Stop the BLOODY Excuses!

My sincere apologies to anyone reading this article who is actively involved in contributing to social upliftment....engaged in selfless social service.... Or conscientiously participating or pursuing the cause of helping underprivileged sections of the society .... Irrespective of caste, religion, nationality etc.

I salute your endeavours and would love to know more about your initiatives, actions and endeavours. We need to get many more active socially responsible citizens together.

The title is not meant to insult anyone - rather it is just an excuse to attract attention. Here is another reason to get 10 minutes of your precious undivided attention: 

"She Was An Unwanted Child & Faced An Abusive Childhood. Today She Is The Mother Of 100s Of Orphans!"

INTERESTED ENOUGH TO SPARE 10 minutes? Pls read on......

The topic of the note today is to call for action.... To wake up from the crazy stupor that we call life... To rethink our duties to our society. 

PART 1: The Challenge

Here is a challenge to each one of us who claims to be good, moral and ethical citizens of the country/globe. Each person who feels that the World and Life have been kind and it is time to repay back what we have received and thus help others who are not so fortunate. 

Below is a list of reasons that we often hear or give to others and also to convince ourselves of our bounds and limitations to provide social service i.e. Our personal contribution to helping improve the lives of the poor, down-trodden and deprived: 

- I pay all my taxes and it is the job of the government to provide for food, shelter, housing and security to all citizens
- No one else does anything so why should I?
- I do not know where to begin!
- I am helpless in making a change in the society as an individual
- BEST EXCUSE - I claim that it is not possible for a single individual to change anything because there is too much bureaucracy, corruption
- I am too busy in my own problems of life with no time left to spare for others
- I would like to donate but cannot find an NGO or an Institution that is genuine or trustworthy
- There is so much corruption that my money will never reach the intended recipient
- My immediate family and professional obligations take away all my time and energy
- I am just too busy running my own individual rat-races to care a damn about anyone else
- If I have to help anyone, it will be within my larger family, community, social circle, caste, religion, town, city or country. Why should I think of helping 5000 infants who die daily of malnutrition in Africa when there are enough problems in my own immediate surroundings or social circles

Pls think for a minute if these sound familiar or there are any more that can be added to this list. Feel free to write down a few that come to your mind...the silly excuses or procrastination normally used by people to avoid going out of the way to help someone

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PART 2: The Story

This touching real life story is of a helpless and uneducated single mother who was abandoned by her husband and maternal family at the age of 20 with a just born girl around 50 years ago. She had to resort to begging on a railway platform to survive.

Read the story of this heroic lady and try to find any of the above or any new reasons/excuses that are still applicable and can prevent you from giving something back to the society.

Who says MOTHER TERESA is no more? She continues to live and serve through such heroes and mothers who dedicate their lives to selfless service.

After reading the story, pls re-read my article again.

http://www.thebetterindia.com/12867/sindhutai-sapkal-mother-of-orphans-pune-inspiring-women/

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PART 3: The Questions and actions

- Are any of the above PETTY REASONS/EXCUSES still relevant as reasons that I can truthfully give to myself or others?
- what are my obligation, responsibility as a good citizen, a righteous individual and a moral human being?
- am I conducting all of the above to the best of my capability/ability?
- Am I leading by personal example to attract more like minded and in-active members of my immediate social circles and beyond?
- Do I commit to make this small change in perspective or attitude and start believing in this statement - "The Universe just reflects back what I am within and repays in kind all my actions (right or wrong)! My life gives me joy or challenges in direct proportion to my selflessness/selfishness"

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PART 4: 

- Write down 3 actions that you personally commit to helping others
- Put a timeline and measure yourself against your commitment
- on completion go back and write down 3 further actions

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It is easy to shirk responsibility thinking that no one notices. However here are two simple reasons to avoid falling into that pitfall:

1) One can fool everyone else, but not oneself!

2) Making the world better will give a better future for our children....isn't that what I am trying very hard to do each day anyway? 

God Bless

A Raksha Bandhan Message

Raksha Bandhan - a bond of protection...pure...divine...a trust...a promise of safety and security for the trusting sister... A heartfelt prayer for the welfare and safety of the brother...a lovely tradition that has been carried out from times immemorial...the sanctity of a relation created by the Gods!

A message to all brothers who love and respect their sisters and are duty bound to protect them from any trouble or strife in life!

We often underestimate the power of Self-Esteem and Dignity. How we treat ourselves is a very accurate indicator of our perspective in dealing with others. The simple fact is that a poor self esteem will never give us the confidence ability to stand up and fight against injustice even if we are staring it in the face. We tend to become another member of the herd mentality and keep quiet when it is most important to take a stand.

