Of a thing called boredom

chronic, never-ending boredom...thats what life is in bangalore...There are things which generate excitement in retrospect. Things you did in the past which you felt nice about, but bangalore has offered me very little of that. The contrast to my life in college is huge. I wasn't eactly a party animal in college, but i had a wide variety of things to keep me happy...And i had people...every once in a while there would be something to do... HEADS UP!!! thats the only thing I can tell myself...I wnat to break this pattern of monotony. And whats somewhat consoling is that I am not the only one. People who have come from delhi and are somewhat driven for their careers find themselves in a odd spot, coming from delhi gives you that craving for a social life and the drive for the career means you are probably involved with something that gives you no time to indulge in a social life. the situation falling out of these contradictions is compunded by a mad "bigger paycheck" rush. Sanity is very subjective.

To trust the "KNEE"

this weekend's trip to kodaikanal was awesome fun!
misty mountain tops ! a walk in the clouds !
and some semi-serious biking and trekking!
i hope there are more of these in the pipeline!
A big refreshing change!!
Climbing up a hill on a bicycle is a killer!!
But at the same time it outs my trust back on my knee...
I wasnt in bad shape...but i guess i can only get better...

Desperation or drive!

There are times when people do things just to claw back to the surface and save themselves from drowning! Even though this requires tremendous effort and will, this does not constitute drive. Drive, is the most supreme of human qualities, that combined with your luck, makes the difference between lance armstrong and the bum you step over on your way to work. Wait a second, come to think of it, Armstrong wasnt very lucky, unless getting cancer makes your day...

Drive is the quality that differentiates your reaction to life-breaking events. Here are few that I have observed:
Some people just look away and ignore the situation and never let it bother them as it slowly kills them within.
Some people immediately make up their mind that their lives are over, and there is nothing to live for.
Some people overcome, with great strength and effort. And these are the people who survive almost anything (other than their eventual demise)

So what is it that differentiates these people?
Are they born with it? If so, this discussion is over? Because then you can assume that everything is pre-ordained and your effort makes no difference...I disagree...there is that example about choice...
A gets run over by a car and loses his legs....A has a choice to fight for what remains...or just give up...
As the first choice plays out...there is a hope, actually a distinct possibility, that A will ressurect his spirit. He will never have his legs, but he will have something...

As the second choice plays out...there is sadness...there is fear...there is loss of faith...a constant reminder of the handicap...there's frustration...and theres lonliness...a life wasted...

in retrospect this is an easy choice...but if the context is more present...its a test of your mettle...
we all have a choice to fight for what we want, we may come close and lose it, and then we have a choice to give up for what we fight for, and choose something new. But in doing this there's a danger of diluting your focus...

where does drive come from?
it comes from a will to excel, from a passion to exceed limits, to tell yourself that you have added value, its the same thing that drives a successful businessman and a freestyle rock-climber.. it is the epitome of indulging yourself for your own sake...

why would it be absent?
trauma...painful experiences..repeated failure...mental illness...all the above could combine to a situation wherein the person lacks drive...it could be due to lack of inspiration...or lacking self-belief...lacking any acheivable short term goals...but most of all I think its the lack of will and positivity.

will and positivity ?
These will prove to be the two most important concepts of anyone's life. There are those who can do without it. However, if you aspire for the extraordinary, dont leave home without it. In fact, make a choice early in life. Do you want to sacrifice ambition and afford yourself a 'loose at the edges' will ? Or do you want to sacrifice leisure and comfort, and beat yourself into pulp driving yourself? When you are beaten to a pulp, you look at yourself in the mirror...and this is where positivity comes in... Perception is wielded by you...you are a product of your perception...and nothing more...

THe road to success:
1. Discipline your life, to give your will a chance to grow.
nothing like following a routine and resolutions to believe that your will actually has a say. And dont trivialize the "no matter what" phrase, I am sure many use it to egg themselves on, and before the blink of an eye, the pastry that was "will not eat, no matter what!" turn into "well I do plan to run this weekend!"

