Happiness

This has become a cliché now that happiness does not come through material or senses. They are pleasurable but happiness is something different, it is a state of mind.

Happiness comes when you are in control. In control of your surroundings and are able to manoeuvre your way as you desire.

• You become happy when you are in control of your work and you mesmerise your customers, peers, boss with the output. you are in control
• You become happy when your lover does as you would have wanted it, you are in control.
• You become happy when you are in control of your time. All done well as planned within time. You control your time
• You become happy when you are at your best in your social circle or with customers. You are appreciated for what you are. You are in control

Control gives happiness. Spirituality and Philosophy believe you cannot control the surroundings, you can never be that perfect and moreover the surroundings also want the same control. There will always be a conflict. As per them best is you control your mind and try to want as less external control as possible. Get it to a point of zero so that you are eternally happy. It definitely has a logic less you want from outside more you are in control of what you want as all lies within you and is independent of the surroundings. The more control you have on your mind the more happy you get. 

Life & Thoughts - 2

Life brings in many contradictions and answers are always difficult. The good thing is all such contradictions serve a definite time, they have their death and it solves by itself. One such contradiction is success and failure. 

We all want for ourselves, our loved ones, friends, family - success. But there are times it just does not come, life has its own ways of dealing with it. Life does not look at effort alone and there is luck, which a lot of times play a spoil sport. Unfortunately with failure comes whole lot of emotions - you feel as if you are being cheated, life is unfair to you, selfish conniving people robbed you of what you deserve, you start feeling under confident, you doubt yourself. The moment just takes over you with a force that it makes you go through a whirlpool. Not a happy one, too many thoughts, emotions.. utter confusion, anger, depression. 

All of this has a ripple impact. All your loved ones feel anxious, worried and they wonder what can we do to make you feel better. Many feel the same way you feel - Why is life so unfair? Why are people so selfish and conniving? Why do they hurt? They fear that you may lose yourself and want to protect you. 

But they cant protect you. The mind does not listen to anyone but to its own self. If it does not have the right coping mechanism it can go down; down to a point of no return. It is scary. 

The mind needs coping mechanism. The coping mechanism is nothing but a repository of good successful experiences, of happy thoughts, its about belief in oneself, it is about knowing your strengths and playing on it.  This is the repository you can go back to and remind yourself this too shall pass. There are ups and then there are downs. But there are ups. That builds hope and gives you courage to stand again and fight. 

The coping mechanism develops much faster  with sensitive encouragement from people who want to protect you - your loved ones, colleagues and family. This is perhaps the most important purpose of any relationship. If the relationship does not provide you this encouragement and is not sensitive to you, your strengths it is meaningless. Get away from it.

Keep Walking

Follow me I will take you to heaven,
Its a long way, will have to run,
Else the heaven moves further away,
We can't rest on this long journey
Think through, its a heavy burden to bear,
If you deviate you will waste your years.
_______

This is my dream and I will follow,
I know, my commitment is not shallow
I will follow it with unwavering grit,
Till I reach my dream, the heaven.

On the path for few years I have tread,
The journey has bestowed many rewards.
But often I have wavered and wasted,
Each time I  returned more determined.

Many times I fell, I learnt and rose back
How many mistakes will I commit?
How much will I learn from past?
Am I really learning? Am I in a vicious cycle?
I know not the answer, but this time I will not waver
With this determination I take the arduous path again.

Therapies of Life

I am an atheist and  if you have read my blogs you would have realized that. Atheism however does not limit me in believing in life which is larger than the lives we live. Much larger, a life beyond, something inside makes me believe my life will continue long after I am dead. I am not referring to work or assets I create here which may live longer but a concept which is non proven by science. I am talking about life after death. Anyway these are beliefs which I don't have a proof of and are best left unanalysed.   

What I want to analyse and leave a thought on is what are these larger beyond life concepts or God have a role to play in our lives. These concepts are the best psychologists and therapists. A belief in these give us human beings hope, a hope when most needed. At moments of failure or injustice or heartbreak or unhappiness  or hopelessness these give us a hope, a hope of life of dreams in time to come, as God or justice awaits in some form. These concepts give us a reason to believe in future and endure the travails with a smile. 

For the western world the God is much archaic and a life after death preposterous, therefore they have created similar therapists in glorifying stories of rags to riches like the one in the movie  - The pursuit of Happyness, there are many such stories abundant in Western world giving the average man a hope, a strength to face the bitter realities. It is as powerful concept as God yet it is not as effective. The problem is that it does not seem to create the same amount of reverence as God does and as these stories are human, God is supernatural. 

