The Pleasure of Reading...

...surpasses every other pleasure--for me. Put me in a room full of books that get automatically renewed/replaced periodically and I'll stay there for all eternity, unbothered about anything else. We picked up this dirty habit in early childhood when Dad would bring home all periodicals, magazines, books of the day(He still does it nowadays, with more vigour) and we'd fight over each other to read the latest installment of Champak, Amar chitrakatha, chandamama....the habit got reinforced in late school and early college years when I had more friends in fictional characters than in real life, the fictional world being more authentic and fascinating than the drudgery of everyday existence.

Circa 2005. I discovered blogs. And also discovered that I had sufficient cash flow by which I could indulge myself by purchasing every other delicious book I could smell. Three years of software testing and I can say, I've read more during office hours than tested code(of course, by squeezing all work into my available 'work' hours and getting three headaches every month). I wake up early sometimes and read. Or sit late at night. Carry a book to the railway reservation queue. Or at the doctors. I read two books in between attending the marriage rituals of my sister-in-law. And sometimes during breakfast, I'll be eating more words than bread crumbs. Yet there are more unread books in my shelf than those which I've read. And my must-read list goes on and on making me wonder if I'll ever get to the end of it in this life-time.

But what's the point? Why read at all? Spend so much time-money -attention...for what purpose? The primary purpose is ...pure orgasm. Nothing else. And sometimes, a bit of illumination(eckart tolle, khalil gibran), inspiration(ran prieur, reality sandwich, Dave pollard) and new thought(last american man,flow). But most of the time, it's the simple intellectual and emotional kick/satisfaction that's derived by looking and wondering at life through eyes not your own. I bet, the pleasure center in the brain for sex, fruit-salad and reading must be the same!

And just as a new project starts at work, I come across this series of blogposts--a rendition of the Epic Mahabharata through Bhima's eyes. And a book on Ramayana by Kamala subramaniam which a friend has promised to deliver this weekend. And another set of translations of Marathi mythological novels in English (Mruthyunjaya and Yayati), which I'll get my hands on very soon.

If I were a gladiator I would've shouted, 'Felice di essere vivo e cazzo!' Yeah!!

Dawn..still far away

You think that you're super detached. You think you're not sentimental. You pride yourself in your aloofness, in your stoicness. No, you aren't. You are very much human even if you have difficulty in accepting it.

A colleague leaves for another company after 4 years and you have a lump in the throat. He isn't a best friend, infact he's a pain sometimes, but this long association ends in a snap. And with this, something in you dies too. Where did this tenderness arrive from? You had become hard and opaque; you'd deliberately killed all soft feelings and turned rigid over many years. What was it that mellowed you? Made you responsive! Sensitive!

I know hunger. I've felt its pangs, an immense burning sensation that clouds everything--your judgement, your reasoning, the very awareness that you're a human being. Long back, when I was travelling a long distance with very little money and even little inner strength, I spent nearly two days eating two packets of biscuits and an apple. By the time I reached half the journey, I was mad with hunger and could barely walk. So when I hear the adage, 'The greatest God is the food God,' I agree wholeheartedly. You can speak lofty ideals only after your stomach is full. When hunger strikes everything else goes out of the window and what's left is a pure animal who's intent on surviving, nothing else. If there's anyone who's an exception to this, I haven't met him/her yet and would definetly like to know them.

There are reports of food riots breaking out in flood ravaged bihar. The administration has failed to cope up with the devastation there and much of the relief sent by the government is eaten up by the middle men, with only a trickle reaching the needy. What follows is pure survivalism. Hungry villagers armed with sticks and sickels have attacked the food godowns, grabbing sacks of rice and wheat, carrying them back to the waiting stomachs at home. It takes only a river to flood and a pathetic administration to fail and you have authentic human nature coming out.

Maybe you don't need such extreme situations too-- a small push will do. A funny thing happens every afternoon at the restuarant near my workplace. The crowd that collects at the food counter is a healthy mix of officials, executives, technicians and people from all walks of life. We buy the tickets at the entrance, hand it over to the servers at the food counter and wait patiently for the food to arrive. If there are 10 people who've ordered Masala dosa and the server brings 4 at a time, it's a sight to watch people jump over one another to grab these dishes. At that moment you aren't a manager or an executive from a Multi national, drawing a six figure income every month. You're a bloody stomach. And sometimes the cook comes out and peeks at us with a wry smile. He's no longer a poor cook ekeing out a living preparing dishes in a modest restuarant. For one moment, he's God.

