9 ways the habit of Jogging transformed me

Why jogging, of all things, I wanted to write about?

Firstly, jogging comes as one of the only activities I enjoy most doing in my otherwise boring life. Secondly, in the world of “who build the faster processor”, only activities like running, eating, JOGGING, and writing makes sense, if at all any, to my well being.

So, here are the 9 things I perceive as the outcomes of my daily jogging habit.

1) This long, luxurious, and self-gratifying life is going to make you depressed.

What I mean as depression is not what you feel when your favorite cricket team loses a T20 match. It’s rather, you’re turned into an emotional pressure cooker with its cap on, and the lid feels like blowing up anytime, as your mind, like a hung computer, plays repeatedly every irrational fear, worry, and confusion that you have been fed from mother’s womb to your tomb. And you would wonder whether killing yourself is the easiest way to shut the mind down, and sometimes afraid that you may even commit one.

But, every day, a dosage of 30 minutes run can help with you this neurosis. As every time the running releases the dopamine neurotransmitter in the blood stream, the delusional, impatient, craving, and instinctual self comes back to the absolute reality of calmness. As soon as you freed from this emotional rut, you would feel instantly all light. And you tell yourself, laughing,  “Man, you’re a fool to hang yourself up”. “Just relax, that’s why politicians, extremists, and corporate are there for”.

And jogging make you feel light every time, exceptionally cleaner & efficient, than what a pack of cigarettes or sleeping pills, or whiskeys can do. Plus, you don’t smell bad or suffer nausea and stomach cancer.

2) All essential things in the world are free.

You don’t require a warmed-up swimming pool or a gym with noisy music. All you need is a pair of sweat-absorbing clothes and running shoes (although I increasingly read that bare foot running is the natural way). And from park to city sidewalks there are plenty of places for runners to explore — at no cost. Even if you travel a lot, it’s still easy to pack your running shoes and run while you’re on the road (but preferably on early morning, because there is more chance that you will not be run over by the “career people” who are always in rush as if they need to put the earth back in its orbit, while feeding it some more carbons).

An optimum amount of jogging/walking activity coupled with a bit of bending and stretching, after or before the run, is all it takes. And, add a few pull-ups & push-ups to it, you have got yourself a mini yoga or something like that. And hey, if you are the guy who worries about your appearance, for giving and receiving of love (or sex?), jogging does not do a bad job to your butt, hip, thigh, and tummy. Also, the sweat and fresh air won’t hurt, either. But, on a more relevant note, the aerobic activity, will open-up your heart & lungs and ensure the efficient flow of blood and oxygen throughout your body.

3) Eating right is your medicine.

I come from a place where we eat rice, more rice and then some. For generations, we do this, for breakfast, for lunch, and for dinner, without ever losing the appetite for it. But the problem with that is though, along the way, our plate of food become almost entirely whitish, lacking a colorful of variety. And, crucially, not only just we lost our forefather’s all-round diet plan but also never understood the hoax of modern vitamin and protein pills.

Moreover, in this maddening city life, the rice-sambar diet is barely enough even to carry out your daily personal & professional drama, let alone it cheers you up at 5 am in the winter cold. And jogging will backfire on you big-time, if you don’t consume enough calories to help your body recover after every workout. The longer you run, the more you worry about your intakes of proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, fats, etc, especially if you're a vegan. And this injury fear and fatigue would push your plate to become more colorful, with fruits, vegetables, sprouts, nuts, etc. Not only just that, you may also now cook your own dinner. And living in cooler place like Bangalore, jogging is an ideal workout for sufficient water intake (and for occasional beer too, as hydration!) necessary for your body.

4) Sleeping enough is your energy.

Exercise and sleep are inherently linked with each other. How you sleep influences how you exercise, and how you exercise influences how you sleep. Anything less than 7-8 hours night sleep is not going to be enough to self-repair your bodily system that you always use up insensitively.

If you are 5 am jogger, it may set your body clock so that you are wide awake during the day and sleepy at night. Plus it may help you to relax and go to sleep more easily, even in this device age, where we load & process tons of data, that when we go to bed, our brain refuses to stop processing balance sheets. And exercising outdoors, which lifts mood and relieves stress, can be highly beneficial if you are suffering from disease like insomnia.

