Please Spare a Thought for Sean Abbot too!

Phillip Hughes, the Australia Test batsman struck on the head by a ball two days ago, has died after succumbing to a serious head injury. He was hit by in the back-left side of the head while batting for South Australia against New South Wales at the Sydney Cricket Ground on Tuesday. Sean Abbot was the bowler.

Former England cricket captain Sir Ian Botham tweeted: "A very sad day for the world of cricket. So sorry for Phillip Hughes and his family. Spare a thought for Sean Abbott."

Yes Indeed it is important to think of Sean Abbot too.

The guilt and the trauma that he must be going through due to the fact that it was his ball that killed Phil Hughes must be devastating. It was in news that his career may be at stake. 

Spare a thought please.

Everything is about intention.  Intention is a thought process where one plans with an awareness that one wants to hurt someone. It is processed in mind, planned out so that the other can be hurt. For whatever reasons one wants to hurt other- the aim is to hurt. The hurt could be at an emotional level or physical. Intent to hurt may not be extreme – to kill; any action from  a person that jeopardizes other’s family life, career, self-esteem is the intent to hurt. (It is a different point of discussion however that when one is strong inside nobody’s intention to hurt can hurt you- the subject and the object have to be dealt with separately here)

Coming back to Abbot- he had no intention to hurt Phil. He was bowling and Phil was batting. The ball hit at the wrong place and Phil succumbed to his injury.  Abbot did not get up in the morning with the prior thought or plan to hurt.  Yes the intention to oust Phil to win must have been there.  A similar metaphor could be that if one kills someone in an accident there was no intent to hurt; there could be carelessness on the part of the driver.

Also destiny cannot be ignored.  The events in life happen exactly as these have to happen. Exactly , perfectly, in totality! Because of the perfection of this Universe – everything is perfect right down to an atom or to the largest galaxies with all forces then the perfection has to extend to the everything at macroscopic level too. Whatever has to happen will happen. Whether with the intention to hurt or with no intention to hurt, the events of life tun out perfectly. If there is no intent then it is a different to if there was an intent- a matter of another blog

SO please spare a thought for Sean Abbot too. Send him love and let him be healed too

A Flower falls and a Weed grows

Aristotle said that The Ideal man bears the accidents of life with dignity and grace making the best of circumstances.

Life is a flow and we may be sure of doing what we have planned to do tomorrow- organized to hilt and yet how do we know that that moment that we have planned right down to smallest detail will come?

The plan to plan and to organize,  the stress of things not working the way one wants it, the money that one needs to earn to pay off mortgage, the relationships,  the worry and the time spent on worrying, the trap of comfort zone, the security of knowing how the day will go, 8 to 5 at work, then home, then dinner and the day ends. Fitted in and fixed. The whole life seems to pass away as in "fitted in" and then one wonders whatever happened to my life at some stage.

And when someone dies many of us read it and go about doing our own thing thinking well that is how it is. However, if we were suddenly told that we had just a few months or years to live everything around us would fall like a pack of cards. Nothing would matter anymore, nothing except grappling with the fact that – that which one stressed about so much was not worth worrying about at all.

The thing is that when one lives with the heart up the sleeve in spontaneity of taking the day as it comes and with this thought that nothing lasts – the day ends, the date ends, years ends to become past and the future is in a potential possibility to be past after going through present moment. Another xmas and another new year.

Then what must be done? Live and Laugh, love and forgive, fill your mind with higher thoughts and nourish your inner being. We are human "Beings" not Human "Doing" .But sadly we are never in the state of BE, we are more in the state of DO most of the time. 

Que Sera sera whatever will be will be – it is said that a flower even when nourished falls and a weed grows even when unloved.
. 

If whatever will be will be- plan what is needed and when done do the things you love to do. And just BE

Spread love

The Perception of Reality

Why at all is everything in the universe the way it is? From where has come the material to make the structure- the atoms of the periodic table that in different combinations make the entire world around us.

