It is not that I hate watching television or even dislike it, it has more to do with it’s content that irritates me. Otherwise in every valid case - be it entertainment or knowledge gathering - I love watching television. But when I weigh the merits against it’s demerits, I find television to be more negative on me – in a more objective sense: it irritates me. This, I had felt and thought to have a negative impact on the way I look at the world surrounding me and also within me. The negation is on my mental being and that boils down to my attitude towards life. Apart from the psychological disturbances television creates, the content usually finds me with a stench of scorn – I don’t find it logical in a way that I prefer calling things logical.
I have used the television in many ways. Right from playing video games of all kinds on it – 8 bit to 64 bit, connecting cassette and CD players and watching movies, and of course the broadcasted channels which are connected to the set via the famous ‘cable’. I desire to discuss the content available through this ‘cable’.
The most decent of the television channels are the news channels. They are just supposed to be the decent but they do a great amount of damage. Every individual news channel can be found to have taken a stance on every particular item and they prove to the viewers that the opinion they have put out is correct. The facts are on the dull side of the game and opinions are given more shine. The spicing up of the facts to the ‘creation’ of news makes or breaks a news channel. They all seem to be in a rat race to increase their TRPs but they do not seem understand that a winner of a rat race is a rat. I somehow feel like asking them back if so much of ridiculous stuff is worth being acquired by our brains and expected to be called as knowledge which is said to be a satisfaction in itself.
Some days back I happened to sit in front of the television. Though I didn’t like myself doing this, I had to do – there were forceful reasons behind. I was watching a news channel which was ‘sharing’ with the viewers the story of an Indian girl getting married to a Pakistani boy. They had met through the internet and they had decided to get married for reasons best known to them-selves as if they can’t find suitable matches in their own respective countries. This was ‘news’ according to that news channel. They were showing all the preparation the girl was making at her residence – the design of henna on her hands, her jewelry, her bridal clothes, and what not. For once I just got the feeling that I was watching the video of some relative of mine getting married! I couldn’t understand how such a personal endeavor can become an occasion worthy enough to be broadcasted on a national channel with millions of viewers watching it.
When I find any useless news on the television I can understand that there was nothing much that had happened that day and the channel is playing with the audience. Then the next day when something fascinating happens, it looks as if these channel people have made that happen.
Then there are the advertisements on these news channels that are shown even while the news is being read. They look more like pop-ups popping out when we use the internet. The only difference is that while using the internet we can have a pop-up blocker to stop them and here we can’t have that privilege.
The music channels are a class in themselves. There are those that belong to the lowest class but command a higher TRP.
Among the several shows that irritate me the most of them are the ones that make the viewer come back to them again. They are like cigarettes with a high content of nicotine in them that pull the smoker back in. The lead in this kind is taken by the daily soaps. This is so obvious that it will be silly for me to elaborate the dumbness of these shows. But I salute the directors and producers of such shows – they know exactly what touches the hearts of the viewers and what can make them feel rather than think. The acting performances make no difference; it is the dialogues and the music. Dialogues induce new vocabulary into the minds of the viewers and they learn how to become more expression-filled when they talk to others (when they get time). The music is the chieftain – no matter how the dialogues are, no matter how the action is, or whatever, music creates the perfect atmosphere. Music creates the mood that fits into the story – sorrowful, threatening horror, romantic or pleasant.
It is not the ask for entertainment that pulls people back to these shows but the curiosity of what’s going to happen next in the story. The ‘next’ keeps coming and more ‘nexts’ follow. The show never ends. The finality is that there is nothing final.
There are quiz shows and those that acknowledge the youth for their impressive knowledge filled minds. I wonder if the knowledge in our brains is more important or the wisdom to know what we got to do to have the relevant knowledge with us. Gifts worth a heck are given to the so-called knowledgeable. I am sure what those people thrive to remember can be found in a hundred rupee book available at the nearest book shop. (Am I supposed to know what made a particular car manufacturing company to give a particular name to it’s new car model? Why should I have concerns with that? Let them name it anything – Sissy Boy or He-Man.)
The movies shown on movie channels are again a confusing lot. They are called block-busters and kind. They are just the movies that was declared flop even before they were released.
The other part of the television: advertisements or commercials. There are people who complain about the number of advertisements the channels air. Do they think the channels are run by some government or a welfare society that intends to entertain people? Don’t they understand the purpose behind the running of these channels? It is all money do doubt.
The advertisements are the most severe irritators to me though I am amused by them at times. The news channels probably give away the air time at a lower cost so the adverts on them are third grade with all the local products being publicized. The adverts are either dubbed from other languages or have idiotic themes and ideas. The local music channels air the most rotten of them.
There are of course those adverts, common to all the channels, which seem to have taken birth in a numbskull’s advertising agency. They make good and branded names silly at times with ridiculous concepts used to advertise them. They take superstar celebrities and create a heck out of them. I remember seeing a top notch Bollywood actor trying to sell hair oil that promises to keep my head cool. I have no objections to that but when a favorite of mine is endorsing a hair oil brand by behaving like a fool on the television, it definitely hurts me. More than half of the adverts are dumb and they are worth not a single watch.
But some people do have brains. I love that commercial of an adhesive wherein a woman is working and her about-two-year-old son keeps running away from her. She brings the child back but he runs away again. Then she finally makes him sit on a box and he doesn’t move! The kid is sitting on a box of that adhesive. There in not a single real dialog spoken but still the advert looks least formidable. The logic of a boy sitting on a box that holds him from moving may look silly but it is entertaining alongside advertising that brand.
There are very few commercials of such kind that boast of a wise explanation of why that product should be preferred over the others. Even if there is nothing wise, there are few that just entertain, with no reason, with no logic, but still have a class in them. The kind of adverts a channel broadcasts makes up for the ‘class’ of that channel. Usually the news channels lack this.
Once I turned on the television set to get the latest updates of a cricket match. It was late night and I had to search for the channel that was relaying the game. I came across 51 of them before I could find what I wanted. But in those 51 channels I saw at least 20 of them showing some advertisement of some product that proclaims itself to be the best that would help us slim down and reduce weight. I was thinking if people have no other work than losing weight. Why are they more concerned about their looks and not their brains?
I once saw the commercial of the shaving razor brand I use. I felt like punishing myself for using that brand. I knew why there was a female model in that advert but I didn’t like her being there. This was just one single instance – even other accessories used only by men have ladies in their advertisements.
