Everyone likes bubbles. As a kid I loved them. And now as an adult still I love them. Soap bubbles are fascinating creation of nature, for that matter any bubble. These are little insights which are gathered over the years looking at soap bubbles. I remember when I was a little boy, making soap bubbles was one of my favorite sports. Time was different then, and I did not see balloons very often. Putting some water into a coconut shell, and Then I had to steal some soap from the kitchen. Often, scraping off if it is a new soap bar, so my mother would not see that part of the soap is missing. And it took some time to dissolve it. With a straw or using an empty ballpoint pen, we used to blow bubbles. Sometimes hallow straw of a papaw leaf was used to blow bigger bubbles. It was difficult to blow them when there was too much wind. But for a child, that was the best thing. To see a bubble float in the air, often slowly drifting away. That was the only thing we did with bubbles. Blow them as much bigger and watch them drift slowly in air. And when it starts to sink due to its minimal mass, when there is not enough wind, tried hard to push them back in the air, using hands to generate uplifting thrust. Life of a soap bubble. These bubbles they had a very short life. But it was a fascinating one. Often in the beginning, they were just transparent, reflecting the surrounding, on its surface, and slowly they begin change their colors. First to a pink and green, slowly turning into an orange and red, ending up in a shade of blue. Given enough time on air, every bubble came to grey colorless state, before start thinning out so much at some point, they looked like they started to wrinkle, suddenly there would be a pop, and it would become droplets of soap and fall back on earth. During the lifetime of a bubble, the environment will be reflected upon its surface, except at the last second of it where all the colors fades. That was not the only encounter with bubbles in my life. I have even seen great "Bubble show's" done by Bubble experts. And bigger and bigger bubbles which can even use to cover a human being in a magic show. And it did not end in there. Bubbles will be back in life in whatever the form in the future as well, and I am sure of it. How about your bubble story? I am sure, there will be interesting stories. Discussion. For the discussion, I would like to summaries the characteristics of the bubble I saw. Bubbles, reflect the environment throughout their life, except at the last moment. Bubbles have a short life span, and they are colorless at both ends of their live. If there is no constant effort, bubbles will crash early on the ground, and even with the effort they are doomed from the start. Now I think you have an idea where I am heading with the story of bubbles. I will make it easy. If soap bubble represents your life, you will see some similarity. If the color of the bubble represents the information, it will show that we are colorless when we are a child due to lack of experience and at the end of life due to dementia. Throughout the course of the lifetime, we also have to make a constant effort to keep it floating. We have to keep eating, keep drinking and keep swallowing medication, keep travelling and keep our relationships. We reflect our environment, or more importantly we have our own model of the world with us. Except for its difference fundamentally it's the same material. I would end the bubble story here with insights about the waves of the sea. You would see, the truth about the nature is everywhere if you are careful to listen in silence.

My childhood dreams. What is the most beautiful dream you can remember? Let's talk about dreams. When I was very little, I can remember I had a dream. The dream went like this. I was near a pond, and I can remember the dream was full of balloons. These were not big ordinary balloons. They were very small balloons. They were in all the colors of the rainbow floating around the air, and I can remember I was playing on feeling so happy to be in that Dream. I saw that dream over and over again. I can remember waking up feeling happy, but realizing it was a dream broke the bubble of happiness. However as when I get older dreams became more complicated and more realistic than extraordinary childhood dreams. In another dream everywhere was flooded about few inches with Cristel clear water and fish swim in this water. They could swim to my feet and that was an extraordinary experience. Occasionally there were scary kind of dreams. What about your dreams have you had any dreams when you are a child? Following is a chapter from the book from the past to the Future or what is time. Sleeping, it’s time to disappear. Time is created in mind as a side effect of comparing two events in mind, in now. Hence time does not exist unless in the mind of an observer which is you! As nobody can observe on behalf of anyone else, time is an independent relative truth to each one of us. What if the observer is asleep? Let's imagine the modern Manhattan man. He started to observe time since he woke up Saturday morning. Just at the moment he woke up and noticed he was, his mind