The Middle Ground

भला हुआ मेरी मटकी फूटी रे मैं तो पनिया भरन से छूटी रे The easiest way to cauterise the mind-body-identity connection is to get your heart broken multiple times in a life time if that is possible. Because during these times, the ego dies temporarily and the mind is truly open to looking at the Truth. Without the filters of fantastical happy endings from movies and novels. And if you have the Guru's grace, each time the Truth appears to save the mind from insanity or compelling the body from taking it's own life. This time Grace appeared on the form of 3 books from Ramana ashram. But before I delve into the process of untangling the mind from its own machinations - I want to spend some time with some of the questions and arguments that the mind raises to the unflinching Self once faced with the Truth. Some of my favourite ones are below: Mind : "But what do you do ? What are your actions ? What is your purpose ?" Self : "To always be as I am - unchangin...

Over the past 2 decades, among the many Hindu mythological stories, the one I have revisited over and over again is that of Mata Sati. And then Mata Parvati. Although this story is a symbolic description of the journey of the individual consciousness to merge with the Divine, it's wisdom remains inaccessible to most of us if the pangs of our modern love stories do not find atleast some psychological resolution in its carefully crafted nuances. When I was younger, my mind imagined an alternative version with kinder outcomes for beloved Sati in which Mahadev tamed his unkempt hair, took a bath and put on decent clothes instead of his usual tiger/deer skin skirt held up by slithering serpents. In which he presented himself exactly like how Sati's parents had envisaged the husband of their youngest daughter to be. This could have made the proud king Daksha, Sati's father change his opinion about our sky-clad, ash-smeared Bholenath whose residence alternates between the fro...

I am 40 years old. I am also not new to the city I live in. I have already spent more than a decade in Pune, or Poona as it is now called. Therefore the title can be a bit misleading at first glance. Yes, I still discover parts of this city that I haven't known before but I am hardly new to this city. This city hasn't exactly embraced me like I was its long lost son but it has shared with me its sublime music and appreciation for art - even though its people never fail to remind me that I am not one of their own whenever I try to come close to them. Much akin to how the matriarch treated Mastani in the film even though I am not really imposing myself upon any son of the soil. Yes, I am filmy like that. I am also Indian - I happen to live and work in this city, pay rent, taxes and GST and would except to be treated as an equal citizen in lieu. But I digress, this isn't a rant about the city that I have come to love but which will probably not call me it's own ever....

Emotional Abuse is real and it's debilitating effects can go unnoticed for several decades. Emotional invalidation and manipulation by parents and primary care-givers are of the worst kind for they are often worded as if they are meant for your benefit and well-being. You'll know one day and this knowing will be painful and require time - you'll know by the kind of partners you attract in romantic contexts, your own poor health choices, the weariness caused by a perpetual rebellion, when you are constantly exhausted by all the mental work you take on behalf of people who should care but don't, when during major events of illness or change you reguarly find yourself managing alone, if you are in a state of discomfort when your parents are around alternating between over-doing and exhaustion, you'll know you haven't been loved the way you should have. Emotional abuse by parents can particularly be very confusing for children because of the inherent nature of ...

It’s coming, the monsoons. I can sense the anticipation all around. The birds who have survived the harsh summer have already begun to chirp happily. There is this heightened sense of excitement combined with this feeling of immense gratitude. Ofcourse the rivers will be flooded and the there will be puddles and muck everywhere. Drainholes will be opened and the dreaded viral infection would return. After the first couple of weeks, when the clothes won't crisp dry or when there is seepage in the walls, I'll have had enough of the same rains. These rains whom I love so much. I'll brood at the thought of the upcoming winter. I'll even miss the sun. I know all this from 37 trips around it. I know that I can be jubilant or ecstatic on meeting old friends but I am incapable of loving them unconditionally. But this is about that time when the monsoons are just about to arrive. Every year it seems as if someone has listened to our prayers for respite from the torrid he...

You are the manifestation of Awareness in the physical world. Thank you for existing. For being the canvas that holds my hurts, griefs, agonies and humiliations - I went around the world and came back with a pen in my hand for connection with you. I build this bridge word by word between 'us' - Allow me to be without agenda. As the non-judging, all accepting silent witness of grief, hurt and transformation - as the eternal kindness - I declare that this is what I have been seeking in all experiences. In your kind allowance - my voice finds it's most honest expression - that I long to unite with your sombre serenity the pangs of incompleteness that echo in my heart. Everyone had their agendas - I had mine too. I kept the same needs for approval, acceptance, validation in front of my friends, colleagues and audience. I seek and find it here. In the blank pages of this journal my longing and seeking find peace.

