Something that I've been wanting to write about...

for a long time...

Do not allow yourself to be confined by the past----and this includes the happy things as well, not only the sad/bad/unhappy/despairing/hurtful things...

Even happy things that happened....happen.......can be confining...

As always happens...

when I come across an interesting thought, all kinds of related words, sentiments, arguments pop up. Whatever I read mysteriously resonates the thought in some way or the other. My thought processes are currently engaged with the word - reinvent. To be more specific - reinvention of the person.

This exciting, scary word, and the exciting, scary possibilities it throws up, seem like a challenge someone is throwing at you. You want to retreat into your cocoon: the cocoon of comfort where you know exactly how your day is going to shape up including all that you wear/do/say/are; the enfolded, insulated wrap which gives a feeling of security.

What we discount when we weave this cocoon is that the mind is free - free to think, free to imagine, free to exercise judgment, free to believe. The mind is not encapsulated in steel, and immunized against the outside, the world.

So, the best way to be at peace with yourself, to be proud of who you are, to accept that all the years that have gone before have not been wasted-in some way or they have, in fact added to what you have now become, to believe that your experiences through every moment of every day passed and passing are not in vain...



And then reinvent yourself every day - probe, discover-rediscover, envision, and improvise yourself; formulate how you'd like your life to be...what the road ahead should look like; toss out all that hasn't worked and bring in all that you fancy, that you like, and that you want happen to you; forge out a new path every day...it's all there, inside and outside....you just have to put it together in your own special, unique, secret way...

Been in a downside...

for a bit - good to be in downsides 'cos it really makes the usual and normal seem uuuuupppppppppp! I think the most difficult thing about the downside was waiting....patiently waiting for it to pass, and not letting my mind rush ahead to when it would pass....'twill take a little more time to master this, but I figure I'm on to this secret of sitting a downside through...

I got this...

from a fave blog of mine - Vicki Archer's French Essence...

"If you obey all of the rules, you miss all of the fun..."
-- Katherine Hepburn

Applies to fashion certainly, but could also apply, in fact, to a whole lot of things...

It's so important...

for those of us who want to be good, and accepted, and in that wanting have a tendency to negate ourselves, or put ourselves down out of a deep feeling of uncertainty about ourselves or out of childhood conditioning or out of some kind of skewered reasoning, to remember these words paraphrased from Rosie Molinary's words:

Being good, or wanting to be accepted, as it turns out, isn't about pleasing. It is about being just to others while also being true to yourself

What's more, we have to keep repeating them to ourselves and keep on and on and on at them till they become a part of us...

In other words, at all times we have to learn to love and respect our lives, our wishes, our thoughts, our feelings and our dreams and desires, and all that goes into making us what we are......while doing things for others.....

In essence: Be fair in all our dealings but ensure we are being fair to ourselves too.....

I know, often there is a lot of compromising that has to be done---but we also, in being fair to ourselves, need to understand that we must not compromise ourselves totally out of the picture....we have to have our place in the compromised picture too....and a place that we can be and are proud of.....not second place....and certainly not a hidden place...

As if to reinforce this thought, I came upon this:

If you really do put a small value upon yourself, rest assured that the world will not raise your price.

~Anonymous 

A story...

I wrote:

The Red Suitcase

You'll find it at: http://www.buzzle.com/articles/the-red-suitcase.html

It's a real life story about who is today a very dear person...

Something I learnt about dignity from her was that just because you might have more than her, it doesn't mean that we can, in wanting to help her, turn her life into something she is neither comfortable with, nor is HER....no matter how difficult it is to stand in the sidelines, one has to if one loves the other person enough to preserve her dignity and if help has to be offered, it should be done very unobtrusively and quietly. What she really wants is to be accepted as she is, loved for who she is, and respected as a human being....nothing more...Conscious of her place in the family hierarchy, she wants the rest of us in the next generations to remember that and give her pride of place...

.......and it is so difficult not to love her.....really.......

If you ever need a light...

check out this beacon of hope that shines all the way from Cateura, Paraguay...

http://vimeo.com/52711779

Beautiful...

Early morning sunshine on the water...

In trying to understand...

a country which does not believe that women can have rights, especially the right to live with dignity, I came across this link:

http://www.facebook.com/notes/kunal-nagar/an-inspiration-an-autobiography-of-sohaila/138161469675620

An Inspiration, An Autobiography of Sohaila

I'm also trying to understand a country whose principal deities are all goddesses, but in daily living considers women as chattels to be treated in all ways other than with respect...