started to compare the events of last night. Then he knew, he lived across Y hours of time. Feelings of time started to bombard his day and continued to stress him. However, during the sleep was there time? There are two perspectives. To another observer secretly observing him in sleep, yes time did exist. However to the Manhattan man in his perspective time did not exist, as he was not making any meaningful observations, his mind was not conscious. He would look at the clock and say “Ah! I slept Ten hours”. But he knew exactly that it's just that he slept, and he woke up. There was no ten hours ‘feeling’ in it. It was only two events which were only a few seconds from each other as his consciousness was taking a break. But he compares whatever the gap, which is shown in the clock. Compare it with past experience of how it felt when he was ‘continuously’ aware and thinking for ten hours. And think “Ah, I have slept this many hours”. But the truth is if he is brutally honest with himself like a child, there was no time during true sleep. What if one day after death we wake up and realize we were dreaming all this time. We would be laughing at everyone who is sleeping and would not be able to wake them up. Of course, this can be a possibility when we compare to the dreaming Manhattan man. As during the dream, the Manhattan man did not believe he is dreaming, and he could not remember he had a life before the dream. Only after the dream he will realize he had been dreaming. Living in a dream or living it in real. How about living in a dream it in real life? That was a kind of a question that can be answered by philosophy. Really speaking nobody can answer the question that Whether we are living in a dream or not. So, we may be living in a matrix as in the film The Matrix. More recently during the pandemic in 2021 film free Guy. Free Guy is a character inside the free City video game. During the game his intelligence develop into a level that he is able to understand that he is not real and just a character in the game. Which is the ultimate form of developed artificial intelligence. Although this is fictional, we haven't seen anything like that so far. However as at this rate of development of artificial intelligence we are never far from there hence before our lifetime comes to an end, most of us are likely to see at least similar responsive artificial intelligence. Unfortunately for such an artificial intelligence once they understand that they are not real, still they cannot get out of the realm of technology. What is real and what is not when living in a dream? Returning our attention to Philosophy from Plato to Chinese philosophers to Descartes all of them asked the question "why reality is not a dream?" or "what is the evidence to say what we experience is not someone else's dream" So it is agreed upon that we can never prove or disprove such an argument. However, what we can assume is that at this moment of time there is thinking happening, even if it is in a dream the thinking is real in that context. So that is a relative truth. That is the closest we get to disproving that we are living in a dream. Even our science is not advanced enough to answer such a question. That's why philosophy still haven't lost its role in modern day. You can read more about philosophy in era of science article. In summary Nobody can answer the question whether we are living in some kind of a dream. Thinking is a relative truth happening even if we are living in a dream. You may also like to read: What is time? Beauty of a flower, Beauty of mind

I was looking at the sky, the other day and someone told me that it was beautiful. So, I looked at it again. Then I got afraid. And here is the reason why I was afraid of the beauty in a little thought experiment. Duality of the beauty. Previously I wrote about the beauty of a flower and the beauty of a mind. And boy I was totally positive about it. Now when I read it, it feels inspiring and motivating. Yet, what I did not mention was the beauty hides its own dangers. Beauty does not stand on its own. To understand its dangers let's analyze what goes in our minds when we think about beauty of something. Why I am afraid of beauty. You can imagine anything beautiful. It could be a flower, a scene, a movie, a person, a diamond or even peaceful experience you had when meditating. Now, when you think the thought 'Oh that is beautiful' what happens? How does that thought arises? We will have to go back in time. Judging something 'beautiful' is a learned behavior. You would agree that it was not there until certain age strongly. For a baby, warmth of the mother is beautiful, against the coldness that baby feels when mother is not there. So, from time we were born the ability to recognize something nice and not nice had been there. Even without the words ! even without any learning it had been there. We recognize food is tasty, against non tasty things. Later when we learn about the world and make our own information sphere, we would be able to judge something beautiful. Often, we do not talk about against what. But if you learn about how values are formed. Beauty is one such value we give