We have heard a lot about the negative impacts of the television on our society and also the individuals. The thing that pricks me the most is that I believe the failure of most of the marriage relationships that are taking place now a days are mainly due to this television. The actors and actresses are chosen by the producers from millions - these faces are one in a million – picked up and prepared to look perfect in front of the camera. They appear pleasing and incredible and they make money for the industry. But the viewers cough up their lives sometimes because of the same. When they see perfect faces they expect the same from their spouses. But of course their spouses are not one in millions; they are not perfect and as pleasing as the ones seen on the television screen. The expectations are hurt and the relationships broken. It happens directly or indirectly.
The language used in many soaps; the vocabulary – everything; the plots, the sequences – they are all related by the people with their own lives and they don’t imagine the loss as a result of this. It results in people having lesser trust in their spouses. This, in a way, creates a communication gap. The difference between hate and dislike is forgotten, the relationship is lost.
The most beautiful relation created by God is destroyed by a nuisance called The Television. It is not the television exactly but the content that does the damage and harm.
Have people lost their ability to decide what is right and wrong? Have people failed to realize that what can entertain them can also destroy them? Have people been so ignorant of the consequences of becoming couch potatoes?
I have nothing against those who watch television. They can decide for themselves. I am much concerned with myself and I have decided that I will keep away from it. Yes, sometimes it becomes necessary for me to have a look at it when there is something important being shown. And once in a while I do sit in front of it. But I hardly switch it on by myself except on rare occasions. I am glad this thing couldn’t carry me away from my consciousness.
Every person needs some kind of entertainment and it is his/her right. But anything that can be a means of destruction to him/her must be condemned. The whole of television is not bad. It has many good advantages. These kinds of merits and demerits have been discussed at many places. My purpose of writing this was to share why I prefer having the demerits speak for me as a source of drive for me that stops me from watching it.
Keeping away from the television gives me a lot of extra time and helps me have a better commitment towards my parents. Though sometimes I find myself ignorant of some facts shown on the television but it gives a kind of pride to me – not knowing something because I don’t watch television. I am glad to be ignorant about the hit movies now a days, and also the names of many movies. I feel great when someone asks me if I have seen some advertisement and I say I haven’t.
The bottom line: I love not watching television – it is a satisfaction in itself.
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Thank you!
This work by Syed Zubair Hasan is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Selfishness: A Virtue and a Concrete Principle
Selflessness is often considered another word for greatness; a selfless person is regarded as a true human being ready to help others and most importantly live for others. He is respected everywhere and he takes no concern for the respect he gets – he is selfless. Everyone likes to adapt this ‘accepted virtue’ and seeks to attain satisfaction and contentment in his life through it.
So I thought it would rather be a ‘virtue’ to help everybody this way – helping them know what they are to do to become true persons (if they desire to); helping them know more about their want. So I decided to write out about two men – a selfless and a selfish – under a similar situation, and the way they act. Their actions are strictly in concord to their belief structures. The selfless man believes in altruism and the selfish man believes in egoism.
Let me consider an event when both these men cross a very busy street, busy with heavy and fast flow of vehicular traffic – with their respective mothers.
As the selfless man starts to cross the street with his mother, his mother slips and falls down. He finds there is another woman who has fallen too. Initially he tries to help both the people lying on the high speed lane. He realizes he has no choice but to choose one of them. He pulls out the other woman safe out of the street. His mother dies.
In the same situation the selfish man helps his mother out. The other lady dies.
The two men are true to their beliefs. Both of them are avid followers of their principles in a sense that they long for perfection in what they have opted to believe in. They have their priorities and their priorities are defined by their virtues. The altruist man has his virtue as selflessness and the egoist has it as selfishness.
When religion in taken into account first, then next the ethics and morality, in this particular show of actions of the two men, the selfless man is unreservedly the murderer of his mother. Though he has saved a life, he has committed a sin and a moral crime – of letting his mother die. It his mother that declares him the murderer. In the case of the selfish man he is religiously, morally and ethically right. Though he has left the other lady to die, he has not made any mistakes. Here the selfless man has saved his mother because he lives for others and not himself – living for himself would require him to have his mother saved and that would have been the ask to leave the other woman die.
Coming to the psychological impact of the actions of the two men on themselves. The selfless man can never be happy letting his mother die. He will live the rest of his life with a guilt inside him that will ultimately turn into a supernatural punishment after his death. He has let his mother die. On the other hand the selfish man may feel empathy for the other lady but he is glad to save his mother. He couldn’t have had a better opportunity to serve his mother. Though he has done something not for him directly, but his action gives him happiness and contentment which is for him.
So if selflessness that makes a man let his mother die a virtue? If selflessness is followed to its core, does it lead to guilt in a person’s life? Does selflessness make a man a murderer? Is it wise to thrive to follow such an idea? Is altruism a sin?
Selflessness is a ridiculous idea. It is an incomplete principle and incomplete by principle. When a principle is taken as an end to us – an idea that shall remain with us as a premise till our end, then it must be complete and final in every way.
Selfless – the word itself looks threatening. Self – less. Without self. No respect, no value, no recognition, no existence of the ‘self’. Altruism preaches: live for others; it asks for self sacrifice. Is makes one become a slave of the other – a self surrendered slave – with ones own will – much worse than enforced slavery. It is a slavery out of own happiness – a happiness that is not final – that has strings attached to it – that carries guilt with it. Selflessness gives a happiness that makes one feel guiltier. Selflessness preaches being happy is a sin. Selflessness asks abandonment of ones happiness. It asks to thrive of the other’s happiness.
Altruism promises contentment. Is that promise itself not a selfish desire – a desire for contentment. Whose contentment? Ones own? Or the others’? A final principle can’t be self-contradictory. A virtue can’t promise what it calls as evil. Altruism in principle is suicidal.
But these ideas have been accepted because they are accepted; accepted and taught – by our elders, parents, teachers, preachers, friends, enemies, television, newspapers, magazines, unauthenticated scriptures – needless to say, by every human being who has been taught the same thing by one of these things. Selflessness is taken as a virtue because it is called as a virtue by everyone around. People do not know what they must do to be happy and most desirably, be satisfied. So when they are said that it is selflessness that is going to give them happiness and satisfaction, they adapt it. Or should I say, try to adapt it.
Altruism (or selflessness), being incomplete as a virtue, creates more contempt and dissatisfaction. When a person attempts to be selfless, he starts with destroying his self. Later he sacrifices himself to the will of the society. He sacrifices his ideas, his abilities and his values. He believes this is the right way towards everlasting happiness. The more he does this sacrificial act, the more he looses of his life. The more he looses makes him even more unhappy and dissatisfied. But he never doubts the principle he has opted for. He doubts his inefficiency. He puts in more efforts to become more selfless. He runs around in a circle – he never finds contentment.
