The Unabridged Version of a Rational Emotional Mind

I had the opportunity to attend a youth group meeting discussing about the Farmers’ Bill of 2020 today. The key question that was raised in that group was – ‘What can we as youths do to help the cause of the farmers, sitting at home?’ When the discussion was unfolding, I also started thinking, what can I do to help the cause of the farmers in our country, sitting in front of my laptop, desperately trying to finish my assignments! Here are a few things I came up with. All of them are up for debate and deliberation – 1.       Initiate discussions: Today a group of twenty odd people could meet in the session, trying to understand the implications of the Bill. Now, if this group of people, belonging to various social groups could spread awareness about the insights they gained during the session. The twenty would multiply to forty to eighty and so on. I guess this is where social media acts as a great tool. If instead of posting about our food menus for the...

  Living in these times I have always wondered, if the God(s) we worship is/are all powerful, where does the need to protect our God’s homes (religious places) and his/her people come from. Why do the followers of a spiritual force feel this overwhelming need to protect the One who protects them? The answer for this question came to me from revisiting a theory in psychology that I have truly admired. The concept is simple- according to Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchical Theory of Motivation; all of us have needs which lie in a hierarchy, starting from basic needs of nutrition and water to higher level needs of self-actualization (going beyond one’s own needs to reach out to one’s community at large) These needs are the ones that guide our every action. For example- the basic need of hunger makes us look for food and eat. Similarly, it is our need for belongingness that makes us want to maintain social bonds, however limited they may be. To explain my point today, I will have to ex...

All of us, in our lifetime, look at various forms of injustice around us and wonder, why? Right from our school days where we see our teachers treating their ‘favourite’ students preferentially to our workplaces where capable individuals lose opportunities because of XYZ reason; mostly which have nothing to do with their caliber. Many of us may choose to stay mum to instances of injustice around us. But a chosen few, with this unyielding fire in their hearts, chose to respond, act out, in ways they think will make things better. I like to believe that each one of us is passionate about something in our life. There are issues that make each of our hearts burn with an unyielding fire. You may be a feminist fighting for equality of the sexes, an environmental activist with an unyielding desire to make the world a safer place or a good old citizen, trying to voice your opinion and share the right information to as many people as you can. If you are one such person, you may want to he...

My mother is not a woman of many lessons, but the one lesson she has always repeated almost my entire life is this – “If someone is feeling uncomfortable because of any of your actions or words directed at them, Stop Right There!” It took me years to realize that she was trying to teach me the most valuable lesson there is to humanity – Kindness. In this lifetime, we interact with a multitude of people. Some of them are similar to us in many ways, but most of them are not. How then do we uphold our individuality even as we strive to be kind to the world around us? We start by changing the direction of our words and actions. Often, as the ‘woke’ generation tries to question the social disgust there is, we tend to vilify the people involved, instead of the issue itself. We need to understand that it is not the person but the problem that has to be eradicated. Sure, I am in no way trying to justify the heinous crimes committed by people all around us. But when we decide to raise our...

 Sometimes I wish I were born a bird instead I could spread my wings and fly Without worrying about people Saying I don’t have what it takes to fly high I could soar as high as the sky Without looking back, looking down On what is expected of me Sure I won’t fly too close to the Sun I know better than Icarus that Over-ambitions can burn   Sometimes I wish I was born an ant instead I could eat as much sugary treats as I wanted Hoard them even, for all I care! The quite hard-work, pain and toil I put Would reap me more benefits as an ant Than as a human Being a female would only bear privilege In the ant’s world Far be it to get the same respect as a woman In the human’s man’s world   But I was born a human Much to my dismay Feeling all these emotions My heart wishes to play That an ant or a bird would never have To fathom or display The constant pain in my chest The constant utterances in my head- ‘You are not go...

Ever since I stepped into the threshold of adolescence, I have never taken an afternoon nap. I always thought that naps are a waste of time; time that I can use productively. This sentiment was strong in me even during the lazy days of summer holidays in school and college. I would rather sit idle, doing absolutely nothing, mindlessly watch T.V. for hours on end, than take a nap. But today, at 4.56pm, all of that changed. I woke up from my first nap in over a decade and now I wanna kill the old me for believing that naps are over-rated. Waking up in the afternoon felt as if I was waking up to a new morning with new possibilities. I had the renewed energy to face the rest of the day with more enthusiasm. Now why am I ranting about my nap right now? It is to tell you how I stumbled across another great reality in our lives. See, I had created this notion that ‘naps are over-rated’ without ever having tested the validity of that premise in my life. I just believed what I chose to be...

I was watching this episode of Brooklyn 99 (Season 5, Episode 14) in which Jake Peralta and Raymond Holt interrogate the perfect criminal, Philip – a dentist who murdered his business partner leaving no traces behind. Even after 14 hours of intense interrogation, both these officers could not get an inch near making Philip confess. Until, they exploited a fear they identified in him during the interrogation – The fear of being considered a product of sheer luck. Philip, as stated before, was a dentist. As a norm, he was often ridiculed as not being a real ‘doctor’. His insecurity or fear had made him so uptight that as he tried to defend his perfect alibis in the interrogation room, he also wanted to prove to the officers how good he was. But when Jake tugged on Philip’s underlying insecurity real nice by calling the entire murder operation a product of ‘dumb luck’, Philip spiraled and confessed everything in a heartbeat. This was all in his attempt to disprove the relevance of h...

