A Sunny Day at Last!

A perfectly sunny day after what it seems like ages. Many a fate seemed to have frozen. Life almost suspended, barely pulsating in hibernation. Sun appeared to have gone on a sabbatical, making us realise how important He is. Imagine, what would happen if sun goes off duty for some time!? Coldness creeped in from all corners, stalking all and sundry almost everywhere. Icy winds, frosty nights, grey overcast skies giving their best to realise how important warmth is to life and living on earth. What chance poor earth stands without the glowing father? And does human soul stand a better chance without the warmth of love and compassion? And dispelling all the doomsday talk lisped through the elders' shivering bones, He peeps over a perfectly clean eastern horizon one fine day and gives an assuring smile like a seafaring father returning to bring protectiveness and peace with him after months. Lo, all the grey ghosts of cold vanish. The cold wind still tries a frigid mischief, but its swirly taunts get absorbed in His fatherly smile. All they appear is just innocuous lukewarm airy swirls. Frost beaten leaves tumble down with gently pining musical notes. The birds raise their chorus again, after staying uncharacteristically subdued for weeks. The sky blue and fresh like freshly washed. Icing on the cake for me also. I spot a rufous Indian treepie. The beautiful long-tailed bird, so conspicuously proud of its long tail, appears to lord over a drove of insecure, noisy mynas. And lo, a bigger icing on the previous icing! A pair of Indian Grey Hornbills! Dear o dear! Is it a dream!? First time I have seen them here in this part! Almost exotic! The grey, long-tailed birds carry their long, curving, scimitar type beaks with an aloof majesty. They grace the weather beaten branches of the gulmohar and flow away like the VVIPs of the birdie world. The treepie and and Hornbills appear to give a smiling assurance that not all is lost. Among the boring monotony of the ubiquitous house sparrows, crows, mynas, pied sterlings and pigeons, these two appear like foreigner birds. Well, a great day indeed. Possibly, propelled by the heartwarming enthusiasm of a sunny day, they took a larger foraging circle!

The Ultimate Doom

There are costs to be paid as an omnivorous carnivore society like the Chinese. Not judgmental about them. They have every right to eat anything, including themselves. But then one can't rule out scenarios like Coronavirus. There are a huge number of human-hazardous viruses hosted by animal and bird species. In this case, bats are the hosts for this virus. The poor bat was gobbled by the snake who in turn found himself on the enthusiastic dining table of a human and lo, the world gets an epidemic. At Wuhan market, you have truckloads of dogs, live foxes, crocodiles, wolf puppies, giant salamanders, snakes, rats, peacocks, porcupines, camel meat and you name anything possible under the sun to douse human gluttony. Eat man eat, i know you love boiling live being and take burps of world supermacy! But why spread the evil effects of your gluttony world over! As an epidemic-scared globalist, I am as scared of the hunger rumblings in a Chinese stomach as as dog is while being ferried to the dog market. Because God, or maybe even dog, knows, what new species may end up on the table of culinary experiment, unleashing some new virus in the food chain. Given their overblown aspirations to rule the world by cramming Chinese nationals all over the globe, the strain travels faster than their supernukes. As a poor vegetarian Indian I am more scared of the viral-nukes launched from their dinner tables than the globe-destroying weaponry. God, errr dogs, save us! I am getting more and more scared. I think, the human race will be destroyed, not by nukes and supernukes as u may suppose, by some hitherto unheard of culinary experiment in some Chinese kitchen where some animal, reptile or bird might be boiled and cooked for the first time in their entire millions of years of history, introducing a viral strain that willl eat the entire glibe-load of Homo-sapiens...oh God, errr, o dogs rather!!! To make it still worse, if i fall in Chinese hands, the kindest of them would still be happy to roast me alive and bring about another culinary experiment!!

An epidemic-scared globalist

There are costs to be paid as an omnivorous carnivore society like the Chinese. Not judgmental about them. They have every right to eat anything, including themselves. But then one can't rule out scenarios like Coronavirus. There are a huge number of human-hazardous viruses hosted by animal and bird species. In this case, bats are the hosts for this virus. The poor bat was gobbled by the snake who in turn found himself on the enthusiastic dining table of a human and lo, the world gets an epidemic. At Wuhan market, you have truckloads of dogs, live foxes, crocodiles, wolf puppies, giant salamanders, snakes, rats, peacocks, porcupines, camel meat and you name anything possible under the sun to douse human gluttony. Eat man eat, i know you love boiling live being and take burps of world supermacy! But why spread the evil effects of your gluttony world over! As an epidemic-scared globalist, I am as scared of the hunger rumblings in a Chinese stomach as as dog is while being ferried to the dog market. Because God, or maybe even dog, knows, what new species may end up on the table of culinary experiment, unleashing some new virus in the food chain. Given their overblown aspirations to rule the world by cramming Chinese nationals all over the globe, the strain travels faster than their supernukes. As a poor vegetarian Indian I am more scared of the viral-nukes launched from their dinner tables than the globe-destroying weaponry. God, errr dogs, save us! I am getting more and more scared.

Be a Creator

The entire meaning of being human is to become a 'creator' from a mere 'creation'. This mind is the largest workshop in the cosmos. Sustained imagination impregnated with specific details create a flow of energy in the direction of its manifestation. This blueprint in the mind can be kept fresh and alive by pumping the vital life force, the abounding energy, through powerful emotions in synchronisation with the imagined 'creation'. Whatever we perceive as creation within the spectrum of our human perception was designed in mind with an infallible vividness. It was first imprinted on the canvas of mind by enthusiastically firing neurons. It was first thought to be 'possible' before it manifested. There is hardly any limitations to design whatever one wants on the infinite dimenaionless canvas on which a sustained conscious effort can etch out as many dimensions as one wants. See your dream, imagine your dream in the specific real life details, fuel it with the life energies of your emotions. You heave a whole lot of energies around you. Whatever follows is just a cause and effect corollary. This cosmos is yet to see the first miracle. All this is too mundane. Go and create your reality. Be a creator!