Selfishness gives contentment. It provides with a complete finality of a principle – a virtue. The word ‘selfishness’ is always misunderstood and it will continue to be so as long as people don’t allow consciousness to overcome their ignorance. Selfishness makes a person an individual a ‘self’ – a unit himself living for the sole purpose of his happiness. Selfishness preaches the idea of putting ones own life before the other’s. It makes a person complete as an object himself that has its own existence – giving him self-respect and recognition. The means to his end can be chosen by himself that give him the liberty over his actions and endeavors.
Everybody is selfish. Breathing, eating, and requirement of shelter are the basic needs of everyman – the needs are for him - selfish. He requires love – for mental fitness – for completeness – selfish. No human can deny his being of selfish. So why should he try and make altruism as his ideal? Why should man search for a principle that promises of selfishness in return? Why should he not follow the virtue of selfishness in the first place itself?
In a free country it is the individual who has to be given freedom – it is the individuals who make a country – not the boundaries. A free country is free only when the self-esteem of every man is upheld. He is happy only when his needs are met. All the requirements are defined under selfishness. How can the desire for basic necessities be evil? How can selfishness be evil? Is eating food to fill ones own stomach evil? Is breathing evil? We live ‘our’ life. Is its evil to do so? Is being free evil?
No religion asks man to sacrifice himself for others. We are here in this world for ourselves – so that we get the right credits in our account – so that we reach heaven. We pray for ourselves. When we pray for others we do it for our happiness. Everything is selfishness.
When a man makes a lot of money he is termed selfish. Whenever he thinks of himself he is called selfish. Whenever he acts in his self-interest he is regarded selfish. The reason is that people are jealous. When they can’t do something for themselves and when they find someone else doing it, they feel jealousy. They can’t make lot of money, they can’t think of themselves, they can’t do things in their self-interest – they want to be selfless or called as selfless. So to make those egoist people be accepted as evil in the society, to destroy them, they call them as selfish. The society has never dared to find out what selfishness is, it accepts the egoists as evil to the society.
So if this is how things take shape then every person who breathes, who fills his stomach, who prays to God – they are must be declared as evil. They are doing this for themselves and not for others. Or do people know what actual evil is? Who defined evil for them? The so unauthenticated so-called religious scriptures? Or themselves?
Selfishness can never be escaped. It has to be accepted in every way. It is a complete idea – in every sense. It is not wrong living for ourselves – for the things of interest to us – for the matters that are of our concern – our happiness, our desires, our satisfaction, our contentment. Being selfish means being more concerned with things of out own interest – people we love, things we value, our religion, doing everything that gives happiness and satisfaction: everything without making a sacrifice. Doing the above is not evil. It is a virtue.
Being selfishness doesn’t mean that we do things that cause to hurt others or cause any destruction. For this purpose moral ethical codes are necessary. Religion has defined all this for us. Any idea not defined under religion can be decided on our own value judgment – rationally.
So I thought it would rather be a ‘virtue’ to help everybody this way – helping them know what they are to do to become true persons (if they desire to); helping them know more about their want. So I decided to write out about two men – a selfless and a selfish – under a similar situation, and the way they act. Their actions are strictly in concord to their belief structures. The selfless man believes in altruism and the selfish man believes in egoism.
Let me consider an event when both these men cross a very busy street, busy with heavy and fast flow of vehicular traffic – with their respective mothers.
As the selfless man starts to cross the street with his mother, his mother slips and falls down. He finds there is another woman who has fallen too. Initially he tries to help both the people lying on the high speed lane. He realizes he has no choice but to choose one of them. He pulls out the other woman safe out of the street. His mother dies.
In the same situation the selfish man helps his mother out. The other lady dies.
The two men are true to their beliefs. Both of them are avid followers of their principles in a sense that they long for perfection in what they have opted to believe in. They have their priorities and their priorities are defined by their virtues. The altruist man has his virtue as selflessness and the egoist has it as selfishness.
When religion in taken into account first, then next the ethics and morality, in this particular show of actions of the two men, the selfless man is unreservedly the murderer of his mother. Though he has saved a life, he has committed a sin and a moral crime – of letting his mother die. It his mother that declares him the murderer. In the case of the selfish man he is religiously, morally and ethically right. Though he has left the other lady to die, he has not made any mistakes. Here the selfless man has saved his mother because he lives for others and not himself – living for himself would require him to have his mother saved and that would have been the ask to leave the other woman die.
Coming to the psychological impact of the actions of the two men on themselves. The selfless man can never be happy letting his mother die. He will live the rest of his life with a guilt inside him that will ultimately turn into a supernatural punishment after his death. He has let his mother die. On the other hand the selfish man may feel empathy for the other lady but he is glad to save his mother. He couldn’t have had a better opportunity to serve his mother. Though he has done something not for him directly, but his action gives him happiness and contentment which is for him.
So if selflessness that makes a man let his mother die a virtue? If selflessness is followed to its core, does it lead to guilt in a person’s life? Does selflessness make a man a murderer? Is it wise to thrive to follow such an idea? Is altruism a sin?
Selflessness is a ridiculous idea. It is an incomplete principle and incomplete by principle. When a principle is taken as an end to us – an idea that shall remain with us as a premise till our end, then it must be complete and final in every way.
Selfless – the word itself looks threatening. Self – less. Without self. No respect, no value, no recognition, no existence of the ‘self’. Altruism preaches: live for others; it asks for self sacrifice. Is makes one become a slave of the other – a self surrendered slave – with ones own will – much worse than enforced slavery. It is a slavery out of own happiness – a happiness that is not final – that has strings attached to it – that carries guilt with it. Selflessness gives a happiness that makes one feel guiltier. Selflessness preaches being happy is a sin. Selflessness asks abandonment of ones happiness. It asks to thrive of the other’s happiness.
Altruism promises contentment. Is that promise itself not a selfish desire – a desire for contentment. Whose contentment? Ones own? Or the others’? A final principle can’t be self-contradictory. A virtue can’t promise what it calls as evil. Altruism in principle is suicidal.
But these ideas have been accepted because they are accepted; accepted and taught – by our elders, parents, teachers, preachers, friends, enemies, television, newspapers, magazines, unauthenticated scriptures – needless to say, by every human being who has been taught the same thing by one of these things. Selflessness is taken as a virtue because it is called as a virtue by everyone around. People do not know what they must do to be happy and most desirably, be satisfied. So when they are said that it is selflessness that is going to give them happiness and satisfaction, they adapt it. Or should I say, try to adapt it.
