It was a lazy Saturday evening with friends and some freshly brewed coffee. It was after a long time that all of us decided to do nothing and to just catch up on life. As the evening progressed and our conversations moved from the regular humour and banter to sharing dreams and ambitions I realized how the quest to rise and rise fast is the only thing on the minds of the youth today.
I will admit that I am a part of this clan. Our need to accomplish and accomplish at a younger age is taking over a lot of 'me' time or 'family' time. As we discussed our goals and lives 5 years down the line, there were comments like "boss jaldi paisa kamana hai, par kaise?"(I want to make some quick money but how?) "I don't mind doing anything dude but its gotta be quick". Our parents had the time we don't ya, where's the time? Our parents went for their first foreign holiday at 50; we want to do it at 20 and our kids at 2. That's the pace and we all need to keep up.
As the discussion moved on we came to discussing babies and how it’s so expensive to raise them and so time consuming and restricting to careers, personal accomplishment, relationships, travel that it’s best to restrict it to one. My mind drifted away to the conversation I had a few weeks ago with my mom and remembered her words, “you’ll think so much about yourselves vs. us who thought about our kids all the time.” She is often amazed at how every activity in our lives is so planned and calculated including having kids. She often tells me “don’t think so much, har baccha ya insaan apna naseeb leke aata hai.”(Each child/person will come with his fate, so don’t think so much). Sub consciously I thought my god it would be such a riot if my mom was part of this discussion.
We then moved onto social skills and how it’s so important to network to climb that ladder fast. All the boys defended themselves saying that's why they keep doing their boys night out. (We believe them). I agree that today your social skills and ability to network that can get you going and going great places. The result is obviously evident with the amount of time we spend on these social networking sites.
It was almost dawn as we discussed our lives, we all agreed with some and disagreed with some. I listened to all my friends intently, soul searching and trying to identify traits that drive all of us today keeping us so young and restless
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Showing posts with label society. Show all posts
Showing posts with label society. Show all posts
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Sea of Change
What a wonderful thing change can be and how much we resist it. Last week I met an old friend who had a few months ago given up his cushy job as an investment banker only to pursue his first love, teaching. He had to give up his well appointed Malabar Hill apartment, his club memberships, even his holidays abroad, but the peace and contentment on his face was worth seeing. He walked, lived likely finally he found his ground, his calling, his life. Of course there had been trepidation, would his daughter adjust to the change in lifestyle, school, miss the luxuries of life.
Did he deprive her of it, was he being selfish. Is giving up luxury for love foolish? Once the moment passes by those luxuries seem petty, those friends who didn’t hold on with your status change seem worthless.
If they didn’t support your calling they weren’t your friends. If you cease to be reason enough to your friends, you were definitely treading the wrong path. Change. How much we fear it. And how important it is for us to experience it. And any change, not only when good things happen to us, but also when the bad things occur.
Life is, as any enlightened sage will tell you, is a constant interplay of interconnected opposites, good and bad, happy and sad, kind and cruel. In what doses no one can say, but what s absolutely certain is that nothing lasts forever, and change is inevitable. We are all so adaptable that we will survive and learn the tricks of the new trade. After a while we will also enjoy the new trade. You will survive and then live. Its only a matter of time.
My friend who chucked his job as a banker now has time to read to his daughter, accompany his wife to the plays she longed to see hand in hand and read the book he always wanted. Its not all hunky dory, there are the inevitable lows as well. But he says for 24 years I hung on to my job as a banker and worked myself to sickness and death so frightened of losing it; or not reaching the top, or not performing to my bosses expectations. And then finally when I let go, the relief was so much. I confronted my worst fear and insecurity and found that I had still survived.
Change. See what you hold dear in your life, what you cling to, and hanker for. And be courageous and let go. Go with the flow, don’t surrender to life, be that unpredictable crazy river that decided her own course and is never scared to chase her dreams, her heart. Jump with out looking. And you will see that the safety net will always be there. It might not be the net you wanted. But something for someone will be there to break your fall, and hold you.
