Unique is this tithi!

 The Shrawan Krushna Ashtami is indeed unique. Want to know why? This happens to be the tithi, the day according to the lunar calendar prevalent in India, when Lord Krishna and Sant Dnyandev were born.

Unique indeed are both of them. As the Bhakti Marg or the Bhakti Panth paves the path, let us follow it and proceed from the concrete to the abstract. So let us first appreciate the greatness of Sant Dnyaneshwar. 

In my opinion, he is literally everything a human being can ever be. He is a great poet, a superb philosopher, a wonderful thinker. He revived, in fact, initiated in a way, Marathi. He brought to the commonest man the great knowledge cooped up in impossible modes of  thinking and being. He changed thus the very social structure. Great every which way!

And all this when he was in his teens! He took samadhi  when he was just twenty-one! Yet his achievements are such that many people would need many lifetimes to attain one tenth of these! Worst of all is the fact that he was harassed like hell all along. Yet he survived, and in the most positive way possible, and in the process, energised  the  very society and its mode of thinking and being. Most motherly was his kind mode, moreover.

The brightest of the brilliant and the best of best he was. Yet he was treated worse than the worst. That never made him bitter though. Instead, he uplifted an entire way of thinking, living, being! He could make a dull animal recite the greatest Vedas to prove the unity of being. He thus lived the concepts, the precepts he preached. Simply superb!

Shri Krishna, too, is extremely interesting as a deity, a divine concept. Right from the moment he is born till his last breath, he has to constantly face utmost difficulties and the biggest problems. Horrible are the hurdles that are consciously created in his path, his own Mama trying to kill him as a baby, as a child, as a teenager. We all know the way his father ferried him across the Yamuna in spate, the Putana Mavashi, the Kaliya, and so on, and so on! Difficulties never cease for him.

Yet he never ever loses either his cool nor his smile. He knows, moreover, how to find a positive way out of an impossible situation. Forever creative in his thinking, he always manages to uplift every possible reject of each possible variety, animals to zealots!

Most importantly, he never wastes time fighting or answering back the vicious. He just lets himself be, does the best in the worst context, and thus wins life itself. His sense of humour and his love of life in all its forms never ever waver. Absolutely endearing and enriching concept of divinity, right?

Well, I can go on and on and on. Almost write a book on each of them, and yet not get done! Both of them, however, prioritised the best way. Better to follow them thus, right? Let both of them abide ever in our lives!

Pratima@Both of them always leave the choice open. They never impose any thought processes nor any compulsions of  so-called purity on anyone. May be, that is why these great souls appear comfortably adaptable to every shallow sect that hardly follows their spirit though!

Food Fares! (or Food Fair)?!?!

 Currently, the world nutrition week is on. Yes, food sure needs celebration. No, I am not going to quote the Bhagwad Geeta which describes in detail the process of "annad bhawati ..". In brief, though, I do admit that the equation between the food and the very being is quite ancient as any religious text can prove beyond doubt.

In fact, the world over-n-across, there is an obsession with food. Oh, no, I am not talking about the so-called " khau gallies" every two/three tier city, too, is brimming with. In fact, in mini metros like Pune proliferate so many eateries and "khau gallies" with dedicated foodie clientele that often people wonder if cooking food at home is no longer the norm nor the fashion/passion!

Beyond such taste-bud(die)s, on the menu, we have endless discussions of food. Books, articles, social sites, blogs, vlogs, YouTube, and so on are overflowing with debates and discussions regarding niche food, namely, food for brain, diet for arthritis, food to avoid any amnesia, dementia, Alzheimer's, sago-n-ragi for seniors, and so on. Oh, no, not to forget the food for furry friends!

Equally the rage is the cult food! Sects such as the Bramha Kumari gang have this fad about 'satvik' food that only their blessed prepare as pure. Actually, to put it mildly, it is so bland that its lack of taste can make anybody 'tamasik', and running fast toward some inn or a dhaba for a 'dabba'/lunch box!

Yet another craze (quite literally!) is the food for depression. Actually, along with a good brunch and dinner on time with a simple neurobion and a banana twice a day with a tall glass of an apple-cum-beet root-lemon juice should suffice! 

But chefs and psychologists must survive, too! So the boom of lazy bums, whose grandparents worked horribly hard so as to produce brilliant sons who would make lots of money so that GenX or Z or whatever can comfortably idle around, all along feeding on fad (actually, fab) food!

Indeed, currently nutrition week type Tedex Talk to shallow prattle about food is such a buzz that forget Chapter XVIII of the Bhagwad Geeta on three food types, most all so froth and salivate at the mouth that there is hardly any food for thought!

