Practical Vedanta

Tagged !!

2005-12-09T04:05:00.000-08:00

Tagged by Ranj. Here it goes.

1) One of the most impatient souls on earth. If I have to do something, I over think about it and go to an extent that even my health goes for a toss.
2) I am extremely passionate about everything I do. This may sound contradictory to the first point, but it’s true. Be it sports, yoga or work, I give my 100% to it and never give up anything.
3) I cannot live without Sports, Gym, Yoga, Music and PG.
4) I love the work I do and never try to complain about it. I believe that there is nothing called ‘mean work’.
5) The funniest reply I gave to an interviewer for the most idiotic question ‘Please tell me about yourself’.
“Am Single, Uncommitted, never looked, not looking, and most importantly Extremely Happy”.
6) Perseverance and hard work are the principles I believe in and learnt from my dad who brought our family to the present status it is in.
7) I have no ego coming my way in accepting my fault, though I am an Indian.
8) I neither smoke nor drink, but never discourage anyone who does.
9) I have the habit of striking without prior notice and that was how I met big shots at work place and outside.
10) I love seeing people around me happy and don’t mind a joke even if it is on me. I love socializing with people.
11) Good habit or bad, I never tell anyone if I am suffering from anything.
12) “Girls are scared of you”. That is from a very confidential source. J Whatever does that mean? :p
13) I give a damn to what others think about me. At times this attitude took me into serious troubles. I hate people who cannot face me directly and make comments about me in my absence.
14) I love inspiring people. Whether they like it or not, I will keep doing it. If I care for someone, even if the other person never cares for me I don’t give up.
15) I am a ‘Red for Life’. Guess most of them cannot understand what I meant. ;)
16) I love cooking and I am really crazy to an extent that if I feel like making a recipe I don’t mind even if it means not going to office.
17) All thanks to Ranjitha who supplies me books to read, I added reading as one of my hobbies.
18) One thing I am really passionate about is Transcendental Meditation and Yoga. Some times, I wake up in the morning and sit in TM and open my eyes only to realize that it is evening.
19) I always had this fetish to learn Martial arts, and I once planned a trip to Tibet having heard of a Grand Master, but the plans did not materialize in the last moment.
20) I celebrate daily for being alive.

Tagging my dear friend Prashant menon. :twisted:

Some Inferences ...

2005-11-04T00:07:00.000-08:00

There were many questions which I asked y’day but really do not feel like putting them here as the discussion turned out to be a bit acrimonious. But all thanks to Swami Sreekantananda for allowing me to attend his lecture yesterday on “Mind and its control”. Most of what he spoke was from the complete works of Swami Vivekananda which I had already read.
Today, I went to Ramakrishna Mutt again to meet him, but he was not available in the office. So, I went to some other place where the so-called “monks” are produced. I do not want to disclose the place where I went as I feel that it will be unfair on my part if one reads what I am going to write now.
From all my observations of the Hindu Monks, I have made a few inferences, which I had always wanted to talk about.
Disclaimer:
All the opinions below are totally mine and they have nothing to do with any person’s opinions.
1) The monks are nothing but carriers of Religion and not the Spirit of humanity. They are only bothered about the religion and sit in their own well like a frog and think that it is the whole world. If anything good or bad happens, they relate it immediately to someone called “God” whom they never realized or never knew the meaning of. If there is anything they can do, it is converting many people to their respective religions and bashing the other religions. They think that by chanting some hymns one reaches the path of ‘Spirituality’, which they do not know what it is all about. They are always under the impression that if we deserve to get something, we get it. Never they preach people to make an attempt to aim and reach whatever they wished or however insurmountable the difficulties are. If there are any difficulties, they just advice to leave everything to ‘God’.
2) It so happened that I asked a ‘Monk’ how he defined god. Without any thought, he said ‘God’ is the one who is the savior of mankind. “Savior of mankind?”. What did the so-called ‘God’ save? From that I could clearly infer that the monk was nothing better than a liar. A series of questions have always been striking me.
Is god there at all? If yes, where can I see him? If no, are all the monks liars? And when I asked the same questions to a few monks, none of them gave the reply and went about blabbering whatever they could about ‘God’. But none answered my question regarding presence of god in footwear and why they shouldn’t be worn inside temples.
3) I am aghast by the way the mantra “AUM” has been made a religious one. Vast majorities of people consider that it is a Hindu mantra. And all this, thanks to our wonderful monks who have made it religious. They have just ‘Stolen’ it. I have learnt the chanting from a great man who explained me the beauty of ‘AUM’ and the scientific research done on the same.
In ‘AUM’, ‘A’ refers to ‘Srishti’ or birth. It refers to the 9 months, which a baby spends in a mother’s womb.
‘U’ refers to ‘stithi’ or the life that a man goes through.
‘M’ refers to ‘Laya’ or Death.
It has to be chanted in a way where ‘A’ should be kept low and for a very little time and ‘U’ with the maximum amount of stress and time. ‘M’ should be as low as possible. And moreover, scientifically the chanting has to be done in such a way that the vibrations generated by it should touch the brain and this helps remove any blockages of blood in the nerves which convey the blood from the heart to the brain. This is one of the concepts of Transcendental Meditation.
And look at the way the beautiful mantra has been stolen!!
Off late, we have seen some yoga ‘Gurus’ in action on the TV teaching some breathing exercises and claiming that people lose weight. I really do not know the credibility of those pranayamas as they are totally attached to ‘God’ and ‘Religion’.