'Everyone does everything for his stomach and for a peice of cloth,' sang a saint. How cool would it be if one could bypass the need to eat in order to survive! Maybe we could draw nourishment from the sun directly, the way plants do. And have no need to work, earn, struggle. Wishful thinking. Why not?

Amidst a never ending effort for a secure base, for stability, beating your hands frantically attempting not to drown, there are sudden flashes. That everything is just fine as it is. That you're better off swimming in the current and there's no need to panic, to reach the shore or find any destination. You're at home right now, here, in this very place and moment. Such moments arrive unheralded, at unlikely places--say, when I'm in the middle of the busy traffic, or under the shower, or while surfing the channels or observing my son at play....

And these moments are so fleeting that in an instant, you're back to your anxious self. You're again in the flux, in the struggle, fighting, seeking, hoping. But you know that the moment comes again. That it's not a freak occurance. That the relaxedness is your default state of living to which you'll go back soon. That you need to find ways to set up roots in that stillness, in that carefreeness.

'To utter the truth you need a simple courage,' he said. 'To accept something as true itself requires great courage. I hate to hurt others but is it because I'm scared that once hurt, they may pounce on me? Or do I have a genuine concern for their well being?'

'You might have a real concern for them...'

'Mmm. I think not. I'm scared that they'll attack me. Or maybe stay away from me and I'll become alone. Or even, if someone's hurt, it makes me feel wretched and I don't like feeling that way...'

I thought for a while and said, 'What do you want to do then?'

'Just speak the truth. And live quietly after that. No f pretense. I'm tired.'

I sit alone in the dead of the night, listening to crickets, barking dogs from another universe and the thud of my fingers on the keyboard. For one moment, I wonder what I'm doing here, putting my thoughts down, for what purpose. I have work to do, a waiting headache in the office tomorrow, followed by a possible dinner with friends in the evening and a relaxing weekend after that. I have several journeys to traverse, new lessons to learn and, inspite of bitterness and anxiety, a rewarding life to explore and celebrate. I stand on the threshold of new discoveries and an exciting tomorrow. When I'm truly tired of thinking and feeling for myself, I stand up and try to expand a bit, try to look ahead and around. No, I can't empathise with others. Expandedness is an empty word for me; I can only feel for a select few around me.

I'd love to expand, to feel the oneness with others, other beings, other things. I'd love to feel this Love--pure and pristine. Taste it. What's it like?

I'll find this Love. When I cease, it shall be found....

Immediate thoughts

'Lust Caution' is disturbingly pleasant. Not just for the explicit scenes but because of the conclusion, in which the protagonist fails in the carefully thoughtout mission for which she has devoted her life. I expected an ending in which she finishes off the villian after another intense lovemaking session and either breaks down in regret or flies off into the sunset with the hero who's waiting in the sidewings. What happens is totally unexpected and so true to life--like, you search for some bloody conclusions and neatly tied-up endings here and you draw a blank. Life isn't a fucking holly/bollywood drama where the white triumphs over the black and you get pampered and mollycoddled by existence. It's a kaleidoscope of gray shades--you don't know what's right or what's wrong in this dreamlike reality and by the time you figure it out, you're near the end of the goddamned journey and you're still not sure.

A fascinating peek into what might exist beyond our perceptions, beyond death, on the other side. Here. Reminds me of what this guy says 'The occult isn't hidden. It's ignored.'

Nowadays it's frequent... a sinking feeling... that I'm wasting my youth, my time, my energy in the pursuit of horse shit. That I'm missing the most precious years of my kid, staring at a blinking box and typing like insane in a cold cubicle, doing what, I'm not sure. That I watch the days, weeks, months passby without knowing or trying to know my purpose, why the hell I'm here or what'm I supposed to be doing.

Do I flow with the world around--living like a robot just like everybody else because everything around's so screwed up, and then waking up only when everything falls apart in the near future? Or do I take charge of my life and decide what to do with it--Now--without waiting for something to happen or someone to come around and rescue me?

Who on earth am I...

I am a body-- fair, lean and hungry. I am the voice inside my head. I am what I think I am.

