Strangers touch your life

There are lots of time when strangers touch your life or do something you never expect, knowing fully well that they won't get anything in return. I am sure all of us have experienced this. So as a tribute to one such person, I narrate an experience that I will never forget !

So I had been to Seattle some time back and I met a cab driver, an Indian, who was very excited to see someone from his own country. So he picked me up from the airport, took me to my hotel and gave me his number to call the next day.

Something made me call that number the next day instead of telling the hotel receptionist that I need a taxi. Coming prompt on time, he took me around the city showing all the nice locations he could cover in the 5-6 hrs that I had. He then took me to lunch at Udupi and guess what, despite my offer he insisted that he would pay for my lunch and pay he did !! I was taken aback considering the fact that my trip was completely sponsored. When he dropped me off at the airport, I was about to offer him a tip, and he refused saying he does not take tip from students !!

Well he did not gain anything from it. Such simple actions move you as a person !! I will definetly not forget him for the rest of my life

When will India Inc learn ?

Silicon Valley at Bangalore !!

Those are the headlines dominating the Indian media these days or have been for some years now ! Its high time Indian IT (I hate the word IT) industry takes a hard look at itself !

I prefer to call it the coolie valley ! How many silicon chips do we produce in India for it to be called the Silicon Valley ? Do we have a single company that has changed the face of the industry ? Why don't we have a single product company which can stand on its own and not be begging for US clients ? And i don't even want to talk about the working conditions there !

Infosys, Wipro and TCS are the main companies to blame here ! Before moving further I would like to emphasize that this is not against the employees of these companies. I believe that they are among the best in the world but haven't got the environment to produce the best ! Lots of young talented young engineers join the bandwagon and end up being project managers after 5 years; where they could have excelled had they been pushed a bit harder in the right direction.

So lots of people might argue that these companies have provided jobs to Indians and improved the standard of life. I completely agree that they have provided lots of jobs in a country like India and thats where the credit should stop. Calling these companies, the flag bearer of the Indian software industry is a crime in itself. And for this, I blame the media more than these companies !!

I hope that the situation improves sooner than latter and Indian Inc provides true competition to the US behemoths.

Maturity of mind !

Some of my previous posts have been about life .. And so this was an interesting read I came across and decided to post it on my blog !!
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Certain questions indicate the maturity of our mind. Do you know what those questions are? They are: What is life? What is the purpose of my life? Why am I here? What do I want?

If these questions arise in your mind, it is a sign of the mind or intellect getting matured. Otherwise the mind is just in routine doing the same thing again and again, not even introspecting looking into the source of life.

These questions are vital. Where am I? Are you aware you are on this planet Earth? Have you ever thought “I am on planet Earth and this planet is in the solar system”? So, I am in the solar system. The solar system is just a dot in the Milky Way. So, I am in the Milky Way. This expansion of awareness to the macrocosm and being aware of where you are in this body is important. Just sit with your eyes closed and ask yourself “where am I in this body”? Am I in the head, in the nose, in the heart? Where am I in the body? Then the sharpness of the mind happens, awareness happens. You are able to perceive that you are nowhere and you are everywhere in the body. A shift in the quality of awareness happens instantaneously. And it is this awareness that can eliminate stresses and sorrows from life. This awareness is called wisdom. Every living being wants happiness, everyone wants to be in love. Everyone wants to be loved and everyone wants to give love. Right? There is not a single creature on this planet that doesn’t like love. And do you know that love is the cause of all misery also? Love is the cause of jealousy, anger, hatred, fear, everything. The basis of all problems in the world is again love! You have two choices. You can be indifferent\n or be in love and go through the suffering. Is there any other third hope for being in love and not facing all the miseries? Yes. It is through awareness. When we raise our consciousness, we become more aware of the sensation that is happening in the body and we see that the sensations change. An intense sensation that is pain and an intense sensation that is pleasure, both become pleasurable. Love and pain, they are very closely related. The symbol of Jesus on the cross means that the cross is pain and Jesus is love. One is with the other. The transformation of this pain into bliss, the love into bliss is what happens with awareness. The same happens with doubts. Have you noticed doubts are always about something positive? We never doubt anything negative in life. You never doubt someone else’s anger or your anger. You never doubt your depression. Nobody ever doubts his/her depression. But when one is happy, one doubts, am I really happy? If someone tells you they hate you, you don’t doubt it but if someone tells you they love you, you say: “Really? Are you sure?” If we can doubt in the negativity of people, we become close to the reality. Do you see what I am saying? We take it for granted that everybody is a hoax or a fraud and then we try to find somebody we can trust. It becomes so difficult in the world. Sometimes you have a lot of doubts in your mind. But when you increase the energy level in your body, you will see that the doubts disappear. There is more clarity in the mind. Confusion goes away from the mind. Without this awareness the mind shrinks. When the mind shrinks, the joy diminishes. Whenever we are happy, we feel that something in us is expanding and the expression of sadness is the contraction of mind.

