Smile

A smile says a million things

Sunflowers and beaches

Misty mountain air

Pristine waters of a river flowing

Energy

Warmth, peace and love

Care, gay abandon, mystery and magic

Innocence of a toddler

Butterflies flying

A smile says a million things

Concern, pain, understanding

Empathy, loneliness and suffering

Unsaid feelings and emotions

Little tugs of the heart

Deep sadness, anguish and hurt

Surprise, rejection, shock

Acceptance, helplessness, anguish

Misunderstood, misrepresented, misaligned

A smile says a million things

Random Acts of Kindness

Soft morning due

like a mothers gentle touch


Caressing, holding, securing

so well 


Unable to describe emotions

joy, paradise, happiness, contentment,

peace deep inside


Forming a gentle yet firm grip


Acceptance is like magic


Life just blends in


Surrender so powerful

so divine


I wish there was a way


To teach this to all


To live a life so warm


To find solace within


Knowing and believing


In yourself all the way


And random acts of kindness


Just adding to the spirit


As I sat and wondered about the purpose

for so long without a clue


I guess it was all about 

showing the way


Random acts of kindness


Purposeful acts of caring


Spirited acts of connectedness


Oneness


Just being

The Nature of Man

The nature of flowers is to bloom
The nature of the wind is to blow
The nature of water is to flow
What is the nature of man?

On the soul plane, all are one
On the physical plane, all are one
On the mind plane
where is the oneness?

The needs of all are one
Love, belongingness, happiness
Cherished dreams, warmth and peace
Why then the differences?

The world brimming with people
The world brimming with ideas
The world giving and taking
Why then there is no love?

True, we come alone
True, we go alone
But we don't live alone
Why do we feel alone?

All it takes is reaching out
All it takes is believing
All it takes is having trust
Why then do we hesitate?

Expectations are fulfilled if we give
Needs are fulfilled if we give
Love is felt if we give
Why do we then not give?

Taken for Granted?

What is it about relationships, especially where there is love and warmth that we all "love" to take for granted? Don't we all, often, just let these special relationships stand the tests of time, again and again because we feel the other will understand?

 

Funny, isn't it? We make sure we reach in time for official meetings, give priority to an official phone call if it comes along while in the midst of chatting with a friend, definitely make it to the colleague's dinner party while we tell our family and friends on how busy life is and how there is no time these days to connect! Promises of catching up later or sometime soon. That later seldom arrives leaving the important people in our lives wondering.

 

Interestingly, we all know this, no surprises for sure. We always also say that when there is a real need, xyz will always be there or i will always be there for xyz.....and we are, for sure in a situation of life and death. Thank God for that! But life is made up of every day, the minutes and hours we spend each day running errands, going to work, household chores, watching TV, reading a book. These everyday activities comprising of our life, we spend alone.

 

The best part is that we all do this to many of the important relationships in our lives. Despite that we also always sit and feel sad about not having enough time to catch up without really making the time ourselves. Often leading to little misunderstandings, unnecessary fights and emotions and distances we create with the ones we love in our minds.

 

So a gentle reminder - make a mental note to connect with one important person in your life everyday even if it is just a small text that says - hey, i am thinking of you - and see the difference it makes to you. Its your one good deed for the day. It will put a spring in your step and the person you connected with!

 

Here's to all my friends, family and the busy bees - lets stay connected folks, you are important to me!

 

 

 

 

Let it be...

I grew up to the strings of the Beatles vibrating through my house. My dad's favourite band. His favourite song - "Let It Be"..whoever has heard it will agree, it is deeply philosophical, yet simple. Difficult to imbibe in life but if one does, life becomes a cake walk. I never really understood it then, nor do i really do so well now. 

Recently a wise young friend said the same thing to me..let it be...simple philosophy, helps you get by. The wise old call it surrender...whatever the words, the essence remains the same. 

A part of me kind of disagrees, is letting it be running away from the situation? Should we not confront things and make them take shape, whatever the shape, give them our best shot? 

Or does it mean, give it your best shot and then let it be, not worrying about the outcome, knowing you did what you possibly could have to win it over?

But how does one do that anyway? What about our favourite word - closure? The nagging feeling that i  did what i did but i have no closure. Be it relationships, a intensive project, a hobby, any activity. It must have a logical end that makes sense so that one can move on to another. So how does one really let it be?

I have thought long and hard about this one and while i am no expert at it, i have tried to make a few attempts to understand it better. Let it be is closely linked to acceptance. The one thing we all say we do but actually don't. Accepting situations and circumstances that we come across everyday. Mostly we end up living in denial or passing the buck to outside our circle of influence. Someone else is responsible, we say. We feel let down, hurt and disappointed. That brews anger and in more serious cases, even depression. 

