Stupid me

Life has been a a puzzle for me so far. Tried hard to understand and reciprocate but failed most of the times. Guess i dot have the smarts to know one of the most complex thing - LIFE. My fingers constantly trying to access my social network site--am I idle? If not then why this constant urge to knw what's going on? Am I bored? if not then why this delibrate effort to play games and feel delighted at completing some stupid tasks they assign. well, I would say I feel lonely at times and when it is at its peak is when I find refuge in Blogging.
Today I met a child.. he was crying so profusely and nothing on earth could stop him from crying. It was sad to see a beautiful face so sunken in tears and I couldn't stop myself from finding out what made him so sad. Somewhere I felt he too wanted to speak him mind out and was looking for someone who could listen to his sweet little nothings or even his anger. I decided to go ahead and headed straight to him. As we got talking I learnt his name, that he belonged to my country and he was new there etc etc.. so far all this was told to me without giving a break to crying. So one can imagine how difficult it was for me to hear him amidst his loud cries. Well as we talked further, he told me he wished to be back with his family now while almost trying to hug me. I thought to myself may be a cuddle could have relieved him of his worries. May be he would have had a feeling that someone is there to sit down and just be with him. While my mind was still figuring out if I could actually cuddle the little one ( i wasn't authorised to do so in that particular environment), I still held his hand. We were still talking and I felt he was going to tell me all is well and that he is happy and BOOM comes the shocker my way...He told me in the loudest voice possible "mai yahan rahunga toh mar jaunga !!"..that if I stayed here I would die. For a minute i couldn't get over this shock.. the shock that a small child could make such a big statement..to understand that child could have been stressed and nearly choked to have actually mouthed out those words for me. Or was I going through similar feelings and hence shocked to hear it being told to me. Anyways for the child I found a way out and he would have been out of the choking for today but me.. wht about me.. where am I heading for? and who would get me off this choking...for now life isnt having good things to think about..just surrounded by negetive thoughts which have succeded in turning me to ashes.. I shall soon arise like a phoenix like always. Hope is my key and as always I'm hoping

Life is what happens to you while u r busy making plans

Quite true, isnt it? Life indeed is what happens while you are planning for other things. Other things like parents, kids, spouse, friends. So what happens to your life. Is someone else planning it for you. Most of the time yes. Its people around you who are planning things for you.

The other day I went on to meet one of my old friend. She appeared happy and contended with her life. A happy family as it appeared, blessed with beautiful angel. But as we got talking I saw how much efforts she was making to hide her tears. She was going through a lot of pain post delivery and despite all that she is expected to work more and more. Her health not supporting her and her pleads falling on deaf ears. The sight just filled me up with anger.. not against people responsible for her state but, on her for not speaking for herself. The same girl who would have eaten her parents' brains for not listening to her is now all quiet and waiting for some miracle. I feel if you make a doormat of urself, people will treat you so. so i think its time to change. Live for yourself not for others..atleast not people who don't have a substantial role in your life. make yourself heard when there is a need for it.

I hope my friend does speak for herself, get up and act before its too late. The whole incident has just reinforced the same old question before me on why Life changes post Marriage

The Same Old Question

Getting back to books and reading could also mean that Mind will get some more food for thoughts. So as my mind is busy making peace between arguements of its own and that of the author of the book, I decide to give it an additional task of putting it into words for this blog.
So wht's the agenda? Well, I'm reading a book by Deepak Chopra which apparently talks about Life after Death. The bit I read today talked about the story of Savithri and how Ramana inspired her to feel grateful for this life she has and also on how to apparently fool Yama into getting the God in you thereby saving yourself to live for somemore time. And as Ramana told Savithri,"....when Death comes to grab you, let him grab God instead. If God is in you, Yama's noose will always miss. That's the secret for escaping his clutches" It further threw light on the concept of hell and heaven. Now this was an intresting thing to note that my mind had already started the debate on this concept even before the writer could get in there.