to things. It never stands alone. Beauty always appears when our minds compare two things. The sky was beautiful, when we compare it to another day which it was not. A flower is beautiful, when we compare it to the background where it came from. A movie scene is beautiful, than the other parts of the same movie or other movies, or even real life. A person is beautiful, when we compare him against his/her past or some other bad person or another day where he was not so beautiful, maybe due to age or disease. A diamond is beautiful when we compare it to a piece of rock in your garden. A peaceful experience in meditation is beautiful, when we compare this to the all the chaotic experience we have throughout the day. From the day we were born fundamentally we try to find beauty in things. Doing this, what we are doing is comparing and dividing things into two dumps. The dump that we like, to keep, to possess and try to collect. And the dump that we like to throw away, trying to avoid and dislike. We become happy when we have the dump we like, and we become sad when we are in the dump of dislikes all the other times. And the pattern repeats over and over again. So, what is the solution? Generalizing our thought experiment. If someone asked me to give a character of a living creature. I would say, ability to like and dislike things. Look at a baby even without words baby could do this. Look at an animal. Grazers in savanna run away from dangers and pain and run towards green pastures. Even if you look at a single cell animal or even a plant you would see this phenomenon of likes and dislikes. A plant will move towards sun and move away from the shade. Even plants are clearly different from animals, through this fundamental characteristic they are same. Summary Conclusions from our little thought experiment. Ability to like and dislike is a fundamental characteristic of an any living being. More advanced form of this is seen in humans, with measuring devices and ability to recognize beauty. Often, we forget the other side of the equation that beauty does not stand alone. The problem is when we label something beautiful, fundamentally what we are saying or doing is, dumping it into our like group, but unknowingly we add the opposite to our dislike group. Often the beauty doesn't last long, as everything is eternally changing, so, when we label we will fall back to the dislike group anyway. Hence Beauty is dangerous, and I am afraid of it. Solution is not to label? What are your thoughts on this? would like to know.

Do you want to know the root cause of all the problems you have? I recon you want. If so, keep reading. If you would understand this is yet another way to look at the life. Yet another piece of wisdom which helps us in mindful practice. I am trying to make myself understand life enough so when at near the death for the last time I would not be regretting like I had earlier. There are no strings attached. This is just a mind speaking to another mind. I believe minds are neither good nor bad. But that is another topic to discuss another day. Currently at the moment of this typing I can assure you mind is pure and not in any corrupted situation. So, it will only output good kindhearted words. We all go through some experience of this behavior of mind from time to time. So where is the root cause of all the problems? The wisdom I am writing here are not my words. I bow all those great teachers for distributing their wisdom with kindness. One such occasion I was shown to the root cause of all our problems. Root cause of all our suffering is our attachments. Our mental attachments to things. You would not believe but we will analyze how this web of problems are created in the first place. Do problems come from universe? We will go to the far end of the known universe and then find out where all our problems come from. In the universe what is the most important galaxy we are concerned? It is the Milkey way, right? Of course, it is our galaxy. It is our 'home'. Maybe if you are a scientist your next most important would be the andromeda galaxy which is our Neighbour. So, we are worried about the andromeda as it is closer to us. So, if you think in a universal scale, we name our galaxy as 'Home' and if anything is going to happen to this galaxy, we are really worried. Because we (as a human race) are in it. Coming backwards there are thousands of solar systems in the milky way galaxy. But we are worried about our solar system. We send space probes once in a while. We constantly monitor our solar system with space scopes to make sure nothing goes by un-noticed in our solar system. Why? because we are in it as a human race. We will be more alarmed if something happens in our solar system than far end of our Milkey way. Because it has more chances of affecting us. Root cause of all the problems in solar system Now from all the planets in our solar system, we are worried about Earth. Of course, we try to avoid global warming and catastrophic climate change. We want to survive massive scale meteorite colliding on our earth. We even try to make a backup plan on Mars to make it habitable if unavoidable happens on