I am this face... no, I am someone hiding behind this face, looking out, hearing something, thinking a lot. I am a person in this body. I'm this stubble, this breath, this black tee-shirt with some crap imprint.

I am a wary child to my parents; I am a watchful and delighted parent to my child. I am a struggling disciple to my Guru. I'm the irreverant, disrespectful guy standing next to you. I'm the lover of my beloved. I'm an unending desire, a guilty passion. A stranger to oneself. In dark moments, I'm a good for nothing jackass yet at brighter horizons I'm most self-assured. I'm my moods.

I'm what I eat. I'm hunger and thirst. I'm my frequent headaches. I'm the irritation of the mosquito bites. I'm sleeplessness. I'm physical.

I'm lust. I'm the uncontrollable anger. I'm the regret that follows the anger. I'm an energy that posseses this body at times. I'm the body possesed by this strange energy.

I'm a yearning for many freedoms. I'm the freedom which I yearn for.

I'm the fear of many unknowns. I'm the nostalgia of bygone days. I'm a few terrible regrets of my youth. I'm a great enthusiast of the coming future.

I'm what I scribble, what I type. I'm the memory, bright yet painful. I'm the hope, anxious yet excited.

I'm a slave to the society, a conformist craving for validation. I'm a secret rebel, raging to explode. I'm a prisoner of my own imagined limitations. I'm the revealation that the prison is an illusion, that I'm without limits.

I'm a stranger, lost in the crowds of a big city. I'm a friend, smiling at unknown people, feeling myself in them.

I'm the hero and the coward of my dreams. I'm the beggar of my senses. I'm the conquerer of small triumphs.

I’m a thousand questions, a million doubts, and a few answers. I’m the wonder of a baby’s eyes and the wisdom of the aged wrinkles.

I’m solitude, a deep longing to be alone. I’m the warmth of friends, family, acquaintances, a craving for company.

I’m a cog in the wheel of a Software vehicle on the Information highway. I’m a wageslave yet I’m the taste of independence given by the work ethic.

I’m the search for an unknown, unglimpsed light. I’m an untapped potential, a divine possibility.

I’m humour and pathos. I’m exhilaration and sorrow. Day and night are in me.

I stand naked yet hide innumerable secrets. I’m the tear behind the smile.

I’m the sum of several mistakes and lessons. I’m the latest fall and the newest admonish.

I’m the one you humiliated and also the one who lauged at/wept over/felt awkward at your humiliation. I’m the fire surging towards a fresh vision.

I’m an adventure. I’m a bird in flight.

I’m the one who lit the candle.

I'm the one who’ll watch the candle burn out into a thin smoke.

I am darkness.

I am light.

I am everything.

I'm the nothing that pervades everything.

I am.

I.

...

Small new beginnings

There are frequent powercuts these days. We three sit in front of the Tv late at night, expecting the latest installement of 'Mata ki chowki', and plunk goes the power. We peer at one another for sometime, a bit bewildered, too lazy to get up and
light a candle until tejas begins to get uneasy and starts questioning. The fan's stopped and it's getting warmer. Light the candle, sing a lullaby and pat tejas to sleep. Pull out a book and try to read in the waning candle light. Close it and walk out. Every other area surrounding ours is bright with glittering lights; our colony is an oasis of darkness. Stand under the million sparkles up there. Shut all mental noise and look at the silence. Be still.

I leave home early, thinking I'll avoid the traffic jams but no, there are at least three clogs before I reach office. And with 300 two wheelers being added to the roads of bangalore everyday, one wonders where this will lead to? The pollution, dust, hustle are overwhelming at times and I'm sure this must be the case across many more cities elsewhere. Suddenly you have a sinking feeling that you're driving fast down doom's lane, that an inevitable crash is staring in your face. Yet we continue our daily lives as if this technoutopia will continue ad infinitum. My next ambition is to possess an iphone, a laptop and a royal enfield motorbike. This amidst my noble desire to cut down on my wants, to simplify, to learn new skills of sustainability and,community building. The conflict is obvious; between the old world and the coming new age, a world of material wants and isolation and a new world of inner growth and community. Of hoarding excessive baggage and living lightly.

