Hiatus #1

I have my exams coming up so small break :P

Blog #5 - Uncommon Sense

Where is God?

-         In your head.

-         Whether God exists or not, you and I can’t really know.

-         If there was any concrete evidence for either of the sides. The side would have presented that evidence and it would be only common sense from there onwards.

-         But, I am not really discussing about existence of God. Only using this as an example.

 

What is Common Sense?

-         Common Sense refers to plain sound judgement.

-         The kind of sound judgement which does not require you to have any specialized knowledge

-         It comes intuitively to all intellectually capable humans. Being Human has certain perks J

 

What do I mean by uncommon sense then?

-         Uncommon sense by simple inverse requires you to have some thing uncommon. Something odd that is not common in the normal human intellect.

-         It is the kind of decision-making which helps you decide whether to believe in God or not

-         Most of our decisions are made by this uncommon sense; they are the ones that make us what we are.

-         We choose whether we have to believe in God or not, and in all such decisions where there is no absolute right or wrong.

 

How can I make the “right” decision?

-         As is pretty obvious by now, most things have no right solutions. But there are rational decisions. These are decisions which you make intending to get what you want.

-         There is no universal purpose; hence there can not be a universally right decision.

-         You thus are the one making the choices in your life.

-         Are you doing what is “right” for you?

 

Who am I?

-         Ask this question to yourself, Ask this to yourself to know what is it that you desire.

-         We are all humans. We are cowards one second because we chose to behave cowardly and yet we are the brave, for we have fought against things which we should have ran away from.

-         Your past behaviour is not who you are. You can choose to set a new course. There will be barriers. Quitting an addiction is tough. Leaving your comfort zone even tougher at times. But consciously you can set a new behaviour.

-         It is the time to take responsibility for who you are.

 

Where do I start?

-         It starts with a leap of faith. That is the uncommon sense. Uncommon sense is the faith you put in yourself.

-         When you choose to believe in God, you are taking a leap of faith. A faith in your judgement that he exists. At the opposite end, when you decide to shun that faith in God, you support a judgement of yours.

-         You already believe in your uncommon sense. It’s about time you took some responsibility for it and empowered it.

-         Your beliefs are a result of the choices you have made and their outcomes. The choices which were contextual. UNCOMMON.

-         Your behaviour is thus contextual. UNCOMMON.

-         Accept this.

 

Why do I need to accept this?

-         Your habits and behaviour are tools incorporated by nature in us as a tool to help you, to make you efficient in repeating the same acts again and again and becoming proficient in them. Remember what daddy always said, “Practise makes Perfect.”

-         But this Perfect is only contextual, it’s uncommon. What is perfect in most cases is the absolute most imperfect thing you can do in others.

-         You can thus become a slave to your habits. Doing imperfect things, but doing them perfectly.

-         Are you a slave to your habits?

-         Don’t be. Challenge your beliefs when they seem out of place, support them when they seem in place.

-         You have uncommon sense J.You can make better beliefs now. Being Human has more perks than you can imagine.

 

Why can’t I choose to be an Ignoramus?

-         For starters you can. You choose remember J

-         But you will never succeed. You can never really ignore everything. You will soon find paradoxes challenging your beliefs.

-         Ignorance is bliss but unfortunately it is as hard to attain as perfect knowledge.

-         I only advice you to think and then choose. The final choice is yours. Your Risk, Your Gain.

 

When should I use my Uncommon Sense?

-         Do I really need to answer this?

-         It’s UNCOMMON.

-         So are the times it is to be used. Don’t try to use it every now and then. There are common things you know :p and besides the human mind has it’s limitations.

-         “I” can not tell “You” when “Your” beliefs are out of line with what “You” intend.

-         Lucky for us, there is a system called feedback. Tells you when you did something wrong. Regrettably it only works after the action has been made, so you are already invested. But something is better than nothing. J

 

Hopefully, you will try something Uncommon soon. Believe in yourself; take the risks which are long due. Life is beautiful, but only if you choose to make it. J

Blog #4 - Children of Echo and Narcissus

What in an Echo?

-         An echo is an acoustic phenomenon wherein a reflection of the original sound reaches the listener some time after the original sound.

-         What I mean by an echo is a more important question though; I shall explain that a little later. Patience my child :P

Who was Echo?

-         Echo was a Nymph. A Nymph, not A Nympho ;)

-         Echo was in love with her voice, and was a real glib talker.

-         The story of Echo begins with Zeus (King of Greek gods, firangi Indra devta baba)

-         Zeus, even though he was a god loved to “come down” to earth for a little *wink, wink* *Men :P *.

-         People make gods; our gods are only an exaggerated image of ourselves. There were no Movie stars/ Rock stars/ Saas-Bahu serials at that time so this was like universal gossip J .

