Artist or Artisan, Which One Are You?

Artist or Artisan, Which One Are You?

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I remember on my first day with my art teacher, he said one thing that stayed with me. As we spoke of copying vs. originality, he said “There’s a difference between a painter and an artist. Merely having technical knowledge does not make you an artist. That’s just a painter”. My head first protested because well, painters are those who paint walls, not those who make beautiful designs on canvases. But I did get the point.

And now, mingling closely with artists, I see so much more clearly what he meant. Again, I get my terminology slightly wrong here, because technically artisans are people who work in a skilled trade, making things with their hands. But you’ll get the point, won’t you?

I see so many artists who compartmentalize. And I guess this will be natural for most people without any spiritual background, because art without spirituality is dangerous. The mind is like a tank of water, mud safely settled at the bottom, the upper surface appearing calm and clear, giving the illusion that there is no trash. Art shakes things up, brings the dirt right up to the surface. And without a spiritual foundation, one has no idea how this needs to be handled. So we limit art to the canvas, or to the instrument, dance floor, or to the stage. And this compartmentalization works initially, and then starts to tear the system apart. Is it any wonder then, that India has a history of great artists, none of whom were mentally unstable, eccentric or suicidal, whereas Western artists have always been either or all? I don’t know of any Indian art form that didn’t establish a firm spiritual foundation first, and that is what made the difference.

What is an artist, really?

  • Someone who looks at something ordinary, something everyone looks at all the time, and sees something no one’s ever seen before. A fresh perspective, a new direction, a different approach.
  • Someone who is fearless in creating- or someone who is capable of setting any fears aside, in order to create.
  • Someone who is willing to see the truth as it is, and is willing to bear the brunt of expressing that truth. And more than anything else, someone who can do this in a creative, loving and beautiful way – in a way that the message will be accepted.

Our creative outlets give us this space – a space where we can be free of judgment – especially judgment of ourselves, a space where we can learn to set aside our fears of discovering and expressing the truth. But when it comes to taking this approach to our personal lives, we falter.

Almost all artists I know have trouble really fitting in with the society, because a part of them follows the heart – enough to not feel a sense of belonging in a mostly-zombied-out world. And this is a difficult thing, because it is human to want to belong. The bane of an artist is the fact that they will probably never belong. They try, to belong among other artists, but that doesn’t work out, because they’re all compartmentalizing too, and we all compartmentalize in different ways, which causes conflict and friction. The eventual consequence is a feeling of resentment, indignation and self-righteousness towards others, even more so towards ‘ordinary’ people. If you find yourself becoming cynical and angry (a masculine approach to unsolvable problems) or depressed and dejected (a feminine approach) over time, you know it is because you’re not taking art outside your studio or your stage.

Is there a way out? Yes there is. Every artist will tell you that art is their bliss. But we come back to the question we began with – are you an artist, or an artisan? Are you just learning a technique, are you just capable of creating when you pick up a tool? Or do you let yourself carry your wide-eyed, child-like wonder everywhere you go, and bring your vulnerability to everyone you meet? That’s the secret here.

Let your art take over your life. Allow yourself to listen just as deeply, observe just as wholly, and absorb just as effectively, in every moment, every conversation, every relationship in your life. Allow yourself to be brutally honest with yourself, and allow yourself to show your true self to others – in a beautiful, creative way that is easy to accept, while still being true to the message. More than anything, be open to letting life break you, and have faith that you will learn to rebuild yourself, putting the pieces back together in the completely different way. Sounds difficult? Since when did difficulty ever scare artists? Not only is it possible, it is also worth the effort. If a few hours of your art form can bring you such bliss, have you ever wondered what a lifetime of it can do?

What is LOVE? Love Vs. Addiction/ Abuse

What is LOVE? Love Vs. Addiction/ Abuse

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I never thought I’d write an article on love. It is a topic too vast, and in my opinion a realm where the learning never stops. Nobody can ever claim to completely understand or ‘master’ love, as I see it. So I always thought that writing on it would be a pompous, self-deluding exercise. But here I am anyway, in response to a distraught friend who asked me ‘What is Love?’ at the end of a relationship. It is a question I have asked myself too, so I don’t claim to know the answer. But a little clarity has been there, which is what I attempt to share here.

