God! I got a problem wid ya

Belief, is a funny thing. Some people fold to it, some squeeze, some rage blood wars and some learn to appreciate it.

Me, well, I am still questioning it!

One of the most perpetuated of them all is the belief in the almighty. The GEE OOO DEEE. The Wonder man! He is supposed to posses superhuman qualities and perceives the world as if it were an ant on top of a tennis ball.

He is considered to be the alpha and the omega.

Why not the delta?
The Pai? Anyone?

Gimme a bunch of these symbols and I shit you not, I’d make a formula and snap the heck outta schizophrenic mathematicians.

Fellas! Brace yourselves coz, I do believe in God! I doubt the sexuality though. Why refer to God as a ‘he’ if Physics tells us ther’z an equal probability of him being a ‘she’

Hey! All you atheists reading this scribbling. Don’t walk away. I promise my belief in God is not going to convince you to start believing. It might as well force the believers to quit! J

My perception of GOD is of a sadist. Who likes to watch us suffer, while he rejoices us conjuring up the useless set of instincts he gives us to battle life’s troubles.
My perception of God is also of a lover who fixes the desires in opposition.
He sets the rules in contrast.
A quote from an Alpacino movie often pops into my head
“Look, but don’t touch”
“Touch, but don’t taste”
“Taste, but don’t swallow”

He gives us a fruit. Eloquently describes how quick it’ll melt in our mouths. Instigates a burning urge to eat. Salivates our mouths dry. And the moment we reach out to pluck it, he declares it forbidden.

God! Why Oh why?

First you give us the glance
Then you set our eyes ablaze when we stare.
You give us hunger.
Then you poison us when we eat.
You strike us with thirst.
Then you create the paradoxical mirage
You give us erection.
Then you make someone walk in on us while we secretly try to make deposits.

I have had enough of this polarity God!
Life is not a battery with terminals charged in opposition. I don’t think the hypocritical balance that you claim to render through your “yin and yang” does any good to us poor creatures. Crushing down a desire feels more painful than getting beaten down to the pulp by henchmen looking for a few bucks and a quick sodomy.

I want it and I want it all.
No conditions apply!
The day my wishes come true is the day I quit believing you exist!

Time changes!

April 23
2011

I am exhausted, somewhat exasperated from working round the clock. I have recently step foot inside a new business, a new dimension of my life, a new approach to sanity. Or not! Who am I to judge?

Anyway, it's 2:30 in the noon. I am at my store and there is no one to serve. I steal a glance at the disgruntled faces of my employees enduring their crumbling feet, fighting an urge to lay down naked and sleep forever. Their body language defies the fact that their assiduous nature is of any healthy value to me. Yet, I must press on, for there is no other alternative. I have squandered over my resources long enough to see them dwindling.

It’s been 4 hours since I last saw my salesman frown at me. I must leave for a short while or else he'd barge on me any minute now. I take a break and storm out of my store. Sensing a respite, I arrive at a sequestered spot, a gumti, if you will, for my, well, physical needs.
As I light up a cancer stick, I feel alone. The tobacco gushes slowly into my blood and drowns my stress like the sun gradually feeding upon the darkness. I begin to sense a bonhomie slowly flaring within my lungs.

Midway through my cigarette, I realise a familiar face standing next to me still oblivious to my existence. I look into my past for a flick and it strikes me. It’s the guy I once pounded upon when we were kids. He had stolen my eraser and I was pretty sure he was the one. Recalcitrant though he was, he never accepted it and ended up with a big fat lower lip. I was stronger then. Pulpy yet massive enough to beat the shit out of irascible punks like him.

Now was a scenario I had never thought I'd have to dread. He was twice the size I once used to be. I was pretty sure he must not have forgotten me. And also sure he'd take less than a minute to beat the heck out of me. Yet an overwhelming stupidity compelled me to do something that made me confront one of the most significant needs of living inside a human skin.