For centuries now we have been struggling to figure out on how good heaven is and how bad hell is.. like it has been predefined that Heaven is all good and Hell all scary and bad but to what extend is for time to tell. As if its goodness or wretchedness depends on one's own doings in this world. So what are we actually doing in this world? trying to get a good score either ways and make way to one of these places and being totally ignorant to that the fact that all is here- hell or heaven. Now one thing which I just miss on mentioning here and which keeps ringing in my ears all througout is something that my dad said. He once said that God has being Hi-tech and is now sitting with a computer in his desk so we get more prompt results of what we do here. On the face of it, this statement of dad's, appeared as one of his jokes but if you just ponder over it you will see that there is a lot of depth in that statement. Isnt that exactly what we see around us now? Say for example the increasing population in Old age homes..like people dont have time for thier dear ones.. like its a mad mad rush towards nothingness. Hell or heaven is right here  right now and it is defiantly in the choices you make in life. You could either make right and sensible choices or just get ignorant and keep on making mistakes. It is these choices which make your pathway either to go up in life or go down. So either you could just ignore your loved ones and continue to be on this race to get ahead in life and getting nowhere or you could take time to do your best for your loved ones.

Had a casual chit chat with my friend today, where she was talking about someone she knew who genrally didnt take notice of others in pain and was only focussed on her immediate family and how pained she was towards her last days when the same immediate family members didnt budge or take care of her when she needed them the most.... Classic example of God sitting with the computer. Either she was paying for the mistakes she did or her daughter was actually making her way to either hell or heaven depending on the choice she makes.  My mom keeps mentioning that whenever she has faced troubles people from outside have come forth and helped her and none from her own blood turn in for help. I dont know how to take this statement but to me it means that she is blessed to have good people around who do come in to help and her immediate question does get answered. now either I shud say this is heaven to have blessed souls around or I should say she is in one big hell where her own blood relations dont help her. quite confusing isnt it..
well the point is also about  how you look at things. Either you could look at it through a rose tinted glass and rest assured alls well and feel blessed for all you have or you just keep fretting only to get your peace of mind into the bin. Another passing thought for now is if this world itself isnt a big example  of how good Heaven can be or how bad Hell be? So if your boyfriend has dumped you for someone else either you could feel lucky to be out of the mental torture or just keep getting frustrated and make hell for everyone else around.
So like Emperor Jahangir I could possibly say "."Gar firdaus, ruhe zamin ast, hamin asto, hamin asto, hamin ast." about the beauty of places on earth or I could say "its a hell out here" looking at the potholes, corrupt people. As usual reminded of Guruji's words, "live life this moment, this very moment" and I choose to live a life being compassionate and being delighted and genuinely thankful to God for what He has and has not given me. Being good for my own sake yet not trying to make up my score for my seat in Hell or Heaven :)

Life as a child and as a Parent

 When I was a kid I didn't have a computer, cell phone, iPod, Nintendo, DSi, Xbox, PS3, Wifi or Wii. I played outside till evening.... I ate what my mom made. If I ever told my parents "no" or back answered, I got in TROUBLE! Life wasn't hard, it was BEAUTIFUL & I survived. Re-post if you appreciate the way you were raised.... I do. I love my parents and the childhood they gave me... :)

