The Floating Leaf at peace

If you ever read my blog archive, you'd find that there are three or four posts with the same title, mostly wrestling with whether I need to live in the present or plan with the future in mind. The wrestling has always been taking place in the back of my mind, even when I don't write about it, but for the past 3-4 months, it has settled a lot toward focusing on the present. Wise words from a kurta-clad friend helped me feel at peace with this new development. 

If you've read/watched the "The Way of the Peaceful Warrior", (and if you haven't, I strongly suggest you do) you'd remember the philosophy of 'staying in the present'. Everything that matters is right now. Obviously, I fell in love with the philosophy when I heard it and some of you who know me would say that I tend to go overkill this one. I have always felt an existential ease with the process, and I have been the most productive when I am at peace with the uncertainty of the future, and even now, I feel that I may not have many regrets, if I get the chance to grow old and look back at my life. 

But even when I make it my purpose to work one day at a time, there are times I tend to get thrown off this philosophical horse. Mostly it's because of the overflowing emotions that I am learning to control. The first one is obviously panic. When I suddenly lift my eyes toward the future and have the swirling mist blind me and the well-meant yet discourgaging voices of those I trust and respect, I tend to lose focus on the present and begin to worry about the tomorrow, and at the end of the day, get frustrated with how I've handled the past, leading to this horrible vicious cycle that throws me into this rut making me unproductive and useless. 

The second, and more subtle (and therefore more vicious) way I lose control is to count chickens. When everything is going right with the present, I guess it's human nature to project the graph toward the future and imagine the future. The future; what was once a misty void now seems to be a paradise. The danger with this thinking that comes so naturally to us is the amount of happy hormones wishful thinking releases, making us not want to get out of that happy world. The moment we begin to count chickens, however, we tend stop working toward the goal we projected so beautifully. (To be clear, this is different for those of you who work with a dream in hand. Who work toward something you desire and overcome the odds to achieve the utopia in your head.) It does take intense effort on my part to stay focussed on being as useful as possible in the present. 

Well, just an update on the floating leaf: more to come :)

Focus outward

Like I mentioned in floating leaf 3, it does get unsettling when people all around tend to wonder 'what you're going to do after graduation', and more often than not, I was tempted to put this meme up on facebook!

The last few months have been quite difficult for me in this regard, filled with this gnawing question; what am I supposed to do with my life? Where is that hole in the world that I'm supposed to fit in? Where is my niche? I have looked at many possibilities, and have turned most of them down. I have spent sleepless nights pondering and praying as to whether I say 'yes' to this offer, or is that one better. 

While I went through this, there were so many friends who were there to support me emotionally and spiritually, and sometimes give me sound advise. This is also a shout-out of thanks to you all. 

Two years in a cloistered environment like a Theological Institute makes you soft in the head. You tend to somehow close your eyes to things that happen around you, and that lack of looking outward makes you focus on yourself more than anything else. And that's how you become self-pitying and pathetic, and that pushes you into depression and frustration. Three weeks at home, and I begin to look outward again; at people with difficult life-styles, friends who work things out the hard, but right way; I look at life in general, with all its bright colours and highlighted by rough jaded patches, and the moment I take your eyes off myself, everything falls into focus.

And once again, everything is clear. I've been asking the wrong questions. It's not "what should my career be like?" but "what should I do right now that will make a difference right now?". He will take care of the rest. 

Happy New Year!

Here I am, writing my first post this year. And I have a 3000 word assignment that is due in 23 hours! Shocking? Well, I do this all the time. Experience in JNU hasn't helped either. It's interesting, how one craves for college life when he works, and craves for work life when he is in college! Knowing that I just have two more months at SAIACS has started working on the tectonic plates of my psyche; and I'm gearing myself to work my head off once again. 

The Floating Leaf moves on into another phase. What is it going to be this time? Publishing? Advocacy? Social Work? Education? I'm not sure yet, but as the spectator of my own life, I'm at the edge of my seat!

Home

It's a strange thing. When you want to post on your blog, you never get around doing it. But when you want to write your assignment due in 4 hours, you get the strongest urge to blog. Why is it always this way? While this may be a sign of unproductivity, laziness and lack of discipline, it at least makes for one more good post!