5) Your morning can make or break your day

The 5-8 am, with the unruffled mind and silent neighborhood, is claimed to be the most productive hours of a day. And the 40 minutes of the physical activity could just act central in these hours for the nourishment of physical, emotional and mental system of your body.

While the workout, follows from the good night sleep, primarily helps me out to have proper detoxification and planned food diet, the brimming energy that follows from it, lightens up the mood so much that I can cheerfully go and spend the rest of the morning with some of the most demanding activities like meditation, reading and writing, which is to help myself emotionally and mentally.

And you don’t feel the improved mood & energy level not just for those three hours but for the entire day that you may go and earn your bread and butter without being too cynical.

6) The discipline of Jogging helps your immune system

Jogging is, of course, not an occasional event. Being a routine outdoor activity, Jogging will always help you to get, even if it’s a little, some cold winter mornings, some evening monsoon rains, and some scorching summer heats and even some muggy weathers in between. And as you are exposed to these extreme conditions, your natural immune system, because of your discipline, is prepared & improved to protect you from these conditions, as you become a little more of street boy.

Of course, it doesn’t mean that you won’t catch any infections at all. But, you would surely experience far fewer colds or flu since taking up running. And the relevant part here is that, with proper rest and diet, you can send now these germs packing on your own. The last time I needed any antibiotic is some 15 months back. Science says that light or moderate running boosts our body’s natural immune system by circulating protective cells through the body faster.

7) It teaches Mindfulness

Every day after waking up, the first thing I do is that I go through my regrets of yesterday and the anxieties of today & tomorrow, which would usually send my insecure self into a defensive shell every time. And as I start my run with this unconscious & grumpy mood, my jaws goes automatically tight, the shoulder gets hunched, the spine gets bent and the neck feels stiff. And I hurry through longer strides, with heals getting beaten up by the asphalt. And because of this body posture, the entire body now loads on knees, and the resulting drag would wear me down. 
Moreover, the wandering mind, not aware of what’s going on around, would also make me frequently bump into the pockets of grandmas and uncles, who are all over the track and lost, in the gossips on politicians & actresses. And when this resulting small burst of irritation, comes from the lack of flow of run, reaches the physical discomfort being felt already, all hell will break loose.

But this enormous physical & emotional discomfort during the unconscious running, would, sooner or later, alert you that something is wrong. And as you sense it, you mindfully straight your back up, and start landing on your toes, while listening to your breaths. You slowly take back your body load into hip, while allowing your jaw, shoulder, and neck to relax. As the body posture is being corrected, the half smile now slowly comes back on your face. And that's it, you are now experiencing the activity to its fullest. 
Jogging always involves attention and awareness, and teaches you them until you completely learn to run mindfully.

8) It is a socialization tool

Some runners, like me, enjoy the quiet and solitude of running on their own, but others see running time as social opportunities. While I have no idea how good the activities like partying & travelling are, finding a running buddy or group, who share the same obsession, and working out with him/them is surely a great way to develop a sense of community. Running group is also a great way to stay motivated to run. Even a simple smile from a stranger girl around can out power the best energy drink in the world!

Also, regular runners report an increase in their confidence and self-esteem. In fact, one of my colleagues, after his first half-marathon, has gone and inspired his entire housing society now to run with him.

9) “Ah just felt like runnin.”

Running marathon is a world cup event for every hobby jogger. Not just because you have this abundant love for running, but also, as I secretly believe, every runner, by his nature, cares about social issues. He runs always for something bigger than himself.

But, Marathon is a serious endurance race, and, in fact, a voluntary suffering. During marathon, your legs, heart, and lung hurt up to a point, where all your senses would get confused of the sensitivity, and make the brain to shut down the body as an emergency procedure. And,while this, the temperament of the self would be reaching its humblest point, stripping down all its arrogance & prejudices in each step you take for the last 5 of the 42 kilometers. Your emotion get all too soft that you would feel like crying.

Thus, marathon=training. Beginners need to log at least 40 miles per week for 5-6 weeks to increase the chance that they will have a good race experience. And the regular jogging habit can help you to achieve this. Each week, you’ll add a little more distance in your run, and progress towards your half/full marathon goal. While I took 5 hours 15 minutes to finish my first full marathon last year, my routine jogging habit helped me this time to complete in 4 hours 40 minutes.