Altruism (or selflessness), being incomplete as a virtue, creates more contempt and dissatisfaction. When a person attempts to be selfless, he starts with destroying his self. Later he sacrifices himself to the will of the society. He sacrifices his ideas, his abilities and his values. He believes this is the right way towards everlasting happiness. The more he does this sacrificial act, the more he looses of his life. The more he looses makes him even more unhappy and dissatisfied. But he never doubts the principle he has opted for. He doubts his inefficiency. He puts in more efforts to become more selfless. He runs around in a circle – he never finds contentment.
Selfishness gives contentment. It provides with a complete finality of a principle – a virtue. The word ‘selfishness’ is always misunderstood and it will continue to be so as long as people don’t allow consciousness to overcome their ignorance. Selfishness makes a person an individual a ‘self’ – a unit himself living for the sole purpose of his happiness. Selfishness preaches the idea of putting ones own life before the other’s. It makes a person complete as an object himself that has its own existence – giving him self-respect and recognition. The means to his end can be chosen by himself that give him the liberty over his actions and endeavors.
Everybody is selfish. Breathing, eating, and requirement of shelter are the basic needs of everyman – the needs are for him - selfish. He requires love – for mental fitness – for completeness – selfish. No human can deny his being of selfish. So why should he try and make altruism as his ideal? Why should man search for a principle that promises of selfishness in return? Why should he not follow the virtue of selfishness in the first place itself?
In a free country it is the individual who has to be given freedom – it is the individuals who make a country – not the boundaries. A free country is free only when the self-esteem of every man is upheld. He is happy only when his needs are met. All the requirements are defined under selfishness. How can the desire for basic necessities be evil? How can selfishness be evil? Is eating food to fill ones own stomach evil? Is breathing evil? We live ‘our’ life. Is its evil to do so? Is being free evil?
No religion asks man to sacrifice himself for others. We are here in this world for ourselves – so that we get the right credits in our account – so that we reach heaven. We pray for ourselves. When we pray for others we do it for our happiness. Everything is selfishness.
When a man makes a lot of money he is termed selfish. Whenever he thinks of himself he is called selfish. Whenever he acts in his self-interest he is regarded selfish. The reason is that people are jealous. When they can’t do something for themselves and when they find someone else doing it, they feel jealousy. They can’t make lot of money, they can’t think of themselves, they can’t do things in their self-interest – they want to be selfless or called as selfless. So to make those egoist people be accepted as evil in the society, to destroy them, they call them as selfish. The society has never dared to find out what selfishness is, it accepts the egoists as evil to the society.
So if this is how things take shape then every person who breathes, who fills his stomach, who prays to God – they are must be declared as evil. They are doing this for themselves and not for others. Or do people know what actual evil is? Who defined evil for them? The so unauthenticated so-called religious scriptures? Or themselves?
Selfishness can never be escaped. It has to be accepted in every way. It is a complete idea – in every sense. It is not wrong living for ourselves – for the things of interest to us – for the matters that are of our concern – our happiness, our desires, our satisfaction, our contentment. Being selfish means being more concerned with things of out own interest – people we love, things we value, our religion, doing everything that gives happiness and satisfaction: everything without making a sacrifice. Doing the above is not evil. It is a virtue.
Being selfishness doesn’t mean that we do things that cause to hurt others or cause any destruction. For this purpose moral ethical codes are necessary. Religion has defined all this for us. Any idea not defined under religion can be decided on our own value judgment – rationally.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Geometry of Abstractions
I can in every way have power over what I say and what I act upon. But it is the thought process that I can’t control. My brain tends to act like a hot-air-filled balloon with an inertia of moving away from my consciousness, and unlike the reality in inertia, I can seldom control it’s motion with external forces – the forces of my consciousness. Some people call it as ‘imagination let run wild’. I prefer it known as abstractions from abstractions which are interconnected again by abstractions and finally lead to only one end – the basic premise of my interests or obsessions or objects or people that mean life to me – in a colloquial sense.
On July 13th, that happened to be a Tuesday, I ran into a train of abstractions that lasted for almost 12 hours. It was not exactly a train – it was a line of marbles rolling, sticking together, but creating no friction and no voice, just newer marbles, more and more, until they joined with a colloquial premise, finally – painfully, to make it complete. A unique geometry of innumerable abstractions was created and even the unseen gaps between successive marbles had abstractions in them. There were no concretes.
After a good number of pages of a novel, I felt like dissolving myself into the present world and decided to read the day’s newspaper. The one I receive at home, The Indian Express’ is merely a brick – it can’t absorb like a sponge nor can it give out like a fresh spring. So I dropped some coins in my pocket, locked the main door, and started on the street to buy myself another newspaper.
When I was out, I looked at the place where my car is usually parked. It wasn’t there. With no thought or analysis of the empty space I had just seen, I looked the other side. The vehicle was there. It was not a sight of relief to me – it was nothing. I was more with myself than my possessions. I saw the vehicle under a thin layer of dust which was visible only from a close distance. I recalled my father who had asked me to wash it the last Sunday. I looked at the vegetable shop in front of me.
The owner, popular in the locality as ‘anna’, was sitting on a stool in a corner with the owner of a shop beside his. Anna has been here for the past several years I have no idea. He hasn’t changed a bit is what I thought when I saw him. He has had many workers at his shop – right from a boy I hated to see, to the present boy who is too mild and soft toward me. Anna, when he started this shop, would also rent bicycles. Then he stopped it. Now he sells milk and vegetables. He might be having a family, I thought – his children whom I have never seen. I continued with: didn’t he ever try to make any progress? how much does he make per month? I thought it can’t be enough for him. Or he might be having some other endeavors too. He is a good man – soft spoken and honest.
His neighbor makes pillows and mattresses that are filled with cotton, not foam. He always has his shop filled with pillows, but never did I see any customers there. I didn’t think about his family.
On the opposite line of the shop, the other side of the street, is a manhole that serves as the drain for rainwater. Involuntarily my eyes paused at it. Anna and his neighbor were no more on my mind. I saw the drain. I lifted my eyes. I was walking. I usually never see beyond 6 inches from my feet while walking – I have been misunderstood with this but it is just my way of walking. I don’t care for what comes and goes from my sides and beyond the 6 inches. But at that instance I lifted my gaze to more than 10 inches.
Two burqa clad girls were heading towards me. Not exactly towards me but towards the street behind me. I kept my eyes to the line I was walking on, parallel to the curves the street was taking, straight to the path I was going to walk on in the next seconds. I didn’t look toward the two ladies. As they came nearer to me they started changing their tracks – they moved left, right, again towards me, confused. I wanted to learn about the absurd behavior of their feet and their tracks. I felt they looked at me – more than the road – obvious little things flashing in their minds – trembling tracks – obviously! Of course.