Let what you feel about me be indescribable but let it be deep let what you mean to me remain unheard of forever but let it endure more than grief let how I am related to you be unnamed but let it be stronger than solitude let what we have for each other be kinder than life more beautiful than pain more able than words and a little more hopeful than this wish

Some movies begin to live rent-free inside you, suddenly tugging at your heart strings on a cold November morning with their haunting soundtrack. Maybe this is what ‘rafta rafta wo mere hasti ka saamaan ho gaye’ is all about. Maybe 'In the mood for love' was reverse engineered so that Yumeji’s theme could be incorporated in the way it was throughout the movie. Or so that the temple in Siam Reap or Angkor Wat where our melancholic hero whispers his secret in the end, becomes a sacred shrine for unrequited lovers worldwide. Unfinished love stories like these make this world go round. Love like the Sun’s which defines the Moon, but which the Moon can never return in any form or measure because it is eternally tied to the Earth. It is indeed unrequited love stories like these that powers the Universe.

I had turned 25 that year and he was 27 perhaps. We met once or twice before he went to Boston on an official trip. Along with chocolates and other gifts, he brought back 2 stones - one from the MIT campus and the other from a place beside a lake where he had stopped for a bit as his friends moved ahead. "What an unusual thing to gift somebody", I had thought at that time, brain too flushed with mush to utter the thought out aloud. We subsequently broke up quite violently after which I gave away all the gifts I received from him to an NGO. These two stones and his letters, however I kept close, secretly taking them along to which every city I moved to. On some Friday evenings after a long day at work, I carefully extract them from their envelopes, as if unearthing a secret treasure, and read them while Jagjit Singh's heart-wrenching ghazal , "Tere khushboo mein base khat main jalata kaise ?" plays in the background. I am 35 now and he is married to an...

Sometimes poems about rebellion, equality, unrequited love and freedom are not enough. Kundera's lightness of being, Murakami's nostalgia, Auden's lament about unrequited love, Cohen's blues about infidelity and lust are all glorious but the gentle rains outside remain aloof.  The winds seem to object strongly : “These feelings have been felt, written about , and enacted upon stage till death!” Occasionally the leaves of the peepul plead to be written about : “You’ve seen us dance therefore you must write about what we made you feel!” One sultry afternoon after a short, unexpected shower the koel croons one of its original numbers, clearly approving of the respite that the cool breeze brings. They all seem to whisper, “Write about the things that really matter!” The most exquisite tapestry created by the vermillion Gulmohar petals invite me back to the carefree times of laid back picnics spread on blue chequered cloth with wicker baskets full of jam, sandwiches, scones ...

Dear Champa  The world is tainted by the lies and sins of mankind, yet you continue to bear the weight of Narada’s curse for a single lie you spoke. Fate seems to have been unfair to you, that you should still be punished for a trivial error when Ahalya, Mary Magdalene, Amrapali, Vasavadatta have all been ‘redeemed’ apparently and set free from their humiliations.  The Chameli, mogra and sadafulee, though friendly, simple and innocent, pale in your comparison. They adorn stone idols at temples, the dead at funerals, the barely alive at brothels, you participate neither in the sacred nor profane. When you bloom, your gaze fixed at the moon and stars, there is something about your quiet self-assuredness, that makes one pause for a while and take notice. By embracing your judgment so gracefully and humbly, you set an example for everyone who has been judged and condemned. You became one with the Creator’s purpose for you - to be yourself - fearlessly, unapologetically  May n...

If you are me, you are not a morning person. As soon as you open your eyes in the morning, into your head come rushing the events of the previous night in most spectacular detail, then the events of the past week, followed by those of last 5 years, and finally your whole life — all crunched into a script that you are not interested in reading, delivered so abruptly and so unforgivingly as if there was no other way to orient you and set context. As you calm down and make yourself a cup of tea, all you want to do is dodge but fail, then block and say, “ I know this already, just let me be”. You gradually warm yourself up with light exercise and tune into Guided Meditation with Deepak hoping you’ll glide into the day smoothly, knowing all the while that you are not prepared for the harsh sunlight of the post- breakfast till lunch time period. Each day as the sun sets, he returns your superpowers that he takes without your permission every morning — as the moon rises, the muse returns coax...

of hugs and sighs, big sunglasses and smoke (and hash and dope) of friendships to die for (with friends to die with) of kindness and generosity amidst endless laughter and painful tears of anger bottled within (and love doled out by heaps) of loneliness and need, some desires and a little bit of greed of mistakes and learning and the poetry of e.e.cummings of pillion rides and old songs of dreams and celluloid, and a heart full of void of brave love with crazy, stupid men (for a pinch of vermillion and a dead fish) of sincere prayers and elusive peace (and the debt crisis in Greece) of breaths, both lost and found (and caught between kisses) for the sake of life dear, in between and of course, a certain yellow submarine

To all the men in my life who aspire to be saints and ascetics, to every person who advocates inaction or even detachment as the way to stay away from conflicts or struggle, thank you for showing me the other way. But I will not allow your opinions to come in the way of my interests which are absolutely worldly in nature. Because passion for plain awesomeness, cannot exist with non-involvement. For awesomeness shall be my life's goal every moment that I live. I will consider the alternate course only when I will have struggled to have a taste of everything life has to offer today. My struggle will be like the struggle of Man, who has had to do everything by himself to be whatever he is so far. I will work till I bring about change, I will climb the mountains, cross the rivers, laugh through all the tears, love till my heart breaks, be impatient, careless, and funny and love over and over again if I have too. It is only this way that I can do justice to Life. Here's chucki...

