If There is Heaven...

It's mid afternoon
And a breeze scatters the leaves,
You can almost hear a call if you have a ear for it,
to come and lose yourself somewhere
in the mangroves or the clusters of trees
at the foot of the hill.
Nowhere the twilight sings so beautifully,
Nowhere the trees invite you so maddening,
Nowhere you melt into tears
just for nothing,
Nowhere you can meditate
and connect with the universe so close,
even on a bike,
Nowhere else can you close your eyes
in the middle of a crowd
and trust so perfectly

and can choose to get lost completely.

Balancing Love and Logic- From The Speaking Tree column published in THE TIMES OF INDIA

IT IS SOMETHING NOT WRITTEN BY ME. I READ IT IN THE TIMES OF INDIA AND LIKED IT.

Can we achieve a balance between love and logic? Logic leads to material gains, while love warms the heart and leads to emotional and spiritual gain. In life, both are required. The eternal battle between mind and heart is something all of us have to contend with. You are made up of body, mind, heart and soul. Physically, the heart is a separate organ and the mind has no physical location. But when we speak of heart in poetic or metaphysical terms, when we speak of emotions, ‘heart’ refers to the part of the brain which is responsible for our emotions. And love is always of the heart, never of the mind.

The human mind is a double edged sword. It can take us to great heights, as we can see from scientific and technical advances we’ve accomplished. It can also push us into the depths of decline, and all the crimes, wars and bloodshed over centuries are proof of that. The heart is responsible for feelings of love, compassion, sharing, altruism, sympathy, and empathy, but is a bad businessman. The heart is much ‘weaker’ than the cognitive and rational thinking part of the brain. The heart is not concerned with profit and loss, or with assets and liabilities. In fact, if anything, the heart is irrational and illogical.

Love always springs in the heart. It is a deep connection between two human beings, which cannot be explained or understood with words. And love can happen to anyone, anytime. Every society places a lot of rules and restrictions on love, romance and marriage. Although our mind understands these and tries to follow them, the heart can often break through the barriers and fall in love, even if it means going against social conditionings and beliefs. The heart can bring you true love, but you might have to pay a price.

Another problem with love is that we often tend to confuse our thoughts for feelings. Love cannot be described or taught to anyone. It arises spontaneously. How does one know whether what one feels, is really love, or something masquerading as love? Love implies freedom both to you and the one you love; love implies that you are willing to do anything for the happiness of the other person, even if it is not in your interest. Love is unconditional, without any ifs and buts. If one wants to know true love, one must observe, study and understand the love of a mother for her child. This is often considered the gold standard, where love is concerned.

If you truly love someone, you will only want to give, not to take. Possessiveness and jealousy are not part of true love; they are thoughts of the mind, which is always from worrying about losing your love. True love is never scared of losing anything, because it does not want to take, only give. And when you are only interested in giving, how can you be worried about losing anything?

The mind often tries to tell us many things---the person you love is not rich, is not good looking, is not educated enough, will not be acceptable to your parents …. But if you truly love someone, it will be easy to counter all these arguments. The mind warns us against losses when we are in love, but true love does not care whether you gain or lose. The moment you start asking “What’s in it for me, it is no longer love. Real love is always unconditional, without ego, and ready for every sacrifice.

Follow P V Vaidyanathan at speakingtree.in

CLASS TEACHERS, FALLING LEAVES AND VALENTINE'S DAY

We were revising concepts and I was flipping through the note-book. I was loooking at concept explanations and correction in red pen and couldn't even remember when I had done it. Suddenly it dawned to me that I will not do so in his notebook anymore. All these red marks will become a distant memory for him and me. But they are there today.Suddenly I felt choked with emotion that this bond was going to end and I will not see his innocent face anymore.

Today was my last day with my children. My children because I have been their class teacher for the last ten months. Sthiti told again today that she will miss me very much. 'Ma'am, I am feeling very sad.' she told. She always talks a lot and I don't give a lot of importance to her. But after they submitted their art papers and stated going to the field, Sahil told that it was my last day with her and even a hardy like Sohel came and asked for blessings. Following him, my bravest girl Smriti came and snuggled up to me and told that she would miss me badly. Other girls and boys followed. It was then that I couldn't control my tears. It was may be because nobody missed me or made me feel special that way ever. I told them that they will get into a new class and will gradually gorget the old memories. New happiness will enter their life in the new class.