Books by Sandeep Dahiya

A Half House
https://www.amazon.in/A-half-house/dp/8193238206

Chimp, Champ and Chops
https://www.amazon.in/Chimp-Champ-and-Chops/dp/8193238222

Beyond and Beneath
https://www.amazon.in/Beyond-and-Beneath/dp/8193238214

Lost in Red Mist
https://www.amazon.in/Lost-Red-Mist-First-2017/dp/9386148269

Ice Cubes on Desert Sands
https://www.amazon.in/Cubes-Desert-Sands-sandeep-dahiya/dp/B07MFBCM7S

Love: The Ultimate Alchemy
https://www.amazon.in/Love-Ultimate-Alchemy-Sandeep-Dahiya/dp/9389600251

Faceless Gods
https://www.flipkart.com/faceless-gods/p/itm9789384049355?pid=9789384049355&lid=LSTBOK9789384049355BZIPBV&marketplace=FLIPKART&pageUID=1579776998970

The Night Sun
https://shop.24by7publishing.com/product/the-night-sun-by-sandeep-dahiya/

Mind over Matter

Matter-like behaviour is a property of the cosmic mind, the universal intelligence throbbing as the energy. Mind, universal collective consciousness, is the primary cosmic constituent. The so called matter is merely a manifestation of it, just a dependent property. Had it been the reverse, i.e., mind-type behaviour of matter, we surely would require the basic, unbreakable, having intrinsic properties, building blocks in terms of atomic and subatomic particles. But as we see it, subatomic particles have no intrinsic value and properties independent of the observer. With matter first, and mind just its behaviour, eternity would be mathematically impossible. However, a fundamental entity in the form of cosmic mind leaves an open ended, ever evolving field for the manifestation of matter in countless ways over eternal paths of creation. Simply because there is no intrinsic property or value to define and limit the material manifestation. Call it the cosmic energy or the cosmic mind. It's a dimenaionless plane where any kind of material dimension is possible to draw out of nothingness. The limitless canvas. Wipe it, draw another. On and on. Is there any limit to imagination? No. Same is the case with cosmic mind's imagination. Eternal are its horizons.

He has the last laugh--consciously, by choice

So who has the last laugh? The winters have been unprecedented. Horrific. Cold has slayed soots and saplings with its unsparing frosty sword. 'Had all your wrath poured out, fella?' this garden cactus asks. Irrespective of the severe damage, it decides to retain its smile. Its smile overcomes the frosty burns. Happiness is a choice. A conscious effort, independent of so many external factors that we presume to be finally decisive for our happiness!

Kabadis in the Space

Unmanned Landers landing on the moon have a coating of previous metals like gold. This moon-scrap goes into the value of billions of dollars. In the near future, it will open a new vista for high tech kabadis, the swanky version of our humble neighborhood scrap dealer. America with its 40 years advancement in space technology over its nearest rival will gain the most out of this new business stream. Scrap dealers in America listening? In order to avoid scrap clashes in future, there should be a treaty by which the owner country will retain the rights over the space scrap. Mankind is ever ready to fight over any type of issues. So when we will wipe out all contestable things on mother earth, we will enlarge the domain of quarrels, taking into space. So it's high time we fix it now itself. Let's agree on the principal that 'bhai mera kabad mera hi rahega'. Means, I retain the right to my scrap, wheresoever it may land up! Something is better than nothing. We will have at least one reason less to fight.

A moment captured in the hills

Life and living losing footing amidst the smoke of hate, greed, anger, ambition and jealousy. More than the carbon bugs chucking out air, it will be the nefarious exhausts from evil human minds that will turn mother earth unlivable during the coming decades. But in the unconcerned vales, the mountain eagle is gliding effortlessly,--

The mountain eagle flying

in splendor and ecstasy,

Its unquenchable tempests

creating airy firmament,

But does this fraction of reality

possess anything good for the prey as well?

The prey, the little mouse is tucked in a little corner in the hills. It’s a flimsy covering, a roof of cobwebs and dew clinging to it. The little creature is sipping the night’s nectar. Watery beads. Jewellery of leaves. A little piece set-up by the free-flowing spontaneity of the existential force. And the larger of life and living meandering through it. Has the eagle spotted it? It seems to have!

Museful Dumplings on a Cold-lashed Day!

And dear brothers and sisters, here goes the winters caravan. Definite signs of climate change! Unprecedented fires somewhere, and icy blizzards at other places. Here, in north India, it’s unprecedently frozen.  

Homo-sapiens beat other species of the genus Homo to rule and crowd the planet to its last guts. Wait fella wait, great are the ways of evolution. Evolution doesn't end with Homo-sapiens. It's but a brief coma, a tiny pause, a cute little interlude before the juggernaut takes on further. Artificial intelligence will sow the seeds of almost a different type of species of the genus Homo. The great AI will do us what we did to other species in manipulating nature and depriving them of their natural rights.

It seems almost inevitable: the doomsday scenario born of unchecked ambitions of the Homo Sapiens. But all nightmares and fears melt in the gentle heat of real-life stories played by people like Lata Bhagwan Khare. They are the ones whose grand spirit still throws a silver lining across the dark clouds.  

