Looking from Within - Sri Aurobindo and Mother

 I picked up this slim book in Pondicherry at the Aurobindo ashram. It made a lot of sense. As usual I picked up the lines that resonated with me.

'Happy indeed are we who own nothing. We shall feed upon delight like the radiant gods' - Dhammapada

In the presence of circumstances that are about to take place you can take the highest attitude possible - put your consciousness in contact with the highest consciousness within reach. You can be absolutely sure that in that case it is the best that can happen to you.

The right attitude not only has the power to turn every circumstance to advantage but can change the very circumstance itself. We can move from a place of fear to a place of seeking divine help t a place where we have the consciousness of divine presence everywhere around.

What we have within us creates the circumstances outside us.

Always circumstances come to reveal the hidden weakness that have to be overcome.

We should seek the company of the sage who shows our faults as if he were showing us a hidden treasure. - Dhammapada

To recognise one's weakness and false moments and draw back from them is the way towards liberation.  

 Learn to act always from within - from your inner being.

Its the spirit and consciousness from which it is done that makes an action yogic - not the action itself.

It is a mistake to over strain as there is a reaction afterwards.

Think of your work only when it is being done, not before or after.

If you want to get rid of something say that it is outside.

Concentrate exclusively on what you want to be, forget as entirely as possible what you do not want to be.

To keep steady one's aspirations and to look at oneself with an absolute sincerity are the sure means to overcome all obstacles. 

The more pointed the aspiration the swifter the progress.

Pain and discomfort come from a physical consciousness not forceful enough to determine it as a reaction to things.

You only have to remain quiet and firm in your following of the path and your will to go to the end. If you do that, circumstances will in the end be obliged to shape themselves to your will because it will be the divine will in you.

Cheerfulness is the salt of sadhana. It is a 1000 times better than gloominess.

There is nothing spiritually wrong in being glad and cheerful, on the contrary it is the right thing.

If you keep cheerfulness within you, you fight much better, resist much better.

A smile acts upon difficulties as the sun upon clouds - it disperses them.

There is a stage in sadhana in which the inner being begins to awake. The process goes like 1) a sort of witness attitude observing things but taking no active interest or pleasure in them 2) a state of neutral equanimity in which there is neither joy nor sorrow, only quietude 3) a sense of being separate from all that happens, observing it but not part of it

Detachment is the beginning of mastery, but for complete mastery there should be no reaction at all.

...

And many such wonderful gems. I loved the stuff about attitude and how it can change circs.

Anjali - I Have a Dream

Was browsing through the computer and found a treasure - Anjali's old writings from probably when she was in her 5th or 6th class. Poems, articles etc. 

Here is an upbeat, sensible poem untouched by the cynicism of grown ups.

I HAVE A DREAM

I have a dreeeeam,

A song to sing.

To help me coooope

With everything.

If you see the wonder,

In a fairytale.

You can see the future,

Even if you fail.

I believe in angels,

Something good in everything I see.

I believe in angels,

When the time is right for me.

I can cross the streeeam,

DJ Tillu - Movie

 I have been wanting to watch this movie for a long time and finally watched it today. Its a crazy laugh riot with Sidhu Jonnalagadda excelling in the lead role. Brilliant stuff.

Whacky  humour - the kind I like. Easily made me laugh out loud 10-12 times which means its a hit.

Will I watch it again. Certainly!

And will watch the sequel directed by our good pal Mallik which is in the theatres as well!

Thought for the Day - Health Issues and My Take On It

Health issues really wake us up to reality. Until then, it is all stuff that happens to other people. My realisation came when I had a health issue some fifteen years ago. That changed my perspective on many things regarding health. Principally - that we need to work on physical, mental and emotional planes for faster healing.

Some of the principles I followed since that experience
1)  Firstly, get over the panic and the fear. It just takes you down a rabbit hole. There are doctors, hospitals and the best of medicine to help you. Even more, you have a great body which has a lot of healing abilities. Trust yourself and the system. 

Stop panicking and breathe.