The life of a class teacher is like that. In the beginning of the session, we struggle to remember the names of all the children in a class. But by the end of a session, we become a family. A family with a class teacher and her children. Just three days ago, In was asking children why teachers don't want to do substitution in their class...why they have grown so naughty and unruly. But I felt so happy and comfortable with them. They were my responsibility. Sahil told Ma'am we are yours and you are ours. I was almost in tears at that moment. It's beautiful bond that is ever forged between a teacher and children because of a single responsibility. And there is no possesssion. Just a relationship based on mutual love and trust. Despit the full knowledge of the fact that these children will forget everything next year. Their innocense will go. They will grow and the world will take them in their grip. They would start following others. I felt a bit sad today thinking that I will never find them again with this innocense, this originality and beauty. These life will be lost forever. Bt at the same time, I am happy that with full knowledge of this ephemeral world, I have tried my best to be fair and just to them, have shared their problems and have loved and disciplined them without wanting anything in return except some love and a little respect.

 Today the day remained sad. I mean the sky. The sun showed only half of its face. This kind of weather is    simply heavenly.In my home town, the trees are shedding leaves. When you walk under them, dead leaves fall in light showers all over you. And under a sorrowful sky, walking the streets is another experence. You get transformed under the canopy of foliages overhead in a city surrounded by hills. Falling leaves tell that if there is life, there is death too. If there is death, there is regeneration and rebirth. The world is witness to this continuous process. We live only one life, but life goes on. I fall into reverie looking at the falling leaves, that one day this world will be and I will not be anymore. All the experiences, of pleasure and pain, will be lost in the eternity.

Tomorrow's valentine's day. Today our youngest teacher came in a beautifully bright saree and a nose ring, hands full of bangles and eyes lined with kohl. She had just got married to her girlhood sweetheart. Looking at her, Valentine's day, seems to have some meaning. Some creatures like me never got the luck to expect love, but on such occassions, there is nobody to buy a present for or feel close to. But there are so many couples who are with one another and are perfectly happy. This day is for them. And people like me can make the day special for those old couples who have no love in their life. Something to remind them that they ought to express love for the people who spend life with them.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY TO ALL SUCH PEOPLE WHO ARE IN LOVE AND ALL SUCH WHO HAVE FORGGOTTEN A WORD CALLED LOVE.

Would there be a man...unlimited....like the sky?

                     

Today's editorial page of Times of India shows Taslima's photo, she quoting that her maid thinks her to be poor and laughs at her that she doesn't have a mobile phone whereas the author is merely amused at the ubiquitous cell phone and doesn't use one nowadays. I don't know how she manages, though we all can, if we calm our minds, but it had really become a necessity. How do you communicate when there is an emergency and you can't immediately reach someone in person? Taslima can do so because she is an international figure and writers and media people throng her almost always and she can have other means of reaching out. But it's true that she's the only person who cannot be called a freak or a attention seeker when she does something different. May be she's the only  woman who has never been untrue in her life, though at times she has become silent, being tired of a harrowed and hounded existence and has wanted some peace.

