Out there my senses rooted in the earth,
draining my spirit.
Under the bludgeonings of my fleshly desires,
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
My heart is shattered, not the love.
My faith and hope will define the perseverance.
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
It matters not how arduous my journey,
I am the master of my fate.
I am the captain of my soul.
And I know I am the seed.
Inspired by the poem ‘Invictus‘ by William Ernest Henley
Are you a transformer or a fence sitter? It is easy to talk about the things rather than putting into action.Every task required perseverance to see its end. You may succeed or fail in your pursuit task. But the point is you do it.As it is said, Whatever you do in life will be insignificant, but it’s very important that you do it. Because nobody else will. The joy does not lie in the result, rather than the enjoyment of performing the task itself.
It is an inspiring speech from the movie Chariots of Fire by Eric Liddell,
You came to see a race today. See someone win. Happened to be me. But I want you to do more than just watch a race. I want you to take part in it.I want to compare faith to running in a race. It’s hard. It requires concentration of will, energy of soul. You experience elation when the winner breaks the tape — ‘specially if you’ve got a bet on it. But how long does that last? You go home. Maybe your dinner’s burnt. Maybe, maybe you haven’t got a job. So who am I to say, “believe,” “have faith,” in the face of life’s realities?I would like to give you something more permanent, but I can only point the way. I have no formula for winning the race. Everyone runs in her own way, or his own way.And where does the power come from to see the race to its end? From within.
There was a thought by God, about the fusion of matter and energy to form the life. He wanted to do it safely and hence devised an elegant and complicated design for the idea of life. The design ensured that there will be controlled randomness among the life entities. With the everlasting echoing sound, the energy and the matter fused to flourish the life. The matter is a static and intelligent. The energy is dynamic and altering. Life began as the energy trapped inside the matter. For the energy, the matter has become the mirror to perceive itself. Thence energy started tacking the matter into complex arrangements to perceive the beauty. It evolved into various species over a long period of time. Each evolution step, the energy acquired the intelligence through the expression over the matter. With the billions of interconnections, energy assembled itself into a beautiful entity called as ‘brain’, residing in the sophisticated organism of the evolution tree.
The power of energy is infinite. But, being trapped inside the matter, its perception has limited to the inputs of the evolved sensory organs. However, in the process of self identification the energy expands itself through one of the sense using the brain and the process is called ‘Imagination’. Reality is the manifestation of the imagination. Imagination is all about the other alternatives of the God’s design.
Imagination plays a unique role in human being in shaping the reality. However the dreaming should not be mistaken as imagination. There is a subtle difference between imagination and dreaming. Dreaming happens when there is a desire and the imagination occurs when there is an insight. Imagination is the sparkle for the creativity. But what is the use of spark? Unless it finds an outlet to create the fire. It is the ‘Curiosity’ which takes it forward. Imagination is about thought of ‘Why not’ and the curiosity is the pursuit of the ‘Why not’.
Basically there are two types of joy: joy of consumption and joy of creation. The joy of consumption is to have a desire and then dream about it and pursue the desired thing. The joy of creation is to imagine it and pursue it and finally create it. You get the joy of consumption at the end and might be a big one. But the joy creation is a long and steady, sustaining with the curiosity level until the completion. Always the choice is yours.
Respect is the final component which along with curiosity transforms the imagination into the reality. Respect is not only the courteous feeling or behavior intended to please others. Respect is the conscious listening to the things around us and the feeling arise out that. Respect is about perceiving the oneness. Respect yourself. Do not put limit to yourself. You do it because you can. Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it’s very important that you do it because nobody else will.
Have Imagination, Curiosity, and Respect which defines the flow of life.
The summer has begun and the most of the tress had started shedding their leaves and become dry. However the mango tree (seen from my office window) which was dry now started flourishing with a new zeal of life. The changing color of the mango leaves evince the merriment of the summer heat. As one thing ends, the other one begins.
I have started a cartoon blog http://justkooldown.blogspot.com to perceive the lighter side of life. Have Fun!
