My take on life from perspective of death

It is written in 1st person to make it more personal and more impactful does not mean that all I write here is my own experience.

Why restrain the fun…. I will die anyways one day

I often see people say and that we have only one life and let’s make most out of it. Let’s enjoy to its fullest.

I wonder if it is only one life and with death it will end why we put breaks to the enjoyment and pleasure. Don’t eat that dessert (ah the one which gives you pleasure which nothing else does. It looks, smells, and tastes like heaven). You will put on weight. Get up you lazy you are wasting your time. You tell yourself early afternoon while lying on the bed. Get up and do some work. The pleasures of senses which you just can’t have it unlimited because of values which say - be moderate, learn to be content, plethora of rules of what is right or wrong when it comes to senses. If it is only one life why not have it all? What’s the harm in having all the pleasures before we die?

At the end of day I will die living with all this restraint behavior I may have only 10 -60 minutes of good time each day. Considering on the weekdays it will be not more than 20 minutes (all the stress of work and on weekends it will go up to 2 hours. The average for a week will be 48 minutes. If I will live for 70 years and keep having fun this way I will have 20700 hours of fun. That may sound big but if I have unlimited fun 12 hours a day (assume rest time I sleep and do my necessary chores) I can clock these hours in just 4.7 years I don’t need 70 goddamn years. And the depth of experience needless to say will be higher in 4.7 years. I can have unrestricted fun with drugs, booze and sex. That’s what hippie culture was based on. I love them and their lifestyle.

Why all debates on euthanasia, life when is suffering it will be good to end it. Why all debate on suicide we die any ways one day when don’t want to slog one’s ass to come out of a depression as slogging is pretty boring and tiresome could just have an overdose of a drug which will give you an ecstatic experience, the ultimate nirvana and then could just move on. Why debate on drugs? it gives you a nirvanic experience. Just out of the world pleasure which you can otherwise never have. Why the restrain when death will follow. I should perhaps just maximize my pleasures.

Any answers?

Why do I write blogs?

When I started writing a blog I just had an excitement to be there and explore some topics which otherwise are difficult to write about. Here you have the hope and excitement that a larger world will read it and some may like it. Also these are themes which one does not talk about on a coffee table; these also require some peace of mind to organize thoughts.

People write blogs for various reasons and there are pop psychologists who have theories around why people write blogs. I have not seen any convincing theory most of them are bogus theories. One common fact is these are thoughts/ opinions which we want people to read, it could be though only your social circle. If there were no blogs imagine the long blogs I write I would have to narrate to all my friends/ family one by one. By end of it I would have been declared insane. I think that’s one common thread for all the bloggers (communicating my thoughts to larger world) but there are more reasons and is very individual centric.

For me another reason is to explore organize thoughts around some aspects of life. Little philosophy oriented. I am not the one who can read a lot but I like to learn through my own reasoning and writing helps me do so.

Blogs add the charm of letting people know and comment on my thoughts. And perhaps there is a hope of getting appreciation from the world, from your social circle of how well I think or write. Well the reality may be otherwise (I may be a boring blogger) but well I have defense mechanism up and quite hopeful to impress quite a few :)

Some conversation drifted me to the subject of death. It triggered my thoughts - one day I will die and so will all of you reading this :) (Death and smiley I don’t know go well together). I am not trying to scare anyone but jut plan to write on a series of human topics keeping in mind that we do die one day and in that context want to explore if the baggage we create in this life is really worth it? It’s a topic I want to explore may be extreme but extremes help us learn better they challenge the thought process.

Purpose

Just day before I was chatting up with my friend and he was quite frustrated with doing his job each day 9 to 7 and wanted to do something more meaningful in life. But the questions where is the meaning and how one will balance the material needs along with the meaning were very difficult to answer. Even I wonder a lot of times a similar question - What next? Want to have a goal which is larger than life, larger than MY life. By my life I mean it is relative to each individual for e.g. as a child overcoming shyness was larger than life in college years getting into a top management institute was a larger than my life goal, it can be different for a different individual.