I kept straight, took no concern, saw a middle aged man on a 2-wheeler. He wore an off-white safari suit. His physique was bulky with a second chin above his neck, dark complexion and the eyes of a careful rider. He had a big dark mark on his forehead caused by the prostrations he might have made in his prayers. Instinctively I remembered an Islamic scholar saying that that mark happens when the pressure on the nose and the forehead while prostration is not properly balanced – improper posture while praying. But of course this man must have prayed a lot – the mark was too dark – full of pride and sereneness. I thought if it as unnecessary that it must be written on our face we pray to our God religiously. I recollected an e-mail I had received from a cousin. At the end it had asked me to forward it to all people I know if I were to love my God. The mail had come to me for that reason my cousin had read. When I met my cousin next I had made a request to him. I had asked him to write back to the person who sent him that mail asking that person to ask himself if it is necessary that love for God is shown in the forwarding of an e-mail. My cousin had told me that the mail was from my other cousin sister. She had forwarded it to the existence of the last sentence – ‘forward this too all your friends if you love God’.
I recollected that I had not forwarded that letter - I know God knows my love for Him better than my own knowledge of it; I can’t show it to anybody – including myself.
I saw some tyres lying I front of me. There was a puncture-repair shop. There were many men standing there. When I took a turn from the largest tyre lying, I found the newspaper shop. There were many papers hanging from a desk. I wondered if I could read all of them in a day and if there was someone who really could do that. I gave the money, took the paper, and turned for home. I was thinking about the contents of the newspaper when I found myself back on the diwaan in my living room.
I wondered why I had chosen that particular paper and not the one that is more famous. The comparison was between ‘The Hindu’ and ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. I went on to elaborate myself on 3 major differences in these 2 papers.
The same day I had read ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. There was a news article on the lower half of the front page that said about the non-coalition working of the Congress Party and the CPI (M) in the forth coming Panchayat Raj polls. The article was titled as ‘End of Road for Congress – CPI (M) relationship’ or something like that. The first sentence in the article was ‘Now it’s official!’ The same news in ‘The Hindu’ was facts and plain. There were no exclamation marks in ‘The Hindu’. The editors of ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ have never kept a distance between facts and opinions. ‘The Hindu’ is clear with its news and the stance it has taken. The news in ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ is opinionated and more factoid. The ownership of ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ is by a congressman. ‘The Hindu’ is inclined towards the BJP. But it apparently seems as if ‘The Hindu’ never makes it’s inclination as obvious as ‘The Deccan Chronicle’.
The second difference I found then was in the feeding of the public tastes. ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ is full of energy and dynamism with the tastes it has developed in it’s readers and also in the way it feeds it. This newspaper has matter which people like to read – good or bad. The news items are more of commentaries and the commentaries are written in such a manner that they are liked by the readers – good or bad. The content on the first page of it additional supplement always deals with obscenity which people deject in the open but like to read in seclusion. It is so obvious. People like it. They want to read such matter. It is full of spice. It gives them excitement. The newspaper makes money. I never found such content with such a ridiculous intention in ‘The Hindu’. ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ has crossed the boundaries of morality and ethics in the quest to gain more circulation and in the greed for more green-backs.
The final difference was in the visuals the newspaper can be defined with. I recognize the semi-nude pictures with the character of ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. ‘The Hindu’ has news and then the pictures related to that news. It is vise versa in ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ has pictures of no importance to the readers but they are projected in such a way that the readers can’t keep their eyes off the obscenity. How disgusting! ‘The Hindu’ is pure and devoid of such third-gradedness.
After going through the paper I took a pen on the Sudoku puzzle on the last page. I got 2 correct digits in the next few seconds and my mind traveled to the computer resting on my desk. I was at my desk immediately.
Later in the evening I had to go to my Grandparent’s house. I was crossing a busy street when I had to wait for a few seconds at a divider in the middle of it. I felt a sudden thud. I saw a man sitting beside me, close to my feet. I didn’t know how that noise had traveled to me – through the vibrations in my tympanum or through the vibrations at the palm of my feet. That man had slipped and landed on the divider as if he were sitting there – but I had not seen it happen. Before I could think of what has actually happened, I was on the other side of the road. I saw a woman staring at me contemptible eyes. I was expected to help that fallen man. He was more than 60 I suppose.
All through my walk to my grandparents’ house I had only one bitter thought in my complete body – what made me not help that man? why didn’t I realize that I had to help him? why did I leave him there? I didn’t pity that man. I didn’t curse myself. I wanted to know what had stopped me. I felt sorry for myself for being slow to react or not reacting at all. I tried to justify by telling myself that I didn’t know that man slipped, I didn’t know what was going on, I was preoccupied with the crossing of that street. But I knew I had to help him – not for him, but for myself – for my satisfaction – for the discipline I have to set for myself – for the rules I have to follow. I took the whole as a lesson learnt. But still I knew I could never be so quick and alert while walking on the streets. I find streets more than what exactly they are. They are the most interesting places on the earth.
I reached my grandparents’ house and forgot everything. I had learnt something and only the lesson remained with me – the desire and not the object – the adjective and not the noun.
I decided to go to sleep early. At 10:45 pm I was on bed. The music of the daily soaps, running on the television behind my bad, was helping me think better. I was wondering about the directors and the screenwriters of these dramas. They make the actors and actresses say and do the exact things people like to hear and see – that touch their heart – makes them feel rather than think. The music is so composed that the feelings are made stronger – like nicotine that pulls the smoker back to the pleasure of smoking.
I thought, the next day I have to meet my friend. I recalled I had met him some days back and we were making some purchases at a pharmacy. I had found my friend to be very friendly with the store owner so I had asked my friend to ask the owner if there was a medicine that could help me forget some things of past. He had explained to the owner the medicine – he had said we wanted the opposite of the medicines that help in improving memory. The pharmacist had replied in negative. He had said there was nothing like that with him.
There was another man standing beside us, listening to our talk. I remember he suggested us to take alcohol – beer and whiskey precisely. We had a good laugh after that but we also had realized how correct that man was. We had spoken a lot about that later.
While lying on my ‘7 feet by 5 feet’ bed I was wondering about the effects of alcohol on us. I recollected: some days back I had told about this to my dad who has many friends who drink; my dad told me that alcohol definitely makes us forget out painful past but makes us recall those times which we had long forgotten; he gave me many examples of his friends – a one where his friend had told him about a shirt my dad had, green in color which he had liked a lot 40 years ago - his friend was drunk when he said this.