earth. Only because we as human race are living on earth. What happens when there is a storm in some other country? Or a war going on, in neighboring countries in middle east. Often, we look at the news daily to update our database to see what is happening in the world. We will be worried if there are human deaths. We would be more worried if those deaths are of immigrants of our country. It will affect more to us. Why? because those are people from 'our' country. Now let's look at our country. More than anything else I would want to know what is happening in my state. If there are new rules affecting me? Are there any new taxes which I have to pay? If there is a storm, I want to know whether it passes through my state. Ultimately, I would be more troubled by problems in 'my state' than any other state. Root cause of all the problems in neighborhood further going back, I would be more worried what is happening in my neighborhood. Even when I am away from home, I would want to know what is going on in my neighborhood. When I call someone at home, they will update me about new Neighbours and passing away of old lady next door. That will affect me more if I know these people. Remember when it was covid. It got into a panic when little by little when the covid got closer and closer to your home and ultimately to your Neighbours house. In all the houses in the world what is the most important one you are worried about? That is your house, right? From all the families in the neighborhood you are worried about your family. So, whenever there is some problem if affects you, because it is your family. The things you gathered for yourself and labeled as yours have the ability to give you most of the problems. Root cause of all the problems in family From all the beings in the family what is the most important being you care about? That is you right? You would be lying if you would say that is not true. We all care about ourselves first and because of this self we label all the things around us as 'my' and whenever we label things as 'mine' constantly we try to keep them in a optimal state to make us happy. But the problem is it is an impossible task as things are bound with change. Root cause of all the problems in you. More importantly now we know where the root cause of all the problems is in attachment in you. Now imagine there is nothing called me. I know you have thousand arguments against this, but for the argument's sake, if there is nothing called me, then all those attachments will lose its value and in such a state, everything would start to disappear. It won't disappear like you would not see them anymore. But things will disappear their ability to trouble you as there is nothing for them to trouble. So, you would agree the most important question from the whole world is to ask yourself who are you? You would be helped with insights from following articles in the blog for further reading on the subject. Story of the scarecrow. What imaginary numbers teach about life. Mindfulness.

Once upon a time there lived little Rose. She lived by the river with her family. As they lived far away inside the woods, she was lonely. There was no one to play, no one to talk. So, she used to walk to the river and talk to herself. She talked about stars, The moon at night, she talked about the trees and butterflies. She talked about her loneliness. And one day, a fish came to her feet, and he spoke. "Oh my dear, Little Rose. Would you be my friend? Hearing your stories and pretty songs, I wanted to be your friend." Rose was surprised. She had never seen a talking fish. But she was enormously happy that he could talk. She jumped in joy and spoke. "Of course, my lovely little fishy friend, you are my friend from this moment on. What is your name?" "I am Freddie, I am one-of-a-kind fish." So, the Freddie the one-of-a-kind fish and Rose became friends. And they met almost every day by the river and talked about things and neither of them were lonely anymore. As time went by, one evening when Rose was about to go to the river, there came a thundering storm. It got dark like the night, and it started to rain and wind, started to blow. Trees swayed this way and that way. And Rose could not leave the house to meet her friend. She sat on her bed by the window and with a sigh looked at the water that flowed down the gutters. Rain and thundering did not stop next day. Even day after that. And she forgot how many days she was stuck inside the house. Rose was lonely again. And after so much rain, the river started to overflow. Little by little water spread along the riverbank and in a matter of hours, it reached the window of Little Rose's home. And guess who came swimming along with the flood!. It was Freddie the One-of-a-kind fish. Rose was so happy having seen her friend by her window. After all, this was the first time Freddie came to visit her. They had loads and loads of things to talk about. Rainy day was not lonely anymore. So, once the flood water went down again, after rain stopped, Rose went to her father and made a gutter from the river to her window So Freddie could visit her any day he wanted. And they were never lonely again.

