An old thought

//Beginning of excerpt

I wondered what we were/are for each other all the time.
But today you used the term 'best friend'.

I like it. It's like a load off my mind. Now that the relationship is defined, the protocol follows. What to do and (more importantly) what not to do is defined.

I like the way you said "I don't want to fall in love with you again". I wish the same. I don't want to fall in love with you again. But in my case, it is not again. It did not really really stop... and at what point it increased in intensity, I do not know. But now it is like I am engulfed by you. You are in the classroom, you are in the trains, on the bridge, you are in the student who is asking me the question, you are on the staircases where we fleetingly and coyly flirted... you are so much a part of my life here, that I wish you don't enter this make-believe world... this world in which the image I have drafted of you symbiotically co-exists with me... because if you do enter this solemn creation, it might, perhaps, disrupt the peace that I have finally attained.

There is no doubt in my mind that my perception of what-you-would-be-were-you-here is more attractive that what you actually are. I endow you with all the qualities I want in you. I edit you blatantly. You are just the facade. For me, you look and appear like you, but your personality otherwise is a concoction of my desires.

The question that naturally follows is why would I ever want you in my life?
Can't I live with the mirage?

I am torn between "what is" and "what ought to be"... although it is ME who gives answers to both these questions

// End of excerpt

When someone quotes mad-or-what...

and pits my point in the blog against my conversational point, and then laughs accusingly... I belie my internal complacency with the facade of annoyance

Kaisa ullu banaaya! ;-)

Know Thyself

She hears the cell beep with the message tone. She feels her stomach contract slightly... and finds herself taking a deep breath.
She ignores her cell. But the more she ignores, the tenser she gets. She knows he must have reached downstairs, waiting for her in his car. She checks herself in the mirror for the nth time, smiles broadly to relieve herself of any residual tension... and walks out with a carefree gait.

The first moment, the moment when she enters the car is the harbinger of the evening. She looks at him, there is a momentary silence... and she feels the need to dispel it before the silence starts to imply anything. She talks in a fake tone, eager to set a light jocular mood. Once that objective is achieved, she feels much better. She likes being in her comfort zone... now things are under control.

They go about their normal routine of talking to each other without listening, deciding on the place to go and then changing their minds at the last minute, looking at each other furtively, playing bhangra music coupled with romantic bollywood... and in general giving opinions on each other and pulling each others' legs.

This is sooooo much fun. She feels so light during and after such meetings. These meetings have none of the intellectual thrills she had anticipated to have on an interesting date, and they don't do anything out of the way (its food or movie or food), and it's not even new i.e. its not the novelty that has kept it interesting.
But she realllly enjoys these meets... so much so that she wonders if she knows what she really wants.

She has begun to dread that her conceptions about perfection, and conclusions about self, may be highly flawed. And her favorite pet-peeve is an undetected narrow-mindedness that has remained undetected for precisely the same reason: her being narrow-minded.

On holding back

She starts scrapping him on orkut... then scraps the idea.
She wrote one of those I-have-nothing-to-say-so-here-it-is---hidden-in-a-silly-heyyyyy-msg.
Then she decided against it.

At night, 2 am perhaps, she was as herself as she could be. In that state there is generally very little holding back, being done. She gives in to all temptations/desires (thats what life's for, after all, eh?)
Yet, she controls the urge to click on the send button of gmail.

She hears those songs, reads those stories and watches those movies that advocate professing one's feelings before it's 'too late'... or advocate speaking one's minds nonetheless.
She believes in that partly. Perhaps wholeheartedly.

But there's something fishy. She doesn't know if its just her, but more often than not, she has been successful in eliciting a more satisfactory response when she doesn't communicate too often. When she doesn't mail or call or communicate much, in general, the other person feels a sense of mild insecurity. It is THAT which brings more enthusiasm/consideration-for-her-feelings in those rare communications.

She doesn't like holding herself back. But refraining has often brought greater rewards than being oneself without any check on it.

Does it matter that I matter?

Handling someone's emotions is a draining task.
Sometimes one wishes to escape such ordeals, even at the cost of a less involved relationship.

Is it inherent in us to rely so deeply on someone else for our emotional highs such that it becomes dangerously parasitic?
Isn't it true/proved that our happiness is 'within us'? If so, why is this knowledge not omnipresent enough to spare the heart-aches to many a lost soul!

A random realization

A person's true wealth is judged by how happy he is.
It is not money, but happiness that counts.

But money is valued because somehow it seems that happiness can be achieved by using money effectively.
So, one is as rich by x amount, if one uses the x amount effectively to gain happiness. The piles of rupees/dollars do not contribute to a person's wealth if they don't contribute to the person's happiness.

There are other factors that give one happiness....
1. The number of fulfilling relationships with other people
2. One's clarity of thought and peace of mind.
3. Lack of stresses and discomforts.
4. Variety and intensity of emotions felt over the lifetime.

Many more.. which I can't articulate accurately.

So, wealth is a summation of all the potentials that contribute to making a person happy.

But are these potentials measurable?
Since there is no provably clear way to gauge the intensity of these factors, the Fortue 500 estimates a person's wealth only by the measurables, which happen to be money.

I don't know what's the point I am trying to make. But sometimes, some partial realizations make one feel profound. This one is almost there :)

The Art of Living

There are these courses that happen across the globe, in all continents and cater to all strata of society... and they claim to change people's life.

They probably do.

But what's the big deal about it? Why make so much noise about changing lives? Almost everything that we do, changes/impacts our life.
Another bad thing about claiming to change someone's life is that you put that person in a vulnerable position. Some (like me) may get super-guarded... hell! I don't want something to change my life overnight, without me inspecting, evaluating and finally allowing it to change. And there are some who get excited, who are desperately waiting for someone to show them direction, to point a finger at the right path so that they can comfortably and conveniently walk on.. and they are relieved to hear the things that one typically hears in such courses.

These courses are good in their own way... there is almost always certain takeaways that are worth the resources invested into the course. In particular, this AoL course taught me to:-
1. Be a better listener
2. to do crazy things that I would be awkward to do otherwise (tell people my true dreams, look into their eyes and search for divinity, dance to the tunes of bhajans... many more)
3. how humor can be used effectively to drive home a point.
4. subtle aspects of dealing with failures

But what sticks in my mind and bothers me is the fundamental methodology used in such courses. It works on the philosophy of faith. "Do the kriya, do the saadhna, and you will feel joy within". The kriya and its functioning, the meditations, the saadhnas are not described clearly. Since the guru says it is to be done, the followers do it... how can they question the guru? They need to have faith in the guru's words and doctrine.

This, in my opinion, is extremely dangerous. It can lead to (or probably already is) fanaticism.

What is the difference, after all, in the way, say, a religious extremist outfit operates and a self-development course where the practices are not questioned?
To an outsider of both of these, both of these are dangerous.
But to an insider of either of these, they are doing the right thing.

Interestingly, it seemed impossible to communicate this, put this point across to the AoL volunteer. She was not even listening.

Anyway, the bhakti and sangeet was mind-blowing. And the tidbits of interesting facts was fun listening to. The teacher was cool.
It was worth the time, money, energy and the space in mind devoted to it :)