BEING AND BECOMING

It's very easy to blame others, but it's most difficult to accept our own folly. Whatever we are facing today is our own making. No government or organization has come to Earth naturally. It is our wisdom or agreement which has established the institutions. Since institutions are failing, do we have courage to accept our own fault or we will continue blaming someone for our own miseries? Nobody helps unless one helps oneself. It's time to face the fact that our priority has never been health-care or education, except a few heroic acts of a few people. We live in a "culture of power", whereas becoming a doctor or teacher to serve the people is not a desirable goal. We love a culture of celebrity. And except few, celebrities are not interested in the suffering of poor people. We have Indian Idols, Cricket Idols, Political Idols, Bollywood Idols, but do we have a doctor idol, teacher idol, or  farmer idol? Do we value labour which makes our society possible? I know, ...

Yes, we are all concerned about survival. Survival for whom from what? Survival for the human's species from a virus, which seems to be too subtle but lethal to outsmart human's self-glorified intelligence. We often belive about ourself as the highest intelligence ever evolved on the planet with a unique capacity to imagine and transcend beyond the limited dimension of time and space. But when it comes to a crisis like this our response seems to be orthodox, presumptuous, uncontrollable, and outdated. We the human species are the self-proclaimed prophets of progress and rationality. We are, in fact, too selfish to see and experience the life beyond a human's skin. Earth, for us, is not a beautiful garden for aesthetic of existence, rather it is a place for opportunities to get enmeshed in bafflement of narcissistic dreams and aspirations. Life for us is not about feeling its fragrance in totality but a challenge to conquer extrapolated enemies. Death is feared by us even th...

What is life? This question has huge significance to understand the nature of death. Life is merely an abstraction or it is genuinely true? Life is certainly more than thought or consciousness. For example, a tree doesn't have thought to ponder upon its own existence, even though it is an example of life, or an animal like cat is not concerned with what is state of existence, except for a few basic needs, it moves on and plays the game what we the humans know as life. So to say that life is merely a consciousness is not a truthful statement. Life is a movement or it  resides in inertia as well? This question may be investigated only after looking at any inert matter. But the question may be asked is there anything which may be nominalised as inert-matter? Inside every inert-matter there is a chaotic order between various opposite forces. The centripetal and centrifugal forces are at work. Every dead thing is a dwelling place for life. Just like our house, which is occupied by vario...

Baruch de Spinoza was a Dutch philosopher considered one of the great rationalists of 17th century philosophy, along with Descartes. (Spinoza) : God would say: Stop praying. What I want you to do is go out into the world and enjoy your life. I want you to sing, have fun and enjoy everything I've made for you. Stop going into those dark, cold temples that you built yourself and saying they are my house. My house is in the mountains, in the woods, rivers, lakes, beaches. That's where I live and there I express my love for you. Stop blaming me for your miserable life; I never told you there was anything wrong with you or that you were a sinner, or that your sexuality was a bad thing. Sex is a gift I have given you and with which you can express your love, your ecstasy, your joy. So don't blame me for everything they made you believe. Stop reading alleged sacred scriptures that have nothing to do with me. If you can't read me in a sunrise, in a landscape, in the look of you...

Nothing is so fresh about language. It's noisy, symbolic, empty, ritualistic, discriminatory, but useful. It's meant for pragmatic use, misuse, and abuse. I wonder in what language a mountain communicates with the sky? And in what symbol a tree expresses love towards existence? They may have communication system, though unfathomable from the perspective of our ritualistic and habitual symbols. Enlightenment thinkers like Kant or Rousseau emphasized upon reason and logic as the basis to differentiate between anthropocentric worldview and the rest of the world of animals and plants. I find, language is the point of departure from the world of animals, whereas one appears to be a speaking animal, creating a life of symbols, by which things are claimed, justified, rationalized in symbols. For the purpose of discourses, language and its signification are pre-conditions for a symbolic world. On the other hand, rest of the world, as it seems to be, is living in the moment without bein...

Genuine questions deserve the name question otherwise every sentence organized with a question mark doesn't deserve to be labelled as questions. I often get puzzled to see many ideas are floating around without its relationship to any genuine question. Do we have any question to ponder up? Or we want to avoid questions? The first question begins with who is thinker? I am a thinker or a bundle of thoughts? I am thinking or my society and my history is thinking? Thinker thinks in language or thinker is capable to perceive the truth beyond any language? Isn't possible that we the human species live around the world of language, its structure and signification? Isn't it possible that our world is symbolic and idealistic? We as thinkers live in the language and express in the language. Language is the limitation of our world as Wittgenstein argued. Or to say so, our world is a binary reality, consisting of a world like any other animal, who has certain basic instincts, and also ...

Portrait of Lao Tzu who is believed to be a founder of Taoism. A teacher and his student were passing near a village, whereas a few people were quarreling for a piece of land. Teacher asked his disciple, "What is the source of conflict"? Student answered, "It must have origin in some misunderstanding". "Misunderstanding of what, asked the teacher? Student answered, "It has its genesis in ego. Especially, when a person feels he is too important a subject that the whole universe must serve his ends". And this sense of self-importance must have its origin, asked the teacher? Student replied, "Ego-centric life is a part of human's culture, which is nurtured and cultivated like a truth. As if, individuation is a quintessential necessity for life and freedom".  Teacher was interested to go further in that interesting dialogue. He asked further, "What happens in a quarrel like this? Should one avoid indulgence in a duet like this when a pe...