I snuck up to him and mouthed, literally mouthed the words, “Hey!”
He turned, stared at me for about 3 seconds and his nostrils almost flared. I felt a belch rumbling up my stomach as I saw him raising his arm towards me. Anything he did next was totally acceptable given I deserved my share of fair deal. Killing all my intuitive instincts, he took me by surprise, threw me the most honest smile and embraced me like he had never embraced anyone before. He immediately greeted me with words you don’t generally speak out to someone you have been grudging against for a long while. Before I could dive inside his mind, he started mentioning anecdotes from our past that were surprisingly funny for two enemy cowboys from hell.

20 minutes of talking and I realized he had changed. So much so that I wanted to thank him for not crushing me to the ground He was no longer the annoying bully he once was. He had put on a little weight that could have instigated me to create some irony but I was ok with the situation. Besides, his body fat now was much decentralized in density than my memory of his terrifying fat lip. We talked for three hours that day. Forgetful of the fact that this friendly chit chat would be at the cost of my business, I kept talking.

As I talked, countless opposing thoughts forced their way through my mind. Why couldn’t I hate him? Why was I experiencing a sense of affinity for the same man I once wanted to gun down and bury several feet into the ground?

I realized the erratic nature of time that day. I sensed how the hardest times have a transient nature. How even the strangest situations solve themselves out over time. How people change, some deliberately, some unknowingly. No matter how stable, unending, stagnant and unyielding it seems, time changes. That’s a fact. It might change for the better for some. It might become a nightmare for some. These contrasting cases are absolutely natural. But the fact that they are going to happen simultaneously is equally natural too. And this phenomenon is exactly what humans need to exist.

We need change, whether it is for the good or bad, we desperately need it. It is this change that provides us with a bit of enthusiasm to handle the unchangeable within us and around us.

Time I guess is not just a counting system with numbers changing periodically like clockwork. It’s a system of evolution arranged in a simple network of digits with meaning attached to them.

What's your mantra?

Why do people do what they do? Alright! Alright! I have heard enough against this word "people" in blogs. Too sermonizing. Isn't it? So i would say why do I do what I do? What makes me scribble now? What motivates me to do what I do? Why do I pen down figments of my imagination every now and then? Why do I get up early when I am pretty privileged not to? What instigates me to try and shape up my career? To study hard on my heels? To resist the urge to fight back when I can slap the taste out of someone's mouth? To do something that would get me and hopefully my parents, the often dreaded, almost incensed upon, envied and sometimes even spoken sardonically against, "Respect, honour, dignity and pride"?

Yeah Yeah Yeah! I understand I shouldn't be negative. I never am negative. I just choose not to be inclined towards the sanguine positive side of what we choose. Means the same? Of course it does. It's a polite way of saying 'Come what may, I'll open up my taps when it floods". But, what the heck! That's the way it is.

No it's not an implacable urge to pen down my thoughts this time that makes me write up this blog. It's not something I just learnt and wanted to share with you. It's definitely not a salutary attempt at my own philosophical dimensions. Please! Not philosophical!

This is what it's all about. We all secretly house an adrenalin nitrate pumping through our veins. Not the one the chemical formula for which we crammed up and made through our semesters. NO sir! It'z the intangible one that defines the motive. The motive to work. The motive to love. The motive to share, care, decide, rebel, fightback and the motive to exist. What I intend to convey is that each one of us carries a mantra that becomes the motive to breathe the oxygen around us peacefully. Anything that forces you to do what is right for you is your mantra.

What can it be like?

Different individuals can have different mantras. It may be the togetherness of a loved one for some. Some on the other hand can have the patronage of their parents, siblings, guardians. Some can have their sagacious mentors that define their motives. Highly qualified seals, imperial degrees, top brass references can drive some for instance. God! Ah yes! God! How can I forget, is the biggest and the most everlasting mantra ever adopted by mankind. Being an atheist, I barely have to say anything on this matter but I believe it's good as long as the faith in God and the motivation it offers keeps the believer's sanity levels in check! :) Just kidding!