From where do these larger than life goals form? I believe as a child when we are growing up we see adults and feel we have some inadequacy and we wish to overcome that. Ask any small child and he/ she wishes to grow big. He wants to become an adult/ a man/ a woman. And when she is more aware she wants to be like someone she admires who she thinks is better than her or there are some weaknesses which she wants to overcome or some attribute she thinks that will make her more socially acceptable/ famous.

And with this realization flows some goals in life which are important for you to make you feel good about yourself. Getting over with shyness, have a career, have a house, having a desired social circle of friends, etc. This is our natural purpose then and this keeps us keep busy in our growing years.

At the adult age we are able to achieve these. From the large lists one makes some of them are achieved and some fall into category not so important now, you eliminate some goals labeling them as not qualified as an inadequacy. It is a fair process.

By not so important now or elimination I mean as a child at initial stages you wanted to be an all rounder – have good looks, most well dressed, most intellectual, best in sports, in all sports, be good in arts, languages, etc.. Then starts your thinking faculty you hear wisdom around you - Everyone has his/ her own strengths and you are unique and you start eliminating some of it. For some take the intellectual path some the looks path, some sports path. It is a different concoction for a different individual. And as adults this process is complete. As an adult this process of elimination becomes even stronger as most of the goals for us as humans (social animals) are a way to find acceptance among others. As a child you want everyone to admire you but as an adult you get selective and have a narrower social circle. It contains your family, friends, and professional network. Most of these are made on your own individual strengths and hence elimination is easier as the end goal of you being admired/ adequate is easier to get by only few of your strengths.

It’s not the just the as a child you have such aims but there are two other initial stages which keeps one busy one is - when you start working and then the only aim at that a time is to prove yourself as a competent professional and you fight, slog to prove yourself adequate to this new world of yours. Another important stage is acquiring a family and that keeps you busy.
But thereafter you may come to stage of not knowing what to do, what is more meaningful and a general lack of purpose. When this happens to individual? It varies from individual to individual. For some it can be as early as his twenties and for some it may be when near to his death. When you question your own life flow it is bound to come.

This general lack of purpose and meaning I think happens as we stop feeling inadequate, stop dreaming about ourselves, stop challenging, stop seeing the world as we see as a child - a place of opportunity to learn. We just want to get over the first list of goals list we had as a child and feel good.

Why do we stop? Is it because we do not want to feel inadequate as that can be stressful? As a child this feeling had positive outcome to go out there and achieve. But as we grow into adults we have our defenses on and we are no longer let anyone or our self know of these weaknesses. We stop challenging ourselves.

Is it fear of failure? All your life till now you have struggled to make it adequate. Somewhere you succeeded some goals you gave up by intelligent elimination – not so important any longer to feel adequate. Opening up another set of goals means fresh set of work and you may fail.
Is it also because we have taken some responsibilities and now to go out there and achieve means a lot of hard work? And well hard work means giving up a lot of lazy pleasures of life.
There is so much to do as human beings, enough of meaning/ purpose one can find if we just challenge ourselves. Ask yourself what next? What looks important to you in life, what you would want to have as an individual it can be of any nature – physical, intellectual, material or spiritual. Overcome your fears and just go out there and do it.

Defense Mechanism

Sometime back I was out of a relationship and well a difficult one. It was an extreme an abusive relationship. The bad part was my partner who was the perpetrator was blissfully unaware of all the actions.

That’s the sad part of being a human being. We have a mind which as per its own convenience makes a defense mechanism, our twisted reality. By defense mechanism I mean the reasoning which we develop and shield ourselves from looking into our own weaknesses. For e.g. as a child never wanted to accept that I got defeated to a better player my mind will have a reasoning why I failed – I could not give my 100%, I did not sleep well and well I was therefore not fully fit, there were too many distractions on the court, I was just unlucky had just some of my shots had gone well I could have won.

There is a thin line between correct reasoning and false defense mechanism. Infact our instant instinctive reaction to shield us from a defeat, failure, negative consequence is some kind of defense mechanism. Some of us when we get over with the emotional setback due to the negative consequence reflect back and see through our defense mechanism or when we go through the experience again and the consequence is similar reality strikes us. That’s an awakening moment in our life and we break through the defenses to just open to another reality. It’s a moment through which we learn and we grow.

