Why it is suck to be a chicken? I am no vegetarian, neither this article is to make you a vegetarian. Infact it may be the only time that word vegitarian might appear in this article. As it is philosophy we are looking at, we will first learn about why, life of a chicken seems suck. Imagine a chick born in a chicken farm. It starts to live this chicken life in the farm. Of course without any predetors, and taken care of diseases, plenty of food throughout, except maybe a little bit of limited space and freedom, a chicken has nothing to complaint. As that is nothing as expected. Infact if you look at the point of view of chicken the life seems to be a very happy affair in the chicken farm. As long as chicken are not aware of their doomed fate. Let's look at this from the eyes of chicken, as shown in the film Chicken run. Chicken : https://unsplash.com/@dariuscotoi Chicken run film Plot. On a dreary egg farm ruled by the cruel Mrs. Tweedy, a determined hen named Ginger dreams of freedom. Her constant escape attempts fail until Rocky, a boastful American rooster, crash-lands into their coop, promising to teach them to fly (BTW I can think of so many Rockeis). Ginger sees Rocky as their ticket to freedom, but he's a fraud, a circus rooster shot from a cannon. Despite his deception, Rocky is drawn into their plight as Mrs. Tweedy invests in a pie-making machine, accelerating their fate. Ginger and Rocky train the other chickens, facing numerous obstacles, and eventually build a makeshift airplane. In a daring escape, they take flight, leaving the Tweedys and the farm behind, finding a peaceful island sanctuary. Hypothesis. Although it seems chickens wanted to run away from the meat machine, in the movie. Actual chicken do live in the farm relatively happily. Even in the movie, until when all the chicken understood their doomed fate, by information , they lived happily ever after for generations. It seem someone could have avoided the hustle if they do not deliver the bad news. And it is exactly what happens in a modern chicken farm. If animals gain consciousness of what we humans do to them, I am sure no human would walk on earth one day. And we can thank God for that matter. Ironically what can be applied to the chicken can be applied to our lives as well. How can we say we are not implanted souls, in a chicken farm for someones consumption? We call Earth is our home , yet what if it is a gigantic chicken farm where the owners could harvest our souls when we loose it? How sure are we that death is not a creation of the terrestial life. Next generation of a meat machine? Let's put aside the dream, as it is highly unlikely. But the important problem is, we even cannot prove or disprove this kind of illusionary and bizzare question about afterlife even with modern equippment and science. So we are technically blind to the truths of nature . Happy Chicken : https://unsplash.com/@hassanrafi Solution But there is simple truth, a glimpse of hope about the chicken farm, from the same observation we made earlier. And that is the fear, comes from information. All the fear that you gained about the earth being a chicken farm created because of the information I gave you. Which is again not correct. So, it is this story which creates in our minds causes problems, when we hear about chicken farms day after day. Simply saying, one possible solution is to, understand that there is no possible end conclusion that we can come, by arguing with illusions our own mindfulness creates. Maybe it is just a film after all which has nothing to be fear of and no one who is being afraid.

Mangroves on the move. It's been a tiring day for the mangroves. They were on the move by dozens. Just like the jelly fish just like dandelions they are on the move for survival. It's a cruel game unless you change your tactics. Instead putting seeds, thousands of them into the water and make them strand everywhere, mangrove parents have decided it's better if they nature their kids at home. Until they are big enough to live on their own. Until they are capable of making their own roots grow as a source of income to nourish themselves. Then came the flood , which ripped them apart. While mangrove parents were watching their children were dragged by the flood. For days they have been drifting here and there in the lagoon. Desperately trying to find a land to land their young roots. I saw them drifting towards the sea with the low tide. Maybe they have a better chance there. Mangroves on the move Why moving house is so difficult? Migration is a stressful endeavor. Not only for the plants and animals, more often for us. Imagine you are moving from your apartment to a new and better place. Yet still until you settle down it can be really difficult, from choosing what to pack what to discard. How to move with whom. To explore the new environment, new Neighbours, to decide whether to order food or to start cooking from day one. As everything is novel there is a lot to take in. As we are habitual animals, we prefer everything habitual. However, migration doesn't allow us to settle just like when you were a student driver. Change is difficult from sports to lightening. Imagine a child learning to ride a bicycle. For that matter even to swim. Initially it's a struggle. A constant fear of a fall. It's so hard to teach someone how to balance a cycle. If you do not know, the cycle balance itself. It's just when you try to steer that it loses the balance and tip over. But fear doesn't allow the child to let it steer by itself. He tries to balance again and again after so many falls that he learns it is not at all about gripping hard. It's about letting go. Trusting the universe. You may wonder what is the point of a cycle lessons i words? Only if you are a cyclist, you would agree this is true. I am sure similar thing happens any other sports like surfing or curling. After the initial struggle it tends to start to a flow. This is true for even nature. Imagine a dessert which is full of sand dunes. And suddenly there is a rain. And as the rainwater collects, initially nothing would happen. The water would soke the sand, and then it will saturate the sand and