On Passion

You have to take a stand if the music is too loud for you to take. Facing the music is tough sometimes you may run but that’s not guts and what’s guts is to take that stand and face it, for at least you know you can face it, at least you can say you faced it, at least all things being the way they are - ain't not that great or good, so what the hell- better face it and die a strong one with passion rather than a weakling who ran away. Sometimes you may but I'd prefer all times you stay and face it.

Passion is embarking on something that’s difficult, that’s the reason why it’s called passion because it involves all your senses it takes you out of the delirium of life and place you on a pedestal were you would feel that the Damocles sword is hanging over you. Its inert, its within and it unwinds and brings forth an energy that’s unforeseen and that’s the reason you feel you have two choices either to run or to stay, and its due to the energy that it unwinds from within sometimes you feel weak and from deep inside each of us, a pressure seems to build which does not let go and we fear failure which is again an emotion that we term as Satan : when it manifests itself into something other than the defined basic morals and values  and the winners term as 'the losers’ or as people who could not take it &c.. and we run and we hide forgetting were we began - losing the energy that catapulted us to this level.

At this stage we feel the comfort level of having lost all that energy and it makes us sullen from within withdrawing away into nothingness - the state which is most pleasant, as we are not answerable to anything and anybody- except ourselves, but that phase it is quite easy because the questions that demand attention gets muffled by the calm breathing patterns that ensues in the outer core. But this hangs on our neck for forever and we feel helpless as days move into months and months into years and we loose ourselves to the world of least inertia.

Now the choice is ours again as always, which is better - the inertia-less existence were we do what natural circumstances pushed us to do and loose our own self to the withering masses, or the boundless freedom of seeking what we intend to do with ourselves and enjoying the freedom of failure, of trial and error, of judgment, and at last of eternal peace and success, Amen.

Passion is within all of us we have to keep disturbing it all the time and it would challenge us with multitudes of corners which are unappealing to the senses but we got to try to love those corners that’s all life is, simple...I guess that’s what makes the world such a beautiful as well as pathetic place at the same time. It's because of people with passion. All of us who go about their business in a manner which affects other's lives in a good or bad way have ardor. That’s where I appreciate some of the movies that Hollywood comes up with. I've never been exposed much to movies from other cultures except may be Indian, Italian, some Akira Kurasowa from Japan, some French and a lot of Malayalam and Bengali. But almost all movies, which affect us in some manner, are really based on passion. That’s the base pattern. The movie's character has passion - we love it, the movie's story-line has passion - we love it. In fact, everything we do, we say, we enact on, we react on, we conjure up in our mind; all of it is based on the the fervor we have in our innards. That’s why we tend to do it and then redo it again and again until we achieve some semblance of having reached a crossroad which looks more welcoming.

A lot of my conversations with friends, family, acquaintances or strangers are instances of listening to anecdotes and yarns from their past. And they keep repeating these tales or reaching the very same stories again and again and each time they narrate its always mentioned in a different manner trying to make it more attractive than the previous time, but at the end of the day we do get bored of it because we know its the same story. But look deeper and you would find that that’s the thing they had passion for. In fact that is the one thing, if followed religiously with extreme vigor, without worrying about money, society, family, circumstances and all those things that stop us, the person would have achieved heights hitherto untouched and the happiness that accompanies such simple passions is beyond a lot that we tend to experience.

They keep repeating these stories because the intensity of the passion that they tasted and the absolute exaltation they got familiar with during those few days that they did those things. They remember every tiny detail so picturesquely, precisely and their eyes widen and the lips move faster, and they want for us to respond similarly, they are on a high; a raise that even the best psychedelic drug cannot deliver. During those few days of their monotonous existence they had forgotten almost every other thing of this world. Nothing mattered then and when they are telling you the story nothing else matters to them but to seek the very same ecstasy and enthusiasm and share it with others.

A friend of mine went for a two week mountaineering program. She has told me that story at least 50 times. In myriad ways with multitude of emotions and it was almost a lesson for me on understanding human depth and sensations. She would talk about the difficulties of terrains, the beauty that awaited at the end of the road, the small hassles of morning chores in the open mountains, a majestic horse that suddenly came out of nowhere in a misty morning, unfurling its heavy brown mane between the flow of the fog, the haze lifting itself for the regal animal. I could see it and I could visualize everything she spoke of. I had felt a tug in my heart, a heavy brimming within me: it was not sadness in the fact that she is corporate honcho who busies herself in the everyday muddle but because of the force of the sentiment she was sharing I was moved at the exhilaration that she was infecting. The achievement of reaching the top, her team, the teamwork they enjoyed, the camaraderie with the instructor, the stories of small issues and small delights : all coming together to form a brilliant anecdote of  extreme passion. I reckon she never had anything as exciting as that ever in here life. Many a thing may have passed her by were she was happy and thrilled: a promotion, marriage, kids, the dream job, an awesome salary &c but nothing compares to that particular elation.

There are stories that would make one weep, and there are stories of brilliant souls that took the jump and came out smiling; which by the way, is always.

That’s what passion is about. Its about wherewithal freedom in your life.. When one has passion one does not have to really think about thinking out of the box or looking beyond to come up with something extraordinary. All those philosophical gaga goes for a toss as these are natural ingredients which are within us and permeates itself outwards when the nature of things you do are obsession and zeal bound. The deep rooted human need to do something special, to show that we are important and that we are to mean something with our birth is extreme and the outward expressions of those primary requirements seep out only when you follow your deep endemic purpose. All the self-help books in the world would have lost their relevance and value if we found what we wanted to do and followed it without any fears, inhibitions or hangovers that make us chained to the paradigm of safe existence.