Does it help?
Oh hell yeah! It does. Mind, I believe, is just a jigsaw puzzle we need to program and reprogram, not the way our guardians taught us but the way we need it to work effectively for us. Once we are through sorting out our mantra, an invisible impelling force backs every move, every act, every work that we undertake.

Take me for instance. I am irrevocably addicted to psychedelic trance and psychedelic metal. I wake up with it, I work with it and retire with it. Not a single hour goes by that I let go of my ipod. Over the years, this has led me to develop signs of musical ear syndrome, uncontrollable craving in my ears, an obsessive compulsive ipod disorder and yet I never stop listening, Why? Just coz I am addicted to it? Not really. Well, it's my mantra. It gives me courage to work. It shapes up my fortitude to endure. It inspires me to create melodies on my guitar. It reminds me to love and to be loved. It urges me to care. Helps me fight the moments of weakness. Not only does my mantra cuddle me up against scurrilous, scurvy and seamy people but it also strengthens me to smash the dirt away.

I live with my mantra! I love it within me! It's not always an outside inspiration that gets the job done. Sometimes you need to shave a little off the puzzle piece to understand that salvation lies within!!!!

Cheers!

One day!

No matter how bad you prey
you will, one day, be preyed upon.

No matter how creatively you visualise
you will, one day, be condoned.

No matter how deeply you believe
you will, one day, be shattered

No matter how immaculately you proceed
you will, one day, be blemished

No matter how relentlessly you create
you will, one day, be vandalised

No matter how much you bathe
you will, one day, be tainted

No matter how persistently you try
you will, one day, give up

No matter how intensely you whip
you will, one day, be whipped

No matter how long you live
you will, one day, expire

I guess it's the time's take on us that drives the polarity of our fortunes. Had it not been for the cycle of life, a world with never ceasing paradoxes would seem like a cage with one way in and no way out.

So relax if you're exhausted along the journey, coz, one day, no matter how hard you try and stop it, it's all gonna come to an end.

And when it ends, just let it!

The Marijuana Effect!

Some how, call it a universal anathema or a congenial curse, you happen to have the most squeamish, scathing, execrable and fractious person as a friend. Annoys you so much that literally excoriates the very fabric of your skin. Disturbs you in the middle of your work. Is too exacting for you to correspond. Forces you to rejudge your decision to befriend him/her in the first place. You are thinking of breaking up but for some silly reason, you need to stay put. Leaves no stones unturned in giving you hell. What do you do? How do you cope?

You know what they say, "Everything has a silver lining"

Well, I wouldn't do that. But ya, there actually is a little something you could do. A couple grey green tiny dried up globules is what you might be unknowingly looking for. Yes, if you guessed it, I am scribbling this blog on 'Marijuana'.

Flagrant though it is, 'marijuana' or 'cannabis' consumption is thriving by the second in today's world.
As of 2010, more than 70% Americans reported to have used Marijuana for trial, a staggering 60% of which were youngsters. It is usually taken in as a joint, with tobacco rolled up within the infamous 'white paper stick'. The immediate effect is an increase in heart rate, red eye, physical imbalance and dry mouth. But who cares about these symptoms if the much desired symptoms include a multicolored extravaganza, incessant giggling, an overpowering sense of well being and a slight paranoia. When you mix the crushed tiny green blocks with tobacco, roll them up a cigarette and take a couple of puffs, the blood seems heavier than you ever knew it would. As if you just conquered the world and an improbable yet magnanimous acclaim awaits you.

Now, coming back to the point. Your friend. Aaah! Damn it! The friend! The exasperating friend shows up at your doorstep with the same attitude you really despise. Just when you're about to think of killing yourself, think again. You might have something in store for him this time.
"So, what's the action", he asks you with the same condescension.
(I wanna kill you, that's what the action is), Now I know that's how you'd love to reply.

Don't!

