What do you do when the person you love the most, repeatedly breaks your trust?

What do you do when you realize you cannot depend on the person you were banking on?

What do you do when the one watching your back is the one stabbing you?

Do you strike back?

Is it possible to take a deep breath and not strike back?

Is it possible to not strike back, stay committed, and offer the other cheek because you know it will happen again?

Is it cowardice or betrayal to call it a day?

Is it stupididty not to call it a day?

So many questions and no answers. These are rhetocircal questions – the kind where the answers are obvious but they still tempt you to give an opinion.

I’m in Hong Kong right now – been here for almost a week actually – and the sun’s just starting to make its presence felt.

The first few days were brrrrrrrrr because the winter was weighing on the sun, but the last couple of days have been good and it’s pleasant weather right now.

It’s amazing how sunlight affects the weather. It was grey and foggy and cold … till I realized the temperature was pretty much how it was in Pune when we left. But, in Pune, the sun is always around and so the winter is cheerful and toasty warm with a pleasant chill.

Come to think of it, I kinda enjoyed the gloomy winter … and also this sunnier avatar – I think I just like winter. 

Okay, I can now say that I’m off tea.

It’s more than a month now since I gave up chai. And this afternoon, while in a meeting, our usual round of chai came by and stood waiting patiently on the meeting table.

Yep, I’ve given up chai. Next stop: coffee.

“I am still beautiful,” she said, looking up at me wistfully. Her rosy cheeks were withered, under the onslaught of the hot sun. She had been standing there patiently for someone to notice her. But nobody had. And now there were others like her, younger, prettier.

Yes, she is beautiful, I thought. I had never seen her so up close. I picked her up and she turned her face towards me. Soft. Her petals were so soft. This had to be the most beautiful rose in the world.

I looked at the little boy who was standing on Paud Road, trying to sell his roses. The flowers were at least a day old. There was a florist nearby and people were buying flowers from there. Fresh, colourful and pretty.

The little boy looked at me and said, “Paanch rupiya.” He didn’t expect me to buy the roses – he knew they were old. But those were the only flowers he had managed to get.

The rose in my hand looked at me hopefully, seemingly to tell me again: I am still beautiful.

I bought all the roses and took them home. They lit up my whole house, with their rosy hues. The deep red one, the one I had picked up first, told me: “We are thirsty.”

So I got a bucket of water and placed them in it. Most of them had lost the sheen on their outer petals. So I peeled them off, and they all started grinning up at me.

“I told you, we are still beautiful,” Deep Red reminded me.

“Yes, you are.”

I looked at the thorns. They were a dark green. Strong and yet beautiful. And the petals were fascinating. Cuddled together, they seemed to be protecting the heart of the rose, the part which would keep the rose beautiful till the very end.

Deep Red lasted six days. Every day she would ask me to peel off the withered petals. And every day she looked even more beautiful. Not once did her thorns strike me.

“The thorns are not to hurt you. They are a reminder to me that once I am old, I will be forgotten. The thorn is a symbol of my destiny,” she told me one day.

I think human beings are like roses. And the petals are all the inhibitions that hide our inner beauty. As we mature, we learn to shed them, one by one. And while our bodies grow older, our wisdom and beauty shines forth. The thorns are the gap between what we can be and who we are.

There’s this joke which I’d heard some 10 years ago – a joke at the expense of Blondes. It went something like this: There’s this Blonde who always went to sleep listening to walkman. And then one day while she was sleeping, someone took the headphones out and the blonde passed away. And what was playing in the walkman? A voice that said: “Breathe in. Breathe Out. Breathe In, Breathe Out.”

I used to find this joke very funny. In fact, I wold walking down a road, smoking a cigarette and I would think of that blonde with her walkman, and start laughing.

A couple of weeks ago, I figured out that the joke was really on me. And whoever wrote that joke.

Of course, I have a funny bone and all that. But I also suffer from acute acidity problems and perennial back problems, etc. For years, my family, my wife, and other wellwishers have been telling me to take up yoga, and I just haven’t gotten around to it. Till a couple of weeks ago.