Emotional abuse is so normalized these days, that most abuse is misconstrued as love. What’s worse, when one tries to call it out, one is often accused of rejecting the other’s love. But the differences are stark and clear, if you’re trying to look for them. So this isn’t meant to be a guide on how to love – that takes years of self-work and healing – but a guide for those trying to figure out if a particular relationship is loving or abusive. Check by studying yourself, not the other person, because love is about giving more than receiving.

You Want to Surrender, Not Control

Control and manipulation are signs of the absence of love and heart energy in a relationship. It means that the person is coming from a space of fear and lack – and someone functioning from that space is not in a position to love.

In abuse, the other person is held responsible for one’s feelings. Osho said that when in love, during conflict the person thinks that there must be something wrong with them. The moment one thinks that there is something wrong with the other person, it is a sign that there is no love anymore. And this is my experience too. Love is acceptance of who you are, as you are, while at the same time calling out your delusions or mistakes – but it does not accuse you or put you down.

You Want to Give

In love, you give for no reason other than it makes you happy and the other isn’t expected to be grateful or to acknowledge how much you do. The statement “I did so much for you, and this is what I get in return” is a clear sign of a lack of love. That was business. There was an investment, and now you’re upset because you didn’t get appropriate returns on your investment. You could be in a relationship for years, and you’d never feel like the relationship was a dead investment – even if it ends badly – because you were never investing in the first place. When doing things for the other makes you happy, then there is no baggage attached to that giving.

What Can I Do for You?

It is always during a conflict of interest when the true colors of love come out. In a loving relationship you will find that both the people are trying to ask ‘what are you going through, and how can I make this right?’. In an abusive relationship, both are defending their positions and accusing the other of not doing enough. Or worse, telling the other person how they need to change.

You Seek a Win-Win

You know how all those stories circulate, about women listing out all the mistakes their husbands have made over the last decade, in every fight? Well that’s normalized abuse for you. It is a sign of an abusive relationship where one demands and the other eventually gives up on trying to comply, or keeps trying, failing, and feeling inadequate. Love seeks resolution so that there can be a win-win – where both partners can be comfortable with a solution. When it’s ‘my way or the highway’, take it for granted that that is not love being manifested there.

Another consequence of seeking a win-win is that it makes it easier to be more forgiving of the other’s mistakes, and also makes you kinder when you’re both hurting.

You Don’t Want to Hurt the Other

Anyone reading this statement is likely to go, ‘Oh I never want to hurt another person’ – and if you just thought that, you’re not only wrong, but you also need to work more deeply with your level of self-awareness. There is a tendency to want to hurt the other person when you don’t get what you want from them, and even more if they are hurting you. Sensitive people are usually more aware of this in others and can feel either deeply traumatized or infuriated when they sense this.

Observe yourself carefully. If you feel like hurting the other person when you feel wronged – either by saying something nasty or mean, or by doing something – even hurting yourself – to bring about pain and/ or guilt in the other, you are not only not coming from love but also being highly manipulative and abusive.

An Apology is Easy. And Meaningful

I think apologies need a separate article on their own, I’ve seen so many people completely screw this up. But you’ll find that when there is love, this comes naturally. When you realize that you’ve hurt the other person, you tend to automatically feel sorry to have put the other person through pain or distress, and you promise yourself that you won’t repeat it. And then you don’t.

“Sorry, but…. ” is not an apology. There may sometimes be an explanation to help the other understand why you acted a certain way and clear the ‘why did you do this to me?’ question in their minds. But there’s a big difference between an explanation and an excuse. An explanation says this is what happened, and I’m really sorry I acted this way and it caused you pain, and an excuse says I’m sorry, but this is why I acted this way, I couldn’t have helped but act like this (and often – if you had acted differently, my words/ actions would not have been hurtful).

There are no rules

We have a tendency to attach rules to love. If it’s true love, it’ll last forever, if it is true love, we’ll never fight, or we’ll never sleep without resolving a fight, true love means never giving up no matter how painful it gets, and so on and so forth. You know what, none of these are true. Nothing is. Love is not bound by a bunch of belief systems. If you’re trying to analyse whether someone else has experienced love, you’re wasting your time and need to find something better to do. If it is your own relationships you’re trying to assess by these standards, let go. Do the best you can, and leave the rest to God. The heart opens bit by bit when the time comes, and you will find yourself more loving as time passes, if you are sincerely working on yourself.

