We exist both
In time and
Outside of it.
The Now is both
Tied to a circumstance
And free of it.
We are…
And yet we are not…
We are here and beyond.
Grow Within
Life is not so much an externality
As it is an internal movement
Of pulse and impulse
-Unknown cause and
Its sorrowful effect….
Between which man must learn
How to be. Should he be
Defined by his fears and
Limited by his desires?
Or, refusing all definitions and
Rejecting the impulse for an identity
He should give up the idea of being someone?
Achievement (of anything in this world)
Cannot be a worthy goal
If it is pursued for its own sake.
It becomes liberating
When it entails
Leaving behind the need
To be accomplished
…To be someone distinctive
In the vastness of existence
That is the real need;
The real poverty of consciousness
We need to be free of.
Of Course, The World is Disappointing
Why expect anything
Of real value
From a world
Designed for disappointment?
Then what? What else is there
Apart from this world?
Of what purpose its enticements and its promises?
What is the ultimate fate of our hopes, our efforts?
The world’s vacuousness
Becomes your ache
A sorrow that leaves you wondering
About what counts as real happiness.
The world is a provider, not a giver
The individual can only find meaning in giving
He can neither satisfactorily take
Nor meaningfully provide.
To make something
Of what is provided
Is the art of man.
This art cultivates him.
Through his art, he transforms his ignorance to faith
He learns to stand unaffected and un-compromised
By the vagaries of the world.
His artifice reflecting a profound wisdom.
The lies of the world cannot be changed
By the activism of truth.
Truth is in being
Not in dreaming.
The truth just is-
unlimited, infinite in its possibilities.
It’s neither an idea
Nor an ideal.
If the world feels like a disappointment
It’s a time to grow
It’s an opportunity to cultivate new means
It’s time to recalibrate your perception of the world.
Beauty’s Designation
The Beautiful is the teacher
Of the Philosophical.
Apprehending beauty
Is the dawn of understanding.
Expressing beauty
Is the awakening of knowledge
Living as its instrument
Is our pilgrimage to wisdom.
The Aesthetics of Education
Ugliness is an hour
In the perception of beauty.
The ugliness of darkness,
Pride, arrogance and dishonesty
Will pass…
All facades will fall
And you will find yourself
Standing exposed…
Your ignorance, you will come to see,
Was faking it as knowledge.
While you were busy learning
How to do, how to act
How to think and how to be
Those lessons were futile and
Meaningless…till you learned how to see.
But learning how to see
Is a becoming…
It is arriving to a point
Where you’re able to tell the difference
Between reality and concept.
It involves a return
To a no-man’s land
Where all the knowledge
That you have acquired
Stands in vain.
When your satisfactions
Have become your discontent
Your truth is now false
And the certainty of your ideas
Have become an ideological noose.
You wish to be liberated
From fashionable ideas
And to look at
What you don’t know
For recourse…
Your ignorance then transforms…
From being the nakedness
That you were ashamed of-
It becomes the very means
By which you will learn.
When false knowledge is dropped
A superficial ignorance too breaks…
You come to see that
True knowledge lies in understanding
What you’re ignorant about.
It’s our ignorance
That teaches us what
We must know.
It introduces us to our human-ness
And thereafter our promise.
A good education
Will free you of conclusion
You will learn how to learn
And therefore, learn how to be
And therein, learn how to see.
The Life of “I”
“I”
-an idea
-an image
-an impostor
-an individual
-an identity
-an idiom
-an illusion
-an imperfection
-intelligence
Life is a design
For sublimating the ‘I’
For losing it in life
So that it is not merely
Concluded by death.
Offer the ‘I’ through work
Dissolve it in devotion.
Learn to become…
But only to discover
Who you never were.
Learn to embrace
All the things that
The other ‘I’s in the world
Are ashamed of-
And run away from:
Failure
Loss
Solitude
Grief
Ordinariness.
Therein lies
The light by which
You will come to see
The darkness in which
The “I” was born.
Humility
Appearances are not the Truth
And the Truth is evident, not apparent.
Know the difference.
Courage may not always look grand
It often keeps its distance from the grandiosity of gesture.
Let it remain invisible.
Your real achievements often go unnoticed.
Awards are intended to legitimise the awarder.
Their place is on a shelf; yours, in life.
You’re educated to acquire special skills
Yet all real work happens through surrender and prayer.
Give up all ideas of yourself.
Pause
Pause…
Because a pause creates beauty
And this creation of beauty
Is not designed action
It is a reflection in stillness.
What a paradox it is
That in order
To apprehend life’s complexity
The simplest act of cessation is sufficient
Just as much as it is necessary.
A pause
Is a way to pay respect
To the doer, the doing and the done
It’s a constraint you put
On the excessive and the unnecessary.
A pause
Is a form of acknowledgement
That conveyance
Is an action of many forces
And that intention is one such force.
A pause is power
The ultimate form of self-control
A recognition of
What fails in success
And what succeeds in failure.
Money
Money as a means
Is a blessing;
As an end in itself
It’s a curse.
As a means it provides
As an end it appropriates
As a means it exchanges value
As an end it robs value.
Money is an energy
That supports the business of living.
But it’s not the objective of life.
Ask yourself:
What’s the price you paid
To earn your money?
Can it redeem for you
All that you lost in its pursuit?
Can it sustain its worth
Or does it lose it over time?
Are you making money for money’s sake
By passing off a lesser value in exchange?
Have you normalised
An economic mindset
That sees nothing wrong
In profiting out of thievery?
What if we resolved
To spend more thoughtfully
Seeking value rather than a steal?
What if money could
Be made more true?
Not as wealth in itself
But as a supporter and promoter
Of the wealth already in you.
Life is to be Made
Play an active role
In your own life:
Make tough choices.
Create joy.
Give love.
Provide space.
Bring intelligence.
Leverage opportunities.
Earn respect.
Work for a cause.
Acquire experiences.
Develop capability.
Dream and then recreate the dream.
Inspire and influence.
Leave. Know when you’re not needed.
Accept your fate with faith.
Rest. Redeem yourself.
Wit. Wisdom. Wonder... 