Every living being wants happiness, everyone wants to be in love. Everyone wants to be loved and everyone wants to give love. Right? There is not a single creature on this planet that doesn’t like love. And do you know that love is the cause of all misery also? Love is the cause of jealousy, anger, hatred, fear, everything. The basis of all problems in the world is again love! You have two choices. You can be indifferent or be in love and go through the suffering. Is there any other third hope for being in love and not facing all the miseries? Yes. It is through awareness.

When we raise our consciousness, we become more aware of the sensation that is happening in the body and we see that the sensations change. An intense sensation that is pain and an intense sensation that is pleasure, both become pleasurable. Love and pain, they are very closely related. The symbol of Jesus on the cross means that the cross is pain and Jesus is love. One is with the other. The transformation of this pain into bliss, the love into bliss is what happens with awareness.

The same happens with doubts. Have you noticed doubts are always about something positive? We never doubt anything negative in life. You never doubt someone else’s anger or your anger.

You never doubt your depression. Nobody ever doubts his/her depression. But when one is happy, one doubts, am I really happy? If someone tells you they hate you, you don’t doubt it but if someone tells you they love you, you say: “Really? Are you sure?”

If we can doubt in the negativity of people, we become close to the reality. Do you see what I am saying? We take it for granted that everybody is a hoax or a fraud and then we try to find somebody we can trust. It becomes so difficult in the world. Sometimes you have a lot of doubts in your mind. But when you increase the energy level in your body, you will see that the doubts disappear. There is more clarity in the mind. Confusion goes away from the mind.

Without this awareness the mind shrinks. When the mind shrinks, the joy diminishes. Whenever we are happy, we feel that something in us is expanding and the expression of sadness is the contraction of mind. Meditation is a technique where the mind expands and relaxes. And whenever we are relaxed, we are expanding automatically. It is worth knowing this expansion because then nothing can disturb us or take our smile away. Otherwise, some small things can throw us off the balance. It is not worth letting your mind or your life undergo such suffering, such misery. Do you see that?

Meditation is a technique where the mind expands and relaxes. And whenever we are relaxed, we are expanding automatically. It is worth knowing this expansion because then nothing can disturb us or take our smile away. Otherwise, some small things can throw us off the balance. It is not worth letting your mind or your life undergo such suffering, such misery. Do you see that?

Copyright: Sri Sri Ravishankar

Rural vs urban divide

We take many things in life for granted ! And city dwellers who have all the basic facilities at their beck and call, take them for granted ! When they visit a rural hill station or a village they enjoy the stay; but have they ever wondered what it takes to live in those places for years ?

Living without basic facilties or having to struggle hard to get them can take a toll on both the physical and mental state of the person. Having to travel 50 miles to get a pen, having to plan 3 months ahead to buy textbooks, having to stay without vegetables for 4 days in a row, no power for days together, having to study under street lights, to be cut from the civilization for days during rain .. the list is endless. What are those people doing there ? They are people in the villages and remote places helping you get the basic facilties in the cities. And the government or the people in the cities don't care about them !

I would even say instead of giving reservations on the basis of caste, people coming from the remote villages deserve the reservation