More observations later ;)

A tryst with Swami Sreekantananda. (Part I)

2005-11-03T20:15:00.000-08:00

I always had this habit of striking without prior notice or warning. And so did the same today by meeting Swami Paramananda and Swami Sreekantananda the Directors of the Vivekananda Institute of excellence and the Ramakrishna mutt.
It so happened that I was going through the famous Ramakrishna Mutt road and something really pulled me into Ramakrishna mutt. Without any prior notice I went straight to see Swamy Parmananda, without any appointment. Well, even he was shocked to see someone come straight into his room without prior notice.
Me: Swamy, I would like to talk with you about something, which I always wanted to ask the monks.
SP: Can u please see me later? I am not keeping well. Or, you may talk with Swamy Sreekantananda who is the Director of the Ramakrishna Mutt.

Meanwhile, Swami Sreekantananda enters the room.
SP: aah swami! A young gentleman wants to ask us something (grinning). Can you please answer him?
SS: Sure. (Looks at me, asks my name and profession, and makes sure that I am not from the press ;) )
Swami Sreekantananda (SS) returned from the “Conference of the Hindu Monks” from Belur Mutt in West Bengal yesterday.

The meeting:

Me: Thanks a lot for your time Sir.
SS: Young man! What is it that you wanted to ask a monk?
Me: About Life.
SS: How old are you?
Me: 23.
SS: And what did you see in life? Don’t you think that 23 years is too less a time to have experienced something??
Me: No. What makes you think so, Sir?
SS: Well, lets put aside what I think. It was you, who came here to ask me something, is it?
Me: Yes Sir. I want to know about Life.
(He looked at me impassively and gave a faint smile)
SS: Fine. I can understand that you are facing turbulent times in your life and out of sheer desperation and frustration you came here to know something.
Me: (A bit flabbergasted) …err… well … Sir… you are right….
SS: Tell me, what troubles you so much.
Me: Mind. My mind, Sir. But I am not complaining about anything. I have a few questions in my mind and am in quest for answers.
SS: (with a smile) Go ahead.
Me: What do you think constitutes mind?
SS: Manas, Buddhi, Chitta and Ahankaara. Manas refers to your thought process. Buddhi refers to your intellect. Chitta refers to your Subconscious and Ahankaara refers to your ego.
Me: Is ahankaara a part of ones mind since the inception or does it grows in ones mind due to the external factors?
SS: My friend, ahankaara is part and parcel of the human mind and as you said, it just grows depending upon the surroundings. Something cannot grow out of nothing.
Me: Can you explain why the present day mind is always at a wild rush for something or the other?
SS: Lust, Greed and Anger. They should be self explanatory, I guess.
Me: (Not satisfied) Sir, everyone says the same. Fine … let me ask you something else. ‘They’ say that ‘God’ is everywhere. Is god really everywhere? If yes, then he should be there in footwear as well. Then why aren’t people allowed to wear footwear into temples?
SS: A good question indeed. Let me tell you a story.
“There was once a master who had three disciples. He taught them that there is god everywhere and in everyone. One day, the disciples went into the forest to pick up sticks for fire. Meanwhile, they noticed a mad elephant that was destroying everything on its way to the futile attempts of the person on it trying to control it. Two of the three boys ran away hearing the screams of the person on the elephant and the third stood unmoved. The elephant threw the boy away and he got badly injured. The master asked him, “When the other two boys moved, what stopped you from doing so?”. The boy said, “Master, you told that there is god everywhere. So I have seen my god in the elephant which stopped me from moving.” Then the master exclaimed, “You fool! You have seen god only in the elephant but not in the person on it who screamed at you people to move away. And is this what I taught you?”. “
So, my friend, this has been the problem all the while. You do not perceive god if you really do not want to do so.

Part 2 … to be continued after meeting him again t’row ;)

Rain Rain go away….

