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“People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered; forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies; succeed anyway.
If you are honest and sincere, people may deceive you; be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight; create anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous; be happy anyway.
The good you do today will often be forgotten; do good anyway
Give the best you have, and it may never be enough; give your best anyway.
In the final analysis, it is between you and God; it was never between you and them anyway.”
~ Mother Teresa
My older sister read me this quote by Mother Teresa a few days back, and I was just thinking about it this morning. If there is any purpose in life worthy of living, it is to live a life as prescribed above. Every action a reflection of compassion formulated through forgiveness. All religions preach the same message and all purposes lead down this path of humility. What others think is important to society, but what we do when no one is watching is what makes the greatest difference between oneself and God. The thoughts, actions, motives, and desires which may be hidden from you or me, are very real and visible to the One who has created all. Without trust in ourselves, there is no need to look for success for even amidst mounds of wealth, sorrow and insecurity will devour one’s mind.
-GOD BLESS
Speak less
Destroy arrogance and ego
Complement people on genuine attributes
Smile at the sky, people, conflicts, drama, and life
Be at peace and see God’s script behind all that happens
Do not be shy of who I am, but be firm with my purpose
Remain at peace in the moment and acknowledge thoughts of unease without reacting.
Accept and surrender
Forgive the ego’s of men
Listen with the intent to feel empathy
Never criticize or condemn another man
Recite the 5 daily banis . Live like the Gurus
Everyone I meet is a superior; have humility
Live as though my death awaits me the next day
Whenever the mind reverts to procrastination defeat it.
Do not put up barriers or judgements on any human being
Criticism only has an impact on my false ego, not my being.
Become aware of the mind’s chatter and distance myself from it
Do not speak with the purpose to persuade, but instead to connect
Those things that annoy me, make it a spiritual practice to accept
Whenever pessimism beckons forth, kick it out with the force of optimism and positive thinking.
Do not curse or spew hate
My physical form is an illusion, extract thyself from within
Do not react to a situation that angers me, but instead stay strong and composed
Whenever anger comes forth, acknowledge the feeling and convert it to awareness
Stop myself before thinking or uttering a word that will harm or injure another.
Live a healthy and balanced life with mediation, yoga, jogging, and exercise
Remember the miracle of my existence every instant and be grateful to God
Do not slander, ridicule, or diminish those whom are not present
Life is one day shorter each day the sunsets, just remember.
Be the person people want to rely on and seek peace.
Do not let the mind pass judgement of another.
Express my love with everything as One
I am at peace and at ease
I am not my thoughts
I am my Being
I am
This is my personal mantra to live by each and every moment of every day. I created this to change the paradigm of my thinking and set my focus and energy in a positive direction. It is my life’s compass to assist me down the path of my destined purpose by God’s will. I believe that everyone should make such a mission statement and abide by it until it becomes a habit for the rest of your life. Just as you follow the laws of the land, you must follow the laws of your personal success in order to fulfill your purpose with no regret.
It is impossible for us to put ourselves in another’s shoes, and feel what they feel. We never even come close to fully understanding another person although sometimes we believe we do. Imagine for a moment relieving your skull of your brain, and transferring within it another man’s mind. His thoughts project within yourself as if they were your own. You get to hear the constant mind noise which overcomes every second of his life. Those thoughts create that person’s personality, motives, ethics, vices, and insecurities. For once you can understand the unspoken gaps in conversation, the taboo reels which unwind within, and the emotions which cannot be expressed in words. All those feelings and thoughts that people do not express for fear of judgement leap out and become your own. Only after listening to the daily mind chatter can you truly understand someone else and why they feel the way they do. There is too much past and history engrained within every thought to simply pretend to sympathize with someone. Your “understanding”, fascial expressions, sympathy, and solutions are your own and maybe in your reality they even make sense. But how do you really connect and understand someone else? Unfortunately, the exchanging of craniums is both impossible and perhaps too unsettling a thought for every human who drowns in their own deep secret sea of thoughts.