And lastly,

Here’s a video I fell in love with. Botton talks about how love is not ‘natural’ and needs to be learned and taught. Being in a relationship is about patiently teaching the other how to help you feel loved. And patiently and sincerely learning how to make the other feel loved. It is one of the most beautiful videos I’ve ever come across on relationships and I hope you enjoy it too.

 

Can’t Handle the Negativity? Read This!

Can’t Handle the Negativity? Read This!

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Years ago when I was completely frustrated in a setting very different from my home, I had complained to my mother that I can’t cope with this environment. It is too negative, and these shallow people seem to have nothing better than gossip, cricket, govt and traffic to talk about. I couldn’t cope. I hated where I was.

And instead of helping me, she said this was my problem. ‘You can either be the victim, or you can be the change’ she said. I was irritated for a day. And then my life changed direction completely.

YOU are the source.

You don’t have to depend on stones, angels or anything else for changes in your life.
YOU choose how you respond to the shit life throws at you –
YOU choose whether you let it drown you or whether you use that as a stepping stone to grow and rise.
YOU choose whether you invest all your energies in trying to change the environment by (mis)using energy healing, stones and what not, or whether you let circumstances change, shape and polish you into the best version of you.
This is how you create your destiny, not by facilitating change outside, but by opening up to transformations within.

When the world around you changes from nurturing to shit, it is a sign that it is time for you to start giving instead of receiving. It is an unpleasant lesson in most cases, a reluctant transition. But you’re growing from a sapling needing care to a tree which bears fruit. It is time to nurture the world. Are you ready?

How do you do this?

Believe it or not, you don’t have to have a plan. It really begins by processing the fact that this is your problem to deal with, and you have to deal with it assuming no external change. We’re always cribbing that the external circumstances are not right. There isn’t enough money, there aren’t enough jobs, the people aren’t right or supportive, or they’re downright abusive and demeaning, the food isn’t good, the culture isn’t right, the list is endless. And you can either sit with this mess and let it take your life and joy away from you, OR you can ask yourself, can I find a way to be happy even if I have to survive in this mess?

Who do I need to be so that I can make the most of my life the way it stands right now?

We all talk about stopping to smell the flowers, but it is something very, very few of us actually integrate into our lives. Are you taking the time out to enjoy the little things? Or has life just become a race from one finishing line to another, one problem to another? When you start taking the time out to be happy – little moments during the day here and there, your system starts to lean towards a happiness-oriented approach.

Next, you have to integrate your power. New age spirituality seems to me like a bunch of belief systems designed to take your power away. Buy this crystal, pray to this angel, do this workshop and you’ll get everything you want and finally be happy. FUN FACT: You cannot buy happiness with money. No, you really cannot. You can buy some pleasure, sure. But that’s just going to be a life of endless chasing. You buy happiness through offering your identity. Through letting go of the attachment to your ideas and your personality. We’re all about ‘this is my identity, I’ve gotta preserve it’ – No! That’s exactly what is holding you back, let it go.

If you chant affirmations or pray, pray for the support and guidance to help you become everything you need to become, and open up to new possibilities. Open up to the idea that there indeed is a way of being happy in the present, pathetic circumstances and that you’re going to find it. The rest actually flows pretty naturally. People have asked me many times what they should be doing in certain circumstances – and I’ve almost always replied that if they’re clear about their motivations – if they’re taking this action while being open to internal change – and if they’re tuned in to their heart, the path is always clear. If there is a conflict, it is usually because your belief systems or ulterior motives are interfering.

Lastly, you cannot really be the change unless you have a strong foundation first. A strong daily spiritual practice is essential, whether it is meditation, energy healing or something else. I would’ve said yoga too if that involved deep self-reflection, but today yoga seems more like acrobatics to me. Somehow people who can wrap their ankles around their necks are suddenly more spiritual. Anyway. We’ll leave that for another day.

Q&A: The Death of the Feminine

Q&A: The Death of the Feminine

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I’ve always considered myself a feminist. But much of the movement in the name of feminism disturbs me deeply. It’s like today we celebrate when a woman ‘becomes a man’. Not that a woman should be forced to remain at home and care for her children, no. But it is like that just isn’t satisfying enough anymore. There was an interesting discussion in this context on my group recently, and I post it here because I thought it got interesting. 

Ashwita women getting into air force.. fighter jets.. and all this concept of feminism…Isn’t current feminism trying to make women more masculine?

Is war masculine?