start to collect on the surface in little pools. And after a while it will start to flow. And these small water flows will connect each other and will make a stream. If given enough rain this stream will start to change the terrain and leave its mark even on the dry dessert. The fact is flow is a natural state of nature. Migration is like the rain in the dessert. Initially you would not know where to go and how to go there. You would flatten out and disperse your energy everywhere to see your options. And then when the pressure builds up you will start to follow the options and naturally after a while it will start to shape your future in a predictable manner. Like a child who has trust in his cycle you would be able to join the natural flow. Lightening - main beam and roots -https://unsplash.com/@smcauliffe If you would not believe me, ask from the lightening. Have you seen lightening in ultra slow motion? Shutter speeds of our cameras are so fast that nowadays our equipment provides us opportunity to become quicksilver just like that. I will describe it for you if you haven't seen that. First the supercharged particles peep down from the clouds. As they go down, they initially do not know where to hit, so they make little branches like tentacles of a jelly fish, blistering intricate patterns from heaven. Then one finds a path with least resistance and in a flash, everything discharges through this path in supersonic speed. And that is amazing to watch. How to make migration easy? I can give you a list of ten difficulties to make you understand why moving houses is so difficult. In fact, google suggests me to do just that. Followed by ten steps to overcome those difficulties. However, I would not do that mistake. I would just open your eyes into a natural world with chaos and show you how to find your Loranzo attractors so you can start flowing back again. Just like a stream, just like lightening or like a mangrove on a beach. And once you know its natural and inevitable that it happens, it would be just a waiting game. With a little bit of positive psychology, you may speed up the process even. PS: 1. I watched the movie migration the other day, an animation movie about a family of birds who happened to be Migrating! Amazing, and I would say you will find more insights about difficulties of moving a house in this movie than any other sources of information. Specially if you are about to move your house. 2. Literally you can move your house. And I have seen instead of moving houses some traditional people just carry their wooden house from place to place. Maybe living in a caravan is not bad after all. 3. You may find it helpful the rule of best choice if you are looking for a new house. -> Picking up corn problem Birds in migration

This article contains no medical advice. This is personal perspective of myself only. It is always recommended medical treatment, over some random blog post for clinical Depression! When you are depressed. If you are a leaf, when you are depressed, You may feel like stagnating in pools of calm. If you are a mountain, when you are depressed, You may feel like cold, dark night in a winter storm. If you are a tree, when you are depressed, You may feel like you are suppressed by the Giant Canopy above, And never see the sunlight. If you are a flower, when you are depressed. You will feel you wither when all the bees are gone, left alone to fall down used, abused. If you are a man, or a woman, depressed. You may feel like, there is nothing to smile, no hope, no future. And I will be there for you If you are depressed. To help you to smile at a buzzing bee, and wind at your forehead tossing your hair. I will show you the golden fish, swim in the clear water, when you sink into the bottom of the river I will show you the beauty of a snowflake, when it is shined with the starlight in shimmery color I will find a hole in the tree wall to reflect just enough light for you to hold on till your roots gets stronger And show you the life, you help created, in a fruit, in a seed Just before you wither and disappear There will be so much, for us to laugh about, if you are mindful Hopes, smiles and purpose will reappear. https://unsplash.com/@zhenh2424 Have you felt like nothing is working in your life? I have, felt exactly the same for some time. As I was looking for unanswered questions of why we are doing what we are doing? Simple questions like, why should I eat, and maintain the body? Why should I work and earn money? Who am I in the first place? Why am I protecting myself from anything, when I even do not know who am I? And these are philosophical questions. They seem random or even stupid for some, as we all have our own answers to them, at least what we believe is true. Yet it all seems to be subjective than objective. Hence, I find no value in these answers, as I should find answers myself. I am not sure how much you enjoy the philosophy, not a lot of people does understand it is a must. Understanding life, why mindfulness is the key. In understanding anything I follow the Richard Ferman philosophy. If you know it, and only if you know it well, you will be able to teach it to a kid. Imagine you try to teach some Nietzsche philosophy to a kid. If you try to read an online article about Superman philosophy and Materialism, and try to teach a Kid, you will start to realize you do not understand a F---in thing about philosophy. So, I keep gaps. When I do not understand I leave it a gap. Until one day, I understand it. Even if I could not It doesn't matter. I think complexity we create in the subject of philosophy is an artificial show off than trying to understand life. This is why I take a practical approach to philosophy. And Mindfulness is the key for everything. Look at life, Look at a mountain. Can you understand what is a mountain? If you are a geologist, you would understand the mountain from its origin. If you are a mountaineer, you would understand the mountain, from its anatomical features, and difficulty in climbing. If you are an artist, you would understand the mountain in its pure beauty. If you are a goat, the mountain will be your home. But, if you are a philosopher, you