PS: The blog does not indent to mean that jogging is the one stop solution for all our issues in life. I think, in fact, there’s no such solution. And even if I sounded like that, it’s only because, my writing skill need further emotional workout.

Also, before starting your new jogging/walking routine, please check with physiotherapist and the concerned doctors on what your system can safely handle. I started my marathon training only after my full body medical check-up was cleared.

The final confession of a lost soul

The ignorant sky is beginning to weep now in the emotional aftermath of dying sun. And so, darkness & silence establish themselves in the forest after a long day. The pouring rain has been piercing into the wounds of my chest as if to clean my soul deep inside. However, my tangled body gets a proper rain bath, performing its own last rites in the battle field.

"O death, won’t you come? Won’t you come soon and set me free?"

I think I had decades to think about how my end would come. Dying alone in this desolated mangrove, giving my chest to bullets, is what i had already pictured myself. I wonder though how I still breathe with five shots. Nonetheless, death gets only familiar for a man who readily wore cyanide capsule around his neck to commit suicide in case of capture by enemy, anytime.

I have seen them all - Power, charisma and fame, yet it should not end like this, “So little done, so much to do”, you know. But the reality is that it’s all over for us, along with the dream of achieving our statehood. I had just led my last brigade of soldiers to fight, whose strewn bodies are now coloring the rain water into red.

Ironically, I have somehow managed myself to die as the last fighter of this decade old rebellion movement. Perhaps a leader should finish what he starts. Isn't it?

The loneliness & defeat are all over me, as I have been lying down here shot into pieces. I have got one foot in the grave for almost a day now. The dead bodies strewn across the bushes makes me fear if my best friend is dead already. They gradually let it slip that someone must lost a husband; someone lost a son; someone a father, and numerous are themselves. The glimpse of corpses does not fail to remind me the awful truth of how my wife & children might have been murdered by now. They don’t deserve to die, nor do any of these of people for that matter.

What I've done, my lord? Why all of a sudden this rush of sorrow is flowing through me, ripping my heart out?

I never felt anything like this, even when I sent my brother to be a suicide bomber, or when sending children & women to bleed in the front line. Perhaps the fact that my lung is now guaranteed no more than a few breaths has finally opened me to my human terms that I had abandoned long time ago? It’s interesting what thoughts come to your mind in the last hours of your life.

Still, there’s no better place to review your life than in your deathbed. To settle it once and for all, with all honesty and transparency. It’s a special place finally where you find the idea of possessing power, material and fame goes totally meaningless. Not till we are lost do we begin to really find ourselves. It’s ironic, isn't?

“O my poor soul, tell me why do we do the things that we do?” "I know that deathbed confession is too little, too late. But the reviewer inside me demands answer".

As you know, the question is that how I came in to this world as an innocent human, except that only now leaving not quite the same. 

Why am I hunted down now like a dog? I am dying now like a beast.

Why? “Is it my fate?” “Is it an accident?” “Is it a chance?” No. No, it is my choice. I chose violence for our freedom struggle. I made up my mind that only with gun I could take them down. It's just that i didn't know then that violence doesn't determine who is right, only who is left.

“Why didn't we hit them back?” I furiously asked my father as a 12 year old boy, seeing my minority community was unfairly targeted by the army. I remember thinking, “I should go and kill the person that did this”. I remember the hatred building up in me. To realize now, it is all coming down to that moment. You know, all my life can be attributed to that single thought by which we established ourselves, by terror, physically and physiologically to get our rights back.

A man is what he thinks all day. And I thought for all my life that revenge, hatred & anger are the only way to solve any problem. I made up my mind that our rights, culture & independence are much more dignified than our existence itself. We considered martyrs as god. So Humanity came only after our principles. I, the leader, wanted freedom in unhealthy and obsessive way.

Life & its situations are your thoughts, unfolding step by step whether you like it or not. You are made or unmade by the thoughts you choose & encourage. They are factual data, verifiable to every single event in your life. 

It is the nature of thought to find its way into action. As the result of what I have thought & done in the 30 years of the bloodiest civil war, I had knowingly or unknowingly started making my own way to this graveyard, finally where I struggle even for a lungful of air now. Your thoughts decide your character only which leads you to your life's circumstances. Thus I now walk out of my life leaving a case study of how the forces of thought and elements of the mind decide & mould your character, circumstances, and destiny.

