Be kind, be kind!

When my son puts on his Batman costume, he doesn’t think of himself as a scraped-kneed, blond-headed boy in a polyester cape and cowl. He is Batman. Batman is brave. Batman beats bad guys. Batman doesn’t have to pick up his toys.

I know Batman isn’t real. I know sometimes the credits roll before the bad guys get what’s coming to them.

My favorite moment in all of Christopher Nolan’s “Batman” movies comes from “Batman Begins,” and it reappears in “The Dark Knight Rises.” It’s when a young Officer Gordon — the future Commissioner Gordon — places a coat around Bruce Wayne’s shoulders after the boy’s parents have been killed. It’s a small, gentle action that follows a grand, horrific one. It’s the moment that starts Bruce Wayne on the path to becoming Batman rather than Bane. Both men are born in cruelty, but Bruce receives one small kindness, and that makes all the difference.

The shootings on July 20 made us feel that Bane is real and that Batman remains fiction. After events like this, we either want to become Batman, the symbol of perfect justice, or we want to become Bane, the symbol of all-out vengeance. We cannot be Batman; we must not be Bane. But we can find tiny times when we can extend meaningful kindnesses to one another. We can be — should be — Commissioner Gordon.

An article in the Express titled: Be Kind, Be Kind.

By Kristen Page-Kirby

http://www.expressnightout.com/2012/07/be-kind-be-kind/

Love is not a feeling!

I have said that love is an action, an activity. This leads to the final major misconception of love which needs to be addressed.
Love is not a feeling. Many, many people possessing a feeling of love and even acting in response to that feeling act in all manner of unloving and destructive ways. On the other hand, a genuinely loving individual will often take loving and constructive action toward a person he or she consciously dislikes, actually feeling no love toward the person at the time and perhaps even finding the person repugnant in some way.


It is from a book of psychology but it is definitely worth a read!


Peck, M. Scott. The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values, and Spiritual Growth. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1978.

Turn it to stone!

By the River Piedra I sat down and wept. There is a legend that everything that falls into the waters of this river—leaves, insects, the feathers of birds—is transformed into the rocks that make the riverbed. If only I could tear out my heart and hurl it into the current, then my pain and longing would be over, and I could finally forget.

By the River Piedra I sat down and wept. The winter air chills the tears on my cheeks, and my tears fall into the cold waters that course past me. Somewhere, this river joins another, then another, until—far from my heart and sight—all of them merge with the sea.

May my tears run just as far, that my love might never know that one day I cried for him. May my tears run just as far, that I might forget the River Piedra, the monastery, the church in the Pyrenees, the mists, and the paths we walked together.

I shall forget the roads, the mountains, and the fields of my dreams—the dreams that will never come true.

I remember my “magic moment”—that instant when a “yes” or a “no” can change one’s life forever. It seems so long ago now. It is hard to believe that it was only last week that I had found my love once again, and then lost him.

I am writing this story on the bank of the River Piedra. My hands are freezing, my legs are numb, and every minute I want to stop.

“Seek to live. Remembrance is for the old,” he said.

Perhaps love makes us old before our time—or young, if youth
has passed. But how can I not recall those moments? That is why I write—to try to turn sadness into longing, solitude into remembrance. So that when I finish telling myself the story, I can toss it into the Piedra. That’s what the woman who has given me shelter told me to do. Only then—in the words of one of the saints—will the water extinguish what the flames have written.

All love stories are the same.


From the book: By the River Piedra, I sat down and wept.
Coelho, Paulo, (Translated to English by Alan Clarke). By the River Piedra I Sat down and Wept. [San Francisco, CA]: HarperSanFrancisco, 1996.

What is life!

मानवी जीवनात आत्मा हा रथी, शरीर हा रथ, बुद्धी हा सारथी आणि मन हा लगाम आहे. विविध इंद्रिय हे घोडे, उपभोगाचे सर्व विषय हे त्यांचे मार्ग आणि इंद्रिय आणि मन यांनी युक्त असा आत्मा हा त्यांचा भोक्ता आहे.