will have imagination to understand the mountain in all different point of views of the above and more. And more importantly if you are mindful, you will have answers to the questions, like why a mountain is a mountain, not a river, or the sky. Why you even see a mountain, and why you cannot feel your feet when you look at the mountain. You will be able to answer question like why a mountain is taller than you? You will have an answer to every question you can ever ask about a mountain, as you know, how this Object of mountain generated in your mind in first place. And that can only be seen by mindful eyes. https://unsplash.com/@thkelley If you are depressed- be mindful- Be mindful even if you are not However, it is not an easy task. Mindfulness takes time to grow. If you let the seed of mindfulness grow, and water it with enough kindness, and belief, it will start to grow into a wisdom tree. And in times of depression, it will make you understand and face it, without running away. And in times of happiness and glory, it will make you a humble human being like a bamboo, as you understand what is meant by being in the world. As we all are part of the universe and born from the star dust, we would start to pay a little bit more attention to fellow human beings and animals. And when you do this, and be mindful daily, even a little breeze tossing your hair, will make you smile. As it is a reminder that you are just universe. Stuck at 3 The fan regulator on my wall Haven't been used for a while Stuck at 3, Just like me Maybe it is depressed after all Fan Regulator

Atoms that fly. I was by the lagoon looked up at the sky Searching for a silver lining in a dark cloud that shine Like Lilly white Instead I saw some atoms that fly And landed in the lagoon Hoping to find some bite Atoms that fly, searching atoms that swim. In the sea of atoms that float Isn't it a wonderful sight? Atoms that fly What is life? After a long time, I was looking at the sky . Just to note some twinkling stars. Maybe it is more than a year since I was consciously aware of these tiny dots presence in the sky. Last I can remember, was two years ago, looking for roaming satellites in a background of countless stars. And today there is no luck, and I could not see any shooting stars or moving things. But it's good enough. It is good enough few stars, which just send those light which reach my eyes millions of years later. Did those stars ever think that I will observe them and think about it? I highly doubt that, it is my consciousness which noted their presense in the dark moonless night. Uncertainity of stargazing Let's assume otherwise. Let's assume a star I observe is a consciousness itself. That it wanted to be seen and exclusively send those light rays towards earth, at the exact moment for me to see. How likely is that? Even if that is true still, there is a chance I would have not looked up at the sky. If I did not, climb this hill, if I did not have a minute for myself uninterrupted awareness, if the sky wasn't clear , I would have not made that observation. And if that did not happen I would not write this now, and there would be nothing for you to read. So, I suggest you to look around, where you are now. Lanterns in the night Lanterns Lanterns in the dark Reminds me of the nights How we stayed till they burn out To bring back the darkness And start counting stars Uncertainity of any observation You can be on your vacation, drinking a beer on a beach, you can be at work, just taking a hot coffee break, you can be stressed searching for meaning of life, and if any of that did not happen you would not read these words. The real question is those reasons were just the tip of the iceberg. And we can travel back in time chasing reason after reason, and interwoven jumble of reasons which is called universe upto the big bang! And even the story would not end up there, as there is always an egg before any chicken and chicken before an any egg . And if we pick up any tiny event from this untraceable streak of events and made tiny adjustment ( chaos theory ) to this we can assume, we would never be here on earth. If the earth did move few hundred kilometers to right or left due to a nuclear reaction of an atom which did not happen quantillion years ago, there would not be humans at all, and no smartphones, so much so for a reason of an atom! And I would be not there to observe the stars and you would not be there to follow the thought process. Liers of faith, liers of science. In the vast jungle of interwoven reasons, if someone claims that they know why we are on earth, I would call him mad, not God. And I would not replace my blind faith of a universal creator with a scientist who is looking for reasons beyond reasons. As I can understand the likelihood of science reaching the begining of everything outside, seems unrealistic from the begining. What are we thinking? With 10000 years of human history we can only go back three to five iterations of any reasoning. How are we going to expect a million reasons behind the blooming of a flower in my garden? At this rate it will be anyway eternity. Silhoutte of life Silhouette Silhouette of life Looking at the skies Searching for a meaning In an infinity Undefined Why? Selfish mindfulness Instead I like to take the rational route, which is selfish way of doing things. Instead of looking at stars for the meaning of life , I would look at myself. I would look at myself when I see the stars. I would look at myself when I see the migrating birds. I would look at myself when I win a lottery I would look at myself when my car hit a bump I would look at myself when I hear a song I would look at myself when I take a shower I would look at myself when I write a poem Or break my heart when I cry I would look at myself when you listen, and react to my poem And understand it is nothing but the knower and the knowing made it a mess in the first place. Selfish answer is it all started for myself, at the exact moment I recognise a thing, in this unexplainable unthingy world. Maybe the stars are meant to be not things after all, and there would be one less problem for you, if I did not stargaze tonight.