Home. Where the suitcases are. Where my family is. Where I belong. Right now, Home is H-68, Trivandrum. It changes every 3 to 5 years. It has been that way since I was a kid. While everybody wants to go back to their own hometown for vacation because they miss the familiar surroundings, and the climate and the smells and the familiar friends, where everybody knows them. But for me, the place is not as familiar as the hostel I'm staying in right now. I don't have friends my age there. It is not the best place for a holiday. 

But right now, sitting alone in a class-room, trying to focus my mind on the assignment, my mind wanders around. I am alone. Everyone have somehow finished their assignments, and are having fun together, while I am still alone in the class. But I never ever ever feel lonely. I still feel I am safe, and secure; not just because of the assurance of Divine company, but also because of a family back home, waiting for me. While I may not have the greatest urge to get there right now, just the thought of my family brings me a sense of remote community; in spite of the fact that I do not call them often enough, or even email them. 

Thank You, all at home! For just being there!

Lots of Love

The Blog Evangelist

In a couple of days, I might actually get a new blog convert; a fine respite to my own ever-increasing disinterest, marked by the increasingly boring posts that you see popping up. If you're at my blogsite for the first time, and if you are a friend of mine, you would go to the years 2008 and 09 where I've actually written something worth reading! 

But back to blog-converts...

Ever since I started my blog in the year 2006, I've managed to tell a few select people about it, and those I did, I persuaded to start ones of their own. Some are defunct, while others are going strong! The peppy linguists' blog was started, and so did Parul's and Mahim's; the angry old man's blog revived, and now, there'll be a new one! 

I'll post and tweet the link as much as I can! I'm sure this new writer will be awesome too!!! 

Words

It's been a while since I've posted, and I thought I'd resume my post with a few updates, for those of you who read my blog to know what's up with me.
I'm still in Theological college, doing hopefully my final year here. I can study for one more year if I want to. I'm not sure what I want to do with my life actually. If any one of you out there who think I might be of help in your enterprise/organization, let me know. I am pretty good when it comes to computers and writing. Though I can keep good inter-personal relationships, I'm horrible at public speaking. As long as you work for justice and equity, I'm all ears!
Ok. that's it for the CV.
Right now, I'm reading a book on Trauma and Recovery; and I'm finding it very difficult to read it. It talks about how fragile the human mind is, and how it can be irreversibly broken by traumatic events or human atrocity. The psychological damage a rape victim, or a car-crash survivor, or a soldier that has seen battle goes through is immense, and though the the symptoms are more or less unseen, the cause is like a huge iceberg under the person's conscious being.
And an insensitive word, or a loose remark can actually create havoc in that person's mind; that the person could even drown in depression for days... And in today's world, there are more people than not that have experienced trauma; more likely because of domestic violence or child-abuse or rape or war, as opposed to being victim to a tsunami, or an earthquake.
While my close friend and inspiration, the Angry Old Man would shake his fist at the system, and fight to make sure abusers and war-mongerers are never born, I, being a little more passive; would watch out for those that need help, and try and help make right emotionally, mentally and spiritually the wrong that has been done to them. 

Trip to NE Post 1 Train Ride

The journey, though hot and tiring, was peppered with lots of fun and jokes.

This is the post you've all been waiting for! about the awesome adventure trip to NE!, well, technically, just Nagaland, with a longish stop-over at Guwahati. Nonetheless, the trip was awesome, not just as an adventure trip, but a learning experience in culture, language and err... travel-planning.

The train journey was 'AWESOME' Barney Stinson style. We had earlier booked Sleeper-Class tickets via apparently the 'only' train from Bangalore to Dimapur. It stopped at 70 odd stations! 3 days n 2 nights! But thankfully we had amazing co-passengers.
I remember, in the movie Spy Game, Robert-Redford tells Brad Pitt that cigarettes are the best ice-breaker. I was thrilled to know that the best ice-breaker in any sleeper-class compartment is a full deck of cards. I realized that almost 99% males in our lovely country knows how to handle a deck of cards. We spend 4 to 6 hot hours playing Bluff, Rummy and Donkey. We got to know the co-passengers, a bunch of Assamese laborers in Bangalore. Fun, honest and soft-spoken to the point of being coy. My friend and I, two average South Indians, with a loud sense of humor seemed like aggressive North Indians next to them.
 Another bunch of co-passengers, some Thangkul Bible College students also provided us directions to get around NE, and good suggestions about where to go and what to eat.