Introduction Shishpangma, is the 14th of eight-thousanders. This is the lowest of all the eight thousanders. With two peaks mounting to 8027 meters and 8013 meters It is one of the less challenging mountains to climb from all the eight thousanders. To date, about 350 summits were made with around 35 of climbers losing their lives. I invite you to a thought Journey through the fascinating 14th eight-Thousander 14th Eight thousander is not Short at all. Our minds trick us sometimes thinking that being a 14th in a list of 14 is bad. Clearly this is not the case. Let's analyze this phenomenon. Think that you are in a school. You learn enough to get through to the university and in the university you fail. You become the last in a group of a class. Does this mean you are the Last? How easily you forget all the effort you have pulled thorough to get to the position you are in. Only few ever go to the university. Think about an Olympic 100m game. You are running with all the other competitors from all around the world. It is even harder to get selected to the Olympic games. And you are at the finals. We all look at the first second and the third. Maybe the fourth only because he is giving a good fight to become the third. Do we ever talk about the seventh? Does it even cross your mind, or even your eyes pick up who is seventh? Unless he is not from your country or some specific reason, we do not keep our attention to the seventh. Yet, it is a great achievement to become seventh in Olympic games which we take for granted. And this is true to any competition. Mountain Shishapangma the eight thousander in its full glory. Now, let's look at Mountain Shishapangma with this new wisdom we gained. Then we can fully appreciate the value of the mountain as it is. If you think about any mountain you have seen in your country, It is likely that Mountain Shishapangma is bigger and taller than any of these. Truely speaking if you are not in India, or Nepal or in Pakistan, all the mountains all around the world are less tall than Mountain Shishapangma, and that is a fact. This includes, Rockey's Andes, Alps, even great mountain Kilimanjaro. So, becoming 14th in a list of 14 is a great achievement only if you are able to fully appreciate what it means. Not only by height and the volume. Mount Shishapangma is taller on death rates than any other mountain as well except the ones before it on the list. Even to reach the base of such a giant mountain is challenging than any other hike. Yet alone climbing one. Most of the men and women can only dream about it. Story about a vegetable market. Let's go back to our classroom lesson. There is a story once I was told about a vegetable market. Here, I will write to illustrate the above fact. When fresh vegetables come to the market, It initially goes to the shop owners. They open up the bought vegetables and select good vegetables and they only buy good lots of vegetables. Imagine they buy Three loads of brinjal. In their shop these vendors sort most fresh and edible looking vegetables and they set their price high. They do this in turn and make separate quality of vegetable heaps from most fresh to least. And of course, they will find vegetables which are not aesthetically appealing and maybe little damaged on transport, over or under harvested ones, and these wholesale vendors sell the last heap of vegetables to a secondary seller who is willing to pay some small cash. These secondary sellers are not shop owners. Once they buy the poor-quality vegetable heap, they also separate vegetables into a quality groups and display by the side of the road outside the market, At a lower price. If you are not from an affluent country, you would see such a market. Even if you are from an affluent country if you are into business, you would have seen such black markets. I was told by some wise teacher once. "It is far better to be a bad vegetable in a good heap of vegetables than a good vegetable in the bad heap of vegetables." It seems obvious at first, but why does this happen? Why do we forget that fact it is a fact to be a bad vegetable in a good heap of vegetables is better? Spectrums of nature. I think part of the problem is we fail to look at the world as a spectrum. This is exactly what I tried to explain the in the following articles about spectrums of nature. It seems vegetables in a market is a spectrum than heaps. If we want to find out the value of something, we have to look at the full spectrum of the things rather than one specific subcategory. Let's apply this new intuition to above examples from life and mountains. When you are in an academic journey, we fail to recognize the fact that we are above the levels that we previously passed. If we keep our academic achievements on a spectrum if you are above high school level, that would be more than half of the world population. Yet we fail to recognize this and be happy about it. We always compare ourselves with few other people who are around us. When it is Olympic games, we fail to look at all the men or women who are in the world. We just look at the seven on the race. So, we only see the first three or four who are the winners. This is true for each and every race. If we forget the fact there are thousands and thousands of athletes who do not even, make it to the stadium we will only just see a race only between handful of them. Similarly, Eight-thousanders is only a small subgroup of mountains in the world. When we focus on the top 14 we fail to recognize the rest of the hundreds and thousands of them who did not even make it to the list. So, when I say it is a less challenging climb from all the eight thousanders, most of us even would not think about attempting. After all it is only a relative truth. Fact Sheet: Elevation and Ranking: Mount Shishapangma stands tall at an impressive elevation of 8,027 meters (26,335 feet), making it the 14th highest mountain in the world1. It is the youngest among all the 8,000-meter peaks. Location and Names: Situated