Writing is a quest, a journey, which flowers and flourishes on the pathways of silence. I welcome you to be a part of my quest, my journey as a poet and writer. I hope you enjoy it and it enriches your own quest and journey as a writer and as a human being.
We often hear such gratifications / consolations when there are talks about injustice to women ....
Sometimes, they are also used to caution / discourage a successful lady, steadily progressing on her chosen path, urging her to be "satisfied" with her share of achievements .... The reasons behind such discouragements can be very many that may even be too difficult to decipher immediately, but there is a clear, definite oversight to the sense of duty, commitment or necessity that prompts the lady to work towards perfection / excellence and resulting success ....
Plight Of Womanhood ....
Continued Refusal To Learn From Past,
To Change For Good ....
How Long, How Far .... ??!!
The Plight Of Sita .... ".... Prove Yourself ...."
Draupadi's Ordeal .... The Worst Insult Of Womanhood Right In Front Of Elders And Distinguished, Respected Courtiers ....
Perceptions Steer Relationships - In Professional As Well As Personal Life .... Clarity; Focus On Merits, Principles And Objectives Of Common, Higher Interests Is Essential ....
Perceptions Steer Relationships - In Professional As Well As Personal Life .... Clarity And Focus On Merits, Principles And Objectives Of Common, Higher Interests Is Essential ....
Judgments have more to do with the person who judges
Than with the person who is being judged.
Sometimes, the shortcomings or drawbacks
Which we think others have
Are the reflections of
Our own drawbacks in them.
So, whenever, one feels that
The other person lacks so and so,
Instead of worrying about that person,
One should check one’s own self first.
- Vanita Thakkar (04-06-1991 - from my old diary)
Superimposition of one's own fault on someone else to justify one's possessiveness to one's preferences, is an example of one of the "Klesha"s (afflictions) described in the Patanjal Yoga Sutra (classical text on Yoga by Sage Patanjali), which creates havoc in administrative systems as well as relationships ....
In administrative systems, focus on Merits and Principles is essential and in relationships, Love is the essence.
- Vanita Thakkar (21-08-2017)
Life begins as a quest of the child for the man, and ends as a journey by the man to rediscover the child.
Madness literally would mean an unstable mental condition. However, due to the discrepancies that tend to creep into civilized social life on a mass scale, in the name of traditions or behaviours that go out of tune with the dynamics of changes / progress with time, circumstances and necessities of prevailing ecosystems, certain abnormalities assume the label of normality and vice versa.
A book of parables and poems by the great Khalil Gibran is titled - The Madman. It begins with this interesting parable, in which he describes how he became a madman .... He says he woke up one day, long before many gods were born, from a deep sleep and found that all his masks were stolen. The seven masks that he said he had fashioned and worn in seven lives were stolen. He says, he ran maskless through the crowded streets shouting, "Thieves, thieves, the cursed thieves !!" Men and women laughed at him and some ran into their houses out of fear of him. And when he reached the market place, a youth standing on a house-top cried, "He is a madman." He says, as he looked up to behold the youth, the sun kissed his own naked face for the first time and that his soul was inflamed with love for the sun and he no longer wanted any masks. He cried, as if in a trance, "Blessed, blessed are the thieves that stole my masks." And thus he became a madman. Then he writes, "And I have found both freedom and safety in my madness; the freedom of loneliness and the safety from being understood, for those who understand us enslave something in us. But let me not be too proud of my safety. Even a Thief in a jail is safe from another thief."
Commitment as Madness ....
Firm commitment is also looked upon as madness. But the fairness of purpose is important here.
Here, I am reminded of the great martyrs who laid down the lives for noble causes, such as the freedom struggle of India. Two days are celebrated as Shaheed Divas (Martyr's Day) in India to gratefully remember supreme scarifies of martyrs of Indian Freedom Struggle. 30th January is the martyrdom day of Mahatma Gandhi. The Mahatma was assassinated on 30th January, 1948 when he was returning from his evening prayers. 23rd March is the Martyrdom Day of three young Freedom Fighters of India - Shaheed Bhagat Singh, Shaheed Rajguru and Shaheed Sukhdev, who were hanged to death on 23rd March, 1931 for killing the English policeman who was behind the death of the great Indian Freedom Fighter Lala Lajpat Rai ....
One who truly loves his / her mother never even thinks of insulting anybody else's mother. So it is with one's love for one's motherland and one's religion. We need to recognize the ugly face of nasty power games - non-violence is not synonymous to cowardice, nor is a thoughtless, greed-inspired act of brutality or crookedness anywhere close to being bravery or manliness.
There can be no justifications for wrong means adopted for fulfilling "right" goals. A thief has the good intentions of making himself and his family prosperous. That does not justify his wrong actions. Colonialism was inspired by "good intentions" of serving one's country at the cost of destroying the identity and fundamental human rights of another country / countries .... Means and ends cannot be separated. Wrong means adopted for "right intentions" is a lame, and on a large scale, a dangerous and cruel excuse.
There is hardly anything "fair" in and about wars and anything "unfair" cannot be love. We need to recognize and understand the absurdity and reckless incivility in the thought - "Everything is fair in love and war."
Shaheed Bhagat Singh - the martyr who laid down his life for the freedom of India ....