Change something. Anything. Remove just one thing, from your life, and see what life puts back in as a surprise.
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Did he deprive her of it, was he being selfish. Is giving up luxury for love foolish? Once the moment passes by those luxuries seem petty, those friends who didn’t hold on with your status change seem worthless.
If they didn’t support your calling they weren’t your friends. If you cease to be reason enough to your friends, you were definitely treading the wrong path. Change. How much we fear it. And how important it is for us to experience it. And any change, not only when good things happen to us, but also when the bad things occur.
Life is, as any enlightened sage will tell you, is a constant interplay of interconnected opposites, good and bad, happy and sad, kind and cruel. In what doses no one can say, but what s absolutely certain is that nothing lasts forever, and change is inevitable. We are all so adaptable that we will survive and learn the tricks of the new trade. After a while we will also enjoy the new trade. You will survive and then live. Its only a matter of time.
My friend who chucked his job as a banker now has time to read to his daughter, accompany his wife to the plays she longed to see hand in hand and read the book he always wanted. Its not all hunky dory, there are the inevitable lows as well. But he says for 24 years I hung on to my job as a banker and worked myself to sickness and death so frightened of losing it; or not reaching the top, or not performing to my bosses expectations. And then finally when I let go, the relief was so much. I confronted my worst fear and insecurity and found that I had still survived.
Change. See what you hold dear in your life, what you cling to, and hanker for. And be courageous and let go. Go with the flow, don’t surrender to life, be that unpredictable crazy river that decided her own course and is never scared to chase her dreams, her heart. Jump with out looking. And you will see that the safety net will always be there. It might not be the net you wanted. But something for someone will be there to break your fall, and hold you.
Change something. Anything. Remove just one thing, from your life, and see what life puts back in as a surprise.
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Cardiac Confusion
Half of life's misery comes because of others in your life. Usually (and this is the supreme contradiction) it comes from those you love most. Your own nest becomes a noose; cactus grows in the mulberry bush. And you go blaming yourself. The others who hurt, trouble, torment ought to be the ones going through cause it's because of them that you are going through it, but what do you know – heart hammerer is out on a lucky limb and you are paying with the price of uncried tears.
Not just tears but restless days, sleepless nights and a carnival of cardiac confusion.
Get this straight: you will always be unhappy if you allow your happiness to be determined by other people. You will do your best, you will spray rose petals before they walk, but they won’t think a minute before walking over you or out on you. You give someone the key tp to your piece of mind and they will take your mind. Always the others. Nothing personal. It’s never personal. People hurt you because they are deficient in some way. People don’t respect you because they don’t know what respect means or is. People treat you badly because they don’t know otherwise. People cheat on you and get into adulterous affairs or cheap one night stands because they don’t know your worth – and in all probability their own.
The bad choices people make in their life, reflect on yours, in some divine way those who are out of your life are meant to be out. Don’t march to their doomed drums. It’s their upbringing. Their breeding. Their lifescape. You’re good you’re better than good, why are you raking their sanity? The problem is out there , not in you. If people don’t know who you are, then never mind how much they mean to you, ask them to go walk. Nobody, and I repeat nobody is worth the price of your self respect. In my life, self respect ranks higher than even love. You are a child of god. If god doesn’t treat you this way, who is anybody else to?
People see the world not as is, but as they are. People have their own luggage, their own scars, their own weaknesses, their own misery. Behind their own bravado their own life is falling apart so they try to make yours too. Don’t be fooled or awed by people who have power over you. They only have it because you have given it to them. Usually the biggest bullies are the biggest cowards. The ones who make the most noise are silenced souls. All the banter, swagger, tough-talk chaos a remarkably low opinion of self and life bereft of any joy.
Only unhappy people make others unhappy. Wife-beaters, cheating siblings, ungrateful lovers, rude bosses, callous youngsters, indifferent friends are all a reflection of their own inadequacies. A happy, balanced person will treat you well because that’s how a happy, balanced person is treated.