A new house is getting constructed in our layout and the watchman has built a small room next to the park and moved in with his family. The husband and wife work hard all day long, eat their food early in the evening and are deep asleep while the rest of the layout is busy watching teleserials. There are four small kids, who play all day in the sun, sand and rains. Once this house gets constructed, this small family will shift elsewhere and take roots--for sometime. And then move again. Their possessions are light, their worries & joys are immediate and it appears as though they're living day to day, moment to moment.

I guess, detachment and a kind of lightness are a part of their lives. They do not have to struggle to develop these, like I have to. If I want to change my house, I'll have to think hundred times. This house has been a part of me, my life, for the past 22 years. Much of my life is entwined here, so to shift from here is to uproot oneself and get rid of a part of ones identity.

I love to be that detached and light, however difficult and alien it is to me. And this could become a necessity also.

Reading Flow. Placed an order for a collection of short stories by Nathan englander(Had read a review of one of his shortstories here, long back). And also another book which I've been lusting for for quite sometime--'The last american man'.

I have a direct experience of how Light works. We saunter into the meeting room, expecting another round of verbal bashing and admonishes from the Manager. I channel light, spread it everywhere with a request of fearlessness and peace. Throughout the meeting, I stay aware of the light spreading out from my heart, all around.

Surprisingly, the manager seems to have forgotten that he's one hell of an asshole, for his behaviour is completly out of the norm. For the first time, he praises the team for the good efforts and resists from probing and prodding the individual efforts. Even the team members are relaxed and upfront in their reporting. There's an ambience of ease and humour, no fear or
dejection-- and the meeting ends on a high note with the manager hinting at the announcement of our overdue salary raises by the weekend.

How could this happen? 'It's an one off thing,'says Nazeer.'He'll bash us in the next meeting, just see.' The skeptic in me thinks the same. But I believe it isn't so. The Light makes a difference, in how people think, emote and act. It changes everything, elevates the quality of our lives and reminds even the hardened nut that beneath layers upon layers of accumulated dirt, she's a pristine spark of the divine. It first changes you, changes how you view the world. No matter you believe or not, it works, beyond the rat hole of all your learnt logic and rationality.

This simple event inspires me to practise Light awareness all the time, in every situation, under any circumstances, without any expectation of goodies or favourable ambience. Because I understand that the time period that's closing in on us in the near future has tremendous challenges, far far greater than dealing with the warped ego of a retarded manager. When the system comes crashing down on you, When everything you know about dealing with the world goes for a toss and you're confronted with a new world order, there's only one thing that saves, guards and guides you. It's the light that you carry, the light you manifest, the light you're aligned to.

You are that light. Not an alienated human pygmy tossed onto this earth, in a remote corner of an uncaring universe. You...are...Light. Know it and start living it....Now

Where's your sense of humour...!

Heavy tension pervades our workplace nowadays. A project has started with the tightest deadline ever and it seems to be taking its toll on all of us. Suddenly we're transported back in time, to that suffocating school days when the terrorist PT Master stood over us, ruler in hand, thrashing not the knuckles or bones but at a part where it hurts most--ones self-esteem. That horror has revisted and everyone seems to be enjoying it.

Every evening is a torture where the project manager marches all the team members into a stuffy room and conducts a status meeting. Even the best effort is ridiculed, every minutes accountability is asked and there are long lectures on time-management, dedication, quality, work-ethics and company policy. The juice in the work is gone and what remains is a dry terror. We listen in awe as the manager barks on and on, making each one feel and realise ones own worthlessness.

When I stand listening to the never ending harangue, wondering what karmas did I do to deserve this, who comes to my rescue but my dear friend R.K.Narayan! I lift a scene out of 'The Bachelor of Arts'--and imagine the manager, a short, stout fellow standing in the middle of the room, only in his underpants. That ugly scar on his pot belly, how his teats bounce every 5 seconds, how he scratches himself like a sick dog, that super squeaky voice--what's there to be scared of this asshole? 'I'm going to hold this against each one of you, once this ends'--bark, bark--he's threatening with termination if we don't do as he wants us to. Now I imagine him in his full glory, in his birthday suit. Awww Yuck! Why does he attack and thrash his juniors? His wife's a bomb and he's so pathetic; that's the source of his self-hatred and inferiority complex! 'I was a school leader and I'm used to kicking people out'...Yeah, I just heard you fart, you jackass!