She hadn't anything. Well, not in the terms we are used to evaluate possessions. Age wasn't on her side. She was 65. Poorest of the poor, the biggest disadvantage! But she had wealth, a big mountain of it, in terms of subtle intangibles. She had courage and conviction. And most importantly, she loved her husband. They were a simple farming couple in a Maharashtra village, happy in earning a day’s wage and look forward to another hard-worked but peaceful day. When you learn to stay happy and joyful in the present, life turns a string of shiny beads. Past doesn’t pinch you, the future doesn’t scare you. Life but will have its share of tests and challenges. So, like all of us face, they also faced one. The 70-year-old farm laborer fell sick. The treatment meant almost that much amount which the poor couple hadn't seen in their entire life. But she, a life-long equal partner in his life and living, was sure that she had to save her husband at any cost. He may die, like all of us will one day, but not on account of the unavailability of medical treatment. When people far younger and far more privileged would have lost hope and surrendered to desperation, she saw chance at life in the Marathi headlines on a greased local daily paper piece she was using to hold the samosa they were eating. It announced a big price for the winner of a Marathon soon to be organized. And the old woman with a young spirit ran a marathon, barefoot, her sari tucked with determination, her naked feet bleeding, and the mocking jeers of the spectators who took it as a comic act worth their cheap entertainment. Very few have the depths of soul to feel the mammoth struggles going inside a fellow human being. The woman won. Beyond the story of laurels, to her it was simply a matter of money beyond the finish line so that she could help her soulmate during his fight against the disease. Enjoy the story of this courageous woman. A story of love basically! Bask in her glory!

Let’s pump a bit more warmth into the frozen bones and eyes that seem to have lost hope through a bit of talk on ‘soulmateship’. I know we have an overestimated view of our own validity and suitability to be an idealistic soulmate, provided we come across someone suitable for our pre-existing suitability to be a soulmate. Sounds a bit egoistic! In practical life, soulmateship is fabricated and carefully formulated with conscious effort. Soulmates are delicately worked upon relationships. We presume that we are a package and wait for the destiny to make us meet our soulmates. Well, guys it doesn't work that way. Soulmates are made. We never meet someone as soulmates. Don't expect to meet yours. Love, that initial attraction and biological pull, is just the first step. After that it's a long way to a careful walk on the road to turn someone's soulmate. Beyond the categories of caste and class, soulmates like Lata and her husband are what substantiate all about life and living. With such little realizations, greatness is just one step and one breath away! Claim yours today itself!

Well, we can discuss a bit more about love which is supposed to be the bedrock of any relationship in cluding that of soulmates. I just point out a bit of advice to all those into the business of soulmateship. Hate is not the opposite of love, indifference is! You may ask, ‘How?’ Well, I give my feeble light on this. Take it if you find it digestible.  

See, love and hate are almost the shadow of each other, just a thin line between them. In fact, they may—ad they do on a routine basis—interchange. In fact, the love—hate combo fuels each other. Beware, ‘indifference’ is what kills the soul of a relationship. When the person doesn't matter anymore to you, not even worth hate, that is when a relationship dies. So, indifference is the opposite of love, not hate because even with hate, there is still a possibility, indifference kills all prospects. Don’t allow indifference to creep in. It’s the termite for the institution of soulmateship. Beyond the Love—Hate chemistry, the sole purpose of being human is to consciously try to evolve spiritually. And your love, beginning from self and those who are near to your self, is the ladder to take you there.

Coming to the more mundane wheels of life. Even in the frozen lanes of December end  streets, there are hot tempers and frayed attitudes. I am too common of an Indian to add to the noisy Chorus about NRC-CAA that has jolted India. in any case, the opposing notes from both ends have turned it into a defeating Blizzard. I am more concerned about my little issue. We haven't had electricity for the last 8 days in our village. To the hell with both the opposing armies on the NRC-CAA battlefield! All I want is restoration of electricity, so that I can continue reading with my 12 books that I am reading simultaneously. My stock of candles is gone. Inverter supply shrieked before calling it quits. I just want electricity. And most of you also need the basic necessities of life. So kindly leave the battlefield my bruised, bloodied and lacerated pro and anti NRC-CAA soldiers and come back home to find out if there is flour in the bin, light in your bulb, drinkable water in your pot, sewage channel in your street! Come brave hearts come! You have participated in the historical battle, created enough history. Now return with pride and loads of prejudices. And see the littlest things that also need your benevolent look. Come home o my brave soldiers! All I need is this f***ing flicker in my dead bulb so that I can read my books at night!

Beyond the pitched ideological battles, this lonesome tree marvels at the humans’ ingenuity in fighting over fiction and be totally unaware of the facts. The lonesome peepal! It’s left out as an insignia of the past. All around you see the brown guts of tilled earth, where not even a single blade of grass isn’t allowed without the distressed farmers’ permission. Just 40 years back, the lonesome peeplal had a big family of trees around him. But then man-born greater needs, call it greed, arose. The farmland now creeps over the horizon like a deadly parasitic creeper. Let's see, how many more misty dusks remain in its destiny?!

Under the peepal, a mighty truth is written on the soiled stage of life. These are the beautiful feathers of a bird, scattered as the aftermaths of life and living. The scythe of time reaping the harvest intangibly, everywhere in all directions. Colours melting back to seep int the womb of mother earth for another step in the corridors of creation! Nearby, in the grayish black swathes of a cold, frozen afternoon, a former colony of weaverbirds hangs like corpses of once alive dreams. The cycle gone, the caravan moved ahead and the remnants! An abandoned colony melting into the greyish dusk! Humans got any message?