Today know most of your problems are not your problems but others people’s problems. You’re fine, you’re better than fine and you’ll get along fine. The best part of your life is you, the best friend is god and you’ve been burying yourself and god. God will never hurt you, it’s the wrong people you choose who do.
Life is beautiful, you are beautiful, it’s the outside world that is ugly. Just allow god in, then close the door, change the locks and bring the champagne out. I never feel sorry for who or what I’ve lost, I just feel sorry for the things and people who’ve lost me. Because I know the circle of life completes itself for the faithful. You’ll win in the end, but to win in the end, play your life with some more dignity, play it with grace, play it with gratitude and play it with the awesome love of god that is just waiting to be part of your life.
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Not just tears but restless days, sleepless nights and a carnival of cardiac confusion.
Get this straight: you will always be unhappy if you allow your happiness to be determined by other people. You will do your best, you will spray rose petals before they walk, but they won’t think a minute before walking over you or out on you. You give someone the key tp to your piece of mind and they will take your mind. Always the others. Nothing personal. It’s never personal. People hurt you because they are deficient in some way. People don’t respect you because they don’t know what respect means or is. People treat you badly because they don’t know otherwise. People cheat on you and get into adulterous affairs or cheap one night stands because they don’t know your worth – and in all probability their own.
The bad choices people make in their life, reflect on yours, in some divine way those who are out of your life are meant to be out. Don’t march to their doomed drums. It’s their upbringing. Their breeding. Their lifescape. You’re good you’re better than good, why are you raking their sanity? The problem is out there , not in you. If people don’t know who you are, then never mind how much they mean to you, ask them to go walk. Nobody, and I repeat nobody is worth the price of your self respect. In my life, self respect ranks higher than even love. You are a child of god. If god doesn’t treat you this way, who is anybody else to?
People see the world not as is, but as they are. People have their own luggage, their own scars, their own weaknesses, their own misery. Behind their own bravado their own life is falling apart so they try to make yours too. Don’t be fooled or awed by people who have power over you. They only have it because you have given it to them. Usually the biggest bullies are the biggest cowards. The ones who make the most noise are silenced souls. All the banter, swagger, tough-talk chaos a remarkably low opinion of self and life bereft of any joy.
Only unhappy people make others unhappy. Wife-beaters, cheating siblings, ungrateful lovers, rude bosses, callous youngsters, indifferent friends are all a reflection of their own inadequacies. A happy, balanced person will treat you well because that’s how a happy, balanced person is treated.
Today know most of your problems are not your problems but others people’s problems. You’re fine, you’re better than fine and you’ll get along fine. The best part of your life is you, the best friend is god and you’ve been burying yourself and god. God will never hurt you, it’s the wrong people you choose who do.
Life is beautiful, you are beautiful, it’s the outside world that is ugly. Just allow god in, then close the door, change the locks and bring the champagne out. I never feel sorry for who or what I’ve lost, I just feel sorry for the things and people who’ve lost me. Because I know the circle of life completes itself for the faithful. You’ll win in the end, but to win in the end, play your life with some more dignity, play it with grace, play it with gratitude and play it with the awesome love of god that is just waiting to be part of your life.
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Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Fool's Paradise
Hmmm! an expression used more often than not by fool's who live in this eternal hope that life will come to them. They wait for things to happen and wait till eternity for things to happen, things to be in equilibrium not knowing that life never reaches an equilibrium!!!
To have a balance in life or to achieve all that you want in life is only wishful thinking. It's a notional phase which is never true. We keep thinking let me achieve this and I will do this let me achieve this and I will start this... let this project get over let me get this promotion... let me enjoy this one last year... Alas! life doesn't stop and problems never cease to exist.
Only if man was such a content animal, there would be no problem. Only if we never stopped wishing would life be much better. Every time we climb a step up in the ladder of life we feel higher than some & lower than some. The lower than some always pinches us more and our lust for more out of life only increases.
