River

River's inspire me....though I have never lived near a River. For that matter being a city (Mumbai) born and brought up person, I haven't even seen or experienced a River at close. Herman Hesse (who is one of my favorite authors) in "Siddhartha" draws life's parallels from a River. Many writers and poets have been inspired by Rivers having repeatedly captured various moods of a River through prose and poetry.

What does the River teach us......that the true nature of life is to move on...move forward....and only forward...a River never goes back....it travels only in the forward direction... thats what makes it a River and different from a Lake/Pond/Sea/Ocean.

Each day I ask this question to myself...."Am I where I was yesterday or have I moved forward in life today?"

And trust me...in this simple question I find the solution/answers to all my life's challenges. Answering this simple question has made me more decisive and as a result more happy person. Not for me to get stuck in one place in life. Move forward decisively....Be it illness, health wealth issues, relationship or career....life is about moving forward. Imagine if the River one day feels that .."oh!!! this Mountain base is lovey and I am very comfortable here...so let me not move forward. I want to stay here till eternity because I am happy here....."

Old saying....stagnant water stinks. And so it is with life.....staying in one place...life gets into a rut. By staying in one place I dont necessarily mean physically living in one place. It could be staying stuck with a thought, a problem, a moment of anger or hatred.....Don't linger too long in happy moments...similarly don't carry on unhappiness for too long...move on......moving on.....like the flow of a River....joyful....clean and cool.....bubbly....fresh....surmounting and crossing all blocks and challenges happily....eagerly awaiting to meet its end....the Ocean. Not loosing its true character...the character of a River....That is life.

Moving forward each day......covering some distance!How much distance is covered does not matter...but moving forward matters.

Whom are we competing with?

Recession, global warming, terrorism, GDP.....so many things to talk about. Everything around us is moving too fast. Explosive growth, never seen before. Accelerated human evolution.

Is anyone really concerned about what impact all this is having on humanity? World leaders? Why is it that they don't discuss this issue? How are we as human beings coping with it all? How is this fast pace changing our mind and our body? Who is measuring this aspect of growth and development and its impact on society and mankind? What are the metrics or yard stick to measure how much have we grown as human beings? Or de-grown as compared to our ancestors who lived in lesser developed environment.

Whom are we competing with? God? Nature? Aliens? Time? Past civilizations? ..May be all..may be none....we could just competing with ourselves.

What is this hurry and why is this hurry? Cant we slow down? Why does GDP have to grow at 8% and why not 4 or 14 or 25 or 2....? Fixation with numbers! Not quality. These numbers are driving humanity crazy...

Yes there is an urgency...but the urgency is to slow down this crazy pace of life....quieten the minds! Shut out the noise and the clutter! Find the silence within.

This equation has gone wrong....shoudn't it be corrected?

The only thing I find more complex than my own thoughts, is relationships. Closer the relation, more important it is. More important it is, more complex it is. And greater power it has to make us happy or unhappy. 

In order of importance, off course parents come first. My relationship with them is the oldest, closest and most powerful. It is an inherited, invisible bond....their smallest pain or unhappiness can break me into pieces. 

I am blessed to be born as a daughter to my parents. As equal opportunity parents; both me and my brother shared similar upbringing. There wasn't any preference. For my parents' there still isn't any preference. As a daughter, I can only reflect upon this from my own perspective. There comes a time in one's life (as a daughter) when we have to leave our parents and move into a new home. It is almost a universal phenomenon. Many things change after that. Much though we wish, it is not always possible to join our parents and share with them their happiness or even unhappiness.  Many a times, we become (not by choice) silent spectators to our parents quality of life!

So much is changing in the social set-up. More working couples. Greater focus on modern (as against traditional) upbringing of children. Hence....grand-parents are more dispensable....younger generation has lesser time and patience with older parents!!! 

There are many examples all around us. I have a very dear friend (she is a practicing Doctor). Off late my friend is feeling quite low and not her usual self. Reason; her old, ailing mother is being mistreated by her brother and sister-in-law. The poor old lady has no other place to live, except with her only son and daughter-in-law. My friend is doing her best to make things comfortable for her mother. But sadly she is facing many challenges from her own husband. He is not too keen on his wife he;ling her old mother. As a daughter, I can completely understand her situation and empathize with her. 

Many son's don't look after their old parents. Mainly because they are conditioned to think and act other-wise by their own spouses.  Similarly many daughter's do not look after their parent-in-laws, while they want to take good care of their own parents. There is a role reversal between son's and daughter's. Daughter's are becoming more like son's.....and son's want to remain only husbands'........dint I say it was all too complex!!!!

Son's must respect and take very good care of their parents. Daughter-in-laws must respect and take very good care of their parent-in-laws. This way daughter's needn't worry about their own parents and leave it to their own brother/sister-in-law. Daughter's must replicate the same and love care for their own parent- in-laws.

This equation has gone wrong. It has to be sight right, firstly in our own mind. As a son or as a daughter. Not difficult at all......all it needs is a shift in the way we approach relationships.