I would like to quote one of favorite authors Mr. Charles Bukowski here "We are all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn't. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing."

Of images

Everyday our eyes see, watch, contemplate, ignore and memorize images that keep moving around us. The one's we memorize sometimes stays with us forever, sometimes they leave us as we speak about them or place them out in words which makes our expressions more imaginative. This I speak of our everyday lives. But when we move around and we are on the road there are images and pictures that capture our heart as well as our minds in a demeanor that we rarely fail to fathom. They hit us hard, now, when I say hard, the emotion could be anything - it could be harsh, it could be soothing, it could be elevating, enlightening blah blah blah.                    

 These dour and sometimes picturesque details when captured through the lens stay on for posterity. And if the story and the hardship behind picturing them are presented in a manner where the best possible adjectives are avoided so as to present the eye a small background score and let the eye that beholds contemplate, judge, rationalize and assimilate : much better. And when the stories are told to others and when the others would want to regale in the same expose and enjoy the fruits of their imagination then the success within those frames become immortal. A name gets attached and a million more of these others, for years to come, would like to sleep or get up and watch these endearing images grow within them for the questions they may have, for the thoughts they may render and for the serenity they may provide.
 What we have here in this life is a series of images with a small detail about them and the rest is for you to enjoy, unravel and marvel and take off to where your imagination would carry your thoughts. 

The colors, the detail and the vivid imagery of our wonderful earth whether it's in the most beautiful landscapes or the smoky, smoggy terrains, the dourness of everyday life or the pathos in the dirt that we accumulate and keep hiding under the carpet of dust and sand, the sadness of our wisdom in things which we ourselves created but we never took care of, the accumulation of our sins or the ignorant washing of the same, the majestic idealism of the structures that make us feel grand about ourselves and all of it. 

Probably we tried to capture all of this within a small-calculated frame and tried to portray all things that have carried a deja vu within us since childhood and still do and will always do. These are images, which every one of us has seen and probably thought of too, but we haven’t thought enough to have bought it across to ourselves. We are so bound within the idiosyncrasies and monotony of everyday existence that we have forgotten that particular area in our brain where we have kept all these small but extraordinary details. You may look into something and find that somewhere within you a door opened and the floodgates slammed out and heralded for you the details of all that you might have forgotten to look back upon. Isn't that what an image does?
 All of us sometimes in the rush forget where we come from, what we have seen, what we have captured and what we have gone through. It’s important to revisit the times that we might have had if... And it’s also the time now that we do not forget that past is like a history book that teaches, and morals and values are contemplative thoughts that we garner due to our past, we are what we are due to our past and the future is but an amalgamation of all that’s done and all that we are doing, to a place unknown but way better off if we haven’t forgotten the exotic imagery and ecstasy of being alive within the frames that we lived in.
 So, grab a cozy blanket and a cup of hot chocolate, prop up your feet, and enjoy a perfect weekend afternoon, within your confines and watch, as your imagination takes a ride...

On Pornography and cuckoos

Pornography, articles relating to it, movies or documentaries underlining its benefits as well as dangers associated with it, all of that stuff has some sort of curiosity build into it and that is a secondary reason on why it is an industry that thrives. The current streams over the internet and the virtual reality elements that seem to harness quite a bit of news is a new way but these wi-fi speeds and the sheer on your face sorta thing that seems to be all over could possibly be the beginning of the slide of an industry grows exponentially year by year. The primary reason being curiosity being satiated quite early and quite fast. The beauty of all things taboo or for that matter anything at all is the reach as well as the difficulty of achieving it. This thing is just too easy and the fun of it all is down the drain.

I remember my days when the first time, someone bought a few pages from 'The Hustler' and 'Playboy' to school. It was consternation the first time around, and then all the boys circled around a lot of oohs and aahs going on with the lady in the picture doing something absolutely incorrigible. First time around everything looks just too good. I remember that photograph and the lady to this date and I don't think I will ever forget. She was a willful companion on many a nights then. But the way this kid who bought it to school became a hero of epic proportions on that day was amazing. I wanted to get my own, but never could.

I remember the day when we found our first porn video cassettes from the local video store. It was so difficult to ask the guy in the first place, once done, it was all about when are we gonna watch it. It took us two days to figure a place we can. And when we did, misery, the damn visuals had grains all over. The worst part was when the female of the species who had been strutting and gaining our attention, wants to remove that small t-shirt of hers and show what we were waiting to see, the screen would go all awry, blinking and static and I dunno what all. Damn! damn! damn!

The beginning of attraction is opaque. The unseen is the most attractive. Then it floats over to translucent. That is the best stage. The adrenaline is going haywire and the uncontrollable urge takes over. Transparent is good just immediately after translucent but not at all times...the current issue is that. It begins with transparent and then there is only transparent. There is no curiosity being built.

Funnily, nowadays, the curiosity is for the tool that showcases this thing. First the laptop, oooh! a tool that's personal and does not involve watching with other people, but contrived to a room in the house or wherever. Then when it moved on to the phones, wallah! brilliant, too personal hold it in the hand and watch stuff. Now they are moving it closer to the eye, Virtual Reality. It is not the porn which attracting attention, it is the gadgets that are attracting attention. As soon as those VR glasses come around, the first thing to do is pop it in and watch Khalifa's or Amber's or whatever is available, they are all the same. That is it, end of story. After that it is purely awaiting the release of the worthy documentaries, the visit to the moon, Pyramids, Amazon etc.

