Life Lessons #1: Keep Calm and Ignore

It amazes me sometimes how much each day brings for us in learning. We've all already learnt so much and there's still such a long way to go, one of my most valuable lessons being the importance of being thick skinned in this world.

I for one am very sensitive and when somebody says something to me, good or bad- I tend to take it very seriously and it permeates all the way inside. Combine this with a short temper and a quick tongue and you have the recipe for disaster. A disaster for your personal wellbeing. I never really believed I could change that about me, but time has a way of doing the impossible. And for this impossibility turned possible, I am truly grateful.

Abhishek Bachchan's character says in Guru, "Agar log tumhare khilaf bolne lage toh samjho tarakki kar rahe ho", and I couldn't agree more. At every nook, turn and corner, are people who are unhappy, with themselves or with your success. They are insecure; and for many of them the best cure is to spread the negativity. They will take aim and try to hook the leash in you. The leash filled with anger, frustration, jealousy or unhappiness. And this can be done in so many ways; they will speak with you badly, try to put you down, treat you unfairly, or hundred other things. Don't give it a holding. Because when you do, when you let these things affect you, you are indeed spreading the pain. The best way to deal with it- think of your thoughts as a beautiful garden, and when you let something unpleasant affect you, think of that as allowing a dirty pig through the gates of your garden and letting it eat away at all your pretty little flowers. So lock the gates tight and very consciously decide who and what you want to let in. If all you do is react to people, then who is the real you? Respond, in a way that suits your personality, not theirs. Besides, I strongly feel that when somebody misbehaves with you it speaks volumes about their character and upbringing and very little about you.

Bottom line: Keep Calm and Ignore! 

Girl Power!

I'm at the Lower Parel railway station. The clock reads 8.34 pm. The train to my destination is slowly pulling in on the platform. I do not have a first class pass this time. I'm tired and fervently hoping for the ladies coach to have, if nothing else, one tiny empty space against some seat for me to stand in peacefully without being shoved around. Looking at the men hanging out of the compartments though I begin to lose all hope. But then slowly and surely, it begins to resurface. The ladies coach is not half as much crowded and wait a sec, did I just see an empty seat?! Whoa! God does love me very much! Because next door I can hear the choicest abuses being hurled by men trying to get into the train themselves. And that's how my train of thoughts begins...

As much as we crib about guys having it easier than girls, I beg to differ. I love being a girl and can't thank God and my parents enough! For one, my life would be so colorless if I were a guy, literally. A guys brain can't distinguish between magenta and fuchsia.  For them both are pink and a color to be stayed away from by all means. The same goes for shades of yellow, purple, orange and every other color. Well I love all colors (most of them) and am glad that biased perceptions of a flawed society do not dictate what colors are normal for me to wear and what aren't. So sad for the boys!

Then there's the concept of change. If I want a 'change', I'll go for a new haircut, maybe cut my hair really short, or get bangs, or get layers, or get my hair streaked, or get a perm. What can a guy do? Lol! (And frankly I don't really look up to the guys who are obsessed with their looks. So when I write this, I'm not considering that breed, well actually, I'm never considering that breed.) Or if a girl doesn't want to mess with her hair, she'll try a change in style of clothes- wear a floral dress maybe if she's a jeans and tee kind of a girl. So sad for the boys!

Then comes the career. For a girl coming from a middle class family living in Mumbai, a career is not a mandate. She does not have to support a family or run a house with the salary. She works for self- satisfaction. And that's when your job becomes something you love to do. If it's not something she loves to do, she can take time off and find something that she wants. The family lifestyle or the family name will not suffer if she is jobless for a while. So sad for the boys!

What's also really sad for the boys is that-

It's so much more easier for a girl to skip a queue- be it at the bank, the bus stop, or anywhere. Basically, Ladies First it is. ;)

A girl can get moody, bitchy or plain vicious and quarrelsome one day; and blame it on 'that time of the month' the next day.

A girl gets treated to dinners and lunches ever so often.

She has doors held open and chairs pulled out for her. A girl commands refined behavior.

A single tear down the cheek is all a girl needs to have her way with the most hardened and brawny of all men! Well even a smile does it.

The world would be one giant boxing ring if it weren't for us girls. There would be no aesthetics and no beauty. I'm sure God is a woman.