What was there before big bang? If everything was just one big primeval atom then how and why did the blasting of that atom create material? How is it that the atoms and the molecules that we are made of make life and yet the same atoms and molecules become useless in a special condition of an object called death?  The most lethal of all questions is not what matter is – but why is it? Why?

This Universe is made up of all living and all non-living, the sentient/responsive  and the insentient then the fact that one part of this universe is aware of the other part and also of self to a certain extent is indeed very intriguing.

Einstein said that - the most incomprehensible thing about this Universe is that it is comprehensible.

From where has this factor of ‘awareness’ come in the structure of predominantly material Universe? How do genes know what to manifest in an organism in certain way and not in other organism? Why is it that one person’s idea of happiness and beauty and sorrow is very different from other, why do we so heavily rely on perception, do we know that everything is relative, and how do we know that we know , how many of us do not know that we do not know anything,  who is that aware entity that knows that we had a deep sleep when most of our brain is shut down...and yet we are aware of our deep sleep( I slept like a log), who is this who is aware?

Someone said that the essence of growing is asking, and when one stops asking one stops growing. Either everything is a wonder or nothing is a wonder. Let us assume a hypothetical experiment and place an isolated brain in a jar and subject it to conditions in such a way so that is stays alive. This brain is then connected to a computer and a scientist feeds idea sot this brain. The brains assume that it is a brain is a male – this brain is then fed with data of what it likes and does not like , parents, and emotions that must predominate it’s thoughts etc The brain then starts thinking the data that is has been fed.

Are we just what we have been fed  into most of the time? Yes!

Then what is independent existence? What is reality?

Is perceiving anything the way we perceive reality?

Is our programming – our conditioning a reality? And who has programmed us the way we have been programmed?

Can we ever comprehend that which is not a part of our memory?  

Can we for a minute think that just as the dreams that we dream and when wake up know that we were dreaming could be it- that we are a part of someone’s dream?

Can we consider all this to be illusion?

Does your brain hurt right now? Does this sound wishy washy to you? Metaphysics is a combination of confusions and puzzles and the lack of any common sense as in assuming we understand what commons sense is makes this abstraction baseless and maddening to even comprehend let alone think that there may be some truth in all this.

If we say that the real is that which exists then what is the meaning of this word EXIST?

If we are real then are the dreams too real? If the dreams that appear so real when we are dreaming become unreal when we wake up- the dream was still real but the characters of the dream are unreal then do we have unreal part of us in real us- the waking state.

I think I must stop here.

   

My Conversation with Pallavi :)

My conversation with Pallavi was very one sided. I spoke and she laughed. A great catch up time at MacDonald with large chocolate shake and fries. Burp!  

From seriousness of life to random Indian jokes, from Bollywood to love to music to parents to men to spirituality to physics to breast scanning we missed out on nothing. From homosexual to heterosexual to books to God to paradoxes to higher purpose of life everything was discussed. Ah it felt like a charged up chat where all talking was done by me and all listening by Pallavi. Of  course I talked and she listened. Who had taught her Physics and who has graded her  for two years of her life? So it was clear from the start that who would lead.  I did let her speak occasionally. Her laughter with that famous dimple  can truly inspire poets to write a poem. You listening Ron? 


And as we both sipped our chocolate shake that too large one - I am sure we both thought of calories. And we still kept giving other the compliment that we looked slim! I did not believe a word of the compliments that Pallavi threw my way, no dinner tonight, a banana tomorrow and may be stay hungry for the rest of the day( not happening I know!)

To sum up we reached this conclusion that all the one needs to have a good life is 
1) love in the heart 2) a mind that knows how to stay inspired and 3) health

Ofcouse we discussed men and boys and Ron you definitely came into our chats!  To be in love and to stay in love are two things. Being is easy, staying is a challenge and after some time of life one is not sure if one is 'staying' in love or just 'sleepwalking'.