2005-10-29T23:06:00.000-07:00

It has been a real tough week in Bangalore with the torrential rains hitting hard. Adding to the din, the infrastructure in Bangalore was at its usual worst and there were no traces of Hosur road which connects the Electronics City to the city by the evening of Monday.
It took us 4 hours to reach the office which otherwise hardly takes 15 mins. And unlike Bombay, Bangalore was absolutely not prepared to face these situations. There is absolutely no Resilience and to our complete disappointment, we haven’t seen a traffic police till the morning of Tuesday.
There was water everywhere and worst heard that water clogged the server rooms of a few companies who had them in their basements. Despite the threats from the IT companies about shifting their offices to Hyderabad, there was not even a statement issued by the government of Karnataka. And the ‘Balatron’ Deve Gowda was at his cribbing best. Its high time he gets some life!!
And NRN quitting BAIL was something substantial he did after a longtime. Better late than never, he realized there’s gonna be nothing being in the mouth of the ‘Balatron’ getting fletcherized. If this is one side of the story, the other side of the story is fight between the Govt and the IT cos for better roads. When the pro’s are supposed to sit at offices and work, they are struck in the traffic jams. All blame again to the buses plying between Karnataka and Tamilnadu, especially the private ones and the ‘imbecile’ traffic policemen who really cannot take stringent measures to control this. All in all, looks like its ‘adios to Bangalore’ and ‘Hyderabad Beckons’ to most of the IT cos. Even my employer is thinking to shift the base to Hyderabad despite the fact that he has the biggest campus in Bangalore amongst all his other Development Centers.
On the work front, things are getting very hectic with delivery dates hanging like swords over the neck. Those 16 hour days are back again, but more enjoyable this time. Responsibility is clearly given, which I had always wanted. As someone said, “Responsibility is like a baby. When the baby is in arms, even the most notorious criminal becomes very careful and the world will go still for him”.
On the personal front, nothing absolutely is happening and am spending 3-4 hours of the rest 8 hrs in gymming and reading.
Happy Diwali to all my friends and Well-wishers J
Well, I’ll try to be regular at blogging :P

Passion but Nothing

2005-09-23T04:53:00.000-07:00

If I am still here typing all this crap, then it is my passion for blogging.
If I stay late at office, and realize that there are more than 24 hours a day, it is passion for work, whatever be the negative aspects of work.
If go home after the 24 plus hour day and still read and read to desperation, it is my passion for reading.
If I play for 6 hours at a stretch, with every part of my body aching, but still something is crying "Play more", it is my passion for the sport.
Passion, but nothing, still keeps me living my life during my extreme moments of happiness and misery, though the latter prevailed more in my life. But who cares?
Happiness and Misery are the obverse and the reverse of the same coin; and he who takes happiness must take misery also.
This Passion is something really hard to describe. It is that which can change the World Vision of an eternal prison to a playground. It changes weaker ones strong. It makes a burning heart of unquenchable thirst for anything and everything one does.
Very often we see people complain about their work, why others, I was one complaining all the way about my work. Well, some things in life happen only to take you out of the deep sh*t which you threw yourself into, and this happens out of sheer desperation. The very moment you realize that you are doing it only for your own good; your spirit acquires the ultimate passion to just do it, and kills all the adversities. This "Passion" stays with you to hell. It is the Passion for accomplishments which gives you the 'Pride' and not the 'Arrogance'.
And I live life my own way, where my Passion drives. It might contradict with others immediately, but who really cares? Let anyone go to hell. They only realize that my passion took me to hell even before they went there. Fighting against all odds, with this frigging passion makes one really strong.
My Special thanks to "that" person, who really changed my life, who taught me that there is nothing called misery, and even if there is one, in the long run it is nothing but joy, who was guiding me through every moment helping me fight every obstacle on my path……. Of this journey which goes on and on …………….

One Year !! and Learnings continued........

2005-07-27T04:03:00.000-07:00

Atlast, itz been one year since i joined this company.....
An year which showed the peaks in everything, be it learning,
be it problems, be it health ........

An year filled with extreme emotions, filled with joy, filed with sorrow...

An year which taught me many things ..... which taught me how to survive
the worst things this world shows, which taught me how to keep quiet
during bad times, which also taught me how to stay calm even in good moods..

An year which deteriorated my health only to teach me how to fight this
big battle of life..... An year, which won me many accolades only to teach me
that there is something more than that......

An year which introduced me to many people to teach me that there is life beyond
myself...... Which made enemies only to teach that there are different kinds of people in this world.....

An year which shattered my faith apart, only to teach that one has to have an indomitable will to survive....

All in all ........ itz been an year with mixed feelings........

All ppl who got trained along with me were celebrating ...... but i really didnot know whether to celebrate for completing 1 year..... or............

whatever it is, the truth i realised that this life sucks at every stage. It all begins with a small problem or rather which appears like a small problem, but has an ocean of problems and distresses behind that.....
before a storm there is always this calm.......This calm which makes us think everything is going right ...... and the moment we think everything is going right, we are absolutely mistaken!! As someone rightly said, "If everything is going right, then there is something wrong"....

if there is anything else realised ....... it is Working only for Work's sake......
to work we have the right... and not for the effects thereof...
if you are poor, work ...... if u are rich, even then keep working...
if you are healthy, work ...... if u are weak, keep working......
but never tend to stop working .... it will kill one .....

Another thing i have learnt ...... or to say .....was forced to learn was to keep silent if i had nothing really to say ......
instead of all the frothy talk one does, it is always better to shut ones mouth and find a practical solution for the problems.....
The word of Power comes thru silence and not constant Blabbering ......

And if therez anything in which i have really improved, then it is my Verbal ...... both written and Spoken skills ....... All my thanks are due to Ranjitha who supplied me with the right books at the right time......

and if i keep cribbing ....... there wont be any end :P

what did i achieve ?? !!

2005-07-22T05:47:00.000-07:00

I'm 23. and almost through 1/3rd of my life.
what did i accomplish in my life ?
Did i become the best in the field i'm working in ?
Am i the best consultant in SAP ?
or put aside work, am i the best TT or Badminton or Volley ball player??

absolutely no answers !!! or is it that the definition of Achievement has to
be defined properly to answer the questions ??