A lot of people have this question in their minds at different stages in their life that recurr time & again...when is the right time to fall in love, the right time to start a job, right time to finish my education, right time for me to say yes to my girlfriend, right time for marriage, right time for children, right time to quit smoking, right time to strike a work life balance, right time to focus on health and start hitting the gym from tom, right time to look beyond me, right time to give sometime to your relationships...your priorities... there is this no right time... no right person. I know some people in this quest of the right time & right person have spent so many years alone, in misery waiting for things to happen, cupid to knock on their doors, careers wasted, skills unused... regrets left by... people left behind...stories untold, emotions unexpressed...only becuase it wasn't the right time. There will never be a perfect time a perfect person.
What makes you feel right today who makes you feel perfect today is the right time and right person in your life. Time & people keep changing so its obvious that, that perfect moment will also change. so what seems right now seems like a mistake tom, who seems like your soulmate today may seem your worst enemy tom.
Men fear marriage... committment babies... but its really that moment that you thought would never happen to you and you are not ready for it... my friend you will never be ready for it. It's not only men... we as people are never ready for changes... it's just women have higher anticipation skills and the excitement to do something new makes them accept it & make decisions much faster... Trust me it's a change for them as well.
We plan so much in our lives... dates, marriage, proposals, interviews, schedules, careers, babies, love, old age, death...
Only if life went according to plans there would be no fools in the paradise.
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To have a balance in life or to achieve all that you want in life is only wishful thinking. It's a notional phase which is never true. We keep thinking let me achieve this and I will do this let me achieve this and I will start this... let this project get over let me get this promotion... let me enjoy this one last year... Alas! life doesn't stop and problems never cease to exist.
Only if man was such a content animal, there would be no problem. Only if we never stopped wishing would life be much better. Every time we climb a step up in the ladder of life we feel higher than some & lower than some. The lower than some always pinches us more and our lust for more out of life only increases.
A lot of people have this question in their minds at different stages in their life that recurr time & again...when is the right time to fall in love, the right time to start a job, right time to finish my education, right time for me to say yes to my girlfriend, right time for marriage, right time for children, right time to quit smoking, right time to strike a work life balance, right time to focus on health and start hitting the gym from tom, right time to look beyond me, right time to give sometime to your relationships...your priorities... there is this no right time... no right person. I know some people in this quest of the right time & right person have spent so many years alone, in misery waiting for things to happen, cupid to knock on their doors, careers wasted, skills unused... regrets left by... people left behind...stories untold, emotions unexpressed...only becuase it wasn't the right time. There will never be a perfect time a perfect person.
What makes you feel right today who makes you feel perfect today is the right time and right person in your life. Time & people keep changing so its obvious that, that perfect moment will also change. so what seems right now seems like a mistake tom, who seems like your soulmate today may seem your worst enemy tom.
Men fear marriage... committment babies... but its really that moment that you thought would never happen to you and you are not ready for it... my friend you will never be ready for it. It's not only men... we as people are never ready for changes... it's just women have higher anticipation skills and the excitement to do something new makes them accept it & make decisions much faster... Trust me it's a change for them as well.
We plan so much in our lives... dates, marriage, proposals, interviews, schedules, careers, babies, love, old age, death...
Only if life went according to plans there would be no fools in the paradise.
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Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Tech Infidelity
Before you get judgemental and think I'm suffereing from it, take a step back and think aren't you? Technology has just made life so easy and everything and everybody so accessible for us. Until yesterday we yearned to be connected today we switch off our cell phones to be disconnected. Ya and these days its not one but 2 cell phones that you are dealing with. I know people who dread that one phone and are already struggling with the second one. Do we want to be connected all the time? Are we insecure if we are not connected? Probably yes, if I am not around someone else will do it... ya proabably someone else will... but thats the choice one makes that how much do you want to let go off? This connectivity syndrome is what is leading to more and more couples stretching themselves over time zones trying to accomodate all that they can, to ensure they are " Connected". Over a cup of chai and the daily tabloid i read these interesting celeb Q&A's where they ask you, things you won't leave your house without and most of them say my cell phone. Some say my Ipod, there has to be technology... Some questions go if you were marooned on an island who would you be with? And the answer goes my Ipod. The role that these techie things play in peoples lives is amazing.