Instead, ask him if he has some time which sure as he is born, he will.
Take him out to a spot quite desolate. By desolate, I mean really really alone. A spot not even the air could locate. Offer him a cigarette. He would promptly take it. Light it up for him. I know you hate it but you wanna work up the plan right? So be a good boy and show some courtesy.
He would take a puff and would ask you, "Dude, where the hell is your cigarette?", he says when he is about to offer you his cigarette.

Now if you're an occasional smoker, I know the smell would instigate your gut to crave but you need to hold your ground. You don't wanna inhale that cigarette that is also secretly contaminated with nasty chunks of marijuana to which your friend is sadly oblivious.
So before he offers you his joint, take out your pure cigarette and start smoking slowly. Really slooooowly! Now you don't want him offering you his joint. Do you?

In a few minutes, he would start to feel dizzy. Being absolutely oblivious to marijuana effects, he would start to panic. Just revel in his predicament. Tell him bad things. Tell him, he's gonna faint. Tell him he's behaving too awkwardly. Even if he is not, he would start to believe you under the effect of marijuana. Ask him to sit down and close his eyes. Comfort him. He might fall asleep.

Now that you have taken your pleasure, you can choose whether to abandon him there or take him back. If I were you, I know I would leave him there.

This is just a small way to fabricate your revenge. I know it's way out of bounds and might land you in trouble. But, if handled properly, it's fun if operated on a one time experimental basis. It won't kill you and the fun is totally surreal. Still, if you're too skeptic, try it at your own risk. And please! Don't ever get addicted to it!

Tragedy Thrills Us!!!!!!

Coz out there, someone really dies. Someone really cries!

How often do we find ourselves immobilized by a footage showing how brutally a man was run away by a truck. Or when they show a cover story of a mother who, out of poverty and misery, drowns her own baby. Or about the horrifying plight of Afgan Women who burn themselves to the point when the pink flesh reveals itself. What about when the evening news describes every savage part of a story that ended in death? Quoting the lines from one of my favorite songs, "It ain't fun till someone dies!"

Right from the first beam in the morning till the late night scuffle with the spouse, we struggle to thrive under cobwebs spun within the societal parameters. We face thick skinned colleagues at work. Threadbare jokes on the cellphones. The under qualified subordinates. Indolent children at home.That nagging wife who can't get enough out of it. That prehensile landlord who eats up more of our calories than a 4 hour workout at gym. Bills, over-dues, liabilities render us dangling at the the cusp of being broke. What fun do we have then? What thrill do we we have then?

That's right! Under so much pressure, tragedy seems to be the only element at rescue. Of course not the tragedy we face. What's thrilling to us is the tragedy others face. We, like junkies, sit back poked to our televisions and enjoy those tragedies vicariously. A wife kills her own husband. A husband rapes and stabs own wife, may be even daughter, depending upon the atrocious mind he has. A son shoots his own honest father. A farmer is found dead in a grave he himself dug.

Moving up a level, a 7.6 Richter scale shakes the very fabric of humanity rendering lakhs dead and millions homeless. The havoc of the rain Gods that flood us to the nostrils. When happening market places, with mothers bargaining with fruit sellers and children playing gleefully, are rocked by earsplitting explosions leaving several dead and thousands doomed for life.

What do we, the mango people, do when all this shit happens? Yes and I am sorry to say, we sit back locked to our idiot boxes and savor those crunchy chips with our evening tea. Sure, we feel sad watching all this displayed on the news under the captions, 'Breaking News'. Still, and painfully putting it, it helps chill out a bit after all our marathons for life. Thanks to the ever advancing internet and media, that's the only way we relax now. We need to watch things destroy themselves from a distance.

We express condolences at deaths. We send flowers to the plagued. We treat the disabled with care. That's good. But our basic instinct has been transformed from creating something into deriving pleasure from witnessing anarchy, commotion, disorder. Chaos, unless it's in our lives, is always a bite to catch. Sadly, that pizza become even more crispy and anodyne with a tragic incident shown on some news channel or during a gossip with friend. Why has our fabric transformed into a vicarious entity that enjoys badness from a distance?

