Collective wisdom

Stumbled upon this page where a lot of learning was collated. Advice from wise men and teachings of great achievers, just dumped in a single paragraph, probably in the hope of fulfilling a decade long hunger in a single days meal.

Even so, here it goes(points separated contextually):

Be brave. Even if you’re not, pretend to be. No one can tell the difference.
Don’t allow the phone to interrupt important moments. It’s there for your convenience, not the callers.
Don’t be afraid to go out on a limb. That’s where the fruit is.
Don’t burn bridges. You’ll be surprised how many times you have to cross the same river.
Don’t forget, a person’s greatest emotional need is to feel appreciated.
Don’t major in minor things.
Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresa, Helen Keller, Leonardo Da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.
Don’t spread yourself too thin.
Learn to say no politely and quickly.
Don’t use time or words carelessly. Neither can be retrieved.
Don’t waste time grieving over past mistakes Learn from them and move on.
Every person needs to have their moment in the sun, when they raise their arms in victory, knowing that on this day, at his hour, they were at their very best.
Get your priorities straight. No one ever said on his death bed, ‘Gee, if I’d only spent more time at the office’.
Give people a second chance, but not a third.
Judge your success by the degree that you’re enjoying peace, health and love.
Learn to listen. Opportunity sometimes knocks very softly.
Leave everything a little better than you found it.
Live your life as an exclamation, not an explanation.
Loosen up. Relax. Except for rare life and death matters, nothing is as important as it first seems.
Never cut what can be untied.
Never overestimate your power to change others.
Never underestimate your power to change yourself.
Remember that overnight success usually takes about fifteen years.
Remember that winners do what losers don’t want to do.
Seek opportunity, not security. A boat in harbor is safe, but in time its bottom will rot out.
Spend less time worrying who’s right, more time deciding what’s right.
Stop blaming others. Take responsibility for every area of your life.
Success is getting what you want. Happiness is liking what you get.
The importance of winning is not what we get from it, but what we become because of it.
When facing a difficult task, act as though it’s impossible to fail.

The mind

One of the most incredibly devious creations we are aware of and know very little about is our own mind. It's a tool on one hand, yet pretends to be who we are. It's wayward mostly, swayed by external circumstances yet absolutely capable of utter stillness.

One needs a lot of practice to know and realize what it wants, how it behaves and to then tame it. There are very few people who can actually lay claim to have tamed it. But for the majority, its a lost cause. And to such an extent that we don't even realize the need to keep a check on it.

Its so powerful that it can create ripples by just thought and yet so weak that the minutest of untoward incident can throw it off balance. It dictates how we feel and how we live yet it is not really the one. Is your mind really you? If you can ask that question, then you'll know it isn't. It's this realization that probably leads the way to know more about who we really are.

So who are we for real?

Quo Vadis

The mind is an organ of inexplicable complexities. It's known to work about a billion times faster at parallel computing than the fastest computing systems at home. And guess what? The mind, doesn't even have a basic parallel computing capability, it's just a super awhsum serial computer as per current understanding.

But humans have some pretty fast ones, called super computers, running at a whopping 16.32 petaflops, or 16 thousand trillion calculations per second!(at the time of writing this.)

Now allow me to clue you in. 1 petaflop is 1 quadrillion(three zeros after trillion, 10^15) floating point operations per SECOND. 1 floating point operation indicates how many mathematical operations, involving decimal fractions, the computer (or microprocessor) can handle.

Some world renowned experts claim the brains power is limitless and cannot be calculated. But the reality remains that eventually, it's just a matter of time before we get there. If and when we do, do you think we'll be able to just plug in that alternative reality that the machines could create? If we did, could we unwind into a plugged in, but virtually alternate reality where we could have our own world with customized reality? That would bring in the much needed faux pas in our imagined universe. Its like the Matrix revisited, except, this one would probably be the one we want.

Some basic research on the internet gave the following information about the human brain.
http://www.ualberta.ca/~chrisw/howfast.html

"About the raw speed of a brain in terms of cycles per second. A human being has about 100 billion brain cells. Although different neurons fire at different speeds, as a rough estimate it is reasonable to estimate that a neuron can fire about once every 5 milliseconds, or about 200 times a second. The number of cells each neuron is connected to also varies, but as a rough estimate it is reasonable to say that each neuron connects to 1000 other neurons- so every time a neuron fires, about 1000 other neurons get information about that firing. If we multiply all this out we get 100 billion neurons X 200 firings per second X 1000 connections per firing = 20 million billion calculations per second. This estimate might easily be off by an order of magnitude- that is, it might be 10 times too high or low."

"The second question was about the storage capacity of the brain. Some people have estimated that the storage capacity of the human brain is functionally infinite- that is, we can essentially always find room to store more information if we want to, so no practical limit exists."