2. Train your perception . And here again discipline is everything. Look at everything with a positive view..Here are a few things which are affected by perception.
a. People
b. Situations
c. Prospects

Never make judgements about people, for this immediately limits your perception of them. Never be emotional about situations, as this clouds your response. Respond to solve and not to absorb the manifold implications. Prospects, always take a deep look at the brightest and a quick look at the gravest. Make a decision and never look back at the grave prospects...

drive cannot be switched off...switch it on only if you need it bad..or just simply cannot do without it...

VROOOM!!!!

Do you hear that???
That low hum , slowly spiralling into a high pitched whine,
do you feel the earth shake and send warm vibration through you...
that powerful sensation of having a 300 HP beast rearing to go ...
well thats my drive coming back online after a year long hiatus...
a man is defined by his will to achieve...and without focus and motivation, there is no such will.
I have missed sorely, my age old companion. My drive, my soulful inspiration, the desire to be something more than 'all around you'..
I lost it in great turmoil, and great turmoil has restored it ...

Love, Erudition and Money

i have for a long time believed that the things of greatest importance to me are
love, erudition and money. And till recently the order was as listed. Nothing like heartbreak to reorder your priorities, so here is an insight to how the heart of those in love works as opposed to those fallen out of love.

Initially when i planned to write this, i wanted to write a very impersonal journal of what i felt were my priorities. So i will try no to deter from my initial objective.

Love : By this I mean two kinds of love, the intimate shared with only a few. And the much wider love that comes bundled with achievement, the love of a friend, of an admirer, of a junior who thinks you are the best thing since elvis presley, or a fan at a concert who tells you that you have a n awesome voice, or the love of a fellow intellectual whose strife for a conversation partner is temporarily subdued by your presence, by a young woman who thinks you rock when you move on the dance floor, by the geek who thinks you look great on that bike, or the even the envy of those single men out there as they check out the 'very hot' women by your side. I strive for both these loves. I want to be recognized for who i am, I am desperate to prove my individuality from the throngs of billions of humans...I am different...know me for it...I want to assert...

The love of a woman...the most intimate that a man can find...eludes me...
and presently wouldnt want to express much on that...

Erudition: Knowledge is the fruit of human existense, in its study I find that I am part of something timeless and immortal. In a constant quest to define who I am, I feel it nessecary to read history and stories of human trials and endurance. What are the quintessential human qualities?? is it greed and hunger or is it love and communal harmony? is it desire which turns us poets or carnal lust which makes criminals of us?? If it is both, which one am I?

Money: Hmmmm.... its the certified universal symbol of your "survivabilty quotient' ...Money sure cant buy happiness...but it buys everything material and many things abstract from here to the ends of the universe.... for me it just symbolizes an opportunity which if i miss out now, i will regret later...I am not overpowered by any desire to own a ferrari, however prudence is best excercised now ...than be burdened with the onus of a wasted youth...

The Biggest Superstition of all times- GOD.

“He loves us all. He is kind and great. He sees us through our bad times. He is omnipotent, all powerful, all knowing, benevolent and graceful. Our lives have been pre-ordained, and there is a perfectly good reason for all the suffering, which god shall reveal to us in the afterlife. Have your faith in god, and all will be well. Take his hand! And you shall be in his kingdom for eternity!”

As I wrote that I was beginning to feel this benign feeling of calmness spread over me. I was beginning to feel that I am taken care off. By the third sentence, the sharp edge of my sarcasm began to wear off. Boy! I must say that the lure indeed must be great. No accountability, no need for soul-searching, no existential angst, no worries, just you and bottle of wine in the kingdom of heaven. I would take that any day over an all expense trip to the Hawaii. That is if I was dumb enough to think there was any truth to this preposterous idea.

“I am an aetheist," and I proudly avow my inclinations. That being said, I would like to rant on a bit about my belief (my convictions really). On the issue of god and his kingdom, there are two brands of fools on this planet ( I am not totally sure, maybe it’s three, and may recall this statement on being subjected to any form of inquisition ). There is the average ordinary fool and there is the extra-ordinary fool. Let us examine closely these two broad classification of the species homo sapien.