Pratima@Given such near total lack of fair brain fare, it is not wonder that farmlands are mere fodder for debates and riots!

Teachers' Day!

 Teaching

 Earnestly!

Answering

Contentedly!

Heartily!

Equalising 

Ramifications!

Dedicated

Are teachers

Year-long!

Happy Teachers' Day!

Pratima@ Teachers perform yeoman duties./Learners' lives thus filled with bounties!

Animal Form!

 Aai-Papa encouraged us a lot when it came to reading. No wonder, I was an avid fan of the Aesop's fables, and the Panchatantra. As children, that fantasy world is highly appealing, like Alice's adventures  in the impossibly probable wonderland. Yet the animal forms linger forever in our mind.

As we grow old, we realise that the animal forms are actually from the human world. So the bunny rabbit is never merely shy. Nor is he the timid one worried about the falling sky. He is also somebody horribly sure of himself, and hence degrading others. Well, this animal form we meet repeatedly in the real world rabbit, eh, rat race!

The other animal forms met equally regularly, if not oftener, are the wicked wolf, the dodging fox, the cute but crafty cat, the fence-sitting bat, the shrewd and dangerous serpent in the grass, and so on. 

The most difficult ones to meet in the public space are the regal lion, and the shy fawns. Yet in our private familial space, they are the regulars as wonderful parents caring for you as if they are the king, without nary a worry.  That forever protection lingers a lifetime, even when they are no more. Similarly, the gentle grace of a shy fawn is the sister who  continues to be the (s)cared little one who    needs a generous hand-holding.

Given such animal form(s) from both the real and the fictional world, no wonder, George Orwell thought of the Animal Farm as a parable of human foibles, and, most importantly as a political allegory, exposing the grand failure called the Russian Revolution. In brief, animal wor(l)ds matter the most!

Pratima@ "I could turn and live with animals,"  said Walt Whitman. Read his  "Songs of Myself", especially No. 32, and the entire argument would resonate with you.

Sports Special

 Are sports special? Indeed, yes! Why? Well, most people are busy playing games, right? No, I am NOT referring to the stupid addictive computer/mobile games. They are truly dangerous. Life threatening, however, are the games people play, especially for mastery/control over others.

Such games have a huge variety. The most well-known is playing the victim card. Such people are great at blaming the circumstances and/or the other people for their difficulties. They choose to ignore that they never play by the simple rule, 'we make our destinies', and hence we continue to play it passionately, however many might be the blocks and hurdles on the way. 

The other game is sado-masochistic. "I am the king, you are the pawn; you better me obey, or you are gone," is the motto of such 'master' players. Often their behaviour is passive-aggressive. Eternally, they are playing the cat-mouse game with the often hapless, at times willing, victim/other.

The collective games people play are quite crazy, too. In my blog yesterday, I referred to one such viciously dangerous game, the cult craze! It is a horrible mind game, and better be beware of such brain-washing.

There can be healthy games, too. The "you win; I, too, win" game is the best supportive, creative mode which does not make "any one" suffer! Similarly, team togetherness is yet another winning match. People who respect others, and self, prefer such win-all strategies.

The so-called actual games, however, are no longer sports. For one thing, they are hyper professional. They are, moreover, excessively competitive, and are market- and monies-driven. Look at the gentlemen's game to understand the circus! Yet another example could be the cultural fests such as 'manglagaur games' which capitalise on the traditional venture(s) factor. 

 The heady but dangerous mix of these with the 'favourite club or preferred  national team' feel is a volatile match that George Orwell discussed most explosively a century ago! Let us not practise what he preached against very vocally. 

Well, when World Cup or Olympic Games are imminent, better that we wake up to all such ugly realities, weed them out, and let the real winning spirit, 'may the best player/team enjoy his/her/their day!", be the motto. Sports would truly be special then!

Pratima@ An honest win is ninety per cent genuine efforts and ten per cent luck! 

Cult Cruelties

 Sure you have heard of cults. Remember in Delhi (and there have been many such parallels, multiple such examples across the length and breadth of our country), an entire family believed that some "baba" , or some such creepy crazy control freak, talked to one of them, and an entire family was ruined, destroyed? 

Cults are indeed dangerous. How? Why? Well, to begin with, why is their communication secret? Mystique? Why is not it open like the very air we breath? Why is it necessary that their message does not jell with the humane decencies, normal practices?

Next, why do they need to deny the parallel established realities? Why the rejection of the simple joys of life? Why the belief  that they alone, their practices and rituals alone are pure? Is it not a new caste system? Why does a cult need to deny the mainstream realities? To build a parallel sultanate?

