Editorial note 2020

Once again the new year wishes resound all around. Once again there is positive charge in the air. People wishing each other the best. Good vibes pervades our being. This is yet another amazing moment. 

It is more than a decade of blogging for me now.  A decade of an avid readership following and liking the simplest things in life; poetry, music, writings, art and the inspirational vibes that touch the heart.

Readership extended to countries like United States, India, Russia, Germany, France, Ukraine, Portugal, Latvia and United Kingdom. I thank all my readers for their valuable feedback and encouraging  support from the bottom of my heart. 

One thing that universally comes out from the myriad responses received from the readers all across the world is that how people across cultures, ethnicities and religions yearn for accumulating treasures of the heart. Accumulating treasures of the heart may not bring material gains but it certainly enrich your soul and nourish your inner self. This leads to expiation of karma and suffuse you with a feeling of joy. 

The Joy of Life!! 

The joy of being in rhythm with the universe!! 

The Joy of helping others!! 

How many lives did you help finding their goal? How many lives did you help bring a smile to their face? How many hearts did you illuminate with the rekindled hope? 

The peril of being misunderstood, being hated, being shunned, being   envied, being slandered and being persecuted is inevitable when you selflessly help others or do good to them. It is unavoidable when you accumulate treasures of the heart. 

Nevertheless, keep doing good, keep helping others, keep encouraging people and keep giving them hope: Undaunted and undefeated, with humility and gratitude accept undoing the ties of Karma knot by knot until emancipation. 

It is not as over complicated as spiritual awakening or nirvana...

 It is just the simplest way to live life joyfully with effortless ease and no heavy burden of negativity and wrongdoing. 

It is human, it is natural to our soul, it is most simple!! 

Do it! !

Wish you a very happy new year once again!! 

Manish "pakhi"

My Favourite songs : Papa

Papa

Paul Anka 1974

One of the sensitive songs
and
one of my favorites!!

My Favourite songs : Lady

Lady

A super hit of 1980's and one of my most favorite song, 'Lady' was written by Lionel Richie and performed by Kenny Rogers. After 'Island in the streams' superb success, 'Lady' took Kenny Rogers to the peaks of popularity and this song was acclaimed to be most romantic song of the times. 

My Poems : Deepawali

Deepawali

My Poems : Soulmate

Soulmate

My Poems : तलाश

तलाश

My Favourite songs : Forever Sensei

Forever Sensei

One of my most favorite songs that always lift the spirits. A song filled with deep gratitude to our mentor!! 

Sensei is new age, progressive, compassionate and ever inspiring. Sensei is a role model to live a life for helping others and bring them happiness. Sensei is about winning in life - an eternal victory!  

My Favourite songs: wo jahan

wo jahan

Beautiful lyrics bringing about the longing in every human heart to have a world free of mystery,  unhappiness, violence,  greed, war,  and grief: utopian though but not impossible ..

I like the music of both Rock-on 1 and Rock-on 2 for their lovely lyrics,  lively music and magical performance!! Here is one of my favorite:

My Poems: joie de vivre

joie de vivre

My Poems: Acceptance

Acceptance

My Favourite songs: Send my love

Send my love

This song  from Adele is yet another of my favourite.

Exquisite and elegant performance!!

 The rhythmic musical notes perfectly blend with the delicately expressive movements !! 

My Poems: बेजान

बेजान

My Poem: फख्र

फख्र

My Poems : खत

खत

My Poems : आगाह

आगाह

My Poems : Never

Never

My Poems : कशमकश

कशमकश

My Poems: दिनचर्या

दिनचर्या

My Poems : Culprit

Culprit 

My Poems : Soldiers of Peace

Soldiers of Peace

My Expressions : Soft violence

Soft violence 

A slap, a punch,  or a  fisticuff is not a common site among educated people. However education does not necessarily inculcate a sense of poise and respect in all for others.The surge of inner rage in people manifest itself in the form of soft violence.  This soft violence carried out in subtle manner hurt the other person even more than the physical violence. Some such instances of soft violence commonly seen are :

1. Ignoring one's presence selectively.
2. Not greeting a person selectively.
3. Not inviting someone while all else are invited.
4. Giving dull, subdued and discouraging response to one's greetings.
5. Refusing someone's invitation  with discourtsey.
6. Discussing financial gains loudly in front of a relatively less well off person.
7. Not answering one's call or message despite being well known and related.
8. Talking over and keep talking without giving chance to other person to speak.
9. Discouraging a talented or capable person by impeding his/ her progress selectively.