All of this and further speculation eventually brings to forth the question, if this brain thing is doing this and that, storing and processing, what or who exactly is it doing it for? Is it for a purpose in itself or is it a tool for something which is beyond our understanding and comprehension as yet? If it is a purpose in itself, then why do we continuously keep looking for a purpose to everything? Why should everything have a reason? Then again, maybe we are just bits and characters in someones game and this whole world is just a video game where we are simply supposed to live without having to know what is not needed to be known. If so, why this ability in the first place to understand things around us? We might as well just have been animals!

Since we are not, I am just presuming there's something out there or else this all seems like a cruel joke.

Presumptions

Every sentence I utter must be understood not as an affirmation, but as a question. -Niels Bohr

We lead a life of preconceived notions where there is absolutely nothing we can ingest using our five senses which can be understood for what it truly is and not because we are conditioned to do so. It is sometimes said by neuroscientists that colours are imagined by our mind because evolution made it inevitable. If there were no colours, we the then primitive sapiens would have probably not survived.

It's also said, that the image we actually see is reversed for a fact and the mind turns it upside down again just so we remain sane. Now imagine if we were to see things as they were actually presented without the mental tricks, the world would turn downside up with no racial biases! It'd just be the lighter or darker side of grey with gravity pushing us up. The sun would go down every morning and rise at night.

Surely, there would be skeptics who'd claim we'll just name everything opposite. But holding that chain of thought, why not implement the same principle as a cure for folks afflicted with say dementia or depression? You could say sunsets were the way to go! The returning tides of the ocean are the best moments of life where light fades away to give way to darkness., which would obviously be the way to go!

Some peace at last. Just to be discarded as soon as your reality kicks in.

Why wake up?

God, well played!

On the crossroads of comprehension, lay the essence of confusion. Since you are already guiding from above, figuratively, any which road I choose, should ideally be predestined under your preordained manner of existence.

The path to understand your order of merit, is obviously beyond the comprehension of mere mortals who exist, by very nature, because of your generous whim. So how dare they even mention the rules of governance by which you operate? The nerve of these insolent superstitious dare devil's!

You tell them, you tell them it's a winner, you give them hope; and to what use? They go on to raise awareness.. they talk of free will! They kill the very creation you so beautifully crafted, the mind. The single most important organ differentiating mere beings from the ones you so gloriously articulated into killers.

Over all, there is nothing but a sense of stunning which prevails over the beauty of the marvelous colours you made in nature, the brilliant chain of command based on hunger versus the ignorance of the very intelligence you so made to dominate.

Salut!

High, Time.

Paused, spent,
Buzzing at stuck,
Make it, no reserve,
Play, start.

Blocks, writers, readers,
Dooms - nights and days,
Wait, for the prophecy runs,
Game, for you didn't play.

Happy, sometimes,
For reasons, for seasons,
Perfection., far away,
Needless, as ever.

Assure, bring it,
Pride, ring it,
Fly, fell,
Prey, hunger.

Idea, used,
Comprise, you,
Bad, mistake,
Great, wish.

Belief, question,
Fingernail, edge,
Sit, nothing,
Think, do.

Single, never,
All, right now,
Make, already,
High, time.

Simple

There are frequently times in which a man has to think of things others cannot conceive of. There are things which one won't want to think of, or tell.. but some how people expect to hear them. Even if only to make fun and judge.

Theres a lot to write about this.. so far as my mind is concerned, but experience tells me I shouldn't. So I will just do this, let the experts speak..

Simple Man - Lynyrd Skynyrd


Mama told me when I was young
Come sit beside me, my only son
And listen closely to what I say
And if you do this it'll help you some sunny day

Oh, take your time don't live too fast
Troubles will come and they will pass
Go find a woman you'll find love
And don't forget son there is someone up above

And be a simple kind of man
Be something you love and understand
Baby be a simple kind of man
Oh, won't you do this for me son if you can?

Forget your lust for the rich man's gold
All that you need is in your soul
And you can do this, oh baby, if you try
All that I want for you my son is to be satisfied

And be a simple kind of man
Be something you love and understand
Baby be a simple kind of man
Oh, won't you do this for me son if you can? Oh yes, I will

Boy, don't you worry you'll find yourself
Follow your heart and nothing else
And you can do this, oh baby, if you try
All that I want for you my son is to be satisfied

And be a simple kind of man
Be something you love and understand
Baby be a simple kind of man
Oh, won't you do this for me son if you can?

Baby be a simple, be a simple man
Be something you love and understand
Baby be a simple kind of man.

The Problem of Evil in Religious Life

From: http://swami-krishnananda.org/total.thinking/total_4.html

From the book: The Art of Total Thinking

Excerpts; Chapter 4:

The beginning of our problem is our confrontation with the world itself. I pointed out to you in a few words yesterday that in our religious aspirations and spiritual pursuits we are really after the universal omnipresent mystery, the great Self of things, and every effort of ours is a movement towards the achievement of this goal. It is an impulsion from within ourselves towards the attainment of a wholeness which is the characteristic of the universal Self. But this wholeness is cut off and partitioned into a subjective percipient and an outside world. This is the point where we are standing now. Creation is only this much: a presentation of a world before a Creator who seems to be standing outside it. The Lucifer that is spoken of in biblical language is the world in front of us. He has become Satan because of warring with God, asserting an independence by his own self. He was an angel in the beginning; he became Satan afterwards because of his assertion of independence over and above the supremacy of God, the omnipotent Being.