Easy accessibility  is dangerous for all businesses and brands... 

On another level, a little story from a few days back. 

The amount of energy wasted on considering and dreaming of materials consisting of pornographic elegance is shocking. I read some statistics regarding the same in a local newspaper and it’s appalling. But another way of looking at it is that the photographs and the headlines for this particular newspaper article was quite evidently chosen with thought to attract attention and it was too much tilted towards the same genre it was talking about. May be journalism demands that or may be the sales department demands that. 

Whatever, the next day it seems they found that the sales for that edition were pretty high. It was a Monday, and it seems Monday blues hit newspaper circulations. So exactly on a Monday they came up with article - sales tactic. 

Whatever was written and the pictures attached all of it made interesting reading and a good raise in knowledge about some websites one can go to. Instead of the real intention which is to say that pornography is a bane of the society. My girl-friends read it and they came up with genuine queries about having visited a few of them and on how the others mentioned in the article stand. Well, needless to say as usual I gave them a download of information on all the porn websites that we all know of or visited of course, the information had to be female oriented and so it was. That gave way for a good conversation. It really does almost all the time I’ve ever broached the subject whether it’s with friends or quaint acquaintances and it has always turned out to be long, knowledgeable and boisterous conversations. 

In a different sense and manner, morally so to say, it is a very pathetic way of looking at women. But guess what, this is what men are all about most of them. They strut their stuff, blow their horn about imaginary sexual escapades, wade thru' life in the same demeanor forever and brag about it as old bastards sitting on creaky old park benches and laughing one's heart out and going back home and trying to figure what the hell all that brouhaha was about. 

Lastly, I knew a guy once who used to have ejaculatory benefits out of all these newspaper articles that come out once in a while. In almost any developed country his people would have taken him to a shrink, but in India it turned out the guy's big brothers, mom and daddy dearest were all hunky dory about it and not only that, they thought that their little brother was endowed with a fantastic libido. 

Libido my ass, the guy is cuckoo; that’s what I'd say another rape specimen being slowly trained into the drain of dirt.... 

Obituaries...and then Some Epitaphs

You have heard of obituaries everyone believes in them.
Except the Greeks of yore.

They did not believe in obituaries, they looked out for only question when a person dies or even when he is alive. ”Does he have passion?”

Ask yourself this question and that’s when they say that a human understands themselves and that’s when they find out what they are and why they are and how they can know what they shall be otherwise it’ll be just another life wandered about, made some money, spent some money, had sex, had food, created kids (of course, the cycle has to continue rolling), bought a house, drove a car, went touristy to a few places and thank you very very much;  moved on to the kingdom of god or wherever hell we move on to.... Period

Epitaphs are an interesting element. Love 'em

For me what I want is
                                  She smiled and then                    
                                         he loved and then he stopped existing
                                 he lived, they lived
                                        a cheer spread around them, at all times
                                  A visible passion clothed them
                                            Still clothed, passion floats here

There could be a million variations to this.. but for now this...

The best I have seen
                                 Les Gunther from Alamogordo, NM
                            Spat at a dog
                                     two slugs from .45
                                 no Les, no More

On Perception

Perception is a funny thing it gets me to do a load of stuff. It may sound ominous 'coz again perception has a bad rap. But it in turn allows you to be free to do things which in normal circumstances, rather, realistic circumstances does not allow you to do...

For example the doctor told me to keep my drinking to a bare minimum due to diabetes. I was like okay, sounds good. This was Monday, by the time Friday popped, okay became 'what the hell' one drink won't make a difference. I checked the internet for company. Found a few articles which supported my notion. Perception turns to small reality as you get a supporters along the way. But still the rational mind kept popping up, what are you doing, take care, these things will bust your can, take care. Okay accepted, I take a little step backwards. I say lets spend some money, buy some Kentucky brew, Jack Daniels, to be exact the cost here in India is a little over the top. That helps. I am drinking now and I am fine, the liquor succors me. I know why, my perception helps... the cost of the liquor assuages my rational that it wont affect my liver or my diabetes, because it is good liquor, The mind simply ignores the fact that wherever it is brewed in whatever way whiskey is whiskey, it is going to affect my liver and my diabetes. But mind over matter, my perception is extremely strong since the money takes over where rationale stops.

A lot of the stuff we do is such, this above is a very small example. We look for reasons, we look for support and in a billion odd population, hell, I am gonna get support at all times, because there sure shall be a nincompoop like me someplace everywhere who believes my kind of truth. That is what makes life so beautiful. Perception may have a bad rap and shall continue to do so till the end of time, but perception helps in faith, in hope, in mirth, goddamn it in every possible way. 

I heard a friend of mine has a colleague at his workplace, who always believes that he is right. Because of this he is continuously tearing apart the system, the attrition levels there are at a record high, nobody can stand this adamant soul. But the adamant soul is thinking well this is the way it is and it is right, let the world say otherwise, I know my shit, I know what I am doing. What a brilliant perception, dumb for the whole world, but for him the fool at his woeful brink he survives and thrives on this.....

Let us continue living..perceiving....

River Saraswati Popped Up Bah!!

It is amazing how media to gain eyeballs could go to any lengths and never consider the average readers intellect. The average reader reads only the headlines. But this number is very huge, I mean the average reader. The remaining bunch, the more curious ones pick up topics based on their level of curiosity and their level of need to gain knowledge or information. All three categories, as is the whole human race fall into the muck of perception before any article is read.

