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May 19 Sattelite Navigation"So what's your true calling then? What is the lord saying to you right now......what does'he' want you to do?"...
Those words still keep ringing in my ear.... I sat there looking at the pastor wishing he would also tell me how to figure out what god wants, but then I guess he would say what I know he would; "keep praying son"...
Prayer is at the end of the day, all we have. People often say the same about 'hope', but I feel we wouldn't have hope if we didn't have prayer. I look at the papers and watch the news and all I hear is '10,000 dead and another 10,000 missing in China, 20,000 dead in Myanmar, suicide bombers having a hey day in our very own country, let alone others. Honestly I feel like a nine pin in a bowling alley, not knowing whether I would be knocked down any second..
But in reality even ninepins are put back up each time they are put down. In fact the chances that they will be put back up is absolute, while their chance of being put down is less. The same reality is true for us too... no matter what happens we will be lifted back up onto our feet...prayer simply reminds us of that fact.
As for knowing what god wants me to do with my life, well I'm still in the process of asking him...
April 27 Reverse Engineering....(musings)Most of us have heard of how, many automobile manufacturers tare down BMWs into small components in a bid to try and match, or at least construct a poor imitation, hoping that their automobiles would turn out to be somewhat close to BMW in their quality of engineering....(or so they fantasize)...In other words, if you use the same ingredients, theoretically one should get a similar result.
My case in point?
Well, I have caught myself doing something akin to this myself the past few months.....(or is it years?)......
I have had many dreams in my life, but non more astute than to find a partner that I am content with. Now, I do know that such a quest is so cliche that it borders on the repulsive, but I do urge you to bare with me...! The last few years have been spent with me trying my utmost to pove the theory that if we find a person who meets certain criteria, 'love would follow'! The problem is that finding people who meet your criteria can prove to be rather difficult.
Eversince I lost my ex girl friend to social pressures, I have been trying my best to re invent love. The only hitch has been the fact that I am 'all alone' in this quest. All my friends and colleagues discourage me by saying that I will never find that person, but I beg to differ.
Is anyone else trying to find real love out there? (Hides behind the wall expecting missiles of spoilt vegetables)
May 12 Picket FencesI watched a story about a Christian who took it upon himself to live as a Muslim and follow all their traditions, while living among them for thirty days, in order to understand their culture better. The experience had apparently changed the man's outlook in so many ways, for the better......
One of the biggest drawbacks of humankind seems to be the utter lack of empathy towards one another. But 'empathizing' is easier said than done. Norah Vincent became famous for actually living among men while pretending to be a man herself, in order to understand the opposite sex better. She says that she has a whole new respect for men and their ways of communication amongst each other. She also says that she now realizes how hard it is for a man to keep making the 'first move', while constanty opening himself up for rejection.
I once had a lecturer who lived amongst the 'poorest of poor' on the streets, in order to gain a better understanding of what it actually felt like to starve and to not know from where and when the next meal would come from. His experiences later helped him become a famour professor in human Psychology.
Today's biggest problem seems to be the growing lack of tolerance and understanding towards people and cultures that differ from one's own. The ongoing unrest in my own country, the problems between Israel and Palestine since 1948, the initial war on Iraq and its present spiral towards civil war, friction between the West and Iran regarding the use of nuclear energy, are all but symptoms of a greater problem, i.e. the total lack of empathy and 'proper' understanding of the other's point of view.
Arnold Bennet, summed up the need to 'experience' something to really understand its gravity, when she so aptly stated.... "There can be no knowledge without emotion. We may be aware of a truth, yet until we have experienced its force it isn't ours. To the cognition of the brain, must be added the experience of the soul"......
Wiser words have seldom been spoken.
April 30 The Law Of NumbersLife has seldom known to be an experience without its surprises along the way. One of the factors that makes the concept of life so captivating is it's uncertainty and the fact that no one knows what tomorrow might hold.
I have had times where things no matter how hard I tried, ever seemed to fall in place. Then there have been those few times where great things have happened, things I will never forget as long as I live. But once in a blue moon, things happen in a way that makes you wonder if there was a 'ripple' in the 'code of life'....
