Self respect is a strange concept. I have often wondered what exactly it is. Is it being able to look yourself in the eye every morning or is it being able to sleep at night? In my world, these are two events that often do not happen together. I can look myself in the eye almost always – because basic habits and up-bringing ensure that I rarely do things that I will be ashamed of. Sleeping at night, well that’s a function of decisions made and actions taken thereafter. And that determines the respect I have for my decisions. Respect, unfortunately, becomes a relative term.
I remember repeated conversations with my closest friends about how a decision is valid only in a given situation and you make it based on the best information available. Why then is it that it is so difficult for people to forgive themselves for decisions made in the past when new information comes their way. If I acted a certain way, it was because I saw a situation from a certain viewpoint. Today, something moved, and I see something new. Why is it that I berate myself for seeing things the way I did. I did not do anything that was against my self respect – yet, I can’t seem to respect my own decisions and judgment.
Forgiveness is easy. It really is -but only when it pertains to someone else. The reason is that while you can lie to another person, you can’t ever fool yourself. You always know what is irking you. To learn to deceive your own self is an art undiscovered. But to let go, is a tool we use- it’s what I call the out of sight out of mind system. Remember how as a child, you closed your eyes when something unpleasant happened in the hope that because you cant see, no one can see you and it never happened. That carries us through our lives. When you find it the most difficult to deal with, let it go. No right and wrong here. Its just survival – if you can’t control it, there is no limit you can put on it. Let it go and for you it will no longer exist. Life is normal again.
Hum of the day
The great part about life is that time and distance are related concepts. With time, distance is created, with distance peace and with peace, somewhere, forgiveness and respect.
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Unknown to me
“I have a dream, A song to sing, To help me cope, with anything. If you see the wonder of a fairytale, you can take the future, even if you fail. I believe in angels, something good in everything I see. I cross the stream, I have a dream.”
One of my favorite songs from childhood – always makes me smile. Today, it makes me wonder what the writer of that song must have been experiencing to feel a desperate need to express a hope for optimism. To give him/her that inspiration and motivation to move on, to let go of things in the hope that better would be around the corner – to need to know that if the distance was covered, that was a step towards a better world.
For a long time I have been writing – and it’s cathartic for me. Therefore, I was stumped with myself when I no longer could. I think I was afraid of facing what would flow from me if I allowed myself to write. But I also knew somewhere, some day I would have to, in order for me to cross the stream - today is that day.
I held on tight to a dream
Unknown to me its strength
I help on tight to a hope
Unknown to me the end
A need to know the truth
An urge to make it true
A call to take a step
Unknown to me it was back
A look around of me
Somehow clearly I see
Unknown to me a life
Unknown to me the truth
A decision to move ahead
Unknown to me the hope
A decision to take a step
To forgive myself the road
Unknown to me a smile
A surprise upon my eyes
Unknown to me freedom
A new beginning became known.
Hum of the day
Life is full of surprises. It’s the most pleasant when you surprise yourself.
One of my favorite songs from childhood – always makes me smile. Today, it makes me wonder what the writer of that song must have been experiencing to feel a desperate need to express a hope for optimism. To give him/her that inspiration and motivation to move on, to let go of things in the hope that better would be around the corner – to need to know that if the distance was covered, that was a step towards a better world.
For a long time I have been writing – and it’s cathartic for me. Therefore, I was stumped with myself when I no longer could. I think I was afraid of facing what would flow from me if I allowed myself to write. But I also knew somewhere, some day I would have to, in order for me to cross the stream - today is that day.
I held on tight to a dream
Unknown to me its strength
I help on tight to a hope
Unknown to me the end
A need to know the truth
An urge to make it true
A call to take a step
Unknown to me it was back
A look around of me
Somehow clearly I see
Unknown to me a life
Unknown to me the truth
A decision to move ahead
Unknown to me the hope
A decision to take a step
To forgive myself the road
Unknown to me a smile
A surprise upon my eyes
Unknown to me freedom
A new beginning became known.
Hum of the day
Life is full of surprises. It’s the most pleasant when you surprise yourself.
Would a map help?
I read this book (I think it was called When You Meet Buddha on the Road Shoot Him – I’m not sure). It began with a thought that has stuck with me – one of the biggest causes of unhappiness is the belief that there is a purpose to our life. There isn’t. Living is what we are meant to do, the ups and downs, the good and bad, the experience of it all is our only purpose. We give ourselves a lot of unhappiness because we try to extract from it something which is not. It is in living that you will actually achieve what you were given life for. That’s the answer to a happy life – just live it.
That’s easy enough to when things are at a level where you feel you can control it- but when the course veers off-track, that’s when I know I have a tendency to look for some other purpose – some higher goal of life. I think it gives me the comfort that things are happening for a reason – that the madness around me is not just a random. Because randomness scares me like nothing else. Because I can’t seem to be able to fence in the extent to which it can be unpleasant. I rarely find myself wanting to fence in the good – no surprises there.
I have gone through a lot of life philosophies – one where I believed I could control life, where I believed I could not control life only myself to one where I believed nothing is in my hands. Today I seem to have settled for a mid-path. I control the route which controls which of the limited end goals I will reach. In other words, I have come to believe my life is like a maze – one of those puzzles we used to solve as kids where you need to find 1 of 3 or four alternative treasures- you can wind down various roads and depending which you will chose, you will get what’s at the end. My hope is that the treasures don’t differ dramatically. My gut is that they do. My wish is that I chose correctly.
Hum of the day
I met a schoolboy of the present-past today. Crisply ironed shirt, well matched shoes and trousers, neat hair, confident stride with a backpack. I smiled as he walked into his cabin, opened his backpack to remove his laptop and get to his task for the day with the same enthusiasm as that of a child entering school. I wonder if anything has changed. We are all just children - working first to learn to be able to make a living, then to make that living. Somewhere we forget to do what we are trying to – live.
That’s easy enough to when things are at a level where you feel you can control it- but when the course veers off-track, that’s when I know I have a tendency to look for some other purpose – some higher goal of life. I think it gives me the comfort that things are happening for a reason – that the madness around me is not just a random. Because randomness scares me like nothing else. Because I can’t seem to be able to fence in the extent to which it can be unpleasant. I rarely find myself wanting to fence in the good – no surprises there.
I have gone through a lot of life philosophies – one where I believed I could control life, where I believed I could not control life only myself to one where I believed nothing is in my hands. Today I seem to have settled for a mid-path. I control the route which controls which of the limited end goals I will reach. In other words, I have come to believe my life is like a maze – one of those puzzles we used to solve as kids where you need to find 1 of 3 or four alternative treasures- you can wind down various roads and depending which you will chose, you will get what’s at the end. My hope is that the treasures don’t differ dramatically. My gut is that they do. My wish is that I chose correctly.
Hum of the day
I met a schoolboy of the present-past today. Crisply ironed shirt, well matched shoes and trousers, neat hair, confident stride with a backpack. I smiled as he walked into his cabin, opened his backpack to remove his laptop and get to his task for the day with the same enthusiasm as that of a child entering school. I wonder if anything has changed. We are all just children - working first to learn to be able to make a living, then to make that living. Somewhere we forget to do what we are trying to – live.
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