What's strikingly astonishing is the fear he evokes in everyone around here? What's everyone scared of? Loss of job? Loss of face? Fear of embarrassment? The primeval fear of annihilation is staring at every face here and it's to be seen to be believed. And secondly, the way he sways and influences everyone towards his ideals. There are only robots here, programmed to act, not aware human beings with self-respect. All nod to his tunes, the way the Nazis might've listened to the Fuhrer...where does he derive this destructive power? Does someone else whack him and so he takes it out on others? There, he farts again!

This is the worst period of my worklife. Maybe my best. These crushing forces have now shown me what's the prioritiy and what's fluffy! What's lacking, what's to be done, how to do it, where's the motivation--these are becoming clear. Whether I act on them and grow or pass through the ordeal and remain unchanged remains to be seen. But boy does it hurt, this change.
The proverb is totally true...'My ass is getting torn and becoming as wide as that door...!'

The Tao is Silent

One world.....One Light

'I'll first practise this properly. Only then will I write about it.....'

'You're already practising it all these years. You've been living it. You don't have to wait!'

Early in the morning, before my son is up and jumping, I come out of the room onto the terrace. At a distance, one floor below on another terrace, I see Sahana sitting in a meditative posture. Maybe she has spotted me and becomes self-conscious and fidgety. I move away where she cannot see me.

Go down memory lane. Nearly 15 years ago, in my college years I took up Yogasanas and spiritual practices, just on a whim. It was unusual then-- nobody in my class practised such things, none of my friends were bothered about meditations or spirituality....even my interest in these things was born out of a desperation to improve myself, to come to terms with a nagging sense of emptiness. I would wake up early, have a cold bath, amble up to the terrace, spread a mat and practice exercises, yogic postures, breathing techniques, try to silence the mind....and I was the queer fish. Once in fifteen days I would go on a 12 hour fast. I became totally vegetarian and began to strictly observe my diet. Mom and Dad would scold me for such fancies, my sisters and her friends found these indulgences silly(maybe they still do).

Things happened fairly quickly. In the same desperation, with the similar necessity to come to terms with another spell of dejection and directionlessness, I joined a spiritual path. I took up meditations a tad seriously. And with that a new life began, something I never paid much attention to, and just took into my stride as if it was a natural thing. A paradigm shift, you could say.

Meditation, as I understood, was a process by which we would silence, not just the mind but our entire system. It was difficult. It is. But what I gradually came to know and accept was that, behind this practice there existed the wisdom of thousands of years. Meditation was not just about focussing your attention on some symbol and gaining peace of mind. This effort of becoming silent would create a space where a hundred other processes would get initiated. Most of these processes remained hidden except for a few glimpses here and there, a fleeting vision, strange dreams,.....but I would hear accounts of amazing experiences from fellow practitioners. There are multiple worlds and dimensions behind and beyond what we normally can see, hear and feel! One of the processes initiated through meditations would cleanse our perception and make us aware of these multiple worlds! I met and listened to people who could recall these visions, who could narrate improbable occurences. Somehow these didn't come across as tall stories. They defied logic but there was a ring of authenticity in these experiences.

Yet these were just the side-effects. The main intention of Meditation was Self-transformation. Not just the transformation advocated by self-help gurus-- to become assertive, to communicate well, to win friends, to become the toast of the party...No. The transformation had to be total, from taking your awareness from a limited ego-centric 'I', to the center of your being. To experience who you truly are, not just a body or a mind, but a brilliant spark of divinity. To directly know the truth of existence. To find out who you are, why you're here, what you're supposed to do with your life, how to do it and where you go from here. What lies before birth and after death? Not just rhetoric but an actual experience. In deep silence and an expanding awareness, you would gain a simple clarity about existence. Meditation was a process that would take you to that experience and bring you back transformed. Enlightened! The Goal is Enlightenment. And beyond!

This was tremendous. I'd unknowingly stepped into a fantastic voyage.

It was an ocean, an unknown world into which I waded with trepidation. There were fellow travellers, youngsters like me and also unlike me. Many of us(not all) came to the spiritual world without an inkling of what it was. We wanted relief from our problems, we wanted a sense of direction when nothing was sure, maybe we wanted to explore. Yet we got more than what we'd bargained for. Without any fanfare, we'd gradually grown into better people. The total transformation towards which meditational practices aimed at, did not come in one big cascade. It would happen gradually, without upsetting the balance of our lives. Yes it did. And continues to do so. There were fears reconciled. Responsiblities taken up. Adventures were answered. A cheerful disposition arrived. Cynicism withdrew. I changed and so did my life. This world is subjective. Change your attitude and 'your' world changes.