Man is a growth by law, and his life functions by the logical system of “cause and effect”. One is always the result of the other. The circumstance of a human being dying like a beast is not a coincidence or fate. It’s because I lived like a beast which grew out of my ideology. Reality is a product of our thought, decisions & actions.

As a thinking animal, you live, you die, you love, you hate, you reject, and you embrace because of the excuses and decisions you make. Nothing is meant to be. Everything that happens in our life does have a logic reason whether we want to see it or not. I know I could easily have been that father who walks his daughter to school every day.

Moreover, Life and its circumstances are not what make you. Instead, it reveals to you what kind of person you really are, and what kind of life you have lived so far. It just measures you by the way you react to it.

When I started to fight the enemy, life threw me two choices: Either die taking revenge on him or live defending your own people’s lives. I decided to free ourselves by having our control over the enemy. Thus i chose guns & bombs, thinking it could kill only enemies. But when you make any choice you have to live with its consequences. You take the responsibility for the outcome. Sadly, the outcome now is that how my whole community has been flatted and how our entire families are wiped out.

All the time I was blaming the outside conditions for the problem I had inside me. Indeed, the relentless suffering from the enemy drew all my people against a common foe. But my enemy alone doesn't decide the final choice of weapon I take to fight him. It’s my ignorance to an extent. As a man, we have the power to determine what we think & act about in all our predestined life.

In the end if you see, the enemy is after all an excuse for the circumstances you are in. If you ever want to differ from your enemy it’s only by means of your attitude towards him & his events. We might have been hunted like animals, but we never should have become one of them. He wanted power & control, and so did i. And he wanted them by killing his opponents, and so did i too. It was like trying to solve a problem by the same thinking which was used to create it.

We might have been mercilessly annihilated by the enemy now, but who had set it up for them perfectly? The problem is not how he intends to kill you but how you let him to do that. It's about how you can save yourself. You cannot expect your enemy to be kind because he ain't Buddha or Gandhi but a human turned beast. You never really have an effective control anything other than you. As a human being you create your storms and sun shines.

The truth is that you are buffeted by circumstances so long as you believe yourself to be a creature affected by outside condition.

Of all creatures, human alone jeopardize his own life, while all others succumb to fate. As a creative being, we have key to every situation in our life. Of all the creatures in the universe, man alone has the ability to choose or create or master the condition he needs to survive. His control over his life and its events is decided by how he uses his mind to its potential. This ability is part of what makes him human. Only five sense animals need to adapt to their environment they are provided, in order keep them alive and safe. They cannot create their life.

Man can survive any condition as he thinks. His only disability is his attitude.

I now realize that it’s the job of thinking leaders not to be on the side of executioners. All war is a symptom of man’s failure as the thinking animal. Without my rational mind, I willingly believed what I wished. To be honest, I had chances to stop the war a long before now. The millions of my people were ready to follow me even to death only because they wanted to live safely. But I dragged them to my violence solution thorough the emotions of patriotism and pride, which are way overrated by any culture. My people didn't think, nor were they allowed to, before they took weapons. But then any mediocre idea that generates enthusiasm & adrenaline rush prevails longer than any truth that doesn't. 

Honestly, I should have searched freedom & peace in my mind and its thoughts, not merely in boundaries, or power. Without my violence ideology, Hundreds of thousands of my people would have had at least their life even if not the so called independent land. They had only started killing my people, but I factually asked them to continue it by killing theirs.

You know, I have got struck now on the regrets of things that I should have done, and the things that I never should have done. The principle of military never harmonizes with peace. Taking weapon to defend you from beasts is different from finding arms to avenge one. You should fight for the existence, not for revenge or control because when you take revenge you dig two graves.

How could I rise up to peace when I still dwelled into the thoughts of killing people? You know that you would not go any higher than you think. We don’t attract what we want, but what we are.

The fact was that that I took gun to release my people from the enemy. But only gradually did I realize that I used it to acquire more power. I was the sole leadership to tell my people what to do. 

Until the ambition in mind ends, peace never begins. The hungry for power & control became a stumbling stone to my self realization.

