must live it fully – learning from each experience and enjoying each moment! Each of us has this opportunity, without doubt, but we must learn to not want to control Life and take it as it comes – one day at a time, one experience at a time.

The episode of our complimentary tickets brought my focus back, yet again, to the complimentary nature of our Life itself. At a physical level, given our financial challenges, my family is able to survive day-after-day only because of “acts of the Universe and the kindness of fellow human beings”. At a spiritual level, we understand that nothing really belongs to us. We are just guests on this planet, who are traveling this journey, this complimentary journey, called this lifetime! So when we came with nothing, when we own nothing, and when we will soon have to leave empty-handed, what’s the point in trying to control anything?

When you understand that this whole Life you have is complimentary, that it is a gift, you too will learn to sit back and enjoy it! Just as the way you would enjoy a show for which you have free VIP tickets! 

“wotsubusu” craving, feel liberated!

No object of desire is the cause of any agony in itself. It is your craving for that object that makes you suffer.

Take for instance, a hot summer day. And you are thirsty. You see nice juicy watermelons on the street and want to stop your car. But you find the parking slots by the stall crowded and you see a policeman standing under a tree nearby. You believe the cop will object to your parking your car outside of the earmarked space. You are miffed and drive away cursing the crowds and the cop, ruing the missed opportunity to take some of those melons home. Even when you narrate this experience to your wife when you get home, you are complaining and are not merely reporting. There’s a sense of loss and evidence of frustration in your reportage. Now, did the humble melon on the street cause your agony or did your craving for it__and your eventual inability to buy it__cause it?

Think about it. All of us are victims of this cravings-brings-suffering trap. What we crave for is not the cause, it is the act of craving that causes misery. We crave for attention, adulation, understanding, respect, fame, rewards, recognition, wealth, opportunity, love and followership. And when we don’t get it, we are disappointed. Now, if you are disappointed and if your disappointment doesn’t affect your Life, it is fine. But when you are disappointed, you are mourning. Your energies are low. You start operating in a low energy__scarcity__spectrum. This naturally affects the way you live and experience Life. On the other hand, consider the situation when there is no craving, and so there’s no disappointment, so there’s no suffering. In such a scenario, you are operating in a high-energy__abundance__spectrum. Remember: Wherever your attention goes, your energy flows. In Buddhist teachings, they advocate the complete cessation of craving. Which means to eliminate all craving. In Japanese, the word wotsubusu means to annihilate. When you wotsubusu craving, you feel liberated. Such freedom opens up a whole new opportunity spectrum of playing to your strengths – to what you have. Than to worry about, lament over, what you don’t have.

Simplify Life: Give up the craving. And you will immediately stop suffering!

Beat “maya” with M.A.Y.A

Life is but an illusion. A seen between two unseens__of the time of the soul before death and its time after death. This is the big teaching of the Bhagavad Gita. This is the essence of being in this world and yet being above it.

When we realize that whatever is happening to us__fame, success, defeat, pain, loss__is not happening to the real us, that all this is a perception, we will be able to stay detached. Life is like going to the movies. When we go to watch a movie, we see the entire story play out in front of us, on a giant screen, we get involved sometimes with the characters, but never attached. When the movie is over, we get up and depart. Life is that movie, and you, the real you, are the spectator, the watcher. Your journey on the planet in a human form is like the stint of the movie-goer in a movie hall__you arrive, you witness, you depart. And a movie is just an imagined story, a perception of reality, really not the reality itself.

In Indian mythology, and in Indian scriptures, this whole illusionary experience of Life is called maya. So if we are to assume that everything we know or have ever known is only an illusion, then what is the point to it all? That, the Gita explains, is a good question. Krishna asks Arjuna: “Why do we find sorrow in this truth that the attachment to all that is unreal, and only a perception, is pointless?” But there’s a way out from this entrapment__from this illusion, from maya. And that solution, I have read somewhere, is M.A.Y.A. The cure for maya is M.A.Y.A, which is to be Mindful, Awakened, Yielding and Accepting! In being Mindful of the now__focusing on whatever is happening than focusing on what happened or will happen__we will be Awakened to immense possibilities and opportunities. From that Awakened state we will see value in Yielding to__and not resisting__Life. When we Yield we reach a state of Acceptance. In Acceptance, and only in Acceptance, do we find total bliss. And only in bliss will we find our true, real, Self! So beat maya with M.A.Y.A. Be Mindful, Awakened, Yielding and Accepting __ always!

On being the light yourself!

Your Life will be as dark as you imagine it to be.

Over these last few days of Diwali fervor, there’s so much talk about darkness and light, on social media that it’s assuming an almost banal proportion. People are mindlessly talking about dispelling the darkness around them with light – ostensibly with candles and diyas, and firecrackers. It’s almost as if a social media status or an utterance or wishing over SMS or WhatsApp can make anyone’s Life brighter. I am not being cynical. I am only calling for a greater degree of reflection. What about the darkness within? How will you dispel it?

This reflection requires that you first understand the meaning of darkness in a Life context. Almost all of us are steeped in worry, insecurity, anxiety, guilt, anger, grief and fear. This is the darkness that grips our soul. And the true message of Diwali is to trust Life and allow your faith to light you up from within. As our lives get challenged by events, people and circumstances, we often tend to worry over what will happen to us, we fear the unknown future – and these are what are causing us to feel that our lives are filled with darkness. In such times, we must learn to keep the faith – and learn to be the light ourselves. Metaphorically, when you find yourself in a dark, endless tunnel and you don’t see the light at the end of that tunnel, your faith can be your light!

