Soulmates - Guest Post by Prateek Pandey

That dreamy look you get when someone walks into the room can mean only one thing. Your soul mate has arrived. The way they smile, the way they shift their gaze down and left with that reflective look before they answer, or the way they throw their head back when they let out a hearty laugh leaves you weak at the knees. Carefully caressing every movement of theirs with your gaze, their sigh becomes your sigh and their embrace becomes your completion.

Such deep surrender can only be possible with a soul mate. It cannot be explained any other way, right? Of course it can, but in that moment of desire, logic escapes us and the loins take over where love pretends to play. But it’s not a singular desire that drives us to lose sight of reality and suddenly abandon our faculties in favour of love, sweet love. That would be far too simple a neanderthal response to explain why such sophisticated beings as ourselves suddenly drool with desire when the brain fog sets it.

We go through life savouring successes, even tiny ones, bravely rising from each setback that befalls us. With each rising we muster a portion of renewed hope, a smattering of new wisdom, and a lowly regret that we tuck away neatly because it doesn’t quite complete the picture that we now present to the world. That’s the image of composed resilience that won’t be stifled. It would be fantastic if that cycle came around only once, but it doesn’t. It comes around more often than we’d care to remember, or even less than we’d care to admit. And so with each cycle we grow weary, but continue to exude hope and optimism, because all the fairy tales in the world cannot be wrong. My soul mate cometh, and I shall be ready and waiting to meet her at the door before the threshold, so that we can trundle in together, or not.

The reality is closer to the truth of us spending our lives seeking avenues of expression so that we may be able to reveal ourselves to the world without feeling vulnerable in the process. Striking that balance leads to a tiresome combination of restraint and expression, until one of the two become more dominant. That dominant disposition shapes our character to the world around us, eventually convincing even us that it is who we are, until that fateful moment when that soul mate enters. That soul mate comes in the form of one who expresses what we restrain, and restrains what we express, thereby striking a cord with a desire buried so deep that just teasing it leaves us giggling like lovesick teens who just witnessed the de-flowering of the world.

That completeness awakens us to the optimism and passion we once held dear, and with seeming abandon, we expose ourselves willingly in preparation for the embrace we yearned for since forever. Suddenly we wish to express to the world on their behalf what they restrain, trusting foolishly that they will express to the world what we restrain, and from between our loins shall spawn the perfectly balanced beauty of the sum of us.

PC - www.aliexpress.com

Whether they are soul mates or not is almost entirely irrelevant, or at best, subject to interpretation. We selectively interpret life, and love, and then follow it with deliberate action that either proves our views to be true, or abandons the world for being untrue. It is what we choose it to be, but such choices have to be mutual if the outcome is to be idyllic. Sometimes we meet one whose choices are inversely mutual, thereby syncing perfectly with our own, but sometimes what appears to be an initial sync turns out to be a novelty phase of fascination and not much more. When that phase passes, some will convince us that soul mates are not always intended to stay forever, while others will suggest that they weren’t ours to begin with. Either way, the outcome remains true, and the lessons we take will either build us up, or break us down.

The amazing thing is, whether we’re right or wrong is not really what matters. That’s just bonus points. How we appreciate and grow from whatever or whoever comes our way is what peppers life beautifully, or taints it horribly. Much of life is wasted waiting for opportune moments or validation. Soul mates will be drawn towards us as kindred spirits when we live authentically and pause only for air to fill our lungs before we push on again. But authenticity is not easy to express, because we’re raised to find affection and validation as markers that determine our success. No wonder, in a world of emotionally stinted half formed adults, we wait for our soul mates to join us before we immerse ourselves fully in what is always only ever a one time offer.

Life doesn’t wait for soul mates, nor should you.

***

About the Author - Prateek Pandey is an idiot. He is precisely the kind of idiot I am proud of knowing and in whose presence literature, poetry and language acquire newer dimensions. He answering questions through his prose and poetry which the world is yet to learn to ask. Lampooner. 

Love Each Other or Perish

Dear Morrie,

To whichever corner of heaven you are comfortably practising your wisdom in, I want to tell you that I am glad to have met you.

I know you must be sad by the way many of us are going about our lives, but I am also sure that you are okay to see us live on making mistakes and sometimes, just sometimes being strong enough to admit those to ourselves. It is essential for moving on, for evolution, for becoming better than the levels of collective misery and mediocrity that human kind debilitates to.

I don't write reviews like this, but since your student says that you promised to be a brilliant listener post your ascent to a world I don't comprehend, I thought I should thank you directly for being who you are. Even if my words of gratitude are a shout into the void, I don't care. The afterglow your book lends me despite being profoundly poignant is unmistakable.

Actually, I am wrong. Not profoundly poignant, but PROFOUND. And SIMPLE. These are the two words I can use to describe your life, your existence and your acquired wisdom. I am talking to you in first person because I have a confession to make. All that you put out in words in your Tuesday lectures, I know those things. I am not dying as of now, but I just know them. Like, I believe all humans do, but they fail to admit it to themselves as many times as they should.