Not far from the lonesome peepal, among the grassy waste outside the main village habitation, he has set up his very own colony for his son, daughter in law and a noisy brood of grandchildren. All this is complemented by pigs, goats and poultry. A world in itself. Sube Valmiki was young when we little ones hopped over the banyan’s branches. Now it's a grandfatherly sage, so is Sube Singh and me a greyish fatherly figure marveling how swiftly time flies!

His sparse beard and thick moustache is snow white. His multicolored woolen cal and shiny red blanket make him stand out as a milestone as he smokes hookah sitting on his charpoy in front of his little world surrounded by wasteland and tufts of bunchgrass which have been decimated by the frost. 'You are turning into an old sadhu!' I tell him. He welcomes the compliment with a disarming smile. As a child, I remember him as a sturdy youth working for us on some house repairs. Now I am a greyish middle aged man and he is acquiring the golden shades of old age. He has settled outside the village in a world of his own. His grandchildren play with more verve and enthusiasm even than his little goats. His pride possession, Moi Rani, the lady pig is tethered. Her long rows of shiny teats along the udder a hallmark of its feminine fecundity. 'She is our offering to Moi Mata! We keep her for non commercial purposes!' he says. Well, i understand that she is a sort of offering to a local goddess. But I cannot understand fully. 'Non commercial' doesn't make much of a meaning to me. Does it mean her sons and daughters also go along the same way? Most probably not. That would be taking one's faith too far! At the most, it may mean she will not be sold for some bucks in the pocket, and won't be slaughtered to add to fun and funstry on some celebratory occasion. Her pedigree i suppose is beyond the deity's protection. Anyway, they don't think that deeply. And that is why they can have a real laugh!

He has even a pet raven. A feat in itself in taming a wild bird known for its claim on independence and gaukish  husky kawing! He had chanced upon it under a tree, a mere meatball, waiting to become something’s meal. He picked it up and showed astute mastery and common sense in parenting it. The bird flows to enjoy freedom in free skis but acknowledges its gratitude by coming back almost regularly and sit by him.     

Raven

in cuddling heaven!

Its irritable kaw-kaw melting into bearable notes,

Its erstwhile black monochrome, ewwe!

Glowing now with a likeable hue,

Love is the best form of truth and beauty,

Take it as your conscious humanoid duty!

Back home in my yard I have a little more reasons to smile over the frozen time. Rajnigandha (Tuberose) smiles at long, long last! In fact after 1.5 years! It appeared to have lost interest in life, living and smiles. Looked just a faded, forlorn bunch of grass in the pot, waiting to be cast away for some better, more attractive flower. Little did she realize that I have the patience of a grandfatherly sea. I put away any idea of any replacement. Lo, here she reciprocates with a lovely little bouquet! It's soooo fragrant! It seems to say a gentle sorry for the delay! No worries baby! Better late than never! Even long delayed smiles are better than any other alternative! Keep smiling? Nearby is the Reddest Rose. Pouting heavenward as a passionate kiss from mother Earth to the Sky, with loads of love of course! When the sky melts and goes down on its knee to kiss the petalous hand of mother earth! A holy kiss! The daughter of the yard, Hibiscus, has charted her journey from a pleasantly uncouth toddler to a lithesome, curvey, confident young woman. She has delicately touched the peak of her youth...vow...what a journey! And how can I ignore the indomitable spirit of the garden cactus!? Her forefathers braved the desert sands to bloom. She carries sturdy, hardy genes. Her flowers stay for months. Amazing. Mercury hits the bottom, but they stay unperturbed! These are five-petaled little red marvels that continue to kiss night frost and faded sunrays with same enthusiasm! Little wonder they stay for weeks after weeks. Glory be showered upon thou Garden Cactus. You beat the thorny ignominy to blossom up a flowery smile. All you need to have a flowering smile is to overlook the thorns. All of us have pinchy edges to our persona that pierce soft skins around. Accept your own thorns. Forgive others for having the same. And all you have is a bouquet of victory for all..smiles...smiles...smiles! And this Parijat showers love like a crazy lover! A fragrant heap of love is found every morning under it after the frozen wet nights. I give her an ounce of my care. She multiplies it thousand times and showers me with heavenly drizzle of scented dumplings. Thank you darling!

Outside in the streets, a group of migrant Bihari laborer is moving in this cold to reach the construction site where they are employed currently.

Their dreams frequently suffer a break,

They are but the ones who help others make!

An old woman is walking behind them. She is going for morning rituals at the temple. Devotion is the easiest means to realize the Ultimate. But out of millions and millions of hardcore devotees, how many qualify to be real devotees? Not many, I suppose! Simply because the majority of our devotion, in the form of rituals, prayers and beliefs, falls in the category of a deal with the object of our devotion. The moment your devotion becomes free of your 'deal', you take a quantum jump into realizing the hidden truths lying at every nook corner.

In a nearby chaupal, idle men are baulking in endless debates! Who says women are talkative? Have a look at them! They can beat any number of women in chatting on non-issues days after days, years after years. After a life-long war with words how many of us realize the real meaning of knowledge and information?

True knowledge, I suppose, is just coming home with the realization that all the information fed in our neural network is only a means for survival, a mere tool like a chair to sit upon. It also sets up the course for unknowing and unlearning, and the consequent swiping the screen clean, to be in sync with the intangible, but ever manifesting, intelligence in its undivided form. Logic, words, knowledge and information are mere chisels and hammers to chip away the mind-created stone from the huge rock of our assumed self, ego, and carve out a dimensionless entity. So one's logic though can't take you to the Truth, but it can at least help you in avoiding the tricks of the false. So guys pic up your tools, but remember they are nothing more than a stonemason's instruments in his rucksack as he moves to his stoneyard.