People with less faith in one own self or too much dependent on a false façade, dependent on what the external world perceives get caught in the false defense mechanism. To sustain such a false defense mechanism in wake of experiences which negate it one gets caught in the maze of false reality. For all your shortcoming there will be one genuine reason why it is so. You just grow physically all other growth - emotional, mental, spiritual stops.

My partner if I reflect back had this issue. This defense mechanism with time only grows and as I mentioned earlier to sustain it when life experiences go in another way you are caught in a maze. You will have further complex false reasoning, you will start blaming all others and become a cynical, will have a negative view of life. This if prolonged will only come with more serious mind games. If prolonged it also gets extremely difficult to break this defense mechanism as one has been hiding a deluge of low feeling with all the moments of weakness/ failure all his/her life.

I wonder how it would start in childhood. May be it is a consequence of parents who just get extra protective of their children. Just keep building false pictures to their kids of the greatness they possess it could be either out of love or because they are themselves caught in a false reality and think their children are the geniuses which they could not be, they think they are the stars which they could not be. They themselves would have this issue of a false reality, an impregnable defense mechanism passed on from parents to children.

The other strong reason it may develop when love is conditional when a child is loved only if he wins. The child then feels a lot of pain if she fails and cannot deal with it. In that case he will only build a strong defense mechanism to keep himself away from all the hurt associated with failure. Defense mechanism is then like a pain killer fatal to the life ahead he/ she has to live.
It may hurt a child to know that he is not the best and may never become but this reality needs to be taught to him/ her at a certain age when he can understand. The time should be when he is able to develop some reasoning of his own. At the time when he/she starts developing a mind of his own.

The foundation though still will be love that child you may be weak in certain areas but we still love you and are still with you. You may lose but you are still the best for us that’s the confidence be given to him/ her instead of blurring his vision with false reasoning.

Credibility

I watched a couple of good movies this weekend. One was the enemy of state, one time good watch and the other was scent of a woman. Beautiful movie!! Some of these movies inspire my thought process to enquire about life and do something larger than whatever I am doing now. Sadly the inspiration has been there too long in the mind and has been difficult to put in action
Enemy of state is a good action packed thriller but there was something I picked from there as well. Jon Voight when threatened by will smith and he possessing the tape says. I have seen men who commit heinous sexual crimes because the girl who reports is a call girl; I have seen men get away with murder as the only witness to crime is a history sheeter. Destroy a man’s credibility and his/ her words will no longer be credible in front of the jury. And there unable to find the tape he begins to destroy the credibility of will smith.

Credibility is a very strong perception to be managed in our work life and even otherwise. Why just restrict it to work life. If someone gives you his/ her word and you just know that this guy is so much credible that now this will happen as he/ she said how relaxed one will feel. It’s just so good. If a person with credibility of honesty does get into trouble someday I am sure he will not need a jury to prove himself. I have seen this happening with myself, my family we got into real trouble. And the trouble maker decided to hit on us by publicly ridiculing us and what save me or my family is the credibility which we have developed about our value system.

Great leaders are what they are because they are credible, they keep their words and never waiver from it. Waiver not just to be stubborn but do not waiver because of pressure or a need to avoid hard work or to run from the long route with a lot of difficult times. Buddha was credible and so was Gandhi and hence they could become the great leaders. They developed this credibility through integrity and trust on them came through their selfless actions.

Do you remember the story of the boy who for his own fun used to cry fox every time and when the real fox came, no one helped him. That is the power of credibility and one need to nurture it.
In any relationship credibility (similar to trust) develops over time. It is a result of repetitive processing of information in a certain pattern and unwavering action each time. The pattern which is what people begin to associate you with and that is the one may be believed to do every time in any situation.

In any relationship (work, personal, etc) it is a foundation. Be it a relationship of leader -followers or be it between husband-wife, friends - credibility is what will differentiate; destroy it through your actions and you destroy the relationship.

I will come back on scent of a woman later!!

Another take on Love, Marriage

The conundrum called marriage

I have been debating the purpose and need for marriage for some time. I had this question only as a defense to delay the pressure of marriage before I got married, though I had good arguments then. But now having been divorced and having had a bad experience I am kind of debating it seriously. It will help me only to take right decision right time. The right decision first to marry or not to marry (this one seems difficult) and if it is to marry what kind of person to marry.