The Project Lead calls upon a developer and programmer and asks, “I have this problem. Can you solve it? And you have the required resources”. The Lead turns to the Programmer and asks can you see the problem? The Programmer replies, “Yeah! I can see it clearly”. “What else you see?” the Lead continued. The Programmer said, “I see the SDK, APIs, IDE, etc. to solve the problem”. The Lead turns to the Developer, “Do you see the problem?”. The Developer acknowledges, “I do”. “Can you tell me what type of APIs and SDK can be used to solve it?”. The Developer replied, “I can’t. I only see the problem that to be solved”. The Lead yelled, “Start coding”.
The programmer sees the limitations with the available tools and does not see the vision. Whereas, the developer is not limited by the tools and finds the way to approach and solve the problem. A true Engineer focuses on the problem and tries to solve it; does not evade with excuses of tool limitations.
A lighter version of the same story:
The CEO asks the same question to different persons:
CEO : “Do you see the problem?”
Person A: [Thinks: What a stupid question]
Person A: “Of course! I can see everything?”
CEO : “OK. You are eligible as a Tester”.
CEO asks the same to Person B.
Person B: “Yeah! I can see the problem. I can clearly see the tools required to solve”
CEO: “You will be a good programmer”
CEO turns to Person C.
Person C: “I can only see the problem”
CEO : “You are a developer”
CEO: [Formulate this quote in the mind: Developer writes code and Programmer copy-paste it]
CEO finally turns to the Person D.
Person D: “I do not see anything”.
CEO : “Well, you are eligible for the Manager post”
Recalling the memories, dreaming or imaging, acquiring knowledge, and sleeping are the states of mind. At any moment, a person’s mind can be identified in any one of the state and its keep changing. Similarly, there are different areas in life where people keep swinging in and out during the entire life and exhibit different behavior throughout their life. These areas can be classified on a average basis in a simple way.
Fun Area
Reason : By nature.
Behavior : Being in the state of Happy and person is mostly in the state of laughing.
Period : Age 0 – 8
Irregular Fun Area
Reason : Education, Increase in the reasoning capability
Behavior: Undergoes the state of thinking before laughing.
Period : Age 8 – 15
Purpose Area
Reason : Parents, Society, Mirror Neurons in the brain, Survival Competition
Behavior: Working hard; Using the brain and physical body to achieve the purpose; Start spending less time in the fun area
Period : Age 15 – Till death
Empty Area
Reason : Confusion due to presence of Fun and Purpose area; Inability to stay in the Purpose area; Disinterest in doing anything;
Behavior: Staying calm; Depression; Neutrality; Signs of anger, jealous, etc.
Period : Age 17 – Till death
God’s Area
Reason : Staying in the Empty area; Limitations of one’s capability in Purpose area
Behavior: Having faith in unknown entity; Visiting Temples; Trying to be good; Blame the unknown entity for the all the pain incurred; Trying to understand one’s self.
Period : Age 18 – After death
Relations Area
Reason : Lot of people exists on the earth.
Behavior: Happy, Sad, love, and lot of human emotions take place.
Period : Age 16 – Till Death
Segregated Relation Area
Reason : Love; Marriage
Behavior: Happy, Sad, love, and lot of human emotions take place with limited people.
Period: Age 20 – Till Death
Hoarding Area
Reason : Insecurity feeling; Social responsibility; Greed;
Behavior: Keep accumulating the wealth beyond one’s need; Fun area starts shrinking; God’s and Empty area increases; Purpose area decreases.
Period : Age 25 – Till Health drains completely
Growth of Empty Area
Reason : Realization of 18-40-60 rule (The rule says that When you’re 18, you worry about what everybody is thinking of you; when you’re 40, you don’t give a darn what anybody thinks of you; when you’re 60, you realize nobody’s been thinking about you at all.)
Period : At some point of life
In the last days of life, only empty area exits
One who has skilled in many arts is not great
Physician who saves lives is not great
One who controls his breath is not great
One who does the charity is not great
For everyone something will be easy
Some are bestowed with talents to achieve success
However Know is drop and unknown is ocean
But who is great?
One who knows one’s self and lives according is great
One who is composed at everytime and shows compassion and love is great
Like the Sun can be seen in its own light
One can be seen by one’s own actions
Being great is a state and being good is an action
The final question is not, are you happy?
Rather how many people are happy because of you?