It is very interesting that such cults want their own empires. Obviously these are very much rooted, mired in money matters as well. A genuine prayer does not need any rituals. If the rituals of the established religion are a horror, how can the sick silly rituals of some sect be okay?

Sects take advantage of simple people, tired with the disappointments, difficulties and distresses of a tough life. Cults feed such sincere souls with ominous mumbo-jumbo such as 'the end of life is near', 'there is a flood of depression', et al kind of  sheer nonsense.

 For depression, there are very many non-chemical (shocks are given in shitty Bollywood films alone!) transformative therapies! And, yes, Nature has the power to regenerate itself, however much human-beings may  destroy it. 

Sovereign sects would not suggest such simple, creative, positive alternatives. Instead, they would use scientific sounding half truths, actually  falsehoods, which beguile the thinking power, the intelligence of the innocent. These sects, moreover, use subtle hypnotism. Their auto-suggestion mode is apparently very individualistic, highly personalised. That is deeply deceptive and dangerous.

Actually, being a devotee in a sect  is an addiction, too, almost as bad as drinks, doing drugs or silly computer games that flood the market. Such sects subtly control straightforward people who are either overcoming a trauma or are actually silently calling out for support and love.

Following a sect is, honestly, committing spiritual suicide. Everybody around must understand the subtle call for help of the so-called devotee. These devotees are a danger not only to themselves, but to the entire family and community.

The cult devotee mindset is no different from the mental state of a jihadi who has been so indoctrinated that he/she is ready to do anything to follow the orders of the supremo, however much the supremo and his minions ill-treat, debase the devotee, use him/her for all the donkey work!

Funny it is that the cult devotees would not do such duties at home, for the near and dear ones, for the extended family! Most uncritically, however, they would accept and practice any nonsense which they vehemently deny in the established religion. Actually, they are deceiving themselves. Or, may be, they are consciously choosing to be deceived!?!

Cults ARE cruel and crude control mechanisms. A human being must never ever give up on the thinking self . Suppose, a cult tells me that accepting Prasad is bad, then i must, not even deeply logically, but simply question why the cult is creating its own ways of its own Prasad, its own exclusionary rituals, right? 

Jihad of any variety, whatever nice name it may carry,  IS a horror, and must be avoided. A life simply and honestly lived is much better than  being a gilded but trapped bird who believes that it has flown out of, away from some  imaginary cage! Birds need neither cages, nor traps. The sky is indeed the limit, however small be the flight of delicate wings, and, yes, there is always a normal simple succour for every beak!

Pratima@"Following a cult is a nice way of saying that very few people like you," says Martin Muis!😀

The Dog Devotion

 The dog, in my opinion, is indeed god as the anagram (to be very specific, anadrome) of the word reads. There can never be any other animal that is as patient, tolerant, and yet deeply loving. A dog loves, believes the master from the heart, from its very soul.

A cat, too, loves from the soul, etc. A cat's love, however, is restricted only to herself, her comforts, her preferences, etc etc and etc as it is always she, she and she alone that matters the most. Absolutely self-centred a cat is. I should know!

 Despite our maid's protestations, she was of the opinion that I should throw the as yet blind kitten in the dustbin, I was firm that I would allow the kitten a fair chance at life even when her mother had abandoned her.

Aai was not exactly okay with that decision either. She let the kitten be though. Till the kitty turned a super healthy eight months old cat,  she was so used to us, her humans, that she was hugely surprised when she first saw a cat.

Thereafter it was her catty world though. She would allow me to pet her at her decided hour, and as much as she wanted. After the allotted time got over, she would just jump away. Why, she was even irritated with her own kittens if they bothered her a bit too much.

A dog, on the contrary, is selfless love. The owner may ill-treat him, not feed him on time, not bathe him, not take care of him, and yet the dog would continue to love the master. Even after months of extreme  crude and rude behaviour, one gentle caress or call from the master, he would limp and run to greet the master.

Does that mean that dogs lack self-respect? No way! A dog sulks like anything, is upset hugely if the crook of a cruel, heartless master ignores, disrespects, ill-treats him. Basically, however, he has too huge a heart and too gentle a soul to hold a grudge.  A dog is truly large-hearted, and forgiving. Almost like parents or generous siblings.

Dogs, therefore,  do deserve a day devoted and dedicated to this unique species. There is something noble about the animal that is reflected in literature as well, whether high-minded or populist. Remember Homer? Or the 'famous five' series, for that matter?

Here is wishing that human behaviour as human beings is more and more like a dog's, devoted and divine!

Pratima@Behave well with an animal. It would sure reciprocate, and a dog, the utmost.