“You’ve been living in a dreamworld Neo. Free your mind.” Some glaring realities that make me have to believe in the Matrix.
I promise a happier one next time. Another article of sorts is precipitating in my head. Will post it in “Passing Showers” in due time.
…was thought to be insane. He was in a mental institution and was given shock treatment. He battled it all to write a book that was, is, and will always be so profound, and deeply moving yet disturbing that they all salute to him today.
Wikipedia has a compilation of some of his most fascinating thoughts. Read these. Robert M. Pirsig remains my sole inspiration as far as analyzing, thinking, and living is concerned. I do of course turn to Ian Anderson to seek attitude and musical inspiration. But this man Pirsig is in a world of his own.
The end of the semester inches nearer and so do deadlines; for record submissions and the round of patching up with the professors (you would like them not to screw your internal marks!). All the time that I usually spend playing the guitar, reading fiction, watching movies, and generally hanging about will all be channelized to finishing these pointless record notebooks. What a way to make you an engineer…
Meanwhile, during the time between sleep and brushing my teeth, I am reading this spectacular book I picked up from my grandfather's place. I visit them weekends when possible, because I am 45 kilometers away in a hostel trapped inside my college. Coming back to the book, its titled- "Mind According to Vedanta" written by Swami Satprakashananda. It has this brilliant insight into how the mind works, how we are able to talk about the mind, how the mind is actually an instrument and how we are more powerful than the mind since we are able to analyze its functions. The Self.
I am only halfway through it, but it is simply fascinating me in every single page. I can't believe I didn't spot this one sooner. I am usually hunting for books to read and managed only to pick up a Wodehouse or two, some Arthur Haileys etc.
I think the world needs books like these. We are so thoroughly jobless individuals always looking for ways to give the next man something to suffer with. Its really sad.
The moment a book like this opens the mind up, it does miracles. We forget these sense pleasures and move on to moral purity and further to intellectual delight. We become relaxed, more compassionate, more composed, and very calm. Its simply magnificent. And suddenly, I am not worried about those record notebooks I am to complete, I just understand that it is possible, not stressful.
Isn't it time we had a round of physical adaptation? The real idea of evolution was based on physical adaptation, and we have not had that in a long, long time. Since the dark ages (let me not go too far back in time), we have seen only mental adaptation. Intelligence, argumentative capabilities, analytic thought and understanding in and of relationships; these are the changes we have seen and felt.So, when is that phase of evolution going to resume? Geoffrey Miller said to Newscientist earlier this month that in the next thousand years, humans will be more beautiful, intelligent, symmetric, and virtually disease free, thanks to 40 generations of genetic shielding from mutation.We still remain humans then? When are we going to become a different organism? It sometimes occurs to me that we could become just thought entities, like the mind only… no physical form. Like God? Perhaps… that could well be the next step in evolution. I'd like to think that. I think I read about this or heard this from someone, I am not very sure if this is an original thought. A new one nevertheless We are able to accept and relate very well to movies with ghosts in them, maybe somewhere in the mind, we expect to be one. A little Freudian psychoanalysis can spice things up a bit, I am sure it can. Or maybe I require psychoanalysis. My intention is not to form a theory, just bring up some of my thoughts that are not entirely crackpot…marginally perhaps but not entirely. I refuse to think so.More on this when it occurs to me…as it precipitates. I'll just draft this one under Maturity…
It feels nice to be finally out of that annoying teen age as I am now. All that confusion, all those changes, the talk of maturity, and breaking some rules now and then. What was all that about? I think now, that the problem was information. There was just too much information shoved on to me. Trying to figure out which was a good philosophy and when things didn’t work out that way, I always had to adapt and change my opinions. There was always a clash of emotions and work and the tireless struggle to think how both could be one, not to mention the thought of utopia. Clearly, the missing ingredient was— Clarity.
When I say maturity, I actually mean to say clarity. To get a break in life, what is more important than any philosophy is, how you prioritize activities. There is a need, and let’s face it, to form a distinction between work and emotion. These always were two different things. There is no potential for a mix. I am in college pursuing mechanical engineering and 80 percent of the student population is either interested in bunking lectures or looking for a person of the opposite sex to talk to, or both of these. Do these things have to be done during class hours? Did these people join an intensive program such as this to pursue these activities? Why does it appear to be so? Such is the reality around here that some of my peers wish me to do the same. I don’t. It can wait. I can wait. Its a matter of four years, a time well spent preparing for life and its pleasures.
Is it such a crime to have financial independence as a primary goal…A battle between work and emotions in my current disposition is a lost one as far as emotion is concerned. Not that I am a rock; I just think there is a time for everything…prioritzing is key. I do admit that yes, I probably do crave for the company of a girl I love. It is bound to happen someday. Its not something I can escape.
It is only because someone understood this, that there are workplaces and there are recreational centers and there is home. They are different in all respects except for the fact that there is a biological life form called a human being involved. The atmosphere, the furniture, the decor, the mental disposition is different. If work and emotion could mix… it is but a teenager’s dream, a premature one. Clarity of thought is, maturity.
