Lessons from the Mahabharata...

The Mahabharata teaches us a lot about life, and that's probably why it's the best book in the world. I've had to do a lot of soul-searching and thinking recently, and reading the Mahabharata has somewhat helped me find myself in a maze of confusion and ups and downs. So I thought I'd take this chance to sit and think about what all the epic has taught me, and maybe also wonder how I can implement its teachings in my life. 

I've listed out the top ten things I need to do as part of the learnings of the Mahabharata. Ironically enough most of them are lessons that you pick up from Yudhishthira, who is neither the strongest like Bheema, nor the most skilled and favoured by Gods, like Arjuna. However, he has some amazing qualities that make him the king over these two and the other brothers.

1. Cultivate patience

2. Think before reacting

3. Find peace of mind in what you do

4. You will always be tested by circumstance - deal with it

5. Don't expect to be happy even you have everything, and don't expect to be sad even when you have nothing

6. Actions don't necessarily always speak louder than words.

7. Our thoughts though can sometimes be even louder than actions or words.

8. We ourselves are important in the scheme of things, but we should not forget that there is someone who watches over us and makes the decisions. Everything flows from him / her and goes back into him / her. It is this attitude that makes Arjuna succeed.

9. Nobody - but nobody including God himself in the form of Krishna - is perfect. To expect perfection is searching for the impossible.

10. And finally of course the well known one and the most difficult to follow: Karmanye vaadhika raste, ma phaleshu kadachana - carry out your actions without thinking about the results. In a highly results oriented atmosphere, it is probably this that is going to carry me back to sanity at the times I feel like I'm going insane.

Hope that I get the strength to keep these in mind and deal with difficult circumstances and difficult people through not just this time, but my life ahead as well.

Philosophically yours,

Archana

Pray

Sometimes you just play it by the ear and see what happens. And put your trust and faith in a higher supreme God, who will see you through in the end. 

Pray for peace of mind. Pray for friendship. Pray for love. In that order.

Smile

In the words of the Charlie Chaplin song:

Smile, though your heart is aching
Smile, even though it’s breaking
When there are clouds in the sky
you’ll get by
If you smile through your fear and sorrow
Smile and maybe tomorrow
You’ll see the sun come shining through
for you

Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness Although a tear may be ever so near
That’s the time you must keep on trying
Smile what’s the use of crying
You’ll find that life is still worthwhile
If you’ll just
Smile

It's almost over...

The more I am here, the more I don't want to leave. I just don't. I remember how I wrote here only about how I was scared of coming here - and now I am scared of leaving. I just realised that I might never see these people - my friends - again in my life. It's very very hard to deal with something like that.

I lost all my data today and recovered it. The relief was really something. But then a stray comment made me realise - why was I so keen to recover it? It's almost over. Every day I hear the same thing - it's almost over. And to me, that's not a relief. That makes me afraid and pained and unhappy and depressed - that it's almost over. I won't see the sun rise over the valley any more. I won't have meals with friends any more - no more hanging out, no more sitting and talking and laughing and making crazy plans. There's no time for crazy plans any more.

I've said it before and I will say it again. I will miss this place. I will miss these people. I will miss some of the best friends I have ever made in my life. I can't write any more.

Tanha Dil Tanha Safar...

Organisational Behaviour talks of the Need for Affiliation, the Need for Belongingness, to feel close to people, part of a group, a family, a clan, a larger society, a country, the world itself. Everytime we also define ourselves as part of this group or clan or whatever. And yet, despite the number of people we so-called belong to, we are all essentially alone. Maybe not lonely - just alone. It doesn't matter who is on the journey with us - they will get off at some station at some point of time. Someone else might even get on when they get off. But you know - that at the end station, the last one - it's going to be only you. No one else. Just you.

Slipping through my fingers all the time...

Sometimes the smallest things can become the biggest memories that you carry with you. As time goes by here and I look back at everything - I just keep thinking about the amount of time I wasted on things which were not worth it. And I feel like I have wasted SO much. There is so much I could have done. People I could have spent so much more time with, if I had just realised who they were and what they are. And I still don't know them, still don't understand them. I just know that they are important in my life - and I will always carry memories of them - small memories which are so special, larger memories, but most of all the memory of the fact that I didn't get to do all the things I wanted to do or that I planned to do with them.