2) Get a diagnosis done which means you go to a good doctor who finds out whats wrong with you - nothing like allopathy for diagnosis because they have the best diagnostic tools which pretty much tell whats wrong and where.

Allopathy is also the best for emergencies. Surgeries and other such stuff.

Don't reject allopathy because of the fear that they will fleece you. Use it sensibly. Get second opinions, find doctors who you trust. It's still the best option in many cases.

3) For anything that assists long term healing turn to alternate medicine - holistic stuff like ayurveda, homeo, Siddha, Tibetan...what not. They all work for different people. Homeo works wonderfully well for colds and coughs for me, Tibetan they say works brilliantly for cancer and general health, acupuncture they say works well for chronic aches and pains...whatever works for you.

This however is long term and supplementary so I used them all as a supplement to what my doctor said. I also kept him in the loop.

4) We are still at a physical level - but I feel healing must happen at an emotional and a mental level too. I remember that how much ever I followed what the doctor said there was always fear and anxiety and the doctors did not address that. In fact most of them did everything but assure me. 

So I decided to take help to heal my mental and emotional sides.

5) By mental I realised that my thoughts keep running away with the worst scenarios. Dying, long illnesses, what will happen etc. I remember reading (and then doing a workshop) on 'You Can Heal Your Life' by Louise Hay which gave me a mental lifeline. That our thoughts can create illnesses and those thoughts can be reversed by thinking and feeling 'positive affirmations' came as a help from heaven. I used those affirmations like a mantra - writing them, saying them, so I can shut out these negative thoughts.

In fact for those who have a mantra, they can work as well as positive affirmations. In the best case we occupy our mind with something not scary and perhaps slightly hopeful. 

On the other hand I found those little connections she makes to our illnesses, possible thought patterns that led to it and the positive affirmation to replace those very empowering. I f I could create those circumstances, I could uncreate them. And even better, create something I want as well.

For example - my nephew who had a problem with his right wrist, the book says wrist issues are to do with movement and ease - the affirmation to heal then becomes 'I handle all my experiences with wisdom, with love and with ease'. His old pattern might have been to handle experiences with anger, with rigidity and perhaps went hard at life.  

Or my friend who has a slipped disc, the book says 'feeling totally unsupported by Life. Indecisive.' and the affirmation goes 'Life supports all of my thoughts, therefore I love and approve of myself and all is well.

Or another friend who had a stroke which the book says is about - Giving up. Resistance. Rather die than change. Rejection of life.' The affirmation being 'Life is change and i adapt easily to the new. i accept life- past, present and future'.

Or snoring which I know I do - stubborn refusal to let go of old patterns and the affirmation being 'I release all that is unlike love and joy in my mind. I move from the past into the new and fresh and vital.'

I sent my nephew a copy of 'You Can Heal Your Life'. Might just help.

So mentally, keep yourself occupied with good thoughts, replace negative thoughts, cut out free time where such thoughts can pop up.

Read 'You Can Heal Your Life' by Louise Hay if you can.

6) Emotional healing - now here was something I needed spiritual help, from the universe perhaps. The  mental aspect I could do for myself but I needed to tune into the universe also. So I visited whoever had the power to heal me - from a friend's baba who said I would be fine and asked me to eat some curd with salt, to a yoga master Dhyanam Master, to Nithyananda, Patrick to anyone who could connect me to a higher power.

To get over my emotional lows I also found great advice in Norman Cousins book 'Anatomy of an Illness' where he laughed himself out of an autoimmune disease simply because he told himself that being in a good emotional state will heal him faster. He banished all the negative guys, the sad sacks from his room, shifted from the hospital to a hotel room where all he did was watch stuff on television that made him laugh or kept him happy. He cured himself.

I didn't do stuff as drastic as that but I wrote a lot, did not watch depressing stuff, kept sad people away and positive people closer, and tried to stay in as positive a state I could. Of course I read a lot of spiritual books, stuff on death and health, grew comfortable with the idea (so it was not something I was rejecting at all)

In the end, I got to a point where I was feeling like I did something to help myself, where I was accepting of all possibilities (and thereby not creating any resistance to anything - including allopathy or alternative or spiritual healers). I think that aided my healing and finally when we did a biopsy of my kidney, it was found that the damage was containable and we did a course of steroids and that was that.

