Make a difference

When I initially thought of writing this, I had some topic in mind. But yesterday, while talking to a friend, I thought of something else. But this new idea, I guess, is not actually enough to make a new post. Hence am going to merge the two. Can’t exactly use the word “merge” as the two topics can be viewed as entirely two different unconnected subjects and one can relate them too, if one wants to...

Actually, I was talking to a very good friend of mine. He taught me something. I liked what he told and was happy that I have learnt something good. Then thought, “y cant I just pen these points so that others who want to, can benefit with it?”…

Hey... Can u guys tell who the best teacher is? I feel that “life is the best teacher”. No one can teach u what life can…

Actually, I was not like this before. Things used to happen, I used to react and then wud just carry on. Never used to analyze the situation and learn from it. My roommate, in this case, was exactly opposite to wot I was. Even if something wrong happened, she would say “I have learnt from this”. I always used to wonder wot she cud learn from such situations???

But now I realize that a person can learn from the smallest of incidents… Growing old doesn’t actually confirm that u r growing wise as well. If u try to learn, each day, each moment will make u wiser…

I am the kind of person who wud buy anything just coz of the very simple reason that "I liked it". I don’t actually think much before getting it. But a friend of mine wud never do that. He had two pair of shoes. If he saw another good one in a showroom, he wud appreciate it but never buy it. If only the old ones got spoilt, he wud buy new ones. I used to think that he was stingy. One day he told me : “ there is a difference between wot u want and wot u need. U shud be able to differentiate the two.” It was a grt lesson indeed. Sad part is that I understood wot he told but haven’t implemented it so far. Probably, I will do that when I have more responsibilities to shoulder.

What I am going to tell now is wot I learnt yesterday. It was actually an explicitly told lesson. My friend, yesterday, told me the difference between another set of words. Ie. “listen” and “hear”… I guess, when someone scolds u, say for an example when a mother scolds a kid, the kid always “hears” it n not “listen”. Even if u go to a satsang and just hear the entire speech, u r not going to gain anything. But if u “listen” to it and try to understand the meaning of wot is being told and try to imbibe it, u will learn many a things, for sure…




Many of my friends have been onsite in the near past and many are still there. Since I haven’t been to a foreign land, I have always been curious to know their experiences. They tell me “people over here are so polite. Almost all their sentences precede or succeed with lotsa thankus and sorrys”… Some say “India is the best place... But only if it was a lil cleaner”… In this last statement the second part can be replaced by “... but if only the traffic wasn’t this bad”, “…but if only the infrastructure was better”, “…but if only the ….”. The list is endless…

But tell me very frankly… when u say u want your country to be better , who do u think will do that if not u???? if ever, after getting down from a bus, u have thrown the tickets on the road or the pavement, u don’t have the right to complain about the cleanliness. If ever while traveling in ur car, u have thrown the chips or biscuit cover on the roadside, u don’t have the right to complain.
If u urself keep honking wen behind the wheels, u don’t have the right to complain about the noise on the road. If ever u have broken the traffic rules, u don’t have the right to complain about the bad traffic either.
Do u really talk politely to others everytime??? If ever u have shouted at someone angrily for him/her having stamped on ur feet in a crowded bus or for any such petty things, then u don’t have the right to complain about other ppl being impolite either!!!!
Well… India is superior to other countries in many matters but still...like the case of the reasons of India being inferior to other countries is endless, so are the reasons of we not contributing enough to make the place a better place to live in!!!!

If all of us realize our responsibilities, we can make a difference for sure. We need not be a president or a prime minister or a minister for helping the country grow. If all of us understand our responsibilities and work accordingly, v can change many of the bad things around us.