Jumanji plot Have you watched the movie? It is about a magical board game which unleashes a world of adventure on siblings Peter (Bradley Pierce) and Judy Shepherd (Kirsten Dunst). While exploring an old mansion, the youngsters find a curious, jungle-themed game called Jumanji in the attic. When they start playing, they free Alan Parrish (Robin Williams), who's been stuck in the game's inner world for decades. If they win Jumanji, the kids can free Alan for good -- but that means braving giant bugs, ill-mannered monkeys and even stampeding rhinos! Boardgame: https://unsplash.com/@kimibmoon Rules of the game. Rules of the game were simple, when you roll the dice, you move forward. And when you fall into a trap, you will need help from your friends. The objective is to reach the middle of the board and shout "jumanji" so you are out of the horrible dream! Rules of soccer Do you know anything similar? I am sure you have played some game after all. Let's imagine Soccer. You get 11 payers for a team, why? Don't ask me that's how it is. Two teams two goals, and you cannot touch the ball with hand. But head is ok! And the ground is square, a foul is a yellow or a red card. Why not blue? Don't ask me. And it is easy to understand the whole thing is imaginary. All the rules of the game are imaginary and if FIFA wanted it, they could have changed it to brown and a blue card instead. Although the rules of the game and game itself is imaginary, soccer is not unreal after all. And there are big stadiums, fans all around the world, events, clubs, a whole culture around it. And some people become so good at it and have done this their entire lives. And some become goats (Like Christiano Ronaldo) while others become gods (Like Maradona). So much so for an imaginary game. Soccer : https://unsplash.com/@vikramtkv Rules of any game At this point I can tell you that, every game we play from childhood to the Olympics are imaginary. The rules that we agreed upon are imaginary in nature, and as you can understand changes from time to time. Infact 10000 years ago, majority of the games that we play today were never even heard of. Game of life . A gigantic Jumanji Let's say you are an American citizen. Living your entire life in Arizona, you have been following a set of local rules, and national rules. How about these rules? Do you see any similarity? From simple things like taxes, driving license, mortgage laws, to complex rules of how to establish a co-operation in your district, you follow a set of rules. And who, when and how these things were made? Have you ever questioned this? We just learn the rules and play the game until we finish all our lives allowed without even knowing the objective of life. And that is sadly the truth about most of our good Samaritans. We just play the good citizen, not knowing it's all imaginary game, or we take radical route and break the law, still not knowing it is all imaginary. And we call success when we increase our favorable numbers , whatever it means to us. It can be a number in your bank, calories you burnt, or number of cows in your farm. And some are stuck in science, or math. And expect it to uncover truths. Thinking that the nature's rules are written in the numbers or in words. But mind you the nature has been there long before math and science. And it seems nature function without rules, ethics or numbers. Nature doesn't care you understand it or not. Just a neutral nothingness . Game in Africa: https://unsplash.com/@mirapolis Only when we travel to the space and look at ourselves from the top, we can understand the world is just another giant Jumanji. Some play the UK version of it, and they have better chance of winning. Some play communist version of it in China or Russia. Some play under dictators , crazy dudes who manipulate rules, to satisfy their own needs. Some play the God's version. Some play the poor version. Some are stuck in continuous loops of suffering without ever having a chance to learn the game without a proper education. Some gets promoted to make the rules, sometimes in the house, as a father. Sometimes in a classroom as a schoolteacher. Sometimes in a factory as a CEO. Have you ever thought about this? How far deep are you lost in this jungle of Jumanji? And what is the compass you could use to understand all of this and get out safely by breaking the illusion. Some say its wisdom. Some say its philosophy. Some say its mindfulness . How do we exactly know it's not another level of the same game? Next-> about the jungle

Following article is not brand promotion. Purely hypothetical discussion on Coca-Cola label. Interactions of color by Josef Albers. Recently, I wanted to start painting again. And I remembered my raw painting skills were never sharpened enough. Still crude, hence I struggled in choosing colors. So, I decided I should read about colors, learn about their interactions, and I was interested in the book by above name. Which essentially teaches how colors, and more importantly how our perception of colors is different from person to person. I only read first two pages of the book and realized how insightful the book is! It's all about mindfulness of what we see! Which I have written over and over again in my book and blog. I will summaries few fundamentals of the colors that we see along the way but first let's look at a Coca-Cola label. Coca-Cola : https://unsplash.com/@picoftasty Philosophy in Coca-Cola label I am sure half of the world population have seen a Coca-Cola label. Including pigmies in Congo jungle. That is how far this brand has reached. Can you imagine the label? Its red color, right? But how much red is it? Is it the red color of a bright sky you saw yesterday afternoon? Or is it the red color of a pound of flesh ? Or a glass of wine . As you can see there are thousands of red color shades. You may be thinking of any color right now. Let's do some more mental experiments on this. Let's imagine you were given a red color spectrum . From light red to dark red changing hue and saturation. Even if 1000 people pointed out the Coca-Cola red, after seeing a same label shown to them, they will point out at different colors in the spectrum. There are some other ways to see the spectrum of colors the Coca-Cola label poses and see fundamental errors in our perception. How about looking at the Coca-Cola label throughout the day. You can keep a bottle at your window and still photograph this from morning till night. Is it the same color you, see? Can you see the problem? When we say Coca-Cola label is red color, we assume that it is some red color on the label itself. Yet, when we see the same label changes its color depending on the time of the day and lighting, or even the angle we look at it, we can see we have never seen same color ever. It is not the same red that see even if you stare at it for hours. As after 100 years of staring you would notice it is not even red anymore. Interaction of colors : https://unsplash.com/@davidpisnoy What do these observations tech us? How about following facts. Colors that we see are in spectrum, and it is impossible to label all of the shades of colors Just like there are infinite number of numbers between 0 and 1 there are infinite number of shades of red between any two shades of red. There is no singular color red which we can point out. Even in something like a regular Coca-Cola label, there are infinite number of colors. When we look closely, we can see colors are created in our mind, at the time of observation. This is why two colors can look same although it is not the same that we see, it's just imagination! The book is about colors, so it keeps on talking about applications of these observations for colors. But as you can see this is a problem for anything that we measure for that matter. Generalization of philosophy of Coca-cola label How about temperature? What about time? How many shades of flavors a slice of bread would have? Doesn't it depend on the time of the day? How much you chew? And amount of salt that the Baker did put in it? Can you see there was never any bread taste twice the same? But we know, bread as bread taste and mango and mango taste. Only a real Ratatouille (Not the dish but the mouse in the film) would say which bread came from which bakery. And this fact leads to another important conclusion which helps in our mindfulness practice. Which is, Ratatouille : https://unsplash.com/@elmartinbaron Although our sensations cannot grasp there is an inherent error when we say Coca-Cola label is red, and bread you ate for lunch tasted exactly like yesterday, fundamentally they are wrong statements, yet we agree as a society to ignore the errors in our perception, so we do not sound insane. But remember the facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored . What have you been doing lately with colors?