Well the above message throws light on a lot of aspects of our life then and now. The other day I was talking to one of my friend and I happened to mention how my son dreams of having a Nintendo soon while I quite didnt understand what its meant to be in the first place (yeah I'm quite unaware of such things :D). It also made me think how complicated my child's life is now where he is under constant peer pressure and thinks these things are absolutly necessary in life just coz his friends have it. I don't remember if I had ever undergone this kind of peer pressure.. and as rightly said Life was still beautiful. Thanks to my parents who stuck to "KISS" theory  of "keeping it short and simple", my life was devoid of such complications.
I remember they brought me a Kitchen set and I used to love pretend cooking chapatis made of tulsi leaves and curry made from other flowers n leaves from my garden. I could play that for hours and never get bored of them even if I'm playing all by myself. I think most of us did try a hand at what we called "Teacher Teacher" game where we would pretend to be a teacher trying to teach imaginary students who often had names similar to our friends then. As if our mind didnt want to take additional burden of thinking for new names :). Being a girl I also got to play some girly games like pretending to be a mom to a doll.. I remember desiging dresses for my doll and trying new hair styles. We didnt get tired or frustrated then as we do now..
Going on vacations to Kerala meant a whole new world of adventures. Band of cousins.. We used to climb the rocky hills with a small pack of masala( red chilli powder mixed with some salt) and how on reaching our favourite spot we would try to gather some tender mangoes washed in pond water and relished to the core. We never bothered of bacteria and germs then as we do now...
How we used to invade into other's gardens and rob them of thier produce. I particularly remember this one incident where we had barged into someone's banana plantation to have some nectar which we can generally find in the banana inflorescence and were nearly caught :D.. We weren't bothered of brands and labels then as we are now..

The other day when my son asked me about the things I did as a child, I was quite amazed to see how easy life was for me. Climbing trees, playing hide n seek, watching the birds chirp, following a butterfly while it hopped from flower to flower, waiting for the grasshoppers to surround me before onam time, sheer joy of running around the house trying to imitate the koel bird, waking up to the morning sunshine, Granny giving me a bath in the garden with homemade shampoos and soaps and the lovely fragrance it would surround me with, waiting for grandpa to come home with hand full of sweets and delicacies, the yummy mango pickle and how I would try to get a little pickle for anything and everything i ate :D, the taste of cocunut chutney served everyday at lunchtime and how I could eat all my food with that simple chutney is simply difficult for me to put in words..I'm now missing all those simple things of life. And no matter how much I try I cannot replicate any of the same for my child now. We never bothered of complicating life then as we do now. Well, all this wasn't written to show how negetive things are around. It could be that 20 years from now when my son would be writing/talking about his childhood, he might also have some simple things to talk about yet what would be intresting to see is if those simple things till top the list. Innocence of life which we complicate as we grow...A lot around us is still simple while we are running from pillar to post to complicate us and our life.
It reminds me of this famous quote " Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”