in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, Mount Shishapangma is known by various names, including Gosainthan, Gosaithan, and Xixabangma. The name “Gosainthan” means “place of the saint” or “Abode of God” in Nepali2. First Ascent: The mountain remained unclimbed until May 2, 1964, when a Chinese expedition team led by Xu Jing successfully reached the summit for the first time. They ascended the central summit, marking a significant achievement in mountaineering history. Buddhist Pilgrimage: Mount Shishapangma holds immense religious significance for Buddhists. It is considered the holy abode of the Buddhist deity Dorje Zongpo. Many Buddhist pilgrims visit the mountain to pay their respects and seek blessings. Unique Geographical Features: What makes Mount Shishapangma stand out is its distinctive pyramid-shaped structure, with multiple towering ridges connecting to its main peak. The prominent central summit is the highest point of the mountain. Challenging Climbing Routes: Mount Shishapangma presents a significant challenge to mountaineers due to its technical climbing routes. The north face is particularly renowned for its steepness and demanding route known as the “Snake Ridge.” Height Variation: Mount Shishapangma experiences a significant height variation between its base and summit. From the Tibetan Plateau, where its base is located, to its highest point, the mountain rises over 2,900 meters (9,500 feet)1. Conservation Efforts and Winter Ascents: Conservation efforts aim to protect its fragile ecosystem. Winter ascents of Mount Shishapangma are considered remarkable achievements. In summary: Mount Shishapangma is not only a challenging climb for seasoned mountaineers but also a place of cultural and natural significance. Its pyramid shape, religious importance, and technical climbing routes make it a captivating destination for adventurers worldwide. We fail to recognize importance of 14th eight-thousander as we fail to see the big picture of the spectrums of nature. Thank you for reading: Eight Thousanders - Mountain Shishapangma

Superman is the savior of the world. Not just once, not just twice, but multiple times. He did save us from our inevitable death. But the movie ended there. Not just this movie most of the movie's end when the villain is dead. Unless there is a new villain to give a plot for the second movie giving rise to a series of movies. But let's imagine otherwise. Let's imagine superman happily married had his super kids and lived enough to see getting old to see what happens. What will happen When the superman gets old? Superman the Iconic character by DC comics possess following powers. Let's see what happens to these when he gets old. Superhuman strength: Superman has incredible strength, allowing him to lift heavy objects, including cars and buildings, with ease.: when he gets old, he will lose the ability to superhuman strength. And he will become a normal human strength and eventually a child's strength. His performance scale will drop down from hero to zero near his death. And he would need some help to get food into his own mouth. Superhuman speed: He can move, react, and fly at incredible speeds. And when he gets old, slowly he will become a slow-moving snail, and take ages to cross the road. And if he lived up to 200 you will be able to see him on a wheelchair, struggling to get up and move onto his own bed. Speed is a limiting factor even for the superman when he is old. Invulnerability: His body is nearly impervious to harm and can withstand extreme forces and temperatures. Of course, does this mean immortal? If he is immortal, there will be a no world for him to save at the end of the next billion years, when the sun ceases to exist. His solar power battery will ultimately die, and he will become vulnerable to all the forces of extreme universe and temperatures. And who knows ultimately, he will be happy to age and die, when endless saving of human beings seems to be an impossible task as they are inherently vulnerable, and he cannot do more. Flight: Superman has the ability to fly and maneuver through the air at will. When he gets old superman will lose the ability to fly gradually, his flight speed and rise above the earth will gradually reduce and ultimately he will hardly be able to levitate above few feet. He will need to use common transportation if he did not save enough to travel in a car and have to burn some fossil fuels like almost all of us. He would become a destroyer of our planet indirectly like all the rest of us in this respect. Superhuman senses: This includes enhanced hearing, sight, and the ability to perceive events happening far away. These superhuman senses will start to fade away, and he will need the help of television to see the news happening around the world. He would need telephone to hear some of his grandchildren talking from other side of the town. And of courses he will visit the optician one day for a pair of glasses. Not once, not twice, but again and again. If he outlives his senses, he will eventually become deaf or blind or both and will need the help of a caregiver. Heat vision: He can emit beams of intense heat from his eyes. Once he starts to lose this ability to emit beams, he would be no longer dared to fight the new evil who is present in the world. And he would use a heater to make a cup of tea and a fireplace and some blankets to keep him warm in the winter. X-ray vision: Superman can see through solid objects, with the exception of lead. I saw a comic image once the old superman on a wheelchair is using his x ray vision to see the naked bodies of his nurses in his homecare. They use lead protection against such intruding into their privacy. But most likely is that super Xray vision is going to fade away and like earlier becoming normal vision and later impaired vision. Superhuman breath: He can exhale powerful gusts of wind and freeze his enemies with his breath. Like all his other powers his superhuman mint breath will become