The world was not originally an object of perception. It was an angel inseparable from the bosom of the Almighty. The universe so-called, the creation that we see before our eyes, was not this form which is before us at present. It was one with God’s almighty all-comprehensiveness. Similarly, Satan was an angel once upon a time. He was indistinguishable from God’s being. But something happened. Nobody knows how it happened and what actually happened. The angel began to feel a sense of intolerance; and to affirm an importance in the eyes of God or in the presence of the Almighty would be to defy the Almighty nature of God. Therefore, the world stood against God’s omnipresence when it asserted its objectivity and independence in that manner. Thus, the Satan of the Bible is the world that we see in front of us. He is not in hell, in the inferno, in fire and brimstone as literature will tell us. The very thing in front of our eyes is the Satan. And there is no use merely calling names and getting dissatisfied with the circumstances of life. “You idiot! Get away!” is not a solution to the idiocy of a person. You may say, “You wretched world, I kick you out in the name of God,” but it is not a spiritual solution. You may go on calling names, but the world is not going to listen to your abuses. It shall be what it is.

The great problem of spirituality is a reconciliation of ourselves with the evil which is standing before us and which has taken various forms of the so-called evils of the world. Originally it is a philosophical evil, a metaphysical evil in the form of the whole of creation outside consciousness. Then it becomes a cosmological evil, an epistemological evil, a psychological evil, a social evil, a political evil, a business evil, a moral evil, an ethical evil, every blessed evil. These are all the multitudinous children born to the original evil, the mother of all problems; and we are not going to be saved until we strike a balance between ourselves and this great foe in front of us. The foe happens to be reality, unfortunately for us. We do not struggle against an unreal foe.

The Deva and the Asura sampat mentioned in the sixteenth chapter of the Bhagavadgita are the moral and the immoral. But there is no use simply saying, “It is immoral. I shall not have anything to do with it.” We shall have something to do with it, if not today; we shall have to confront it and make it our own, and cannot brook it standing outside us as our enemy forever. It is not for nothing that the great Christ told us that we cannot make friendship with God unless we first make friendship with man. We must first make peace with our brother before we make peace with our Father in heaven. But we are always trying to make peace with the Father in heaven by condemning our brother, who is an evil before us.

Our religion, as it appears today, has to be shed. I have often been under the impression and am becoming convinced that it is high time that we abolished all the religions of the world and be without any religion. This idea arose in my mind because of the sorrow that I felt at the deceptive attitudes of religions and the camouflage which they put on in the name of morality and divinity, which is to their own ruin and the harm of society itself. We are grinning at God and mocking our own selves, and suffering a sorrow which has arisen because of our idea of morality, ethics, religion, spirituality, God-consciousness. This is the fate of religion today.

dvitīyᾱd vai bhayaṁ bhavati (Brihad. Up. 1.4.2). Whenever there is another near us, we are afraid of that ‘another’.
Such peculiar affirmations of a unitary existence manifests itself as the problem of the evil which is a problem in the scriptures of every religion. The moment we become religious, we close our eyes to the realities of life, condemning them as ungodly, irreligious, immoral, and unworthy of any consideration at all. Here begins our sorrow. That is why I said our sorrow begins the moment we start becoming religious. A wholly social, materialistic person is also happy in his own way. He doesn’t bother about anything. Everything is reconcilable to him. He is able to reconcile himself with everything, even with the worst of things in the world, and so he is happy in a way. But we are very virtuous persons, and our virtue is our sorrow. This is again something very unfortunate.

To be religious is to search for God, and to be spiritual is to affirm God’s originality of being.


Evil does not exist. Because it does not exist, it has become a problem. If it had really existed, it would not have been a confronting principle. Also, if it had been really existing, we would not be trying to overcome it.

But what is evil, again? Place this question before your own mind. It is a part of you struggling with another part of your own self. One part of you is the so-called present ‘I’ or ‘you’. The other part is what you are unable to reconcile yourself to. When you are attracted to anything in this world, you are pulled by a part of your own self that you see externally in the world of space and time. Otherwise, who can attract you in this world? How can a totally contrary being pull you in its own direction unless there is something akin to you in its character? Unless a feature belonging to yourself is present in the world outside, it cannot pull you, attract you and demand your attention. A part of you is present outside there. So you are seeing yourself in the things outside, and calling it an evil. You are trying to run away from a part of your own self. The evil of the world is a part of your own self, and therefore you cannot run away from evil. Just as you cannot say that you do not exist, you cannot say that evil does not exist. But at the same time, you cannot say that you are other than your own self. You cannot be something more than, or less than, or different from what you are. In the same way, the so-called principle of evil cannot be regarded as a feature totally alien to your own self.