Revelations of the year 2012

The year 2012 has not been one of my favourites. But they say, tough times make tough people and so I am thankful for everything that happened because I'm a wiser person today.

This year proved to me how constant change is. You may be on top of the world now but it takes a mere second to change that. It's taught me to appreciate every single thing that I have been blessed with and not take anything for granted. It is very important never to pass up an opportunity to help others. Because we live in a karmic universe and karma is fast. There'll be plenty of times when you will need somebody to help you out, however safe and secure things may seem right now. You should feel deserving of that help when it is extended to you. 

Our professional lives and personal lives are very very different. It is crucial to realize this fact and keep them separate. I'm friendly, cheerful and a very straightforward person. I do not like to put on a face. But to succeed professionally you need to play a whole different game. The key to creating the perfect workplace environment for you lies in the following few things I learnt, very early on in my career thankfully. 

1) Never participate in office gossip. Smile and nod along but don't join in. Never take sides. You cannot take back your words and they are sure to come bite you at the worst possible time.

2) Build a wall around yourself. Do not allow anyone to walk into your personal space. Chatter about your family, marriage, friends etc are best left outside office doors. I do not imply here that you walk around as a stuck up snob who will not talk to anyone. The trick is in making people feel comfortable around you but never getting too comfortable yourself! Go figure ;)

3) If you sense bad feelings in your relationship with a colleague who matters, talk about it, communicate. Very politely, ask him/her, "Is there a problem? I would definitely want to get it out of our way if that's possible."

4) Never ever get drunk at office parties! You do not want your boss seeing you swaying uncontrollably or dropping things right? :D
(P.S. All the above rules become invalid if you're among the lucky ones who have found a best friend for life at work. Be very sure about that though :P)

And the most  important thing. Your life is your own, you belong to only you and are not answerable to anyone but you. So be brave and take decisions to change that which makes you unhappy. Even if it means that some people are going to be displeased. Whatever you do, there will be one set of people who will make you doubt, fret and worry and another that will quietly support you and help you in every way they can. Ignore the former, hold on to the latter and go for it! After darkness comes the morning, it's the law of life. 

WEIRD IS NORMAL

I was waiting for a bus at the bus stop the other day and there was this girl there, who would cross her fingers every time a bus came along. I was at the bus stop for 20 – 25 minutes and she did this for every bus that stopped there. Initially I thought it was the anticipation but she did it more like a habit. Her face remained expressionless. Only the fingers would cross and uncross. It’s my favourite pastime observing people like this and getting to know the quirks of their personalities.

I have a friend who hates it if you fold your arms across your chest while talking to her. Before you even realize you have done it, her forehead starts forming creases. This other friend is so terribly petrified of lizards, she freezes if she sees one and the discomfort is beyond normalcy. You can see the disgust forming within her and pouring itself onto her face. My 10th std. Math tuition teacher can wake up at just about any time without ever needing to use the alarm. Yet another friend is always fidgeting with something or the other, always. I don’t think he can stay still even if it were to save his own life.

I am nobody to talk about other people though. I am full of quirks myself. The weirdest of them all is my unreasonable attachment to my old stuff. Old jeans, tees I’ve brought years back, hair clips, watches, books, bags, accessories, anything. I can’t bring myself to get rid of these things, however useless their existence seems. I lost my stationary pouch last month (I was using it since the 8th std.). It was mourning day for me. I have this pair of pajamas that I really really love. They are cool pink and white Winnie-The-Pooh pajamas. I have worn them every day of my life since I- don’t- remember- when. They have gone threadbare and colour drained but I still love them. My mom gets particularly disgusted with this. When she can’t get me to lose my old clothes, she discreetly hands them over to our housemaid. Usually, if I fume and fret or go on a hunger strike, I get my things back, but sometimes even that does not work. I’m sure my pajamas are going to meet the same fate one of these days. :(

I am very superstitious about my amethyst- replaced- by- sapphire ring. I will not be caught dead without it.

I eat very slowly. I am famous for this, ask anybody who knows me. For this reason I avoid socializing over lunches and dinners. Doing so would make me hugely unpopular and I’d understand :). For this reason also I am extremely grateful to all my lunch buddies, right from school time. They have never complained (not on my face at least). Thanks you guys! I am trying to kick this habit; have not succeeded much so far. I’d rather skip my meals than rush through them.