I have read so many collections of her; novellas, poetry, columns, autobiography. It has been very natural to fall in love with her, because she has been immensely courageous to bring to light the truths that no woman or even man dared to. May be I have understood her clearly because I have seen and felt these truths from a very close distance. Men have hated and despised her because she has shreded their fake images into pieces and has exposed their ageold hypocrisy in their treatment of women. But how enlightened man would be if he understood what she wanted to speak and tried to raise the society from the dirty dogmatism and egocentric existence and wanted women to be treated as human beings. It's only natural that no man could love a woman like her, because man has always loved to see a woman in the traditional image of her shy, demure, subdued, soft and sacrificing self. So loudly her autobiography screams of her mother's pain and agony of being ignored, subjugated, underestimated, commanded, destroyed, degraded and tortured . I remember a few lines from one of her books where she has written that there is nobody in her city to hold her hand and look into her eyes straight and tell that he loved her. She has not found a man who can bear her truths and love her. She had met men and had fallen in love, but all of them either lied or cheated or simply were too small for her highly evolved consciousness and felt insecure and uncomfortable before her truths. She never found somebody she could respect and love. She openly stands up for sexual freedom, but to me, it is just an outcome of her frustration in not getting true love. She at last accepted that men only need to use women to manage their homes, to bear their childen , to obey them and to serve them and be happy with whatever happiness they get in exchange. There is nobody to uphold their capabilities or taents, their rationality ot their sensibility. As there was no love to be gotten, why live without pleasure? After all, sex is also a mere biological need like food and ablution according to her. I never subscribed to this view of her chasing pleasre uninhibited because I still belong to the species of women who connect sex to a pure and loyal emotional bonding, and that without pure, dedicated and singleminded love, sex becomes a mechanical excercise and animalistic pleasue which, as human beings, we should keep away from so that the societey doesn't jump into a valueless brutal and chaotic existence. Without pure emotions, there cannot be peace in human consciousness. But whenever I think about Taslima, I feel really sad that there cannot be a man in this suncontinent who didn't have the courage, the personal height, the unlimited conscious to bear her immnse truthfulness and daring to expose the ageold hypocritical dogmas and customs that have forced woman to be the second sex and have not allowed her to express herself as a human being. Couldn't there been a man with an expansive mind, who could have understood her and would have loved her?Is there really so much of fear in man that he  can't ever be an evolved human being rather than remaining a puny little man. Can he ever break the shackles of his ego and become unlimited like the shy. Yes, there is risk in it. It is easy to live a safe life, to work, marry a woman, bear children, gather money, build houses, buy cars, pretend to be busy in diffeent circles , have some good diseases and die with caring or uncaring children. But what about living like wind? What about exlploring truths? What about questioning things? Will the Taslimas would have to die disappointed, sad and bored. Would there ever be men...unlimited... like the sky?

Violation of Dignity

It sometimes feels nauseatic nowadays when I sit to write. Of course there are so many things happening in this world on which I can write and write. For instance,take the nationwide outrage on the recent incident of rape in Delhi. Rape is not a new thing. In different places, cultures , communities and races, the response to it is varied. When a dalit woman or a woman in a very conservative community gets raped or gang raped,  the incident is suppressed in a wonderful way. Marital rapes often are not reported. When five to six men rape a girl in a moving bus, it only tells us that men have animals inside them and they come out when a woman is vulnerable and alone. All human beings have animal instinct in them and they come out when nobody or no social or personal monitoring system is around. Is there a solution to it? Yes, if rape laws are made stringent and people know that conviction is sure, then there will be a fear of punishment so that people will think twice before attempting any such thing. 

We are being attacked by imported west ern and European sensibilities for the last many years. Our urban society is being invaded by life-style changes such as live-in relationships, free sex, permissive behaviour etc. Sexual behaviour in a country like India was always controlled by social , legal and ethical codes. The recent changes are affecting it and nobody can help the upsurge of irresponsible and reckless sexual trends. Besides legal punishment, unless our people are educated and enlightened enough to understand that sex is a very delicate matter which requires social. legal and moral sanction and is not a matter of manifesting one's animal self , rape will continue to be a problem. Women can avoid places and situations which make them vulnerable and susceptible to violent sexual assaults. But where do you protect women and how much? Sex between married couples is a most beautiful thing because it is born of mutual love and affection. The bond of young or even little girls with their fathers, uncles or cousins are beautiful things. But are we able to stop marital or incestual rape?Everywhere women are in danger. The legal system has to be upgraded in regard to this and women, mothers and parents have to be very careful. In this way, at least we can prevent some unfortunate incidents. The present outrage is heartening, but will the government rise to the occasion and 
do something to protect women in our cities and villages. Will the legal procedure be subtle and kind so as not to harass a raped woman? 

The Song of the Magi

It's a song 
only a few wrote,
They rotted lonely and abandoned,
Some had the lock to fame 
and thrived,
Who are you but,
only a spent desire to branch out.

Seasons changed and
told you to sync in,
Yet you clung to that tune.
The carnivals passed before you
and you learnt no music,
Truths have never 
made a life,
They have only seared  hearts
and your being.

Looking for a lonely tree,
You will lose the jungle,
When the wind will usher the leaves
to a song, pick up the new tune
and erase the old,
no read read marks
you leave, to remind you of 
the dead who torched your 
soul and slipped away ,
unscarred.

This next season, gather your things
and wait,
till the caravan comes along.
 