Influencing the thoughts

Recently happened to watch my favourite movie on my London-Hyderabad flight. The movie "3 Idiots" has been a hit not only for the brilliant performances from some of the best actors in the Hindi Film industry but also coz there was a message to be conveyed at each and every point. One of those messages that hit me the most was this thought that Our heart seems to be very weak, we need to keep fooling it around with some loving and inspiring thoughts and it gains strength to face any challenge that Life throws your way.
Well I would like to add that Heart listens to only that what it wants to listen and imbibe. It is interesting to note that we are at this age arrested by stress at every stage of our life so much that even doctors blame stress as a reason to all problems they cannot figure out in thier medical world. Stress can be cured by meditation so basicaly we end up listening to the customised divine words of a Guru. Personally I have nothing against them and I myself follow one of them but that being a different issue altogther. During my sessions of meditations I realsied that all Gurus basically tell you the same things in words which sound very appealing. Its like reading the same Moral science lessons written by different writers. I also noticed that they try and influence your mind and the thought process there. Involuntarily you start relating to what is being said. It is possible that you have already gone through the experience and your mind starts corelating the instances. It starts to run on the same track which is being spoken about then and there. The most apt example right now would be to guage your own thought process while you are reading this blog. You may like to say agree or disagree depending on your own personal experiences which comes back to teh fact that we listen to the things our heart wants to listen..rest would automatically get deleted. On one of my meditation session my teacher gave and example of a small child. they wanted to explain that a child is influenced by his own thoughts, there is nothing called impossible for them. They would cry if they want to n laugh if they want to. they keep trying till they reach the end result. While listening to all this I kept picturing my son and my mind was busy co relating those thoughts to my son's activities and I found them all so true. From a broader prospective though I can say there wasn't much of learning there. It was just a reminder of things which already reside somewhere in our minds.
Having said all this I would now want to divert my thought to something that has been troubling me since long. I admit I'm addicted to Facebook but it also has led me to see some things which arent commonly talked about. I saw some influencial videos offlate. Some of them talked about the political scenario of our country and like every youth even my mind started feeling the anger and rage of the speaker.  I felt that it was high time for the system to change etc. However today I saw a video of an ordinary lady who spoke about human trafficing. Dr. Sunita Krishnan, a victim of a gang rape who is now working to rescue innocent people who have got trapped in this web voluntarily or unvoluntarily. She began her talk with the stories of 3 small girls all aged between 3-4 years and what thier life is all about. As usual my mind had thoughts of my small baby who is the same age. I wouldn't deny I almost puked when I was hearing the stories the brutalities these little kids were subjected to. The youngest kid had been so brutally raped that her intestine was outside her body when she was rescued and it needed 32 stitches to put be back to her body. strange isnt it that those people who do such hineous crimes still live amongst us as one of us and that too with pride while the poor soul who has lost it all mentally , physically and emotionally is left to get more and more tortured. strange is our ways that we move to Gurus for spiritual knowledge while we still haven't completly learnt lessons of our materiliastic world. I dont knw if I should call it escapism.  I didnt know how I could be of help to this brave soldier untill she said that every person who has heard her talk should go and tell two more people about it, and convince them to pass this further to two more people and the message was to open our minds from the self created barriers and accept these victims as normal people. Its not thier fault to have been victimised. Now I have chosen my blog as a platform to influence the thoughts of whoever reads this blog of mine. The victims are victims of brutality from societyand so if you have to hate someone here then hate the doer of the deed. Hate that jerk who has so cruelly done this to a small angel who didnt know how to save itself. Every child is special whether it is yours or not. There is absolutly no reason for any child to have gone thru so much in such early stages of life. Being compassionate is one of the few thinsg we could do for them. Today my thoughts have been influenced in such a way that now I see the faces of those three small girls in every child's face I meet and I can say they deserve to be living a happy childhood. I regret the fact that we can't do much to reverse the damage but Love can conquer all pain and Love is all they need from us.

Motivation gets you through the day, but inspiration lasts a lifetime

What you read as the topic of this particular blog are the words of Nick Vujicic and he has actually inspired me to post this blog. I first came across him in a video and the first time I saw him my reaction was like what you would see in cartoon.. eyes popped out, jaw dropped type look on my face. Unless you have heard of Nick before you wouldn't make sense of my reaction. Lemme put it in a better way for those who havn't heard of this inspirational figure before.
(excerpts from Nick's website )
"Imagine being born without arms. No arms to wrap around someone, no hands to experience touch, or to hold another hand with. Or what about being born without legs? Having no ability to dance, walk, run, or even stand on two feet. Now put both of those scenarios together: no arms and no legs. What would you do? How would that effect your everyday life?

Meet Nick Vujicic... Born in 1982 in Melbourne, Australia, without any medical explanation or warning, Nicholas Vujicic (pronounced Voy-a-chich) came into the world with neither arms or legs. Having had an uneventful pregnancy and no family history to expect this condition, imagine the shock his parents felt when they saw their first born, brand new baby boy, only to find he was what the world would consider imperfect and abnormal. A limbless son was not what nurse Dushka Vujicic, and her husband Pastor Borris Vujicic had been expecting. How would their son live a normal happy life? What could he ever do or become when living with what the world would see as such a massive disability? Little did they or anyone know that this beautiful limbless baby would one day be someone who would inspire and motivate people from all walks of life, touching lives all over the world.
Throughout his childhood Nick dealt not only with the typical challenges of school and adolescence such as bullying and self-esteem issues; he also struggled with depression and loneliness as he questioned why he was different to all the other kids surrounding him; why he was the one born without arms and legs. He wondered what was the purpose behind his life, or if he even had a purpose. After a lot of frustration and feeling like the odd one out in school, at seven years of age Nick tried out some specially designed electronic arms and hands, in hope that he would be more like the other kids. During the short trial period of the electronic arms, Nick realized that even with them, he was still unlike his peers at school, and they turned out to be much too heavy for Nick to operate, effecting his general mobility quite significantly.