And that’s when I started doing the pranayam – a set of six breathing techniques. Now this is part of my Indian heritage – we belong to the ancient temple town of Kashi (Benares). My family (on both sides) have had astrologers, yogis, homeopaths, and seers. I’ve known about yoga and pranayam since childhood and have even extolled the virtues of the scientific foundations of yoga. But I just hadn’t practiced it.
 
Two weeks later, today, I’m feeling like a fool. And rightly so. My health is a little better than it was two weeks ago. I’m eating everything I’ve always eaten except that I’m watching the quantities and meal times. I’m drinking litres and litres of water. And I’m breathing in. And breathing out. In a particular rhythm.

What is pranayam and what does it do? Well, there are many great Indian yogis and gurus and spiritual leaders who are spreading the correct knowledge of this science, so I shall not add my two amateur bits – after all, I’m following their advice.

But I will tell you what’s happening to me. We all breathe, but I wasn’t breathing properly – imagine that! Who would have thought something so natural has to be taught? I sure didn’t.

Noadays, I spend 20 minutes concentrating on my breathing, mediation and some simple yoga asanas. I hope to increase this to about an hour at some point in time.

I’m not on top of the world. But my neck and back ache have reduced marginally. My acidity problem seems to be responding. The fatigue in my system has gone down a bit and I’m doing more activities on any given day than I used to earlier.

I’ll keep reporting on this front as and when there is progress or retardation. And I want you to know: it’s not just paranayam and exercises. Yoga is about an approach to life as I’m rediscovering, and so there are a series of measures that I’m taking all of which will hopefully add up to a healthier me.

Ciao

In July 1984, I found myself on the last bench of an eighth standard classroom in the Union Academy School in Delhi. It was quite a fall from the fourth row bench in St. Joseph’s High School in Juhu, Mumbai. But I had little choice – my dad had just been transferred to Delhi and the last bench was all that was available.
The world looked very hazy from the last bench in the class. I could see the blackboard, but I couldn’t see what was written on it. Then, of course, there was that matter of the tall boys who sat on the benches in the rows ahead. So I usually saw the teacher only when she was towering over my head and asking: “Why are you looking out of the window?”
The window was my only solace for the first two months. And it wasn’t much of a solace because all I could see outside was a desolate road coming from somewhere and going off somewhere else. It was dry, it was dusty, and it looked depressing. I could also see a few rundown buildings.

The window was at the backend of the classroom, so it went very well with last bench. And when I say last bench, I mean that it was the last bench in the last row in the classroom. Sadly – as fate would have it – I wasn’t the last man sitting. I had to sit in the middle of the bench since the aisle and the window seats were taken.

So as I was saying, the world looked pretty hazy from that last bench. And it continued to be hazy when I stepped out into the world as well. There was a nice mist all around, always, and the leaves on trees never looked as sharp as they did in the text book pictures.

It didn’t take me long to take control and get things into focus. I began with the window without the view. I started imagining that there was green grass along the sides of the road and that there were all kinds of people walking up and down that road. While a teacher was in class, I usually had to look in the general direction of the hazy blackboard.

The sound of a bullock cart or a jangling bicycle creaking past the window was enough to get me smiling as I looked ahead at the teacher but saw a lanky man on a Hero cycle raising dust on the road below. Most teachers punished me for smiling a lot in class and not responding to questions.

Outside, in the world, I didn’t have to imagine much except when I was playing football. I was a goalkeeper and it was rare that I could see the forwards till they were about to score. I eventually decided I couldn’t wait for them to be that close before making my move. So I started studying the blurry images, imagining their precise movements and predicting where they would turn or strike. I never thought twice about flying off the ground in spectacular dives to save goals since the ground was a blur anyway.