Thus, the fight with evil is a fight with one’s own self.

When we take to religious practice or to the practice of yoga, we are in a terrible difficulty indeed. Very few can succeed in yoga or even religion or spirituality or anything worthwhile because the moral evil stares at us as an insoluble problem before us, and the ideas of the undesirable which have been implanted in our minds right from the various incarnations we have passed through obstruct our newly reoriented form of thinking, so even when we think religiously or in a so-called divine way, we are thinking in an old stereotyped fashion only.

The world has been a dear object. It has been dear, but it has been an object. That is the pitiable part of it. It is very good that it has been dear; everything has to be dear, but it is an object. How can an object be dear? Only the Self can be dear, says the Upanishad. Na vᾱ are sarvasya kᾱmᾱya sarvam priyam bhavati, ᾱtmanas tu kᾱmᾱya sarvam priyam bhavati (Brihad. Up. 2.4.5): Only the Self can be dear, and nothing else can be dear.

Unfortunately, the world is contending before us as an independent existence, and we have never felt that it is a part of us or we are a part of it, though in our loves for things we have unconsciously accepted a participation of ourselves in it and its participation in us, though we have spoken to the world with tongue in cheek or a little bit of salt in our mouths, not accepting it fully. We have not fully accepted that the world is a part of us, nor have we completely rejected it. We cannot reject it because we love it, but we cannot make it a part of ourselves because it asserts its independence. Even one’s wife, one’s son are independent individuals. They would not like to merge in us. The wife asserts her independence, the husband asserts his independence, the son and the daughter assert their independence. Though we may say they are ours, they are ours in some way only, under some conditions. Wholly they are not us. When even the dearest of objects has an independence of its own and it would not like to get absorbed in us totally and lose its individuality, the world would also not like it. So much love it cannot evince in regard to us. The world does not want from us so much love as to lose its independence totally and get absorbed into us. That is not possible. “No. I am what I am.”

Guru

From: Krishnananda


The reason why we have been told again and again that a Guru is necessary is this: we have to be deconditioned in our brains, or rather, I would say, we have to be dehypnotised. We are in a hypnotic condition today by the conditions imposed upon us due to the existence of racial factors embedded in our psyches and the impressions formed by experiences of our past through the various incarnations of our own individualities. We have not started life just now, a few years back when we came from our mother’s womb. Our life began, we do not know when. We have been living for centuries, for aeons. We have passed through many forms, entering new forms in our struggle to overcome this evil of an ‘other’ than God’s being. As a soldier may declare a temporary truce to regain his strength and take rest in his camp only to resume the battle the next morning, we are shedding this form of the present personality as soldiers in the battle of life and entering into a camp of unconsciousness for the time being, in order to resume the battle of the very same existence, the confrontation with evil, in another form which we have to assume whether we want it or not.

Thus, the impressions formed in our psyche, which pursue us wherever we go through the various incarnations, stand as obstacles for a totally reoriented form of thinking. The reason why we require a Guru or a teacher or a superior in this task is because we cannot enlighten ourselves qualitatively in a new manner as long as we are capable of thinking only in the old fashion, conditioned by the psyche which has been impressed with the various forms of experience through which it has passed in the earlier incarnations of life. Hence is the need for a Guru, to reiterate.

Don't think twice, it's alright

It ain’t no use to sit and wonder why, babe
It don’t matter, anyhow
An’ it ain’t no use to sit and wonder why, babe
If you don’t know by now
When your rooster crows at the break of dawn
Look out your window and I’ll be gone
You’re the reason I’m trav’lin’ on
Don’t think twice, it’s all right

It ain’t no use in turnin’ on your light, babe
That light I never knowed
An’ it ain’t no use in turnin’ on your light, babe


I’m on the dark side of the road
Still I wish there was somethin’ you would do or say
To try and make me change my mind and stay
We never did too much talkin’ anyway
So don’t think twice, it’s all right

It ain’t no use in callin’ out my name, gal
Like you never did before
It ain’t no use in callin’ out my name, gal
I can’t hear you anymore
I’m a-thinkin’ and a-wond’rin’ all the way down the road
I once loved a woman, a child I’m told
I give her my heart but she wanted my soul
But don’t think twice, it’s all right

I’m walkin’ down that long, lonesome road, babe
Where I’m bound, I can’t tell
But goodbye’s too good a word, gal
So I’ll just say fare thee well
I ain’t sayin’ you treated me unkind
You could have done better but I don’t mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
But don’t think twice, it’s all right

- Bob Dylan
Copyright © 1963 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991 by Special Rider Music

Cycle

When the first atom was split successfully, in the Manhattan project(rivaled only by the NASA's moon mission in terms of investment of resources - money, manpower, intellect;) the lead scientist Dr. Robert Oppenheimer quoted a verse from the Gita, which the lord Shri Krishn says to Arjun after having revealed his true form. It goes - "I've become death, the destroyer of the world's."



