149. Boho me

148. Nishkaam Karmayoga – Duty without Desire

Many a times we are fraught with the inane verbatim from friends but more so from family, “If you do this, you will be rich and famous” and so and so forth. Having said this, I remember having endlessly futile arguments with my mother about why I should or shouldn’t take up a government job, wear and buy more gold, buy a piece of land or have the desire for a flat somewhere in the burgeoning city-scape. But my explanations of how miniscule all these are when it comes to the larger picture of who I am, what I have done so far, where I want to go and what my plans for the world are, all seems to fall on deaf ears and every time the exercise is pretty exhausting for me, as I return home wanting to go ‘blip’ at the first sight of my comfort zone; my bed! And dream as usual!

The long many years of my passion, my love for my work has paid off so far and I have so much more to do. I am happy! This inner strength is my biggest treasure. The excitement of creating something out of nothing, the words on paper, a dream taking shape. Can all this ever be replaced with anything  else? The adventure, the pleasure, the intense emotions are all that I call life; a life made beautiful with doing the things I have always loved. I have never worked a single day of my life! I just played, had fun and dreamt!

147. Devil vs Angel

As I wiz past several cars, angry, frustrated and late, the only thing I can feel working inside me is a red-tailed devil making me angrier by the second at commuters who I presumed were driving in a manner not congruous to the already maddening situation (but was I driving well enough?). And I was helping in no better way to lessen the chaotic situation as I heightened the accumulated rage of people in cars who were already honking incessantly, or were trying to squeeze through an impossibility. The red-tailed nuisance, with one eye squinted and a raised eye-brow, with lips that spat fire, sat on my left shoulder and made me look at the cars on my left, right, front and rear and scream expletives, gesture vulgarly and literally forget about the soothing Norah Jones' Come Away With Me playing ever so softly inside the car. It cackled and spat and laughed and heckled me to a point of no return!

My eyes burnt and I was almost turning insane(wishing I had a monster truck to run over everyone!). I laughed uncontrollably at my 'power' to unnerve everyone. Just as I was losing sight of everything around me, there was a light touch on my right shoulder and I see the Angel himself, sitting all prim and proper gesturing me softly to slow down, relax, take a deep breath and think! He had a gentle, calm look on his face, a relaxing smile on his lips and as he winked at me, I could feel a different sort of emotion coursing through me! He instructed me to look ahead, think, feel good about myself, listen to the music and enhance the positivity I had promised to surround myself with when I sat at the wheels from home! 

The fire, which was almost starting to singe my skin by now, died down; it's embers replaced by a cooling balm and the sound of Spice Girls singing Mama. I was relieved I was breathing easy once again!! 

146. OMG!

And then they say that expectation is the mother of all sadness, all unhappiness! Chiklits galore have just one opinion- learn to be happy with yourself!

But when I think deeply, I often ask myself this question; does happiness really lie deep within a person? And the answer hits me back; ofcourse silly-billy, happiness does lie deep within us. Then why do we keep looking only for things, people or incidents outside ourselves to make us happy and keep us happy? Why can’t we be plain and happy with our own selves? I mean it is no rocket science to remain happy with oneself! There is so much to explore in oneself.

Just like when we buy a smart phone, we have so much to explore. As we go through the different applications installed in the phone, we are thrilled beyond our dreams to see the ingenuity of each one of them and we eventually succeed as we spend most of our time trying to put it to good use in our daily lives.

Isn’t it also possible that we spend a lot of time with ourselves, try to reach deep within ourselves and make an effort to find out the applications installed inside us so that we can put it to good use in our lives and be happy with ourselves. Instead of waiting for some grand incident to happen, we just got to be happy every moment of our lives and just make the most of life.

‘Cause if I think of the Universe(s) that exist, I can only understand that I am but a speck of dust; just a mere dot in this magnanimous creation!

So this dot needs to understand that it is an extremely precious creation of the omnipotent in His magnificent blue-print and be happy about it! It’s pretty much easy!

145. Ghost!

Simplistically put; I just don’t want to leave this world. By the time I will be gone, I will still have so much work to complete. I don’t want to leave without giving love to the people of the World. As a spirit, I would be able to travel far and wide and touch the lives of the less privileged. Wishful thinking but they say that if I desire something passionately enough, I am sure to get it anyhow, dead or alive!

144. Tranquil Waters-III

As they sat there for what seemed like eternity staring at the majestic banyan tree, watching its leaves barely stirring in the whispering breeze, he slowly clasped his right hand around her almost cold left hand and lifted her from her kneeling position. They slowly walked, hand in hand. It was getting dark but there was a power which moved within them to see their way through the trees, as if their souls knew exactly which way to go. A spell of glow-worms lit whichever way they went. They spotted half-blooming Angelicas here and there, bobbing in the breeze and found it a little strange. However, when the same soft breeze touched their skins, all their fears were allayed and they continued walking, slowly. The forest, otherwise heavy with mystery gave them a feel of home. The leaves on the forest floor crackled with a warmth they recognised. This is where they always wanted to be, they thought and by some decree or destiny, here they were. An owl called out! 

Soon enough, they reached the end of the line of trees and they found themselves gently being touched by the warm rays of the sunlight. They were not far from where they wanted to go. Birds chirped cheerily all around them and wild flowers bloomed and danced to an astral tune. The morning breeze was cooler than when they were in the forest. From where they stood on top of the hillock, they could see miles and miles of open spaces; splendid acres of green fields, with the blue sky, bounteously decorated with white clouds in the distance, its reflection in the almost still water, making this whole landscape look like an ethereal, almost surreal image for both of them. They stood there in silence holding onto the magical moment and wishing it to freeze  forever....

143. Lover and Dreamer

Whenever my friend calls me in the morning to ask me, “What are your plans for today?”, I am mildly and slightly perplexed. I would like to give an out-of-the-world-kind-of- answer, pretending that I have this amazing blue-print to become a millionaire in a years time. But then my answer is, “Today, I will do what I love to do throughout the day and I will love what I do.” My answer is again answered with a “Hmmm!”

Well, all my life till now, I have just loved what I have done every second of my day (hmm...not always!) and I have done what I had loved with an unbounded passion. So, everyday has been a holiday, a vacation, a dream-ride for me; whether it’s writing a piece for the papers or my blogs, listening to a song, getting its lyrics and humming it soon after, dressing up, biting into a vegetable burger, working out at the gym, trying a new posture in yoga, designing a totally new ensemble, chilling out with Tirus at a bowling game, hanging onto the phone with my best buddy and talking endlessly about ‘great ideas’ and sometimes-I-wonder-God-knows-what, taking my Mom and Dad out for dinner, not to forget about the way I feel when I am on stage, enacting a role; I feel like a King! And oh, I am so on top of the world when I am anchoring a show. It’s a power only I can feel as I speak each word and look into the eyes of each person in the audience looking back at me. It’s undeniably an exhilarating feeling, probably unmatched with anything so far! Another position which gives me a high is when I am counselling teachers and students. It’s an up close and personal relationship I share with these people who after a two-hour session become my extended family. So far, I have had a wonderful life, peppered with adventure and fun and my answer to what I had done the whole day would be, “I just dreamt!”