-         So, Zeus liked to “come down” to earth. But obviously Hera, his wife, didn’t like this. Would you like your partner sniffing around here and there? So she followed Zeus *pink panther theme song*

-         Echo, being a slick talker, tricked Hera into an engaging conversation, thus distracting her. There is a moral here, but it’s not the one I am writing about today. Let’s see if you can pick it up.

-         Hera on realizing this curtailed Echo’s power to repeating only the words of others

What do I mean by Echo?

-         Echoes are people. People who only repeat the words of others

-       They have nothing to say of their own, yet they love to talk. They just like to hear their voice and make it heard

-         There is a little Echo is every one of us... where we just want to agree & get along

-         Do you often hear things in your head which others have said and even end up saying them the exact same way? Hello….. ello.. llo.. You are an Echo buddy.

Who was Narcissus?

-         Narcissus was the son of a Nymph, Lyriope

-         He was an exceptionally beautiful boy. Movie star style.

-         Liriope was often worried about Narcissus, so she went to a prophet, Teiresias

-         He predicted that Narcissus would live to a ripe old age, as long as “he never knew himself”.

How was Narcissus related to Echo?

-         Now, we are talking

-         Well, Narcissus went hunting once, there Echo saw him, and immediately fell in love with him. She wanted to express her love to him but all she could do now was repeating the words of others

-         So, when Narcissus finally saw her, all she could do was to repeat what Narcissus had just said. Not a very good way to make someone fall in love with you. I would have been irritated too.

-         So, there she was in love in Narcissus, rejected because she had no words of her own. Tells you something doesn’t it?

Where did this story lead to then?

-      Yes, there is more. Well there are different versions actually on how the story goes on. There are always so many versions to everything in mythology. Gossip, I am telling you.

-         I am going to take the one which is slightly more apt here.

-         After this, Narcissus comes upon a calm stream, he bent down to drink some water and sees his reflection in water

-       The boy finally found himself. In his sixteenth year, the boy fell in love with himself. Mythology is just so beautiful.

-         So there was Echo pining for Narcissus’s love could now repeat the words he said to himself “I Love You”. But it was a bit too late.

-         And there was Narcissus, in love with himself

-         What happened to both of them, well I am more of a big happy Punjabi wedding ending kind of guy, so I will skip that. There is always Google though J

            

 Why am I Discussing this?

-         Hmm, well one reason is that there are so many Echoes & Narcissuses out there

-         Second, there is a bit of them in all of us and we need to realize that before the fate of Echo and Narcissus is repeated for us too.

-         I am not saying that appreciating the great things others have said or liking yourself is bad. But excess of everything is bad. So this is like a public disclaimer

When am I an Echo?

-         Well a clue, I dropped earlier, that you often end up repeating the words of others

-         You quote established authorities when their quotes are in favor of your argument, or just to show off.

-         You talk in clichés. Totally, awesome, dude J

-         There are times when these clichés aren’t bad, when they show to others that you speak the exact same language. You feel about things in a manner they do, your thinking pattern is like theirs

-         But be very beware of overdoing it, because then you are only an Echo. A mere repeater. You, like Echo will lose out on things which require real thought. You will think like millions others do, hence gullible to the men who know how you work

When am I a Narcissus?

-         Hmm, this is a bit tougher. See loving yourself isn’t bad, but being self-obsessed is. The thin line between the two, you will have to spot.

-         Do you think you are the best there is, was or ever will be? If the answer is yes, there is your clue buddy.

-         You do different things, just because you don’t want to be part of the crowd whether they do any good or not. You just like to do “your own thing”

-         You are the best and you love yourself, what is there not to love, you are absolutely perfect

-         And those who don’t, well what good are they, fools, they will realise one day how spectacular you are.

-         Hmm, we have a problem buddy, and I know you are the kind of person who will be very hard to convince on this too, because once you have made a decision, it’s final. You made it, after all. And accepting that this is a problem is a bit against your values.

-         Well, there is a price you pay for everything and you just better be prepared

Where does one end and other start?

-         I know, I know, by now many of you must be thinking that the two of these are exactly opposite. One is a person who only repeats what others say and other is a person who thinks for himself and thus does “his own thing”

-         Well, they aren’t actually, often you will find the same person having both of these in them and Boy, are they common!

-         They do their own thing which a million other people are already doing. They don’t want to get their hands dirty doing little things. That is for other mortals. They are the best, thus only the best will do for them.

-         The best though is the one that everyone else has proclaimed to be the best. For therein lies the Echo.

-         Echo might not have been able to make Narcissus fall in love with him, but there are millions out there, may even billions, who seem like a result of the consummation of the love of the two.