I have been 'preaching' similar things out loud to a few close ones, and beliefs in the same made me take some harsh decisions, and I wanted to be sure if I was not turning out to be a really big person inside my head. After reading your transcribed words, I think I am fine, really. I think I understand where you came from, your humanism and your world view.

My only not so proud moment while going through a journey of your last days is that I would not have been able to care for you the way your student did. I would have lurked around, but not touched you. I am just trying to make my peace with this realization while being on your journey.

Mitch Albom with Morrie in 1995

So, I hope you are always alive and that you keep giving strength to many of us who are grappling with miseries and notions of life without having understood the simplicity of love and longing in its essence. I hope the world understands soon that the only way to detachment goes through experience. Intense experience.

Like you say, "Love each other, or perish". I'll hope not to perish. I'll hope to love.

Warm wishes,

Saumya

P.S. - Thanks Neha Thureja for gifting me this book. You are a fonder part of my life after this book. 

A Philosopher on the Wrong Side of 40!

Hello!

Some books convince you on the unique nature of everything that constitutes you. Such books carve a very permanent niche in your heart and make you trust the author to an extent that you feel an acute urge to exhaust his/her entire literary corpus. The book I am referring to here is Fault In Our Stars written by the genius wordsmith, John Green. It wasn't a book which shook the earth for me - but it was definitely one which made me want to know more about the thought process of the writer. And yes, it lent me some very fascinating perspectives on this short life we lead.

I had jotted down my spontaneous reflections on the book about 5 months ago, and revisited them this morning while trying to positivise some persistent negativities. A very senior person called me a 'philosopher on the wrong side of 40' for those reflections, and when I remembered that, I caught myself smiling. And just like that, the day acquired a vibrant hue, along with the still persisting cynicism. Who says cynicism and vibrance can't coexist? Look at me and you'll know - I am wearing pink with a black-&-white top.

Here. My thoughts on Fault In Our Stars

"I have read the book and seen the movie, in that order. Quite obviously, I enjoyed the former more, since it left so much scope for me to think beyond the obvious tale of love between two protagonists whose love affair with life was about to end.

The Fault In Our Stars is so much more than the story of Hazel and Augustus - it is the tale of entire humanity struggling to come to terms with the nature of existence. Are we all tiny, ephemeral specks on the grandness that is the Universe, or are we all, in our own ways, altering the Universe in a manner that leaves a permanent impact?

By changing our perception on the disease called cancer, John Green succeeds in changing so much about the way we view struggles in life. Like cancer is a necessary evil on the road to evolution (arrived at through mutation of cells, few of which mutate to malignancy), struggles are a necessary force to makes us grow, to chisel us to perfection. In his lens, cancer is actually evolution, or progress/growth.

That our prism is biased towards pity is also brought out handsomely in the text. I will give away the plot if I say anymore here - read on to find out. But, we sympathise too easily to visible distresses. Not the best idea perhaps.

Let us live, breathe, and smile at the bounties which life gives us. Probably only he can live life unabashedly from whose existence the fear of death is eliminated. Iconic quotes are found by dozens in the book - I have a lot many scribbled in my journal.

The movie is good to the eyes, but fails the book completely in the sense of the sorrow it evokes in us, against a sense of triumph for having lived a life which NOONE else in the entire history of humanity is going to get an opportunity to live."

So, hmm. Life is a fair deal that God has given you. As John Green says "What makes life precious is that it ends."

P.S. - The next book I am picking up is An Abundance of Katherines. Do you want to tell me something about that one?

Hurriedly Scribbled #1

If the last year was the year of possibilities, this one turned out to be the year of impossibilities. A lot of things I deemed impossible happened, and no, I don't mean in the achievement sense. I do not mean in any positive sense. I mean those things which make you withdraw, which make you look at the world with renewed amusement. However, since those sad-kinda-impossible-things have been continuing for sometime, I am hoping their days are numbered. Since I like dates, and turning points, and all those things which have romance-like-connotations attached to them, I am hoping that the end of this week will bring some novelty in a life which has its happy moments, but against an overall pall of gloom. At the end of this week lies the start of a new year of my life - and for a week, I thought of hurriedly scribbling these little notes to myself, about things which are whirling in my head at the precise time I sit down to write them. My attempt will be to count blessings, to delineate incidents in a cryptic manner and to decode them in an evermore frustrating philosophical tone. Now, since I never listen to philosophies others waste on me, the typical bull-head that I am, it is imperative, that time and again, I formulate junk philosophies of my own. I have a whole trash-can full of them, did I tell you? Well, invite me over for a coffee and I shall entertain you. If you don't like what I philosophize, well, too bad, since I won't be listening to you in any case. You see, I can pretend to listen very well - but, yes, it stops at pretension. What is left then is the lovely, stubborn world inside me.