Actually, even if we understand the expectations from us as a son/daughter, a brother/sister or a friend or any relation for that matter, and try to play the role well, v can have a better relation. Its said that “ if u love someone, say I love u, be it a friend, ur parents or whoever for that matter”. But just telling someone that they are ur best friends isn’t enough. Well… “actions speaks louder than words”. isn’t it?... Hope u got wot I wanted to tell…

Hey, we guys work hard at office rt? In our professional lives, v have our set of roles n objectives defined and ve have to work to achieve it. At the end of 6 months or so, our performance is measured and v get the appraisal accordingly. Because of this, v work hard to achieve our goals.

In our personal lives, no one sets any such objectives. But does that mean that we wont work to achieve our implicitly defined roles??? Does everything needs to be told to us explicitly?? Cant v, own our own, understand our roles and responsibilities as a son/daughter, as a family member, a friend, an employee, as a citizen and work accordingly. If all of us understand this and act accordingly, I am sure that the world will be a better place to live in…

Each one of us has the capability to make that small beginning which will end up making a big difference…

Moving Thoughts...

Hey guys...What do u do when u sit alone and have nothing to do? Probably u will try to pass ur time doing something that u like.. ie. ur hobbies probably.. wot if u r not in a mood to do that either???
Probably u too will do the most easiest thing.. ie.. think… Obviously I cannot tell wot exactly one will think. Actually, I happened to ask this stupid ques to one of my friends and he answered “ well.. that depends on wot m thinking about “… :)

As Yudhishtar had very correctly said, “The fastest thing on this earth is nothing but ur thoughts…”

Ever wondered how v connect things wen v think n hop from one thought to the other with in a fraction of a second???.. V might be in Switzerland this moment n at home, in our cozy rooms in the next …
Here I have just tried to capture some of my moving thoughts…

NB: Shall just bullet the thoughts to demarcate them and for the easy understanding of the reader that I have actually jumped from one thought to the other… In some of the thoughts, I might have reached at a conclusion n some will be left as a question for u to answer, as I haven’t been able to find an answer myself.. Probably, ur views might help me find the answer m looking for...Obviously, u can tell ur views even about the thoughts I have concluded upon.. ur views may vary or u may agree with me .. depends on how u feel about it.. So lemme start now.. :)

a) I saw a book yesterday that said “Speeches... that changed the World”… But do u think that a speech can influence everyone equally???
Had met one of my big bosses a few days back and he was trying to encourage us n inspire us by telling some stories about the difference between the two different forms of carbon: the graphite n the diamond.
The way he spoke was influencial… But it didn’t have the same effect on everyone.. Some reacted by telling “kya pakata hei”.. some said “ wen u r in a mood to listen to bedtime stories, u shud go to him”..
But, I doubt, if anyone actually tried to grasp wot he was trying to convey us… m not saying that I understood it all, I cud make out a few things that were within my reach.
Yes, that’s the point… U actually understand how much u want to and is based on ur level of knowledge about the topic...And also obviously on ur willingness, and the state of your mind..
In case u r wondering wot made me think about this, wud like to tell that it was again, as always, coz of a friend of mine..
About my last blog, he commented by telling that all my sketches are very close to “emotions”..
Well.. if u think deeply, they are. If u probably think in a different way, theya aren't. Its all about the way u look at it.. Telling frankly, I had not looked at them with that angle but I was appreciated for a thing which even I never knew it reflected :)..
Just look at the painting below n tell me wot u feel it talks about… Probably if all of u tell ur views, v can appreciate the capablility of the human mind... Ur views reflect ur nature and ur circumstances.. ( As does the CRBT tone that u set for ur phone :)... he he he wondering y such an unrelated comparison?? actually had read an article in the paper that says that the CRBT tone u set for ur mobile actually speaks a lot about u, ur likes n dislikes n ur nature. True indeed !!!)...
Anyways, dont forget to tell me the meaning of the painting below, that u feel, is...