To know that how the tens of thousands of people are now being killed for no living reasons; To think that how the millions of people had to live as refuge years after years, whose struggles of getting daily food and water was often hopeless against the minefields and crossfire; To think that how those children forced to learn guns & bombs instead of bicycle & science; To realize that how the years of our freedom efforts resulted into martyrs graveyards now; I understand that the violence can’t even be a choice in pursuing your life.

The war was not worth it. It was a battle fought by forgotten soldiers over nothing.

Now having seen all these turmoil and hardships, I realize that non violence is not a bad way at all to fight for freedom. At least, you would be able to be alive to enjoy it if you ever achieve by it. At least, you would live & die like a human. A true victory is winning your freedom without having victims.

Whether you are ascending above to humane perfection or descending below to the beast level is purely the choice of our thoughts, what you think. I realize now, looking back, I did not fight my enemy, I fought myself, the enemy was in me. My thoughts were the weapons drenched in the poison of emotions.

If only I had watched, controlled and altered my thoughts upon others, and upon my life, and circumstances, linking cause and effect, many of our lives would have been alive to rise up when the sun shines tomorrow, instead of serving a feast to eagles & foxes now.

“As you think so you are; as you continue to think, so you remain”. 

As they call themselves the thinking creatures, I hope that the mankind will one day find enough reason and sense to settle their differences without cutting throats. Peace cannot be hunted like this. It can only be created in mind.

A sixth sense-sheep!

Dear Teacher Buddha,

Greetings from the 21^st century!

First of all, i would like to express my deepest gratitude for inspiring human minds through last one hundred generation. i am grateful to have you as my teacher.

Seeing that you never considered yourself to be something other than a human being- an awakened one, i could hold my nerve here, and speak out my story sound. At least you know what it feels to be an ignorant human.

Since my childhood i had always considered myself that I was my own person, and i did what i thought i wanted to do in life. i assumed that some combination of knowledge, career, money, fame and love will drive away all of my woes. However, what i saw soon was that, in fact, they had made me miserable. My life didn't grow up the way i needed it to. In reality, it had become the way i wanted it, and never was really enough. i declared my life was worthless.

As going through the lifeless life whilst my mind was gulping some gallons of ignorance, one day, completely out of blue, i came across to this thought of yours, teacher Buddha.

“Do not believe me because you see me as your teacher. Don’t believe me because others do. And don’t believe anything because you've read it in a book, either. Don’t put your faith in reports, or tradition, or hearsay, or the authority of religious leaders or texts. Don’t rely on mere logic, or inference, or appearances, or speculation. Believe nothing unless it agrees with your own reason and your own commons sense.”

i was spellbound. i went again & again, word by word. Everything now had made sense with those 74 words. i had finally found the disease i was suffering from. And it was just that somehow i had started living someone else’s life along the way.

My mind didn't have a diet plan in the first place. It seems that i fed it thoughts from anyone & everywhere, without putting them into toxicity test. Thus i developed an obese mind, causing all the pains to me and others.

The beauty of human is his innocence, and it seemed i had lost it. i realized that all the hatred, warring, graveling and manipulation were my own doing. They came out of my own mind, out of my confusion, my insecurity and my ignorance, as I didn't awake to my own truth because I continued to live a lie, a life led by the thoughts & demands of others.

The world was so much organized and regulated with rules & conditions, and i saw it as a template for my living. It was a lockstep program of do’s & don’ts.

i followed what majorities followed. i accepted what the society believed. i adored who they acclaimed, and i criticized who they disapproved. i was comfortable with not knowing things for myself. And as if that are not enough there's this media indoctrination that decides what type & level of knowledge i would ultimately acquire.

As you taught, the problem here was not just that i believed in some prepackaged & easy to swallow story by people but the fact that i accepted them to be true without my own examining. If everyone liked something, then i felt it was necessarily likable. Plain & simple.

It was like how a parent would inquire about the groom by everyone in the village, except knowing through the groom himself.

I just failed to understand that people always told their versions of story. Someone said about other person was twisted from the total reality as his judgments were based on his likes & dislike, knowledge, ambition, experience and leaning of his own mind. They were always less than the truth. They were always subjective.