This is the second attempt at answering the same question, 1 year apart. And with more wisdom gained it is going to be comprehensive. Let's dive in. Mindfulness, is it meditation? It is a yes and no answer. Mindfulness by definition invites us to be aware of our awareness. Or in simple terms, let us observe the observer. In meditation we focus on some object. Outside or within us. To calm ourselves which is a form of sustained awareness. Of course we cannot do that without being aware of ourselves. On the other hand, as Mindfulness let us observe ourselves during which we might see ourselves focusing on different objects. Hence it is yes and no. In meditation object matters, in mindfulness any object would be fine. Mindfulness is kind of meditation, and not at the same time. meditation Little bit of history Meditation is a common practice in Eastern and western spiritual seekers. They saw the benefits of it and taught commoners how to do it. They taught us how to be happy just looking at drifting clouds , or flowing stream . So, most of the time meditation is seen as a solution to a problem. Just like any other solution. Let's look at some problems to understand pattern and what is the problem meditation try to solve. When you are hungry you search for food. When you don't have food, you buy some with your money. When you don't have money, you do a job. When your job doesn't pay enough money to quench your cravings, you learn a new skill When you don't know which skill you want to learn you try few of them When you get stressed, you watch TV or binge eat When you are more stressed, you run a marathon or exercise When you are even more stressed, you go to a therapist, or do yoga and mediation And when you are broken, you take medication. That is the traditional approach to any problem. In life this is what we do. But sometimes it becomes overwhelming for unknown reasons. And we need to calm down. More than ever when we are detached from the environment, we feel the need to connect. We need to look inside ourselves to identify what went wrong with our judgements in right and wrong. So, meditation have evolved as a method to close this gap between our expectations and reality. In fact, meditation is considered a solution a lot of human problems and it seems to be working! When you struggle with sleep When you are stressed or anxious To control anger Just before landing a plane, or pull the trigger to kill a terrorist Meditation can improve your brain function. Food on the table Epidemic of meditation. More problems we have which are mental in nature, more and more people are seeing the meditation as a solution. It's because of benefits of meditation. But there is another school of thought about meditation. It doesn't answer to fundamental questions that Eastern and western philosophers and even common men like you and me tried to answer. What is the meaning of life ? Who am I ? What is happiness ? Why anything is a thing ? What happens when we die ? What is living ? What is time? Can you answer these questions with meditation? I don't think so. Not even if you started meditation from the day 1 you were born till you die. So, meditation is not a solution to some problems. That is where mindfulness is different. It is the solution to every problem! It is the art of investigation the problems of life itself. Mindfulness the solution to every problem Mindfulness is the tool we use to answer such simple yet fundamental questions about life. As we are stuck in our own subjective realities , there is no other option as the knowledge about a single self cannot come from another self. It's like tasting salt. You know what salt taste like right? But can you ever know what it tastes like for me? Or anyone else? Similarly, we are stuck in our own realities, hence investigation of life depends on one person and one method only. And that is called mindfulness. And mind you it is not pseudo-science. It is true science at its best. It's just using scientific method to investigate self. As all the problems arise from things, mindfulness is the tool to understand things about things. So, mindfulness is not watching the breath. Its investigating what is breath. It is also investigating who is breathing, when and where all these phenomena of watching the breath is happening? Is it happening in the last second? Next second? Or this second? If then what happens, when this second becomes next second? What binds a second to the next? Is it same breath or new breath? And who said time is measured in seconds anyway? Observing the banana leaves wave in the wind can create more happiness than a million dollars. Paradoxes of life. : https://unsplash.com/@maite11 Can you see the problem? And the depth? Let's tap into mindfulness today, to investigate phenomenon of life

Understanding nothingness - part 2 In the previous article we discussed why nothingness is not, absence of a thing . Closest explanation we can give for nothingness is, it is something which never have been there. As this is a difficult concept to grasp, and also a wonderful thing to know we will try to understand this with more and more examples. Nothingness Is in everything. Empty : https://unsplash.com/@haleytruong You would admire nothingness, is something which is present in everything. For that matter we need to know workings of the mind. One important question to ask is when and how a thing became a thing in your mind? Imagine you take a walk, on a country road which you have never been before. And you see houses, and people, footpaths and trees you have never seen before. Forget about the perspective of others. When did these things became things in your consciousness? When I look at this question in mindfulness, I see they became things in my mind only when I was aware of them. Until I took the Christmas Walk , a nude oak tree was not a thing for me. This nude oak was not a thing for me every second I was not aware of it. Only when it comes to my consciousness that it becomes a thing for me. This observation leaves us with a fundamental rule. Our minds are simply mechanisms to register and observe things in the so called outside and inside world. We can call them mental object s. However as, we cannot separate ourselves from the things we observe someone can argue it is even singular like a lump of clay . Then what is the duality of the nature? It seems duality of the nature is nothing but the imaginary place where things are not there which is another thing. However, the problem is this also is not the nothingness itself. If things in the world becomes things only when I am aware of them, for vast majority of the time, individually they behave as nothingness. So how can I see the nothingness of a thing when it is a thing in my mind? Did you get the question? Nothingness always there hidden behind things: https://unsplash.com/@beccatapert There is no point reading further if you do not understand the question. I know if you have just landed to this page by a random Google recommendation, I suggest you follow at least some of the simpler articles I have written before in links. As it took me 1.5 years writing 350 articles to ask this question. It's unfair by you if I expected you to understand. Back to the question: How can I see nothingness of a thing when it is a thing in my mind? And that is called mindfulness. Mindfulness is not just another meditation to teach you how to focus on your breath to make you sleep better. Mindfulness is a path to wisdom, to identify true nature of things we see hear smell touch taste and think about all our lives. Mindfulness is the practice to observe how things arise from nothingness and go back to nothingness when you are no longer aware of them. Mindfulness is the investigation to question things that you observe and identify nothingness in them. So, our strong attachments to the materialistic and imaginary world gets loosened day by day, until we are liberated from all the suffering arise from things. If you ask me a question, have you seen nothingness? I would say, no, it is not something we can see. I just try to see the lie, which is present in everything that I see. Including nothingness itself. Then only we can reach what is unreachable. I try to understand how, a life which can be cornered to a fraction of a second makes sense. How can I get a meaning out of a millisecond called life? Who is this mad man called me, creating things out of nothingness? What about you? What is your way to nothingness?