We listen to others to feel better about ourselves. Our ego places itself on a higher level when listening to someone else’s problems. Subconsciously or for many consciously, helping someone means getting approval through giving worthy advice. Often this advice is exactly what the speaker wants to hear. Drowning in the same exact sea as the other person, we somehow, as listeners, seem to find answers and solutions as if we are the ultimate guides of life. We merely role play, switching from venting victim to all knowing Guru of endless ideal advice. Both are false as they speak. Neither the listener nor the victim get closure when true empathy ceases to exist.
Talking to someone is very therapeutic, and it can be a great way to relieve pressure; However, when both the listener and the speaker are looking for attention neither achieves a true connect. Nothing deeper wells up to create interdependent communication and understanding. The speaker/victim is too busy scripting and spicing up the story to induce sympathy and approval from the listener. “Oh can you believe he/she did.____, so I had to _____. I guess life just is not fair to me.” On the other hand, the listener is not really listening nor trying to understand, because the listener is too busy thinking about what advice to give or what to say next. The listener is often thinking, “How do I put this without being too hard, ummmm, maybe she should get a divorce. They just do not have a strong mutual understanding. No, counseling maybe.” Both are viciously trying to gain the other’s approval without ever listening or speaking. This is how ninety percent of communication unfolds, hence there is a lack of depth in relationships, friendships, businesses, and households.
The moment we put ourselves away and intensify the empathy within a conversation we see the situation from the other person’s perspective. One of the greatest used words in daily conversation is “me, my, mine.” The ego subtly inserts itself within every single aspect of our lives giving the illusion of being superficial or self-centered. We commonly toss the “superficial” word around to describe people around us whom we sense are too centered on themselves. However, the magic mirror depicts an intrinsic law in human character and that is a direct reflection of YOURSELF. Do you ever listen to just listen? Do you listen to truly help and understand someone else? Do you listen without a motive to further yourself? Your motives may never be seen, but the depth from which you live and interact with others does show a gigantic ripple of either superficial or empathetic intentions.
The paradox still exists, how does one place oneself in someone else’s perspective if it is impossible to totally “understand” another person? The answer does not lie in understanding and solving everybody’s life with a basic formula or knowing everything about someone else. Instead listening without judgment, role, or ego increases the depth of frequency in conversation. A genuine person with humility can empathetically listen without inserting himself in the conversation, and relieve the other miraculously by never uttering a word of advice or fake expression of sympathy. Essentially, we must crawl into the thoughts of the other person, and make them our own without putting our own spin on the conversation. Clarifying emotions with short phrases and matching the person’s intensity creates a unity and cohesion. The empty void between words, thoughts, and phrases is filled with a deeper understanding much further in the universe than can be expressed by words or felt by the human template. Closure comes to both the listener and the speaker when there is a mutual sense of empathy. Understanding appears and problems minimize in the fury of human compassion and intrinsically in the universal silence of the Creator, Waheguru.
If you want to be understood, then learn to understand. If you want love, then learn to love. If you want someone to respect you, then learn to respect others. What you see in others you end up seeing within yourself. If everyone is superficial and fake, then I recommend looking in the magic mirror and seeing an answer. It might just be you. If ego exits a conversation, a friendship, or relationship then expectations also die without the oxygen created by the ego. The death of the ego leads to the death of expectations, and the death of expectations leads to openness. Openness joins with oneness. Now you can both understand and be understood because everything and everyone begin vibrating at the same frequency of the One God and Creator.
Communication through conversation is a secondary vehicle to connect with those outside yourself. Enjoy and learn from the differences in views because everyone is, indeed, unique. Once a cause for conflict, difference now becomes a point to understand and learn from. One cannot experience everything in life, but one can learn from the experiences of others. If you fear opening yourself to others and different views and ideas, then take a moment to ask what you are afraid to lose? Sure we become vulnerable when we open ourselves, but the only change which takes hold is growth. Growth is vital for survival in all things that flourish in life. Fear of betrayal and pain is also a real component in openness for the rose cannot be admired without acknowledging the beauty of both the rose and its thorn.