People earlier struggled with people then came work and now its technology. Its amazing how we dont realize how gradually from a balanced life we gradually changed our preferences. Earlier one of the spouse was working and the other created the balance. Gradually our greed and the need ensured that both the partners work. So we sliced those 12 hours of togetherness further to 8 hours of togetherness. Then came technology where those 8 hours of togetherness are also sliced and has come down to probably 6. Earlier we dreaded that if we as a couple do not spend enough time together he/she might look outside the relationship and be involved with someone else, then came the extended working hours where people distinctly spent less time together and hence proximities at work started to rise. But now that's passe, today probably there is no time for the first two but i make time for the third.
Often wonder what is that lends people to tech infidelity, probably the need to be updated, cause today every interaction is an opportunity to cast an impression, the more abreast & updated you are the cooler you are perceived to be... Or is it the need to 'fit in' or technology gives me the space I need... ya the battle for space... or is just so informative & accessible that I want it... Ya may be it is. Today everything is a click away so all my acts are probably governed by what Googles top 10 search results are...Why do we wake up and want to see the news like the world collapsed while we were asleep, or we need our IPODS' on, while we are at our morning walk. Probably Google sends me more sms's than my husband does.
And ofcourse i cant forget the Blackberry...its like the world at your fingertips... a spy gaurd your bosses installed in you in the name of seniority and a must for managers. I check my blackberry when i wake up, while I'm brushing, while I'm in the loo... just when i finished my bath(how some people would wish it was water proof) while i'm driving... over lunch... during meetings... while fetching my children from school... while playing with them in the garden... over a family dinner... in the midlle of a dance... the list doesnt end.
Our lives are governed by ringtones and sms tones... ha ha ha ha... never thoght it would get here... So my friends its not another person who is eating into your spouses time... its that ringtone thats the intruder.
Technology is great... I love it but if you really love it learn from it...
Learn to switch on and off...
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People earlier struggled with people then came work and now its technology. Its amazing how we dont realize how gradually from a balanced life we gradually changed our preferences. Earlier one of the spouse was working and the other created the balance. Gradually our greed and the need ensured that both the partners work. So we sliced those 12 hours of togetherness further to 8 hours of togetherness. Then came technology where those 8 hours of togetherness are also sliced and has come down to probably 6. Earlier we dreaded that if we as a couple do not spend enough time together he/she might look outside the relationship and be involved with someone else, then came the extended working hours where people distinctly spent less time together and hence proximities at work started to rise. But now that's passe, today probably there is no time for the first two but i make time for the third.
Often wonder what is that lends people to tech infidelity, probably the need to be updated, cause today every interaction is an opportunity to cast an impression, the more abreast & updated you are the cooler you are perceived to be... Or is it the need to 'fit in' or technology gives me the space I need... ya the battle for space... or is just so informative & accessible that I want it... Ya may be it is. Today everything is a click away so all my acts are probably governed by what Googles top 10 search results are...Why do we wake up and want to see the news like the world collapsed while we were asleep, or we need our IPODS' on, while we are at our morning walk. Probably Google sends me more sms's than my husband does.
And ofcourse i cant forget the Blackberry...its like the world at your fingertips... a spy gaurd your bosses installed in you in the name of seniority and a must for managers. I check my blackberry when i wake up, while I'm brushing, while I'm in the loo... just when i finished my bath(how some people would wish it was water proof) while i'm driving... over lunch... during meetings... while fetching my children from school... while playing with them in the garden... over a family dinner... in the midlle of a dance... the list doesnt end.
Our lives are governed by ringtones and sms tones... ha ha ha ha... never thoght it would get here... So my friends its not another person who is eating into your spouses time... its that ringtone thats the intruder.
Technology is great... I love it but if you really love it learn from it...
Learn to switch on and off...
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