From the ones who sound most affable to the ones pounding your nerves with obnoxious ferocity, all of us are equally distant from the most presentable best 'truth', simply because there is no absolute 'truth'. The only absolute truth may be that there is no absolute truth. The so called truths are merely flimsy bubbles floating in the sky. So guys glide freely cocooned in the bubble of your truth with only this much caution that you don't crash too often into other's bubbles floating around. This is what good and bad might be all about. Otherwise, this existence does not even care what this hypothetical talk is about the absolutes, sin, piousness, etc., etc.

When my own voice starts disturbing me, I douse it under the all-overpowering notes of the great mystic Osho. The rats of my mind go to sleep. Today, I remember  him telling me:

‘Freedom and equality are two opposite conditions. If you want to maintain equality, then freedom can't be sustained. If you cherish freedom, you have to forget equality. People can be cut to a tailor-made size of equality, but it won't be possible without taking their freedom from them. You can't have equality other than in jail. And even inside the jail, if there are some elements of utility and convenience, inequality will creep in. So the jailor has to be stone like hard and unsparing in approach to manage perfect equality. Complete equality is possible only in a state of perfect subjugation and control. It should be so tight that nobody gets a chance to be unequal to anyone. So if communism takes control of earth, the entire planet will turn into a mammoth jail. Communism can't succeed without jail.’

Crossing the threshold of individual consciousness

Nothing stands in isolation. Can a drop of water stand alone in the ocean? Can an ocean exist without a drop, i.e., with a hole in its heart and the drop missing? Same is the cosmos. It's one continuity in one or the other form. Sea is nothing but drops drops everywhere in the expansion of its geographical spread. Same is with the super sea of cosmic consciousness. It's merely individual consciousness everywhere. Now the question is: how come there is a perception of individual consciousness? Well, that's how the fabric is! Start dividing a sea into tiniest dots! What happens? All we have littler seas made of tinier drops! The threshold from individual to infinite intelligence exists and doesn't at the same time. Possibly the sea itself perceives itself like a drop. Divide it into countless drops, they retain the feeling of individualty. Individual consciousness is thus nothing but a point of perception in the transforming whirlpool where the elements are going cyclically. Is a drop fundamentally and qualitatively different from a big sea? It isn't! Coming to humanoids. The so called conscious is the littlest bit of perception surrounded by the subconscious, which in turn melts into the infinite intelligence and consciousness pervading all around. That's the ladder to spread yourself, to feel more meaningful. One's subconscious part of mind is most active just before sleep and immediately after waking up. That's when the gates open tangibly for taking a quantum jump from conscious to subconscious and further on into superconsciousness. Grab it. Put your affirmation and claim to a larger self. There are infinite possibilities. What you seek at your greediest best may not be more than a drop of water desiring to double its size. You have the pathway etched to be the sea itself. You already are. Just that all that remains to be done is to start seeing through the walls of conscious, watch eagerly through the windows of subconscious in those walls and get connected to the infinite right there in front of you. It's suitable to start with tangibles to break the virtual shackles, just like it's easier to start with body in yoga. The higher battles with more virtual demons are managed further on the path. At the mind front, it's more convenient to start with the conscious part because it's tangible through its operational part through thoughts and emotions. There starts the second tier of management leading to the subconscious part and further on to be out of the prison to come united with everything around. It's not mother existence's concern whether there are storms lashing a drop, pond or sea, or peaceful calm waters pervade. To her indiscriminating eyes all things are just as they are. What happens in the drop of your consciousness is solely your own concern. You create the storms or peace in the tea cup of your existence. And the tools to make and break are conscious thoughts and their shadows in the form of emotions and feelings. They majorly decide the energy pattern pervading across this specific pattern of awareness, this little arrangement of energy within the super sea of energy. Pain, suffering, disease, stress and tensions are mere effects, little obstruction in the flow of river, the life stream. And the repair work primarily begins from the conscious part of the mind , which operates through thoughts, emotions and feelings.  So just like u go gyming, go gyming with thoughts. Work like a mason. And etch your reality, your better self on the subconscious, which in turn reflects as your truth on the endless canvas hung around with its infinite dimensions. Good luck!

LOVE: The Ultimate Alchemy

Ravindranath Tagore says, “Love is the only reality and it 

is not a mere sentiment.” The great mystic and poet very 

suitably sees it as “the ultimate truth that lies at the core of 

creation”.

Love defines the countless pathways to the cause of creation 

as Lord Byron points out with poetic precision: “Love will find 

a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.”

Do you think fear, anger, hate, envy, jealousy, ego, lust and 

greed have their own standing? No. Just like darkness is simply 

an absence of light, all these tortuous tools that lynch our self 

are nothing but phantoms doing painful rounds in the absence 

of love. Like a tiny lamp puts out darkness simply by casting 

light, without fighting the dark, a simple ray of love, a symbol of 

our true self, chucks out the flimsy appendages of the unreal self.

There is definitely limit to everything in cosmos. But there 

is one exception: Love, prem as we say it in Hindi. Yoko Ono 

feels the mankind’s regret in not fully absorbing their self in the 

sea of love when he says: “The regret of my life is that I have not 

said ‘I love you’ often enough.”