To many more of such meeting Pallavi- you were my student and  it has transformed into such an amazing synergy of inspirational connection with you

Ron next time we are having a meal in Hare Rama  Hare Krishna

Stay Blessed!


    

What Makes us Wholehearted?

The scientist mind of mine remembers a quote from somewhere that says that – That which cannot be measured does not exist.

The poet mind of mine grapples with that quote. It surely fits in when one wants to measure a data from an experiment, however how would one fit the message from the quote in daily life.  For example how does one measure people? What does one measure about people?

My friends?

 My neighbors?

Are people mere data ?

Or wait a minute…

….Data with souls?

As I prodded further I asked myself this question- What is the most important thing for all of us? And the more I struggled with this question the more I realized that all of us look for connectivity. In one way or another.  Connectivity through internet, TV, meeting friends and in all possible ways. And the more I thought on these lines the more I realized that it is how we connect that makes us measurable or immeasurable- mere data with souls (metaphorically).  

When people connect with each other, some keep a big part of themselves that would make them vulnerable hidden. They connect but behind the walls of ego in a sense of separateness. And then there are other type- the ones who connect wholeheartedly. For them it is alright to be vulnerable. For them it is alright to show love with all their heart even when there was no guarantee, for them it is alright that they be seen as they are- good or bad. And the most important trait of such people is that they do not numb themselves to any emotions. They have accepted being sad some days- not denied those moments. Denying sadness would mean that one wants to forget it temporarily by watching a movie or eating more or with some other means. And they rejoice in their struggle. I have fought with this statement that I just wrote- what does it “feel like” when one says that one rejoices in struggle? I think it simply means that one remembers the struggle and still happily goes ahead to give oneself permission to laugh at anything that was hilarious. Such wholehearted people- when do not deny sadness, would also not deny themselves the other emotions as well- those of love, happiness, cheerfulness.  They did not make themselves numb! They laugh, sing, dance, rejoice and show who they are as they are when they want to as they have given themselves permission to be the other as well.

To be wholehearted always, to be "un-numb", to become vulnerable is what makes a person. That can never be measured ever. That can be felt. To connect wholeheartedly in any way makes us people- with height, weight, age- measured as numbers with soul effect- the whole heartedness.

So that quote that-

That cannot be a measure does not exist was must have been written by a scientist. Not by a poet, not a philosopher.

What would you be when there is nothing left to do?

I am many times in a state of ponder about the fact that we do not know how lonely we are. 

Most of us would say that we do not have time to spare. Between work and home and TV and fb time goes by. Between shopping and other social obligations that we spend time on – time goes by as a time pass. Between decorating a house or buying new clothes we pass our time. We fill our time; that is all that we do, in random useless things, debating, analyzing, discussing in a reactive mode. It may have some use but nothing is ever changed so effectively it is a time pass activity.

But all this will come to an end one day. One will retire, or the activities that one does may get repetitive, TV and fb may become boring and one may have so much time that one then starts to speculate on the purpose of life. I have met many old and young people who become very depressed when they have so much of free time that they know not what to do about it apart from watching TV the whole day, or being on fb or twitter or being a baby sitter to their grand children or being a part of their children’s family, or becoming a negative fault finding person. Even with job there is still time to kill, young mothers too have some time to spare. For older people children too get busy and do not want much interference and that makes them again be lonely.

And when one loses a spouse or a long time partner or going through a divorce – it gets worse. The point that I am arriving at is that we never spend time on our own self in quiet to understand ourselves to know ourselves and to find out about our own nature.

What would be left with me when all that I depend on gets taken away from me? Sounds depressing but it is still better to ask yourself such questions when you are still in the midst of friends and are young and have less time to think about all this.

One must think about why we do certain things certain way, about our habits, about our fixations, about our dependence on external stimulation.

One must at least think about one's own nature at least for sometime in a day in a quiet mode ! When the structure of a system  that you so depend on( be it home or work front or any other structure)  that you are used to falls -then what are you? Who are you?