Yes feminism is pretty much dead. We’ve glorified and rewarded only masculine qualities and demeaned feminine qualities for decades. So it’s awesome for a woman to go out there and make money – we think she’s awesome, but when a man stays home to take care of the kids he’s somehow a lesser human being. The stars, the achievers, the providers have been glorified, the nourishers, the caretakers, the teachers have been trashed. A cricket star is bathed with money, a nursery teacher responsible for the future generation barely makes two ends meet. So you can see what we’ve prioritised as a society. In your own mind, if you were meeting a star and a nursery teacher, who would you be more interested in? That’s the problem.

And then of course the same gets applied within ourselves too, we prioritise our masculine qualities and downplay our feminine qualities. This works for women because they can get both. You see so frequently these days ‘be the man that you need’. Men suffer too here because then either they lose touch with their feminine altogether and become brutes or they move to the other end, becoming ‘the women that they need’. Now a days I see more kind and nourishing men than the women I meet.

War and aggression are masculine acts yes. Manipulation and brain washing are feminine.

(Someone else) I had a similar doubt. Each soul has different purpose.
Should tasks be characterized just based on gender?
Or one should put effort to look into soul of the partner/family member and support for its upliftment by doing for that soul (be it man being kind and nourishing)?

What makes you think that gender would limit the soul and take it away from its purpose? If the soul had a different purpose, it would have been born as a different gender.

The soul itself is colourless, odourless, limitless, property – less. It is only the mind that imagines a purpose, ideals, values, etc. If the focus of our life is simply to maximise each moment, we are already living out the real purpose of our life – which is for the soul to experience what it is like to be you.

My mom once said in this context. Go to a shop and look at plain cloth. You can use it for anything. But once it is stitched into a pant and shirt, then the pant goes on the lower body and the shirt on the upper body. Neither is superior or inferior.

Today in the name of freedom, pants want to be worn on the chest and shirts on the hips. To anyone looking at this objectively, it is nothing but ridiculous. We’ve turned everything into a chase these days, including experiences. Women want to become men, men want to become women and experience waxing and threading, the monthly cycles, labour pains, etc. Its insane. You’ll run out of your lifetime simply experiencing what it is like to be you, that’s how intense it is, but no, you’d rather abandon that and focus on trying to experience what it is like to be everybody else! (not you, I mean this generally)

(In response to ‘What makes you think that gender would limit the soul and take it away from its purpose?’)
Frequently nowadays, people categorize the tasks, no males have to do this task, female have to do this task.
So I thought, that does constant nudging can eventually take soul away from its purpose.

Yeah so who categorizes it? Like putting clothes in a washing machine is not a male or female task, it is a role assigned by the mind. Giving birth to a baby, breast-feeding, these are clearly female tasks. Chopping wood, clearly a male task. Opening a tight jar, clearly a male task 😁 the mind is screwed up for sure, that’s why our society is where it is today. If you’re confused, ask yourself this simple question – who would do this if I was alone? If you could do it, then it is your role too. If it wouldn’t have been possible, then it is clearly the role of the other.

If it is part of your life choices to marry and co-exist with another person (or even co-exist in another setting) then it isn’t about gender roles. It is about finding a balance and making things work more beautifully with that person. If we want to remain attached to your ideas of gender, then you need to be alone – and even then you might have to change them – a woman might have to pay the bills and fix the light-bulbs and a man might have to cook for himself and clean for himself. If you want to effectively function as a unit in harmony with another person, then you have to set your mental ideas aside and see how you can blend in and maximize the potential of that equation.

Q&A: How Do I Forgive Myself?

Q&A: How Do I Forgive Myself?

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What about forgiving ourselves? How do we forgive ourselves for the decision we made?

Forgiving ourselves becomes an issue if we think that external situations control our capacity to be happy. If one choice could have made you happier and one less happier, then you are better off with the ‘wrong’ choice, because that wrong choice will help you learn much more effectively that choices – and external circumstances don’t have anything with your capacity for joy. When you realise this, forgiveness becomes redundant.

The second aspect is, if you are focused on a spiritual pathway, you are changing and growing everyday. So the person who made that wrong decision is not even who you are anymore, so who are you holding the grudge against?

 I needed to hear this. But what if the decision is something not replaceable? Of course, all decisions are not replaceable, but for example, if we lose one job, we can get another job, or if we lose one lover, we can get another one. But what if the decision we made is something that we can never replace, then the it comes with regret. Yes it is true that we need to realise that external circumstances do not make us less happy… (ultimately), but how do we deal with such regret? Just see it as a “lesson”?