One need not fight fear, fury, hatred, jealousy, distrust, ego, 

lust and greed at various fronts to defeat them. They have a 

common root: burial of your loving self, your essential nature, 

under the peripheral dust of illusions and ignorance, making you 

identify with what is essentially not your real self. Remove the grime, allow the light of love to emanate from your soul, enter 

your behavioral self, and all around you see peace, harmony and 

balance. The vices, which you yourself condemn against yourself 

after being judgmental on your own self, just dry up, like fresh 

rays of sun dispel the last traces of dark clinging to the morning 

twilight.

A house—an assemblage of concrete, mortar, bricks and 

steel—turns a home only with love and care. Without affection 

decorating it from inside, it’s merely a soulless structure. Billy 

Graham says it very aptly: “Nothing can bring a real sense of 

security into the home except true love.”

The mankind’s fears driven by greed have already resulted 

in nukes and super-nukes having the capacity to destroy not 

just earth but many planets and stars around. Does it serve any 

purpose? The modern civilization sitting on the stockpiles of 

death and destruction is always one button push away from 

annihilation. No man, we don’t need hate anymore. We need 

more loving people around. The moisture of love will dampen 

the explosives of death and destruction.

Love for your man, your woman, your family, friends and 

near and dear ones is the seed that holds the potential to blossom 

into universal love for all and everything making you a loving 

person. So guys start your journey on the love path as a lover, as a 

caring husband, wife, parent or friend and proceed onto nurture 

the seed to help it grow into a robust tree of loving kindness 

for all. This basically is supposed to be the natural evolution 

course for your consciousness attached to this mater, this mix 

of materials called body comprising water and few kilograms 

of matter found in earth. The consciousness, the blueprint, the 

carrier of your previous journeys, is on the path of evolution, to 

merge into the all pervading super-consciousness, like a drop of 

water is moving to mix with the seas.

Do you think you can fight darkness by flailing your arms 

and fists in the dark? No man, that’s not the way. Darkness 

cannot be dispelled. It stays irrespective of your fusillade. All you need is a small lamp. It simply leaves darkness redundant 

by itself.

“Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy 

into a friend,” Martin Luther King, Jr. Love definitely is the 

panacea for thousands of ailments afflicting human society. The 

Modern Gandhi of the West further says, “Darkness cannot 

drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive 

out hate; only love can do that.”

Haven’t you felt almost fully alive when in love with your 

man or woman? Well, that sums it up. This feeling is just a 

glimpse of the eternal bliss available on the higher rungs on the 

same ladder. Move up. There are no alternatives. This is the sole 

destiny.

Mind you, there are no sinners. We just have loving and less 

loving people. Come, join me in tilting the scale in favor of love. 

That is your destiny. Later or sooner, in this avatar or in the ones 

coming up next, you have to get along. Just like a river’s natural 

destination is the sea, your soul’s journey is to merge into all-

encompassing love of the eternal entity. The so called sinners, 

who we scorn at, are nothing but strayed selves, like the river 

exploring its final path to the sea gets into a lake somewhere but 

finds it unviable to stay there and takes on the journey again. All 

of us have to explore and find the fallacy of many a thing that 

our disillusioned self makes us believe and come face to face 

with the ultimate meaning of life.

Max Muller says: “A flower cannot blossom without 

sunshine, and man cannot live without love.”

Come, let’s explore the path of love, the alchemy, which 

remedies the suffering self, making it a beautiful, loving entity.

Love is the seed of spirituality. Holy people of all religions 

and faith reached one single point, all-encompassing love.

Saint Basil: “A tree is known by its fruit; a man by his deeds. 

A good deed is never lost; he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, 

and he who plants kindness gathers love.”

Love, compassion and kindness are the biggest commonality 

across various faiths and belief systems. Love is basically the 

essential nature of soul. Kindness, compassion, gratitude, 

generosity, truth, beauty, and all other virtues we hold in 

high esteem are simply the manifestations of love. Love is the 

light that shows everything as it is. It dispels the dark corners 

surrounding our selves. It is the guiding light that takes us on 

the path of our individual and collective destinies.

Though no words are sufficient to cover the fathomless 

power of love, let’s try to know a bit more about our loving self 

and its miraculous powers in shaping our lives.

This book is meant to set up an instructional manual to 

help one rise higher on the scale of evolution by changing one’s 

limited love, defined by family and relations, to universal love 

for a compassionate and all-loving being.

The work is meant to help one hone the art and craft of 

building a loving character, which in turn sets up the base for 

a happy and joyful life. All the chapters in the book are full of 

commonest of the common day-to-day techniques, which can 

build up our compassionate self, like we work in the gym to 

strengthen our muscles.

Things are rapidly aggravating. It’s an angrier world than 

ever. Material progression has proved counterproductive. 

Mother Nature is ailing due to our greedy onslaught, which 

borders on raping mother earth. Now an ailing nature is 

handing over its pain and miseries to the human society in the 

form of wars, diseases and strife. Irony is that we are materially 

the most advanced society in history with the USP of being the 

most miserable one at the same time. Isn’t it the right time to go 

into a pause and rethink our collective priorities? Through my 

work, I am simply trying to ask individuals and organizations 

to reconsider their values because there has been a basic flaw, 

otherwise why would there be so many problems.

My work involves simple tools and techniques of going into 

self-discovery to see things in a larger perspective. It’s a semi-spiritual journey looking within and out to be aware of the 

bigger plights written everywhere, to inculcate a basic loving 

nature almost at the instinctive level, to be more observant of 

the self as much as we observe things outside. It breeds self 

responsibility, leading to a considerate nature. These are the 

basic building blocks of a compassionate self.

For decades I have been into spirituality and meditation. 