Of course there is nothing we can do about it. We can at least not let death and destruction become our evening snack partner. Bad things do happen. We lament only when we get chosen. Till that time comes, someone else's tragedy thrills us. Lets try not to let that happen. May be it's the only thing we can do. But it's one good thing we can do.

Coz out there, someone really dies. Someone really cries!

If they say you're crazy, you better set the trend

Its been the case right from the inception of life on planet earth. You always need someone to set the trend. Be it fashion, gaming, software, automobiles, infrastructure or communication; industrious individuals have always found the gumption to lay the footstall for a ground breaking thought to materialize. Whatever be the field, you name it and you have it. Media for sure, has a substantial role to play. Once the media sets alight the energy of stardom, we find ourselves craving for everything that makes us resemble our icons even to the slightest bite. A gamut of emotions rakes through when we see our suave chocolaty stars in the outfit we long for. Who doesn't want to seem as voluptuous as their role models? They set the trend and we become marionettes that are secretly planned to carry away the legacy.

Some one comes up with an uber-cool idea which doesn't quite get attention. Guess what? Times change and the idea seems to emerge logical and approachable. It manifests breaking all boundaries setting an unfathomable paradigm. You see, human minds are gullible. No matter how subtle one claims to be, a new idea tears apart the subtlety reprogramming the mind that is now irrevocably inclined towards the idea. We so passionately want to live the idea ourselves. For instance. An adult woman, almost inclined to the whims of fashion, yet maintaining her modesty, when watches her idol, say, Malaika Arora, walk the ramp with a shoulder short sizzling jumpsuit, a mix of envy and desire impacts the hell out of her soul. One moment, she sees it adoring the body of a model and the next thing she knows, she is lost in her own utopia, living that fantasy. And that's how you set the trend!

We notice today, a shift in focus from gender inclusive to gender neutral. Every year, the IT industry sees a magnanimous flux of women ready to work at par with men. Some women are just not satisfied. They are entrepreneurs who work like junkies taking their companies to unexpected heights. Yet they can't get enough. Constant travelling, facing predicaments even as strong as an immobilizing disability, family upbringing, qualifying as satisfying sexual partners at bed, loving mothers, caring wives are roles that may require a million women if we consider Karl Marx's theory of division of labour. Surprisingly, a single women does all that with little or no pain and definitely no nagging at all. And that is how you set the trend. How do such women do it? Well that's not the right question. Is it possible that such women exist? That, fellas, is the right question.

Single parenting has almost won the label of a trend. As much of a trend or a fad we like to call it, it is no candy. It can be a pretty nasty pain if you lack what it takes. But there are people setting benchmarks of devotion. Devotion to their kids who they parent singly. Devotion to their life, their job, social network, family and all. Sushmita Sen has set a formidable example in this prospect. Fighting all odds, winning all scuffles, surpassing all legal conflicts, she adopted a girl. She has become an inspiring prototype for a multitude of women out there. Though engrossed in a back breaking schedule, a race against herself, she manoeuvres to take best care of her daughter till date. She has adopted another girl. It has been a good lesson. Due to an inspired media coverage, there has been a cut down in the number of female fetuses found in drains or dug from dry wells or found floating in lakes. And that is how you set the trend! Why do such people do it?Well that's not the right question. Is it possible that such people exist? That, folks, is the right question.
So we get the idea. There is always, in every community, a selective bohemian group of people that sets up new trends beyond all barriers. Their desire to make something new happen is unabated and unfazed. They produce it, fight for it, stand up to it and live it. People call them crazy. Little do people realise that taunts hardly bother them. They know that the same people protesting against the idea will cheer up the innovator once the idea becomes a success. The trend becomes a success. Coz we know that it always takes someone to SET THE TREND.

CHEERS!!!!!