It definitely made me more grateful for life, for every day I wake up. 

Anyway that's been my story and my experience. Everyone finds their own way of course but thought that if my sharing helps someone feel better, job done. To health and its teachings.       

          

Thought for the Day - Maybe We Are Overlooking Our Biggest Strength

 I was recently talking to a friend of mine - smart, intelligent, good at his work but stuck in his career with no projects and no money. We talked about how so many others are making money - people with far less intelligence and smartness and understanding.

Mallaiah's old cycle - he was a handyman 

Then it struck me. Maybe we do not know what is our strength. Maybe our ego makes us feel that we need to do something 'more' than what comes easy to us.

Are we trying to create a masterpiece without grounding our feet on the ground? And missing the whole point?

Consider for a moment that perhaps there is a skill that we have that we do not take seriously. It comes easy to us. We take it for granted. We indulge in it and throw it away.

And we chase something that catches our fancy. Something we may not really be good at but which we feel defines us (or our idea of us). So we try to make that very different novel, movie, work of art - something out of our zone - and ignore what we can easily to.

For eg - when i first started to write I was obsessed with the idea of being different, smart etc. So I wrote some stuff which never took off - too pretentious possibly. Until someone said - why don't you write a cricket story and I thought - hey, its easy. Lets me do it for a lark. Guess what, that got published, got made into a movie, and perhaps is my best work yet.

I overlooked my biggest strength, what I knew well, what was unique to me and chased something else trying to be 'different'.

I spoke to a few writers, musicians and read about some others. All of them said that what they considered their greatest work was a flop while what they did just for fun (or with ease) was a hit.

So to me it looks like my friend could do well to look at his entire skill set, his story and figure what his unique story is that he can tell, what his unique skill is that he can use to make money. It could be real estate, running a hotel, selling designs, teaching - something that comes easy to him that he is rejecting, overlooking. Perhaps that's where his fortune lies.

Perhaps that's what the other 'less intelligent' people did to be more successful.

Perhaps we could look at what gift we are overlooking what we are rejecting as 'not me' and accept it. Things might just change in our lives.   

   

Once More With Feelings - Jayanthi Jaisimha

I finally got my hands on Junie aunty's third major writing venture (far as I know) and her second solo effort after her delightful book 'Much Ado About Everything'. This time she comes with 'Once More with Feelings' and though I felt she tackled more serious stuff this time, she retained her child-like enthusiasm, whacky humour and her joy for life.

Her Preface is titled 'The Formality' which says it all. Once she is done with the formality (and fervent advise to read her first book to fill up any gaps) she traipses along gaily on whatever comes to her happy and cheerful mind starting with 'Homes away from Home' (a recent visit to Ram and Priya's house at Gachibowli and ends with naming all the 12 homes away from homes she has across continents), 'Falling Leaves' (a crusade against non-clearance of fallen leaves in her garden and how she finally managed to get rid of the pile), 'Delusions - Death to Birth' (as the title hints is a ponderous piece on old age, death, middle age, children - which goes backwards like Benjamin Button's life), 'Religion and Symbolism' (all about her fav god Shiva and the many symbols associated with him told in her usual jaunty and irreverent manner of course), 'A Touching Doggy Tail' (an adventure involving the rescue of a pup that got caught in a drain and the pain of sending it away).

Onwards to 'Fumigating Families' (about tracing her roots - many she says - and jumps into Sex and the child - child abuse and her own experiences as a child), 'Lighten Up - About Life' (actually about cleaning up her house when everyone was away which is one way to lighten up), 'Friendships and Best Friends' (and a fascinating commentary on Us and Them), 'Travels' (Singapore and Bali, old friends), 'Shining' (a nice recall of a few incidents where she looks at why we need to show we know, and why it feels good to be acknowledged - her 25 year reunion at Roshni), 'Groups and Eggers' (a nice one about the silent ones who egg us on) and so on.

