Evolving mind

Of late, after having known Shoma now for a few months, I have begun to realize that people are more similar than different.  Basically, they are all the same if we peel away the layers of conditioning and prejudices that envelope us.  In trying to understand Shoma, as I usually try to do with all people I come in contact with, I have realized that what we all project is a result of our conditioning and nurture more than our instincts or nature.  These are some concepts which even I find difficulty putting down on to paper but I have the realization.  I feel inadequate when I am unable to explain it more lucidly. 

I think it is a result of my mind evolving.  New realizations are presented to me very now and then; they just dawn upon me.  Sometimes I don’t take notice of them and sometimes I do.  Sometimes I think deeply about them for sometime and then let them by as a passing thought, sometimes they affect me to the extent that I devote more of my thoughts to them.  I feel inadequate to think deeply.  I am a thinker as are most people, but a scattered thinker with no thought staying in my consciousness for more detailed and deep thinking, most of them being pushed into the subconscious.  Most people have a similar thought process.  They cannot hold a thought.  It is more like a random filmstrip with random images being presented to our consciousness.  I wish I was capable of more deeper thought; sometimes I want to do that.  Is this also something that we can teach ourselves like most of the things in life?

I have to learn to say NO.  It is one of the most important virtues to inculcate in myself now.  Say NO to all the less important things in my life that occupy so much of my waking time.  I need to say NO to them and spend time on the things I really would like to do.

This blog has begun to look more like a self-improvement guidebook.  Well, if it helps me bring the best out of myself, I won’t regret it.  I don’t want a readership for my blog.  I am content to write for myself and see if it helps me somehow.  I may start one for public readership soon.  Amen.

Hi 2010!

 

It’s been a few months now since my last post here.  My blog is crying for attention.  I won’t say I have been busy; that would be a very lame excuse.  I just haven’t had the inclination to write of late.  I have been more interested in reading.  One of my resolutions at the beginning of last year was to read some of the books that had been lying with me unread for quite sometime.  Yes, I just got through some of them and bought a few new ones and finished them up as well.  I finished reading Amitav Ghosh’s A Sea of Poppies.  It’s an outstanding piece of work by him, I couldn’t put it down until I had read the last page.  I finished 300 odd pages in about a week.  He is one of the best Indian writers in English I believe.  He has a terrific command of the English language and his prose is flawless, his characters interesting, and his story uncannily coherent and informative.  I loved reading the book and I eagerly await the release of his next book in the series.

I finished Robin Cook’s fast paced medical mystery.  Slumdog Millionaire a.k.a. Q&A by Vikas Swaroop.  Excellent reads, both of them.  I tried to finish the P.G. Wodehouse I had invested so much money in, but unfortunately, I couldn’t, I lost interest midway.  I found it too seeped in early 20th Century English culture which I found a bit difficult to follow, though I enjoyed his style of writing.  Read Chetan Bhagat’s Three Mistakes of My Life – fast paced and very enjoyable.  He’s a good storyteller.  He keeps it simple.  I like his style too.

Currently, I have a Jeffrey Archer to finish.  Again, finding it a bit difficult to understand the context as it belongs to early 20th Century English society, but I will read along and see how much interest I can generate.

P.G. Wodehouse and Ayn Rand will have to wait.  Atlas Shrugged needs to be finished, but not right now.

Well, coming back to how I welcomed New Year this time, I think I couldn’t have done better.  I worked, night shift.  Although that sounds very boring, I think it was a constructive way to step into a new year.  I had the mandatory party on the 3rd of January with the pada guys.  Alcohol and fags as usual.  One of my resolutions this year was to quit fags.  I have partially succeeded up until now.  I have managed to keep my intake to the minimum.  I am looking forward to cutting back on my tobacco intake.  It’s stickier than Fevicol for sure.  I am a veteran now of making resolutions and failing to live up to them.  I am not alone.

I had joined the gym last year in September but couldn’t keep up the routine and there has a gap of two months since the last time I attended gym.  I am planning to get back into shape (like I have been planning for years!).

Work has been shaping up quite well except for night shifts.  One primary reason for my not being a regular at the gym is night shifts.  I have a few ideas floating around in my head for sometime, let’s see what I can do about them.  I hope to figure out a way soon.  Money was something high on my priority list the previous year, and I think I have fared quite well in that department.  There are more milestones to reach, however.

Well, I think this much will do for a New Year entry.  More next time, which will be soon.  I need to put some of my original thoughts down into the written form before they are too lost to be retrieved.  And also just to be able to see what’s on my mind with my own eyes gives me a sense of purpose.  Blogging is good.

Until then…keep evolving.