I guess… It is wot u think that u can c, not wot u c..

b) Guys, next thought is not exactly philosophical... Its more of a concern than anything else…
During a celebration, v were just enjoying ourselves... One volunteer came up with an idea that v play antakshari. All agreed. She asked us to split into two groups. I felt pity on the way v think still, wen she told the names for the groups that she had come up with. She told “one team will be called south n the other north. So split urselves accordingly”... In case u have not understood already, she was telling that the ppl belonging to south India to form a group n those from north, to form another one... Wasn’t that a very narrow minded idea coming from very educated ppl like us???
No one had any problem with those names n hence no one objected. Well... neither did I. But I feel proud to say that I chose to be a member of the team “NORTH”... Not that m ashamed to say that i belong to south. I wud have chosen the team “SOUTH” in case I was actually a north Indian…
Well... aren’t v all Indians first and then a Mallu or a Marathi or a Kannadiga???

c) Recently I got a forward called “a piece of cake”… The message it gave was : “Wen v ask ourselves why does he make us go thru all the difficult times, v don’t realize that what/ where these events may bring us. Only he knows and he wont let us fall. V don’t need to settle for the raw ingredients, trust in him and c something fantastic happening”…
Obviously, it is a positive message which probably conveys that : “believe in god.. all that happens, is his way of making u strong and he has plans for u.. a future much brighter than wot u ask for”.. A positive thought indeed...
Even wen v console our friends or near ones, v say that “dont worry...all that happens, happens for gud, god must have kept something better for u”... I am not a nastik but is it actually true?????
I do wonder many a times if “all that happens,ACTUALLY happens for good”…

d) Hey ppl, u do agree with me rt that v talk to ourselves?.. I guess, everyone does that. Obviously v dont talk aloud to ourselves but inside us, v do. Well, m not asking or talking about the scientific explanation as to y it happens or wot exactly it is :)… Hey, that’s actually another thing I can think upon I guess…
Well, lemme continue with wot I had intended to write…
Which language do u use wen u talk to urself???? Thinking????
Some might actually talk in their mother tongue, some in Hindi or English or any other language…
I guess, it’s the language that v are most comfortable with, that v use wen v talk within us…
But, in my case, it actually keeps changing. Wen I was young ( oops I still AM!!! :) ), so lemme put it as, wen I was younger, I used to talk in Hindi. ie.. during my school days. Later when I went to college, I guess I used to use my mother tongue as well. Wen I started working, it was a mixture of Hindi and English and now its more of English.
Well.. its not that my proficiency in those languages has fluctuated during these years. It was probably the influence of the place I was staying in. Since during school, it was mostly North Indians who where around me. Even others, used to communicate in Hindi itself. Since my college was in Kerala, and mostly my friends used to talk in Malayalam, and I guess that proves the ingress of that language in my thoughts…Now, since here most ppl use English, probably that’s y I too think mostly in English…
I wonder if this funda of fluctuation holds good as a general principle for others as well…or is it that I change too fast according to the surroundings???

e) This topic about language reminds me of another incident that happened… A friend of mine who is a mallu too, used to talk to me in Hindi. Another mallu happened to notice this and commented to my friend saying “ kyo dikhava kar rahi ho, mallu se Malayalam mein nahi baat kar sakti???"
Now that friend of mine deliberately tries to talk to me in Malayalam. Which I find a lil odd…
Well.. v were comfortable that way, why did the other girl have a problem??
It had nothing to do with her. She was nowhere related to it either. Neither did it used to harm her nor help her in any way.. Then y did she have to pass that comment. And y did my friend change her ways coz of a comment which shudnt have actually mattered to her???
Why cant v live our lives the way v want to, the way v feel like??? Why do v have to think what others feel about it even if the matter has, actually, nothing to do with them????
This is one thing that hurts me a lot… y do the decisions of my life , no matter how small or big, depend on even those ppl who don’t matter to me in anyway, who are not related to me in any way …and to whom I don’t mean anything either…also who probably wont come forward to help me if m in need …

Well.. I guess I have again ended up writing another too long a post to be of interest to others.. So I shall just wind off here keeping the rest of my moving ( and wild to some) thoughts for Moving thoughts – Part II… :)