Synonyms. You may have come across the term nonexistence at some point in your life. If you are a spiritual seeker more often than the others. If you are an ordinary man or women, like me, you may have heard the same term with synonyms like, emptiness, nothingness, nihilism , null etc. Nonexistence or nothingness is a fascinating concept for me. Here in this article, I am trying to understand nonexistence myself, by explaining it to you. Let's get started with flying tortoises. Flying Tortoise and A room without tables Flying tortoise Have you seen flying tortoise? Well, you may have not. Ha ha ha let me know if you have as I just created them in my imagination just like the pink elephant . But as you can see clearly in our physical world flying tortoise are non-existing, like a real chimera . Yet we just created them in our minds. Just when you read the term "Flying Tortoise" they are existing in our minds. As you can see this is a big problem when we try to understand nonexistence or nothingness. We tend to always try to create nothingness from a thing. Imagine you have a table in your room. What is the nonexistence of the table? Is it a room without a table? Then I suggest we just created a room with a table and compared this against a room without one. In true non existing world, there have never been a table. Not even in imagination, not even the concept of it hence we even cannot express such a world. Can you imagine such a room? It seems no matter how much we try true nonexistence is somewhat out of our reach. Like it is in fourth dimension . Is nonexistence really non existing? Why the hassle? At this point I suspect you have questions on my sanity. Questions on my sanity why I write this stupid argument in the first place. Yet I cannot emphasize more, that it is fundamental in understanding the true valueless nature of our relative world . Nothingness do exist like a statue of David hidden inside our consciousness. Until we started to cover it with first things as toddlers. Then named things when we were kids. Now we are lost in our own jumble of words, we cannot understand it. Nonexistence is touchable only by natural wisdom of mind. Yet it is essential to do so. Otherwise, we will fall into countless traps, agendas, and evils of the thingy world every day. We might get depressed, or start to cry, laugh like mad people and kill for a penny, and that is the outcome of not knowing nonexistence. Mountain : https://unsplash.com/@fabulu75 Let's try to tackle the nonexistence in a different way. Not having a bottle in your room doesn't prove its non-existence Not having a dream doesn't prove its non-existence Not seeing a mountain doesn't prove its non-existence. Even breaking something into small parts doesn't prove its non-existence as we broke something which is there. Can you see a pattern? It's all about patterns in nature . We can derive a general rule for nonexistence from here and that is following. Nonexistence is not the thing that you think of. What is not there is not nonexistence, but what was never there is. : https://unsplash.com/@lishakov That is the best description of non-existence or nothingness so far. If you think of something that is not it! So true nonexistence cannot be described by words. As when we describe something from words, we have to create it first and then it would be a thing . Not nothingness. We cannot show it as a picture as a picture or a diagram is a thing. We cannot show it with a sound or a smell or a taste or even a touch. As all these will create things in our minds. As you can understand seeing nothingness is almost an impossible task. But here is a simple truth that you should be contemplating when you do your mindfulness. And that is nothingness is the only thing which there is. Everything else in our relative worlds are built upon this inherent nothingness. And moment we realize this fact, we can start looking for nothingness in everything we see and that will, make you feel like you are freed from the dimensional world. Do you have better explanation on non-existence?