And then we are led into 'Astrology and Past Lives' (her tryst with palm readers - she certainly beat the astrologers prediction that she would live till 68), 'Waalas and Waalis' (all the bais and boys who added spice to her life in the background and made it so fun - from ice fruit walas to kaam wali bais), 'Noises -Rats and Carpenters'  (on rats in the shelf and the art of carpentry and Bihari carpenters), 'Ownership vs Possessiveness' (starts with the concept of ownership and ends with enjoying yawning in bed), 'Death'  (a piece about Maya Anavarathan, an artist and a relative who passed on recently), 'Family Wedding' (Dhruv's wedding in Goa), 'The Travel Bug' (New Zealand with the Torvi family), 'Politics-Power-Propaganda', 'My Canadian Memories' (another lovely travel piece about her visit to Canada), 'Schools and Schooling' and 'The Endless End' where she says she will be back soon.

As always Junie aunty writes like how she thinks - and its so much fun to read her thoughts. Where does she get so much energy from one wonders - have never heard her complain or look at life with disappointment. The fact that she has retained or regained her child like mind is a tribute to her adaptability. Her resilience at wanting to make a change in the world through her writing or her personal crusades or wanting to get the Foundation going is what  I suspect gives her the energy to get up each day with a smile and a list of things to do. Certainly her sense of humour has helped her cope with the world that's changing so fast - much better than most of us. There is a lot of honesty, sometimes brutally so, which is what makes it funny and introspective, many little nuggets from her life that she reveals like thinking of Lord Shiva, Shirdi Sai Baba and MLJ before sleeping at night. With such candour and verve, one cannot help but love reading the book and knowing Junie aunty so much more. 

Fabulous reading aunty. Loved it. Reading your book is like taking a walk with you on one of those nice sunny days, stopping her and there - brilliant.  

Secrets & Lies - Jaishree Misra

 This book has been with me for a long long time and for some reason i kept it. I had never read Jaishree Misra's books so that was an added reason.

The book took off like a shot - the old principal writing to her fav students to invite them for a reunion before her retirement. The twist - there was a death in the school of one of her students, her grandchild, who was not liked by this bunch of fav students. Doubts arise in the readers minds about how the girls might have bumped their new competition off - in looks, in intelligence, in charm and what not.

Then we dive headlong into the lives of four middle aged women - Bubbles (married to uber rich biz man in London), Anita (unmarried but having a successful career in media), Samaira (married and fat and not attractive to her husband anymore) and Zeba (film star who is a rage and a producer who promotes her). And not to mention a million brands - from shoes, to purses, to food, to furniture, to cars, to what not - we get a Karan Joharesque intro to the lives of the rich. The girls are a bit shocked and worried why their old Principal Lamboo (Mrs Lamb, a British woman who stayed back in Delhi) is asking them to come over.

Between building up their lives and flitting back and forth we discover that Lily (the dead girl) is actually Mrs Lamb's grandchild, born to her son born out of a wedlock, who turns out to be abuser no 1 which gives Lily not just the license to be nasty to everyone but also to top everything and make everyone jealous. Worse, Samaira's brother Haroon falls in love with her and she turns him down. By now we must have got the drift -everyone has an angle to kill her. Sami mostly because her brother kills herself. 

And when she proposes they kill Lily because she made her brother kill himself, they all agree and make plans on how to kill her. Turns out their words are enough and Lily is found dead. Lamboo finally tells them not to worry because Lily did not die because of them and they can all live happily ever after. Which they do.

But what about that intent to kill? That cold blooded planning? They are as good as the killers - even if it was suicide.

But somehow Jaishree glosses over that part and goes on to the relief the girls feel and the remorse at having judged her and the forgiveness and crap. Looked like she was confused a bit there. Anyway, I was wondering why I waded through 400 plus pages to read about four women without much of a character to interest me. 200 - 250 pages were good enough!