I just want more time. I feel like it's just slipping away from me. And life is so unpredictable, it can change in an instant. I wish I could just go back and capture those moments when I thought I could have chosen one path and chose the other. And now I wish I had chosen the first one. Wish that the time was not running out on me like this. That we all didn't have other things and commitments that we had to live with. And that I could just gaze into a crystal ball and know what lay ahead of me in the future.

I am scared. I am scared to let go. People think I am strong, but I am not. I am an emotional wreck. And I am paranoid. Mostly about losing my friends. About being alone - or worse, lonely. And that's how I feel at times. Alone. And lonely. Even among people. I feel sometimes like I can't wait to get away from here. And at other times, I am scared. To lose people and friends. To lose this lovely place and the sunrise every morning that I get to see. And I know it's going away. People are going to go away. I feel like the upcoming 2 weeks are going to be so long. What am I going to do when it comes to going away forever?

I had time before. I didn't use it right. Didn't recognise the things I should have recognised before - the people I wanted to be with, the things I wanted to do. Didn't recognise the feelings I should have had, the kind of time I wasted over things which were unnecessary and unimportant. But this is important to me. I am tired of being lost. Tired of being dependent and addicted to things which I feel are beyond my control. Of being desperate and upset. And of time slipping through my fingers at the wrong time...

CB Blog 2 - What does it 'do' for you?!

Last time I wrote about how music can be used to give us the right ups and downs that we require. Most of music research actually goes into finding out how music generates emotions in people – what really ‘does’ it for them. Needless to say a lot of personal attributes make a lot of difference in this – the culture that we live in, our age and musical training to say the least – but music has some universal attributes as well that are able to generate some responses in us.

Some of the interesting research that’s been done on this topic has been on whether we react emotionally or cognitively to music. To put it simply – do we react to music unconsciously as part of our emotional make up or do we react to it because we recognise that this is ‘sad’ music or ‘happy’ music and then, through this thinking process, recognise that we need to accordingly feel sad or happy. Overwhelming evidence suggests that we react to music as an instinctive part of our nature, as a pure emotional response, rather than by thinking through it (which is something that we can all agree with, I suppose).

Similar research was done to find out if the melodies make more of a difference or lyrics. And it was found that in case of ‘happy’ music, the melodies caused emotional change, rather than the lyrics, while for ‘sad’ music, the lyrics actually reinforced the feelings that were experienced. But in all cases the melody made more of a difference than the lyrics (which I suppose is actually good for the Hindi film industry considering the modern lyrics!).

The social setting also makes a huge difference to how we perceive music. The best example could be the parties at K itself. As a person who doesn’t drink alcohol, I rely solely on the music to get me high, but it’s not just that – the whole atmosphere contributes to making non-drinkers feel (and look!) as high as drinkers, so much so that one cannot tell who has been drinking and who has not. (However drinkers never seem to understand how non-drinkers get so high!) We see something similar in rock concerts or even if we play music loudly enough. My personal experience is that at times like this, the music enters you, so much so that it kind of possesses you – you can feel it resonating inside you. And that gives you myriad emotions – some people cry, some just head-bang and others sway in rhythm.

But aside from all rules and research is the reaction of singers, or rather performers, to music. I honestly believe that we react to music at many different levels – that, for us, the cognitive part of our brains never shuts off when we listen to music. So while I get swayed by the emotions like anyone else, there’s another part of my brain that is always judging the song, checking to see if it is ‘singable’ or ‘performable’. Even at a concert, when I am absorbed in the music, a part of me is always thinking – “Is this person on-key? Is he on-rhythm? Can this song be replicated? Can it be done by me? What are my skill gaps if I need to sing this song?” And I come back and consciously search out any song that has caught my fancy to try to figure out how to sing it – even if I know I am never going to perform it in my life!

Honestly if we look at our reactions to music, we can never tell how we are going to react to any song. But we just go back to music everytime – to try to find ourselves, our aspirations, our feelings, our meaning in life. And therein lies the greatest power and unpredictability of music, that makes it so easy, yet so difficult to market.