Instead of finding my life’s simple truth and reality, in all my emotions & feelings I imagined; I assumed; I believed; I expected; I speculated; I wished; I covered up the truths &  facts by just following the light of others, because the actual version came naked, and tasted bitter.

As you said, there actually in everything is something real, genuine and true for me to see, and seeing for myself what’s true is really the only way that I can genuinely know anything.

For instance, how i used to lose my sleep in fear when i was a kid believing in all the ghost stories i heard. i wouldn't have had that irrational fear or confusion if only i allowed myself to venture out in that dark and find out myself if those ghosts were real. I could have known then that they were just stories made up of people’s imagination. The problem was that I didn't suspend my criticisms & judgments until I genuinely knew about things.

As you say, “Truth can’t be expressed in words. It can only to be experienced. It’s directly seeing truth itself, prior to forming or hearing any ideas about it. Reality and truth are self evident.”

I did create distinction out of my own mind and believed them to be true. Thus the non verifiable & non factual truth ultimately brought me an incorrect perception about my life. Thus I gifted me confusions. I lost myself in the persuasion of power, materials, knowledge and fame believing society would judge me better.  And I was put out to prove myself to people whom I didn't even know in the first place.

I held, relied and adhered forever onto whatever I thought, believed and understood was true. There was this fixed view of myself & the world based on my present fluid-experience, and missed the reality & truth big-time.

I didn't realize that including my knowledge there’s nothing that’s everlasting & unchanging self. But i had this mindset where I framed everything as good & bad, above & below, eastern & western and rich & poor based on past history as well as that limited & ever-evolving knowledge of mine & the society.  It ultimately brought me confusions & problems since it simply never matched the reality.

Instead of cultivating this exquisite attention to the present moment- with openness and without judgment, I was so captivated by thought and emotions.

It like how one of my customers still believed that our product is inferior even now just because it failed about 8 years ago. But in reality, there was always a lot of change in the meantime happened to people, technology, infrastructure and quality of the product. So how come a conclusion here is logical without actually testing the product? 

Sad enough, many of my life’s truths were a carbon copy this scenario. I never reviewed my truth based on my motion & fluid experience. I resisted change. I ignored change I didn't get use of my reasoning & commonsense every time.

But, teacher, having had this crucial self-realization, i still have this fear of being booed away for finding my own truth since i have always needed approval from others to be myself. Seeing what’s right and what’s wrong beyond the “already in use” culture and age old traditions/belief is a punishable act to the society. 
It like when I differ from people, the world thinks something is wrong with me. Neat & clean.

Nevertheless I want to take this long unknown journey with the glowing light i have found in me through the help of your teaching, as this path will set me free forever from my all confusions & ignorance. And i could always draw some inspiration from the fact that you did that journey once, and never really looked back.

I would like to again thank for all your guidance & lessons. I take immense pride in being your student, teacher Buddha.

Thank you,

Yours faithfully,

my awakening soul.

As a matter of fact!

“We need stronger laws”!
The sentence has made headlines in recent times. It almost became a proclamation all the way from the Home Secretary to the housekeeping lady ever since the unfortunate Delhi-Girl tragedy took place.

No doubt, a harsher punishment would instantly deliver an emotional justice to the victim & society.

No doubt, by fixing the dysfunctional judicial system it ensures the immediate safety of the nation.

No doubt, a stern law would instill fear in criminals not to commit crimes in future.

So undeniably, the emotional outburst of the people are well justified by the protests for severe punishments. 
But, Is it enough? Is a stronger law alone enough to prevent crimes in a society which is as diversified as the Mother Nature herself? Is it sufficient for a country where people’s mindset is like “wearing motorcycle helmet only when we spot a police at traffic signal? (even though the law is meant for our very own safety)

I doubt that the ineffective system is the only lesson we learn here from this unfortunate Delhi-Girl tragedy. After all, prosecution & punishment comes only after the crime.

In my humble opinion, the problems we face today are mostly human oriented, not system related. Simply put, the way we are looking at our living is outdated.

See, the basic question nobody asks in the first place is “why do people do these”? And the question tells me that the root cause for the Delhi-girl tragedy doesn't just stop with the six criminals, as such. I believe it goes beyond all the way to the lack of “common sense” in the human society. it’s a collective failure of our total awareness.