Then one day, my English teacher called my mom to school and subsequently my parents took me to this building where a guy led me into a dark room, sat me down on a stool, pointed to something on the wall in front, and asked me: “Can you read the last line?” I could barely make out the wall. So I told him: “No”.
“Can you read the second last line?”
“No.”
“Can you read the third last line?”
“No.”
“Can you read the fourth last line?”
“No”.
Apparently, that meant something to him. So, he put a metal frame on my eyes, slid some glasses in and I went “Whoa!”
I could now clearly see a rectangular board on the wall in front of me.
“I can see the wall!”
“Good. Can you read the last line?”
“I can see the board – it’s got an orange glow!”
“Yes yes, but can you read the last line?” 
To cut a long story short, I got my first pair of spectacles in class eight and it was powered at minus two point seven five. Basically, without the glasses I was quite blind for long shots. It hadn’t mattered much till then since most of my time had been spent playing or reading books, and I used to sit on a fourth row bench in Mumbai. And frankly, I thought that was how the world was – a bit hazy with no sharp edges.

So that’s how I gained clearer eyesight. But I am quite sure that the lack of clarity up until then did wonders for my imagination. I am also quite sure that without the imagination, I would have found myself woefully wanting. The way I see it, imagination is the key to creation, the key to going beyond intelligence. In fact, imagination and intelligence complete each other. Imagination is the power to visualize what can be (the possibility), while intelligence is the power to create what has already been visualized (making it happen).

Of course, in my case, imagination rules the roost. So most of the time I smile silly smiles and wait for someone with intelligence to make things happen…

Some times I decide to think things through. And then I realize that it’s too much hard work.
Generally, there are little thoughts flying around at random in my head all the time. Here’s a sample of the thoughts running through my head while I am writing this article:
“I’ll have wada pav for lunch today. Or maybe… I hate this project! It’s too boring! Why did I come through Ganeshkhind Road anyway? I know the roads are bad … I have to send this article by evening… Where can we go this weekend? I need to get out of here and see new places… I hate that ring tone! Whose phone is that?”
Now these thoughts are doing their own thing while I am writing. I have no control over these thoughts. The trouble starts when you have to latch on to one and think it through to a meaningful conclusion. For example:
“Okay, do I want to eat out today evening? Or do I want home-cooked food? If I eat out, do I want to go out and eat? Or do I want to order in? But if I order in, I will have to order the same boring food from the same old restaurant because they are the only one providing home delivery. I need change! Okay, okay, wait. So we can go out. But after a long day, the traffic will be a bother. So we can’t go far. If we don’t go far …”
By this time, I give up and go with the default decision which is practical. The default decision is to order from the same old restaurant. And suffer in silence. 
This is pretty much what happens in every sphere of my experience. If I start concentrating on every little thought, all the time, I’ll never get anything done. That’s why over the course of evolution we humans have developed this ability to automate all the little things we need to do regularly, including taking decisions related to everyday life. Automated thinking gives us the luxury of default decisions.  
This is also how we approach our work and social responsibilities. We work in complex organizations and need to take decisions at every step. Decisions about people, tasks, relationships, and we have to do all of that every single day. When we are faced with a new situation we stop to think about it and then take a decision, which may become the instinctive choice (default) in a similar situation later. Thus, the default defines our reaction.
The trouble with default decisions is that sooner or later our understanding of ourselves and the world changes. And then we need to think afresh. Meanwhile, our inaction (going with the default decisions) has influenced the decisions other people take.  
So how does this affect society? Every society is an organization of individuals who have submitted to a certain order (law) deemed essential for the survival of the individuals. If you accept that definition, then it follows that the willful disregard of the order by individuals might affect the existence of the society at some point.
For instance, the municipal corporation runs the administration of the city. Over the decades, it has learned that everybody is not thinking about what’s good and what’s bad all the time. Experience also tells them that protests against bad decisions and poor administration are sporadic. The corporation’s default reaction, therefore, is to ignore public opinion till matters get worse. And then take short-term measures.
Similarly, a rise in crime in the city is about the responsibility placed on the police and the people’s tolerance of inaction. We read about crime in the papers, feel disoriented or shocked maybe even scared, and then move on with life. Over time, all that changes in our reaction to crime is the perception that the authorities are not doing their job. The erosion of belief in law and order is gradual and the effects accumulate till lawlessness becomes the norm and you start wondering whether it is safe to go out for a late dinner.
 