Especially with elderly and senior people, soft violence is seen being committed by younger ones in following all so many ways:

1. Giving orders to them.
2. Making them / seeing them doing chores without the keenness to help or takeover from them.
3. Asking them to pick up articles to carry while traveling particularly and otherwise too.
4. Disappearing from the scene under some pretext at the time of work.
5. Showing  leisure or entertainment time to be more important than their even serious work.
6. Not asking their well being or truly taking full responsibility of their well being.
7. Leaving behind work for them and thus exploiting their orderliness to get things done.
8. Asking them for money instead of supporting them.
9. Not offering them food first.
10. Not leaving seat for them rather taking it keeping them standing.
11. Not giving passage to them first.
12. Belittling their age and physical limitations.
13. Talking to people elder in age in a mockingly patronizing manner. 


Soft violence against children may take the following forms:

1. Showing them down repeatedly for their mistakes.
2. Not giving credit to them for their accomplishments or talents.
3. Comparing them with other children.
4. Dampening their enthusiasm with cold responses.
5. Depriving them of the love, care and protective guidance.
6. Keep rebuking them for trivial matters.
7. Imposing choices upon them all the time.

Soft violence leaves scars deep in the psyche. Soft violence is unknowingly and inadvertently committed.

Watch out!! Do you commit soft violence too.

(C) Manish 'pakhi'

My Poem: एक असमर्थ की पदचाप

एक असमर्थ की पदचाप

My Poems: Transcend

Transcend

My Poems : Faith

Faith

My Poems : इंतिज़ार

इंतिज़ार

My Expressions : Uncertainty

Uncertainty

One of the things we need to cope in life with, is uncertainty. Uncertainty implies possibility of materialization of any of the favorable or unfavorable outcomes that exist for a given a situation. Since each such outcome has a corresponding impact on our life in a favorable or unfavorable manner,  uncertainty leads many of us to anxiety. 

The law of entropy pulls everything in the direction of disorder. Hence, to keep things in order we have to make effort which in turn means we spend energy to make the outcome favorable for us. The moment we decide on one outcome as our goal, the remaining possibilities become the part of disorder with respect to the chosen goal. The law of entropy applies and the shift towards disorder starts in a natural universal manner. This shifts makes the possibility of materialization of any of the undesired outcomes stronger.

This phenomenon is universal, spontaneous and inevitable. 

It is therefore futile to wish that the universal law of increasing entropy shall not operate on our given situation and  things shall remain perfect in equilibrium endlessly without making any efforts. Infact, the moment we decide upon a goal, we need to apply energy and effort to keep the entropy shift towards the disorderliness at bay. The more exclusive the goal, the greater is the entropy and hence greater is the  effort required to hold on to the desired outcome. 

It is choices between order and disorder. There are some who accept  disorder in their own lives and in their surroundings. Such people remain victims of uncertainty with a deep complacent sense of unawareness and unknowing. They find certainty in the uncertainty itself with ever shifting goals and endless adjustments without ever creating any value. Typically, such people are characterized by a sense of amazement with the disorderliness of change. 

There are others who choose order. They give there energy in maintaing balance, equilibrium and stability to a framework that sustains a goal, a value, a purpose or a mission. They exert themselves to constantly challenge the disorder. In the process they create value. They drive change to synthesize by putting in energy and efforts rather than becoming a casual observer of a disintegrating shift - entropy.

If we understand this principal, it becomes clear to us as to why there is hard work, effort, energy, exertion, endurance, challenge and perseverance required to achieve something of substance and sustain it.

It is the force of universal entropy and our enthalpy that govern our thermodynamics - the heat maps and energy shifts. 

Entropy : an annihilating undercurrent, an unseen reality and an awareness so thoroughly skipped by most of us!!

(C) Manish 'pakhi'

My Poems : Rope

Rope

In everyday life, we find such relationships that tests our endurance. These are the people with whom we have a karmic relationship from our previous life times.
People in these relationship prolong the toxicity by living in a quid pro quo or a tug of war and thus the tussle never ends,

But when one person drops his or her side of the rope by forgiving the other person and by stopping retaliation,  the power struggle stops. The karma of the toxic relationship breaks...

Drop the rope!!

My Poems : Judgement

Judgement

My Poems : लम्हे

लम्हे

My Poems : तजुर्बात

तजुर्बात

My Poems : अनदेखा

अनदेखा

My Poems : जुड़ाव

जुड़ाव

My Poems : गुरुर

गुरुर

My Poems : हौसला

हौसला

My Expressions : Arrogance

Arrogance 

Arrogant

 US ​ /ˈær·ə·ɡənt/

​proud in an unpleasant way and behaving as if you are better or more important than other people

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To begin with, a few quotes on arrogance.....

“Arrogance is a self-defense tactic to disguise insecurities.”

CAROLL MICHELS, How to Survive and Prosper as an Artist

“Arrogance is a veneer -- a thin covering of excuses hiding deep performance deficiencies.”