The world is comprised of over 98% people who believe that they are good and are not actively committing any evil or wrong. Yet the definition of goodness cannot simply be "avoidance of wrongdoing!" 

The evil or wrong-doers are actively committing crime, fostering evil plans, harming innocent people. Hence  "Quiet or Neutral behaviour" cannot be counted as goodness.

Why is it that an evil eye cast on someone's sister or wife burns his heart...and yet his own eyes light up while staring at a stranger on the road? Take a simple example of the sharp and shameless rise in crimes against women. Infanticide, Dowry, Discrimination, Deprivation, Harrassment, Eves-dropping, Lack of Education, Forcible Prostitution, molestation, rape, Acid attacks ...the list is endless. There is no age group that can feel secure...from babies to grandmothers.. Such a shame on our culture and society! No one from the government, political parties, security agencies such as police, army,  administration, judiciary or NGOs seem it have an answer.

It is quite sad and shameful that I am posting this blog on the day of "Raksha Bandhan" which is the occasion for brothers to take an oath to protect their sisters and sisters to tie a Rakhi on their wrist while praying for success, joy and love for their brothers. 

Hence, on this day, let us all remember that an act of barbarity that we ignore or run away from may happen with a dear one and some one else may keep quiet or walk away. 

Let us make DIGNITY & RESPECT NON-NEGOTIABLE! We owe it to our mother, sisters, spouse, daughters and let us stand up and collectively get rid of this virus from our society.

Let us take an oath to cleanse our society of this scourge of evil crime against the female gender. 

Happy RAKSHA-BANDHAN!

The search continues!!

Past, Future and Present Tense!

The downing of a civilian passenger plane by a missile has provoked a huge outcry in the world community and justifiably so -  A fine line has been crossed and the fear is that there is no going back now.

Close to 300 innocent and absolutely clueless lives were vaporised in an instant when the surface-to-air missile chased and ruthlessly hunted the defenceless aircraft at a height over 32,000 feet (10 km or 6 miles) from the surface of the earth. These victims came from many countries across the world and hence there has been a universal outcry of shock and grief.

In a very cruel twist of fate, the crashed plane was a Boeing 777-200ER, the same model as that of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, which disappeared while travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in March 2014.

Investigations are piecing together a theory that this probably was the case of a mistaken identity i.e. This was not the intended target. Even if we were to reach that conclusion, we would need a brave person to present the findings to all the families of the lost souls.

The biggest mistake that WILL be made eventually is to treat these two tragedies as disconnected unfortunate coincidence. Be as it may appear to the logical mind, it is critical that lessons are learnt from here. Our world is currently in the throes of relentless violence all across which is surely not a coincidence. If it isn't the endless strife in the name of freedom, there are innumerable separatist movements raging in multiple regions in the name of religion or other ill-founded causes.

The two horrendous World Wars that we faced in the last century were power struggles on the lines of regional conflicts that escalated into a global crises. The victors of those wars felt justified in going on a mission of weapons production the likes of which had never ever been witnessed in the millions of years of our planet's History. Their pretext was to have adequate self defence capabilities and they hired the topmost brilliant politicians, consultants and lawyers to coin a new term - DETERRENCE (can be defined as the use of threats by one party to convince another party to refrain from initiating some course of action).

This resulted in a bewildering race to amass and horde all sorts of imaginable and unimaginable types of weaponry that would be sufficient to reconvert our precious planet into one of the trillions of lifeless objects floating across the universe.

What is emerging out of all this turmoil is a new world order where sense and logic have taken the back seat or even maybe have been thrown out of the car for good riddance. We are hurtling from one crisis to another. The haves and have-nots are juxtaposed in a very fraught eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with just a wink separating our lives from becoming vaporised. Today it isn't just countries with technical know-how or economic might who can claim to hold and control the precious knowledge of making nuclear or chemical weapons.

The world is indeed a very small place now - anyone sitting anywhere can throw a stone and pluck out a huge plane carrying hundreds of souls out of the sky and then say "I didn't do it... Check my hands... They are clean!"

The world is also a very accessible place thanks to proliferation of technology. We have a briefcase in which codes can be entered by an individual that can annihilate our entire planet in the matter of a few minutes. The irony of the situation is that at the end of it, there will be no hand left to show and no eye left to check cleanliness.

