Looking back at 2016

2016 has been interesting.I wont yet call it a landmark year because it will depend on how i use and built upon the path that is slowly becoming clear to me( with more than enough moments of self doubt thrown in also).Lets try to take a look back and take a stock of some of the main learnings from the year.

Somewhere around April of last year i realised coupleof things. One that i was in a perennial state of unhappiness and two the fact that time for me is running out on this mother earth.I have had both those thoughts/ feelings earlier also but this time they gripped me more sternly. So i decided to set about a journey of trying to find a more happy way to live and as a corollary to that make better use of this limited time on earth.Well " set about a journey" sounds too grand and organised. it was more the reading of a krishnaji quote on social media ( where he talks about world peace) which made me try to find out more about the man and his teachings. Lot of what he said had a profound impact on me and later watching videos of Alan Watts simply reinforced those learning.

So what are some of the things i have internalised


The cosmos is one- the world along with all it people and then everything in nature is all made of the same matter . Everything in the cosmos -the galaxies,the stars.are also made of the same matter.

The astronomer and Scientist Edgar Mitchell said this of what he felt when he was out in space

“Then, looking beyond the Earth itself to the magnificence of the larger scene, there was a startling recognition that the nature of the universe was not as I had been taught. My understanding of the separate distinctness and the relative independence of movement of those cosmic bodies was shattered. There was an upwelling of fresh insight coupled with a feeling of ubiquitous harmony-a sense of interconnectedness with the celestial bodies surrounding our spacecraft. "


This is not the romanticism of a event by a poet type. These are the words of the person who was the sixth man to walk on the moon. He then dedicated rest of his life in learning more about this oneness and interconnectness and where our consciousness fits into all of this.


If i understand everything is one and interconnected then i also admit my action affects everything around me. If i want a more non violent world i need to be more non violent. I need to stop killing for the purposes of filling my stomach. I need to be a vegetarian. I need to be less violent with words.Having meltdowns or using harsh language with the world isnt revolving they way you want it to is no good.then my understanding of the interconnectness if just a phony intellectual thing. This is something i constantly remind myself now and am using to make my day to day decisions.


Thoughts are center stage of our life:the other learning i have had is the understanding the importance of thoughts .As Buddha had implied " you become what you think " through his teachings.I dont think its a difficult concept to grasp and well agree with the centerity of the mind in our existence.All feelings of happiness and sorrow seem to depend on it.Once i agree that thoughts are important it follows from that i need to have some way to control or monitor them.

Here Krishnaji was of great help.He repeatedly says that trying to control your thoughts is really going to create a conflict and is big fight between you and your thoughts.Moreover any victory you can get over your thoughts in such "battles" is only going to give you temporary relief. He instead wants us to develop the trait of observing our thoughts.The moment we observe our negative thoughts or become aware of them, they slowly wither away in the background.The observation of disorder is the cessation of disorder.I am still trying to practise and learn more about this technique to"observe my mind'but can say it does help.


Facing your demons-Another important learning is that we need to face our demons-the internal fears and not run away from them. We need to sit and think about things which are worrying us and most times we will get to the root of the issue.We may not have a ready solution but we will make a good start.The world is created to forget about our worries and drown ourselves in all kinds of sensual pleasures. .While doing all that is fine and dandy it doesnt do much for a troubled mind. we may forget about our worries but the worry doesnt go anywhere and it will come knocking on our minds door sooner or later. It is better to try and tackle it.



There will need to be a part 2 of this blogpost

Time-Linear or cyclical

I came across this question recently. Is time cyclical or linear in nature?  It was a question Alan Watts discussed in his video. He did not seem to go through into too much details but he said enough to trigger my interest in the topic.I tried to do some research on it but did not come across much which would satiate my thirst for knowledge on this topic or maybe i was looking in the wrong places.there was a bit here and a bit there because time as subject has gripped us from  the ages. Is it real? is it illusionary? lot of deep questions have been covered about it by various eminent people right from physicists to philospohers. Whatver little i have tasted from this fountain of knowledge seems intriguing and i want to learn more but i have not find much on this linear vs cyclical nature question and to be this would be one of the fundamental paradoxes to understand time,our attitude towards it and how in the end it affects our well being.

lets try and put together what i understand so far of this question.

if we assume time to be linear be basically are saying that it moves in a straight line,from Point A to to Point B.Lot of western thought/culture  is based on this.This moving in a straight line means we have a destination,we need goals for the future to get  a certain place/state in life. Those goals imply we need need to plan to reach the goals and and then we need to put the plan in action.All this implied a structured planned existence and life is something which we can mould according to our goals and plans.We also need to record how we are doing,map out our progress.We need to record our history as society so that future generations can continue to use that information in their movement forward. Individuals move forward ,so do societies,nations -progress,evolution all stems from this structured journey in linear time.

on the other hand in eastern philosophy time has almost always been looked as cyclical.
There is day and then there is night and then we are back with day after that. Time is moving ina cycle as earth is moving around the sun.we dont have a specific point to get to.Things start and finish and restart again. There is no big grand purpose of existence except existence itself. Species form,evolve into other species or wither away into the dust of nature. Trying to have too many macro goals is not the way to live life as it contradicts the way the cosmos works..Living in the moment without losing oneself in reminiscing in the past or worrying about the future is the way to go.

This is the surface of what i understand.But more i think of it more i believe this belief of how time works may hold the key( or one of the keys) for me atleast on how to lead a calmer life.