Resilience

I wonder how in the most devastating moments of one's life, we humans can still think or bother about the most mundane.

When the heart is racing beyond recognition and palpitation is running high, some part of your brain sends a signal : "Looks like I need to get another bottle of body lotion"

While there are tears in the eye, and accidentally you lock eyes with yourself in the mirror, there is a tiny voice which says : "Maybe my eyebrows need threading again, too disheveled!"

Its amazing how a part of you is breaking and scattering into pieces, there is another part which keeps the equilibrium by thinking of inane stuff

Maybe this is what makes we humans get back to normal after every disaster in life, this is what builds the strength in us, in our worst nightmares

So in my heart I always know, I might be breaking right now, but I will be fine sooner than I expected

Cos I know that those who can break are the ones who can really build something

I know I will be breaking many times over now, but I will resurrect cos I will have you to gather my scattered soul

Resilience in human specie is an amazing thing!

Empty heart

Sometimes the heart is completely empty

You try to fill it, with all the notions of happiness

With things like : Count your blessings, reckon your achievements

But the walls of your heart reject each and all of those ideas, like mismatched blood

Or is it that some people are just made like that? Their DNA rejects drips of sanity and happiness?
They can only filter out grief, absurditiies of heart, malfunctioning of brain

A forlorn, miserable identity carved into their system, unknown to them

I tried making happiness complete me
But what made me whole, was the emptiness of it all

Strength of the weak

"Every woman needs one man in her life who is strong and responsible. Given this security, she can proceed to do what she really wants to do-fall in love with men who are weak and irresponsible." – Richard J. Needham

Though this quote is more on a lighter note, yet I can see the seriousness and truth of it all
 I am sure we all have felt this, some or the other time in our lives
BTW, this applies to men as well
 
But here I am not sure what is weak or whats strong..
Is weak the one who revels in every move we make, every twitch of our eyebrow, every passing of expression on our face
Then we mark this person as weak, weak for loving us to bits like this
Which is actually his/her strength

Or is strong actually the weak men, who make us feel weak and clingy...in their arrogance and convoluted self-esteem
They do whats possible in them to bring the weakest in us come to surface, and turn that into their strength?
And thrive on our weakness?Deriving their strength from it?

The weak might be the bailey Irish cream, which is gentle on your nerves and gives you a mild buzz and their counterparts (aka strong) could be tequila shots which hits you instantly, makes you have more and more of it without thinking of consequences, and then gives a serious hang over when the buzz is gone

And if you love outside marriage, are you willing to leave the comforts of your bailey Irish cream for the charms of a tequila shot? Not many, very very few for sure

So all you women/men out there, who aspire to find love outside marriage, have you ever thought why you still cant leave your spouse.?
Even though s/he lacks the spunk you have, or lacks the mystery which gives you a kick

I will tell you why..

More than societal thing, or the family pressure, its your own desire of acceptance which makes it impossible to break the chains(unless there is a pressing need like adultery, violence and the likes)

We all seek acceptance, from the world, from people we love
When we grow old..we feel the world stops accepting us gradually
We feel that our charisma, which made us glow and gloat earlier, isnt enough to be loved by the changing ways of the world

The world belongs to the youth, thats a fact. Look at all the advertisements around you, they are out there to impress the young, to get them to like what they have to sell. For old ones, maybe pension plans, and for housewives the soap operas.

So we need that one person, who has seen us in our glory, in our hay days
All that we lost, is stored in that one person
We want that person around, cos s/he makes us look good
Even if we feel we lost the enigma and the charm we had earlier, we know that this one person has known us at our best
S/he has seen what we were capable of, how many hearts we could break and how many wounds we could mend

This weak person's undeterred belief in us, will see us thru the mess that we create for both of us
Even when we feel we are no more in love with that person, we can no let go
Maybe it is is another form of love, Self love transcending into love for another

Thank God, we keep our brains in check, just that bit, to never lose that one person
And we realize, life is a little more about giving in to madness
Self obsessed, selfish piece of pests that we are!