For example if I am reading Sartre on a plane and someone who has heard of Sartre thinks that I am intellectual, first up, then haranguing their head over whether I am first time reader...then they see my face and they go oh! nope should be intellectual. The other guy who does not know Sartre is thinking goddamn it even now we have people wasting their time reading such monstrosities, even the photograph on the cover is no good. But we all perceive. And we all insist on that perception to be right. You know what I am talking if you have sat in a crowded place and watched people with your friends. I mean I remember us betting on who is gonna go which way and to what restaurant and who is gonna kiss when or hold hands. You may thinking Voyeurs!!! For the sake of being nice, lets say observers....Anyway, when we get it right we love it, there is a feeling of having arrived. Even if it is nothing...

Now going back to the article, There was an article in today newspapers that they found a lot of water about 50 kilometers close to the Pakistan border in the desert of Thar, Rajasthan, India. Everybody is excited, for heavens sake, it is desert..so hell! ought to be excited....The article reads that people are digging for water and that at about 500 odd feet they find water. And it is not just a little bit of water, but gushing, strong, large quantity of water. The article headline states " Saraswati River Comes up in Thar".

The complete article then goes on to elaborate on how many people are finding water and how good it is and how scientific evidence suggests granite's of yore having water kept in them for centuries may have popped out..etc etc etc..and also that all people have denied that this has anything to do with the mystical river of Saraswati and that is a legend and still stays as one and that there is no river underneath all this buoyant talk.

If this above is the case then the question arises, why that headline in the first place. I understand you are media and you need eyeballs but.. the general population, the average Joe is set to get a few tongues wagging on this extraordinary discovery of his. There may be purists who may have read the article due to curiosity but with the perception of Saraswati someplace in his mind and after completing the article they may have cynically expressed their delight to their friends about their new found discovery because the hangover of why he read the article in the first place stays.....

Wooh! not to pinpoint that all things are bad and awful, the art of grabbing eyeballs is fantastic, but the art of marketing something wrong is going to go down in an awfully wrong manner. And the paying population remember is getting more and more ignorant even with the bombardment and proliferation of information and at the end somewhere when I am not even part of the stories someone is going to say "what the fuck happened"

Take care!!!

Exponentially Communicating Yet None of It

The dearth of communication in an over-communicated world is surprising. Or is it? I see people around who feel that they are communicating. Someone send me video of a R&B song recently on Whatsapp, And this person was sending me something after close to 8 - 9 months. I thought it was a mistake 'coz, personally for me, I forgot he existed. I send him back a thumbs-up emoji. And that's that. We communicated. I reckon we both felt that we did.

He did his part by sending in something totally out of the blue and he may have felt that I would enjoy the pleasurable company of the brilliant singers and the cacophony of the liberal dancing and in return when I acknowledged what he did with my emoji it came full circle in terms of the tenets of communication.

I do not speak to my partner or to my friends as much as we did before the invention of the Facebook, Twitter, Whatsapp, Pinterest, Snapchat and the scores of others that are available as tools of communication.We do send emojis  to each other and there are quaint expressions over the phone, but it is purely need based and requirement oriented and nothing that is permeated purely for the sake of having a decent communication. There are a load of other people, who really are not in the play of relationship or even close to personal, and they seem to be more interactive and condescending when it comes to having a decent conversation. But again, who am I kidding, I mean, they are also the kinds that is purely need based. We talk for the need of achieving an end purpose.

Suddenly, I just realized while I am writing this that there is not a single soul that I speak to or who speak to me for any other purpose other than a reasonable end goal. That shows how pathetic I have become as a individual.

Isn't it important to just simply have a chat with no end purpose or no results. Isn't  it the most beautiful thing to be free in terms of the deed of communicating without any kind of orientation  to consider. I miss a friend, or two , big time. 'Coz, floodgates of memories just opened and the can is looking good. I mean those were the good ol' days where we would sit on corner stones, pubs, or wherever we can find a li'l space to park our asses and talk of all the things under the sun. It never used to be about weather or about the shit loads of crimes that went around. It used be about music, books, dance forms, chicks we dig, chicks we don't dig, philosophy, sociology, culture, religion and booze characteristics, disease, social evils, change, politics, rhetoric and yes of course who can forget movies and documentaries.

Quite a lot of stuff was not accessible easily, things never got to us before they were supposed to, cassettes and CD's had one song which we liked and the remaining were in another cassette or CD and we could not buy that easily as it costed more than we could afford with our weekly pocket money. The pocket money was for the tea, cigarettes, coffee, booze and dates, if any. But this accessibility thing has made life different. There is nothing wrong, I mean I could be doing all these things even now if my friends were free and we were of that age, may be.

But, some aspects of conversation has changed. I was sitting with a friend of mine, we had dated long time back, things did not work out then and we continued with our own journey's, We met, we were happy long lost friends meeting each other, catching up...the works. But all that brouhaha left in about 6-7 minutes as the notifications kept loading in. None of it was work. Starbucks Coffee could not bring in the necessary camaraderie for a chit chat of the old kinds. There was a good connect but those phones were wrecking it. She did talk in between, in fact, she notified me of all the notifications and also updated me of the recent WhatsApp joke that she received. Almost all of what we spoke was from someone else's updates of things that don't matter and philosophy that do not fit with us.

Everybody has to have someone whom they need to talk to. I have found mine quite recently and it is brilliant revisit as well as a great journey. I am enjoying every bit of it and may be so is the person because the conversation continues without any hindrances and a lot of spillages, which makes it special. Spillage means you care, means you thought, means you want to bring in the perspective even if the hour or the day has passed and you mean all of it. I know this shall also not last, as all mortal things that matter but it is here, it is now, it is transcending space and time and all of that bullshit that carries us forward and it is beautiful.