BOB LEWIS, "The Seven Deadly Sins of Information Systems", InfoWorld, Apr. 20, 1998

“The arrogance of some people makes even their virtues appear vices.”

BOUHOURS, attributed, Day's Collacon

“Because arrogance is born in personal vanity, arrogant people are driven without mercy. They can never get enough power to fill the soul's needs or enough respect to overcome the fear that they deserve less than they are getting.”

LEWIS B. SMEDES, Love Within Limits

Arrogance is the mask  for  lack of virtues . Virtuous people have humility, sincerity and respect for others. Arrogant people are easily identified by the following display of behavior:

-          They try to throw an larger than life image .
-          They make a false show of knowledge.
-          They claim the good results for themselves and dump bad results on others.
-          Their way of talking is patronizing, even to their seniors or elders.
-          They are found busy talking about their little achievements in a big way  everywhere.
-          They disrespect others but wants respect for themselves.
-          They project their connection to big names.
-          They reject good suggestions just because it conflicts with their ego.
-          They bring down the performance of a team.
-          They try to embarrass  people  by crossing boundaries of permissible behavior.
-           They try to bring your  reputation down in a wicked and wretched manner if you resist bullying.
-          They are constantly looking for audience.
-          Most of them boss over their parents because parents are loving and caring.
-        They always find someone to do their job. 

-     They do not take responsibility but  pretend to do so and claim so even louder.

Intrinsically, arrogant people are very insecure from inside and this insecurity drives their behavior to be so extreme as to be the center of their attention themselves. 

Most arrogant people try to hide behind moral high grounds. Their lack of humility is appalling.

Humans need to grow intellectually.

Arrogance is the sign of intellectual bankruptcy!!

By -

Manish ‘ Pakhi’   

My Poems : Catacomb

Catacomb

My Poems :

बदहवास

Notes n Beats : Schicksals-Sinfonie (symphony of destiny) : " Fate" - Beethoven

Schicksals-Sinfonie (symphony of destiny) 

 " Fate" - Beethoven

Daisaku Ikeda  is a Buddhist philosopher, educator, author, nuclear disarmament advocate and the founding president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), the world's largest Buddhist lay organization with approximately 12 million practitioners in 192 countries and territories.

Ikeda's sense of the great power of culture and the arts to uplift and assuage people would later become an underlying current in his philosophy of and activism for peace. It was during the turbulent period of his youth that this sensibility was forged.

Ikeda suffered throughout his youth from tuberculosis, a deadly disease at the time. He writes fondly of his memories of listening, exhausted from work and illness, to Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, known as the "Destiny" or "Fate" symphony. "As I sat in the middle of my tiny apartment, with the stirring resonance of that great work filling the room, I felt my blood race and dance with joy . . . a powerful courage resurged in my heart."

This Symphony is another Beethoven's favourite of mine after "Ode to Joy".

My Favorite Books : The Count of Monte Christo

The Count of Monte Christo

The Count of Monte Cristo is a novel by Alexandre Dumas about love, betrayal, jealousy and revenge. 

The Count of Monte Cristo offers an unusual reflection on happiness and justice and compensating the past.

Everyone in the story of The Count of Monte Cristo seems to be jealous of Dantes. Fernand Mondego for his love,Baron Danglars for job, Gaspard for his fortune and Gerard for a reason. The four of them plot to rid themselves of Dantes, each benefiting in their own way with Dantes out of the picture.

The four men conspire and Dantes is taken away in secret and imprisoned at Chateau d'If, an inescapable prison. 

While in prison, Dantès meets Abbé Faria, who teaches Dantès history, science, philosophy, and languages and also bequeaths to him large treasure hidden on the island of Monte Cristo. Dante manages to escape from the prison and travels to Monte Cristo and finds Faria’s enormous treasure. 

Ten years later, Dantès emerges in Rome, calling himself the Count of Monte Crist.  None of his old cohorts recognize the mysterious count. Armed with damning knowledge about each of them that he has gathered over the past decade, Dantès sets an elaborate scheme of revenge into motion.

A great story and one of my favorites and must read for all those who love good literature!! 

Josei Toda stated with reference to this inspiring work of literature by Dumas and offered a Buddhist perspective:

"Those who perpetrate evil or injustice will without fail receive retribution for their actions in accord with the workings of the law of cause and effect.

That said, it is still imperative that we expose evil, and that we use our anger at injustice toward thoroughly denouncing it and rooting it out. If we permit evil to run rampant, even more people will suffer at its hands. A halfhearted struggle against evil only gives it greater leeway to grow and flourish.