Every act by an individual affects the society and its culture. A positive act strengthens the culture; a negative act challenges the culture. What we have to examine is the manner in which we deal with both these situations. What are we doing when someone is not obeying the laws or when some authority is not fulfilling its duties?
We are living in an exciting time because the world is expanding, the population dynamics in any city or nation is changing, and so on.
But we are also living in a dangerous time; a dangerous time because the edifice of social order is showing signs of crumbling around us.
One thing seems certain: I have to give my actions more thought than I have been giving them so far. I’ll have to make it a habit to look beyond my default behavior more often.

(This piece was published in The Maharashtra Herald in March 2006)
 
The other day I was watching TV when I got myself into a quarrel with my wife. And yes, it was all my doing. She was in the living room watching American Idol on TV. I was star gazing outside on the terrace. Then I went inside and started watching American Idol too. Most of the contestants were giving okay performances. Then this girl came onto the stage and I thought had a fabulous voice. My wife didn’t think so. Here’s the conversation that followed:
“She’s good.”
“Nope, she isn’t.”
“She’s got a good voice. She can sing.”
“No she doesn’t. No she can’t.”
“Listen to her. She has the range, she has the power – she could be the next idol.”
“She has no presence and she’s not the next idol.”
“She can be – she has the package.”
“She doesn’t have the package. There is nothing different about her. She’s like Fantasia from last to last year and Fantasia was much better.”
I knew what she was saying was correct but I couldn’t just stop arguing.
“Yes, she has a style that is similar to Fantasia but she’s good.”
“I am not saying she’s not good. I am saying she’s not unique enough to be an idol.”
“Yes, she is!”
Even I was surprised at my vehemence. My wife was quiet cool and she was talking calmly. I was agitated. Frankly, that contestant wasn’t the one I was actually rooting for. There ensued a great debate on music, performance, performing arts… and I lost miserably. In fact, I think in the end my wife decided I was behaving like a child and therefore topped the debate.
Now all of this happened because of my ignorance; ignorance not about the subject matter (which also was a factor), but about the concept of opposing viewpoints. I think ignorance is blindness to that which we are not aware of or that which we do not subscribe to. Paradoxically, this blindness is not that of a blind individual, but the blindness of a sighted individual – blindness of the mind. 
Very often, we let our ignorance take our decisions and rule our actions (and words, in my case). We are quite often at loggerheads with others because we believe they are ignorant. At various stages of our life we think we are wise, that we have a handle on reality; that we have the vision to see. But we all see fragmented pictures the boundaries of which are defined by our limited vision and perception.
But is there something called wisdom and if yes, what is it? I think it is the state of being aware that our understanding is only a part of a much larger image. The wise individual is open to possibilities and aware that there are other realities based on other perspectives.
So is there a characteristic that defines a truly evolved mind? I have met a few people who I think are very wise. Over the years I have been able to identify one quality that they have in common: they can hold two opposing viewpoints in their mind without taking sides.
Thus, if I were an evolved mind I would be able to look at a situation, consider at least two viewpoints, and get down and dirty with both viewpoints so that I can make a strong case for both with sincerity. And after doing this, I should be able to come out of the debate with two perspectives without taking sides. Without taking sides because I would know that both are relevant points of view and not warring factions. 
I have also observed that the wiser the individual, the greater the number of perspectives they are able to hold without taking sides. The greater, thus, is their understanding of the world.
I am, of course, far from being that evolved. So, most of the time, I begin by taking sides and then the conversation goes downhill from there.  Some times, for variety, I start on a neutral point and then take sides so that the conversation can go down its usual hill. Most people that I know or have met are like this.
I think this is because we invest a lot of our time searching the ‘one’ key that opens all doors of knowledge, that one perspective or theory that explains everything, that one system that connects the whole world. As we grow, the key keeps changing but the search for the one key does not. And therein lays the problem: each one of us has a different key at every point in time, which is why there is a clash of perspectives.
I don’t think there is a single key for all doors. And I think so because there are no doors. I think we learn more about the same stuff as we grow older. Its like when you are on the ground floor you can only as far as your eye can show in any direction. When we go to the first floor, we see a little more because we are at an elevation. And so on till the top floor. But it’s only when we reach the terrace that we can see for a much wider distance all around instead of only on one side of the building.
Yep, I think there are no doors. Now if only I can grow up and always respect an opposing viewpoint, then I might be on the path to becoming wiser. It’ll take some time, but I will get there… I think.