To each his own.... please keep talking,,, you will always find someone to listen and if they want to listen that means it is worth it all, it is worth the deed....So keep it going...

Spanish Gypsy flamenco song

The best form of communication is music and dance. There is nothing more powerful than these forms that can express what you need to say better....

Experts and Shit...

I was reading an article on how to improve one's reading skills. What was droll is that I found reading it quite a drag.

A major area of concern with the information overload is that human nature has become acclimatized to a load of stuff much before prime . And because of this explosion of information everyone around is considering themselves experts in a lot of areas. For example, there are a load of DJ's around and so is everyone a photographer. Someone went through a set of research papers without no experience whatsoever in real time scenarios feels like researcher of quite a good order. I met a person who has read everything there is to be read about cross cultural communication, over the internet, over books, magazines, you tube videos, academic exposure &c &c &c and she has never ever stepped out of Bangalore and has met people from across India as well as abroad but only at Bangalore. Her exposure to knowing different cultures were these limited meetings on a particular day when they gathered for a conference or a seminar or something of that sorts. But she is an expert in Cross Cultural Communication. She is a PhD in that. And hence an expert.

Then comes the question what exactly constitutes an expert. who is this person who can be called an expert. What defines this individual. Is it the perception that they carry around due to some certifications or is it that the world around defines them as experts due to the ability to blabber away stuff which was written or presented by other people in a manner discernible to a limited audience. Or is it that my construct of such matters differs extremely from the world views. I am no expert in anything. I probably may have met about 10 experts all together in my lifetime. I have been exposed to a few hundred of them in myriad ways due to, again, the explosion of information.

From my point of view, the expert is someone like Mr. Kailash Satyarthi, the Nobel Prize winner from India who is a children's rights and education advocate and an activist against child labour. He founded the Bachpan Bachao Andolan in 1980 and has acted to protect the rights of more than 83,000 children from 144 countries. Say, Mr. Richard Feynman; an American theoretical physicist known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, hence scientist and also a raconteur, musician and teacher, inspiring millions not only with his physics but also his ability to keep it simple and accessible. His book ' You must be Joking' is good enough for us to comprehend his pure approach to life. Or say may be Mother Teresa who does not need many introductions or lines.

Recently I had the privilege of reading about Haldhar Nag, a 66-year-old poet and writer from western Odisha  who has been named in the PhD research theses of five scholars. This poet writes in Kosli language, and at this age, he remembers all the poems and his 20 epics that he has written so far. Popularly known as Lok Kabi Ratna in Odisha, the themes of his poems are based on the rural areas and his writing  are mainly on religion,  nature, society and mythology. He was awarded a Padma Shri by the President of India.

These above are personalities in their fields and highly decorated and also respected. Other than this I know of people who knows good stuff to survive like a cab driver in Mumbai who knows every little path, every little area and the name of the area all in his head; the complete thriving fucking metropolis of Mumbai in his tiny little head.

Another , a friend of mine, from London, a frequent traveler and tourist who has fighting cancer on his own purely because of his will to live and has fought his way through this scourge for the last 10 years, he is weak but he still has not lost his spirit. It is pure inspiring just to meet him for even an hour as the guy just takes you to a journey of stories, places, people, ladies, booze, culture, sports and I dunno what. The energy just permeates out of him, I am his friend and so I can see how he is straining some of those body cells to continue in that vein, but you know what, what the hell, what are those cells for.

My friends mom who won all her battles because of her unrelenting faith in Jesus is an amazing example of faith moving mountains. I have never seen her question her belief with rationality, she goes about her business, does what she can do at the best of her abilities and she makes sure she says her silent thank you's to the good lord and when shit hits the fan, at times as it does, she says well Jesus shall take care and its never trammeled by anything. It is an amazing gift to be so encompassed with conviction and assurance.I have seen it work in all aspects of her life. She does it with such belief that nothing falters.

Aren't these experts, and also great intellectuals. These people are ordinary people who make life look like a piece of cake if you take it in your stride. They have their morals and values and all that other bullshit; that keeps the world afloat according to the so called historians, culture and spiritual aficionados; in place. I have never seen them falter from the primary approach. It is as simple as that.

Get real, keep it simple, and never forget to do it all for every person you love and keep the expectations aside as it all comes together and delivers if you just keep doing what you are supposed to do.

RIP - Prince

It rains purple today and the Kiss is lost
The stars shall gather together and
                 and carry his dust and songs to the Gods ....


The Kiss Rendering

On Word Porn

'13 courses that could help you get rich'

'12 self -awareness exercises that fuel happiness and success'

'Become a digital entrepreneur with just these 7 courses'

'10 ways to agile up your productivity'

'13 tough interview questions heard at Apple, Google.....'

'12 new business ideas you can start now'

'5 tips for better images on DSLR'

'20 books every marketer should read'

'50 documentaries that are a must see'

Every person who browses the internet or the reading apps should have gone through this horrendous lists that keep forming every day, may be every hour. Humans love lists. Inducing someone to open up the article is the primary idea behind throwing a list at your face. The list looks fascinating only in the its current state - 'THE HEADING'.

What is inside is pure hogwash. Almost incorrigible. The first time you read something like this you feel okay those are things I have thought about but never placed on paper or committed myself to but good, the guy / gal got the idea well enough for a read. But everyday! every fucking day! I mean C'mon!