If the common sense is what separates human from other animals, then it’s logical to think that the human, in the absence of common sense, can naturally be cruel like a hunting animal. (According to Wikipedia, common sense is "a sound and prudent judgement based on a simple perception of the situation or facts") 

I think the common sense in a man generally takes a less emotional heart with a more rational mind. But we live in a state where we are not allowed even mentally to see, to know, to understand and to examine the life by OURSELVES.

In fact, the interesting thing about common sense is that we all think we possess a share of it just by design or by being a human animal or by getting an art & science degree or by making some material wealth or by just socializing. we never intend to EARN them trough our experiences & wisdom, as a necessary tool to measure our judgments.

The human, having the extra sense, still makes gravely mistakes because he barely uses it to judge what's right & whats's wrong.

so why are we deprived of common sense? According to me, It may be because of the reality of poverty, ignorance, illiteracy and socially misunderstood values & principles. 

For example, if we take all the six people charged in the rape case, we can find out that none of them had been exposed to any kind of formal education. Nor were their family. Simply put, they didn't learn any humanity in the first place. 

But, how do we earn common sense? I believe that the common sense is to be earned and acted upon by us, meaning you, me, the neighbor, the parent, the teacher, the student, the preachers, etc. It’s time to do it alone, person to person, if we want change. We cannot wait for any leaders or bureaucrats.

We as everyone can make this Idea possible perhaps by sending every child in this country to elementary school at least. Again, you may ask why even educated people do commit crimes. The thing at fault here is not the education as whole but what people were being taught in classrooms. The teachers must ask themselves what they do to the next generations.

I don’t care what the country’s formal educational system means. But we as teachers can still make a difference here if we build the next generation’s character by providing them a basic level practical knowledge and judgment that they all need to help them live in a reasonable and safer way . 

To me, a formal education is only completed if it develops a common sense in any social animal.

And, If we as parent could teach our kids about human values, compassion, love, tolerance, honesty and ethics, then perhaps we can expect them to become a genuine human being that we are calling upon others to be. It's not just we teach them economics & science because there's a difference between making carrier and making life.
I understand that the ideas are costly. It may not give any T20 solutions but it’s in the long-term interest of this world. We may have to wait for a while to reap them, but it’s worth doing.

And talking about us, how about we, adults? Had some of us knew a little more common sense, the wounded Delhi-girl could have received some medical assistance at least two hours earlier, instead of fighting herself on a road side.
It's fair to find faults in the politicians and systems. But what about us, individually? Our humanity has struck behind an outdated, insensitive and narrow-minded belief system. Our common sense has been weeded out in the presence of materials, fame, power, fun, glamour etc. we are solely in search of every short cuts that are available to all petty pleasures. We do need ourselves equipped with some rational thinking & practical Judgement for already complicated once-plain life.
If we don’t see the problem here clearly, we’re going to perpetuate it. We’re going to teach our children our confusion, and we’ll go on, generation after generation. That’s why I feel that the time now is not only good for some judicial reforms but also right for a review on the way we think who we are; on what we teach ourselves & others about life nowadays.

The impact of the common sense on social problems is more than we think because we live in the 21^st century, where we can alter our lives by just altering our attitudes of mind. As Mr. W. H Auden, saying, “Fate succumbs many a species; one alone jeopardizes itself”.

Thanking you,

MP.

P.S. I believe in my idea to an extent where it made me clear to send at least a kid to school by sponsoring his education. I do believe I can make change here, and most importantly, so are you, lovely people.

The Passion of Sadness

Every college life gives birth to friendships. Or At least that’s what they say!

And, in this part of world, every parent compelled academic degree is essentially followed by the careers, the 20^th century invention of society. When it all happened to me, she was one of the few friendships survived.

But then in a while, my brain chemicals started reacting from bad to worse as my life had started drifting through some emotional storms. On many such “not-fine” days my replies were usually depressed to her infamous question - “How are you”.

Later during one phone call, she had lost her tolerance in hearing my ever saddening life, and so she suggested, “Well, you sound always miserable, and it’s boring. So get your sadness done before you talk to me again”. And that’s how sadness and I became aliens to some human beings. True story!

Eventually I made my choice up and it was to keep my sadness though it cost me some people. But then why did I make that choice?