Let's hold this thought for a moment and take a different perspective into account here:

1) Mother Earth provides ample provisions for each and every living creature. She charges no tax, creates no boundaries, does not differentiate between man and animal

2) Her love and care extends seamlessly to existing and non-existing entity. She provides all necessary means for survival through a delicate self balancing miracle of Nature

3) She has no WMDs, Nuclear weapons, Chemical weapons, Missiles, Rockets or chemical weapons because she understands her and our unique position in the Universe - for all the scientific progress that we have made, there is no current evidence of any other life form existing anywhere else save our planet

4) In her compassionate loving heart, there are no religions or ethnic divisions, no governments or rebels, no rich or poor, no need space for evil, greed, hatred or terror

5) She nurtures and cares for the tiniest and the largest, the weakest and the strongest by treating all equally

6) Her heart breaks, her tears flow, her soul cries upon seeing her own children create these artificial differences of nationality, religion, status, power and use these to hurt, maim, kill, destruct and destroy one another and also our own Mother!

7) She cannot comprehend as to exactly what is missing in her ever giving, ever caring and ever loving nature. She yet tries to silently soak in all the pain, anguish, suffering as much as she possibly can. She sobs silently while mankind plunders, loots, burns and ravages her every moment

8) Global Warming, Deforestation, extinction of precious species of animals, uncontrolled exploration and exploitation of natural and precious resources, uncontrolled weaponisation are all challenging the fragile balance of Nature and steadily pushing her to a point of no return

9) What we term as the fury of Mother Nature is just her fearful and confused misery on account of the unimaginable destruction that mankind is unleashing on her from all directions

To bring together the two perspectives is an eye opening realisation that we are slowly but steadily navigating ourselves towards self-destruction. There have been two largely covered near-misses of nuclear wars in recent decades and they both required a massive doze of luck to be avoided.

Unless we learn and urgently implement the lessons of the PAST, our FUTURE as a living planet is under tremendous threat and hence our PRESENT (is) TENSE!

The choice as always is ours to make!!

Day 92 - Happiness is a "Happy Father's Day"

#100HappyDays/ Day92

Happiness is "being blessed with the best parents in the world"

How do I begin...... Let me keep it simple....

Thank you so much God for blessing me with the best ever parents. I have always felt your presence in my life through mom and dad ever since I remember. Their love, blessings and care for me have always been special and all encompassing.

It is natural for children to look up to and respect their parents. It is no different in my case. As I look back through my life memories, there are so many that pop out and shout for attention. I could literally write a book ...and probably will... Detailing the wonderful kaleidoscope of Eastman colour tinted memories of childhood that have remained fresh on my heart, mind and soul. Here's a sample just for tasters:

- I was my father's boy and used to be always stuck with him. The moment we (me and my younger brother Vivek) woke up, he would be shaving while getting ready to go to work. We would go and joyfully cling up to him asking to be picked up. He would then have to put some shaving cream on our faces and pretend shave us.

- He enjoyed rubbing his stubble on our faces and we loved being tickled by him

- We were monkeys copying all his actions. I would observe him driving and then try to pretend drive the car without the keys :) Sundays we would wait for him to start his preparations for the week ahead... Ironing his clothes and polishing his shoes. As soon as he had completed his work, he had two customers waiting for him with their school dresses and shoes!

- Dinner was special with dad sitting on the ground... Us two chimps running all around the house and running upto him every couple of minutes for him to feed us and then we would resume the run-around through the house

- Being the 3rd of 4 children, I still demanded and forcefully got his complete time and attention - there was no concept of sharing when it came to the love and pampering of Dad. I fiercely wanted to be and still believe that I am the favourite child of my parents... No apologies to my siblings...you gotta want it bad to beat me!

- Every evening, when he came back from work, he barely got time to change his clothes before I wanted to lie with my head on his lap and then he had to rub my back for as long as I wanted. I still crave for those back-rubs.

- We had this fun game where I would twist his nose, lips, chin, eyebrows and he would contort his face as if I was moulding it.

- Dad used to drive from office directly to my school to pick me up. Once he got late and I was not used to be kept waiting and so walked home a mile as a 4 year old. In his panic at not seeing me at the school, poor dad went home, came back to the school and went back home before I reached home. I won't really say what happened after that.... Your guess is as good as my silent confession

- For me, Dad has always been my hero and role model. Everything good that I am today is because of the example that he set for me through his impeccable values. I always observed him closely and wanted to do everything the way he would do it.

- I have seen all through my life, dad and mom being strict and disciplined on their own personal expenses just to ensure that we never had anything missing in our upbringing. Education and correct values were their two focus areas.