Four seperate occurrences, all of great significance somehow took place on one day, Thursday the 27th of April, 2006.
I had not had the opportunity to meet my brother's girl friend since they paired up about four months ago. At the same time, another friend of my brother, who became a good friend of mine as well over time, had been begging me to see her and say hello at least once. Due to various reasons out of our control we never did get to meet up. Another long time acquaintance of mine who hadn't spoken to me for over a year due to a huge misunderstanding, became on talking terms again and wanted me to see her when she came down on vacation. I hadn't spoken to her parents or visited their home in almost three years. She was flying back the next day...
It was also the 'assigned day' that I was supposed to speak to a very close 'Space friend' of mine for the very first time, over the phone.
Needless to say, it so happened that I did indeed meet my brother's girl friend, finally get to meet the girl who wanted to see me, drop into the house of the friend I hadn't spoken to in over a year and hear the voice of my Space friend for the very first time, all on the same day, the 27th.
The events of that day still resonate in my mind..........Someone above was clearly playing with the 'remote buttons'. April 18 "Pieces Of Me"Looking back at my life so far, I recognize many stages of self learning experienced along the way. From the early childhood of being the only child for six years and then getting used to having a younger brother around, from finding my place in my classroom, in terms of average class scores to finding out if the opposite sex would respond positively or negatively towards me as a person, life so far has been a road with quite a few twists and turns.
My best friend and I were both recalling our younger days recently.To this day, one of the most embarrssing moments as teenagers would have to be when my best friend and I both danced with one girl for most of the night. Those were the days when we all felt that not having a date was the equivalent of 'not having a life' and hence we didn't want to be seen on the floor without a partner.
Today all my friends are married and have settled down. Though I have yet to walk down that particular road, thankfully, I seem to have 'found' myself and therefore able to relax and let life and destiny take its course.
Finding out who we really are and how we fit in 'society's jigsaw puzzle' is the starting point to really being able to enjoy life and contribute to its bigger picture.
As for dancing,................ my best friend and I still occasionaly dance with one girl........
i.e. his wife. April 14 'Starry Starry Night'I have forever been fascinated by the mystique and beauty of space. The night sky has always acted like an 'Emergency Exit' from my immediate reality.
I remember staring at the open sky for hours when our country was subjected to non stop powercuts for almost six months, partly due to the lack of rain, but mostly due to bad governance. One of the famous words my best friend's girlfriend used to tell him, would be to look up at a certain star and know that she is looking at it too. I now know that most couples say that to each other, but at the time, it did seem very romantic.
But romance apart, I have often found that just staring at the night sky can really make one feel small and insignificant and by doing so it manages to make us realize that our immediate stresses and worries are actually insignficant in the bigger picture. Furthermore, the night sky, unlike anything else I know, has the presence and awe inspiring ability that somehow makes you believe in a force more powerful than ourselves.
For me, the night sky will always be the 'final bastion', one of the few remaining elements of nature that can still make me stare, with the kind of wonder befitting a child.
March 31 "I will campaign for world peace"Here I was, eating my pretzels and just watching the last few minutes before the final selection of Miss Sri Lanka for Miss Universe on TV.
"Contestant A, what would you do, if you became Miss Sri Lanka?" "Uhh, well I would do my very best to promote peace and harmony"........"Contestant B, what would you do if you won the title of Miss Sri Lanka?" "Hmm, I would make sure there is peace in the land". This made me recall the answers the contestants usually give during the Miss Universe contest. "Miss Venezuela, what would you do if you won the title of Miss Universe?" "I would campaign for world peace"....
This left me scratching my head, why do all the beauty queens say they want world peace? Since they all give similar answers maybe, world peace really should be the biggest priority on everyones' minds? Furthermore, if all beauty queens are chosen for their beauty and their brains, one has to assume that their answers are ones of intellect.
I change the channel; 'Click'.