As Nick grew up he learnt to deal with his disability and started to be able to do more and more things on his own. He adapted to his situation and found ways to accomplish tasks that most people could only do by using their limbs, such as cleaning teeth, brushing hair, typing on a computer, swimming, playing sports, and much more. As time went by Nick began to embrace his situation and achieve greater things. In grade seven Nick was elected captain of his school and worked with the student council there on various fund-raising events for local charities and disability campaigns.



According to Nick the victory over his struggles throughout his journey, as well as the strength and passion he has for life can be credited to his faith, his family, his friends and the many people he's encountered during his life who have encouraged him along the way.



After school Nick went on with further study and obtained a double bachelor degree majoring in accounting and financial planning. By the age of 19 Nick started to fulfil his dream of being able to encourage other people and bring them hope, through motivational speaking and telling his story. I found the purpose of my existence, and also the purpose of my circumstance. There's a purpose for why you're in the fire. Nick wholeheartedly believes that there is a purpose in each of the struggles we encounter in our lives and that our attitude towards those struggles that can be the single most effective factor in overcoming them.



In 2005 Nick was nominated for the "Young Australian of the Year" Award, which is a large honor in Australia, recognizing a young person for their excellence and service to their local community and the nation, as well as their own personal accomplishments. Nominations for this award are only given to truly inspirational people.



Now at 27 years old this limbless young man has accomplished more than most people even twice his age. Nick recently made the massive move from Brisbane, Australia to California, USA, where he is the president of an international non-profit organization, and also has his own motivational speaking company; Attitude Is Altitude. Since his first motivational speaking engagement back when he was 19, Nick has traveled around the world, sharing his story with millions of people, speaking to a range of different groups such as students, teachers, youth, business men and women, entrepreneurs, and church congregations of all sizes. He has also told his story and been interviewed on various televised programs worldwide. However, Nick's speaking engagements have gone beyond purely motivational speaking, he has had the opportunity to speak with several leaders, including the vice president of Kenya. This year alone Nick is set to speak in over 20 countries.



People say to me, "How can you smile?" he says. Then they realize there's got to be something more to life than meets the eye if a guy without arms and legs is living a fuller life than I am.



Nick shares with his audiences the importance of vision and dreaming big. Using his own experiences in worldwide outreach as examples, he challenges others to examine their perspective and look beyond their circumstances. He shares his view of ceasing to see obstacles as problems, but instead begin to see them as opportunities to grow and reach out to others. He stresses the importance of our attitude being the most powerful tool we have at our disposal and illustrates how the choices we make can have a profound effect on our lives and the lives of those around us. Nick shows through his own life that the major keys in fulfilling our biggest dreams are persistence and choosing to embrace failure as a learning experience, rather than allowing the guilt and fear of failure to paralyze us.



How does Nick Vujicic feel about his disability now? He accepts it, embraces it and oftentimes pokes fun at his own circumstance as he shows off his many tricks. He meets challenges with his special blend of humor, perseverance and faith always encouraging those around him to examine their perspective as they develop and define their vision. Using those new definitions he challenges each person he meets to make changes in their lives so that they can begin the path to fulfilling their biggest dreams. Through his amazing ability to connect with people from all walks of life and his incredible sense of humor that captivates children, teens and adults alike, Nick is a truly inspirational motivational speaker."


For those of you who wish to know more about Nick.. you could go to his website http://www.attitudeisaltitude.com/aboutus-nick.php.
 