This is a saying which appeared in the novel "The brothers of Karamazov" By Fyodor Dostoevsky the famous russian novelist. The statement stands on itself. A rare gem of a sentence and today the article is about a detailed explanation, to why this statement itself harbours the meaning of life. First we will introduce you to a story to illustrate how it is applicable to charity and other good deeds, when it is hard to figure out subtle nature of our selfishness which hides in these acts. Then we will expand more to The Sisyphean suffering of rolling the perpetual wheel of self or life. perpetual Motion : https://unsplash.com/@dmitriielj Understanding charity, Is there a lier? Once upon a time there was a king. He was a good king and as all other kings of the era, from time to time he went in disguise, in the kingdom to see how his people were doing. Maybe they did not trust their own news agents for that matter, so kings wanted to see themselves how their governance were at work. He disguised himself as a commonor and left the palace, and plan was to come back in a week. However, on the way, in a far corner town, he was robbed by some gang and severely beaten. Without all his armed gurds, the king was left to die helplessly by the road. Like a begger, he could not even speak or beg. Nobody looked at him except a one man who walked by. His heart melted looking at the poor man. He got down on his knees and took him in his arms. He brought the poor man home and treated him for a good couple of weeks until he was able to walk and talk by himself. The king thanked the good man and went to his palace. Regained the throne. And first thing he did was summoning the good man, and gifting him with unimaginable wealth and status. And the news spread rapidly throughout the kingdom to what happened. And from the next day, the beggers in the country did not have trouble atleast for a good couple of months, as there were plenty of good men who would help. Some even went in trouble of looking for such disabled people. Some even started works of charity, in the name of their parents to help poor people. The question at this point is who had good intensions? It appears, that only the first man who did not know about any good or bad consequences of his act, did it anyway from the kindness which appeared from the bottom of his heart. Others were just cheaters! how much they tried to appear good, their faith was blinded by the potential benifits. Acts of heart : https://unsplash.com/@designecologist Philosophy of charity Now we can answer some philosophical questions about charity. How about the following? How many charity organisations would prevail in the world, if there were no stories about heavens and hell? How many people would spend their time saving children? Animals? trying to help diseased and poor, if guranteed nothing good or bad will happen to them even if they did or not do these things. What if we make the return value of charity 0? Not even a "feeling Good"? I am sure we will be straight away looking at a society like in a jungle. It seems even acts of charity, or acts of good deed are still harbouring our selfishness at its core. I am not saying we should not involve in such acts. It is exactly the opposite of it. I am trying to show you how to do charity properly, like a good kind hearted human, without getting stranguled in the process by the demon of greed. 0 return charity is the best charity out there, and like the good kind hearted man who treated a poor man, not a king. This is why a donation of a penny by a begger can be a bigger act of charity than a million dollar donation by a wealthy CEO. I am sure gates of heaven if at all is there will not open depend on the amount of coins you put in, but by inherent purity of the act which doesn't depend on the culture religion or our believes. Investment: https://unsplash.com/@nampoh Above all do not lie to yourself. Not only in doing charity, we sometimes lie to ourselves more often. Even in day to day activities. Think about love? What is love ? Is it not a kind of deeply rooted greediness to satisfy our needs from someone else? Do we lie to ourselves we love someone purely from our heart? Can there be exist some pure platonic love outside our imagination? What about frendship? What about happiness? Do you lie to yourslef about happiness? Do you lie to yourself about a happy tomorrow and suffer yourself today by cheating yourself promising a dream? What exactly do you need to be happy at this moment ? Nothing? If you look at your thoughts a day, with mindfulness, you will witness, that the mind does lie to itself, from time to time, more when you understand simple truths about life . And realising this fact might make you ashamed of yourself. But do not be disheartened. After all it is all nature, and nature is a neutral phenomenon. Feeling ashamed is just a negative value which we give artificially to our own thoughts, which itself is wrong. Hence that is excessive. Just being aware is enough.

It's about a pair of spectacles. Let's start with boiling some water . I had my first pair of spectacles when I was in the university. We never were addicted to phones when we were kids, as we did not have any. Yet, at latter part of my teenage years I got a computer at my house, and I played 18 hours straight staring at it. My eyesight became bad within months, and when I went to university, I used to sit in front row, so I could see the projections clearly. When I was in the bus stop, I was staring at the buses, trying hard to see them clearly before they come closer, as I could not see the destination boards that they displayed. And it came to a point, I haven't seen anything further than few meters clearly for a long time and I got my first spectacles. Error was not that bad, but doctor told me I am in for a surprise, as I have never used them before. Boil some water: https://unsplash.com/@henrykobutra I can remember walking out from the Opticians wearing my new spectacles. I could see everything! from the birds in faraway trees, to the sand grains at the tip of my toes. Nothing was blurred anymore. And I walked in joy like a kid, found it difficult to step on, as the world seemed to be different. Have you ever seen someone try hearing aids, or spectacles for the first time? Or even walking after a long-term coma? If not, you will have to imagine. I am sure you have some similar experience. What changed? Let's add some vegetables , and spices to the boiling water. I knew exactly nothing changed in the outside world. What changed was the projections which were created in my brain. Better clarity. We can say what changed was the information which I received about the world. And that is the starting point of our argument. Who gives you spectacles? Some salt to make it a little tasty. Well, for a start it was my optician. But if we consider information, I will say many more. It started with my parents, Television, Teachers, Newspapers, Lecturers, politicians, friends, Neighbours, preachers, strangers, and even my own imagination. And from your birth up to the reading of this sentence, you were given information from everyone around you. Some are good, some are bad right? (We can agree on this judgement for now) What we do when we get this information? We contemplate on them; we judge them and either we discard or mark them important. We might