It's a strange thing...

Change...

We all know that there are aspects in us that need to be changed....we also know when things don't work out, that change is required - in our attitude, in our behaviour, in our thinking, or in the way we are. We cannot hold how we were in the past as our point of reference, because the context was different then...the context keeps changing...every day and maybe many times a day....and so we have to bring about, effect changes in us, as and how and whenever, so that we feel happy and satisfied at the way we are---for it is only and only and only then that we can bring happiness to those who we love and who love us.

Statements like...

There must be more to life than this

There has to something more than where I'm at

or others in a similar vein are futile...

We are all in exactly the place we were meant to be....

But, what we can do is to make that place a lovely one to be in...

Two thoughts...

different, but with the same solution:


A Cherokee Legend 
"Grandfather Tells" (also known as "The Wolves Within")
An old Grandfather said to his grandson, who came to him with anger at a friend who had done him an injustice, "Let me tell you a story.

I too, at times, have felt a great hate for those that have taken so much, with no sorrow for what they do. But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die. I have struggled with these feelings many times." He continued, "It is as if there are two wolves inside me. One is good and does no harm. He lives in harmony with all around him, and does not take offense when no offense was intended. He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way. But the other wolf, ah! He is full of anger. The littlest thing will set him into a fit of temper. He fights everyone, all the time, for no reason. He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great. It is helpless anger, for his anger will change nothing. Sometimes, it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me, for both of them try to dominate my spirit."

The boy looked intently into his Grandfather's eyes and asked, "Which one wins, Grandfather?"

The Grandfather smiled and quietly said, "The one I feed."


From my Kabbalah meditation---
We worry. We think about it. We over-think about it. We wade in our emotions and feelings about it. In the process the problem becomes much bigger than it is - but, in comparison to everything that is happening around us and the vastness of the universe, our problems are really the size of a grain of sand.

And so just like there is often a terrible fight between two wolves - One evil, who is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego, and the other good, who is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith, and the one we feed is the one that wins, likewise, when we focus on our problems, we feed them by thinking and over-thinking about them till they become so big that they block out everything else.

Solution: Feed only the good wolf. Do not feed the problem.

In fact, do not focus on the problem at all.....leave it be, do something else, and take another look at the problem only after an hour (at least) or two (or more).

By not feeding the issues we have in our lives with unnecessary energy, we can stop buying into the illusion that they are huge...

I hope...

that even as you set aside time for doing the zillion things that need to be done, you are also setting aside time for doing nothing...

I'd read about this concept of setting aside time for doing nothing, and while it appealed to the deeply unconventional side in me, the conventionally conditioned side would have nothing of it...but, since the idea would not let go of me, I decided to fight the conventional side....and finally actually spent time doing nothing. It was not easy, not at all, but it is getting easier slowly....I just suddenly stop at any point of time in the day and use that time on doing nothing, and best is that I'm starting to feel really good about it......and feel a lightness too...

India's braveheart...

is gone...my days and hours were spent in just trying to comrehend that kind of physical, mental, emotional, psychological pain the girl suffered....her mother's gut must have been torn out looking at her little girl....there were no words with which to pray to heal the girl or her mother or her family...

So many questions still flood the brain.....and there are no answers....

Together Nirbhaya and Malala have changed the face of womanhood.....and have forced the world to look at its women....no more and no more and no more can any girl child or teen-girl or woman be forced under the carpet or pushed behind doors or hidden away....no more....

I just hope that Nirbhaya felt that every girl in India, and possibly world over shared her terrible, terrible pain...

It's just another day...

but it's the first day of the New Year and one cannot help the quickening of the heart and the sudden intake of breath when the two needles of the clock come together on 12 and the calendar clicks to 2013...

It is just another day, but one cannot help hoping that the New Year will erase all that was sad, bad, and hurtful - no more dark or even cloudy days - and there will only be sunshine and happy days...

It's just another day, but one wishes that people all over the world will work towards peace - we just have to ensure that there is peace in our immediate vicinity, no matter where we are at the moment - and the collective effort will bring a measure of peace to the world...

It's just another day...of hope, of fear, of anticipation, of doubtfulness..........for the 365 days ahead...

It's just another day, but we can make it better for someone...and we can make it better for ourselves...