But one moment of that streak of madness, I see in another, my dark thoughts take over and I leave all my rationale...and am ready for a tequila shot

Some days I feel there is a black corpse running thru my veins

the day is shrouded in tons and tons of darkness

darkness emanating from unknown things

darkness of the sort, which only the soul can be

And I feel my heart is on the edge of the cliff,

some one just has to tip me off, just a little bit

And I will be in that overwhelming abyss

An article and my views

Recently read this interesting article by David Bentley Hart, on Ayn Rand's writings and I cant help but agree with few not-so-good things there, even though I have been her hard-core follower. She had always affected my mind many a times in things I said or felt.
Yet there was always a dormant desire in me. to defy her theories, at times, just in small bits

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2011/05/the-trouble-with-ayn-rand

But this article is such a venomous take on her, why so much angst for a woman who just spoke what she felt was right?

Some excerpts from this article:

"Ayn Rand and her idiotic “Objectivism” are enjoying a—well, I won’t call it a renaissance, so let’s say a recrudescence"

"Civilization is always a fragile accommodation at best, precariously poised between barbarism on one side and decadence on the other...Rand was definitely on the side of barbarism."

Barbarism, how?

Though I some what agree with this "I suspect that charity really is the only way to avoid wasting one’s life in a desert of sterile egoism".

And I so not agree with this line

 "And, simply said, I cannot find much common ground with someone who believed that the principal source of human woe over the last twenty centuries has been a tragic shortage of selfishness.".

Maybe selfishness is not the single source, but one of the strongest source. Cos the definition of being selfish, as per her, is not as generally defined by us. So we need to take that in the context and not a stand alone thing.

I just laughed my head off at this: "For what really puts both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead in a class of their own is how sublimely awful they are. "

The mentality of the herd against someone who stands out is so much around, and fills me with disgust.

When I appreciate something brilliant in other, I am pacifying that part of me which could not be all that brilliant.
But if I negate, make it sound ordinary, then there is just one word for such people "jealous".
They are condemning themselves by denying others uniqueness

Just cos they could not be unique, they try to form a herd of people, who would profess to believe in that no-one is unique, all are the same
But silently, and cleverly, they would ry to establish their upper hand on the other, by forming incomprehensible sentences to intimidate the other. And finally telling that you are ordinary, but I am not, since I know I am ordinary....ha!

People look for redemption in others, for their own misery, they always want to hold someone responsible

As Ryan Said : “They hate you for the greatness of your achievement. They hate you for your integrity. They hate you because they know they can neither corrupt nor ruin you” -  I also say that people hate you for your strength, people hate you cos you dont fall apart, people hate you cos you dont even regard them with a hate and intensity which they ask of you.
Some strands of recognition is all they need, from you

But the side note on this line,in that articel, is really funny (Bloody they—I never could stand those swine.)

:D

Not a bad article in all,it is the author's interpretation and personality which s/he reflects in hi/.her likings and disliking. So has he done it here. But nevertheless, I found it harmless & funny.

He reminded me of that novel again by writing such excerpts : For her, the world really was starkly divided between creators and parasites, and the vast majority of humanity belonged to the ranks of the latter. “I came here to say I do not recognize anyone’s right to one minute of my life,” Roark continues, “nor to any part of my energy, nor to any achievement of mine.”

I absolutely loved that part in "Fountainhead", And just for this, I can be in love with her!