Hurt and betrayal are inevitable in society as long as people remain unawakened by consciousness. After such hurt some people get so torn and weak that they raise up walls of barrier. They build a fortress which keeps people out, essentially, suffocating opportunity’s growth. On the other hand, others learn from such traumatic experiences and reform themselves instead of blaming society. They learn to detach from gossip and hurtful conversation, and soon realize a simple yet amazing reaction from their positive action. Those who gossip with you shall gossip of you, no longer pertains to such people for they are now above it. They have built a character on respect, integrity, loyalty, and empathy. They too have built a fortress, but one that is far stronger for it stands on noble character, and no one can take it down. Insecurities do not drag these people down, so they are open to new positive experiences and repel themselves from negative experiences which tear down others at their own expense.
We must learn to live symbiotically with one another. We are all on the same unknown journey, but the only difference is that we trek down our own separate paths together. Do not let it get lonely for we can take interest, joy, and pain from the journey of others as well as our own.
- GOD BLESS
Biology class is finally over and learning human anatomy has really made me think about being a human carnivore. Strip the human of the outer epidermis, the skin, and within you see the flesh of any other animal. We are animals with a higher consciousness, but the main ingredients are very much similar. From the genetic code to the actual flesh there is little difference between a human and another organic living creature. The grand exception comes from the ability to consciously be aware of time, existence, and emotion. We are superior only because of a highly wired and intricate highway system of neuro-pathways that shoot across millions of paths each second.
I was watching a video of a human dissection and it was truly fascinating. The cadaver looked fresh and the whole body was in amazing condition. The face had an expression of awe with the mouth drawn open and the eyes peacefully closed on the chopping board of sorts. The presiding doctor who was doing the dissection began picking away at the different levels of tissue to get into the organs as the face remained composed and cold. I was sure he was dead when the doctor chopped out the heart for closer inspection. I guess that clip inflicted more pain on me than the dead father, son, or grandparent laying on the dissection table. The fate of us all may not be in an itunes video about dissection, but death is surely an inevitable and inescapable ticket. It made me think in a deeper perspective of the daily ego we so easily stride around carrying high and heavy. Perhaps the animals we munch on for dinner have a clearer conscious and unity with the universe than the ignorant man who appears to dine with superiority.
Every cell in the human body lives to function and survive for the overall good of the system. The cell if damaged or dysfunctional may even kill itself for the survival of the greater tissue it lives for. There is no weekend or coffee break, as my professor says, for the cell and like a horse it works until its demise. Regulating organelles, ions, division, particle immigration, and thousands of other jobs each cell makes Obama’s job seem like a piece of cake. Dividing generation after generation to create a linage of function and work. We could learn a thing or two about life by just taking a small glimpse inside the universe which lies within the depths of the skin we feel so insecure about. The flesh which traps our souls in the physical plane of time harbors secrets of a greater truth if one takes the time to introspect the intricacies of life itself.
All matter is composed of atoms and within every atom ninety-nine percent is empty space. Scientists are still debating whether electrons are real components or mere wave like particles of energy. Hence, empty space constitutes the great majority of the earth as we see it. The human eyes magnify the world through a lens which sees the mosaic of atoms as objects, people, stars, planets, and so forth. However, if we were to see the world at the level of the atom we would be exactly where we are now. On a planet, an electron, orbiting the sun, the nucleus, while only seeing vast distances that we call space. The universe is infinite in the scope as seen by NASA, but the distance is purely relative to the size as seen with the smallest building block of matter, the atom.
Distance is relative to space, space is relative to size, and size is relative to the perspective of the beholder. The universe may be found and realized without ever opening a book or traveling millions of light-years away, for the vastness within every single breath of awareness reveals time at a standstill. The world freezes the moment we reach into ourselves and cease the exact moment that exists in the now. Freedom, liberation, peace, solitude, God, ourselves, and the universe can all be revealed in the silence of the mind. When the mind is tamed and the world stands still and we are in harmony with it, we become immortal. Death no longer exists, mysteries no longer matter, life seems plentiful, and worldly attachment seems foolish. The immortal window to reach God is in this exact moment for the next breath is never assured and the breath before the the one we took no longer exists. The past becomes a lie, the future becomes false, and the present becomes just that a present from God to unite with the universal truth of His grace.