Then you ‘integrate it’ into your life. Ultimately we never chase things, we only chase how those things make us feel. So ask yourself what feeling you were chasing and remind yourself that you can feel that way without an external trigger

Q&A: Is Marriage Necessary?

Q&A: Is Marriage Necessary?

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Hello Ashwita. Is marriage truly necessary. Concepts like – better half, one’s partner completing oneself and the Hindu concept of Marriage being one of the samskaras. Are they to be followed or is it OK and perhaps good in a certain way to not marry.

I have also heard a spiritual teacher say something like – some people come to this world to fulfill a bigger purpose and they aren’t meant to have a family.

Please share what according to you is the right perspective on this.

Things like ‘better half’, ‘completing oneself’ etc come from a space of deep unfulfillment and rarely bring sustainable joy. Ultimately, it is simple, vinasha kaale vipreet buddhi – when your time is bad, you’ll take all the wrong decisions, shun people who can guide you in the right direction and support you, and turn to those who will mislead you.

You ask ‘is marriage necessary’, and I ask ‘for what’?

As an antidote for loneliness, marriage is useful for about 2 years if you find the right partner, after which you will find yourself back at where you started. Ultimately you are lonely because you have abandoned yourself. The presence and the distraction of a partner can mask this for a couple of years. If you have a child after 2 years, you can mask it for longer, but you are only masking. Of course, if you marry the wrong partner you will simply be miserable and lonely for many years, so the point is defeated.

Many people think that life will become easier after marriage as there will be someone to share responsibilities. More often than not this is rarely the case. If anything, marriage doubles your responsibilities. If you want a man so that you’ll have someone who will.. I don’t know, pay the bills, drive you around, or if you want a woman who will maybe cook for you, do your laundry, take care of your parents – please, just learn to do all this yourself. Be the man/ woman you want to marry first, because if you don’t, any situation where your partner is incapable of fulfilling these needs will tear your marriage apart.

If you want a partner to raise children with, it may not be a bad idea, provided you find someone who will last with you peacefully until they’re old enough. Quite a hard task these days, but it may be worth trying. A child being raised in a toxic household is probably not a good idea, and single parents might just do a better job, so again it is debatable from this perspective.

If you want to ensure you will not end up alone in your old age, then it is pointless because chances are high your spouse will die 10-20 years before you do, your children will likely be abroad or far away and meet you once a year. If your spouse is alive, you will probably not be able to stand each other after a few decades of rubbing each other the wrong way – look at any couple that’s been together for 3+ decades and you’ll know what I mean. Very rare to find people who are genuinely happy spending time with each other and capable of talking to each other deeply after spending decades of growing apart and ignoring each other while they focus on kids and on making money. So in such a case it is better to simply marry when you start getting older so you find someone you are actually compatible with at 50 and someone who looks fit enough to last another 3 decades with you.

To increase the population and make sure human race is not wiped out from the face of the earth, marriage is a useful tool, yes – although this is a purpose that is long gone, what with 7.5 billion of us threatening to wipe out all other species instead.

To keep an order in the society, maybe marriage is a fairly useful tool… probably. As a therapist especially in India I have very little regard for marriage as I have seen marriage more as a tool which pushes people to have extra-marital affairs. People stay in marriage for the sake of the society and go have relationships with whoever they want, too afraid to be honest and open (even with themselves) about what they really want. This is slowly changing but anyone who is open and supportive enough to have friends who share their personal stories knows how rampant this still is.

Is marriage truly necessary if we want spiritual growth? No. For spiritual growth, nothing is truly necessary except brutal honesty with oneself and utmost sincerity and dedication towards the path. Everything else that you need to develop, the universe will bring into your life and you will surrender because you will know that that is right at that point in time, no matter what others, the society or the sacred books tell you. (Note that this is a dangerous thing if one is not brutally honest and completely sincere with oneself because then one can follow one’s wild fantasies in the name of ‘doing what feels right’ – this is what many of Osho’s disciples did and went completely haywire, and I still see a lot of people on the spiritual pathway doing this)

So – am I saying marriage is completely unnecessary? Well, yes and no. Is it necessary? I don’t believe it is, no. Unless maybe you’re going to need the paperwork or moving to Dubai where you will get arrested if you live without marriage, or unless you are having children and your country needs the parents to be married. If you do find a person you love deeply, who loves you back equally deeply and you both want to commit to each other, then marriage can be a truly beautiful, divine thing. But as with most divine things in the world, this is usually just defiled and used as a means to a whole lot of other ends.

