Maaf karo, aage badho!

Pak gaya

Thak gaya

Tu jo bhi bola

... mere sar mein atak gaya!

Ever wondered why, every soul around you is interested in passing on some of their 'royal' flaws on to you. One such bit, is the urge to advise... or even take advise.

Come on, accept it - there are only some very, very few people who have this skill and right to be entertained. Contrary to the popular line, if you've never used your own or worse still end up using only your own, you deserve to hear nothing but '...Shoo...' in varying tones of politeness (or a complete lack of it).

When you give 'advice', you just add vice to another soul. The vice of not having a spine.

Now, I strongly believe, 'consulting' is not 'advising'. When you consult/or are consulted, you impart 'information'... as in D-I-K-W (Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom *ting*)

Listen... Listen...Listen to the question.

Understand... or at least 'seek' to understand ONLY the question.

Clarify... not sets of morality statements, not faith, not intention... but the question.

And finally, Answer the question in question, and not your inner urge to feel like the law maker.

Have a spine? No?

You can't go get one... you gotta make your own.

Good luck.

The force within

As usual... the title is misleading.

There's a force within that is born before birth.
And that is the feeling of existence.
A cousin of your ego.

The force that strives for acknowledgment. It is something that grows with all the love and care, or flickers for a lack of it. The feeling when your name is called, and a 1 yr old you knows that it is YOU that is being summoned. The ego of a name being used in any human context is born, surrounded by what the YOU prefers, or is allowed to choose from.

A pitiful dependence and a life long abuse story begins.
The death of your ego is beginning of love, and it never truly happens. The fear of losing your identity, when you look at life through someone else's eyes. The stark variance and common dysfunctions, are truly what brings you together.
Do you really fall in love when you like someone because they are as powerful as you?
Or more likely to, when he is as withdrawn from crowds as you are?

You break free mostly when benefits are at stake (!). Not forever.
The Ego needs a focus in its own way; an unshared attention from you such that it becomes you.

But then the Ego is as young as you...
So if I am almost 30, and I think back... what do I remember of my dad's LIC agent who came visiting his best friend every 3rd Sunday to bitch about the new policies and a great weekend breakfast. He called you last to say you're old enough to get bloody married! You said 'Ok, uncle'... but that was 4 years ago.

Of the sad 40 yr old neighbour caught in a troubled marriage who came to talk to your dad because he had no one else. You slapped his son last Saturday - a much older boy because he was bullying the new kid in the colony. You don't hate him now cause he married a lovely fat girl and loves her like crazy.

Of the lonely madman at the signal you saw growing older and lonelier over 8 years of your rides to school. And finally one day, you saw a crowd around some blood and gore, and two twisted feet. It was a mad Tuesday morning under a hot, humid sun.

Of the local sweet shop, the gluttonous old uncle who owned the shop and loved to pamper little girls. Hi granddaughter was as young as you, when she died of pleurisy last year.

Of the many birthday parties, year on year, till some of your neighbors moved away and then it was time for you.

Your first 'best friend' (or so you were told), who had other best friends too.

The first time a teacher in middle school, said "..you think very differently." And that seemed to answer all your baffling questions at once. So why did you hate it when you faced isolation in a crowd for the first time?! The first 'ting' of enlightenment, indeed.
The odd feeling of a routine, till you're allowed to break free. And they gave it a funny term, on tops - "come of age" - whoa!

Feeling older by the day, a little wiser, more befuddled than ever.

The importance of buying a candle during summers (in case the electricity goes off), instead of a quick call to your best friend from school boarding her flight to NYC, forever. You'd always be in touch!
The first dash of wise willingness to let go of the urge to make an episode of such things.
You teach yourself that life goes on.

You almost forget that lesson, when you meet a guy at work, who loves hanging out with you and is a great beer buddy. He has 2 great kids now and you still pull his leg for how pretty and different they are from him...

You exist because you feel because you have a force within you, that will never just let you be.

Mankind !
You love spaces, don't you? Vast... like possibilities. And more possibilities. Like a sea of inviting progression...
Infinite yet imaginable... and the 'beyond'.

But spaces - Can they really scare you? Like the vastness of deserts, for a marooned soul. Like a punishment, something you'd have to baggage. And it smells like deadwood.

Back on track!

Nah... That was a lame attempt at slapstick whatever.
But, back - yes and because it was inevitable.

I'd like to go up and shout from the rooftops - "History repeats..."

But what motivates man really? The end objective or the sick kick in plainly doing it.
So why do people force you to stay, when all they feel for you is instinctive, impenetrable, lame hatred. And since you have this penchant to attract controversies and other suitable forms of the same kind. You can imagine.

So... This is about changing again. Changing for good - that doesn't exist; cannot happen. You can always change back.
Or maybe transformation of trash into something useful for some more time... Trash it is, nevertheless. And trash it will be forever.

So here I am - waiting still but yeah - I can see something shaping up!
Bless the Lord and Bombay... whatever.

...

Yea yea yea...
Why am I surprised? You win some. You lose most!
When I read Paul Coelho's Alchemist ... I was some 20 'slow city' years into life. He spoke of how the universe conspires to help you win something you want passionately. And to this day, I believe that stands unquestionably strong! ( "When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.")
But the point I'd like to make is ... some things are never meant to be. For you. For others. For the whole of humanity..? Nah...
What's more important is that, it brings you closer to something you've been ignoring. The problem is, that people ignore the truth till it becomes a monster and devours all that's left... All that shouldn't exist.
And nothing is left.
Not even anything you can build the same dream, up with.
|| Ab mujhe koi intezaar kahan ||

And this something that you face ... is worth the pain and grief.
I feel really grounded now... like the hangover that took weeks to get off my heavy head. But I loved it.
...

Lessons people laaarn...

Imagine if you'd be in the 1st standard, just learning how to multiply 3 triple figures... assisted by your older sibling in the 5th who's an ace at math... You'd walk up the next day with correct answers but you'd never really know how he got them that fast.
That's what we do to others and to ourselves..
To others we offer advice... genuine, leading and at times strong.
Upon ourselves we bring greater tortures. Today I realized how stupid we are that we apply lessons from our past relationships to those that we are living right now... The fact is that we are different at different times and people around us change. When you hold on to old habits, values... you screw up this moment.
Trust your instinct... whatever you had to learn and keep... will always be there.

Why stay and suffer..? Just change it!

For every nice human on the street, there are 3 dumb heads, 4 crude illiterates and 1 nice,sensible girl.

I am so appalled by the way humanity is being treated. I understand anger more than ever now. I feel it every night when I sit up, purposely waiting for a figment of some thought to hit me and hold me to earth.
I get the feeling so often that I don't want to be here. It is almost like there's something so unfair that is holding me back and I am an idiot in being held.
Patience Patience... Buuuull!!!

People management is based on ethics... and nothing else. You lie, you lose. There are some faff heads that don't come clean, after all that you did working for them. How does it matter to me?
It does for the people I'm leaving behind. I hate to feel helpless. I get the feeling that I am being so selfish. There are these distinctly frustrating times when I almost yell at them... Get out of here. Why stay and suffer, when you know it isn't making any difference to anybody including you?
Why not focus on understanding what you really want from your life? It pays to endure a reality check at least once in a blue moon.
Why do people keep cribbing and not change their situations??? I can understand falling in love tears you if you just can't get over the fact that it was not meant to be... But for anything less emotional, faintly rooted - Just go out and CHANGE it!!! A job, a house, a better friend, a better weather... If you cannot - why kill yourself over it..?