Philosophy of Life

There is a difference between living and existing. You exist. But do you really live life as you want to?

There is no correct way to live life. Every man is different and is a product of his own experiences and thoughts. To each his own.

But more often than not, people live life with some set of rules. Consciously or subconsciously, we are guided by a few set of rules which direct our thinking and our action. Big decision or small decision - we operate within a fixed paradigm. Like it or not, people operate within a certain philosophy of which most of them are not even aware of.

I have always operated with a more idealistic philosophy of life. Do what is right. Be strong enough to do what is right. It is easier to give in to temptations and later blame it as a mistake. It is not really a mistake if you do it intentionally, is it? Most people are in some strange rat race where they compete for money and fake friendships and that elusive social status. They put others opinions above their owns. Not me. I would prefer to be alone than hangout with some phony losers who are basically all the same. Rats.

Of late, my thoughts have been troubling me a lot. Why be right when you can be smart? Why choose to empower people when you can fool them and take advantage of them? Why even bother to think about conscience and virtues when you can have money and fake social value? Unfortunately, the world does not operate on morals and values. You win or you lose. You screw someone or someone screws you. If you have any sense of right or wrong, you are weak. If you are an absolute asshole, you are ambitious. Strange times!

I guess it is better to define one's philosophy consciously in order to bring more awareness, more productivity, more success and more happiness. People change with time and there is no point in rigidly sticking to something. Our thoughts evolves and so our belief structure should be flexible and in sync with our true selves.

Whats mine? I want to find out. And I am sure it will keep evolving with time.
But here it goes anyway.
1. Love yourself. Be proud. Keep pushing yourself to what you want to be. Push but never let negativity get you. Keep loving yourself.
2. Respect time. Time once gone will never come back. This moment is all you will ever have. Act. Do. Live.
Don't wait. Waiting will make you older. Doing will make you feel younger. And wiser. So, prioritize and be a doer.
3. Keep in sync with nature. If you want to scream, scream. Dance when you want to. Sing out loud. If you are hungry, eat! Don't wait for lunch. Same with sleep. Listen to yourself. Let nature guide you.
4. Set goals. Very important. Getting better is good. Getting faster is better. Be SMART.
5. Open up. Make friends. Say hi to everyone possible. Wish them genuinely. Do good. Be good. And don't be afraid to make enemies. The fact is there are no saints around. Give everyone a chance. Then make them pay for it. Like I mentioned in point3, conflicting with your nature will only make you sad. Anger and Fear are powerful emotions but when used wisely, can bring happiness and success. Just think about it.

Unclutter thy mind

As I begin to write this post, at this very moment, I am unsure of what I will write next. There are so many things I want to say which in turn could be expressed in so many ways. What to say? How much to write? Where and how too phrase it? My temples throb violently and my brain gives small migraines every time I try to focus on something. These random uncontrolled voices in my head clutter my mind, paralyze my thinking and make me want to run away from it all every now and then. It is screwing my life.

I wonder what are the reasons for this annoyance. Is it because I think too much? Or is it because I act so little? Maybe because life is so full of external escapisms that I no longer use my brain as much as I need to. Perhaps, sitting in front of the computer, facebooking and surfing the internet whole day has royally screwed my minds ability to gather, sort, process and use whatever knowledge I accumulate.

Maybe somewhere down the line, we simply stop caring about our mind. As long as the money is coming in, as long as things are not 'that' badly screwed up, everything is fine. Really fine. Keep doing what you are doing and things shall fall in place, you say. But that voice doesnt die. It keeps reminding of all things that could be, should be, have to be. And you try to shut it down by engaging in some useless activity like watching television.

I guess the solution would be to unclutter your life by engaging in only those meaningful activities which mean something to you. Focus your energy on one thing at a time. Giving it your all by shutting down everything else at will. If something keeps popping up every now and then, maybe because it means something to you. Address it with the attention it deserves. Do something about it. Maybe that will leave you in some peace.

Ride the Wave

Since I had mentioned you some time back that I haven't had a cell phone my whole life, I think I should now let you know that I got a new one some time back. This post isnt really meant to brag about my cell but then, this phone doesn't really need any bragging.

4 months back, one fine day(evening rather), I began to hunt for a cellphone. I originally intended to purchase an android phone (Samsung Galaxy Spica) but Samsung had decided to discontinue the model to promote its own new OS- BADA. Now I don't know why Samsung has decided for its own proprietary OS because there are already some really good OS's out there in the market. Now to compete with the existing established phones, Samsung had to deliver BADA on a killer phone. And boy, did they deliver!

The Samsung Wave captures your attention the moment you see it. The 3.3'' super Amoled screen is truly one of a kind and brings a never seen before clarity on the mobile phone. Trust me, once you watch a video on the wave, no other phone will look good. Add to that the ability to play multiple video file formats(including avi and mkv), you can throw away all those tedious file conversion software.

The 5MP camera is excellent for not only does it click amazing high resolution pictures but also High-Definition (HD) videos. The photo editing software is quite self sufficient as well. The earphones too are of a very good quality.

The 1Ghz processor provides a really fast, super intuitive usability. All games run very smoothly without any hiccups. The multi-touch is quite fun to zoom into pictures and read ebooks. Multi-tasking is fantastic. Facebook sync and twitter sync allow you to merge your contact list with facebook and twitter (Not really for me this one, coz I hate twitter and didn't even have a fb account some time back). Nevertheless, these are really useful features which no other phone can boast of.

For any more features I have missed (I am sure I have), do please search on the net [:P]. The only thing stopping the phone to be called a dream-phone is the new and still developing BADA OS. Had the OS been some already established one like Android, this cell could have been a gift to mankind. But I like the BADA. There is no problem whatsoever yet. It does what it is supposed to quite well. As far as applications are concerned, they are pouring buckets of them everyday.