 I had written a similar draft in my post which said(though the context here is different) :
"Well, another has only as much hold on you, as much as you give them at any point in time
Never more!
So if someone wishes to be obsessed with you, but if you wish to extricate yourself. You have all the right to. Everything gone in between you 2, before has no meaning. All that we have is today, and today I am allowed to despise someone, and stay away.
One cant hold a moment of past in their kitty to hunt someone down.
Unless of course I have killed someone, or tortured, then I cease to be human and no human rights are not applicable to me"

This paragraph in the article made sense to me in bits and pieces, but not really, cos Ryan emphasized on these attributes, but not denied that there can not be anything apart form this.(If she did then maybe in my mind I have obliterated it)

"Rand really imagined that there could ever be a man whose best achievements were simply and solely the products of his own unfettered and unaided will. She had no concept of grace, even of the ordinary kind: the grace of an existence we do not give ourselves, of natural powers with which we could never have endowed ourselves, and of all those other persons on whom even the strongest among us are dependent. She lacked any ennobling sense that what lies most deeply within us also comes from impossibly far beyond us, as an unmerited gift. She liked to talk about “virtue” a great deal—meaning primarily strength of will and the value that one creates out of one’s own native resources—but for her the only important question regarding the relation between the individual and society was who has a right to what. That is, admittedly, a question that must be asked at various times, but it is never the question that true virtue—true strength—asks of itself."

But Kudos to this para, I know some people who do exactly this, so I just clapped my hands in glee for saying what exactly I have in my mind:

"And, really, what can one say about Objectivism? It isn’t so much a philosophy as what someone who has never actually encountered philosophy imagines a philosophy might look like: good hard axiomatic absolutes, a bluff attitude of intellectual superiority, lots of simple atomic premises supposedly immune to doubt, immense and inflexible conclusions, and plenty of assertions about what is “rational” or “objective” or “real."

Beyond that I could not concentrate more, since too much of negative energy anywhere is not my cup of tea.Thats why I restrain from beign sarcastic, mean and vomit my hatred for anyone in paper.

“There are two ways through life,the way of nature and the way of grace. We have to choose which one to follow.” ~ The Tree Of Life
I choose grace, let others choose their real nature

So Mr.David, you do have substance and potential. Please use it constructively and not by attacking one Ms. Rand

Yet again thoughts of love were on my mind..and the whys which go with it

How much of negativity can a person spread with words and how much of it can one take?
I look for love around, but there is so much of un-love swarming around me that I get back to being my wrong self
In words, in actions, in disapprovals and indifference..there is just too much of un-love sitting around the corner to grab you
Its like some people are out there to jinx all your happiness, even from a distance they can cast a spell, like voo-doo, like black magic

But no, hush, I had love in my mind today..of discourses over coffee or wine in a secluded bar, wishing to be in a stupor
Of my eva-de-clogne minglign with someone's musk
Of a season of the mind which is like reckless new year celebration on goan streets

Love is a state of mind, its a point in you, a point to the center of your being

You can love someone only when you are at peace with yourself,
When you are like that piece of cotton which can absorb everything, ever giving and ever receiving

But when you love cos you are disturbed or not in love with yourself, then you are actually trying to run away from yourself...diving into another person.
You can never love in a disturbed state of your mind, cos then you are actually unloving yourself, in the process of loving someone else
And an un-love for yourself never lasts...it can become an obsession..but never love. So when the other person does not love you back, you start taking out layers off that person, robbing him/her of all adornments you made that person shine with earlier. But its not so much peeling off layers from that person , as much about your loathing for your own weakness, which you realise with time. You are just removing shards of your own personality by owing or disowning things in another

So what do we see in another when we love?
Apart from all those desired qualities you seek in a person: viz honesty, integrity and all that crap, one thing I have heard most from people(and I say it too) is that sense of humor is something which can keep 2 people glued together.

But then is it just about the person's ability to make you laugh? Well, in that case one can go and watch a really cool comedy movie, isnt it?