The ordinary fool. Well since a vast majority belong to this class. You may be it, but maybe not…The kind who is very pragmatic, as long as something works, doesn’t care for changing anything… believes what he reads…does very few things to reason his beliefs…very likely to say things like “I felt his presence”…and most importantly “very uncomfortable at his beliefs being questioned”…Religious fanatics, the priestly class, terrorists, and a lot of average ordinary folks…

The extra-ordinary fool. Well, this class would be the atheists. Going to all lengths, to remove from their minds any hope of a divine answer to this mess of creation. No jingling bells, harp slinging angels, or white fluffy stuff in the afterlife, just dreary and slow decomposition. Whats the fun in that??? No fun at all, but I do believe a lot of truth.

I remember a time, sitting on a bench in HohenSalzburg, a elderly woman and I got into a chat, she was a teaching at a missionary school and took her views on the afterlife very seriously. She carefully, yet authoritatively asked me about my views on what awaits me in the afterlife. I melodramatically replied, “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. And that’s it.” With great dismay she told me that I should reconsider my views on life and the journey afterwards. I thought I heard fear in her voice, fear for my soul.

Fear, is the mother of most superstitions. The need for our intelligent species to explain that which cannot be explained, urges us create intricate stories of all sorts. I was once told by a colleague, that the value of religion is not in the conception of gods and the mythological stories therein, but the moral values taught in these stories. So, according to him, someone thought of a clever way to teach moral values…but posterity took the stories literally and made one big mess. I agree with him, however not on the assumption that all scriptures were written to teach values, I do think some of them were actually meant to be explanations for the universe. Immensely creative as some of these works are, they are just fiction and equivalent to early man’s bestsellers.

Through centuries, there’s been a need to define god. On an individual level, this was required to quench the eternal questions with simplistic axioms. On the societal level, this had strong political repercussions. People who believe in the same fate can unite more easily. Thus there is no doubt that many military generals have exploited this. The raging lines of war even in today’s world are often on the same line that divides differing religious ideology. I will not explore the political consequences of people’s perception of god. I will only explore the individual’s search.

People shy at the thought of not knowing their fate, so here is a brilliant mechanism wherein they are provided an illusion of knowing. And what they know is guarded by a thousand years of dogma and the veil of the unimpeachable. What is never questioned can thus never change, and it is this immutability which transcends GOD to the upper strata of human conscience. People draw comfort in knowing with certainty that this world is but just a small part of the greater journey, helps alleviate the sorrows of poverty, grief, hunger and loss. I can only envy the piety of a poor man, for it is his soul’s food. But the piety of an educated bloke is contemptible. I guess the habit of deluding ourselves with false hope is an incorrigibly human habit. ‘God’ is this false hope. There is however one phenomenon, relating to this superstition, that I find immensely disturbing; the habit of abnegating responsibility of things done in the name of ‘GOD’. Many people absolve their sins and assume forgiveness. That’s nothing but forgiving yourself, but since we would be exposed to ourselves as being unrepentant and selfish, the forgiveness acquires divine scale and becomes instantly more appropriate. Who would not love a person, who will forgive you for all your sins? Who will not embrace such a god? Who will not bleed for one so merciful? What could be more attractive than believing that all your suffering is by the will of this magnificently benevolent person? Its all too easy. Just a product of the human endeavor to be escapist, and find the easy way out, just a way to be lazy and not tax your mind with the unanswerable. However, to me it seems a lot that is branded as unreachable is reached, a lot which has no explanation is explained. And yet people stick to their dogma. And finally, the idea of god creating man in his own form is nothing but human obsession with creating the creator in ‘human’ form. People should get over themselves…this species is transient…just a stepping stone to the next rung on the evolutionary ladder.

The cheapest bottle of beer!

It was race day! Monaco circuit! Enigma in bangalore ...and i had just put away my 5th fosters ...and all i paid for all five was 40 ruppees...and no it was not stuff they pulled out of an expired lot... just that 'Strange Brew', bangalore's recently launched music magazine, had come up with a new promotional stint for metal heads and beer drinker..buy their magazine for Rs. 20 and get two fosters at chosen few pubs in the city on race day... I bought a couple...

One great moment in the nacant life of Psychrome ...
when there was a power outage...they were actually shouting our 'WAR CRY!!'
I almost cried....

At the venue, more magazines were bought, a page was reomoved and the magazine discarded promptly....we even got a couple free... our fisrt perks of being in a metal band..tee hee...
all in all great fun.... MUST READ THE MAGAZINE THOUGH....