life

Life Choices – Cause and Reaction

/ inSolitude / 4 Comments

How often we have walked a path being sure that is what we want only to discover that it is not the right one. We change course, and this time we are ‘sure’ this is the correct path… and then again, it doesn’t seem right. So we take a completely different ‘obvious’ route and still stumble upon the same dilemma of being completely opposite of ‘being sure’.

What is wrong? Why can’t we get it correct? Are we really unsure or we don’t know?

We have all done puzzles – How do we find the right route through the maze? Do we get it right the first time? We try. We were sure but we were wrong… so we tried again. Unlike puzzles like this, life is not so simple with limited, pre-determined paths to follow. There are many unlimited, undefined, unconditional paths – each, once selected, brings us to the next step of the same routine of ‘choices’. Why are we caught in this maze with no beginning or end? If making the choice does not solve the problem, why then do we make the choice in the first place?

Let’s rewind.

Who are you? What contributed to the current state you are in? What choices you have made gives you the current choice you have in hand to choose? Who and what will you be if a different set of options were offered… and choices made?

Life presents us all with situations, and with it options, and tied to that choices. It is either we get ourselves into that situations or the situations presents themselves. We need to make a call. Not making a choice is like clicking the ‘failure to make a choice’ button by default. Choices are made – either you choose or let it be chosen for you. THAT will define the next series of steps… and that cascades down to what and who we have become now.

We ask ourselves. Could I have become a different person? YES, we would have been… but we may not be asking ourselves that question if we were already a different person who chooses ignorance over the truth of self-doubt.

We make choices. Glad we made those choices to let us move, to learn, to become a better person…. and most importantly, to address the birth of new choices. There is nothing limiting us… if anything it is us who are putting layers and layers of shackles around us. Let’s be free. Let’s make those choices and live life!

Repeat mistakes – Painful reminder and New lessons

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We go through some painful lessons in life. We tell ouselves not to ever come back to that dreaded situation again. We remind ourselves time and again not to … and not to… and then… we find ourselves in the exactly same situation.Sad as it may, sometimes it take another rap on the knuckles or even two to wake us up. Complacency creeps in all the time.

As much as we will need to learn from our history, and not to let history repeat itself again, our learnings from the repeated ‘offence’ are different. It acts as both a reminder and to built our strong conviction. It makes us stronger… remind us about matters that really matters – which we conveniently forget or choose to forget.

But we need to learn. As stupid as it may sound making those same mistakes repeatedly, maybe we need to check for a pattern… maybe there is more to the actual mistake that we probably could have missed out in the first place… maybe there is a different lesson we could learn from it now. Whatever the situation, we need to learn from it… remember it… and re-live the pain to re-learn the lessons.

Let the misery live on… for that is the punishment for failing to learn the lessons. Let the time drowned in misery be a deep cast message to not to forget this again. Let there be permanent measures never to revisit this path again.

Let there be peace once this is all over.

Alone – What do you feel?

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We are almost always amongst our colleagues, friends, family and loved ones. How often are we left alone? What happens when we are along? What is that feeling? Do you feel alone and start to call someone to talk to? Do you dress up and leave the ‘lonely’ state and get to the city to be amongst the ‘crowd’? What is being alone mean to you? I realise now that many could actually feel lonely and a good number might feel ‘scared’.

It seems, not many could actually appreciate the pause in the routine cycle of things –  for us to put a break in our daily activity and evaluate life in general. We can go to a nice, cosy corner, and read our favourite novel or serve the internet, updating our Facebook and Twitter… or even catch some funnies in YouTube. Maybe, we can even make ourselves a nice hot chocolate or cold beer, whichever suits us, and turn up the volume on our Surround Speaker and watch our favourite Blu-Ray movie on our HDTV. Or maybe, tidy up our table or pictures we have taken for Christmas… or follow up on some backlog of work… or SMS/email a old friend… or write a diary or share your feeling on WordPress… or go repair that leaking pipe, setup the External Hard Disk or Wireless Router that you just purchased, which is sitting there in the corner…. or maybe get some exercise… or really just unwind and play an online game or simly get some sleep to get recharged… or get some alcohol in your system and do all of the above in the floating state.

Maybe you should try to reconnect with our past and see what you missed out doing. May it be painting, listening to some classics, stamp collecting, looking through our album, or reading some poems… or watching some old movies that we used to enjoy 20 years back. Maybe we can be adventurous and drive our car to a place we have loved to go a long time now, or simply let your heart define the route. Or you could even take a bus and sit there and be absorbed with the world around you.

All of the above are something we can do anytime, but when do we even chose to do it? The moment we are given that precious space in our packed life, what do we choose to do? We can choose to just waste it, only to dump it with the notion that there will always be many such opportunities or simply to even take it as a ‘scary’ moment to ‘endure’ through… or we can cherish it and make every moment of that worth its while. Whichever path we choose are our choices. Choices on how we spent our life, our time and precious moments.

There is so much to do. That is… if we want to do them. Those ‘spare’ moments we have are to be cherished. It is really up to us to make those moments make something out of us. A routine ‘maintenance’ for ourselves by ourselves. To re-align our path to take a better route… or simply to find the better us. Let us value those moments… let us make it worth the while… let us give solitude its rightful place. Live well.

Quiet Moments…

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Today has been quiet. It sure gets quiet without anyone around. Very quiet in fact. This moment that so is presented to me is so precious that I need to log it down.

What does this quiet do to us? For one, it gets us off the wheel and let us have a look around us. Did we notice that there were some emails that we have chucked one corner… did we notice the various websites we have yet to explore… new technology and new things that we can be done? There are some who will be totally lost with this free time. I am too… lost in a different way – on how to make so much of this short little window.

I can feel my breath. I can feel my heat beat. I can feel happiness. It feels like I are one with nature. As if I can communicate with the surrounding. And now my mind starts to think… or rather wander. Now this is where I start to think about life.

What is this life? What do we really achieve in living? I mean, in the end we are all going to die and there is no medal that we are bringing along with us. I feel envious of those who has a religion – which gives them something to believe it. But  the fact is… once your mind expands to a certain point, having had seen beyond the horizon, it can never be contained within the parameters defined. Religion is a great anchor. I have had explored them for many years or even decades, but is just that… once you have gone deep in, the tsunami of spiritual aspirations just could not be confined within these boundaries. Many do no aspire to go beyond, for at the end of the square world, we will all tip over and fall. Well then again, is there any need to do so? For me.. Yes! There is.

I remember when I was young… I used to visit different places of worship. Whichever one I went to, I loved them all. The peace and tranquility that I sense there is wonderful. I always envied the great sages and saints all my life…. and I could sense their  true happiness – To be free. To be one with all. To be the present in the presence.

My mind wanders again… I am getting old. We all are. What have we achieved? Yes, we have a family and there are many religions to choose from… We have money to get almost whatever we want. But what have we achieved? Or is it even necessary to bring up that question? I want to achieve… I want to do something with my life before it slips me by. Money has never made me happy. I mean… I do breath in relief when I get the cheques to keep my life going, but that is not happiness… that is relief. I get a nice gadget around  the house, it is not happiness, it is trill. I get nice shoes and suits to look good – that is not happiness either, that is vanity. I take a glass of gin – that is fake happiness, like a sugar substitute. We do many things in life… how many of them bring us happiness. Most of the things we do are in the pursuit of happiness… In the hope that that action will make us happy… but do they? Instead they act like drugs, giving us an instant high, but fizzes out eventually.

So I need to pursue my journey toward Happiness. Towards Peace. Towards Solitude.