You cannot choose your color
You cannot choose your parents
But you can choose your life
The final destination is determined by your values
Have perseverance and keep moving…
As we all know that is Sun is at the center of our solar system and Earth is revolving around the Sun. Suppose Earth is not tilted then it follow the ecliptic path as shown in the figure below.
Since there is axial tilt of 23.26 degrees, Earth follows the ecliptic path as shown below.
Basically these two paths form a virtual plane around the Sun. The intersection line of the two planes results in two diametrically opposite intersection points, known as the equinoxes. The name “equinox” is derived from the Latin aequus (equal) and nox (night), because around the equinox, the night and day are approximately equally long. There will be two equinoxes: the vernal (Spring) equinox and the autumnal equinox.
The vernal equinox is marked as the beginning of the year. The Tamil New Year (also called as Puthandu) celebration follows the vernal equinox (also known as Nirayanam). However there is an issue in marking the vernal equinox as the celebration. Because the Earth orbits around the Sun by rotating itself and by that it experiences a slow down, similar to a spinning top which takes larger angular rotation towards the end before stopping.
Hence, there will be slight shift in the vernal equinox point every year. For example this year (2009) vernal equinox occurred around 20th March. After few years it will happen little bit early. In a way, it logically does not account for a complete revolution by the earth around the Sun.
So our ancient people, few thousand years ago, identified the vernal equinox point which occurred on 14th of April and from that point divided plane into 12 divisions of Rashi or (Veedu which means House) as shown below.
A Rashi indicates the group of stars (or Nasktra, which means ‘not in motion’) governing the Earth as it rotates.
The Tamil New Year celebration marks the occasion of Earth entering into Mesha (Aries) Rashi followed by the vernal equinox point. (Now [2009], the vernal equinox occurred in 20th March and entering into Mesha rashi is happening on 14th April). The starting month is called Cittirai, a period of mild sun with much light and less humid wind known to be very soothing and refreshing. (Now it is very hot, since the vernal equinox point is receded to March). In some parts of India, like Maharastra, Andra Pradesh, Karnataka, etc. celebrate the new year (Gudhi Padwa, Ugadi) based on the Lunar calendar which also mark the occasion of following the vernal equinox and on the new-moon day (Amavasya). But for your information, there is no astronomical significance in celebrating the 1st January as the new year, it just signifies a logical end.
Now lets see few things about Time. We measure time based on the planetary motion. But what is time at subtle level? According to the Surya Siddhanta, a treatise of Indian astronomy, describes the concept of time as,
‘That which begins with respirations (prAna) is called real; that which begins with atoms (truti) is unreal.’
‘Six respirations make a vinAdi, sixty of these a nAdi. And sixty nAdis make a sidereal day and night. Of thirty of these sidereal days is composed a month; twelve months make a year.’
Basically according to the Surya Siddhanta; 6 respirations x 60 x 60 = 21600 respirations will make a day.
Each proper respiration takes 4 seconds ; 21600 x 4 = 86400 seconds makes a day.
[Hence breathe properly.]
Fundamentally, breathing process is called ‘Ajapa’, an unconscious repetition but constantly. The breath of every person in entering makes the sound of ‘sah’ and in coming out that of ‘ham’. These two sounds make ‘Soham’ which means ‘I am He’. Sage Vyasa, author of Mahabharata, quotes Time is not a continuous entity rather it is discrete. When you concentrated i.e. your cognition flows towards a particular thing, then the notion of time disappears. It reminds me the Einstein’s quote, ‘Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. That’s relativity.’ Understanding the concept of Time makes you to understand about life.
However, every change happens within you is the real [new year] occasion.
“HE is static, intelligent, perfect, and luminous. SHE is the energy holding the purity, action, and ignorance in equilibrium. HE cannot perceive himself. There was absolute silence. But self-luminous HE reflected on SHE, disturbing the equilibrium of SHE and a universe born out this action, echoing the first sound. SHE perceived the HE. SHE had the exquisite feeling called ‘Love’ and eventually become the symbol for that. Thus HE perceived himself in SHE. And then in the universe everything born out of Love and evolved with Love as the reason.”
Love is the center of everything. In human, the Love resides in heart which is the center of human life. Mind is not required to express or perceive Love. But the mind covers the heart with substance called Ego to provide a new definition of Love.
Prathab 