अक़्सर लोग कहा करते हैं सकारात्मक बातें करो। सब कुछ अच्छा हो जाएगा! पर सब कुछ अच्छा होना भी नकारात्मकता की निशानी है। दुनिया में क्या अच्छा है और क्या बुरा है इसका फैसला किस पैमाने पर होता है? अच्छाई-बुराई तो नज़र और नजरिये का खेल मालूम पड़ता है। नैतिकता का जन्म अनैतिकता के माने हुए पैमाने के साथ हुआ होगा वरना नैतिकता की पहचान कैसे की जा सकती है। जैसे मानव ने अपने दुःख को सार्थकता देने के लिए पंथो की स्थापना की। ईश्वर की परिकल्पना की। जन्म-पुनर्जन्म की बातें की गई। आख़िर में हम नकरात्मक पक्ष से डरते क्यों है? और अक़्सर इसे रात की संज्ञा देते हैं। वही रात जिसके आगोश में हम चैन की नींद सोते हैं। और भला पूरे दिन के लिये ऊर्जा का स्रोत क्या है? दुनिया की हर एक सच्चाई के दो पहलू मालूम पड़ते हैं। जब तक हम उजाले को ही सिर्फ़ सच मानते रहेंगे, सच्चाई से दूर ही रहेंगे। हर पक्ष का विरोधाभासी पक्ष है। जो पक्ष-विपक्ष से दूर होना चाहता है वो भी एक पक्ष के साथ है। और हमेशा एक ही पक्ष के साथ रहेगा इसे पुख्ता तौर पर कहा नहीं जा सकता। सच तो यही है कि बदलाव एक मात्र सच है। जिसे मुट्ठी में क़ैद करने की हिमाकत करन...

What is violence if it is not a self-inflicting cruelty? What is hatred if it is not a limitation of ego? What is terrorism if it is not an ignorance at its height? What is jealously it it is not an imaginary anxiety? What is cruelty if it is not disguised in desire of power? What is abuse if it is not a misunderstanding about our real-self? What is education if it eclipses the question about who am I? What is love if it doesn't concern with the reverence of life? What is religion if it is lost in dogmatic rituals?  What is society if individuals are suspicious about each-other?  What is justice if it is not for a weak? What is peace if it is imposed by the conditions of law?

Descartes once said doubt everything to have the firm ground of knowledge. So I doubt the conception of Man; Here I am ignoring the concern of gender neutrality with respect to word. What is the essence of man, then? A biological entity evolved in the scale of history to have the capacity to think and also a capacity to think about thinking, and infinite progression or regression goes on. What is thinking, if I ask a question? Thinking is all about language, its structure, and image. What is language but the symbol to represent the experience. What is experience? If it is an isolated event or shared by many dead and alive beings? I think, no experience is uniquely fresh. It has its genesis in the history and which is shared by all the creatures, irrespective of evolutionary differences. Whether man is different from animal? Yes, some differences but much similarities. Physiological and psychological differences are obvious. But man lives in the future more than present. Man is essentia...

शब्द कहाँ हैं उचित भला जो प्रकृति के ज़ज्बात को क़ैद कर ले  फ़िर भी कुछ तो कहना है, कुछ बातें करनी है बात करने को भला बाकी क्या रहा है अब एक ख़ामोशी है इस शाम के ढ़लते सूरज में और एक उम्मीद की किरण  जो किसी के संसार को सुबह की रौशनी प्रदान कर रही होगी एक हम ही हैं उच्च किस्म के विकासवादी आदम  जो दिन के उजाले को क़ैद करना चाहता है अपनी तिजोरी में ताकि रात का मंज़र ना देखना पड़े! पर रात और दिन बस देखने का फ़र्क है उजाले बेवजूद हैं काली स्याह के बगैर अब किसी एक को चुनना तो नासमझी ही होगी। चुनाव का मतलब है असमंजस सत्य विलीन है हर एक कल्पना में  धरती पे नज़र गड़ा के देखो हर जगह जीवन करतब कर रहा है इसके लिए किसी यान की नहीं दृष्टि की आवश्यकता है जो है तो सबके पास पर उपयोग के बिना आंखे वही देखती है जिसे दिखाया जाता है

सोचते क्यों हो कि आएगी एक दिन नई नवेली सुबह जब पत्तों का रंग एक ही होगा  मानों धरा की बसंती चाह जैसे किसी मानव ने ली यह सोच कर वैराग्य कि हो जाएगा एक दिन ईश्वर से साक्षात्कार वो दिन, कौन सा दिन, पहचानोगे भला कैसे कि इसी दिन की थी दरकार और ईश्वर भी अगर मिल जाएंगे कोई भँवरा बन बगिया में तुम भला जानोगे कैसे कि इसी ईश्वर की थी चाह आज अभी-अभी कुछ बीत गया और नवीन क्या पाओगे जिस सवेरे की चाह में निकले थे उसे हर घड़ी अपने ही आँगन में पाओगे जिस ज्ञान की चाह में बुद्ध लिए संन्यास उसी ज्ञान को कबीर ने किया  गृहस्थ में आत्मसात दूर-सुदूर की बातें और क्या मानव-मन की तृष्णा है जैसे मणि की खोज में मृग कितने पंथों में भटका है