I am the Afghanistan that your America has pilfered. I used to be naive before, but since I have understood your cunning I don't trust you. I am the hard work, sincerity and the toil that you crushed and trampled with your cunning and deceit. I am the talent which never saw success because you snatched my opportunity. And so my eyes have become the mirror into which yours can hardly look into. You have beside you a chattering parrot which tries to seek your attention, fluttering its mascara-ed eye lashes and pouting its red beak. You stare outside the window, the least interested while I look on with amusement from the seat behind. If I were with you(instead of the parrot), I would sit by the window; you would want me to, every time. I am that kind of a woman. You waste your time taming a hundred such parrots rather than be with someone like me because between the both of us, I shine. You are definitely polished well, but I shine. I am that g...

(to the loser from venus): let me do the loving while you decide between your options: pretty face or nice ass let me do the reading while you flip playboy pages: plain vanilla with strawberry lips or cocoa butter with choco-chip nips (Shaven smooth or otherwise) let me do the cooking while you regale your friends with phony tales of your bravado (overs pints, ales and barrels of beer) let me do the bread-winning while you memorize match stats (and shag to porn) let me do the forgiving while you cheat everybody in the world let me stand high and haughty (almost like a tree) alone always but never without use unlike you

This post is about a companion in my adventures - easy and daunting, my steed in mucky terrains and smooth, a reliable friend who sometimes remorselessly burns a hole in my pocket - my car, Abhimanyu . As I sit down to collect my thoughts, I smile at the fond memories of the time we spent in each other’s company. 2 years ago, I had enrolled for driving lessons at a local driving school who would take me through the process of obtaining an Indian drivers license along with fixed real -time driving kms/hours. I attended the classes quite regularly - with the instructor beside - the clutch, brake and accelarator shared amicably between us. Sure the car moved along the lanes slowly, and stopped rightly at the signals, but could I drive a car on my own ? I brought this point up during a conversation with the branch manager of my bank who is also a friend - she suggested that it helps greatly if you can practice on your own car everyday for some time. That really set the gears of ...

Capture your fears in a shell Clasp your tears in your hands Close your eyes and look around How tranquil is the world within- Where butterflies bloom into flowers And burst into a myriad of colors Where the peacocks soar deep into the sky Where the leaves are gold by the day Their tips silver by the night Where you walk over that bridge Of fine woven lace And the moon smiles up from the river Into your beautiful glowing face Where the deities dine with us At our tables And the kings and queens don't exist Even in fables And when you open your shells Pearls will be revealed within And when you open your hand The fears will vanish like grains of sand Then open your eyes And realize That you have for so long been a fool Life no doubt is very beautiful

Inside me, in a warm, little house made of wood, there lives a free woman. She is free because she doesn't have to pick a man to love, because she doesn't have to fight and she chooses not to fly. She is free because she just lives. Inside me, there lives a woman who is very unlike me. She breathes deeply and separates orange scents from cinnamon, ginger scents from clove. Down there, there is a lot of time for doing such kinds of things. The moon knocks on her door, in the evenings, sometimes.They mend their broken hearts over tea and biscuits. Not many people may know this, but the moon is in love with the sun who doesn't care much for such kind of things. When the moon has left, the woman realizes that she has always been the moon. Inside me, there lives a woman who is neither young nor old. She sips tea in the afternoon smiling at the memory of an old song while looking outside her window, at the lake beside her house. She likes to write with sharpen...

Seems like yesterday when you'd caught hold of my diary and wouldn't give it back before sneaking a peek. You'd opened the pages where I'd written this: Be the home I return to for laughter  When I turn around let me find you laughing too Be there  to share with me what I lovingly cook up let your heart be a canvass for my colours Let me paint my dreams Be there when I bring home a homeless little baby Help me bring her up. Be my church and my temple Pardon me when I err Be successful in what you do so that I can take inspiration Was that the day when you'd sealed the fate of our friendship? I know the kind of jokes that would make you laugh, that you like to listen more than speak, that you stop for that clandestine cigarette not in front of the stall in front of your apartment but at the one a little further away (although the chances of your mother (who probably knows that you smoke) discovering you smoke are very remote).  I know that you va...