I was looking up for history of marriage and interesting to know that every country has laws around marriage. It has always been there. What it means essentially is that marriage is looked as a contract between 2 individual and if violated the law takes it course. The law is supposed to be protecting the institution of marriage or any abuse of the contract. The only difference in this contract is that the terms and conditions on this one are not objective as it will be in any other business contract. A lot of ethical and socially acceptable norms come into play. It is essentially a contract.

A contract by nature means that both parties will agree to do for each other and failing of ones duties mean breach of contract. Some of the duties are what are clear ones and on which the laws are based. But all of these duties are governed by the social norms prevalent. In most cultures and religion (in fact it is interesting each religion has rules around marriage) one of the duties of marriage is procreation, having children. If partner disagrees a marriage can be annulled. The other especially in India is that the if role of woman is to breed children man is supposed to be taking care of the financial needs. These are broadly and traditionally the rules. So essentially 2 purposes which are there for marriage is:

• Procreation
• Jointly sharing household responsibility out of which woman traditionally is responsible for taking care of the family and men of running the household
  

But 2nd purpose is essentially derived from the 1st purpose.

Looking at the contract, both parties in the marriage are looking for some benefit and that is the purpose of one’s marriage. If a person is completely sufficient in all ways he/ she may not marry. What are the other benefits (other than procreation) one looks for?

One of the needs is physical; sex is a powerful sense which none can let go of. Here you have a partner always yours who is not to be won over each time and you have the sexual rights over him. You don’t have to worry that she will run away with someone else who is more handsome, intelligent, etc. It gives you legally, socially acceptable sexual partner and brings in a lot of security with the tag of marriage.

A similar need is emotional; again a powerful one perhaps more important as sex is very physical and still easier to crack. This one has varied dimensions and if you fail here it is far more difficult to be happy in your marriage. Human beings are constantly comparing themselves with the larger world and trying to be loved by others, marriage gives you that succor a partner who has to be loving you supporting you come what may, she is an emotional support to you in all times. He is supposed to be giving you strength emotionally, cheering you when you are down and sharing your joys. This cannot be faked that is why we try to choose partners who we can appreciate, respect. It has to be mutual. This is a big need as we humans are always dependent and looking to others for acceptance, others make us feel if we have won/ lost. The degrees may be different but we are dependent on someone to love us for what we are doing, inspite of our failures and success. The biggest factor is in a marriage you need not prove yourself every time the partner will be at your side come what may. That is the extreme power of this contract.
The other need though is a subset of the above is interdependency. In times of difficulty we need people to help us out. You cannot fight a battle alone, you depend on the family. That’s your back up. For e.g. you are unwell and cannot earn for some time, you have a family to back you up. You need to be taken care of there is a family to back you up. It’s the time when you hit low you as a human need aid and that’s where family come in place.

That’s is all I can think of on a macro plane if you can independently have the above 4 of procreation, physical, emotional and interdependency needs you will be happy single. But given the nature that one is running the rat race every time and the fact that the mind gets tempted with the illusionary (maya) world even if you do get all without a partner it will not be stable and you will always be insecure and running around. You need to commit through this contract and train the mind. Marriage is also in a way an exercise to discipline the unruly mind. If it was not for marriage one will be running around infinite prospective partners, each time after finding something attractive. It is never ending and you will end up tiring yourself. You may feel insecure and will not be able to grow as a person as for your basic needs you will always be running.

The reason hippie culture did not survive was for the above only. They tried to break the institution of marriage between 2 and said let there be peace amongst all in the society. One can get into contract with anyone and everyone at any time. It breeds insecurity each time you are dumped for someone else or even if you are not you may worry that you may be dumped. You will never be yourself and always trying to win over your partner. In the race your needs will be get sidelined.

True Confidence

This blog continues from my last post on confidence. If the confidence based on comparison is flawed then what is true confidence..

There are two important interrelated concepts which will make way for true confidence

1) Knowing yourself: The most important aspect for any individual to grow as a human being. Most of us either beleive ourselves bigger than what we are or smaller than what we really are. The first step is to know your true worth, true abilities.