And there was new knowledge awaiting us. That we're in a very great period of transformation, a period of turbulence and churning which was mistaken as 'pralaya' or destruction. That the destruction was not a physical one but that of an unstable old world order. That the Golden age is about to begin and we all are on the threshold, to welcome this new age. That all the darkness we observe around us as corruption, violence, pollution, environmental devastation and all the negativities that are within us in the form of greed, hatred, excessive materialism, unconsciousness--every ounce of darkness would be answered soon. That we were the answers as much as we had been the problems. That we carry the light which would remove this darkness. And there is more light waiting to descend. There are unseen Masters, unknown guides waiting to help humanity transit into the new age....Much much more.

There were techniques which were beyond meditations. We meditated to transform ourselves. And we practised the higher techniques to transform the world, to help others receive the light and transform. A collective growth would happen at a lightening speed if there was a collective will and a mass practice.

On a day with an overcast sky yet a cheerful atmosphere, I open my mailbox and.....

Dear Friend,

This is about a movement that has just begun, a World Movement. A movement towards a higher life. It is a movement towards Light, away from darkness represented by injustice, corruption, suffering, environmental damage etc. It is a movement to live in Light.

Like all movements, this movement has begun silently by a small group of people and it should be expanded to as many people as possible to gather momentum and become effective. The participation does not involve any money or lots of your precious time. It does not require any specific background. All it needs is a few minutes of your time to bring down the Light and spread it to the world. The Light has the power to transform the world but it will work only when we consciously bring it down and allow it to work.

Please visit the website for information on how you can participate in this World Movement.

Please forward this message to all your friends and help this movement.

Divine Love,

Guruji Krishnananda

When I see Sahana meditating on her early morning terrace, I feel like shouting to her, asking her to take up this practise--although she was one of my sister's friends who ridiculed my spiritual practices long back. Yet the world has changed in all these years. There's a newfound interest in the sublime. Youngsters and the elderly alike are drawn to Meditations and yogic practices. We no longer accept what life hands down to us but raise questions---Is there more to life than mere survival and sensual gratification? Do we continue to exist as mere cogs in the ever churning wheel of civilization--nothing more than nuts and bolts in the greater scheme of things? Where on earth are we headed towards? There's a growing unrest with the mundane and an inclination to grasp higher truths. Many of us are at different stages but all are on this journey. From darkness towards the light of a New Age.

I make time amidst my seemingly hectic schedule to practice lightchanneling*. I imagine this message spreads far and wide, through emails, blogs, word of mouth--from this blog and many other websites too. I see millions and millions of people practicing this technique every day, all over the globe, across nations, races and religions. A tremendous force of intention is created through innumerable hearts--that we shun darkness and ask for light. That we shun selfishness and ask for oneness and love. That we desire simplicity. Happiness. Bliss. And Enlightenment.

We get what we ask for. We ask for the Light. Let there be Light.

* Technique: Sit comfortably and close your eyes. Imagine a huge globe of bright white light above you. Draw this light and imagine it enters and fills up your body, your entire system. Feel and experience this light for a minute. Then imagine that this light spreads out and fills up your room, house, locality, city, entire globe and out towards infinity..... Practice this for 7 minutes in the morning and for 7 minutes before going to bed at night. Or at any convenient time in the day.

This light is not the physical light. It is God Himself. Have the awareness that this light is Love, Bliss, Joy, Positivity....this light ushers in the Newage wherever it goes.

My world

'What's your motivation?'

The question arrives as I stare out at the darkness all around. Fresh darkness.

Amidst endless channel hopping, I stop breifly at Sanskar. Swami sukhabodananda is lecturing on living a stress-free life. Continous flow of words, expressions, stories, gesticulations.....of all the modern day swamis, gurus and teachers I personally find him to be the most irritating. The moment I see him on Tv or hear his voice on Moksha, I revolt....'but what has he done to you?' she protests amidst admonishes of not to utter expletives in front of the kid and I have no answer. I just can't stand him, that's it. Watching his theatricals, a question springs up, as if out of nowhere.....what motivates him to sit in front of an audience(and a bigger audience through television) and blabber on and on about stress, breathing, prana, mind, watchfulness.....! What on heavens motivates this person to clown around? From where does the inspiration arrive? Why do people do what they do?