Well, this may be because I couldn't bury sadness alive or the fact that it, being a parasite, needs my thoughts to survive all the time or the truth that it is a property of my DNA.

But after all, sadness is a logical emotion. Isn't it? And there’s an emotion that you can feel but still find it useless to share! Oh dear, what a shame! What a shame of being a living thing, let alone being the talking animal!

Indeed, Sadness isn't joyful. Sure, Sadness is not positive. But suffering is a natural fact of human existence and there’s no avoiding of the truth that sadness is part of life.

Wouldn't it be entirely wrong to refuse to face the fact that there are things fundamentally sick in life? And what’s better medicine than “a weeping on your mother’s lap” or “to get embraced in the arms of your loved one”.

Well, in sadness I find my arrogance disappeared, learning the grammar of love & support. Glad, in sadness I have no fantasy flying, accepting bitter truths and reality on life.

Yes, I might sound a little exaggerating here but those artists know what the emotion of sadness means, not probably those people who run after pleasures day in, day out.

Could the art be art, without an ounce of sadness? Yeah, it would be but just “an ink-filled paper of writing or a color-spilled board of painting or a noise-added tune of music or an organized crowd of movie play. Doubtless, they would all be fun but in the cost of imagination, thought, wisdom, senses and life.

Where’re philosophies if it’s all about happiness?

Where’s spirituality without a suffering?

Sadness is that something happening to us, meaning that the life hasn't forgotten us yet, holding tightly in its arms. Isn't it the very struggle of life that makes us who we are?

Sadness may be depressing, terrible and tearful, yet it keeps us moved, inspired and healed.

But then, there you go, the sadness is something you should never speak of, because firstly the society sees it a symbol of weak and secondly it's a silly emotion because it doesn't involves any glamour. Well done, culture-seriously!

Nevertheless, it’s the common language that connects us all to the world because suffering is universal. And honestly folks, I don’t feel alive without a tinge of madness. Moreover, being normal is what actually boring. It’s stagnant, we are no longer living!

Well, Sadness will, indeed, leave me when it finds people for me who listen better to its problems. After all, it takes a heart to decipher the signals of sadness.

As the quote by Grandpappy, saying, "Any fool can be happy. It takes a man with real heart to make beauty out of the stuff that makes us weep."

Happily Sad!

regards,

MP

The Essence

When I see two people slapping each other for a silly accident in roadside; when I hear a leader calling for mass murdering in the name of patriotism; when I watch an artist solely believes heroism is all about shooting and some brutal beating. I cannot help but always wonder.  But then, I realize everybody is not Mahatma Gandhi and his ideas.

No doubt, even 21^st century couldn't avoid the belief on violence, while there was a guy who did it in 1900s. I tell you why.

100 yrs back, people’s mind didn't have as much access to knowledge, socialization and development as now, with the communications. There couldn't be a better provoking then as such when some aliens invaded into your land and order you how to live, while there were the times when people believed that being brave is about killing their enemy, by seeing all the five-sensed animals.

But then, situation, there is this guy who was going to come out and tell people they were going to fight it out through non-violence, for the first time possibly after inventing the wheels. It must be like rewriting the DNA’s of the people who were emotionally attached to bloods.

I wonder how many of us would have even listened to the idea, let alone believing it.

But Believing is everything, right?  And believing in you and the thing you know is all really matters, even if they look silly to others.

He believed in peace and peace must have believed in him. Together, they led a country to freedom, which may be the biggest understatement of all time.

May be a wife who lost her husband in a freedom fight, could tell the difference what Peace makes. And so did Mahatma Gandhi make to this country. When the world politics was stained in the bloods of world wars, he was the gene who repaired it with harmony and non-violence across the world.

He was, is, the testimony to courage and belief. And I just adore him for the fact that he was different to the entire round-shaped world.

When you see 21st century leaders who construct their belief for power and fame, you couldn't possibly imagine for a peaceful world arriving. But then if you are going to lose a half of your people in fighting for freedom, you don’t do any good to your community, after all.

When asked to give a message to the people, he would respond, "My life is my message." But I seriously doubt if we have decoded it, yet.

Happy Birthday, Mahatma Gandhi! Remembering you is not a bad way to spend every October 2. In fact that’s the right way.

To a selfless, courageous and ever inspiring soul!

regards,

Murugapandiyan P