This whole world of content marketing or the generation of content on the internet over places like the one I am using or on 'Wordpress' or whatever else place, means that people take to blowing it all out across the virtual universe and some nincompoop like laps it up and things everything is hunky dory, there is a lot of action happening. This is just going beyond incomprehensible. Okay; I give them this that they did not ask me to read these and I haven't in the last few years but before that I used to do so and I was okay the stuff being strewn across. But now it is almost looking obsession like. Every magazine, business, entertainment, spiritual; every Tom, Dick and Harry is vomiting out stuff on how to fucking take care of my life and what I should read, and what I should wear and how much should I spent and how I can take the help of apps on the phone to help me with the reading, wearing and spending and how these apps would wake you up in the morning, tell you to walk, then write, have coffee, take a dunk, brush teeth, fuck, take bath, go to office, tell you how much time it would take you to reach office and then after reaching office remind you that the first mail you are supposed to send is to someone totally unimportant but you should do it. After that you should get into the project that you are working on and send updates over another app about where you stand so that everyone in the team is in the loop and guess what you do not need to send an email (woohoo, happy time, no email) the person knows that you have updated because the person also has the same app and he has already got the notifications. In between all this brouhaha make sure you change your profile picture as well as Facebook wall page as you did not do that for the last 2 days and what would the world think of you. They may think that you are completely out of touch, You are supposed to whats App a few people about a few completely unrelated things because else the whole world is thinking; what the fuck happened are you out of the groove and the very same people would pick up a totally avoidable video and pass it on and you shall give a thumbs up emoji and the other person guesses you have watched the video and enjoyed it. Another notification pops up from Twitter that Mr. Trump in the United States of America a few thousand miles away said that he hates Mexicans and on the other side some photographs of Bernie Sanders has popped from the year 1910 and that Ted Cruz does not seem to be the kind of guy who would ever win the American presidential elections. Very important for me as without these notifications I would have been totally out of touch with the world and I may have failed to be aware in a general manner about such important historic events that happen half way across the world.

All this and more continues unabated day in and day out, everyone around is oblivious of this serpentine twirl they are all in the middle of and they do not even realize that its a web and in its perceptions we are bound, feeling secure of the constant inundations and within these they forget to live real lives.

But all this is because of words, everything around us become words. Below these headlines, there are words in the article. Words, catch phrases, positive connotations, motivators, it just goes on. The singular concentration to get the mind to look at the world in one manner, in one way, the bloody positive way and it conjures up images of exaltation and delight and sets forth into the path devised and forgets as the next round of lists and words pop up from all over caressing our souls and making us feel good.

A lot of people who read this stuff say that they are in the habit of reading. and that they read good stuff and that it is food for thought. Funnily they carry these to the meetings, the interviews and even to the dates that they encounter and it all falls flat because these are places were reality meets these supposedly-almost-divine-interventions. Word porn is good in the way that it creates that sudden sense of satisfaction of having read something and also of positive intent and energy but exactly like the way the porn world functions it is all about instant gratification. The gratification of having seen, played, worked upon and no pressures of the real thing. There is no pains and tribulations of love, longing, empathy, desperation, performance, outlook, anxiety.. nothing; just enjoy and move on.. The words take you up in a crescendo and make you feel free and devoid of tensions and then you feel that a deed is done. Reading has been a much publicized, oft repeated  angle of the intellectual elite for centuries and when that deed seems so ridiculously easy to commit to and get done with, there is an elation of the senses that peaks at these random intervals. It is masturbation of the worst kind.

On Blues and Us

"Why did I come here? I am trying to study Differential Equations, but now all I want to do is crack a bottle of 
whiskey open & go on a Tom Waits binge. Damn you Tom, for being so fucking good."

This above is a comment on YouTube below the Tom Waits video ' Hope I don't fall in love with you'. I felt it very accurately captures what blues does to people. I love the music. In fact, I love any kind of music. While I am playing with my laptop keyboard on these lines I can hear the soft but brilliantly moving OST from Godfather playing in the background. Makes all the difference in the way my thoughts are moving. It does. One may not know it but it does. 

I have not done any experimentation on this but I have seen the way people react to music at all levels. It may have a lot to do with the fact that music expands your soul. It takes you to another realm of existence. Before a speech, before a meeting, before an interview before any of the million rigorous yet not so important tasks that we do if we listen to the music that you love it moots a massive change in behavior, approach as well as attitude.

Every time I listen to John Lee Hooker, any of the Chess record guys - Howlin Wolf, Muddy waters, Chuck Berry, Eta James. I am stuck in this forlorn mood where a beer in hand and pain of past lost loves and the need for a little twinge and loss becomes evident. If I have lost someone recently and then I am listening to blues mostly, I go deeper into the throes of human nature and find solace in the guitar plays and the resonance of the gravel voices. The words cut deep within me and I love the cuts, it aches, it does not pain. It creates this wonderful world where the lowering of the spirits and the senses takes you into a hole with the good lord. Funnily, it is never with the devil it takes you to a place of silent rumination and a sharp, clear vision emerges in front of you that helps you to go back to the very same places that has hurt you a million times but that hurt has only made you a better person and made you understand life beyond all its happy failings and sultry daily monotony.