The cycles of creation and destruction are pretty much the cause as well as consequence of all things humane, for example: emotions. Strangely, the preprogrammed mind automatically thinks of consequence as a form of suffering, as against the reason preceded by cause, because we look forward to the future so as to hedge against disapproval from what our current level of intellect perceives our society to be.

The similarities of intellect between what Arjun thought and even felt, are no different than what we feel today! We are still as foolish as we were ~5000 years ago. Man is still confounded by what lies within himself just as much as what lay beyond his imagination. If you find it hard to believe this, just try to imagine and come up with something completely new, intoto! You just can't.

All drama about ideation is just a flawed notion of copying what is already there in an aspect which seemingly has not been used before. All that is created must perish then all which has perished should be recycled, isn't it? If we were to value the total life on this planet earth and think of a root for all of them, call them souls, then I suspect the resultant over all sum is likely to be a constant forever. Maybe not a universal constant, but a constant in the world we are aware of.

If S=soul, E=earth, X=value\# imagined, T=defined quantum of time, K=constant
then x(s).e/t=k

Which is why, when the total sum of all parts breaks the equilibrium of the constant, everything has to be reset back to original and history repeats itself.

The collective sum of all conscious parts of life(species) is always constant in any given realm of a complete world with a full mutation life cycle.

Be

Of all the questions which have troubled an individual on the path towards salvation and coming to terms with whatever life generally tends to offer, "who am I?" - is probably the biggest, most uncomfortable and at the same time, the primary question to be answered. It is only when a man is willing to  that he does not matter, his entire existence is in vain and the struggles, benefits, victories and the emotional turmoil is in vain and going to end up being nothing more than a memory which is bound to be forgotten sooner than later - that he truly begins to start understanding what  humble means.

~ Do we live in order to fulfill a purpose or is it the purpose itself which gives us life?

~ Are we thinking because we are able to and can afford to do so or is it the additional brain power which causes thought itself to arise?

~ Animals, either domestic or wild, are living creatures too. It is said they have a soul., but they don't seem to be bothered about such mundane issues.

~ As a species, there is no evidence to suggest they are self-aware or are bothered about extinction.

~ Humanity seems to have yet to come to terms with the idea of it's own ignorance and appears to get distracted pretty easily by the notion of self worth.

~ Why would there be any dispute or difference of opinion if one knew that it's all coming down to zilch in the end.

~ Is time real? Is God real? Have we created both of them or have they created us?

~ What is life itself? And why do we need to find a purpose to be fulfilled?

~ Critically speaking, if one removes the social obligations and expectations of people, literally meaning ALL kinds of expectations - moral, societal, parental, professional and personal, from ALL sorts of people - parent, guardians, spouse, colleagues, friends, relatives etc., then what is left for you to do?

~ what would the Devnagri word - dharm, mean if you were the last man standing on the earth?

A wise man, long time ago, had reasoned about possibilities of a probable God and the consequences of encountering him\her\it after death:

$ if there was no God to be answerable to and you did not believe in him during your lifetime, there's little to be bothered about or lost.

€ if there is a God and you've been appeasing him during your lifetime in some manner, by following any religion(path) and it's teachings, then you are doing alright.

¥ if there wasn't any God but you followed something out of blind faith, even then you wouldn't have to worry about any of your misgivings or transgressions.

£ now the real issue to be worried about is, if there ended up being a God whom you must be answerable to, after death, and you had neither cared nor acknowledged., only then you'd have reason to be concerned!

What it means in terms of quantifiable metrics is that you have a 25% chance to be worried reasonably. 1\4th rate of success is a good ratio to have in the real world!

From dust you came and to dust you shall return. - Genesis

Krishna: History or Myth?

Rule-breakers and game changers

The idea of a rebellion, against either tyranny or hypocrisy, has always been rooted in discontent of some form or aspect either within or without. The possibilities offered by a single success, mostly at the cost of great sacrifice, is nothing logical or reasonable. No pragmatic view would have any endorsement even remotely related to an uprising against the system simply because of the insurmountable odds stacked against it.

Yet, there has never been an age in recorded human history, which can claim itself to be devoid of a revolt. The philosophy of harm preventing man from foolish pursuits is not just misunderstood, but mistaken in it's entirety. For instance, in today's day and age, majority of people would be aware of potential dangers of an addiction like smoking cigarettes or consuming copious amounts of alcohol. Does it mean people would stop smoking and drinking? No. The principle definition of the theory which presumes knowledge would and should prevent mankind's primitive urges from being indulged in, is completely flawed and incorrect.

Far from being preventive, a regulation\rule only serves to further enhance the desire to do the very thing which is prohibited. To add insult to injury, this is nothing new! What is the primary instinct prodding you to do, before the conditioned brain overrides, when you see the sign - do not touch - written on an artifact in a museum? You go right ahead and feel it!