"Tell us Mr. B, if you become President, what would be the first thing you would do as soon as you assume office?"
"I'll bomb Iraq to pieces and capture Sadham Hussein".
I love watching TV and eating pretzels. March 30 'Things That Make You Go Hmmm'...Life is full of grey areas and ironies. I have always had a tendency to question everything that is suggested by society and my surroundings. But as I have matured I have realized that life isn't always about finding answers but rather, about being in awe about the many mysteries that surround us.
There will forever be things that make us go 'hmmmm' in life..
From the point of view of sustainability of society, 'lies' are an essential component of our daily lives even if they are simply 'white lies'. Our sexual deviations, while they can be reconciled from a logical point of view, will always be ambiguous from an ethical point of view. While we seem to get attracted to others at varying levels and might even give our lives for them, saying 'I Love you', will forever be a challenge. We are intelligent enough to walk on the moon, but seemingly inept to solve world poverty. Though most of us believe that there is only one god, this 'one god' seems to suffer from 'Multiple Personality Disorder', based on the different faiths. Adults can choose to have kids, but kids cannot choose to have 'two' parents.
Ahhh, but how these ironies are often beside the point............................The real irony is that we appear into this world without wanting to and disappear from it, still without wanting to. March 27 "Oh for those curves"I have noticed a rather strange trend in motor car design preferences. While Science can try to explain why we like certain shapes and features among humans, it is rather hard to explain how we perceive beauty in terms of motor car design.
One commonality that I have noticed is that every car that can truly be called a classic in terms of design has one important element in common with each other: 'Curves'.
From the classic Mini, to the Wolkwagon Beetle, the Porsche 911, to the Chevrolet Camaro...every car has a rich array of curves in the right proportions.....and the list just goes on. Uptodate, I cannot think of many cars other than the Lotus Esprit that has stood the test of time with a design sans curves.
Even in terms of human attractiveness, 'curves are where the party is at'. Denims were and still are such a hit, simply because of the way they accentuate the 'rear view' of its wearer. It can even be argued that actresses such as J Lo, and Salma Hayek along with singers such as Kylie Minogue and Beyonce are famous, more for their curves than their talents in the field of entertainment. Women all over the world aspire to have the 'Coke Bottle' shaped figure.
Maybe curves are an implicit sign of sexual maturity, a sign that we mistakenly interpret to be true even in inanimate objects such as motor cars. Or maybe it isn't just a coincidence that we live in a galaxy that is curved, which consists of curved planets with curved orbits.
And just maybe, the fact that arguably the single biggest invention uptodate; 'the wheel', which also happens to be curved....
.........................is just natures way of having a good laugh.
March 23 Addicts R UsMy week started off with me conversing with my lecturer and he mentioned that he doesn't watch TV or listen to the news simply because he wants to follow true Buddhism and be totally 'detached' from all material things in life, since they are a form of addiction....... This made me wonder if all forms of addiction were actually bad for us.
The term addiction is often synonymous with something that is ultimately going to harm us, a form of 'unstoppable attachment to something that gives us short term pleasure while causing long term harm'. All around us, people seem to be victims of some form of addiction.
Even our 'fun addictions' in life, such as shopping and consuming chocolates etc, at times can become a problem, simply because there can be no 'addiction in moderation'........................
But........as in most aspects of life, seldom do we find anything written in pure 'black and white'. There lies the possibility that some forms of addiction might actually be good for us and in certain cases even needed for our survival. Only yesterday, I was telling my close friend that I was addicted to chatting to her and that in this case, there weren't any negative side effects involved. It struck me that maybe, even in other aspects of life, our survival could actually depend on our addictions.
Love is a form of addiction, love keeps us alive, it makes us take care of our loved ones, to the extent that we would happily end our lives to spare theres. Life itself can be construed to be a form of addiction. Once we are born, we are so addicted to being alive, that we will do anything in our power to prevent losing our lives.
So in a way, I guess we are all addicts of something or the other and our 'fate' simply depends on what our addiction is....
........now if I could just find that bar of chocolate..