What is my advice to people around them?

-         None, Don’t try to do anything

-         And please do not try to change them. They can’t be changed by you. People only change for the people they love and they only love themselves. They are the only ones who can change themselves. You can if you are smart enough, show them that changing will be good for them

-         Another reason why you shouldn’t do anything is because you never know; you never know when one of them evolves into a god. The one that makes the path to a better future or builds a better world for all of us.

Never underestimate the power of Ego, don’t try to control it for it will only unleash itself with full vengeance, sooner or later. If possible, deflect it to something positive. Loads of hungry kids to be fed out there, Loads of dark lives to be enlightened.

Blog #3 - The Hypocrites & The Ridiculous

What is an Ad Hominem?

-         Ad Hominems are a general category of fallacious arguments which repudiate a claim by attacking the person presenting the claim. “He is an idiot; hence everything he says is idiotic”. It’s basically a convenient overgeneralization.

-         The quality of claim is independent of the man presenting them, thus the actions, circumstances or character of person  should not be a concern while assessing an argument

 

How can I believe a person if he himself doesn’t believe what he says?

-         The fact that a person is a hypocrite doesn’t prove that his claims are false.

-         It might also have happened that they now make a claim which is inconsistent or even contradictory to their earlier claims (change of heart). In such a case only one of the claims can be true. But, this is not an excuse for rejecting both of them or simply choosing the one which is convenient to you.

 

Why do people behave inconsistently with their logic?

-         Well, for one they might just be hypocrites :P 

-         But, mostly it’s because we humans are emotion rationalizers. We do things which give us emotional payoffs (either short term or long term) and then we rationalise that through a web of beliefs. Often, we are in situations wherein a behaviour expected from others is opposite of the ones we would like to pursue ourselves. Hence, the hypocrisy, it not really intentional.

-         It’s not a bad thing, it’s only human. No matter how rational we claim ourselves to be, we are emotional beings.

-         If you can transcend it, have a great life living alone J

 

Why do we abhor it and still keep on doing it?

-         Well for one, we are social; none of us is able to fulfil all our needs. A lot of our needs especially the emotional ones can only be fulfilled by other humans when they behave in a manner that gives us pleasure, but their expectations might be different. This “hypocrisy” is a way we lubricate our relationships with others.

-         The system is self-reinforcing, because as we make public our beliefs, we are expected to behave in consistency with them. Our behaviour is always watched and if any of our acts is against what is expected of us. We are asked to be consistent our beliefs or be labelled a Hypocrite, because it is really really bad to be a hypocrite. :P.

-         Often, you will see bawlers; these people you will often see shouting and reiterating their belief system and at least in social settings, trying to act quite consistent to it. You see a lot people turning into bawlers after getting drunk. “I *hic* am the kind of *hic* person….” Get the drill?

 

Who is a rebel?

-         Aah, the rebel. Well rebels are a type of bawlers. On the whole not a very cool one either. Rebels are people to whom the system hasn’t been very kind

-         Not that it is the system’s fault. They are often quite ignorant of the implicit workings of the system and thus land up committing gaffes, which others take advantage of. Resolved to take revenge. They bawl, they bawl against the system. They create a contradictory set of beliefs only to be trapped in the same system again.

-         The same cycle starts all over again. Ever wondered how once Rock was the rebel’s music, and all of the sudden there a rebel against the rebel, Punk rock. There was bawler music Metal and when that bawl wasn’t loud enough there was Death Metal.

-         This goes way beyond music, Just used the example because art is a mirror of what is happening in the society

 

When is this wrong?

-         Absolutely critical question. This is wrong when a few people begin to use system for personal gains. Being in situations of power, they get to mould the situations in their favour.

-         If a claim is made that is not convenient to them, they shoot it down with ridicule. Ridicule is one of the most effective ways of annihilating logic. And we all think, “well gee it leads to such absurd results, how can it be true?” “Damn, I can’t even control my laughter; you just say anything don’t you?”

-         Open your mind to the ridiculous. Yes, there will be people out there who you can ignore. People whom it’s not worth wasting your time on. But they might just be saying the right thing. The thing that can change your life

-         Are you willing to let a little ego let that great chance go by?

 

Where do I start?

-         Now, this is the tough part. You will have to be willing to listen.

-         I know, I know, Listening can be a pain in the @$. Why bother listening to somebody else when you can hear yourself listen and other people can listen to you. You are the genius after all.  ;)

-         Listening is the best skill you can develop, because not only will you find that other people can think from different perspectives, they might also have thought of things you forgot.

-         Besides, it can be great source of power. I know, when others listen to you, you feel all smart and stuff, but listen if you want that feeling to be real and sustainable.