Signs

Are these Signs of things to come?

Happy Birthday Mom(-in-law)

Today is my MIL's birthday. She is a very enterprising woman, not surprising considering that she had/has a brilliant career in Sales.

Extremely outspoken, friendly and hospitable are her shining qualities. Here's wishing her a very happy birthday on this special day

e-Humor

Very funny

Endhiran - Sneak Peek

Rajni looks dashing in this unofficial photo taken during Endhiran song picturization

Only in USA

We went with the kids to Denny's restaurant last night for dinner. We were trying to customize a kid meal for my son and here is how it all boiled down :-)

Us: We want a kid's meal with eggs, pancakes, grapes (instead of bacon)
Waitress: How do you like your eggs?
Us: As an Omelette, please
Watiress: No, you can only get it scrambled
Us: #!@#&!()#)

Houston - Ike(s) - We have a problem

The fury of hurricane Ike has clobbered Houston and various parts of Texas big time. Mother nature is almost always unforgiving

Capital bombings

Read this shocking news here. These islamic militants are like pests. What do we do to pests? We eliminate them. We should do the same to these radical, fanatic losers who commit crimes in the name of a really good religion.

Certainty of change

Everything changes in life - weather, time, season. People change too. Some times change is natural as in time, season etc. With humans too, physical change is natural as one gets older. However change in attitude, behavior, outlook etc in humans often are due to experiences (good/bad) in day to day life. So one thing that is certain is everything/everyone in this life keeps changing.

Sometimes change is for good and sometimes it is for bad/worse, but we should certainly be aware that change is constantly happening in everyone. I'm aware of this now....

Accepting people as they are

How often have we heard through various discourses, practices, books, people that we should "Accept People As They Are and Love Them For What They Are."

Let's pause for a moment and think what this really is..........Does it mean we should accept actions without a reaction? Does it mean that we should just move on without asking questions? Does it mean that we just accept certain situations with the person(s) in questions and not accept the ones that are deemed unacceptable (either because of society or our own value/belief/thought system or boundaries)?

The reason I ask these questions is because I have been asking the same questions to myself without any answers. What happens if someone tells you that they have accepted you for who you are and will love you for who you are but some of your action(s) or word(s) irk them? Does that mean they do not accept you for who you are or does it mean that that action/word of yours is unacceptable?

What happens if in a course of a day, you just feel like narrating the sequence of events to somebody and that person thinks that you are justifying yourself/your actions and that you do not have to? What happens if you are cold or in pain or just engrossed in thought and your body automatically goes into a hands-folded pose and that is being perceived as a hostile/ shielding-myself-from-the world-from-whatever-the hell-it might-be? Does it mean you are not being accepted or do you have to explain what you were doing/thinking?

All of us have a belief system or have been wired to interpreting some actions/words in some way because we are used to that system (and we are creatures that get comfortable with routine/ritual/familiar actions or words).Does that mean there is no other interpretation? Does it mean that another approach is wrong or there needs to be some kind of explanation offered?

So where is the concept of "Accepting people as they are and loving them for what they are"? This might come off as going off track but don't the differences in our actions/words/thoughts make us different or distinct? Don't they make us the individuals that we are supposed to be? If everybody has the same way of talking/writing/singing/doing whatever-else-that-might-come-into-your mind, won't we all be manufactured robots or dolls?

I understand that following/trying to follow the teachings of a leader might open up our mind and make our thought process clear but they don't necessarily make us any different than the person who has not undergone that experience. Maybe we apply the things that we have learned to some situations but sometimes we don't because we are too emotionally attached or maybe our perception or perspective is different.

I think that is what we should accept. Instead of accepting people as they are, we should accept that perceptions & perspectives to life and situations will be different and we should accept those differences & try to love & serve past those differences~

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divergent ponderings
laks

Appa, Amma trip to Gandhidham

My parents are visiting my dad's youngest sister (aka athai) in Gandhidham, Gujarat for a couple of weeks. Here is a very recent picture of my dear parents with my athai

For now,until my next visit to India, I have to be content with just seeing their pics....

L to R: Athai, Amma, Appa