You may be wondering I am trying to say there is no hope and all the hope created is an illusion, a therapeutic tool. No that's is not the point what I am saying is these are 3 different ways (could be more) of powerful self therapy - God, Super Humans & Life After Death. Truth though is unknown and a mystery; may be death will reveal, that's my belief :) 

Time to Change

The way we are living life today when compared to few years back, there is a drastic difference. If we go back further in time there will be no similarity perhaps. The life today is led through means which require considerable use of mind and much less use of the body. 

Let me illustrate going through a typical day - you get up and are greeted by the housemaids and cooks you instruct them what needs to be done or cooked. Then you get ready, are off to office, you need to drive which also requires some mental skill, driving can be stressful for the mind with the way traffic moves in my city and I am sure it can be similar for same or other reasons in other cities. In office with your laptops, blackberry or smartphones, technological aids the work gets done  - all done through the use of mind and least physical work.  You come home driving back. At home high chances that work may be at back of your mind. If you are a family person you end up managing the demands of wife, kids; again requiring mental strength. 

All the above is aided by technological aids which itself transform within a span of 2 years and that adds more pressure to the mind to learn how to handle these new aids. If you don't get it you will be left behind and in some time the earlier aids will not be available at all - so you have to learn.

In contrast if we go back in time the requirements of mind, body were very different. This is also the reason why kids today are more developed mentally and not physically. The stimulus to mind they get today is extremely higher. This brings me to the conclusion that we need to give up old ways of training ourselves, our kids. No longer the old system can ensure we keep healthy. A lot of people if are suffering from diseases of mind (it could be mild depression, stress or severe breakdown) is because they are not trained enough for the demands of life. Understanding of the mind and its training is where we must put considerable time. 

Move away the wisdom of the parents, life is changed it is time to create new wisdom. 

How to become Perfect

Every time I go attend trainings or read some self help articles on how to become better in life I feel miserable.  Miserable as I think they are a complete waste of time. 

The programs can only sell if they give a definite solution to the aspect they address. Therefore you will see in all such articles or programs there is always a few points solution  - Do these 5 things and master leadership. These are the secret of effective communication deciphered form the greatest, a sure shot way to negotiate your way through deals if you follow these steps, follow this and you shall manage the change effectively.

MASTER THESE !!!! there are enough examples they have changed people and their lives.. transformed is the word the best trainers use..

I wish it was this simple and all of us had become perfect by now !! .. It never works as real life scenarios has many shades and a simplistic linear solution never works, it is a medley of many such steps in varying proportions which works. It has to be decided basis the situation at hand and it is a subjective decision. This decision making unfortunately does not have any steps, it can never have. Let me illustrate this with a few wisdom quotes:

ALL GOOD THINGS COME TO THOSE WHO WAIT

vs.

TIME AND TIDE WAIT FOR NONE

THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE ARE FREE

vs.

THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS A FREE LUNCH

Contradictory principles when what applies and to what degree is a subjective decision, similar is about these trainings and articles. They can be good guiding post but no elixir.

Our trainings to make people better at what they do needs to change. It cannot be point solution but all trainings must be directed at the individual. It should train individuals at first to give tools to do a careful and honest self assessment plan and then directed towards working on the emotional quotient which is keeping the person away from being effective.

Yet again on Marriage

I think this seems to be my favourite topic ! I am reading this book by Bertrand Russell - Marriage and Morals, amazing insights..  he is a great thinker. His point is marriage was made as it is for many reasons and primarily linked with the economy, role of state. Cant agree more, I have read only 4 pages but just this thought is so appealing that I am writing about it. 

Anyhow will talk about it later. Right now there is another thought which I was thinking about what could have led to making marriage an extravagant affair. Throughout the world marriage is created to be a lifetime event. It is a big marketing event, huge parties, celebrations, lot of money is spent however not so much in divorce. Marriage is uncertain, unpredictable what it may bring to you but divorce typically is expected to end your current misery and bring you closer to regaining your happiness. Divorce perhaps calls for larger celebration..

The question I have why is it such a big event? why is marriage sold like one big romantic, idealist best thing to happen in ALL societies? I really wonder.. Marriage is much smaller event than birth of a child. Birth by all means is a lot bigger achievement and brings in a lot of positive change... Why do we not celebrate that much more than marriage?