Acceptance of life, our circumstances, our jobs, our relationships and making a genuine attempt to give them their due, with dignity, grace and self respect. Letting things pass when they don't go our way. Letting time heal when you don't understand them anyway. Acknowledging to ourselves if not others, the truth. Living a life of honesty, at least to ourselves. 

Most importantly, letting go, moving on, letting bygones be bygones - in spirit. Each new day is a new day, a new opportunity to live life fully. So i try, everyday, genuinely, to let it be!

In Celebration of being Alive

I recently read on a friend's blog that we live a life of "displacement". I have been thinking of this phrase for a while and the more i think of it, the more it makes sense to me. 

Think of it, one thing displaces another in our mind and becomes all important. Till the time that thought is not achieved or fulfilled, it is the most important thing in our minds and nothing else matters. Once that reaches a place of comfort or basically where we wanted to see it, automatically it becomes less important to us, something else displaces it! And life goes on, the cycle repeating itself over and over again...

This law of displacement is a very strong law. It takes over us completely. It defines how we behave, what we say, how we feel, our position on things, our relationships with people and our peace of mind. if things go well, we feel great, sense of achievement, sense of pride, sense of fulfilment and otherwise there is only pain, suffering, discontentment, anger, isolation, loneliness, frustration. 

So who defines our happiness for us? Our joy, life spirit, peace of mind - a material thing, an ambition, a relationship, something or someone that recently displaced some other material thing, thought, person in our minds? Is that not strange? and we let it happen to us again and again in our lives. Often leading to a life less happy, a life more troubled, a life more lonely, a life more unfulfilled. 

As i grapple often with my own "displacements" in life, more and more i begin to realise that true happiness, peace, contentment comes from within. Well we all know that intellectually, don't we? The trick is to know it emotionally. To experience it and then learn to depend on it. 

Ever tried to follow cherished dreams? Your list of 10 things i must do before i die? Or being less dramatic, doing what i always really wanted to do...read a book, learn a language, go join a class, travel, drink coffee with a friend? How much happiness does that give you? 

Often we become extremely critical of our own selves. often we forget to cherish, love and respect our own selves. Often we tend to ignore our own needs and all of it combined leads to a sense of dissatisfaction. The "displaced need" rears its ugly head and becomes all powerful taking precedence over everything else. Ironically, it is always something or someone else, never you. Never your own self.

So can we for once learn to replace our "displacements" with our own self! Our 10 things that we always wanted to do, loving and honouring ourselves, respecting and fulfilling our duties, obligations with a sense of purpose and living our life with a celebration - In celebration of being alive!!

In Pursuit of Unconditional Love

Long long ago, deep below the ocean

Also known as middle Earth to some

Lived a child of the Lord, among others

Serker, special to the world 

He was trained like his buddies

To spread the only message

Unconditional love and compassion

Across all living beings 

They took many forms

Little butterflies et all

Whispered gently in the ears

Spread love, spread compassion, unconditionally 

Young was he, gave in to his desires

Goofed off one day to enjoy

The King of the land heard about the act

Summoned Serker in all his fury 

Held guilty for one small mistake

Dissipated, dissolved, kaput

Serker existed no more

In physical form 

On the day of reckoning

Stood before his masters, trembling

Seeking forgiveness for one naughty turn

Banished forever till he learns….unconditional love 

Thousands of years and more

Serker struggled in many forms

Till one day she knows

Unconditional love, she pursues 

Oh what a difficult journey

Oh so much control

Selflessness, gratitude, giving

Struggling, stumbling along 

Aligned to the purpose again

Looking for acceptance again

Knowing many lifetimes exist

Between the goal and its fulfilment 

Many beautiful souls

Sincerely help in the journey

Difficult it may be so

The North star still aligned

Homage to the Masters!

With gratitude and respect
I ask thee for guidance
Forever the right path
Forever the right spirit

Give me the courage
to live with honesty
to live with integrity
to live with substance

Truth and humility
in all relationships
the ability to accept
the ability to forgive

In all my actions
I wish to serve with passion
To give all that i have learnt
To learn all that i need

I wish to move on my journey
with respect and patience
asking all for forgiveness
for insensitive deeds

To live a life of abundance
to give a life of abundance
to be free spirited
to be progressive

To be humane
to be kind
to be humble
to be graceful

I ask thee for your blessings
I ask thee for your spirit
I ask thee for your forgiveness
I ask thee for your grace