a normal exhalation with normal smell. So, anyone would not want to feel this unless he brushes his teeth daily or someone else does this for him when he is too old to care for himself. That was long, and it summarizes what is possibly going to happen to superman when he gets old. Superman series began on television in 1948 and the first actor who played the superman Kirk Alyn is now two decades since he passed away in 1999. And I am sure he faced some of the consequences of old age like everyone else. What did we do? Instead of facing the reality we replace the image of superman with a new actor. And fool us with stories, and teach our kids an impossible dream, until they learn harsh truth on earth by themselves. Superman in real life. Have been there a superman in your life? Most of us have this person, or persons whom we looked at when we were kids. My father was my superman figure. Over the years I have seen his authority loose its strength and he is no more a superman he used to be. Day by day I see he is getting older and when I see his old photos sometimes, I forget how fast he has aged and has become an old superman. And it brings tears to my eyes when I know what it is like to become an old superman wanting to be helped to get his own feet. If you do not have a father figure, just do not worry. You will find most of our super humans in elders' homes. On their wheelchairs with lost superhuman abilities, struggling for the day and night to sleep. We are very good at hiding our old super men and super women in those dark places that we rarely see them in public places. In summary Finally, if you look at yourself, you will find out what a fool you have been thinking that you are a superman. This will reduce the ego. We crave for a beautiful vacation on a summer holiday on Bora Bora Islands. Everyone craves this. Sometimes I look at this thought and go on a vacation on my imagination. And then I see, the vacation is going to end, and I will be stuck at the end of this life like an old superman in some corner of an old house. What is the use of such a vacation? This is the life we all have to think about before our superhuman strengths are weakened. Thank you for reading: when the superman gets old.

Story of a silent Shrimp I was called a gentle Giant once. Yet, I chose to be a silent Shrimp. Silent Shrimp on the ocean floor, floating on a coral reef. Minding my own business until I am captured and cooked. My future plan is to avoid the dreadful fate, to live longer. A silent Shrimp Life. Of course, if you are not allergic, I assume you may have eaten shrimp. There are few fascinating things I noticed about the creatures over the years. And following is a fact sheet about Shrimp. This is not a cooking lesion unfortunately and if you are looking for how to cook there are plenty of articles there. Shrimp facts. Shrimp farming is a 50-billion-dollar industry! Could you believe that? That is more than total budget of many countries of the world. Although I call it silent Shrimp actually some Shrimp are not silent at all. Pistol shrimp for example is known to cause a sonic boom under the water. (Sonic boom is a condensed form of a shockwave created when the ultrasonic source is travelling faster than the speed of sound) And they are not as innocent as we imagine as they are predators themselves for small animals. Their stomach is in between brain and the heart. Maybe they are just in front of us in the evolution, considering the conduct of humans in the nature. The best definition of Happiness given by a Dancing Shrimp. Have you ever seen a shrimp dance? I suggest you watch the Under-pressure song played in the Film Happy feet. It is one of the most favorite songs of mine where I first heard it in the film. Later only I came to know it was sung by Queen and found out more of my favorites were sung by the band. There is a scene in the film where shrimp under the layer of ice is dancing to the vibrations created by sea Lions above the ground. In a momentary release from existent terrors of existence. Or in happiness. The man who knows everything about Shrimp If you want to know everything about Shrimp. You should meet Mr. Bubba from Forest Gump movie. He knew everything you want to know about shrimp. Unfortunately, He could not survive the war to practice his knowledge. It shows sometimes even knowledge and tactics even would not work as there are other forces working out there. But Forrest Gump on the other had had plenty of Luck, from the beginning of the movie till the end, when everyone else was failing. Even a hard storm benefitted him when all the other shrimp boats were destroyed leaving them to harvest the shrimp as much as they want. But why one man's misfortune is someone Elses fortune? Or is it just another random happening? Shrimp in Biodiversity/ Echo Tanks I will end the Boring topic of shrimp with one more interesting video I found on my random you tube recommendations. Have you ever tried to maintain an aquarium in your home? I can remember my brother used to have a fish tank at place. But after a while water gets dirty and needed change. Often it is a task taking hours of time to change the tank back to its previous state. But, as you will see there are aquariums built as a balanced echo system so that such changes of water is not necessary frequently as it sustains itself, and part of living, shrimp are used in most of them to create the balance. Think that you are having a small underwater forest inside your house? Sounds cool right? But it seems to be a very delicate task to create these echo balanced fish tanks. So here I will end the random collection about Shrimp. In Summary Story of a silent Shrimp: Shrimp are important crustaceans of our echo system which has far more important role in the environment than being ending up on our plate. Happiness according to shrimp is a momentary release from existent terrors of our existence. We do not have answers to why one man's misfortune is another man's fortune.