Bottom-line? If you meet someone with whom giving seems natural and effortless, and it makes you want to spend the rest of your life making that other person happy, do it. Otherwise, take a good hard look at what you are really seeking and whether marriage really is going to fulfill that need.

Q&A: Why Did Creation Happen?

Q&A: Why Did Creation Happen?

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So, this is not a post in which I answer this question, just so you are not disappointed in the end. This is a conversation that happened on our Whatsapp group that I felt was worth sharing. I’ve left grammatical errors as they are just so I don’t change anything, so bear with me.

P: I have a question… why creation happened ?

Ashwita: I have another question. How will you know that my answer is correct?

S (in reply to P): Read Bhagavad Gita… you have all the answers about life and death.

Ashwita: See these ideas are dangerous. It is a great idea to read a sacred book with the openness for transformation – and that is probably how you approached it, but remember that everyone reads a book differently. If a book is giving you ‘answers’ then it is merely adding burden to your spiritual journey by giving you even more belief systems to remove. A book and a teacher should be a means for UNlearning on the spiritual pathway, not a means for learning even more false ideas about the world and its existence.

This is exactly why we have religious wars – because people are too busy defending their belief systems and identity to be able to drown in the depths of the real message and lose their identity altogether.

P: The reason I have this question is, for birth or death, desire or some form of incompletion is required, if Brahman is fully satisfied, complete state, then how or why did creation happen in the first place? If ur answer gives some clarity on this contradiction, then I would know it’s correct. If u r answer is very different, I may get a different perspective that may help me correct my other understandings or assumptions.

Ashwita: In the last line you talk about assumptions. That is a really flawed approach science takes, because if your assumptions are wrong by even a small margin then it can lead to huge differences in the final calculations. Now taking a scientific approach, look at it this way. No two spiritual teachers whether in the same or different traditions or religions agree on everything. This means you have no theoretical access to the right set of assumptions. Furthermore, you are limited by your 5 senses in a highly multidimensional world, and there is no way you can develop the right assumptions by yourself. This means it is impossible to start with the right assumptions. Which then means you are never – NEVER going to truly figure life or existence out. Get used to that idea, because this is not an assumption 😊 and then restart your approach from there – no matter what you believe, you’re already wrong.

I would suggest dedicating yourself more powerfully to your daily spiritual practice. Eventually you will have no questions left. Set your mind aside and go deeper within yourself.

Are We Losing Our Culture?

Are We Losing Our Culture?

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Once upon a time, there was a sage. He spent many years meditating in isolation. One day, he saw a lost, hungry kitten standing at his doorstep and fed it some milk. As would be expected, that cat soon became a regular. And then it got even more friendly and would prawl around his house. And then it went too far – the cat started disturbing him during his meditation. So now he would tie the cat before he meditated.

Years passed and someone found this sage, was touched deeply by him and brought other people. Soon, he had a set of disciples. And then one day, he died. The disciples continued to follow his teachings. One fateful day, his cat died.

That was it. The whole ashram was immersed in chaos, people frustrated, lost, arguing, because now they had to find the ‘right’ cat, without which it would be impossible to start their meditation – after all, tying the cat was the first step!

This sums up culture for you.

And it is a pity, Because if you were paying attention, you would have realised that the initial message is completely lost in this quest to maintain ‘tradition’. What we do in the name of tradition often defiles and violates the very thing we set out to protect.

There have been many protests in India thanks to a system going through a transition. And while some traditions have been targetted by vested interests, most have been questioned for the right reasons. Unfortunately, people are so busy trying to find the cat, that they’ve forgotten the philosophy at the very core of our culture: Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam. (One world, one family)

One of the biggest drawbacks of Indian culture as I observed it growing up, was this drastic lack of a sense of personal space. People on the train could ask you if you were married, why not, how many children, and how much money you earned. All before bestowing you with precious advice about how you should live your life. Distant aunts tried to determine who should marry you. But all was OK, because ultimately, it was Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam. You were never alone. You could walk in to a stranger’s house and they would give you food and a place to stay. Those people on the train would share their lunch with you before doling out their advice. They would fight for you if someone tried to take your seat. They cared for you as if you were their family – and they felt justified in advising you (and probably even abusing you), in the same spirit.