Tom Waits did that to me the other day. I was having a happy, frolicsome day and I was reading 'On Writing' by Stephen King, of course in the morning I was reading the Coca Cola Story by one Mr. Pendergast, and I was brimming in confidence and enthusiasm and that is what books do to you. And i was just passing through various songs on You Tube and Tom Waits came up on the side list and I was induced to click it. I mean the guy is a genius and the voice, OMG; I mean where does that come from, if the devil has not gifted him that then what does the devil do good. I clicked and guess what Mr. King and Mr. Pendergast kind of left me and in came the hurts of yesteryear rumblings; Mr. Bukowski, Mr. Elliot with his Wasteland, my own thousands of wastelands, the wounds I have caused to my own and also to others, the joys of understanding through suffering and the utter disgust of how life is now in the early part of 21st Century. 

What blues says or does is pure human nature with its millions of ups and downs. As you sink into your chair and hear the music bellowing from the room it makes you want to stretch and the animal instincts of what we really are settles in. We want to get free, we want to let go, visit the oceans, get the sun to hit hard on us, meet people talk to them about wondrous journeys and other people, we want to gossip about what is happening in our towns, in our neighborhood, we want to talk about long lost loves and all those things that never happened, we want to share in the beauties of the landscape and terrains and the hills and the valleys of our lives. That blissful journey towards what humans need to be. 

The new age fast track, fast paced lets-get-shit-done and tell the world by uploading a photo does not make for great communication, it does not make for any communication. It bestows to the mind the thought that there is communication but in reality, somewhere in the corner the devil whimpers with a snide and laughs bemoaning how the good lords creation has lost the most beautiful of human relations of sharing and enjoying the nature that surrounds and believes he is doing so with his holiday packages, his sun lotions, his cheap tickets, his stationery observance of sedentary places with their ever-photographed monuments and blip-and-you-shall-miss rivers and grandeur and taking images of all of these for the world to envy and feel green and how in among these visions the mind is conjuring up the payments that await when one returns and the work - the daily grind of routinized inelegance- shall set him back to middle ages. He is worried but he has to continue and he has to seek solace in the cold, unsavory delight his eyes has gathered and get back to working on that camera and sharing on Instagram, Pinterest and I dunno where all.

As the comments on my latest updates settle in, I am listening to Magic Sam's boogie... this is taking me further away from my time into a journey of solace and comfort in the Sun, among the stars with the wild unrelenting expanse of the sky... I can feel the wind on my bald pane

Poco - Call It Love

Way down in the hole

KV, CB and Me - The Novice having fun with some brilliant minds

We begin with the introductory aspect of Kurt Vonnegut trying to explain the why of human life : “Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder, 'Why, why, why?' Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land; Man got to tell himself he understand. Why, why, why?

 There's only one rule that matters and that really keeps you happy and that is whatever is, whatever may be, you've got to be kind.  But to be kind sometimes, I often carry things to read or listen; so that I will not have to look at other people.

About passion and this continuous thirst of knowledge, understanding and need to be better, find your mojo, and when you do If you have decided you're going to try and go all the way, then begin immediate; otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, boyfriends , husbands, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on benches and chairs that do not respond. It could mean tiresome loneliness. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery--isolation. But, Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do this one particular thing. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try and go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. what matters most is how well you walk through the fire. It's the only good fight there is, if there is any fight at all.  

 Find what you love and let it kill you. Let it drain you of your all. Let it cling onto your back and weigh you down into eventual nothingness. Let it kill you and let it devour your remains. For all things will kill you, both slowly and fast, whichever, but it’s much better to be killed by this lover.

But when you choose that passion, that ardor, that lingering notion of delight that never goes away, remember that it has to be from the brain, the heart, the gut and all over you it has to come out of your soul like a rocket, without of which would drive you to madness or suicide or murder, and if not, don't do it. Unless that Sun, that brightness inside of you is burning your gut, don't do it. And when the odds come, commit to memory that we are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that death will tremble to take us.

And if decided, clearly of this path and zeal, when it is truly time, and if you have been chosen which harkens back to the timeless hours that you have spent on this hence you shall be chosen, it will all happen by itself and it will keep on happening until you die or it dies in you. There is no other way of living a wonderful life, and there never was and there never will be of any other kinds.

We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down; this is all there is to it…

And while you are doing it, it is very important for one’s self to stay as close to the edge as one can without going over. Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can't see from the center, it is precarious but the roller coaster has always been better than the merry-go-round. Nothing has ever been accomplished by merrily circling around. In the meantime, while you are committed to this enormous but brilliant task of living on the edge with the dream, committed to your passion, I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.”

While you are doing all this do not forget that everything is beautiful and nothing hurts, people are there, some people come, some others go, some are important, some matter more, some do not have any say, but they all add to the charm of a life lived. For lost people, important ones, we may feel like crying , all hell breaks loose sometime but nothing comes out at other times. It is just a sort of sad sickness, sick sad, when you can't feel any worse. I think everybody knows it now and then. I have known it pretty often, too often, but such vestiges stay with people and become lessons or become memories that pull you further every day and still everything looks beautiful albeit a little monochrome in tone.

Purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, and whatever passion is taking it further and making it precious and dear, is to love whoever is around to be loved and continuously pour that compassion to as many as one can. This makes it meaningful and god-speed-worth. The arts are also something of extreme importance, they are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow. Sing in the shower. Dance to all the music. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward that of having created something.

Whenever the question pops up “- Why me?

The story goes:

 That is a very Earthling question to ask, Mr. Pilgrim. Why you? Why us for that matter? Why anything? Because this moment simply is. Have you ever seen bugs trapped in amber?

- Yes.

- Well, here we are, Mr. Pilgrim, trapped in the amber of this moment. There is no why. There are only moments and this is it…

We are all victims of a series of accidents and while the accidents continue to define this beautiful journey called life do bear in mind that “To be is to do  was what Socrates said, To do is to be is what  Sartre hollered and Sinatra simply made it Do Be Do Be Do” ; All three are worthy of great attention.