Where does such faith come from? It comes from a deeper understanding of Life. It comes from knowing that if you have been created, you will be looked after, cared for and provided for – no matter what the circumstances may be. However, Life’s provisions are never to meet your wants. Yet all that you need will be available to you when you need it the most. I am reminded of a beautiful song from “Panakkaran” (1990, P.Vasu, Rajnikanth, Gauthami, Ilayaraaja), sung by Ilayaraaja. The song goes like this: “Maratha Vecheven Thanni Oothuvan…” meaning “The one who planted (created) the tree will water it too…”. If you follow Tamil, you can listen to the song here.

This song epitomizes the true nature of Life. It reminds us that all our worries, anxieties and fears serve no purpose. That what will happen will happen, no matter how much you worry. And no matter what happens, you will still be taken care of by Life, not the way you want to be, but the way you must be. When you don’t hold this faith in Life, when you don’t trust the cosmic design, you grope in the darkness that you have invited into your Life. So, truly, you are responsible for your Life being filled with darkness. The moment you start trusting that a way will always be born to take you onward, despite all the darkness, you will see the light. And surely you will be that light too! 

A lesson in intelligent living from Rajesh Khanna’s superstardom

Learn to live Life ever-so-humbly, ever-grateful and ever-accepting!

Rajesh Khanna: Dec 29 1942 ~ Jul 18 2012
Picture Courtesy: Internet

A new book on India’s first superstar Rajesh Khanna – Dark Star – The Loneliness of Rajesh Khanna by Gautam Chintamani (Harper Collins, Page 242, Price: Rs.499/-) – “paints”, as Kaveree Bamzai reviews in the latest issue of India Today,  “a startling portrait of a star in terminal decline”. It is now, perhaps, common knowledge that Khanna’s attitude, all through his magical superstar years, 1969~1973, and afterward, had an arrogant ‘I-am-God’ quality to it. Whether it was his forever arriving late on sets, or his handing a half-finished cigarette to acclaimed writer Gulshan Nanda (who wrote ‘Kati Patang’ and ‘Daag’ , both Khanna hits, among others) while he went to complete a shot, or his making his displeasure known of his self-appointed rival by calling Amitabh Bachchan manhoos (unlucky), or his planning a party, the very night a film magazine denied him an award, to teach ‘them’ a lesson (until they come to him begging him to attend their event), or his refusing to visit a local district collector’s residence despite long-time friend and director Shakti Samanta’s insistence – all these and more made Khanna the complete snob, the one who played tantrums with anyone and everyone – taking his stardom to be permanent and himself to be invincible. But Chintamani’s book brilliantly chronicles Khanna’s fall from grace, from the limelight to the darkness of his Carter Road home, Aashirwad, and Khanna’s slipping into his all-night drinking binges, during one of which he is reported to have gone up to the terrace, and while it rained heavily, he is believed to have asked a menacingly dark sky, “Why me?”. The reference of that loaded question was, obviously, to Khanna’s losing out to the Bachchan era, his falling out with the writer-duo of Salim-Javed whom he had helped with an independent writing credit for his hit movie Haathi Mere Saathi (1971), his being dropped from Yash Chopra’s list of “must-have” stars and him being replaced by Shashi Kapoor in Raj Kapoor’s Satyam Shivam Sundaram (1978).

Now, who was responsible for Khanna’s superstardom falling apart? Who was responsible for everything that he touched, in the second half of his Life, turning to dust – from films to relationships to politics? So much so, as Chintamani reveals in his book, he once had to trade his imported car for a Maruti 800 and had to switch to smoking Gold Flake from 555. While it may be argued that time and events conspire to plot our destinies, I also believe that being humble is a responsibility that all of us must be both aware of and fulfill. Be humble to know that everything happens through you and not because of you. This means, if you are a star today, the first duty you have is to the industry and the audience that made you one. Be responsible and humble towards them. Treat your work with respect and treat your colleagues as human beings. I guess Khanna lacked this perspective. And when things go wrong, as they often will, and you fall, have the wisdom and humility to accept that what goes up comes down. So, when you are down, don’t grieve. Don’t wallow in self-pity. Just treat it as a phase in Life that you can learn faith and patience from. I guess Khanna lacked this perspective too.

But let’s not forget that there’s a Khanna in each of us. At various times, in varying degrees, each of us does get carried away by our success or gets snowed under when we fail at something. We must all realize that the nature of Life is cyclical. Each dark night will be interrupted by a brilliant dawn. And each day will dissolve into darkness. To imagine that we are consigned to a lifetime of darkness, whenever things don’t go “our” way, or to believe that we will be blessed with sunshine for eternity, when everything’s going per “our” plan,  is immature to say the least. The best way to live Life is to live ever-so-humbly for what you have managed to achieve, ever-grateful for what you have and ever-accepting of what you don’t have or don’t get. This is the one lesson I will take away from Rajesh Khanna’s Life – a lesson that he, unfortunately, failed to learn himself, until perhaps in the last couple of years of his Life!