Now there’s no family. We don’t even smile at strangers, let alone sharing lunch with them, we’re more likely to be spectators if someone gets hurt, than actually reach out and help. Hell, in my apartment, even friends stand back and watch with glee as you get into a fist-fight with someone else. I’m talking about adults.

We’ve given up the idea of one world, one family, but we refuse to give up the privilege of intruding upon others’ lives. We want our right to keep others awake at night, without ever investing in them. We want to pollute the air they breathe in the name of celebration, because we don’t care about the breathing difficulties their children have – after all, it won’t be us sitting by the bedside or rushing the child to the hospital, so who cares?

Are we being forced to give up our culture? Truth is we flushed it down the drain eons ago. Simple things like wearing a tilak or bindi – something that is meant to protect us from loss of energy, we don’t bother with. Brahmins aren’t supposed to leave their hair open/ loose – but not very fashionable, so who cares? And they make more money as an engineer so all that sadhana they were supposed to do daily can wait till retirement. And they were never supposed to cross an ocean, and somehow nobody protested when that rule was conveniently forgotten. But Diwali fireworks? Ooohhh no no, Goddess Lakshmi must be pleased on all accounts, even if it kills someone. Doesn’t matter if this practice was mainly done to drive away insects, using harmless chemicals and in much smaller numbers. Who cares for the real reason, this is our culture, right? We must save the wrapping paper while we dispose off with the gift. We will replace real diyas with electric lights, that doesn’t corrupt our culture. We will buy sweets, oh we’ll even use cakes and ice-creams to celebrate, instead of making sweets at home – because that used to be a celebration of togetherness, everyone cooked together, where’s the together now? Husband-wife and a toddler? But fire-works? Without this there’s no Diwali, because this is all Diwali is about.

Hindu culture in my understanding, is all about letting the God/Goddess reside within. That is why we live in a country full of roadside temples, as a constant reminder of that fact. But it looks like we’ve still forgotten. When houses were far away from each other, when a village was mostly just one extended family where nobody celebrated if a person was sick, dying or recently deceased, it was completely fine to make all the noise they wanted. Pollution was OK because we were barely a tenth of our current population and density. Thnigs are different today. And if anything, Hindu culture has been about adaptation – it is how we survived centuries of invasions and conversions. So if you protest the removal of a practice that is hurting people, then you’ve forgotten your culture.

P.S. The story I began with, no idea who to credit this with as it is a story my father used to tell me in childhood. May have been Osho’s, who knows.. he used to read a lot of Osho back then.

P.P.S.: If you think  bursting crackers doesn’t her anyone, try talking to someone who has asthma and ask them if they agree.

Why We Attract Negativity

Why We Attract Negativity

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“Good things happen to good people”

I have often wondered if there’s a bigger lie than that. Or a more ruinous one.

All the fairy tales we’re told as children, tell us how the innocent, good and the brave live ‘happily ever after’ and the demons are killed. Our parents often reward us for good behaviour and we’re punished for our misdemeanors. And this makes us want to be ‘good people’. Not for the sake of being good, but because we want the benefits of being good.

‘Spiritual’ people often have it worse. Most people on the spiritual pathway want to be ‘good’ people to fit in with the stereotype. Many of us genuinely believe that being positive and happy and accepting of life is how a spiritual person is supposed to be, and strive to get there. Then why do we end up being surrounded by ‘negative’, ‘toxic’, and ‘narcissistic’ people? When we seem to have the capacity to attract whatever we want, how is it that the negative people still seem to seep in?

Because we want to be good people.

Our mind only understands the value of things through comparison. For example, when compared to a homeless person, our life looks very plush. But when we meet a person who owns a jet, suddenly we seem to be living drab, meaningless lives. Neither of the ideas of our lives is the truth – if we tried to assess the true status of our life, it would be very hard if there was no benchmark. The mind needs something to measure things against.

The Paradox

Now, to be surrounded by deeply loving, kind, generous and brilliant people sounds like a wonderful thing, but the gratitude for such a life is quickly going to fade once the comparisons come in to the picture. If everyone around us is a better person than us, then we eventually become the not-so-good person. We’re the lazy one, the dull or the slow one, the negative one – in comparison. But we’ve grown to believe that to get the best things from life, we need to be ‘good’ people!