- Dad is the best DIY champ that I have ever seen. There was never a problem that he couldn't solve. From cooking, sewing, mending broken toys, first aid, fixing electrical appliances, gardening, car mechanics, plumbing, pottery....name a problem and he would find a way to solve it. Dad is the best magician I have ever seen because all his magic tricks are genuine

- I am still amazed how he could solve every broken thing without having had special education/training. He would sleep on an unsolved problem and invariably find the solution the next day. He confessed getting solutions in his dreams because his attitude was to never give up.

- I still revere the lessons he has taught me by just living life the way he has. His life has been a story of sacrifice of all personal delights to raise a family as the single bread winner.

- I however take complete responsibility for all negative qualities of mine,,, these are all a consequence of me straying away from his footsteps

I could go on and on Dad and Mom... But there aren't enough words in the world which can express your importance in my life. All I will say is that you aren't just my parents in this life... You have always been and will continue to be my guiding lights and loving parents/gurus across lifetimes.

Happy Father's Day mom and dad... as I told my mom today while wishing her... "Dad couldn't be celebrating a Father's Day without her in our lives"... I owe her a separate blog/book....

And the wheels of time keep churning relentlessly. I rode through my childhood on the broad shoulders of my "giant" dad... Idolising him...even basing my signature on his signature. Life kept moving us through phases of childhood, adolescence, adulthood, separation from parents, marriage....the bond though is of the soul and just gets stronger every day.

And now my parents are my kids... They are grey, bent and ginger, I shout at them for their weaknesses when they would just hug me for my mistakes... I dearly pray to god to keep them healthy and peaceful...they remain my pride, joy and love...they are the lighthouses and beacons who have guided me home through all the storms of life. They still dote on me just as they did when I was a baby in their arms. It is my turn now to pamper them and shower them with love and attention.

I can't claim to love them the same though..... My love and respect has just grown a lot more... I realise how precious they are...how special their blessings and love are for me... How important their smiles are...How they are God's special angels in my life and how I will always be grateful for their love.

I speak this on behalf of my brothers and sister....

Happy Father's Day to mom and dad... as I told my mom today while wishing her... "Dad couldn't be celebrating a Father's Day without her in our lives"...

I owe mom a separate blog/book....

P.S. I look forward to the next back-rub Dad.

Day 91 - Happiness is a new journey towards self realisation

If you have lived your life during the 1980's in India, you would probably be familiar with the famous TV serial Mahabharat which used to be telecast each Sunday morning. Many of you would may have also heard about or read the greatest epic poem in the world.

The purpose of the entire story of Mahabharat is to present it's Crown Jewel i.e. "BHAGWAD GITA" on a glittering pedestal so that the lustre would mesmerise, illuminate and educate the world for millenniums innumerable.

Mahabharat is the greatest story every made to illustrate the perpetual conflict between good and evil... In this case it was converted into a no-ends barred apocalypse conflict between proponents of righteousness "Dharma" versus the tyrants perpetuating endless "Adharma"or evil.

BHAGWAD GITA forms the essence of philosophy of life as taught by Lord Sri Krishna to the greatest warrior Arjuna on the day of the most catastrophic war of all times. Upon seeing his entire family split into two warring armies, Arjuna loses his nerve and refuses to fight. His charioteer, Sri Krishna is then seen as imparting the BHAGWAD GITA to him, thus explaining the secret of the origin of the universe, presence and purpose of a soul within each one of us, our connection with the universe and the purpose of our existence. 

In a nutshell Sri Krishna tells him that it is his highest duty to fight the war and demolish the evil enemy in order to re-establish righteousness once again in the world.

It is a very complex and deep rendering of philosophy in very simple and practical terms in order to make it understandable and digestible to the common man. There is no binding of faith, social status, religion, caste or creed... The philosophy is available for anyone who seeks to explore and understand reasons of existence rather than merely exist.

This a a televised version of BHAGWAD GITA currently being showcased as part of Mahabharat on Star Plus channel.

The concepts taught over 5000 years ago are timeless in their relevancy and still astound most scholars by their mere depth and breadth of wisdom. In my earnest opinion, this is the best opportunity for our next generation to connect with the amazing rich heritage of our civilisation.

Through this Facebook event, I intend to share one episode at a time of Sri Krishna sharing his divine knowledge with his dear disciple and friend, Prince Arjuna.

I request you all to spare a mere 30 minutes a day at your convenience and re-acquaint yourselves with BHAGWAD GITA .... The divine path of living life.

Pls send in your comments, observations, reflections, learnings or even questions in the comments. 

We can all learn a lot through this single action of collectively watching and learning BHAGWAD GITA.