Today wasn't a day for me to be an inspiration but to get inspired :). Tomorrow is hope for me to be an inspiration though ;).. Life moves on ....

The Bonsai, The Wild or The Groomed

Blogging at 12am.. God I must be crazy but no. Something is bothering me and has been so since quite sometime.. Today it seems to be at its ultimate. So here I'm penning my views on a topic which I had vaguely mentioned last time about the final product person and the river like person.

Parenting has always been a tough game and not everyone is good at it. And when I say that I mean not everyone has a good approach towards parenting. Bill Cosby says, " Inspite of the six thousand manuals on child raising in the book sotres, child raising is still a dark continent and no one really knows anything. You just need lots of love and luck- and ofcourse, courage".  Like everything else this is also a hit and trial for some and things do or do not work out based on the so many factors which revolve around it. Lately I have been observing how a child's mind develops under certain conditions (read parents).

Its an agreed and proven fact that for the fuller and complete development of the child the roles of both parents are important. The concept in India is that father adorns the role of the tough guy who is difficult to please and the mom is rather softer person who cuddles and easily mouldable character of our lives. "It's not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can't tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself. ~Joyce Maynard"

Times are changing and so it the outlook of the people so with some new generation parents the ground rules are the same and some have tried to interchange the roles. The bottomeline however is I feel on how much you let the child develop. Based on what I have observed I would like to broadly categorize children into three categories which would be The Wild, The Groomed and the Bonsai.

The Wild as would the name suggest are the ones who are IGNORED. No body keeps a check on them and so they end up having thier own ways, own rules, own decisions. These kids generally turn out to be arrogant and loose thier cool very easily. They are generally very grumpy and have temperament issues as well.. It would be as difficult to get them to do a task as it would be to tame a wild bull. Like a creeper growing wild in a jungle. Aimless yet growing, a life wasted in short.

The Bonsai generally is grown in a controlled manner by which I mean that the cultivator has a certain image of the plant in mind based on which he prunes,defoliates, grafts the plant. Inshort not even a leaf is allowed to exist unless it is a part of the original design. They make very good show pieces but are not intended for production of food or any such benefitting factors. Now imagine doing something similar to a child during the growing years. The parent like the cultivator is not facilitating everytime the child wants to explore (read grow) unless they want it that way. Somehow I feel the child would never grow into a mature individual but into more of a remote controlled toy. Every move of the child is controlled. It may be that initially the child would still try to get some of the things done the way it wants to but eventually it would give up that effort because it has been so much monitored n controlled. The growth in this case is definatly designed but the end product isnt something productive. Such a child in my view would always have inferiority complex and would be less confident in his outlook towards everything in life. The thought procedure would be a lot more restricted and negetive.

As parents we should facilitate the child's growth in every sense. We should be the ladder they step on to reach thier goal. Teach them to think responsibly so that thier decisions are something they are proud of. They then become the groomed children who have a much wider horizon and are confident to go thier way and outlook towards life. Its interesting to note how children are taught in the schools here in UK. Unlike the teachers in India who cleary define what is good and what is bad or more often as they say what is right or what is wrong, the teachers here are far more accomodating. By that I mean they would tell the child there is good and bad way of doing something. having said that they leave it to the child which of them they would want to choose. In such a scenario it is very rare that the child doesnt sense the right choice and adapt it because like they say child is father of the man.It definatly has the smarts to figure out what is right or wrong in a given situation. But as parents we do not wait till they make the choice instead we push the decision to them and there the child is tempted to go towards the wrong choice because by human nature we tend to do things we are "not supposed" to do. Too often we give children answers to remember rather than problems to solve. ~Roger Lewin.

 And I agree with Rose Kennedy when she says, "Whenever I held my newborn baby in my arms, I used to think that what I said and did to him could have an influence not only on him but on all whom he met, not only for a day or a month or a year, but for all eternity - a very challenging and exciting thought for a mother".