रथच नसला तर धनुर्धर बसणार कुठे? तो त्वरेने रणांगणावर जाणार कसा? शत्रूशी लढणार कसा? म्हणून व्याक्यीने शरीर रुपी रथाची किंमत कधीच कमी लेखता कामा नये.

इंद्रिय हे या शरीर-रथाचे घोडे होत. कारण त्यांच्यावाचून तो क्षणभरसुद्धा चालू शकणार नाही. रथाला नुसते घोडे जुंपले तर ते सैरावैरा उधळून, रथ केव्हा, कुठल्या दरीत जाऊन पडेल आणि त्याचा चक्काचूर होईल याचा नेम नाही; म्हणू इंद्रिय रुपी घोड्यांना मनाच्या लगामाचे बंधन सतत हवं; पण हा लगामदेखील सदैव हातात असायला हवा! नाही तर तो असून नसल्यासारखाच! म्हणून बुद्धीचं नियंत्रण हवं. बुद्धी आणि मन हि दोन्ही मिळून संयमाने हा रथ चालवू शकतात!!!

(I'm making an effort to try and translate it to English, please bear with it)

In human life,

Soul is the Occupant of a Chariot,

Body is the Chariot,

Intellect is the Charioteer and

Mind is the Bridle.

Different senses are the Horses,

All matters to be experiences in life are the Paths,

and the Soul equipped with mind and senses is the One who uses it all.

If there is no Chariot, where will the Archer sit? How will he rush to the war field? How would he fight the enemy? So one should never under-value (consider of inferior value?) the Body formed Chariot.

Senses are the Horses. Because without them he can never move,If just the horses are tied to the chariot, they'd run wildly and no one would know when the they'd fall in some deep valley and get extirpated; hence these horses (Senses) need to be bounded and controlled by the Bridle (Mind); but this bridle too needs to be in your hands ALWAYS! Else its existence will be pointless!

So Control of the Intellect, Mind and Intellect can together ride this Chariot patiently!!!

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The idea comes from Bhagwad Gita and these words are from the Marathi book: Yayati, by V.S Khandekar.

Khāṇḍekara, Vi Sa., (English Translation by Y. P. Kulkarni). Yayati: A Classic Tale of Lust. New Delhi: Orient Paperbacks, 1978. 

Soulmate!

You will never be mine, and that is why I will never lose you. You were my hope during my days of loneliness, my anxiety during moments of doubt, my certainty during moments of faith.

Knowing that you existed was my one reason for continuing to live.

Then you came, and I understood all of this. You came to free me from the slavery I myself had created, to tell me that I was free to return to the world and to the things of the world. I understood everything I needed to know, and I love you more than all the women I have ever known. I will always remember now that love is liberty.

I will always remember you, and you will remember me, just as we will remember the evening, the rain on the windows, and all the things we’ll always have because we cannot possess them.

From the book: Brida.

Coelho, Paulo, and Montserrat Mira. Brida. New York, NY: Rayo, 2008. 

Fear of suffering!

"My heart is afraid that it will have to suffer," the boy told the alchemist one night as they looked up at the moonless sky.

"Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second's encounter with God and with eternity."

From the book: The Alchemist.

Coelho, Paulo. The Alchemist. [San Francisco]: HarperSanFrancisco, 1993.

A lifeboat called Love!

“… She loved the guy. She did it for him. She would’ve done anything for him. Some women are like that. Some loves are like that. Most loves are like that, from what I can see. Your heart starts to feel like an over-crowded lifeboat. You throw your pride out to keep it afloat, and your self-respect and your independence. After a while you start throwing people out- your friends, everyone you used to know. And it’s still not enough. The lifeboat is sinking, and you know it’s going to take you down with it…”

Karla said these words when she talked to Lin.
From the book - Shantaram.


Roberts, Gregory David. Shantaram, pp 63. London: Abacus, 2004.