The biggest challenges that I have faced are the ones where I have been in some form of deep shit or the other… and I’ve been there quiet a few times. And during every one of those times, I’ve looked for suppport and reassurance from family and friends. And they have always provide me with a solid safety net to fall back upon and bail me out as best they could have.

But, I’ve learnt one essential truth in all the downs: it is up to me to bear the consequences of my thoughts and actions. That’s the only way to learn. If I can run to someone else every time the chips are down, I’ll be running for help or running away all my life.

So what is my first instinct when tough times come a-calling?

Stay tuned and I’ll ramble on.

I currently live in Pune, a little hamlet that’s turning into a mini-metro. 

Till a couple of years ago, I used to rent an apartment in an area that was rather quiet till about a couple of years ago. I suppose in comparison to many other parts of the city, Paramhansnagar (off Paud Road) is still pretty quiet. We have our share of robberies, mishaps, joys, adventures, but on the whole, it is quieter because it is away from the main road and its cacophony.

There’s also this hill nearby that adds to the notion of stillness.
I have always fancied myself as a mountain man, so I have been pretty disgusted with myself for not having explored the hill, ever, not once in the six years I have been here. It’s actually a little hillock spread across a semi-circular area – the expanse gives it the feel of being a mini-mountain range.

One fine day, finally, I decided that it’s time to go up that hill. I walked out of our lane, and walked on to a small road that eventually connects us to the main Paud Road. I crossed the little road and walked towards the hill.

From the ground level, there are several lanes that lead to the hill. Each lane is dotted with apartment buildings or independent bungalows. It’s a peaceful though secluded area and I am happy for the people who live in those lanes … and a little envious of them as well.

I took one of the lanes and walked midway up the hill. Along the way, I picked up a companion – a sorry-looking, golden-colored street dog. I heard the dog’s paws behind me, a little after I felt the hair on my arms warn me there was an animal around. I am no brave. I am wary of dogs. I turned and he stopped. He looked at me sheepishly and then started admiring the countryside casually.

I resumed my trek up the hill. As you go further up, you will find fewer human habitations till you come to the last cluster of buildings standing lonely. This is where the hill starts to climb.

I came to the cluster and turned. The floppy-eared golden dog stopped some ten feet shy of me. He turned off the trail and moved towards some shrubs nearby. I stepped up to a rocky patch and surveyed the area. Even a little elevation does wonders for your perspective and perception. I could see Paramhansnagar – a mass of buildings and a few trees.
“I live in that?” I asked myself. It wasn’t a derogatory question, just a reminder that I was but a part of a multitude, which did not have the bigger perspective in sight on a daily basis. I looked around at the hills on my left and realized that we lived in a basin of sorts. Who knows, this might have been an ancient crater.

Meanwhile, Floppy the dog came towards me, looking friendly.
“Go away,” I told him mildly. So he turned away, smelling the rocks and shrubs and roaming a small circular territory, before returning to me. He smelled my feet shyly and then stood a little distance away. He was unhealthy and ailing. He was even limping a bit on account of a bad hind leg. He wanted to belong to someone – in this instance, me.
“Don’t we all,” I said to him. “You’ve been infected by human kindness. You are doomed.”
He started whimpering and sniffing around the rock. I felt really bad for him. And sad. He had belonged to some human at some point in time. The signs were obvious. He was looking for affection or even acceptance; he was not afraid of human contact nor threatened by it; and he was not projecting animosity.

That is the inevitable course of human kindness. They adopt you and infect you with love and humanity. So much so that you become an alien among your own kind who recognize the smell of humans on you. And then, one day, the human abandons you – probably due to very good human reasons. But in the aftermath of the love, who is responsible for the alteration in the nature of the beast?  Who, then, will protect this floppy-eared lonely dog from his own kind and from the other humans who will see him as a dirty, mangy, possibly dangerous creature?

I started my slow descent down the path. The dog followed. It was better that I left him alone. Maybe we would meet again tomorrow and he would recognize that beneath the milk of human kindness that he seeks in me, there lies a beast, just like him.