A phone call. It's a far-off relative. He informs that one of my distant uncles passed away in Mumbai. I don't know how to react....I don't know this uncle, I haven't seen him at all. 'Is it....? Oh...' I stammer. Keep the phone. Inform Dad about it. Ponder a bit.

People depart just like that. A middle aged lady whom we used to meet in our weekly meditation classes, who used to be a bit of a bother with her quirks---she's run over by a truck and....It's bloody shocking. I drive to my office, covering nearly 25 kms a day, and hardly a day goes by without me approaching the 'edge' at least a couple of times. Vehicles whizz past and they have no eyes, no feelings, no sense of life or death. You're always on the edge and you never know when the balance tips. Cynical! And we always thought this drama would never end, would go on and on and on.....

The death toll in the Chinese earthquake is staggering. A Couple have lost their only son when his school building collapsed. The relief worker is holding the lifeless body, and the parents are putting on new clothes on the body of their child before sending him.....the anguish, the pain on their wailing faces...it brings a lump in the throat.

There's a cricket player on TV-- he's a batsmen for the Chennai team. I remember this bloke because I played with him once, long back, maybe 6 years ago. That was the period when all of a sudden I decided that my future would be in International cricket. I purchased a brand new cricket gear and joined a cricket club, at the ripe age of 25, when most players would be peaking at the highest level and beginning to wither away. Of course, the madness lasted for an year, but before that, there was a match against a team from chennai and this guy played for that team. A few years younger to me, his name was peculiar; Vidyuth. Meaning 'Electricity'. Who on earth would name their kid as Electricity? Why not Hydro electricity? Or nuclear power? Anyway this kid smashed us to all corners of the field in that match and that was it. Six years later, one day you switch on the TV what do you see but this guy playing in the Indian Premier League, smashing bowlers of international repute out of the stadium... and you can't help but admire the persistence, the tenacity this guy has, the passion that sustained him so long when everyone else who played that game six years ago are no where in sight, cricket wise.

We quarrel. My son gets irritated and shouts. As if he senses the ugly vibrations.

We stop at an evening restauarant and order two milkshakes. Overcrowded. A Sunday evening relaxed atmosphere pervades everywhere. A bunch of youngsters eat noisily. A shy couple at a distance. Another couple with an one year old kid. The chubby kid picks up the menu card and begins to play, much to the amusement of a lady in the next seat. She gestures and the kid smiles. The father plucks the menu card, gestures a hit at the baby and pulls him over to his lap. A young waiter watches the crowd, searching for any table that needs cleaning. The couple get up and the waiter walks over with his tub, cleans the table, removes all leftovers and goes back to his place. Stands there and watches again. Tired eyes.

A kid next door. His mom slaps him and he wails, 'What did I do.....Pappa come fast, Mom is beating me....!'

A new team leader arrives at Work. He's short statured, a bit low on the technical front but looks good in people management. A bit hesitant, trying to win the loyalty of a new team, balancing between bossing and understanding, getting bewildered by the aggressiveness of the senior management, pretending not to be listening when we make fun of his predicament...

A chunck of unstructured time arrives. Archana and Tejas are away at Nagpur visiting her sisters'. I take a week off and stay at home. Suddenly there's an abundance of the most scarce commodity in my world---Free time! Empty room. All the time in the world to give life to my dreams, to plan, to do, to stare at new horizons....and what I do is just while away my time in laziness, mindless reading and daydreaming. At the end of the week I sit up and ask, 'What happened?' No answers. And No judgements too. It's okay to laze, to stay relaxed, to let go and do NOTHING!

Suddenly I tell Mom. 'We'll be leaving in another 2 years.' She is worried.

Petrol prices are about to go up exhorbitantly. There's a suggestion that fuel could be rationed. Then? 'Can you ride to your office on a bicycle?' I imagine it for a minute. Not improbable. 'But what office are you talking about? What if the IT industry collapses?' ... What if fuel prices go so high that very few can afford it? What if oil reserves become empty? Will we go back to horse carriages, bullock carts?........ The first signs of days to come!