Almost all the nightmares I have ever had have something to do with tigers. I am fascinated by lions. I love watching them on TV and have even seen quite a few real ones but the very thought of tigers freaks me out completely.

I cannot stand people biting their nails. Try it in front of me sometime and you’ll know. By the way have you heard the village version of the Rocking and Reeling track from Billu? (Imagine the plight of SRK over the name his movie was finally reduced to! Billu! Ha!) In the song, there’s this part where he romances the action of his lady-love biting her nails and skin and what-not!! EWWWWW!! EWWWWWW!!!

I never have playlists when Iistening to music on my PC. I choose one track and then play it in the repeat mode. The track keeps looping, sometimes for hours and sometimes for days together. My latest obsession is a track by Rihanna (‘I hate that...’). Its queued up on my WMP since last Tuesday I think.

I’m terrified of the rockets they burst during Diwali. Every time I hear the noise of a rocket taking off, I fear it’s going to land in my house and the curtains are going to catch fire or something. And when that does not happen, the relief is nothing short of what you would experience if you near-missed a gunshot, I’m not exaggerating. Diwali is a high- stress time for me.

I can go on and on but I’d also like to know about you. What are your quirks? Tell us a little about them (in the form of a comment, since that’s the only interactive tool I have as of now). It will make for some great reading material.

THE SOUL STORY 1

I can’t recollect which event or person or idea has sparked my interest in the subject of Higher Energy or The One, though I've always been interested in the bigger picture of things. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I studied in a convent school. Convent schools lay a lot of importance on prayer, ethics and morality, which is ultimately what your curiosity stems from. What is morally sound and what is not? Who decides? Maybe it has to do with the kind of family you come from. My grandfather was a very knowledgeable person of this subject. Even as a small girl, I used to relish our conversations. He introduced me to the larger-than-life dimension of our existence. Over time it gets uncomfortable not knowing the whole thing and you can’t expect knowledge to just come to you, especially given our way of life today, with barely enough time to sleep a decent seven hours a day and all the other time spent amidst a generation of self-proclaimed forward youth. Gone are the Value-Education classes and gone is my grandfather. I decided to help myself.

Understanding Spirituality and Religion in totality is the work of a lifetime or the work of many lifetimes. It helps to have a clear idea of the possibilities at the very least. No one can say with conviction what really happens. Too many conflicting theories exist. The way I look at it, all you have to do is choose a belief that agrees with your mindset and then live by it. The rest will take care of itself.

If you’re not inclined this way, skip this post instead of reading it in the rejection mode. What comes next is what I believe of spirituality based on how much I know of the same, my teachers being my own life experiences, dad, granddad, friends, cousins, TV shows, books (special mention to ‘One Soul Many Bodies’, Dr. Brian Weiss). Here goes.

Our mind functions on different levels. There is a conscious mind and an unconscious mind/ subconscious mind/ super conscious mind or simply, the soul. The subconscious mind is where our past experiences are stored and it is because of the subconscious mind that we feel, think and act the way we do. There are processes going on in the subconscious mind that the conscious mind is not aware of. The thoughts, creative ideas, intuition that you get are a result of the transfer of some of these processes to the conscious mind.

The subconscious mind or the soul is nothing but energy existing on a higher plane. The purpose of the soul is to heal or attain the state of love. The soul always advances spiritually and never regresses. Each life that the soul takes is to learn some more and evolve spiritually towards the state of healing. When the soul has healed completely, it reaches the highest level of energy, some call it Love, some call it God. This state of the soul of merging with The One is what we call Nirvana or Heaven.

When you die physically, the soul moves out and reviews the life it has just lived - the classic out-of body experience. The soul reviews the actions and deeds of its life and reincarnates to correct the wrong or rather make the right choices. This is Karma. When you choose good over bad, peace over violence, love over hatred, your soul spiritually evolves and heals without postponing for a future life. Unhealed souls or bad people have made and may continue making the wrong choices. Their souls will be reborn to suffer the consequences of their choices, to be faced with the same choices again till they resist the temptation of wrongdoing and make the right choices. I think that’s why in every life we interact with essentially the same set of souls, maybe related differently each time. They are called our Soul Family. Sometimes we just don’t get certain people. Maybe it’s because they are on a much lower/higher evolutionary level than us. Maybe it’s for the same reason that we instantly hit it off with certain others. Inspite of all the bickering and arguing, somehow we connect.