Reminiscing in a Train -1

 

Nowadays I don't feel like writing anything. I just love my silence. I was thinking why one loves to be silent. May be because you have accepted the universe as it is, may be you are so disillusioned with everything and the truths are so clear that you don't feel like writing or talking. I will definitely like to carry this silence with me when I go..that's freedom. Living behind no trace of your existence, having no desire to want, say or leave behind anything I can call my own...absolute freedom from every attachment.. and complete bliss. 

Train journeys are great. And alone they are greater. Of course when you have company you are happy and can while away the time talking. But alone, you can think...think...and think. You can enjoy the faint light in the horizon, you can choose to be silent... you can be free not to talk to anybody, you can share groundnuts with strangers...young or old... you can help people..you can smile at people.. and all this you can do without anybody demanding your attention. It's another thing...

Winter has arrived. The world's turning dusty and grey. Mornings are cold, nights are long and pregnant with possibilities of births;of thoughts, ideas, silences. That day Pradeep came to deliver an article at my place, for Banita(name changed) I dislike getting up before my decided time, but nowadays I don't complain a lot. Both of us got up as Banita got the call and went down. I saw Pradeep for the first time. And saw the bond of immense trust and silent love between them. Possibilities between them are little that they will ever come together. Nobody can stop them if they want to, they are legally married, but they won't because they don't want to make some people unhappy. But they can’t think of moving away. Their solid bond keeps them happy and going.

When you are travelling alone in a train, you perceive nature better, because there is nobody to distract your attention. Passing scenes calm the mind, they also stir memories. Looking at certain mangroves, agricultural land or grounds, I remember how I used to think that it might be our farm, we tending it together. Memories bring sadness. Memories of beautiful, electrifying moments, moments of tenderness, love and great communication. Magical love that will never happen again, because nothing can replace it as certain people are irreplaceable. People leave our world but memories keep lingering. Sometimes they bring warm tears only, reminding of the loved ones whom you miss incessantly and will miss until the world catches up with you or you rise into sainthood. The truths also are driven home that we have the right to give love only, it is not so that the people whom we love will love us back. It’s also another truth that some people are very special, different, nobody can replace them. We only go for compromises, but life is never the same again. It’s not about three or four years, not about the extent, it’s about people, people whom we have known from a greater consciousness, have understood and have loved. But when they move away willingly, happily, seeking happiness somewhere else, only silence remains, because you can’t change their image in your conscious.

I am worried about the suffering of a good old friend of late. This friend was my only hope of a possible pure friendship with the opposite gender because I only thought of him as a human being and never perceived of him as anything else.Sometimes your intuition tells you that you should grow up and  set things right. I just want him to get over the reasons of his suffering and grow up, take care of his family as a priority and spend his goodness without being too attached to anything. True friendship and trust never breaks off , may be we fail to understand our orientation towards a friendship.We human beings are bound to have weakness, but our weakness should be invested in the right place. I only wish that his goodness never shuns him and it grows in the right direction. We are so torn by our own inner conflicts and so afflicted by pain that I don't know how to make him see the good purpose.

  The face of Aanjana ma’am comes floating to my mind. It’s a pensive face, calm yet sad. She  lost her husband in the recent past, had to leave the place where she lived for many years before coming to this city. I had started to love her very much and she’s leaving. The loneliness and the work pressure is hurting her and she wants to go to her daughter, to her old city. I don’t know if she’s doing the right thing. Daughters marry and go away. Unless they keep her with them, she will be lonely again and that time it will be more difficult to cope. I only pray that God be with her. I am alone too, and not in a very pleasant place, but I keep repeating to myself to not to long for my comfort zone, to fight and grow. May be I will learn to be at peace someday, but I am fighting definitely, for the last three and half years. But people are different and so is their response to situations. I cannot understand their problems from a distance. 

Silence is beautiful at times. When silence starts entering you, it can be a good or a bad sign. It can lead you to pure consciousness or it can destroy whatever creativity you have. I have left things to the universe and am floating with the flow. Let life take me wherever it has to. I just will have to be with the moment at hand, be very alive to it, wherever I am and whatever I am doing.

The train is nearing the destination. You can know from the breeze. It’s cold.  In a small hilly town you can feel the winter. How beautiful is the earth, with its seasons. If winter hadn’t been there we would never have known the beauty of spring or the heat of summer. Who can question the wisdom of the universe? We go, but the universe thrives and keeps vibrating with life forms and its many gifts.