The flesh disappears, the body no longer cages the soul, and the vibrancy of every atom begins to match the frequency of the universal one – God.
I am finally back in the warm Caribbean sun for round two of my premed studies. I must say that I am actually beginning to like it here. The people seem more friendly, the scenery breath-taking, the breeze soothing, and the ocean vivid with intense shades of glittering blue. I never noticed how beautiful the college campus was until this time around. This realization did not happen automatically, because I have been preparing myself mentally for over a month. I was set on liking it this semester and wahla, I do!
I came with an open mind with all preset conditions and experiences consciously laid aside. I was going to appreciate Grenada, and I was intent on that. When I arrived I did not refer to it as a place of sacrifice this time, but instead an oasis of refuge and beauty. My very own paradise to study medicine by the majestic sea. This was a dream I had previously denied, but now I have come to realize.
The memories I make and the moments I share with those around me will become my lasting pillars unto which I will create myself. I still have much to discover about myself and the art of dealing with others. I still have to break many habits that threaten a character with genuine attributes. I still long for many dreams to become a reality. However, with all of these inner and outer desires comes a peaceful serenity of accepting what is. The turbulence is less frequent as I begin to accept and surrender to the moment and possess myself within its will with a smile. Views and opinions of mine are becoming more malleable as I witness the vicious entitlement of others ideals. Some stand so strongly by their opinions and views on issues that it frightens one to listen with rationale at the ignorance. I do not hesitate for even a moment to see my own ignorance for harboring such baseless views and labeling them my own due to years of unconscious priming. I am without a label, view, opinion, or ideal still me. This does not exclude my principles that I stand firmly with. Such universal principles as integrity, self respect, honesty, and sincerity. I have not perfected my principles in practice but each day is a struggle and not worth living unless one is continuously striving to live a righteous life.
When judgement does not inhibit the vast scope of life, it opens possibilities that are infinite. I have learned to stop being a victim, the devil’s advocate, or a moral judge. I am merely me trying to live a life with purpose while grappling with the reality of the human condition.
It has been a long time since I sat down to write since I left home about a week ago. It feels great to sit back and just reflect every once in a while amidst a hectic college schedule. Connecting with one’s thoughts is like seeing a stranger in the mirror or digging a huge hole not knowing what treasure or bone will come out. Self exploration is one of the hardest journeys but at least one of the most rewarding.
- God bless
The time has almost come to end another year, and celebrate the coming of a new beginning. Change is now on the minds of men who are writing endless resolutions and goals. The future is bringing the unknown to the forefront so the preparations have begun brewing. Mental images are replacing the present reality with a future filled with more promise and purpose. Soon enough expectations are born and with them the inevitable ascent of anxiety, frustration, and resent.
A man who cannot change this very moment will not be aided by the falling confetti of a new year. The psychological time work of the mind is a continuous stream of thoughts that never end, and can only be stopped by the whims of self-discipline. Sure some people may muster enough energy to change and improve the following day, but chances are that habits will inhibit change from becoming permanent. There is nothing wrong with writing a list, but when that list begins to breed excessive guilt it may end up hurting one’s self esteem instead of improving it.
The moment to become a better person, lose weight, work harder, get better grades, or improve relations is always in the present moment and not a second later. The only time we are actually alive and living is in the present exact moment so why look elsewhere for a miracle. The miracle is the life we live in the moment.
I will enjoy myself this new year but I will make no list of wondrous feats to tackle for when the time is right they shall happen. Goals are important but idealism is fatal. Motivation and inner desire are the fuel that ignite action in the moment, but habits are the logs that keep the fire burning forever. If one wants to lose weight, less intake of calories and more exercise will have to become involuntary components of the day such as breathing and digesting are in the body. When the time is right and the energy is present the doors will open for change if one is aware of them, but if one is oblivious, complacent, or lazy those doors will have never even appeared to exist.