March 21 Racism Against The 'Beautiful In Anatomy'I have been mulling over a few thoughts of late. Just out of sheer curiosity as to how a person would react, I left a comment on a certain Space of a total stranger stating that her physical features caught my eyes. This person had displayed plenty of photographs of herself in numerous poses.
If one scrolls through images of people's faces we maynot spend more than a few seconds looking at most of them, but then you come across a face that you can stare at for a long time......... it's amazing how certain features can have that 'show stopping' impact.
What really stuck me as interesting is how society looks down upon anybody openly stating that they might like someone for their physical features alone. It is almost taboo to tell someone that 'I like you, because I think you are gorgeous'. The perpetrator of that comment would be immediately made to feel 'small and shallow', a fickle minded soul who has no depth to his character, a guy who is so superficial that he cannot get past the fact that 'Beauty is only skin deep'.....
It is always fascinating how we constantly emphasize on the 'person within' us all. It is okay for someone to like or dislike someone based on their personalities but it is not okay for someone to do the same, based on their outer looks. I feel that the reason for this 'Racism against the beautiful in anatomy' is simply due to one underlying reason.........'We cannot mould our looks to our satisfaction'.
We can mould our personalities by changing our attitudes and learning good habits in life. Therefore even if we are rejected by others for our personalities we are being rejected for something we are comfortable with and have some sort of control over. But when it comes to physical features, most people aren't comfortable with themselves and feel a sense of powerlessness and lack of control when they are confronted by society.
If each and everyone of us could mould our physical features just as we do our personalities, we would most certainly hear the term 'beauty is only skin deep' far less and liking someone for their looks alone will most certainly be less 'frowned upon'.
As for my comment on the Space, regarding her looks.......I did not get a reply........maybe it's just taboo.
March 16 'Mediocrity Is A Sin'The term mediocrity more or less refers to one's output that is below the standards of excellence. I came across the marketing phrase 'Mediocrity is a sin' by the company that manufactures Alpha Romeos, for their new Alpha 159 and found it rather intriguing.
The catch phrase reminded me of a conversation I was having with a friend of mine about how we should try to live our lives by getting totally absorbed in our activities and tasks. I have found that living life in a 'Binary Mode' goes a long way in making it a more rewarding experience.
We should have dreams and then follow them with a passion. We should never give terms that do not warrant their use. For instance when we love, we should love with a vengeance and use the term 'love' only when we really feel that strongly about someone. We should appreciate good friendships and make it our goal to be as true a friend as we can be. If we are religious we should believe with passion, if not, we should be complete atheists. If we have kids we should love them with all our hearts, if not we should not have kids to begin with. If we get married, it should be with absolute sincerity and willingness to try and go the full distance, or else we shouldn't get married at all.
Life would be so much more rewarding if we gave every insignificant and significant task that we choose to undertake, our total commitment. A 'take no prisoners' approach to life, where the 'Binary Mode' requires that we are either 'in', or 'out' and no 'inbetween' can help pave the way for 'living life to the fullest'.
The 'Alpha boys' might just have come up with something afterall...... March 14 Life's Best PracticesI was recently talking to my friend about his new work place. His work place is a well known Multi National Company which is renowned for its 'Best Practices' when it comes to Business processes. Due to their attention to detail, they have over time become a highly productive and successful company.
The conversation made me wonder if there was a parallel when it comes to our lives as well. Over the last year or so, I have been extremely lucky to have met and been able to correspond with some extra ordinarily nice individuals. These are individuals who became very good friends in a short period of time and have had a great influence on my way of thinking in general.
In computer lingo, the term 'Garbage In Garbage out' is one that is used often. I feel that the same could be said of our lives as well. Whenever I ask my friends how their day has been, they always answer in the positive. 'The day was good...I am good.....It goes well' etc. No matter how hard the challenges ahead of them are, they always behave as if there is never a challenge that is too great. Not once have I heard them sound negative about anything in their lives. I constantly get phrases such as 'C est La vie and Carpe diem' thrown my way.