I recollected a party at a farm-house of this friend of my dad; he was heavily drunk that day. I had met him and greeted him. He had asked me how I was doing. I had replied “I am fine”. I remembered how he had responded to this –
He raised his right hand, pointed his index finger across in some direction, and opened his mouth. “You should be…”. I waited for him to finish. He was continuously shaking his hand and his finger. “You should be…”. I was worried, with no reason, but he was drunk. My dad was standing beside him. He knew everything was alright. He knew this was regular. “You should be…”. My heart started pounding. “You should be … extra fine”. What a relief that was. I had discussed this with my dad later that day and till now it remains to be a joke between us.
It was 1:30 am. Lying on my bed, thinking everything I could – how powerful wine could be – from no where came to my mind – “I wish God had not forbidden it”.
My next reaction was “oh my God. What have I said? I don’t mean it. It was unintentional”.
The abstractions do create a geometry. Every thought links to the premise. Nothing is concrete – just abstract – illusion. Deception of mind. Mind game. The player is me and I am myself the game. Yes, I play mind games.
It was unintentional. I asked God for forgiveness immediately. I was still there, not moving, still. Not waiting for sleep to come but waiting for the topic in my thoughts to be changed. I tried not to think what was going in my mind. I had nothing to do with my past. Nothing of the present, nor of the future. It was nothing. Just about what made me say that. The next sentence cleared everything – “Why do you do this to me ..... ?”
On July 13th, that happened to be a Tuesday, I ran into a train of abstractions that lasted for almost 12 hours. It was not exactly a train – it was a line of marbles rolling, sticking together, but creating no friction and no voice, just newer marbles, more and more, until they joined with a colloquial premise, finally – painfully, to make it complete. A unique geometry of innumerable abstractions was created and even the unseen gaps between successive marbles had abstractions in them. There were no concretes.
After a good number of pages of a novel, I felt like dissolving myself into the present world and decided to read the day’s newspaper. The one I receive at home, The Indian Express’ is merely a brick – it can’t absorb like a sponge nor can it give out like a fresh spring. So I dropped some coins in my pocket, locked the main door, and started on the street to buy myself another newspaper.
When I was out, I looked at the place where my car is usually parked. It wasn’t there. With no thought or analysis of the empty space I had just seen, I looked the other side. The vehicle was there. It was not a sight of relief to me – it was nothing. I was more with myself than my possessions. I saw the vehicle under a thin layer of dust which was visible only from a close distance. I recalled my father who had asked me to wash it the last Sunday. I looked at the vegetable shop in front of me.
The owner, popular in the locality as ‘anna’, was sitting on a stool in a corner with the owner of a shop beside his. Anna has been here for the past several years I have no idea. He hasn’t changed a bit is what I thought when I saw him. He has had many workers at his shop – right from a boy I hated to see, to the present boy who is too mild and soft toward me. Anna, when he started this shop, would also rent bicycles. Then he stopped it. Now he sells milk and vegetables. He might be having a family, I thought – his children whom I have never seen. I continued with: didn’t he ever try to make any progress? how much does he make per month? I thought it can’t be enough for him. Or he might be having some other endeavors too. He is a good man – soft spoken and honest.
His neighbor makes pillows and mattresses that are filled with cotton, not foam. He always has his shop filled with pillows, but never did I see any customers there. I didn’t think about his family.
On the opposite line of the shop, the other side of the street, is a manhole that serves as the drain for rainwater. Involuntarily my eyes paused at it. Anna and his neighbor were no more on my mind. I saw the drain. I lifted my eyes. I was walking. I usually never see beyond 6 inches from my feet while walking – I have been misunderstood with this but it is just my way of walking. I don’t care for what comes and goes from my sides and beyond the 6 inches. But at that instance I lifted my gaze to more than 10 inches.
Two burqa clad girls were heading towards me. Not exactly towards me but towards the street behind me. I kept my eyes to the line I was walking on, parallel to the curves the street was taking, straight to the path I was going to walk on in the next seconds. I didn’t look toward the two ladies. As they came nearer to me they started changing their tracks – they moved left, right, again towards me, confused. I wanted to learn about the absurd behavior of their feet and their tracks. I felt they looked at me – more than the road – obvious little things flashing in their minds – trembling tracks – obviously! Of course.
I kept straight, took no concern, saw a middle aged man on a 2-wheeler. He wore an off-white safari suit. His physique was bulky with a second chin above his neck, dark complexion and the eyes of a careful rider. He had a big dark mark on his forehead caused by the prostrations he might have made in his prayers. Instinctively I remembered an Islamic scholar saying that that mark happens when the pressure on the nose and the forehead while prostration is not properly balanced – improper posture while praying. But of course this man must have prayed a lot – the mark was too dark – full of pride and sereneness. I thought if it as unnecessary that it must be written on our face we pray to our God religiously. I recollected an e-mail I had received from a cousin. At the end it had asked me to forward it to all people I know if I were to love my God. The mail had come to me for that reason my cousin had read. When I met my cousin next I had made a request to him. I had asked him to write back to the person who sent him that mail asking that person to ask himself if it is necessary that love for God is shown in the forwarding of an e-mail. My cousin had told me that the mail was from my other cousin sister. She had forwarded it to the existence of the last sentence – ‘forward this too all your friends if you love God’.
I recollected that I had not forwarded that letter - I know God knows my love for Him better than my own knowledge of it; I can’t show it to anybody – including myself.
I saw some tyres lying I front of me. There was a puncture-repair shop. There were many men standing there. When I took a turn from the largest tyre lying, I found the newspaper shop. There were many papers hanging from a desk. I wondered if I could read all of them in a day and if there was someone who really could do that. I gave the money, took the paper, and turned for home. I was thinking about the contents of the newspaper when I found myself back on the diwaan in my living room.
I wondered why I had chosen that particular paper and not the one that is more famous. The comparison was between ‘The Hindu’ and ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. I went on to elaborate myself on 3 major differences in these 2 papers.
The same day I had read ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. There was a news article on the lower half of the front page that said about the non-coalition working of the Congress Party and the CPI (M) in the forth coming Panchayat Raj polls. The article was titled as ‘End of Road for Congress – CPI (M) relationship’ or something like that. The first sentence in the article was ‘Now it’s official!’ The same news in ‘The Hindu’ was facts and plain. There were no exclamation marks in ‘The Hindu’. The editors of ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ have never kept a distance between facts and opinions. ‘The Hindu’ is clear with its news and the stance it has taken. The news in ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ is opinionated and more factoid. The ownership of ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ is by a congressman. ‘The Hindu’ is inclined towards the BJP. But it apparently seems as if ‘The Hindu’ never makes it’s inclination as obvious as ‘The Deccan Chronicle’.