So, if someone were to ask me, what was the most amusing, and heart warming thing that happened to me in the day that went by, I would have the following to narrate. Four individuals, not much younger to me, wished me a happy Mothers Day. One of them even recorded a beautiful song to accompany the wish. Now, I am only 23 (about to turn 24), and completely unmarried - so messages like this are amusing. What is furthermore amusing is the fact that I unconsciously reciprocate with motherly emotions. Some awesome mess of wiring in my brain might be the enabler of these seemingly funny relationships I build - but then, all of these relationships are extremely dear to me.

We all have those principle things in life which we gravitate towards, in which we locate the source of our existence. I locate them in these relationships, these bonds which nurture me. People - who are all essentially eccentric - and their stories are enough to make my days and my thoughts seem full. My first scribble is dedicated to all of them, and the roles these people play and not play in my life. When certain people forget to fulfil a certain role you had expected them to play in your life, it adds to you. Let's not get into the mechanisms, but I just know it does. So, yes, to people. Cheers, to all of you, for existing, and not-existing in my life. You're all awesome.

Isn't life too like an awesome illuminated cage? Sometimes?

The countdown to my birthday begins. Really excited :) 

Words, and Me

They linger, haunt, inspire, cajole

They fight, embrace, depress, console

They flow and ebb and flow some more

They merge, emerge, and adorn the shore

Of mind and heart, of love left bare

Of nonsense picked up from here and there

They’re words, just words, 

But beyond what you see

They’re words, of course

,

But at core, they’re me.

The Age of Hibilisk by Sumukh Naik - A Review

I grew up with a generation which was drunk on the fantasy fiction genre. Quizzes and competitions on Harry Potter were common, and so was the desire of many of my friends to acquire the 'Ring' and get it engraved. I, somehow, steered clear of the popular craze. My only tryst with fantasy-adventure genre was Chrisopher Paolini's Inheritance Trilogy, that too, restricted to first two books - Eragon and Eldest. I have to admit, I remember nothing of the two books. With The Age of Hibilisk, I found the first proper opportunity to read, absorb, and write about a book which falls markedly under this fantasy umbrella, but is different in the sense that it is indigenously produced. I hoped to understand the thought of the writer better, as well as the terrain he traverses. At some points, I feel I succeeded in decoding the messages contained within the text. At other points, well, lets come to that after a synopsis of the storyline.

From what I understood, The Age of Hibilisk, is essentially the adventure tale of Prince William and Princess Sara, through the mystical lands of Pantolis, Hibilisk and Ikra. They, respectively, are the rulers of the Kingdom of Jaguar and the Kingdom of Ivory, both involved in a conflict engineered by some dark force. Their world is beginning to be engulfed by a mysterious evil force, which is turning the once lush forests black and is unleashing inscrutable misfortunes on the hapless inhabitants on the land of Pantolis. This mystical and spiritual place is under the protection of Ten Masters, each to take care of ten directions. There is an Eleventh Master, who sits at the throne above the ten Masters, summoned when they need advice. He manifests as the Sage throughout the narrative, one who guides William and Sara on their voyage towards allaying the dark forces from completely annihilating their beloved land.

There are many reasons for why I stuck with this book till the end despite finding it a little dull towards the initial passages. Author Sumukh Naik did not disappoint me for my perseverance, because the book has few of the brightest and most stimulating episodes towards the end. You should not read this story as a mere fantastic novel, because the script has been set in a rich fabric of thoughts and philosophy. Two philosophies emerge very prominently out of the book. First is the balance between good and evil. Each element around us has both, the forces of good and evil contained in equal measure within in. Humans have been blessed with the faculty of making a choice between them. Second, there is a magic far stronger and more potent than all the magic in the world, and that is the magic of love and compassion, which all human beings are capable of harnessing. These two strains of thought are fundamental to the journey motif exploited expertly by Sumukh in his debut work.

The author has done a fine job in his detailing, which is indispensable for any work belonging to the fantasy fiction genre, since you are attempting to take the reader into a land which does not exist anywhere on the map of the world. Oh, cartographic presentation attached at the end of the book do help, and the illustrations are simple enough to let the reader follow up without hassles or confusions. The pace of the story dips at points, but catches up fast. It takes a little long to set the premise, but once it does that, incidents follow each other at a decent speed. Characters are painted with concrete, identifiable and consistent traits - which is excellent - but they falter at something basic, and that is in their naming. Nomenclature is one field which out author needed to pay more heed to, since names have been drawn from various cultural traditions. This may not have been so much of a problem if all the names chosen were obscure. However, when you have a Samantha, a Philip, a Sara and a William coexisting with a Sharma, it gets problematic, and to be completely honest, tad hilarious even.

I found the book a little repetitive in initial parts, as if the author did not trust his readers enough to follow even his very basic statements in the text. The language is colloquial, understandable, but has editing glitches which could have and should have been taken care of. At a little above 350 pages, the book, for its genre is neither too thin, nor too bulky. I wish some imagination had been spared on the cover of the book as well, which does not look very inviting or promising; quite contrary to the content. All in all, I think this is a two on five star book for me.

Book Details - 
Author - Sumukh Nail
Publisher - APK Publishers
Published - June 2012
Book Source - Review Copy
Genre - Fantasy-Adventure
Price - Rs. 295
Pages - 372