There are no inabilities as there is a level of ability and nothing can be termed as an inability. It can be an inability only when you compare and that is as i mentioned flawed. Let me explain with an example. Imagine there is a 100 meter race and you are the only participant. You clock a minute to run that. That is your ability. Only when you start comparing with runners and the world records (which currently is at 9.7 seconds) the word inability comes in. Your ability to run today 100 meter race is 1 minute. That if is sufficient for the purpose you had to run the 100 meter is good for you. In the race not all of us have to come first, there is place for everyone. Not everyone needs to come first in academics, job, etc For first there is only one place rest most will fall in the region which is sufficient but may not be first. That is someone else's ability.

So ability is at a level, you need to know that. You need to know that along with your level. Level defines the ability. As human beings and in our existence on this planet there are different streams in which we can be able. We need to know the ability in all. You know it with experience with pusihing yourself in your life with new experiences. We do it more often in school and less in later life as it is during school days we are discovering ourselves in different fields (This is also one of the main objective of Schools). Based on our experience and our understanding our ability level we choose some over others. The ones we choose are the ones where the level of ability is such that you may be able to be provide for yourself and family successfully. The choice as we are multiply abled is a combination of interest and ability level.

The first aspect for true confidence therefore is knowing yourself.

Unfortunatley we get into comparison right from childhood and we run away from our true self as someone is better and we want to shield ourself from feeling low so we make illusions, excuses and get closed from reality.

2) Accepting Yourself and Your Efforts: After having knowing yourself you need to accept yourself and focus on efforts when delivering on a certain task. The success is not entirely in your hands + if you know you ability well you know what to expect of the outcome. if you know yourself well you will ask for help in areas where higher level of ability is required and you will succeed. So being confident will mean to be accept yourself, ask for help if required and make sincere efforts. It will more often lead to success and you will feel confident.

The dictionary meaning of confidence is: freedom from doubt; belief in yourself and your abilities

Confidence

Confidence seems to be the mantra for success for everyone in every sphere of life. Nobody can doubt more than competence confidence is improtant to be able to succeed in the work one does.

Though some of you may think competence overrules but most of the work which one does is not a rocket science where competence really overrules. rest is average designed for average and the one who has self confidence wins. Look around yourself you will be able to agree to this.

But ironically the foundation of confidence which is learnt, preached by elders is entirely incorrect today. I mean today a child is made to feel confident only if he is better than others, only if he is ahead in the race, comparison with your inferior is the foundation of confidence. The locus is exterior and one only feels confident in comparison to others, in being able to defeat others. how incorrect such a foundation will be, when it is compared to others it will lead to negative feelings like jeolousy, insecurity (since your confidence is dependent on someone else losing and not on you own efforts), hatred, etc.

Come what may such a confidence has to shake you one day the other day as you will meet people who will be better than you and if you are not a genius (which only 10% of people are), you will meet better people more often and it will shake you and take your peace away. Stress is a factor of such confidence only which has to always watch others.

If the society has to be more peaceful and friendly, the foundation of confidence needs to change, it needs to be more inclusive of others and not emanating from me vs others.

It needs to be more based on tenet of philiosphy of efforts, of belief in oneself, of knowing your true self, of what level you are at of physical, emotional, intellectual, creative, spiritiual intelligence.. from whatever level you are you need to move forwad with belief in yourself.. that will be real confidence

Beautiful !! But am i living it?

I wish i had wings and i could have a peaceful glide in the sky, it is such a beautiful sight the birds with a very calm, smooth glide in the air... beautiful !!

let me share some other sights, experiences which i find beautiful....

the receipe of home made choclate cake dipped in custard.. it tastes beautiful... though choices with respect to food are many but this one which my mom makes is amazing

the sweet experience of achievement, creating a solution and implementing sucessfuly a fairly difficult problem... it feels beautiful... more beauty flows if it is recognized by others.

the touch of a woman with a feeling of calmness, and filled with love... divine and beautiful..

sincere gratitude shown by a person who you helped, the beautiful gesture of gratitude makes you melt from inside...though very likely it may bloat your ego and make you arrogant

seeing someone getting success, bouncing up from a low, seeing that smile on his/ her face on having achieved and you have lend a helping hand... it leaves you with a beautiful feeliing of having contributed.. having made a difference... just beautiful

the beautiful sound of some music when listened to in a peaceful environment, when you just completely get absorbed in it.. a rare moment in our days of rat race...

the beauty of the mountains, rivers and the smell of fresh air.. it is so beautiful....