Today, i went to college to meet a few good old profs of mine as i did not go
to collect the gold medal i received. And surprisingly many said.... "My boy, u have achieved it.... and what else do u want ?? ... u'r name is on the Hall of Fame board ... adding to all this .... u r with the best company "....
Achieved it ?? .... what !!! ??
From their perspective i have acheived "it", but from my perspective i have lost many. be it health, or wealth or happiness or whatever ..... u name it ... i lost it... i may sound sick and pessimistic .... but thatz the truth...
but thatz not the end of all .... the lower i fall, the higher i dream ..
and i believe, thatz what is keeping me in one piece.
a truth realised ..... a dream accomplished ...... u name it ...... itz all in the Passion for something strong one feels..... Passion which doesnot break at the will .... and Passion supported by the Gigantic Will which will never crumble or quakes at anything ..... Passion which makes one move along ....... and it is the Passion to break free all the barriers.
there is one passion and it arouses another ..... and in this process the first one dies.If one is angry , and then happy.......the next moment anger passes away.but it is out of that anger that one manufactured happiness. so, the states are always volatile.but it is neither the happiness or misery that one goes through always. One has to be a master of that out of which all these states are manufactured..... or to say, be the masters of the situation at itz very root. and the whole secret is to find out the proper place for everything.

in the gita it is said,
"He who in the midst of intense activity finds himself in the greatest calmness, and in the greatest peace finds intense activity, that is the greatest"

I've seen many people feel tensed or nervous about things which really bother them.
But ... just give this a thought .......
Which is the biggest fear or tension any person faces ?? Is it not the fear of death ?? ..... and is death unavoidable ??? absolutely not ....
When a person has to face the biggest tension called death, which is otherwise unavoidable, what is the point in going through all the minor so-called-tensions and fears of life ??

and still.....the doubt remains ... what have i achieved ??
or should i achieve anything at all?? ... cant i work without
keeping any results for the action i perform?? or should i think
about results for the action and then work ?
and did i get lost in this entire process of action and results ??

the great scriptures say "Do work without any attachment and selfishness" ....
but is it really possible to do so ? and even if one does it that way....
what recognition does one get in the process out of this material world ?
so is it here that one gets lost out of the "achievement" ??

signing off in deep thought and anguish ...............

Back !!!

2005-07-19T06:47:00.000-07:00

back after a long time....... and almost forgot that, i do have
a web space and ofcourse the password too ;)
Been a really hectic time at office with some Development for
Taiwan rollout and the rest of the time went into attending and giving
presentations. And almost all the senior members got released from the
project which added to the problems.

Watched many movies:

Sarkar -- Was fabulous
War of the worlds -- Pathetic
Anniyan - pathetic
D Company - Good
Chandramukhi - Gr8

and many more ......... i dont even remember the names ...Duh !!

Thatz all for now :) ....... shall be going to hydie t'row .....

Another Lizard on the Wall ?? never !!

2005-04-22T10:30:00.000-07:00

aah .... at last found time to update my web-space :D.....
haven't done this for sometime not because nothing interesting was
happening, but coz things were happening at such a fast pace that i
donot remember what exactly happened at which frame of time and
there was hardly anytime to update.

There were many incidents which taught me things which
i have to remember for the rest of life.
1) i've realised the truth that not every person who
puts BS on you is your enemy and not every person who takes u
out of the BS is u'r friend !
2) Silence is the only means thru which one can obtain
the "Word of Power".If u have nothing to say, better
shut your mouth.
3) Think twice bfore saying n e thing, atleast at the
official level.... believe me ...it almost killed me !!
4) If u have no work to do, catch u'r core competencies and
improve upon them.
5) Break the bad news first .........
( dont procrastinate here atleast !!! )

but the best thing i realised was to completely shut my mouth
if i donot have anything to say ....

and this was the period when i felt that i was just
another Lizard on the Wall...I had the strong urge to do
something different, and yes ..... i did it ...and i shall do it
again and again, till i dont feel the guilt anymore........
be it competency building, working in the team, doing the
assigned work ..i've found out my own way ..... a path not
taken by many..... a path not seen by anyone ...... coz.....
it was me, who laid that path ..... MY PATH...

let me stop it here, or it pampers my ego :P

i've learnt the fact that a person who loves getting praise,
suffers a lot when he/ she is blamed.... as gr8 men say.....
. "Do work without expecting anything in return"......

and yes, i've started reading books .........

read "The pilgrimage"- Paulo Coelho
shall be reading "The Stairway to Heaven-Led Zepplin"
by Robert Cole soon.

Back Again !!!

2005-04-08T04:10:00.000-07:00

been a really long time since i blogged ......
and guess what .......... i even forgot my login password.....

the month has been jam-packed with activities and work..... parties,
work and more work..... more parties ..... huh !!!!

first, coming to the work front .........started learning the actual SAP with
its modules..... and the month was really good when it comes to learning

and parties ...... MANY ...... 3-4 b'day parties...... and a Bangalore PG meet.
check this link for the photo.... mez the one holding the pic .... :mg:

and on the movies front....watched "Million Dollar baby"--pathetic,
"Meet the fockers"-- good, "Constantine"-- pathetic,
telugu movies---> "soggaadu"--peaks of madness, "Bunny" -- gr8 :)

if there was anything significant i did last month.... it was joining a gym...
stopped playing completely :( ...

and very happy to know that supervish and a few other folks got into IIM-A :) .
Waiting eagerly for Wayne's IIM-I result .......