'When the human order collapses, a divine order will replace it immediately. We'll never be left alone.'

In this I trust. We will wake up to that tomorrow. You and Me. All of us.

Early morning. I channel the light. Just before hitting the bed at midnight, I channel it again. 'This light is God. It will transform this world. Spread this message everywhere, through websites, emails, blogs....Tell your friends. When a large number of people take up a simple act, it gains enormous strength and builds up a revolution...Do it. Tell others....'

Yes, I will.....

No Reflections, No lessons....

We lived in a rented house for nearly 7 years before moving to our own house. The construction activity lasted nearly an year, during which Dad juggled between his office and monitoring the construction work-- a herculean task, given that he had to do it alone. I was about 10 then and was all excited about moving to a new house. What I never reckoned was that I'd be leaving behind a host of friends and playmates whom I'd known closely all along, moving away from an environment which was very familiar and intimate since my childhood.

Venu was one of those friends, studying a class above mine, who belonged to an austere, pious family, which was very particular about tradition, values and orthodoxy. We'd spent countless afternoons and evenings, creating and inhabiting an astonishing world where we lived multiple roles. We were the fishermen, bus drivers-conductors, police-thieves, cooks-waiters, movie heroes-villains, and much, much more. He was my best friend. He was thin and dark complexioned, but over the one year period during which our house got constructed, he grew to become plump and fair skinned. Kinda chubby. When I asked Mom, she said,'He has brain tumour.' I didn't ask what it meant.

He left school and stayed at home, invoking terrible jealousy in me because school was nothing short of hell for me. He'd borrow my comic books/story books and read them all day long. 'Lucky fellow,' I reflected while dragging myself through the never ending chore of books, study, homework and exams. One night, his parents put a cot outside the house in the garden, and made him sleep there. 'Why?' and Dad said,'Some custom.' Later they moved him back.

We shifted our house in the early hours of a Sunday morning. We woke up early, got dressed and hauled all the furniture and other belongings onto a tempo. Venu's parents had once again made him sleep on the cot, outside the house. They were standing outside and waving us goodbye from a distance.
As the tempo started, Dad said, 'Venu passed away last night'. Those words hardly got registered amidst all the excitement and trepidation of leaving behind an old world and entering a new one.

Transitions are easy, even desirable, when you're a kid, but somewhere on the way to adulthood you lose the flexibility. You tend to become rigid, unmoveable, brittle.. The very thought of change brings uneasiness.

Maybe 10 years back. I was journeying from Mumbai to Bangalore on a second class train compartment. A man in his late 40s opposite me was reading 'My days', by R.K.Narayan. After resisting for a while I broke through my reticence and borrowed the book. He was a seniour executive in an investment firm, carried a guitar, smoked endlessly, and soon I got familiar enough with him to borrow a couple of cigarrettes from his pack and begin puffing. Another guy joined us--a young man my age, an autorickshaw driver from bangalore. We made an interesting trio--A seemingly refined gentleman, sophisticated and successful; a rustic struggling to make ends meet, but jovial and carefree; a young student, bumbling and unsure. We chatted like close friends, shared cigarettes and fruits, joked silly and filled up the compartment with spiralling smoke----looks like an improbable scene from a stupid movie.

What keeps this incident fresh in memory is the dirty looks I received from a couple in the same compartment. Especially the girl, who had a horror stricken expression, who constantly glared at me for having picked up bad habits at such an innocent(?) age, for having the audacity to smoke in public . Not the elderly man, not the autodriver but me! They could do it but not someone my age, someone with my appearance and from my background. It was as if I was murdering someone right there; what might have caused them serious greivance was the fact that I gave no shit, totally ignored their concern and continued to burn the endless hours into ashes.

A slight apprehension about 2012, when our earth enters the photon belt on the 21st of December. What could possibly happen? Will we survive? Or will the man made systems survive? When I think about my savings and future plans, I tend to keep this date in mind. Will civilization collapse? Or, as a few survivalists argue, is the system already crashing? Are we in the crash, right now?

'I want to become enlightened, before any such thing happens.....' he said. 'I don't want to exist in that turmoil, the way I am right now.'

'So what's the plan? How do you get enlightened....?'

'..............'