CBSE 12 th results were released yesterday, and the unachievable was finally achieved. 100% marks is not a utopian concept anymore. It is a reality in front of our eyes made true by two dedicated youths of our country – Divyanshi Jain and Tushar Singh. While these students bask in the glory of cent percent marks, a thought arose in my mind. Something that must have popped up in the minds of countless others like me- How did they score 100% in English? One of the toppers stated thus and I quote, “I don’t think one should get full marks in English because no letter or essay can be perfect”. Today, I dare to ask, why not? If all that I wanted to state through my essay is ‘An apple a day keeps the doctor away’ and I defended every single aspect of my views with perfectly articulated arguments, is my essay not perfect? Had I written a letter in real life instead of my answer script would my future employer have declined my job because I missed the EXACT points he or she intended me t...

Lucky are those who wake up in the morning and can see the world in 1080hp resolution. As for us, a category of ‘ chashmish ’ entities in this world, we are stuck in the middle spot from being labeled disabled to being absolutely ‘normal’. Our first instinct, when we wake up, is to fumble and find our ‘beloved’ chashmas , even before we open our eyes. For reasons unknown to medical sciences (or just to my parents), I have been a loyal chashmish for the past 18 years. And this is the coming of age story of my tryst with the chashma . Disclaimer: This is a guide for the ‘normal’ population out there and a homage to all my chashmish fellows. 1.   Our chashma is our ‘frenemy’ If you think wearing specs all day long is fun, let me tell you, no kind human, IT IS NOT. We almost have a love-hate relationship with our chashmas . It is our friend and foe at the same time. We hate it for being such a constant annoyance (much like our sibling). But we know we cannot live without them. Ne...

For anyone who has been a victim of any form of verbal abuse, be it from a passive aggressive childhood best friend, or a soul sucking bully, or a ghosting ‘true love’ or just anyone who just won’t let you breathe, we know how hard it can be to stand up for ourselves and confront these mean entities. Even though traditionally it’s said that standing up for oneself and confronting is the best way to regain our inner peace. I beg to differ and today I will tell you exactly why. So here’s a friendly guide to dealing with mean people: Energy Saver Edition Step one: Awareness A few things to understand about the nature of mean people in your life: 1.   Intention is important: As a word of caution, before we label somebody mean or a bully, we need to ask ourselves if we were in their position would we say such words or do such things. Intent to crime my friend is always a deal breaker. 2.   If they are mean to you, they won’t get you: If someone is already on the path of hurti...

Let’s do an activity together today. Think about your favourite colour, your favourite flower, favourite stress buster, favourite movie, favourite place to hang out, favourite comfort food, favourite bully, favourite embarrassment, favourite pain. Did you get stuck up on the last three favourites I asked you to think about? Well don’t be fazed, hang in there! I’ll tell you why. Once I asked a close friend to tell me seven favourite spots in his house with a special memory attached to it, and he asked me, ‘Can this favourite place be somewhere I cried?’ That got me thinking that why is it that every favourite of ours is attached to something that makes us happy, why can’t it be something that taught us life lessons through the pain. Don’t get lost in the confusion yet, I will tell you exactly what I mean. You see, the word favourite has its roots in the Latin word ‘favere’ which means ‘to show kindness to’ and the past participle of the Italian word ‘favorire’ which means ‘to favour’. S...

‘To begin to love someone truly completely, you will have to learn to love yourself first’, I have heard this quote umpteen number of times all my life. Recently I came across an absolutely different take to this perspective- ‘I may not know how to love myself, but Lord knows that I love you to pieces.’ I believe love is as complex as any other human emotion, if not the most complex one. It can make you do things you never imagined yourself to do and shatter your soul into a million pieces when you feel that love you have for someone is slowly fading away. So what is it about loving someone unconditionally that hurts so much? What is it about love that makes us who we are even when we are not completely ourselves? When is the ‘right’ time to start loving someone else? Once we learn how to love ourselves or despite ever being able to do so. I can’t answer all these questions at once. But I can try to answer the last one- the right time to begin loving someone. I believe what makes love...

Ever wondered how a beautiful Lotus flower blooms and prospers in the most unsightly of environments- the marshy wetlands? Well, it is to signify that sometimes beauty and greatness can truly shine only in the most unforeseen of circumstances. This is exactly what makes the Lotus not just any other ordinary flower, but a unique one. So what makes one bloom in the most unfavorable of life circumstances? 1.       One’s Life Support: They say that even if you are dying inside and you have someone to share your pain with, you die a happy man. When life throws us in the pit of misery, the one aspect that acts as the pulley that drags us out is our life support system- in the form of our family, our friends and the people we love and look up to. 2.       One’s Hope for a Better Future:  The one thing that truly kills the will to live in any man is the death of hope in him. Anything we do in a day is with the hope to see a better future. Eerily enough, we sle...

Being a part of a world dominating religion, in a country where it is in minority is an eerily odd experience. It makes you a part of a major world community while alienating you in your own home land. Being a Christian in the Land of Sindhu (‘Hindu’stan as we now call it) is a life experience that makes us look at the very idea of life from a varied angle than the majority. Practicing Christianity in the metropolitan city of Delhi has its advantages like none other. 1.         We get the subtexts in any international work of art or entertainment : Ever wonder who Adam is? Or why the apple keeps popping up in every conversation about a mistake? While you may be sitting and wondering, a person born Christian does not have to think twice or Google things when such sub texts occur in popular literature or our favourite sitcoms, we are taught about it, since day 1. 2.       We know our religion : This little fact is something any practicing Christian can b...