Over time, their influence has made me more positve in my outlook, which has resulted in me becoming an optimist after years of being a pessimist who used to call himself a realist!
An important lesson that I have learnt is that nothing can quite match the rewards of one keeping good company in life.
........I just hope my friends feel likewise... March 11 'Stop Says The Red Light..Go Says The Green..''Taking things for granted in life'...., though that phrase has been over used and is almost a cliche, it still can never be over emphasized upon in life.
I was talking to my dad the other day, when he brought it to my attention that most colour blind people cannot see the colour green. For a person who is colour blind, the most common problem is that not only does red appear to be red, but so does the colour green!
I was trying to picture a world where everything green seemed red. The trees, bushes and grass on the hill sides, the lakes, the forrests and golf courses would all appear to be red in colour. Traffic lights would have two red lights, cell phones would forever appear as if the batteries need charging, all army personnel would be wearing red clothing and foot ball would be played on red grounds......The world would forever put our senses on alert due to the overwhelming amount of 'red' in the surroundings!
We look up at the sky and see a soothing blue hue, we look at the trees and they give us such a calming effect with their green leaves. We seldom stop to thank our lucky stars that not only is nature so 'right' in it's colouring, but that it also balances the dark and the bright colours to perfection!
The fact that cats see only in greys and that bees can see violet.............Just highlights the fact that 'reality' is only true for the 'entity' experiencing it.
Now, I wonder if my cell phone really needs charging.... March 09 "Oh and before you trim your finger nails...""Put your left index finger on your nose.......now outstretch your right arm......Your nose is when the earth was formed, about four and a half Billion years ago. Now touch your right shoulder, it is when bacteria first formed on the planet around two and a half Billion years ago. From there all the way upto your hand, it was only batcteria. Now touch your hand, this is when there were sea animals and dinosaurs. Now go to the tips of your finger nails.......take a nail file and file them.
......Congratulations, you just wiped out the human evolutionary tree from the face of the earth!"
This was a demonstration carried out by a professor for his students regarding the evolution of different life on earth. It was a graphic image of how small and insignificant we are in terms of the time we have been on this planet and our overall position in life's ever unfolding drama.
So even though it was the 'hand that gave birth to the finger nails', it is the finger nails that actually seem to control the hand. Or is it? For when the Dinosaurs lived, it is undisputable that they were the rulers of the earth, only to be later replaced by humans.
One wonders how long our journey would be and whether we will ever be anything more than the 'tips of our finger nails', when our time is up.
'Could you pass me the nail cutter please.....'
March 07 Why Da Vinci liked Mona Lisa.....My computer monitor always has only two kinds of wallpapers. It would either be of one of my favourite actresses or that of a beautiful sports car. The same can be said of my cell phone wallpapers.
One thing that did strike me as rather fascinating was that each time I turned on the monitor and saw the wallpaper, the effect it seemed to have on my mind and thereby my emotions to some extent, seemed to vary, depending on whether the wallpaper was of a female or of a Sports car.
I somehow felt that looking at a female face that I liked seemed to have a relaxing effect on my mind. This seemed to happen at a subconscious level and I was not sure if this effect was a figment of my imagination or something actually physiological in nature. That is, until I saw a documentary where they mention that when a woman looks at a face of a child, the part of the brain that senses pleasure gets activated, thereby making the experience a pleasurable one. This apparently holds true when we look at anything cute or endearing to us.
If that theory is extrapolated a tad it might go to explain why looking at a picture of one's wife or kids might seem soothing in times of stress...
.......and to an extent it might just go to explain why I keep the wallpapers of my favourite female actresses a bit longer than my favourite cars. March 02 'Survival of the fittest'.....a flawed theory?Man is a social animal and this point can never be over emphasized. We live in a world where in general, people 'eat sleep and drink' the philosophy that in order to survive, you need to do whatever it takes.