“Anger can be a function of either good or evil” .Anger that springs from good and justice, and is directed at fighting evil and injustice, can produce great good. To oppose extreme evil is an act of extreme good. The greatest “revenge” against evil is for the champions of good to be victorious and for good itself to flourish."

My Favorite Books : Buddha

Buddha

Deepak Chopra's Buddha presents the life of the this come one in three parts : Siddhartha- The Prince, Gautama -The monk and Buddha -The enlightened.

Mara; the devil keep a close eye on Buddha's life and keep throwing obstacles his way but Buddha perseveres and wins. 

I love this book being a fan of Deepak  Chopra and a practitioner of buddhism.

The book will make you learn more of Buddha's life and  thus your life. Discover yourself !! 

My Favorite Books : The Bourne Trilogy

The Bourne  Trilogy

One of my all time favourite, Robert Ludlum novels has a intriguing plot, strong characters  and intricate details of undercover operations in international espionage.

Jason Bourne is one of its best known spy character who had extraordinary survival instincts and can make impossible missions possible.

Jason can improvise, negotiate, camouflage, elude, impersonate and turn the tables. He keeps evaluating alternatives with a keen analysis of logics and counter logics.

The moment you read a even one page of any of Robert Ludlum novel, your senses will shut the outside world drawing you completely into the reading with complete attention riveted.

Irresistable, unstoppable and intelligent must read!!

My Favorite Books : Animal Farm

Animal Farm

Another of George Orwell's classic and my favourite,  Animal farm is a political satire in a way and also an apt commentary on how power corrupts minds.

An uprising in Mr. Jones farm overthrows him and rebel animals take the reigns in their hands. The make 7 commandants of animalism that all in the farm shall adhere to. Over a period of time ,pigs take over and the commandments suitably change to suit the new drumming class.

A very simple and impressive work of fiction to illustrate how power corrupts minds .

My Favorite Books : Pollyanna

Pollyanna

Eleven years old Pollyanna Comes to stay with her aunt Polly after the death of her parents.  She plays what she calls a "Glad Game" and bring smiles to many faces.  Pollyanna thus has literally been taken in the English language as to mean " invincibly optimistic".

Glad game has the power to change life! it's an attitude which finds something positive into everything. 

A very profound message given in the most simple way!!

My Favorite Books : The Bridge Across Forever

 The Bridge Across Forever

An autobiographical love story transcending into the spiritual planes : soul mates, sacrifice, freedom, out of body experience, - Richard and Leslie discover together. 

This is a must read for those who seek deeper meanings in the relationships.  

My Favorite Books : The Time Machine

                               The Time Machine

A flight into the world of humanoids Eloi's  and nocturnal Morlocks and Weena  in 802,701 AD with the fictional Time Machine, -  the time traveler even goes up to 30 millions years ahead in time ..

I read this book when I was 17 and this is one of favourites from H G Wells. 

It made me curious as a youth to read and learn more on the scientific aspects of time as a fourth dimension, grandfather paradox of time travel into past and the choice of several possibilities at any given point of time leading to different course of future. 

Some books tickle your imagination and curiosity.. This is one of them!!

My Favorite Books : Hercule Poirot's Casebook

                    Hercule Poirot's Casebook

                                 David Suchet as Hercule Poirot

Agatha Christie created this suave crime detective who always insist upon use of one's grey cells to solve any mystery. He would tell a person's background from his appearance, mannerisms and accent even though meeting for the first time. 

Poirot has passion for orderliness and always try to find order in the facts getting presented in solving a case. Poirot has an overconfident disposition with keenness for sartorial excellence and neatness. A speck of dust may hurt him more than a wound of bullet.

The egg shaped head, profuse moustache and uncanny ability to analyse human behaviour and motivations makes this Belgian detective's cases an irresistable read.

My Favorite Books : The way of youth

The way of youth

Dr. Daisaku Ikeda is the president of Soka Gakkai International. He is the mentor of more than 12 million Buddhists practicing Nichiren Daishonin's Buddhism across the globe.

Dr. Ikeda is a prolific writer. In this book, he offers very compassionate, empathetic and encouraging guidance rooted in Buddhist philosophy for the youth of today. Friendship, Love, bullying, career, challenges of growing up, teenagers issues etc.  are explained with a very non judgemental, practical and wise perspective.

My Favorite Books : The Mayor of Casterbridge

The Mayor of Casterbridge

Thomas Hardy is one of my all time favourite. The sheer pleasure of reading a beautifully and delicately crafted English , scenic descriptions, stunning twists and turns in the plot, depth of characters and a large canvas immerse you in a literary experience. 

The charterers of Henchard, Susan, Elizabeth-Jane, Lucetta and Farfrae  and the surroundings of countryside - the magic of the plot lies in man vs. fate and the fate wins. 

A must read for lovers of literature!!