take action or refuse to act. We might react aggressively, or cry sadly, or smile joyfully. Now, we will stop there and add some wisdom to our pot. Add some vegetables : https://unsplash.com/@alyson_jane The man with the spectacles. Wisdom in the pot. I want you to imagine a man, who is wearing a pair of red color spectacles. These are the ones; this man was wearing since he was born. And he is arguing with everyone that the world is in fact red. And it seems he is right from his perspective. How can anyone teach him otherwise? I let the task in your hand. All we have to do is sneak into his room when he is sleeping and make him wear a blue color spectacle. And from the moment he wakes up, he starts to doubt his previous idea of the red world and now he is thinking the world is blue. And yet again you try. You try another day when he is sleeping this time you put him on green spectacles. And ah the nightmare! he is now in a green world. You try yellow, and yet again this stupid man tries to prove the world is yellow. Imagine you try different shades every day, and you use all the colors in the f*****g rainbow in a year. Yet he does not understand what is happening. Because he did not think about what is happening in the first place. And that there is the wisdom in your pot! That is the one thing that your parents and teachers and environment did not teach you. Because we are the f******g idiots in the first place not knowing we are wearing spectacles on our own, we were sleeping when the information just change our spectacles. Let's revisit the analogy, for those who did not understand it. It's simple math. Explanation: That one thing your parents and teachers did not teach you. The man with spectacles is you. The spectacles you already have is the previous information you received. And every day you get new spectacles from your parents, teachers, and everyone and everything around you. And with this new upgraded spectacle you start to look at the world tomorrow and say, well, the world is Pink! or Blue! or Black! From your birth to death, you live in a dream of a colorful world created by your own spectacles. So, I will tell you a secret now. The true secret, that you are eager to hear, that will change your future forever. Can you see the idiot in you move when I put it like that? Contemplate on it. That is how I can sell you a pair of spectacles, which I call mindfulness. And that is truly colorless, ha ha ha! (Hope you are wise to understand the irony of this) BTW your pot is ready, it' s time to have lunch. Lunch is ready! : https://unsplash.com/@vdphotography

Jumpers. Disclaimer: Following article discuss jumps, this is philosophical. There is no jump without any risk. Hence, if you feel like, seek professional help. We hold no responsibility of the meaning you would derive reading this, which anyway is impossible to predict. Have you ever, bunjee jumped, sky dived or taken a free fall into a pool? I am sure you have atleast watched a video of such. I have seen neumerous times people jumping from buildings and even planes, with the parachutte on their backs. With popularisation of Red bull challanges such videos are not rarerity in my daily dose of internet. I am sure only very few ever have attempted a free fall entirely, and did not expect to survive. Infact, latest I can remember were the jumpers of 9/11. In one such lonly afternoon in the comfort of my bed I went into a jumpers mind and wrote the following. Jumpers Poem. What makes a jump interesting. There are different kinds of jumps. What is the most important aspects about a jump? Can you summarise? Think about following. Any jump has a start, a flight and an ending, A bottom. Which is Either a happy landing or a Crash landing. We are heros, when we take a jump, only if we make it to the bottom safetly. I am sure if you do a google search today, you would find many such triumphs and faliures. From Franz Reichelt 1912, who fell to death jumping from the effel tower to test his parachutte, to jumpers from latest Paris Olympic games lading perfect tens. If the safe landing is our objective, we have to have faith that everything should go well. If not, no faith is needed. Why is a jump from a top of a tower, is different from a jump from a table top? Both have start, both have ending yet, there is little to no risk from jumping from a table top. The risk for a jump from a airplane is inherently associated with a big risk. Hence not everyone is capable of doing it. We can compare this to any risk that we take in our life. More the risk, generally more the adrenalin rush and if landing is successful, better the satisfiction we feel. Important question we should asking ourselves is who gives a value to a jump from a sky? life as a free fall Life as a free fall. However there is a different kind of a jump. It is hypothetical, and imaginary. And that is a free fall. Imagine a free fall? Can you do that? We simply cannot, as we are so much used to jumps with a start to finish. The free fall is just an impossible dream. I cannot give you a definite example from the physical world. But I can help you with imagination. Imagine you wake up one day, and you are in a fall. You cannot remember, when and how you started to fall. Unlike other jumps you have seen, you know there is no end to this fall. You are guaranteed that there would be no crash, although you do not wear any parachutte. Can you imagine such a fall? If so, that is a free fall. There are some important observations we can make, when we compare our lives to a free fall. Generally we assume life to be a normal fall. With begnining, which is called birth, the flight, which is called life, and the ending which is called death. Philosophy and religion and countless others try to get a meaning of life , from within this framework of life. Sometimes they compare it to a journey , yet, it is not a free fall they are talking about. When we call life a journey we also assume there is some ending to it. Now try to compare the life to the idea of above free fall. Infact, there are lot of similarities if you looked at it with mindfulness. We started to fall, through time, and we did not know how we started to come into this journey. We cannot remember the begining. We assume it is our birth, but how can we be so sure? What if we never land? Will there be a thrill? Of happiness ? Or Sadnesss?: https://unsplash.com/@arstyy We enjoy laugh and cry in the free flight, sometimes fearing about the doomed end that we all have to face. We forget to feel the wind, and enjoy the golden hour view of a sunset because we are so afraid of the crash landing, as we do not have a parachutte to save us. And within this fall, some similar free fallers, try to sell us things. They try to sell us news , retirement plans and caskets to keep our own dead bodies. Some even try to sell us a meaning of life, secrets of love, and ten things we sould be doing to be successful before our crash landing. But mindfulness suggests otherwise. If you want to be free from the crash ending, you have to shift the framework. And really start to look into yourself and ask the question, again and again. What if life is a free fall? Within this free fall, there would be no meaning to the death , no value to the objects of mind , which others try to sell, and maybe one day we all will just enjoy the free fall as it is.