We meet bosses who make life difficult for their subordinates, simply to hang on to their own posts. We find countries waging wars simply to safe guard their world dominance. We see people trying to undercut each other's religious beliefs simply out of insecurity. We find different races trying to dominate others based on skin colour and Economic status. We see developed nations turning a blind eye to the nations where people lead lives with a standard of living far below the standards a household dog or cat might enjoy in a more developed country.
But today, the whole world faces a threat that surpasses any threat the world has seen in centuries, in the form of the Avian flu. The irony is that, the developed nations might succumb not due to their ignorance, or lack of preventive measures, but due to the inability of the poorest nations to curtail the problem and hence resulting in a world wide spread of the disease.
Survival based on mutual coorperation might be a far better solution than the alternative, purely because man needs his fellow man to survive.
Let us hope that it doesn't take a worldwide pandemic to drive that point home.
February 24 The unfinished symphonySomething that has always struck me as fascinating is the way in which a good song that is stopped half way in it's tracks when I'm forced to switch off the radio, often seems to keep on playing in my mind. It's almost as if the mind is yearning for the rest of the song. I seldom find this phenomena with a song that has finished playing.
Most things in life that tug our heart strings the most are the nice converstaions, relationships and experiences that are forced to end prematurely. We seldom mourn the loss of a loved one quite in the same way as when they are taken away from us unexpectedly. The memories of Princess Diana's funeral and her untimely departure are still fresh in my mind.
We remember the Titanic's first and last voyage, the world will never forget Marilyn Monroe or President Kennedy. It's quite certain that we would hardly spend time thinking about them if they had lived out their full lives.
We remember Jesus for his dramatic but short lived life. One wonders how many of us would be Christians if he had lived till the ripe old age of ninety.
Are we all one big bunch of 'drama queens and kings'? Maybe that is why we seem to like the theory of the 'Big Bang' as the answer to creation.
February 17 Sweet Hearts and AngelsHuman interactions have always fascinated me. All forms of relationships are fascinating, but non more so than the complex ones of the 'heart'. I have upto date never called my significant other by names such as 'angel', 'darling', 'sweets', or 'honey' though I might have used them in a descriptive manner. This is not so much because I had anything against those terms, but mostly because I find them too common and highly misused in life.
I prefer coming up with my own names for someone I care for, names that are unique to that individual. The irony in life is that most everyone is a 'honey', 'baby' or an 'angel' and yet it is quite apparent that in most cases, seldom are the people those terms describe anything but 'angels' or 'honeys'!
There must be Millions of 'Angels' among us but I'm pretty sure that not even a minute fraction of that number would be people who would ever make a 'true angel' proud. As for 'Sweet Hearts' well, one can safely assume that not all those 'hearts' out there are filled with nice thoughts and good intentions in life, to warrant the term 'sweet'.
I just feel that people almost feel obliged to use those terms when they are in a relationship, whether it suits the partners concerned or not. I do hope this is the case, for if it isn't and the alternative is true; i.e. that people use those terms simply because 'love is blind', then the question begs to be asked; "How blind can one get?"......
February 15 "But I think Valentine's Day is quite fetching really..."You keep hearing all the detractors voices each year sing the same old tune; "Valentine's day is a heap of crap, a farce, a big Business ruse to make people spend in the name of love!"
My question is what is so wrong with spending on your loved ones? If we love them, we are bound to spend on them anyhow and what harm could come from calling one day of the year by a special name; i.e. 'Valentine's day'?
Our country has its fair share of kill joys who try and ruin Valentine's Day each year, by calling it a 'Western tradition' that goes against the teachings of Buddhism! I feel that it's all simply a case of the 'have's and the 'have nots' like everything else in life, with the 'have nots' being jittery that they cannot take part in the romantic festivities.
It's been a long time since I really took part in the Valentine's Day activities for it's original intended purpose. The last few Velentine's days have been spent with my best friends. We usually go out for dinner and spend some time together.
While I do agree, that there is some form of pressure to have 'somebody to do something for' on Valentine's Day, I will never be in the camp that condemns it. Not having a day to celebrate romance is like not having birthday celebrations to acknowledge somebody's birth into this world. And that would indeed be a shame!
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