I wish everyone a happy new year and hope all their hopes, aspirations, and goals come true. However, for the more faint of heart such as myself I will continue working on change every moment of my existence whether it falls on January first or not.
The whole semester was a frantic flurry to finish and maintain high grades. The mind was continuously bustling from subject to subject as the fear of failure remained ever so near and present. Always on the back of each student’s mind – the innate drive to compete and beat the others. Firing complex questions, one waited for the other to stumble in order to expose one’s Achilles’ heal. Weakness in intellect or theory exposes one’s downfalls, and makes the other more confident and vicarious. There is no room for mistakes for the one who carries the flag of victory is the one revered with success. There is no end for the world will keep on trying to get ahead.
From my peers, there was a respect for the high grades I achieved; however, with respect came an instinctual drive to destroy. Any ounce of uncertainty in my eyes became the chance for my demise. Although the pressure kept me strong to fight, it also led me to see those who despise. Expectations were blown in my face for they would say, “Oh he will surely get an A.” There was no doubt that it was my goal, but for others it was just another load for me to carry alone. I would remain composed as stone on the outside, but inside I was being swallowed by my own tone. The tone that harshly hushed me into submission for the burden of riding every condition.
Men have always envied those who run in first place. They too have practiced for hours, conditioned in the blistering sun, and dealt with many hardships; however, that one man in front always seems to fly on ahead. May it be destiny or chance? Most men leave it to chance and wait for the other to descend. It is the intrinsic nature of man, from the times of primitive survival, to compete for ultimate success. We wear suits on the outside to appear civil, but the battles within are nothing more than that of primitive survival. The man who lives for himself will only help others for recognition and fame. Francois de la Rochefoucauld once said, “We should often feel ashamed of our best actions if the world could see all the motives which produced them.” Selfless men are hard to find for they may only be a concept to rekindle the light of hope within us all. Those men, if they even exist, are as rare as lost ancient gems that have fallen into the murky sea. For certain, I know that God is the only Being that illuminates perfection. Mortal men are merely looking for immortality through their outward actions. Few have made that ambition a reality, but those who have cut out a name in the condensed chapters of history are, nonetheless, never perceived as perfect. Our vices are our shovels used to dig our own graves. We have all dug our own, and are just waiting to be pushed in when the time comes.
I sit alone in my dorm in silence. The scurrying feet, running water, clanking bottles, turning pages, and banging doors have ceased. The quiet has left me without purpose. I have been longing for this moment – the light at the end of the tunnel. Through hard work I have arrived and the light has dimmed. I always needed my own space amidst people in my face for four months straight. No time to breathe without affecting someone else, I never sat in solitude. Time never permitted. I am now liberated in space – just floating. This is not the liberation I truly seek, because true liberation will come only when I have finished the journey and see land on the distant shore. Until medical school is over, I shall count my blessings which are many, and embrace the men who share words, but glare silently in envy. These men have taught me to sail forward looking ahead but never forgetting to glance behind. I am not completely innocent of this crime myself, but I am more vigilant of my feelings after I became the subtle target of conspiracy.
The highs and lows of a university student are many, and the need to perform at one’s best can be draining. Nevertheless, the reward of achieving with humility and honor, the glow of success is the ultimate gift of an education. Admittedly, money has always played a rather big role in my decisions for the future but experience is beginning to make that shed. I still want to live a comfortable life through hard work, but I also want to reciprocally make a difference in people’s lives. As a young man, I am sick and tired of looking for leaders within religion or life itself, so I want to discipline myself to lead. I want to lead not on the pulpit but on the terms of my own actions. I want to bury my vices before they end up burying me. I desperately want to live my life without an ounce of guilt, so I have nothing to bow my head to other than God. My ambitions are many, but I want to manipulate them for the right reasons. Like a sculptor I want to chisel my mind into that of greatness by the grace of God and not by ego. I would rather be a mediocre man with humility than a man with money and arrogance. Being a student has taught me more than formulas and concepts, because I have primarily learned that learning happens until the last breath and heart beat. I am a Sikh, a learner, until the end.
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