BTW ... moi back in hyd for Ugadi :D

Back to Work !

2005-02-28T01:53:00.000-08:00

after a loooooong vacation at home for almost a month, i've been
back to bglore.......
it was sad leaving hyderabad and parents, esp my mom who took gr8
care of me during my illness....
was a bit surprised at the climate of bglore......... while itz hot and humid
in hyd.... itz cold in bglore....
spent the weekend at home w/o straining myself.......
arranged the mini-kitchen i brought from home and started cooking ... :D

woke up at 6:30 today with gr88888888 difficulty :(
left home at 8 and reached office by 8:15...... had a solid breakfast... :D
went to my workstation only to see things getting worse......

first..... itz the number of mails i got during the whole month of feb......
maaaaaaaaaan........ 667 official mails in just 18 days ..
second.... problem with the leave system, which doesnot accept LOP leaves.
third...... lost touch with SAP ....... boy..... ended up asking basic
transaction codes to open the s/w.....
took 4 solid hrs to go thru all the mails........ and did a few adjustments with
the leave system ;)
then had a solid lunch :D:D.........

went back to work station to check if any work was alloted.......
i dont even find any sight of work for the next 2 days,......
c'm on., .... u shud have understood that by now :P

lets see........ how it goes...............

A day at college !!

2005-02-24T05:26:00.000-08:00

"Been there, done that, what next??"

Next...umm.... getting into preaching mode ;)

that was what happened when i went to my college as an
"Alumnus" after almost an year......

the welcome was really warm from the Dean of Placements and
the princi....
had a looooooong chat with placements dean regarding
alumnus-college relationships, and about the Pre-Placement Talks
which are to be conducted for the present 3rd years.

met the princi who was very happy to see after a long time, and we
cherished a few good memories ....

then went over to meet the HOD who made a gr8 impact in my life,
who was also my spiritual guru :).....

been roaming thru the corridors and cherishing all the gr8 memories,...
the time when we played spoilsort with the annual day event ;).....
the days we never used to attend the classes yet have attendance......
the days we used to sit in a near by "chai-hut" and run into the fields on
the sight of princi........
PRICELESS !!!!!!

after that, the dean took me to a few classes where i sounded like a
preacher giving a few career tips et all........... ;)

over all, it was gr8 being there.....
and the happiest thing of all appeared on the HOF notice board

" Hall of Fame for 2000-2004 (EEE)--------> VIJAY SAI "

"Secret of Secrets"

2005-02-19T06:48:00.000-08:00

Here is what Sri Sri Ravishankar of "The Art of Living" has to say about
the Royal Secret.

The Gitâ requires a little preliminary introduction. The scene is laid
on the battlefield of Kurukshetra. There were two branches of the
same race fighting for the empire of India about five thousand years ago.
The Pândavas had the right, but the Kauravas had the might.
The Pandavas were five brothers, and they were living in a forest. Krishna
was the friend of the Pandavas. The Kauravas would not grant them as much
land as would cover the point of a needle.
The opening scene is the battlefield, and both sides see their relatives and
friends — one brother on one side and another on the other side; a grandfather
on one side, grandson on the other side. ...
When Arjuna sees his own friends and relatives on the other side and knows
that he may have to kill them, his heart gives way and he says that he will not
fight. Thus begins the Gita.

Sri Sri Ravishankar quotes what Krishna says in the gita:

"Anityam Asukham Lokam Imam Prapya Bhajasvama"

This means..... Nothing is permanent in this world. Whether it is Joy
or Sorrow.......
he says, no one can be neither happy nor miserable for ever.....

If anyone is miserable for a long time, he gets used to that misery, and
it will no longer be a misery........
If there is anything blissfull in the world, it is not blissfull for ever.......

"Having known the truth that there is nothing permanent in this world, try
to attain me"

He says that this is the secret of secrets .......

great piece of work ........... aint it?? :)

Mind or Heart ??

2005-02-18T21:49:00.000-08:00

A nagging question which constantly troubles me.....
Shud we follow our Heart or follow our mind??
There were many instances where many people
advise,"Control your mind".
why should one try to control one's mind? The mind is
Universal, and it is quite possible that one mind can interact
with an other. When the mind is capable of performing such feats,
does it really not know howto control itself? If it is not able to
have control over itself, what makes it so?What makes people
follow their heart,which I feel makes inferior decisions,when they
have a universal power in the form of mind?
There are two basic qualities which play spoilsport when it
comes to thinking with mind.....
Fear and Ego.....I feel that fear is the result of ego. With ego
one has the fear of failure, fearof harm and the worst of all, fear of death.
When the mind says,"Why can't i do it?" .... the heart
says,"Why shud u do it?"..and this interaction builds up ego in ones mind....
To build ego, one really doesnot need an other person superior
or inferior to him.the discussion between mind and heart is the source
of ego.
when any thing "touches ones heart".. it makes a big difference......
Imagine howmuch diference it would make if it touches ones mind
which is a million fold more powerful than heart.
I've always wanted to write about ego, as i've suffered a
big deal with egoes of others. I have to make a point here that
Indians are the worst lot of people when it comes to ego. it may be
at workplace or at institutions or whatever, i've seen that ppl never
accept their foibles........
To whosoever it may concern.......... ;)
but, I care a damn .........

