Mithas dil me ho aur cup me nahi, to baat bani,
Khushi dene me ho lene me nahi, to baat bani,
Muskurahat khul ke bati jamayi nahi, to baat bani,
Kya khoya aur kya paya ye socha tak nahi, to baat bani,
Zindagi se pyar karo jung nahi, to baat bani,
Kuch mera na tera ye samjh gaye, to baat bani
Independence day reminds us that there is no freedom without struggle. Attachment/Bondage and freedom are in & of your mind. When will you struggle to free your mind? This one is a personal battle.
May you find the strength to walk the path till you free your mind of attachments, that is true freedom🌻
Everyone would agree that the first principle of co-existing peacefully as a society is “First, harm no one” which is the Hippocratic Oath that all Medical Practitioners have to take and also the first tenet of Yoga – “Ahimsa”, but why restrict it only to Medical Practitioners and Yoga Practitioners? Does this not apply to all? It does, but how many choose to follow it? The ones who do are declared saints/Mahatma and are revered but the principle is not embraced, resulting in a broken society/world wherein we know what to do but we simply won’t.
Looking at the current state of affairs wherein the entire world is in war with each other whether economic or otherwise, with a world leader moving around threatening sanctions in order to reconcile warring parties and expecting to win a Nobel Prize for it, I think we have really lost the plot and have to admit that our collective intelligence to peacefully co-exist has failed. So either each one of us sincerely embraces this simple principle of Ahimsa or we may have to finally hand over the reins to Artificial Intelligence since ours isn’t working….
Translation- “God is seen in stone idols, the cow is viewed as a mother, and crows are viewed as ancestors! But why isn’t a human seen in a human? The day humanity is seen in a human, even God will have to be pleased.”
We live in strange times wherein we have lost our moral compass (not to claim we ever had it) but as a society we did uphold it as an ideal which is now long lost. The concept that people with good moral values must be put in leadership positions is gone.
Recently, I had circulated a video of Nana Patekar asking the CM and Deputy CM of Maharashtra that if we as public know that Ministers and Corporators are corrupt, why can’t they see this? To which the reply given was that these are people elected by popular majority and people with clean backgrounds simply are not elected….This is really an alarming fact that cunningness, guile, cheating, murders are acceptable to Society if they are committed by Leaders but not by the common man who is punished for every lapse on his/her part…But then who will call this out?
Reminds me of the phrase “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone” is a quote from Jesus in the Gospel of John (8:7). It appears in the story of the woman caught in adultery, where Jesus is confronted with a situation that tests his wisdom and compassion. His response challenges the accusers to examine their own sinfulness before judging another…
We are living in the age of information overload and ChatGPT is used to glean through tons of data and present a synopsis but this actually handicaps us in a sense that we forget using the faculty of analysing. There is a reason that we were made to mug up tables upto 20 in school, which was made redundant by use of calculators. We have been given faculties with powers beyond our imagination but we choose to uphold convenience & ignore the loss of abilities…
What use is information if it does not help you in obtaining knowledge which is gained by experiencing the causality(cause-effect) of implementing the information and what use is knowledge if it is not converted to wisdom which is gained by change in habits by the results experienced in the knowledge phase and what use is wisdom if it does not help you in experiencing the essence of “This too shall pass”….
You simply can’t jump from school directly to PhD, each one of us has to pass through each stage of information – knowledge – wisdom and beyond, there are no shortcuts to maturity.
A person seeks to meet God and approaches a Saint with the request. The Saint says he will arrange for the meeting and just asks him to write down on a piece of paper who he is so that the Saint could tell God who wants to meet him & when would He like to meet. The person writes down his name, title, place of residence and gives it back to the saint. The saint asks him if his name, title and place of residence were any different would he be any different and the person says obviously no. Then, says the saint, please find out who is asking the question and when you find that out, God would have already met you.
As Ramana Maharshi said “Your Self Realisation is the greatest service you can render the world.”
They say time and tide wait for no one, well neither does fate, which is nothing but your own karma that has come a full circle…
When you are fighting against fate, who/what exactly are you fighting against? Perhaps you are just reaping what you have sown. So the trick is in sowing something that you would be glad to receive even when it comes back.
Fate may decide when but you can decide how to face it with grace….
Do you know what you want from this life? If yes, are you spending 8 most energetic hours a day chasing it? It’s your life after all, don’t you think it’s good to know and make course corrections instead of being comfortable in your routine(comfort zone)
Most people don’t know what they want from life so the ones that are hyperactive by nature try to cram in more activities under the name of “time management” but actually it is FOMO “Fear of missing out” and create a busy routine/comfort zone. The Lazy ones simply don’t venture into the dangerous area of finding purpose lest they have to work and life goes on…A few blessed ones know where they’re headed and devote their energies to their purpose. You can be blessed as well…
Do a purpose and energy audit of your own lives. What do you seek from life(purpose) and where are you expending your energies. Keep a journal to note where you are expending energy and review it weekly to know whether it is aligned with your purpose or not, after all you are the Architect of your life…
They say what you don’t know doesn’t hurt you but in fact what you don’t know could be hurting you most…
Expressing life in terms of “Doing” is largely a Western thing whilst “Being” is largely an Eastern thing. However, as they say “grass looks greener on the other side”, the West has taken up Yoga/Zen/Tai-Chi seriously and the East has taken up chasing power/wealth/fame in terms of “development” seriously and the circus continues…
The concept of “doing” something before you die was captured beautifully by the movie “Bucket List” (Things you want to do before you die/kick the bucket) that was released in 2007 with brilliant performances by Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson. Everyone must prepare a bucket list since it helps in lending focus to your energies for the remainder of your life and also reminds you that life has an expiry date that is unknown to you.
As you tick off the items on your Bucket list you realise that it was never about “doing” and that you are going around in circles and that is when you value “being” that is finding the “Stillness” within you. This is a process of maturity which can’t be hoodwinked – you have to go through “doing” and mature into “being” and there is no guarantee that you will mature in this lifetime – so whatever stage you are in, be in the moment and enjoy it
Whatever you are chasing in the material world, you will eventually get only to know that it did not quench your thirst but only increased it…
The only rule that works here is “This too shall pass”…Then what remains? That which you were before you were born and that which you will be after passing on… Be that and all chases will drop…
Bodhisattva 