The second difference I found then was in the feeding of the public tastes. ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ is full of energy and dynamism with the tastes it has developed in it’s readers and also in the way it feeds it. This newspaper has matter which people like to read – good or bad. The news items are more of commentaries and the commentaries are written in such a manner that they are liked by the readers – good or bad. The content on the first page of it additional supplement always deals with obscenity which people deject in the open but like to read in seclusion. It is so obvious. People like it. They want to read such matter. It is full of spice. It gives them excitement. The newspaper makes money. I never found such content with such a ridiculous intention in ‘The Hindu’. ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ has crossed the boundaries of morality and ethics in the quest to gain more circulation and in the greed for more green-backs.
The final difference was in the visuals the newspaper can be defined with. I recognize the semi-nude pictures with the character of ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. ‘The Hindu’ has news and then the pictures related to that news. It is vise versa in ‘The Deccan Chronicle’. ‘The Deccan Chronicle’ has pictures of no importance to the readers but they are projected in such a way that the readers can’t keep their eyes off the obscenity. How disgusting! ‘The Hindu’ is pure and devoid of such third-gradedness.
After going through the paper I took a pen on the Sudoku puzzle on the last page. I got 2 correct digits in the next few seconds and my mind traveled to the computer resting on my desk. I was at my desk immediately.
Later in the evening I had to go to my Grandparent’s house. I was crossing a busy street when I had to wait for a few seconds at a divider in the middle of it. I felt a sudden thud. I saw a man sitting beside me, close to my feet. I didn’t know how that noise had traveled to me – through the vibrations in my tympanum or through the vibrations at the palm of my feet. That man had slipped and landed on the divider as if he were sitting there – but I had not seen it happen. Before I could think of what has actually happened, I was on the other side of the road. I saw a woman staring at me contemptible eyes. I was expected to help that fallen man. He was more than 60 I suppose.
All through my walk to my grandparents’ house I had only one bitter thought in my complete body – what made me not help that man? why didn’t I realize that I had to help him? why did I leave him there? I didn’t pity that man. I didn’t curse myself. I wanted to know what had stopped me. I felt sorry for myself for being slow to react or not reacting at all. I tried to justify by telling myself that I didn’t know that man slipped, I didn’t know what was going on, I was preoccupied with the crossing of that street. But I knew I had to help him – not for him, but for myself – for my satisfaction – for the discipline I have to set for myself – for the rules I have to follow. I took the whole as a lesson learnt. But still I knew I could never be so quick and alert while walking on the streets. I find streets more than what exactly they are. They are the most interesting places on the earth.
I reached my grandparents’ house and forgot everything. I had learnt something and only the lesson remained with me – the desire and not the object – the adjective and not the noun.
I decided to go to sleep early. At 10:45 pm I was on bed. The music of the daily soaps, running on the television behind my bad, was helping me think better. I was wondering about the directors and the screenwriters of these dramas. They make the actors and actresses say and do the exact things people like to hear and see – that touch their heart – makes them feel rather than think. The music is so composed that the feelings are made stronger – like nicotine that pulls the smoker back to the pleasure of smoking.
I thought, the next day I have to meet my friend. I recalled I had met him some days back and we were making some purchases at a pharmacy. I had found my friend to be very friendly with the store owner so I had asked my friend to ask the owner if there was a medicine that could help me forget some things of past. He had explained to the owner the medicine – he had said we wanted the opposite of the medicines that help in improving memory. The pharmacist had replied in negative. He had said there was nothing like that with him.
There was another man standing beside us, listening to our talk. I remember he suggested us to take alcohol – beer and whiskey precisely. We had a good laugh after that but we also had realized how correct that man was. We had spoken a lot about that later.
While lying on my ‘7 feet by 5 feet’ bed I was wondering about the effects of alcohol on us. I recollected: some days back I had told about this to my dad who has many friends who drink; my dad told me that alcohol definitely makes us forget out painful past but makes us recall those times which we had long forgotten; he gave me many examples of his friends – a one where his friend had told him about a shirt my dad had, green in color which he had liked a lot 40 years ago - his friend was drunk when he said this.
I recollected a party at a farm-house of this friend of my dad; he was heavily drunk that day. I had met him and greeted him. He had asked me how I was doing. I had replied “I am fine”. I remembered how he had responded to this –
He raised his right hand, pointed his index finger across in some direction, and opened his mouth. “You should be…”. I waited for him to finish. He was continuously shaking his hand and his finger. “You should be…”. I was worried, with no reason, but he was drunk. My dad was standing beside him. He knew everything was alright. He knew this was regular. “You should be…”. My heart started pounding. “You should be … extra fine”. What a relief that was. I had discussed this with my dad later that day and till now it remains to be a joke between us.
It was 1:30 am. Lying on my bed, thinking everything I could – how powerful wine could be – from no where came to my mind – “I wish God had not forbidden it”.
My next reaction was “oh my God. What have I said? I don’t mean it. It was unintentional”.
The abstractions do create a geometry. Every thought links to the premise. Nothing is concrete – just abstract – illusion. Deception of mind. Mind game. The player is me and I am myself the game. Yes, I play mind games.
It was unintentional. I asked God for forgiveness immediately. I was still there, not moving, still. Not waiting for sleep to come but waiting for the topic in my thoughts to be changed. I tried not to think what was going in my mind. I had nothing to do with my past. Nothing of the present, nor of the future. It was nothing. Just about what made me say that. The next sentence cleared everything – “Why do you do this to me ..... ?”
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
A Kind of Unappreciated People
At times in my life I come across a kind of people and in a blink of an eye I decide I would not like them. Its a simple spontaneous derivation I make out off their first sight and my intuition. Its pretty deliberate and rude; usually making me feel that I have done the right thing by disliking them. I never found an explanation on what makes me develop this scornful attitude toward these people and no matter how much I try I can never get over what I assume at first place. And yes, many times these people in a way have turned out to be sources of harm to me and invariably a pain in my neck. So it works for my good too. But not always.
Now, today I am here to find out what makes me feel such an inhuman sensation. I will write out all the logic I can think of being behind this repulsive submission to an act that seems to be insolent.
It starts with an empty unimportant-looking glance at a person. It is said that every face speaks. It surely does. It does more than just that – it sparks a ‘no’ with a short and obscure ‘n’ and takes the ‘o’ to a length. The ‘no’ is a simple talk by hunch. It sounds meaningless and sordid and is heard only by me.
It could be the face of that person. Or his/her hair. Or anything right from the body language to clothes. Even the person’s voice clicks the instincts if the first glances have failed to. At times the people surrounding that person too play the fuse. And some way or the other after this thing has started I impulsively find a bitterness created in me toward him/her which looks obvious in the way I speak or behave. If by chance, due to compulsions, my instincts do not convert to practicality, the contemn still remains within me though not physically visible.