So, for parents and people managers alike, the question still remains, how do you deal with a rebel in the camp? You can only ignore them so much, because their relentless questioning, keen observation and righteous influence spreads like a contagion breaking down the hierarchy and chain of command; wrecking havoc on productivity and efficiency or on the domestic front - peace of mind.

One thing is for certain, a rebel without a cause can be like a double edged sword and as such should be dealt with care as well as caution. It will certainly be easier to stick to reason and keep the dialogue going, even if there is no apparent progress. Because a harsh and strict reaction in the form of a punishment, however well designed to discourage other's from following suit, is certain to backfire when it comes to rebels simply because of it's intrinsic characteristics. Instead of enforcing, it'll reinforce the cause they fight for and make it all the more difficult to convince them of your authority and then convert them into allies who support your cause.

Remember, fundamentally speaking, rebellion always has its roots on a moral high ground. The basis of rebellion itself is born out of a compulsion to follow what is presumed to be an unjust act of governance which has to be fought and resisted. This in turn sows the seeds of desire which feeds suspicion on a regular basis. Every action taken from that point onwards, starts getting scrutinized with a specific bias and ends up being judged with a prejudiced notion, irrespective of it being mundane or critical.

What's more, if anyone from the group of rebels is punished, even lawfully, and out of sheer misfortune ends up losing their life, they will have their name glorified and be labelled a martyr!

In the end, the bottom line is to be delicate in handling the people and situation without letting emotional turmoil affect and ruin just decision.

Location : Address not available

Behave

Be blessed and extremely happy, not by getting the love of a woman, but by having better than the best of things on offer, just for the momentary feeling of an exalted emotion. Temporary as it maybe, at the very least, there won't be a regret on the death bed haunting the conscience with - 'what could have been?' Or - 'if only I had tried..'
--
Strangely, the age old saying - adversity will reveal the true feelings and friendships, appeared out of nowhere to ensure the difficult lessons are not just learnt but are also recalled.
--
Many a times, irony plays a wicked joke by making authenticity dependant on the support of the circumstance; without which disbelief and or surprise just won't budge.
--
Acknowledgement and acceptance are probably the most underused and undervalued concepts and as such, tend to be sparingly understood. By the simple association of ego and the nasty habit of being judgemental, the human nature binds itself to a false sense of honour, superiority and grandiose expectation of getting our desires fulfilled.

Desire

As cunning as the mind can be, its the so called heart, which is more difficult to satisfy and please. Unlike the mind, the heart knows no reason to accept, no rule to follow and most certainly has no qualms about proving itself to be plain stupid.

They say, best thing you can do in life is to follow your heart. So what is this thing called heart which is apparently supposed to automatically figure out the best solution? Is it separate from the creative processes of the mind we think we are aware of?

Whatever it might actually be in reality, the only truth we can actually account for, is that - which fulfills our core needs., thirst and hunger. All the rest is the result of having excess brain power left over and is just circumstantial.

Over all, during the ~17 years of conscious witnessing, torturous lessons and incessant but mostly unnecessary passion - there came a point of realization when certain aspects of living in a judgemental society, became apparent. Not only are wants wanted desperately, they are to be acquired in an acceptably pleasing manner.

The conditional response generated, by experiencing reality from an individually unique point of view, as a reflex is extraordinarily sensitive to how it is perceived irrespective of what it actually is. Simply put, there are no 0's and 1's with universally constant values. How much and what those 0's & 1's represent is not a result of logical deduction to be arrived at in principle but is dependent on what is already fed into the conscious. Simpler still, its not that 1+0=1, its the answer 1 we want, which forces us to create the 1+0!

'Half known is completely confused' said the realization., 'Still working on it..' replied the progression.

..and then some

[1] One should never attribute an action to malice when it can adequately be explained by sheer stupidity! - Max Igan

[2] The smart are more biased to think they are less biased - Robin Hanson

[3] Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens - Jimi Hendrix

[4] To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others. - Albert Camus

[5] There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a butterfly. - R. Buckminster Fuller

[6] If you're happy, don't worry you'll get over it. - Edward Murphy

[7] It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend. - William Blake

[8] We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated. - Maya Angelou

[9] Relationships never die of natural causes and are always murdered by suspicion, ego or jealousy. - Someone

[10] It's a terrible thing to look over your shoulder(when you are trying to lead) and find no one there. - Franklin D.Roosevelt

[11] Adjustment with right people is always better than argument with wrong ones because, a meaningful silence is always better than meaningless words. - unknown author

[12] Getting married is very much like going to a restaurant with friends. You order what you want, then when you see what the other fellow has, you wish you had ordered that! - author unknown

[13] We fight with and scold the person whom we love a lot, but interestingly, we wont let others do the same to that very thing - author unknown

All glory is fleeting.