Any Answers ??

2005-02-18T08:15:00.000-08:00

Some more Humour stuff i read.......

1) Why is lemon juice made with artificial flavour, and dishwashing
liquid made with real lemons?

2) Why does the sun lighten our hair, but darken our skin?

3) Why is "abbreviated" such a long word?

4) Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?

5) Why is the third hand on the watch called a second hand?

6) When dog food is new and improved tasting, who tests it?

7) Why do they sterilize the needle for a lethal injection?

8) You know that indestructible black box used on airplanes?
Why don’t they make the whole plane out of the stuff?

9) If you are driving at the speed of light and you turn the
headlights on, what happens?

10) If con is the opposite of pro, is Congress the opposite of Progress?

Oxymorons !!

2005-02-17T09:00:00.000-08:00

A few oxymorons i liked.....

1. Act naturally ( How?? )
2. Same difference
3. Government organization
4. British fashion
5. Small crowd
6. Business ethics ( Now c'm on !! )
7. Soft rock (wazz that? )
8. Plastic glasses ( Duh! )
9. Pretty ugly

and the best of all......

10. Microsoft Works

Yet another day !

2005-02-15T07:37:00.000-08:00

Yet another boring day ....... nothing much to do ......
and sitting on my bed, i thought y not i update this space ;).......

atlast, came back to my original form with fever coming down..

started reading books even though itz fatigue to my eyes :P..
started off with Jeffrey Archer's "Not a Penny more, Not a Penny Less"...
and it wasn't gr8......
just started John Grisham's "The Pelican Brief".... letz see how it goes ..

Yoga Defined ......

2005-02-12T03:58:00.000-08:00

Been going thru some works of Swami Vivekananda.....
herez how he explains Pranayama ( Breathing).....

"There was once a minister to a great king. He fell into disgrace.
The king, as a punishment, ordered him to be shut up in the top
of a very high tower. This was done, and the minister was left
there to perish. He had a faithful wife, however, who came to
the tower at night and called to her husband at the top to know
what she could do to help him. He told her to return to the tower
the following night and bring with her a long rope, some
stout twine, pack thread, silken thread, a beetle, and a little
honey. Wondering much, the good wife obeyed her husband,
and brought him the desired articles. The husband directed her
to attach the silken thread firmly to the beetle, then to smear its
horns with a drop of honey, and to set it free on the wall of the
tower, with its head pointing upwards. She obeyed all these
instructions, and the beetle started on its long journey. Smelling
the honey ahead it slowly crept onwards, in the hope of reaching
the honey, until at last it reached the top of the tower, when the
minister grasped the beetle, and got possession of the silken
thread. He told his wife to tie the other end to the pack thread,
and after he had drawn up the pack thread, he repeated the
process with the stout twine, and lastly with the rope. Then
the rest was easy. The minister descended from the tower by
means of the rope, and made his escape. In this body of ours the
breath motion is the "silken thread"; by laying hold of and learning
to control it we grasp the pack thread of the nerve currents, and
from these the stout twine of our thoughts, and lastly the rope
of Prana, controlling which we reach freedom. "

Mind !!!! ???? !!!

2005-02-11T05:40:00.000-08:00

Started doing Yoga after 10 days.......... and started off the session with meditation, until i realised that my mind was not with me :(.....

How hard it is to control the mind! It is nothing but a mad monkey.

consider a restless monkey............ make him drink wine, so that he becomes more restless......
then, let a scorpion bite him so that he jumps for a whole day......... to complete his misery, let a demon enter into him......
just imagine how restless that monkey wud be !!! ....... one can compare my mind to that monkey.......
how hard is it to control such a mind ? !!! ??

this clearly indicates how badly i need meditation ........

off i hibernate, into the petals of a lighted Lotus...... into the shells of a closing Pearl Oyster......into the cosmos of PRATYAHARA .....

SAPped energies ......... !!!

2005-02-10T07:58:00.000-08:00

working on SAP for 6 months now, i've suddenly realised that i forgot every other concept......

Scene: Just woke up after an afternoon nap...... all of a sudden an idea strikes........ why not build upon my COMPETENCIES???? :P
The first thing that struck my mind was JAVA......... moreover..... SAP Netweaver uses JAVA .....
loaded JAVA onto my dad's lappy and downloaded all the stuff required........
as usual, wrote the first program "Hello World" ........... but to my shock, it doesn't run......
Been writing a few JAVA programs bfore, but they never troubled me ....

The problem was with CLASSPATH :( ...... that was one nightmare which was constantly troubling me ever since i started learning JAVA.....

so, n e pointers ????