It can merely be a matter of my tastes, likes and dislikes. It can just be that that the person has confronted me when I am in an unhealthy mood – at the wrong time as it can be said. It could also be the evil in me. Or perhaps its my jealousy that pushes me toward that sort of feeling. (Usually, just usually, we hate people because we infer a jealous stance on them. Then there is an obfuscating difference between hate and dislike that drives some impulses.)
This was about the effects of the first glances. The talk with those ‘special’ persons gives this effect as a continuation or as a start to the pretensions too. I do not like what they say, the way they say, in the tone they say, or in the words they say. Their talk gives an irritation beyond endurance, but still I am compelled to stay calm – I am expected to be calm. Nothing they say appears correct. The words look harsh on ears. Their eyes give soreness in mine. I get an unsavory urge of shouting back with the most ungracious words I can. But I continue with peace – I have my rules.
This can be because of my commitments to several traits I hold. Their talk may find me displeased because I have decided to take it that way. It may be an effect of my decision to dislike that person. It may be because the facts or comments said by that person are true to such an extent that they taste bitter. It can be because I am such an erroneous person that I don’t like to hear good things. I can be because I don’t find that person worthy to teach me – I sometimes feel like asking back who the heck is that guy to preach and tell all that to me. Or I might be a cynic, I may be an obstinate. It may well be the otherwise too – I may be right in doing this.
On some occasions when I find this prejudice not to be a prejudice but something vaguely undefined that has helped me avert a possible harm, all this recreation of possible fallacies comes down to a laughable abstract and only one thing stands out – the ‘me’ who can never be wrong. This has happened and I have felt proud of myself and proud of my intuition. I have thanked God for this presumed knowledge that has helped me. It is of course God who provides such undefined helps.
But when I find this prejudice to be a prejudice and a mistake of my instincts, then I know about the possible breaches in my character and the possible weaknesses I may contain in understanding people. And here I curse myself for committing a foul and destroy any thoughts of the ‘me’ who can never be wrong. What remains is a humble knowledge of my weakness.
Life is not a game that can be played and won – it has to be lived right till the end. If at all there is a victor, it is the ‘we’ who take it to the line and go beyond. If at all there is a loser, it is the life itself that ceases to live when the line is reached. Life ends but we carry on our beings and never end. We are the ultimate and the never-ending. We have been designed that way. Everything else we see and feel will end.
The world is based on assumptions – biased and unbiased. Every fact that comes out is a result of a dim assumption that was made in the first place. We can control the assumptions based on reason, but not the facts that become discoveries. We can control the conclusions to some extents but the reality cannot be altered. All we can do is use the facts and conclusions in a real way, as real as the reality. Getting me? No? What I mean is: have integrity in assumptions and integrity in utilizing the facts and conclusions. This can make or break the whole experiment that can never be lived again. The conclusion is always the eternity.
© 2006 Zubair
Now, today I am here to find out what makes me feel such an inhuman sensation. I will write out all the logic I can think of being behind this repulsive submission to an act that seems to be insolent.
It starts with an empty unimportant-looking glance at a person. It is said that every face speaks. It surely does. It does more than just that – it sparks a ‘no’ with a short and obscure ‘n’ and takes the ‘o’ to a length. The ‘no’ is a simple talk by hunch. It sounds meaningless and sordid and is heard only by me.
It could be the face of that person. Or his/her hair. Or anything right from the body language to clothes. Even the person’s voice clicks the instincts if the first glances have failed to. At times the people surrounding that person too play the fuse. And some way or the other after this thing has started I impulsively find a bitterness created in me toward him/her which looks obvious in the way I speak or behave. If by chance, due to compulsions, my instincts do not convert to practicality, the contemn still remains within me though not physically visible.
It can merely be a matter of my tastes, likes and dislikes. It can just be that that the person has confronted me when I am in an unhealthy mood – at the wrong time as it can be said. It could also be the evil in me. Or perhaps its my jealousy that pushes me toward that sort of feeling. (Usually, just usually, we hate people because we infer a jealous stance on them. Then there is an obfuscating difference between hate and dislike that drives some impulses.)
This was about the effects of the first glances. The talk with those ‘special’ persons gives this effect as a continuation or as a start to the pretensions too. I do not like what they say, the way they say, in the tone they say, or in the words they say. Their talk gives an irritation beyond endurance, but still I am compelled to stay calm – I am expected to be calm. Nothing they say appears correct. The words look harsh on ears. Their eyes give soreness in mine. I get an unsavory urge of shouting back with the most ungracious words I can. But I continue with peace – I have my rules.
This can be because of my commitments to several traits I hold. Their talk may find me displeased because I have decided to take it that way. It may be an effect of my decision to dislike that person. It may be because the facts or comments said by that person are true to such an extent that they taste bitter. It can be because I am such an erroneous person that I don’t like to hear good things. I can be because I don’t find that person worthy to teach me – I sometimes feel like asking back who the heck is that guy to preach and tell all that to me. Or I might be a cynic, I may be an obstinate. It may well be the otherwise too – I may be right in doing this.
On some occasions when I find this prejudice not to be a prejudice but something vaguely undefined that has helped me avert a possible harm, all this recreation of possible fallacies comes down to a laughable abstract and only one thing stands out – the ‘me’ who can never be wrong. This has happened and I have felt proud of myself and proud of my intuition. I have thanked God for this presumed knowledge that has helped me. It is of course God who provides such undefined helps.
But when I find this prejudice to be a prejudice and a mistake of my instincts, then I know about the possible breaches in my character and the possible weaknesses I may contain in understanding people. And here I curse myself for committing a foul and destroy any thoughts of the ‘me’ who can never be wrong. What remains is a humble knowledge of my weakness.
Life is not a game that can be played and won – it has to be lived right till the end. If at all there is a victor, it is the ‘we’ who take it to the line and go beyond. If at all there is a loser, it is the life itself that ceases to live when the line is reached. Life ends but we carry on our beings and never end. We are the ultimate and the never-ending. We have been designed that way. Everything else we see and feel will end.
The world is based on assumptions – biased and unbiased. Every fact that comes out is a result of a dim assumption that was made in the first place. We can control the assumptions based on reason, but not the facts that become discoveries. We can control the conclusions to some extents but the reality cannot be altered. All we can do is use the facts and conclusions in a real way, as real as the reality. Getting me? No? What I mean is: have integrity in assumptions and integrity in utilizing the facts and conclusions. This can make or break the whole experiment that can never be lived again. The conclusion is always the eternity.
© 2006 Zubair