So what’s the easiest way to become a ‘good’ person? To simply change the benchmark we’re comparing against. The moment we are surrounded by negative, horrible people, we can immediately relax in the knowing that we’re good, and therefore our future is secure – because only good things happen to good people. Of course, this happens at a subconscious level, none of us consciously wants to be surrounded by who we think are bad people. And yet that is exactly what we end up with.

Let go of the labels

When we crib or complain about a person, if we bring our attention to how we’re really feeling about ourselves, we can start shifting things around. Really deep work will even reveal how we want people to hurt or let us down so that we can continue making them ‘the bad guys’.

Working with our shadows and integrating them goes a long way in this direction too. There is no such thing as a good person or bad person. Not only are these terms relative, but we’re all a mix of both, yin and yang. Whether we choose to call it good-bad, spiritual-unspiritual, conscious-unconscious, empath-narcissist or anything else, we’re getting into the same pattern – that of comparison. On the other hand if we view everything and everyone as a celebration of life, and if we realise that nothing is ever really as it seems, we dislodge ourselves from this mess and become truly free.

 

Are You ‘Settling’ for a Mediocre Life?

Are You ‘Settling’ for a Mediocre Life?

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Happiness does not lie 'out there'

Almost every other day, I come across some article or person urging others to go out there and live life or follow your heart. Common people seem to be stuck in the rat race, miserable and incapable of having a life between paying off loans and raising children.

This reminds me of my mother’s Reiki teacher, who was a school teacher by profession. One year when they had exchange students come from the UK, they decided to do something different. The students were picked up from the airport and dropped off in the middle of the desert to live with locals in a below-poverty village. There were no toilets, they used broken pots for cooking, vessels were cleaned with sand and meals consisted of dry rotis (flat bread) with red chili chutney. Two weeks later when the school came to pick the children up, the children started crying, saying they didn’t want to go home. Never before in their plush, abundant lives had they experienced love, affection and bonding like this.

What did the village have that these rich British kids did not? What did they have that you do not? How could they be happy with so much less than you have?

While breaking free and pursuing one’s dreams just might be the answer for a select few that have lived oppressed lives in the fear of rejection from society, the fundamental problem in that approach is that it assumes that happiness lies outside. In a relationship, in a career, in material pleasures, in a new place. And that belief puts you on a fast track to misery. The more choices you have, the more miserable you are going to be, because you don’t know ‘which choice will make you happy’. If only you knew that the answer was ‘none’.

“Choice has made us not freer but more paralyzed, not happier but more dissatisfied” More details

Barry Schwartz

When not to Settle

While on the one hand people don’t want to ‘settle’ for mediocre lives, on the other they want to ‘take a chance’ on mediocre choices. Our generation was raised by over-involved parents, and most of us have refused to grow up and own up for our lives. If we invest our energies in growing up, we will start to see that each action has a consequence, and that will change the way we approach a fork in the road.

What choice we make isn’t about whether it will make us happy in the future – happiness is a choice we make this instant – but about what the consequences will be, and whether we can live with that. I’ve seen so many people settle for a lousy partner because they’re too afraid to be alone. Or settle for having a baby because of parental or societal pressure. Or move to an unpleasant place because they’re desperate to ‘get away’ from family or something else. These are exactly times when we shouldn’t be ‘settling’.

Don’t settle when life brings you to crossroads. If you are desperate and frustrated, seek healing and understand that getting into a different situation will offer only temporary respite, if at all.

When “Settling” is Important

We’re not just talking about relationships here, of course. But this quote is just so, so relevant. Once you’ve made a choice, stick with the consequences and make peace with where the choice has taken you. When you truly make peace with it, it is possible that looking at those beautiful couple or travel pictures on facebook or elsewhere might leave you a tad uneasy, but never will it empty out your heart of happiness.

So many people want to change their lives so desperately that they just cannot give the present moment their best. This is the same as being so unsure whether you’re on the right track, that you are unable to walk. But unless you move, you’re not going anywhere. If you are meant to have a different life, it will happen, and life will bring opportunities and openings your way. If you’re feeling stuck and frustrated in a completely unfulfilling life, it is time to understand that it is not life that is unfulfilling, but you who have stopped investing. Embrace your life for what it is in this moment and give it everything you’ve got. And that’s how you live.

“If you think it’s fame and money that are the key to happiness, you’re not alone – but, you’re mistaken. As the director of a 75-year-old study on adult development, having unprecedented access to data on true happiness and satisfaction here are three important lessons” More details

Robert Waldinger