You never die. Your body dies and you are not what your body is. You are what your soul is and your soul is immortal. You can learn about your past lives ( hypnotism) because it’s the same soul. The problem areas of your present could have been influenced by a particular event of a past life. This understanding leads to faster healing of the soul. The earth exists to facilitate this process of learning. It’s one huge classroom.

The big question is: Where does religion and its associated practices fit in this scheme of things? Does the theory of spirituality render our culture of over 1000 years invalid?

To be continued.

A RANDOM THOUGHT

The clock reads 1:17am. I’m on the couch in my living room with books sprawled all around me, studying for my Oracle exam, due (very) shortly. My mind keeps wandering. The syllabus is so boring and monotonous I just can’t concentrate. On a reflex I turn on the radio and the music enlivens my senses, like a splash of cold water. I feel all energized once again and go back to studying. The music is still playing. Its steady rhythm helps me concentrate and I’m back on track. Now many of you, especially those in the older age group won’t understand this. This post is especially dedicated to all those who don’t understand.

I did a little research on whether music does really improve learning or is it just an escape mechanism and this is what I found:

In simple terms, the human brain has a left and a right area. When both the areas are activated simultaneously, information is processed much faster. When you study, the left brain is active. Music stimulates the right brain. Thus if you’re studying while listening to music, both the brain areas are activated leading to better learning and retention of information. As simple as that!

So, the next time you see somebody trying to study and listening to music at the same time, don’t give them a hard time! Luckily my folks understand!

The clock reads 11.00 pm. I should be getting back to my books now if I wish to do well in this exam.

SMALL THINGS

A phone call from your long-lost-one-time-best-friend; a piece of cadbury’s dairy milk; a bear hug from a loved one in times of distress; running into your school teacher on the road and knowing that she still remembers you and still loves you and cares for you just as much even after all these years; spending an entire day lazing around at home in your favorite pyjamas and Dad’s oversized t-shirt, doing absolutely nothing; a long, hot water bath; coming across your favorite movie on HBO while randomly flipping channels; making it to class on time when you expected to be thrown out; watching the sunset hand-in hand with that special person; trying on a pair of jeans which are a size smaller than usual and finding that they fit; an afternoon nap; hours of leisurely reading; isn’t it these freebies that bring you a glimpse of heaven and fill you up with so much more happiness than the ‘expensive’ things can ever buy? If you think so too, then we are some lucky people.

THE SANDS OF TIME

I turned 21 yesterday. The adult tag sure feels great but time is flying and it scares me.
I barely have a year more of engineering to go and I’m going to miss these days like crazy!! It’s funny how I feel like it was just yesterday when I was in school and decided to pursue engineering. I’m almost done and I’m happy about that. But I wish I could just stop time. If I still miss the 2 years of junior college then I don’t even want to think about how much I am going to miss these 4 years.

I’ll miss the constant company of my best friends. I’ll miss the unpredictability of our movie plans, always last-minute and the crazy rushing that followed. I’ll miss hanging out with them. I’ll miss all the funny experiences I’ve had with Namrata; especially the long uninterrupted chats with her during lectures and the challenge of keeping a straight face even while listening to the most hilarious things. I’ll miss listening to Arpan read my SMSes. I’ll miss the bitter pleasure of the heartaches- those that I went through and the ones that I caused.

I’ll miss BTech IT like crazy. I’ll miss all the fun times. I’ll miss A3. I’ll miss the library and the canteen. As they say, ‘you never know when you’re making memories’.

I’ve met some great people here and some not- so- great. There have been some fostered relationships and some broken. Some things have made me laugh and some have made me cry. The best thing is that it has never been only about academics. In fact, it has hardly ever been so. There have been some major life-lessons and for those I’ll be ever grateful.

We have just a few trimesters left all of which are going to see frenzied preparation for the MBA entrance exams, final attempts to bring up our CGPAs and the stuff. So officially the best part is over. I don’t know what the years to come have in store for me but I sure as hell know that my days in this college are going to be some of my most cherished ones.