All the simple instructions, guidance tools and observations are 

born of my own experiences. Spirituality is not something about 

mysteries in the farthest corners of the universe. It’s simply about 

being a more aware person. It’s about realizing the basic loving 

nature in each and everyone around. It’s about harnessing joy 

out of the mundane incidences of life.

Working on this book itself has been really rewarding. I 

cannot ask for much other than writing it. It has given me so 

much of unconditional love and peace while working on it. I 

am not looking much on the material front from this treatise on 

love. All I need is one more partner in spreading the message of 

unconditional love, peace and harmony.

I firmly believe that ordinary beings possess extraordinary 

potential to win against odds, to jump over hurdles, to smile 

over tears, and, most importantly, to be happy when there aren’t 

enough reasons to be. People like you and me are the faceless 

constituents of a massive commonality. We are surrounded by 

a swiping generality. We are coloured in the monochromes of 

mundane reality. Still we are special. And that speciality is love 

at the core of our being.

Through my work, I acknowledge and celebrate the 

extraordinary in the ordinary people. I see heroes and heroines 

on the common stage of life chugging around. And most 

importantly, we have the very same essentially loving nature 

at the core. Just that the flimsy clouds of ego and apparent 

sufferings keep it buried inside. I try to help people unearth the 

basic seeds of goodness inside to help them grow into luxuriant 

trees of compassionate beings.

We fight, and oftentimes fail, but write a little passage in the 

infinite book of life: an ordinary life that was lived substantially. 

On the small stage of life, we live very intensely. Somehow, the 

world would not be the world that is still beautiful without our 

contribution. We heave humanity onwards in its march to some 

better destination. Just that all this gets overshadowed by the 

shifting clouds of ego, stress, frustration and jealousy. We simply 

need to look beyond the clouds to spot the glorious sun.

With our essentially loving nature fully acknowledged in 

our daily lives, all of us can be the heroes and heroines of our 

stories. The seed in us, the seed of love, carries the potential 

to be the tallest, luxuriant-most tree. The powerful force of 

creation propels the potential for maximization. Nature doesn’t 

want it to be a world of half-smiles, half-growths, half-blossoms 

and half-potential. There is a tendency for fullness. It pulls the 

process of evolution for the maximum, for completion, for what 

we call greatness. And the driving force for all this is love. It exists 

in each and every atom in the cosmos. All we need is to be aware 

of it. And this awareness needs practice. I have put an effort to 

nurture this habit of always reminding ourselves of our basic 

loving nature.

O my mind, my seat of potentiality, take my journey further,

Be the seat of my strength, not weakness,

Be the seat of kindness, not cruelty,

Be the source of light, not darkness.

You, me and all of us are born for the stories of greatness. 

Let’s acknowledge our loving nature to see through the journey. 

Please be my partner in sharing this message of universal love.

Is it about Right or Wrong?

So now Shiv Sena is a bit more secular, or call it an iota lesser Hindutvavadi. The Congress and the NCP are a fragment less secular and an ounce of more Rightist. The BJP would have adjusted anything ranging from less or more secularism to less or more nationalism to stir its constituents in the political cauldron to form government. So guys, beyond the smokescreen of ideology and all, the only recipe to power and privilege turns out to be plain old, bland pragmatism and practicality. So my dear voters, when this pragmatism for power is written so brilliantly in the sky for all to read and understand, why don't you guys also demand the bijli, pani, sadak, hegeiene, less pollution and bla bla, instead of just hypothetical stuff to gratify misplaced ego like caste, class, creed, religion etc etc. When you know that our Netas will go to any extent to retain power, why don't you demand the common day to day amenities to help your life and living? If you demand seriously, they will do it I am sure now after witnessing their limitless capacity to adjust to stay in power. So guys now is the time to turn kingmakers and demand your share against your vote. Demand the little little things that facilitate the life of a common man. Forget about never to be seen magical items flung into your face with hallucinating hyperbole by the tricksters wearing magic hats!

Whose Truth is nearest to the Ultimate?

ounce scattered till eternal distances in the universe, multiverse or whatever it qualifies to be. Out of this infinite option to pick up and churn out individual truth, the so called perceivable reality, the human mind also creates virtual reality. Mind you, it's as simple as you see games in virtual reality. There is hardly any qualitative difference. So we have our realities, some of which have been gathered to form collective realities in order to run this society in the form of common belief, social norms and conventions. We can't help this. This mind has to churn out our own individual reality, the so called our very own dear truth. That can't be helped. Our own truth almost seems to define the meaning of our life. Well then here starts the real problem. One's very own truth may sound a character assassination to someone from his/her point of view decided by their own truth. Why do we hurl out our truths? Possibly it's a means of survival mechanism. We probably try to unburden ourselves by letting it out. But man, our truth, the jewel it may appear to us, may be a dagger to someone. Avoid unseathing it! Even if it turns a knife inside your own self. And starts cutting your own self. But if out, it can hurt someone even more. Why should someone else be its target? It's the keeper's responsibility to manage it. Accepted that if kept inside, it will be painful, but it will cut many falsehoods inside your own self, side by side giving a few painful cuts to the softer tissues. It but saves you from committing a verbal manslaughter. Good people prefer injury to their own self, instead of harming others. And mind u this can be practiced. My new year resolution in advance! To keep my version of reality to myself, even if it hurts. It's my responsibility to keep it, to manage it, to nurture it. Our jewel may be dagger to someone else. Be careful about your simple statement that you may take as simple facts, for these might be character assassinating poison arrows to someone else. It's not about the other person. The onus is on one's own self. So guys, her I go and keep my truths to my own self. That's the path of solitude. Possibly it leads to a place where even the last doubts vanish! God bless you all!