Movie Time !!! :D

2005-02-09T21:30:00.000-08:00

Down with fever, what on earth can i do sitting on the bed??? ....... this was the first question that came to my mind after coming back to hyd........

one thing i cud have done was reading, but thatz fatigue to eyes :P.........
the other alternative was watching movies...... this sounded more feasible ... moreover, itz been ages since i watched a nice movie after "Tagore" ( Telugu movie starring Chiru )....
Watched "Balu" recently in Bglore but it was not upto the standards..... and the theatre in which i watched that made things worse......
so, i opened my movie collection, and started the movie festival with chiru hits :D:D......
watched INDRA and TAGORE y'day....... and IDIOT today :D.........
more updates to come soon ................

Why......... ??

2005-02-06T17:35:00.000-08:00

Now comes the big (biggest ?? ) question of my life ( or is it everyones' ? ) ...... WHY
????.....as usual, comes the first question ......
Why is life unfair at me ?
and then goes the list .............
Why shud i always STRUGGLE to go to the top........ and then SUFFER there???
When nothing is permanent, WHY do i feel that SUFFERING is permanent ?
Why can't i do the work assigned, in my own way, rather than following the proposed
method?
and the list continues.............. rather CONTINUED....... till i met a friend, who
immediately prescribed me the speeches of Swami Vivekananda, looking at the list :D.....
then i thought ....... WHY not try this out???......... As a kid, i was fascinated by the stories of the
heroics of this man ........ and i remember my mother telling me about his childhood,
a few incidents he had at the sea when he shot all the 12 shells in 12 gun shots
.......etc .......etc...... But never took it so seroiusly........

moreover, things were not going good for me then, with unrest and stress ruling
me.........i started off reading the first speech, which was the one delivered at the Parliament of
Religions, and it increased my curiosity .........
and immediately, i went on to read 'Work and its Secrets' which answered many
questions........ :)
in the words of Swami Vivekananda.......
"If we examine our own lives, we find that the greatest cause of sorrow is this: we take
up something, and put our whole energy on it — perhaps it is a failure and yet we
cannot give it up. We know that it is hurting us, that any further clinging to it is simply
bringing misery on us; still, we cannot tear ourselves away from it. The bee came to sip
the honey, but its feet stuck to the honey-pot and it could not get away. Again and
again, we are finding ourselves in that state. That is the whole secret of existence. Why
are we here? We came here to sip the honey, and we find our hands and feet sticking
to it. We are caught, though we came to catch. We came to enjoy; we are being
enjoyed. We came to rule; we are being ruled. We came to work; we are being worked.
All the time, we find that. And this comes into every detail of our life. We are being
worked upon by other minds, and we are always struggling to work on other minds. We
want to enjoy the pleasures of life; and they eat into our vitals. We want to get
everything from nature, but we find in the long run that nature takes everything from us
— depletes us, and casts us aside. "
and the solution !!!!
"Had it not been for this, life would have been all sunshine. Never mind! With all its
failures and successes, with all its joys and sorrows, it can be one succession of
sunshine, if only we are not caught.
That is the one cause of misery: we are attached, we are being caught. Therefore says
the Gita: Work constantly; work, but be not attached; be not caught. Reserve unto
yourself the power of detaching yourself from everything, however beloved, however
much the soul might yearn for it, however great the pangs of misery you feel if you
were going to leave it; still, reserve the power of leaving it whenever you want. The
weak have no place here, in this life or in any other life. Weakness leads to slavery.
Weakness leads to all kinds of misery, physical and mental. Weakness is death. There
are hundreds of thousands of microbes surrounding us, but they cannot harm us
unless we become weak, until the body is ready and predisposed to receive them.
There may be a million microbes of misery, floating about us. Never mind! They dare
not approach us, they have no power to get a hold on us, until the mind is weakened.
This is the great fact: strength is life, weakness is death. Strength is felicity, life eternal,
immortal; weakness is constant strain and misery: weakness is death. "
and more !!
"Ask nothing; want nothing in return. Give what you have to give; it will come back to
you — but do not think of that now, it will come back multiplied a thousandfold — but
the attention must not be on that. Yet have the power to give: give, and there it ends.
Learn that the whole of life is giving, that nature will force you to give. So, give willingly.
Sooner or later you will have to give up. You come into life to accumulate. With
clenched hands, you want to take. But nature puts a hand on your throat and makes
your hands open. Whether you will it or not, you have to give. The moment you say, "I
will not", the blow comes; you are hurt. None is there but will be compelled, in the long
run, to give up everything. And the more one struggles against this law, the more
miserable one feels. It is because we dare not give, because we are not resigned
enough to accede to this grand demand of nature, that we are miserable. The forest is
gone, but we get heat in return. The sun is taking up water from the ocean, to return it
in showers. You are a machine for taking and giving: you take, in order to give. Ask,
therefore, nothing in return; but the more you give, the more will come to you. The
quicker you can empty the air out of this room, the quicker it will be filled up by the
external air; and if you close all the doors and every aperture, that which is within will
remain, but that which is outside will never come in, and that which is within will
stagnate, degenerate, and become poisoned. A river is continually emptying itself into
the ocean and is continually filling up again. Bar not the exit into the ocean. The
moment you do that, death seizes you. "

these were the words, which almost created a storm in my mind that night .............. i
cud hardly sleep......... i read the entire speech atleast a 10 times that night, and started
answering the questions which were troubling me ..........i was thunderstruck by the way solutions were coming by themselves, with just a little
thought as input...........
it took time for the results to show up, but the results came promptly :).........