There is so much beauty and i wonder if i know all what i find beautiful... and am even more surprised how less time i/ we give to the explore and garner experiences which are beautiful to us ....

life is to be lived differently than how we live... may be will talk about it in next blog...

Love & Sex 2

Love in popular terms is about sex. Its about finding that one elusive perfect life partner with whom one can live happily ever after. It is a good thought but one when gets it mind waivers for somehting more and something different, there is no perfection anyways

The popular love has something else too. Sex is definitely the biggest ingredient but the other ingredient is emotional need. You love a person who fulfills your emotional need. It is a one way traffic it is about what you get out of the partner. You only give to make sure that there is some hook for the partner too, to be in love.

You love the person who you think is smarter or in some way is fulfilling your emotional needs of security, appreciation, being able to show him/ her off in the social circle, etc

Real love has to transcend the popular love definitions and is much beyond the basics. One has to learn to give first in real love and really feel compassionate about the other . Quite difficult to achieve. Quite difficult to transcend one's own needs. Popular Love is not love but is perhaps a contract of give and take, i may be sounding cynical but i am not. I am being a realist and i am not being judgemental. As long as you give if and if you are taking i beleive it is a nice fulfilling relationship. If the equation anytime imbalances chances are you will develop cracks in relationships. Though popular love has its reasons to exist and works for most to keep them happy but it is not perfection or pure it has to be mastered, self has to be mastered in some manner to come to a point that you are able to just give.

My Take on Love & Sex

This one is a difficult subject to write and I am sure this will be controversial. I am here to write about sex, love between male and female.

I don’t believe in the concept of love as it is largely followed. Love in general is only between a male and female or let me put it only between sexual partners (male – female in case of heterosexuals, same sex in case of homosexuals). Is it not a narrow meaning of love? What has love as an emotion got to do with sexual partner or gender? Look at all other emotions which describe us – empathy, compassion, anger, hate (opposite of love), pick any emotion it is not directed towards a particular category but transcends all such categories and can be to any specie living or dead or non living.

For sake of simplicity and as per my sexual preference (heterosexual) I will be writing it using male and female examples nothing against homosexuals.

But ask any person looking for love it is to do with gender. One may agree or disagree but the truth is it is about sex. It is longing for physical sex manifesting through emotions. Come to think of it every emotion has physical manifestation anger is seen in physical aggression, extreme hate can lead to similar aggression as anger, empathy could lead to physical actions of helping the person. In all these cases emotion follow the physical action however in case of love it seems the opposite but it is not. It seems so as per my argument sex I said love is about sex so it means it follows desire for sex is preceded by love. But it is not so as Sex is physical but the desire is an emotion, it flows from the need of the emotional solace one gets through the sexual experience. The desire manifests from the experience one has had earlier.

The love we see around us is all about sex? Difficult to answer but large part is sex then flows other attachments as well but it does start with sex.

You see sexual energy all over around you. Playful banters between men and women. Couples walking hand in hand everywhere you don’t see the same in same sex. Flirting, compliments, being conscious, putting your best put forward are some of the experiences you observe in a group of men and women. Look at the romantic movies they are all about finding that perfect partner, sexual partner. The best moments are those which are followed by the romantic gossips followed by gentle kiss and sex. Such are the memorable moments of romantic movies.

It is sex everywhere I have not seen any movie which does not have its energy, even the hardcore action movies will have a dame either with the protagonist or the antagonist and there will be love and sexual energy.

I am to believe the meaning of love and sex entwined and cannot be separated.

With so such of this energy what surprises me is there is so much guilt around sex, sexual desires it is love ultimately and not a harmful emotion per se. Why can you love only one? Why is it a sin for an engaged partner to fall in love or attracted to another person? Why is it a forbidden fruit as per all religions? Why is it be given up to attain the highest ideals of being human – nirvana, moksha?