No, love is that part of you which you will always love, that only part which you will respect in yourself

Love happens when that person pulls your center with a centrifugal force, out on the surface,
You are spilling all over, you are too much to bear, your aura has taken a different colour overnight
And universe is so happy with your "muchness"

Your edges are scathed and sparkle,
In fights and in banal talks, you feel the whole of you

Unlike some people, for whom love is just running away from themselves.Who try to negate every bit of you, who pick ulterior motive in all that you do or say, whose inadequacy starts showing up in you, whose bitterness spills all over you..such people are in-capable of loving, cos their own complexes will never let them love anyone

Sometimes I wonder if its the strong ones who have to bear the cacophony of the weak? Sometimes the strength that you exhibit, can be taken against you, to wear you down. So much that you start condemning your own strength.Just cos, they can not get to the core of you(but keep telling you that you dont have a core and they have you all figured out!)

You can become the same with them, and then its a spiral downwards. The next person you are with, you will spill your venom on him/her and the chain continues


For those who are ensconced in the grandeur of their own thoughts and believes..

Incidentally love is, and will always be about you, yourself

May each one of you find a valentine, to cherish this year..new or old..but someone your own..so much you

In the name of religion

I once met a man in the US. He was an American by birth but had changed his religion to Sikhism and was taking some sessions for getting initiated into it.

It bewildered me. Why would someone want to change one's religion which s/he is born with? Whats this strong connect/disconnect to religion that so many people seem to exhibit? "I am an atheist"..I have heard that statement many times and I feel that if people can be fanatic about their religions, then even atheism is a sort of fanaticism

If you want to defy existence of God, and display it by doing things like not entering temple and standing outside when made to accompany, then you are actually in some way emphasizing the existence of God. You are no better than a fanatic in my eyes.

And I find it funny why someone would want to change the religion they are born with? Is it like a hobby or some school which you change?
What is it that you are seeking in different religions?
Isn't every religion about self discovery in the end? How would learning how to put on a turban and everything else that goes with it, help you in knowing yourself? What was missing in what you believed earlier?

What is this hoopla over religion?

I follow my religion cos I was born with it, that's what I grew up with.
I like my religion for many things..like the smell of incense which fills my house, like the beautiful colors of my deities, like so many stories around each of them.

But most importantly cos my religion wasn't thrust on my face by my folks.
I was never forced into anything, and never stopped from anything, for the sake of religion.

Even though there are restrictions on women in my religion to practice a few things, like you are not supposed to enter temple in one of those days etc. But my parents never bothered to tell me that(by parents I mean my mom, my father is happy being an atheist thought he would not practice it as a law anyway). I learnt it from other girl friends of mine, or other relatives.

And the best thing(for me) which I love about praying is total submission to someone(I call it God). A thing seen rarely in me as a person. I like the way I bow my head in total faith and regard. I sometimes beg, sometimes just blank out. A feeling of total belonging and unquestioned trust. Which I cant seem to have for anyone else in life. Not to forget the perennial hope which comes with my belief

I had gone to a masjid near Charminar in Hyderabad. There is some mystery about a masjid which enchants me and made me want to enter it. But I was stopped and told that women are not supposed to enter. The front bearers of that place looked at me with some ridicule and disdain. I was enraged and wanted to utter something, but checked myself. It wasnt my place.

I once went to a church in US, it was thanks giving or some such important day for the church. I had a catholic friend with me. At the end of the ceremony, all made a line and went up till the priest who was giving some white colored thing to eat. He was feeding each of them with his hand. My friend said I should not do that since only Catholics, who are baptized, should take that. I was irritated, and determined to take that thing. But the moment I reached the priest, I felt some fear. As if I am peeking inside some sacred secrets which I am not supposed to. A feeling of unknown guilt came over me and I backed out.

I hate it when I have to check myself, without knowing why I am doing it. I want to go with the flow of things, and for me anything is not consummated if not done in its entirety. So for me getting that white thing from the priest would have consummated the whole festive mood, but I had to miss it

On these two occasions I realized what probably makes an atheist. Maybe its the restrictions and bars by each religion which makes one loathe it. Which makes one stop believing in a God, who conforms to such baseless things.
Hence they make atheism their religion.

I can never become an atheist though, maybe I have selfish reasons for that.