That brought me closer to his literature...........

as Swami VIvekananda rightly said ,
"It is very difficult, but we can overcome the difficulty by constant practice. We must
learn that nothing can happen to us, unless we make ourselves susceptible to it. I have
just said, no disease can come to me until the body is ready; it does not depend alone
on the germs, but upon a certain predisposition which is already in the body. We get
only that for which we are fitted. Let us give up our pride and understand this, that never
is misery undeserved. There never has been a blow undeserved: there never has been
an evil for which I did not pave the way with my own hands. We ought to know that.
Analyse yourselves and you will find that every blow you have received, came to you
because you prepared yourselves for it. You did half, and the external world did the
other half: that is how the blow came. That will sober us down. At the same time, from
this very analysis will come a note of hope, and the note of hope is: "I have no control of
the external world, but that which is in me and nearer unto me, my own world, is in my
control. If the two together are required to make a failure, if the two together are
necessary to give me a blow, I will not contribute the one which is in my keeping; and
how then can the blow come? If I get real control of myself, the blow will never come."

having done a great deal of experimenting with my own thoughts, i realized the truth
behind swami's saying about the internal world of man..........
then i began my next feat with his doctrine of 'Practical Vedanta'...........i had to read every speech atleast 20 times to understand what he was trying to
talk.......his talk about "The Real and Apparent Man" and "Maya or Illusion" mesmerized me, and
i wondered, "How can a human being probe into such depths of Vedanta??".............His three lectures on Practical Vedanta, are equivalent to something more than the
Vedas and Upanishads put together........
he says it beautifully,
"These are the principles of ethics, but we shall now come down lower and work out
the details. We shall see how this Vedanta can be carried into our everyday life, the city
life, the country life, the national life, and the home life of every nation. For, if a religion
cannot help man wherever he may be, wherever he stands, it is not of much use; it will
remain only a theory for the chosen few. Religion, to help mankind, must be ready and
able to help him in whatever condition he is, in servitude or in freedom, in the depths of
degradation or on the heights of purity; everywhere, equally, it should be able to come
to his aid. The principles of Vedanta, or the ideal of religion, or whatever you may call it,
will be fulfilled by its capacity for performing this great function.
The ideal of faith in ourselves is of the greatest help to us. If faith in ourselves had been
more extensively taught and practiced, I am sure a very large portion of the evils and
miseries that we have would have vanished. Throughout the history of mankind, if any
motive power has been more potent than another in the lives of all great men and
women, it is that of faith in themselves. Born with the consciousness that they were to
be great, they became great. Let a man go down as low as possible; there must come
a time when out of sheer desperation he will take an upward curve and will learn to
have faith in himself. But it is better for us that we should know it from the very first.
Why should we have all these bitter experiences in order to gain faith in ourselves? We
can see that all the difference between man and man is owing to the existence or
non-existence of faith in himself. Faith in ourselves will do everything. I have
experienced it in my own life, and am still doing so; and as I grow older that faith is
becoming stronger and stronger. He is an atheist who does not believe in himself. The
old religions said that he was an atheist who did not believe in God. The new religion
says that he is the atheist who does not believe in himself. But it is not selfish faith
because the Vedanta, again, is the doctrine of oneness. It means faith in all, because
you are all. Love for yourselves means love for all, love for animals, love for everything,
for you are all one. It is the great faith which will make the world better. I am sure of
that. He is the highest man who can say with truth, "I know all about myself." Do you
know how much energy, how many powers, how many forces are still lurking behind
that frame of yours? What scientist has known all that is in man? Millions of years have
passed since man first came here, and yet but one infinitesimal part of his powers has
been manifested. Therefore, you must not say that you are weak. How do you know
what possibilities lie behind that degradation on the surface? You know but little of that
which is within you. For behind you is the ocean of infinite power and blessedness. "

i feel Practical Vedanta is the very essence of life.......... and so, i named my Blog :).....

Autobiography of a YOGI !!

2005-02-05T23:04:00.000-08:00

with supervish's advice, i started reading "Autobiography of a YOGI"-Paramhansa Yogananda..... just done reading 4 chaps..... itz interesting :)....

Down Time !

2005-02-05T08:01:00.000-08:00

itz the down time of my battery, running presently :)...... down with viral fever...... had to fly down to hyd from bglore by the "pathetic" Air Deccan flight ......
but happy to see parents after sometime :).....
looks like i'll have to take complete bed rest for 2 weeks....... so, thought, why not i start a blog :D........
and Why "Practical Vedanta" as the title?? why 'untiring-paladin' as the blog name ?? .......
shall talk more about it later ;) ..........

Time, patience, and indomitable will must show.

At Last !!

2005-02-05T05:02:00.000-08:00

at last me too started a blog :D......... hurrrraaaaayyyyyy !!!!!
thanks to Vishwanath aka supervish for his guidance :).......