Anyways, the phone is gaining popularity every day now that Samsung has stopped producing it (From what I hear, they couldn't afford to sell the expensive super amoled screens at such a small cost). This is resulting in a wild rush on auction sites like ebay where people are willing to pay 22.5k for a secondhand wave(I bought my original at 18.5k)

As a first phone, this is exactly what I was looking for. Never imagined I would say this for a phone - I'm lovin it!

Hello Therapy

I read this article in 'Times Of India' some time back and liked it. This simple story below left some impression on me. So plz read it.

***

He often felt out-of-sorts, wanting to be left alone. Querulousness alternated with an urge to inflict violence. He visited an allopath, who threw out vague suspicions and ordered a battery of tests. All were normal. Other organs were tested and found normal, including that universal refuge of confused doctors, the brain. A friend scoffed, allo-shallow-pathy is bunk, and took him to a homeopath. The homeopath was a cadaveric individual who looked even more depressed than him and asked in a mournful, this-hurts-me-more-than-it-does-you kind of tone, highly personal questions that made him squirm. He asked about his aversions and his likes and how much coffee he drank. His reply that he couldn't live without coffee threw the homeopath off balance. He quickly scribbled something incomprehensible. A week later he felt no different.

Another friend introduced him to a naturopath. This guy made a frontal attack on his lifestyle and eating preferences. He made hostile comments about meat eating, alcohol and smoking and prescribed raw plants and bitter fruit. He cancelled ice cream, fries, pizzas, samosas, jalebis, mutton and chicken. The patient quickly left, stopping rebelliously at a wayside stall to have samosas and jalebis. He then looked in at McDonald's for a large order of fries and cola.

He walked into a park and sat down on a bench next to an old man reading MAD magazine. The old man looked up, smiled and said, "Hello, how are you?" So engaging was the smile and the greeting that he warmed to the man. He smiled back and returned the greeting. He offered fries and suddenly found himself talking about the magazine, about college, about himself, about his family and about his peculiar moods. The old man listened with great interest, undistracted and attentive. Finally, he said, "I don't know if this will help you, but try saying "hello" to everyone you meet. Give them a smile. Strangers, especially women are suspicious and often won't reciprocate. Might look right through you; don't worry. Don't let it stop you from saying hello and smiling. The mantra is 'People matter. Be happy. Communicate happiness to those around you'." I got it. Creating and extending warmth was the key. Bringing sunshine into someone's life would consequently illuminate your own.

***

The Elephant who didnt try long enough

The elephant was born somewhere in the dense forests of India. Home to thousands of wild animals with hills and streams and woods and plains. He enjoyed the wildness of the woods, where he could roam anywhere he wanted to, swim whenever he wished, eat whatever he liked. Life was good.

Until one day he was caught up by a group of hunters. He was still a baby elephant, shorter in height than even humans, when he got trapped. Next thing he knew, he was in a zoo with plenty of other animals but all of them caged like he was. Big strong chains anchored in the ground won't let him move. He tried with all his strength to free himself but he was too tiny and weak to uproot those shackles. He was young, lonely and frightened. Each day he tried to free himself up by using all of his strength but in vain. With each passing day he felt more and more hopeless and then finally one day he stopped trying.

Years later, this same elephant grew up to be a big strong sturdy healthy animal. His strength was at his peak and he could easily have freed himself up from those chains had he tried now. But he didn't. He had given up a long time ago. He had accepted his fate. Not that he was happy with it. He still wanted to get out of bonds but he didn't have the courage to try anymore. Plus there were other negative thoughts that bothered him now- What if he couldn't find his family? What if he wasn't accepted in the wild? What if he got caught again? He was afraid to disappoint himself once again. He had grown up to become timid and weak.

He passed away in the zoo at a very young age. Poor thing, he never tasted freedom. If only he had tried a little more, a little longer.

Happy Job Anniversary to me

It was a rainy day last year on the 1st of July when I made my way through a crowded bus to my first day at office. My first job. It was pouring cats and dogs, I was standing and suffocating inside the BEST bus but it didn't bother me much. I was more concerned about how the office would be. How and where I will work. How will the colleagues be. Who will sit next to me. And many many other questions.

But that was 1 year ago. Now we have finished 1 yr of office life. A whole year of work experience. Not much actually but hey its still a big number. 365 days. Would have been cool if the entire freshers batch who had joined with me could have celebrated it somewhere. But never mind.

A new freshers batch swarmed in the same day. Unlike our batch these one was big. And had quite a lot of girls. Our batch had only one. :(

We being seniors to them, got to interact with them in 1 small induction session on the second day. It felt good, those few minutes. Seeing their faces. Some nervous. Some bored. Some tired. Some anxious. The others, confused. I liked that picture. After some small talk and a few questions, it ended. We walked out with a smile on our face. Felt good at being seniors now.

Seniors :)

The Kite Runner was marvelous

Hello again. Long time since my last post. A month alright. Just couldn't gather the time to sit down and write something in peace.

Anyways its a really rainy day today. Its been raining for hours now and I am so pleased it was a Saturday so I didn't have to step out of home for anything. Wanted to do some shopping for rainy wear but I didn't. It can wait for some other day. Maybe tomorrow. I hate shopping anyways.

Got some time to indulge in reading. Finished 'The Kite Runner' by Khalid Hosseini just 20 minutes back. What an amazing story. So emotional and so riveting. Actually brings a lump to your throat. Do read it if you come across it and tell me if you like it.

That's it for now. Gotta sleep now. Bye.