just another wake up call: A chink of humanity..

just another wake up call: A chink of humanity..: I open the door of my house and step into the garden, feel the fresh air on my skin.. and savor the dawn.. the call of the koel, the rustl...

just another wake up call: The Ingredient of Positivity

just another wake up call: The Ingredient of Positivity: why is it that some people become so negative, so pessimistic, so cynical that they suck out the life from themselves and others around them...

just another wake up call: just a point of view

just another wake up call: just a point of view: Reading "The Palace of Illusions" .. what an amazing book.. retells "Mahabharata" from Draupadi's perspective.. the familiar tale.. soun...

just a point of view

Reading "The Palace of Illusions"    .. what an amazing book.. retells  "Mahabharata" from Draupadi's perspective.. the familiar tale.. sounds so different .. What seemed righteous doesn't anymore, loyalties shift, concerns change, heroes fall, motives differ.. is really everything we think just a matter of perspective? the angle of viewing? the side we are on? If the Ramayana was written by  Bali's widow - would Rama still be a hero? Is anything in the world really black or white? simply good or bad? Everything is shrouded in shades of gray...clouds of in-betweens. .Then is our opinion really worth anything? Does what we think really matter? knowing as we do that our opinion only depends on where we stand.. Why then are we so glued to it? so married to it that we can bear to hurt or even lose those who love us for the sake of them? What makes our opinions so real to us? Is this one of the frailties of the human race? .. the tendency to see their viewpoint as the only one.. or atleast the only one that matters .. What if miraculously we could each one of us start understanding the counter viewpoint :Radical Islamists of  hindutvaists / Palestinians of Israelis/  men of women/ government of Maoists/ the privileged of the poor/ the rapist of the victim/ the doctor of the helpless patient.. would there ever be a conflict again? A scuffle? A disagreement? A fight? A war? Can all the misery in the world then ... just be attributed to this.. difference in perspectives and an inability to understand those on the other side of the fence.. too simplistic .. is it???

The Ingredient of Positivity

why is it that some people become so negative, so pessimistic, so cynical that they suck out the life from themselves and others around them.. what makes them like this? As children we are all born into laughter, curiosity, trust, joy.. When do some of us exchange that for a permanent mantle of despair and unhappiness. Do some life events force this change, for surely no one will opt to live a life of  bleakness by choice..Maybe an unhappy childhood, loss of a loved one, a bad life experience forces certain people to view the world  henceforth with weary eyes..always on the watch for presumed treachery.. and when the slightest of  obstacles come their way they feel vindicated, their world view confirmed... on the other hand one also comes across people who face the worst, the story of their lives so twisted and turned.. full of adversities and loss and yet they haven't given up.. there is still the joy and the happiness , the urge to set things right, the power to trust and the belief  in a better tomorrow.. where lies the difference? is it that some of us are born to be unhappy and distrustful and others the opposite.. or is the mystery deeper.. Did god really make us all the same? is there a key to this puzzle? If only there was a magic ingredient, a wonder formula, a process by which we could make the change.. Fill these souls with the beauty of life in and around them, reveal to them once again (for surely they must have known it as an infant) that the world is full of goodness waiting to be discovered, friends waiting to be made, songs waiting to be sung, life waiting to be lived.. That would be a true discovery.. An invention to outshine all others...Discovery of  the ingredient of positivity! Can it be done?

A chink of humanity..

 I open the door of my house and step into the  garden, feel the fresh air on my skin.. and savor the dawn.. the call of the koel, the rustling of the leaves, the pink tinged sky, the whispering silence..feels like magic.. I  unfurl the news paper .. and the dream shatters!  deceit, cheating, violence, jealousy, never ending greed.. the vilest of human emotions jump out from the letters and threaten to drown me.. to shake my belief in the human race.. in the goodness of people..the beauty in them, the gentleness of their souls, their immense capability to love.. their kindness.. But every once in a while, I come across something that reaffirms my faith in the human race.. like today.. an article in the local daily showed a sorry picture of a young woman.. a new bride, married this May, lying on a dirty hospital bed.. with an inset of her young husband's snap.. The title says, she has succumbed to her 90% burns , another victim of domestic violence..3 months pregnant..A cold hand grips my heart, I am tempted to put aside the piece and read something lighter.. but it beckons.. the 23 year old had a story to tell.. the least i can do is listen... her story is not much different from the hundreds I have read before.. An innocent bride, couldn't satisfy her  in laws greed and is set to fire, the door closed so though her screams reach out , she can't.. distraught parents rush her to the hospital, where she first loses her three month fetus and then grapples for her own survival! And here's the twist.. the difference , the chink of humanity in the grim tale.. After three days of battling for her life, when her husband finally comes to see her..Does she complain?Does she ask what she had done to deserve this fate? Does she turn away her face? or even cry? Instead, she calls her father and tells him that whether she lives or dies her husband should not be implicated, she loved him and doesn't want him to suffer.. she simply forgives.. just like that .. and then lets out a sigh and dies.. as if this was all she was waiting for.. To forgive, to release, to safeguard - the man -  who had promised to safeguard her, to protect her, to take care of her and cherish her..So what if he failed her.. She won't!
That's the beauty of humanity  Within the vilest of human tragedies .. hides also its most compassionate soul.. long live the human race