God Bless

Love n Light

Sent from my iPad

Day78 - Happiness is "being gently guided back on the right path"

My dearest friend Taruna Gupta has been an integral part of my life for over 23 years now. Our friendship has grown and so has the complete trust we share in each other.

Recently, on a chat, she asked me about my criteria for selecting my #100HappyDays moments. Instinctively I felt that here was a teacher who was trying to gently guide her student.

She had observed two glaring missing happy day moments that I had not posted. She was unsure if it was just a miss or if I genuinely did not intend to post these meeting with my dear friends on my challenge posts.

Instead of complaining or being upset, she put a simple question to me. Here was a lovely example of a guide pointing out correction of course but in a beautiful manner which made the learning all the more acceptable.

Life is a string of years lived one moment at a time and once the time has passed, it is very difficult to bring it back or to undo hurts, mistakes, speak unspoken words, communicate through the eyes or through silence. Hence, in my hope of doing justice to those two special moments of joy, I postponed my task of posting these cherished moments on the same day. Once the moment had gone, it never came back - such is the flow of life that "time and tide wait for none!"

Luckily for me, my mistake was noticed by Taruna and today I have another opportunity to learn my lesson and correct my errors. She gave me the precious lesson of "Living in the here and now!"

God bless you Taruna.

I am grateful to God for giving me so many gurus, guides, mentors and teachers in my life. They say "when the student is ready, the master appears." In my case, each moment of my life is a learning opportunity, each person I meet is a teacher, each interaction teaches me more about myself, the way of living, being open, letting go of my ego, connecting with the universe and communicating with my inner self.

Day81 - Happiness is "the presence of angels in the form of children in our lives"

I relate back to a recent conversation with a mother and teenage daughter who are very dear to me. In this instance, the child was protesting at being shouted upon and rebuked for a mistake. She agreed to being at fault but repeatedly insisted "instead of being harsh, you could have gently pointed out my fault and I would have understood".

The aggrieved mother had her own issues with the child being disobedient and reacting strongly. She related numerous instances of the child being careless and lazy in matters of studies and being very picky and choosy about food. I do know for a fact that they both share an incredible bond of true love and mutual trust.

In my observation, the pressures and stresses of life have actually hardened us all to a certain degree. We are often stressed out and under pressure, we end up taking out our frustrations on the easiest targets - our loved ones who often don't have a clue as to why they they are under attack all of a sudden. Young children, spouses, old parents and siblings fit the bill perfectly. In most cases, they put up with this injustice to a point and then they end up reacting in the same manner.

Children are the most precious gifts of God and he entrusts them to us to nurture and raise with pure love and utmost care. In return, children bring us all the joy and love that anyone could ever hope for. They fill our lives with treasures of crackling laughter, twinkling mischiefs, blissful hugs and soulful kisses. Their pure angelic souls reflect the presence of God amongst us. They show us what complete trust and true love we were all born with and are still capable of giving and receiving.

And then we happen to them!

From souls, they become names; from our good and bad virtues they become personalities; from society they get a religion, a caste, a status, a creed; from innocence they convert into egos; from being empty handed and naked at birth they get needs and desires and possessions.

Children are sensitive, delicate saplings that are planted in our lives. They absorb all their good and bad virtues by copying, reflecting and absorbing everything from the environment consisting of family, teachers, friends and society. It is us who are responsible for their successes, self confidence, attitude and behaviour. Conversely, they will equally absorb our egos, lies, frustrations, limitations, failures and fears. We mould them in our own reflections through genuine intent or by innocent, unintended behaviour, attitudes or actions.

So my checklist of items necessary to be imparted to children by way of self-practice consists of:

Values, Virtues, good manners, soft and sweet language, caring, compassion, consideration, sharing, respect, trust, pursuit of knowledge and wisdom, love, truthfulness, simplicity, peace, self realisation, spirit of service, godliness, lack of ego, treating everyone equally, sense of responsibility.......

Coming back to the little argument between our dear mother-daughter. It took me some time to patiently hear both sides of the argument from them and to replay the contrasting viewpoints to each of them gently and for them to resolve this disagreement. All it required was for both of them to calm down, express their own perspective and understand the perspective of the other.

The conversation ended with the mother spending many minutes proudly relating all the excellent virtues and numerous achievements of her daughter in studies, dancing, martial arts, roller skating, crafts, public speaking and sports. The young child was so happy to hear how proud her mother and promised to improve in her behaviour and eliminate the minor faults in her attitude.

It could have so easily escalated into a long drawn full-blown argument.

God bless them both and all parents and their lovely children.