World of View

Glycerine - Bush

Must be your skin that I'm sinkin in
Must be for real cause now I can feel
and I didn't mind
it's not my kind
not my time to wonder why
everything's gone white
and everything's grey
now your here now you away
I don't want this
remember that
I'll never forget where your at
don't let the days go by
glycerine

I'm never alone
I'm alone all the time
are you at one
or do you lie
we live in a wheel
where everyone steals
but when we rise it's like strawberry fields

If I treated you bad
you bruise my face
couldn't love you more
you got a beautiful taste
don't let the days go by
could have been easier on you
I coudn't change though I wanted to
could have been easier by three
our old friend fear and you and me

I needed you more
when we wanted us less
I could not kiss just regress
it might just be
clear simple and plain
that's just fine
that's just one of my names
don't let the days go by
could've been easier on you
glycerine

b32/m80

As the realization of tolerance dawns, it becomes more and more clear why there could be a logical and completely acceptable reason to simply move on to the next phase of what can only be described to be - before time. Funnily, as difficult as it may seem to the non-transient beings around me in this physical life, going simply by their observation, I am pretty sure I have always been late. For the meetings, waking up, going to sleep, being energetic, wasting time for the sake of being just there in the moment, feeling my heartbeat rise if only for having imagined, smiling hopelessly, being lost.. Oh dear lord - so dark the con of man!

Some one said - After silence that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. Without music, life would be an error.
--
Apparently, post modernism says: there is no absolute certainty or truth in life, every persons view of life is as valid as everyone else's.

So dark the con of man.. letting go for the sake of holding on. I no longer belong. I know I am sane, so far.. I can consider, weigh out my options, conclude, survive, any which way sweet leaf, I seek you not, for you are already mine.

Still, better Mr. Late than Late Mr.
--
In other news, Stephen Richard Covey, a famed author, educationist, inspirational kind of guy(*limited to business and management afaik), went to a better place on 16 July 2012 at the ripe age of 80.
Never got myself to read any of his books in-spite of having many chances at various times and stages. Strangely, in a forwarded email highlighting his principles in simple list, I found two which I liked and agreed upon, one almost a revelation. Having sold an estimated 35 million copies, he must be giving out something right in his book! That's when I realized an age old lesson I had learnt during my late teens/early twenties - if everyone who bought Dale Carnegie's - How to make friends and influence people - with over 100 million copies sold(at least) the world would simply have been a whole lot more friendlier, understanding and happier - without any racial prejudice or intentional judgement and most certainly on a better economic parity between the rich and the poor! Sadly, that is not the case at all. If anything, the reality is far from being that simple. The rich would never want to just give away their power and money and the poor will always seek to get it for themselves with as little effort as possible - this remains irrespective of whether or not it is righteous. Also, it will serve well to know that Mr. Dale Carnegie is Mr. Andrew Carnegie's sibling. Yes, the same guys from Carnegie-Mellon Univ. and the vast steel empire, founded when railroads were privatized businesses and on an uptick only behind shipping. It's almost like the Rockefeller's and Rothschild's were giving lessons in grooming a horse, to a rancher, just because they can afford to gamble and lose big money without flinching a bit, on a horse race.

Anyways, having said things, I am also not the one to shy away from giving credit where it is due. And I am glad Mr.Covey cleared up a couple of fundamental things for me and for that, I am thankful indeed.

1. Maturity is when you accept that the person you've become is not necessarily the person you wanted to be.
2. There are three constants in life... Change, Choice and Principles.

Coming to think of it, am wondering, Steven Jobs and Stephen Covey., who could be the next Steve..?

How and why it matters - China

Whenever there is talk of world domination and a debate ensues around which country actually inherits the status of being a super power after the end of the second millennium and the post cold-war reshuffle, the topic of maximum interest has always gravitated towards China. Sure, USA has also been there as the undisputed winner of the cold war era competition, but it no longer holds the position of "undisputed" and overarching decider of any countries fate.

The debacle that ensued soon after the dissolution of communist Soviet states(Warsaw pact countries), the capitalist empire led by USA(NATO) fell into a crisis of its own making. Nobody realizes that if a champion who is used to compete, fight and win every step of the way, finally wins, the glory of having won a difficult fight soon fades away, as no challenger comes forward to seek the same glory. In essence a fighter always needs someone to fight with or else the very existence becomes meaningless. Ditto with the world order in the decade following the end of cold war(1991-2000).

The downfall of the victors started with what was then known as the Y2K bug and subsequent dot-com bubble bust and it has been a slippery and uncontrolled slide for economies ever since.

While all of this was happening and everyone, as usual, was focused on the first and second worlds., a silent but spectacular dragon was starting to breathe out fire, after being starved into submission for ~two millennia.

The aim or agenda of the PRC(Peoples Republic of China) seems to be:

1. to add the word - "Peoples" as a suffix to everything and anything related to and defined by the state. Like for example, Peoples Liberation Army of China - as their armed forces are actually called, The Great Hall of People - as their parliament is officially known etc., but jokes apart..
2. The governing body known as the Peoples Party, of the Peoples Republic of China - mainland China, recognizes and establishes the "[[One China]]" policy which can be interpreted as having the legal right to own and administer entire territories under former Ming/Qing dynasty rule(16th century).