Find people of significance, of value keep them around you because you can't just eat good food or wine or read good books or listen to good music, you've got to talk about it too. And you've got to talk about it to somebody who understands that kind of food, wine, books and music. And find free souls; they are rare, but you know it when you see it - basically because you feel good, very good, when you are near or with them.

So jump into the bandwagon, and of all the words of mice and men, the saddest are, "It might have been” so do not get into that lark ever.

Lastly be however you want to be because laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning to do afterward.

Roller Coaster It Is

Is this not the essence of all that we do. The story of someone taking you out to a ride and you enjoying the merry-go-round kind of defines who you are. I had a friend who was clear about the fact that she loves only the roller coaster. It is an amazing ride the roller...up and down..and up and down Adrenalin ploughing through you. You do not know whether it is fear or is it sickness or is it just pure pleasure. Its quite up there with multiple orgasms, and extremely satisfying once you get down and sit on the bench and wonder about all the blood that flowed into your brain.
I know of people who had a merry go round of ride all their lives or at least they felt like they did that or merrily wanted that for themselves. It is quite easy never do anything out of the ordinary never even jump from 3 feet. No hiccups no hassles. But then whats the bloody fun. Isn't it awesome to just get right into the middle of the storm blow hot blow cold, get sweaty, get fearful, get that knee shivering away and still standing there asking the storm to go fuck itself. What is wrong in that? It is just one life and the way it comes about it brings in all the elements with it.
The other day someone was telling me there are no mistakes in that guys work. some guy!!! I dunno who, I don't care who. If that person has not committed many errors and have continuously been correct at all times and has had a hunky dory life well suits him. But I'm sure that person has never tried anything ever coz you cannot live such.
At work, in personal life and in all forms of living if one does not have the privilege of committing errors or mistakes, I don't think that person has ever done anything worthy of his/her while.

I hate using his/her in my language, I do not say it that way so why should I write it that way. But I tend to do it especially these days since women think they are not being partaken. All this happens inside the brain and there are extreme ways of countering such ill effects of political correctness.

Again, the other day I was reading about Ms. Indra Nooyi saying she does not like men calling her 'honey' or 'baby' etc.. I like the fact that she does not like being called by men in a such a manner and I respect her approach to this bullshit way. But the clarity should be that a partner can do that. I hope she accepts that as I don't think there is anything as beautiful and personal as a few sugar coated nothings. Partners are supposed to be such. Any Tom, Dick or Harry walking around and calling out those names would be of course absolutely out of order but....The problem with the feminism lot is there is a whole population of them trying to figure out what they are fighting for. when they hear such personalities say such things they would go back home and raise the bloody flag and that is where things go all down. I reckon that all personalities at all levels do have to be very clear about covering as many dimensions as possible for the intellectually lesser souls which in my opinion is massive population considering the human population having exploded so much in the last 50 years..

Amen and bless thou wild soul, Baby....

Its an arseh*le not a Vase

I was reading a line in one of the million updates that you end up reading all over the place. This one was good it said " an asshole is an asshole howsoever it may be lined, place some flowers in it and it never becomes vase and never will". The line is not the same but it captures the meaning. But liked it.

The essence is everywhere to be seen. especially the bunch of people who are nice. A lot of people across the board are nice but that does not mean they are worth it in any way. recently some one asked me how do you handle people who wither away time even when there is none of it really available and how do you get them to what they are supposed to do or handle them without loosing cool. Funnily the real answer is just one and that is do not try to be nice to this bunch. Coz howsoever you try to handle them they never will change. You try to be nice they shall go around town telling everyone ' Hey look at me, isn't it a nice vase' and then there would be that crowd, a very large crowd at that, who would say ' oh yeah it is nice, brilliant work of art, the bountiful nature of it brings out the charm of the flowers, good job' Very rarely does someone come out of the bushes and say hey, that looks like an asshole and it is awfully rubbish, what you are trying to do..

But it is important to be straight. Goodness, all around we see people, who smile at you, get cheerful with you around but in real they are gnawing inside trying to get the terror of having met you not to cross their visage. Get to the point, get the job done, or fuck off. That's real, that's satisfying, that does not leave a gap for further conversations, or gossip. It is over then and there,mebbe hurting but I promise it is not going to wind up bad coz someone knows the truth and that someone may work on it hard.
It's important to tell people where they stand. It is important to tell people what they are good at and what they are not. The whole idea of being nice to everyone has messed up a lot of things around. The need to be 'PC - Politically Correct'. I understand that blind man is not supposed to be called a blind fuck. But you cannot the deny the fact that he or she is blind and you need not try to be nice just because they are coz they know it and they know how to handle it too as they have done so until now. I have seen people who deserve praise not getting any of it because the other side is so messed up. Then there is the cynicism of praise which permeates itself because fake praise is all over the place because nicety is a way getting through the day without professional and personal hassles. Hell if the kid is dumb tell the kid, coz then the kid is gonna search for that thing which makes him or her special. Else the kid is dumb but he / she is standing at the very same place he/ she began with no scope of wonderment, seek or for that matter anything. Somewhere in the subconscious even the kid knows but it does not purport out as you stopped it by saying 'its okay, you are good, you will be fine and things will turn around' It fuckin never does...

So please call an asshole an asshole.. stop saying VASE...

You are helping the whole world, the smart and the good ones included and you are keeping a massive space for very less cynicism inside of real praise.