Your Mind is the Universe

What we know and understand of the Cosmos is just a projection of our mind. The basic building blocks of life, your own and collective realities are mental building blocks being stone-worked in the mind-workshop. Thoughts are energy movement much as you have anything tangible on the physical surface. This is no mystical talk! Ask quantum physicists, they will tell you that the erstwhile fundamental entities, atoms, are not the basic entities at all. They are 'events' only. Virtual is not that virtual as we presume. It's a mammoth stone-masonry going on in the unseen subterranean cavern, laying out the foundation of your life and living. So guys be firmly in charge of your thoughts. They make and break! This existence doesn't care whether u choose to make or break. Just that we ourselves suffer, if we end up breaking.

The Gateway to the Heaven

Nothing stands in isolation. Can a drop of water stand alone in the ocean? Can an ocean exist without a drop, i.e., with a hole in its heart and the drop missing? Same is the cosmos. It's one continuity in one or the other form. Sea is nothing but drops drops everywhere in the expansion of its geographical spread. Same is with the super sea of cosmic consciousness. It's merely individual consciousness everywhere. Now the question is: how come there is a perception of individual consciousness? Well, that's how the fabric is! Start dividing a sea into tiniest dots! What happens? All we have littler seas made of tinier drops! The threshold from individual to infinite intelligence exists and doesn't at the same time. Possibly the sea itself perceives itself like a drop. Divide it into countless drops, they retain the feeling of individuality. Individual consciousness is thus nothing but a point of perception in the transforming whirlpool where the elements are going cyclically. Is a drop fundamentally and qualitatively different from a big sea? It isn't! Coming to humanoids. The so called conscious is the littlest bit of perception surrounded by the subconscious, which in turn melts into the infinite intelligence and consciousness pervading all around. That's the ladder to spread yourself, to feel more meaningful. One's subconscious part of mind is most active just before sleep and immediately after waking up. That's when the gates open tangibly for taking a quantum jump from conscious to subconscious and further on into super-consciousness. Grab it. Put your affirmation and claim to a larger self. There are infinite possibilities. What you seek at your greediest best may not be more than a drop of water desiring to double its size. You have the pathway etched to be the sea itself. You already are. Just that all that remains to be done is to start seeing through the walls of conscious, watch eagerly through the windows of subconscious in those walls and get connected to the infinite right there in front of you. It's suitable to start with tangibles to break the virtual shackles, just like it's easier to start with body in yoga. The higher battles with more virtual demons are managed further on the path. At the mind front, it's more convenient to start with the conscious part because it's tangible through its operational part through thoughts and emotions. There starts the second tier of management leading to the subconscious part and further on to be out of the prison to come united with everything around. It's not mother existence's concern whether there are storms lashing a drop, pond or sea, or peaceful calm waters pervade. To her indiscriminating eyes all things are just as they are. What happens in the drop of your consciousness is solely your own concern. You create the storms or peace in the tea cup of your existence. And the tools to make and break are conscious thoughts and their shadows in the form of emotions and feelings. They majorly decide the energy pattern pervading across this specific pattern of awareness, this little arrangement of energy within the super sea of energy. Pain, suffering, disease, stress and tensions are mere effects, little obstruction in the flow of river, the life stream. And the repair work primarily begins from the conscious part of the mind , which operates through thoughts, emotions and feelings. So just like u go gyming, go gyming with thoughts. Work like a mason. And etch your reality, your better self on the subconscious, which in turn reflects as your truth on the endless canvas hung around with its infinite dimensions. Good luck!

I know I might be accused of oversimplifying something fundamentally challenging!. You may crib that I'm asking you to ping Bill Gates each day going to bed and waking up, as if you have some hotline handy. You may crib, 'Crawling out of my materialistic mess and rising to lofty heavens! Is that really so easy?! Shedding off all the past karma! Isn't it like having to first sail through all of its roller coaster effects and then arrive at the ladder to lofty heavens?'

I truly understand your point my dear Sir! But you have to be open to mine also! The yogic practices enable one to rectify lots and lots of energy blocks born of past and present karmic debts attached to an individual's consciousness. There are two ways: either allow things to take their natural course, or forge an alternative reality, totally brand new, free from karmic debt through concerted, aware and hyper-conscious effort.

But then you may still retain your skepticism and counter: 'From a myriad of spiritual practices available, how would a novice discern? Which path to take? Is it okay to leave path of devotion (bhakti) .. unconditional surrender .. and step up to yogic sadhana .. the path of active karma?'

Well, my simple explanation is all I can manage. Bhakti marg is the easiest one. But we have to understand that to completely believe in something we have to unclutter our subconscious of routine fears and insecurity bred by rampant thinking and logical reasoning of the conscious part of our mind. To be receptive and surrendering is a blissful state. But how many of us can be true believers in modern times? Not many! We can think that we are believers hypothetically, but disbelief lurks and that undoes all effect. Modern education, competitive times, dehumanized society and scores of problems have put our mind burdened with anxiety, fear, insecurity, tension. Where is the space for faith and true belief to germinate? Bhakti yoga is for all those whose subconscious is already at position where most of the shadows don't exist. For educated people, whose minds have been bombarded with unchecked what's and why of life, and the consequent anxiety and complexity of mind, they need some conscious efforts to somehow clear the ground to begin with. The modern mind is bruised and burdened under merciless cold hard facts, figures, knowledge and information, and hence least qualified to be a proponent of bhakti yoga. To cut iron, one needs iron. These are the phantoms of mind. It needs going down there with conscious effort and do a bit of de-weeding first.