Strangely, the general populace of the world does not seem to actually know that the resulting dispute between PRC and Taiwan is more or less like two cousins fighting for the throne and neither of them is the legitimate heir apparent. Its simply not about PRC claiming Taiwan! The official name of what we know as Taiwan is .. guess what? Republic of China! aka ROC. And further more the ROC claims the right to rule over the huge mainland China by claiming the right of succession. Who knew!!!

Anyways, having given the background of just the later half of the 20th century, let us see how and why, the first and second worlds, have snapped up to pay attention in today's age and making note of every little movement the dragons tentacles make. These few points are not just sensationalist in nature but are genuine concerns.

China has 19% of the world’s population, but consumes ...

1. 53% of the world's cement
2. 48% of the world's iron ore
3. 47% of the world's coal
4. .... and the majority of just about every other major commodity.
5. In 2010, China produced 11 times more steel than the United States.
6. New World Record: China made and sold 18 million vehicles in 2010.
7. There are more pigs in China than in the next 43 pork producing nations combined.
8. China currently has the world’s fastest train and the world’s largest high-speed rail network.
9. China is currently the number one producer in the world of wind and solar power, but they don’t use it themselves. 
10. While they manufacture 80% of the world’s solar panels, they install less than 5% and build a new coal fired power station every week. 
11. In one year they turn on more new coal powered electricity than Australia's total output.
12. China currently controls more than 90% of the total global supply of rare earth elements.
13. In the past 15 years, China has moved from 14th place to 2nd place in the world in published scientific research articles.
14. China now possesses the fastest supercomputer on the entire globe.
15. At the end of March 2011, China accumulated US$3.04 trillion in foreign currency reserves -- the largest stockpile on the entire globe.
16. Chinese people consume 50,000 cigarettes every second …
17. They are already the largest carbon dioxide emitter and their output will rise 70% by 2020.

Now, some more sobering facts about the same china, these are from considerably more reliable sources which I did mention at the end of the point definition.

• China has 150% more soldiers than America does, plus a high tech 'Kill Weapon' the U.S. can't deal with.
• China has about 3.4 million active military personnel compared to America's 1.4 million. Moreover, in some key spaces, China might even have a tech advantage:
• After years of conjecture, details have begun to emerge of a "kill weapon" developed by the Chinese to target and destroy U.S. aircraft carriers.
  
• "The size of the missile enables it to carry a warhead big enough to inflict significant damage on a large vessel, providing the Chinese the capability of destroying a U.S. super-carrier in one strike. Because the missile employs a complex guidance system, low radar signature and a maneuverability that makes its flight path unpredictable, the odds that it can evade tracking systems to reach its target are increased. It is estimated that the missile can travel at mach 10 and reach its maximum range of 2000km in less than 12 minutes."
• "If operational as is believed, the system marks the first time a ballistic missile has been successfully developed to attack vessels at sea. Ships currently have no defense against a ballistic missile attack.”

Source: U.S. Naval Institute

• By 2025, China will build TEN New York-sized cities.

"[By 2025,] 40 billion square meters of floor space will be built -- in five million buildings.
50,000 of these buildings could be skyscrapers -- the equivalent of ten New York Cities."
Source: Mckinsey, "Preparing for China's urban billion"

• By 2030, China will add more new city-dwellers than the entire U.S. population.

“[By 2030] China's cities will have added 350 million people—more than the entire population of the United States today.”        
Source: Mckinsey

• China already consumes twice as much steel as the US, Europe and Japan combined.

China is the steel market.
Even in 2010, as developed nation steel demand is expected to rebound, Chinese steel demand will still dwarf all other major economies.
This also means that China drives the seaborne iron ore and coking coal markets as well, as these commodities are key ingredients in steel.
Source: Posco Steel

• If the Chinese, one day, use as much oil per person as Americans, then the world will need seven more Saudi Arabias to meet their demand.
  
  
  
• There are already more Christians in China than Italy, and China is on track to become the largest center of Christianity in the world.

Due to the extremely rapid expansion of Christianity in China, there are now an estimated 54 million Christians in the country comprised of about 40 million Protestants and 14 million Catholics.
Meanwhile, Italy has just 60 million people in total, of which only 79% are Christian these days. Which means Italy has 47.4 million Christians, a full 12% less than China. It's partly because 16% of Italians are now irreligious.
Source: Vatican

• Chinese internet users are five times as likely to have blogs as Americans.

Yet these prolific bloggers are under the watchful eye of an internet police army:
"Although the existence of an internet police force - estimated at more than 30,000 - has been known for some time, attention has previously focused on their work as censors and monitors.
Countless critical comments appear on bulletin boards of major portals such as Sohu and Sina only to be erased minutes, or sometimes just seconds, later. In the most recent case, all postings that blamed corrupt local officials or slow-moving police for the deaths of 88 children in floods last Friday were removed almost as soon as they appeared."
Source: The Guardian

Well, where do you think India stands in comparison?