Nicest bus driver ever. I was travelling the bus the other day. And I met the nicest bus driver ever. I was travelling in London suburb bus, normal routine morning bus travel. For the past year I have been travelling. And as often it happens, "Thames water" has blocked the road for their repairs and bus route was diverted. And before diversion the driver got out from his seat, a middle-aged Englishmen with a pretty smile, greeted everyone and spoke to the passengers as he was addressing a gathering, explaining diversion route and asking any more questions at the end. He took full two minutes explaining changes. And I thought to myself "What a nice bus driver". Of course nobody had questions. When the bus came to the town, half of the passengers got out of the bus, and everyone shouted with a loud "Thank you driver" with a big smile on their faces. I think his little speech was the nicest thing happened to everyone that morning, and it cheered most of them more than their morning coffee. And certainly, it made me write this column about Flattery. Flattery Gets you Nowhere. That is the old-fashioned way of thinking. I suggest that came into the English vocabulary when there was industrial revolution or popularized at those times. Where the workers are treated as slaves of the co-operation and to get the more work done often the owners just leave with harsh judgments than the flattery. Since the human rights evolve and Ethics are advanced now at least we find out that our outcomes are inherently increased when the workers are satisfied in their job. Not only salary, physical and mental capacity as well. So, it is important that you feel a part of a team, and that feeling you are doing some important work can make a difference. So, maybe it is time for us to crossover or even agree that "Flattery gets you Nowhere" is a historical mistake that we made. Instead, nowadays it is replaced by "Flattery gets you everywhere." Why Flattery gets you everywhere? I first heard the term "Flattery gets you everywhere" in experiences in Ven Ajahn Brahm in Buddhist society of westerns Australia. He described the story of how he wrote a letter to the plumbers saying how helpful they have been when he was served one of their customer care centers for plumbing equipment. And following that he was returned with lot of favors from the company, and he was treated with a VIP customer service. If you are a politician, a CEO or anyone working with lot of people this is an important point to remember and you would agree with me. Words of encouragement goes a long way; it can make someone's day brighter. Is it only applicable to the workplace ethics? I would not say so, if you are a teacher, you would know this applies to interaction with children in the classroom. If you are a parent, you would know this applies to your kids, sometimes they need is little appreciation and encouragement from you, which can carry a long way into their future life. If you are in a relationship this will apply to your partner. So, I suggest, if you are interacting with any human being, or even animal "Flattery gets you everywhere" is a good advice. Follow this and make some smiles today. Be a true VIP yourself. Following is a tale illustrating the fact. A tale on flattery. Once there was a cow, a strong one who used to pull carts. If you have seen in rural parts of Asia, people still use cows as a form of transport by means of carts they pull. This cow was so strong that it could pull 100 carts at once. And his owner adored the cow. Once there was a contest in local town, funded by merchants, to find out who has the strongest cow. Cows were attached to a row of carts and made to pull the carts. The owner of the cow who pulled most carts becomes the winner and he will get a big sum of money, if he wins. Think of this as a horse race. Everyone can bet right? Now as the story goes our owner of the cow participated in this and knowing his cow could easily pull 100 carts, he knew he is going to win a lot, as there was no other cow stronger than his. When the race started as the money at stake, he caned the cow loudly shouting at it to drive it full speed. Even with his best efforts, cow did not move an inch and the carts did not move an inch. Lost of his all fortune the owner was very sad. And when he feed the cow next day back to his kind self, the cow felt sad of his owner and asked. (of course, in stories, cows can speak fluently) "Why are you sad?" Owner sad "I have lost a fortune because you did not pull the cart yesterday." The cow said " Yes, unlike any other day, you hit me, why did you do that? you have never hit me before." Owner was sad "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have done that. I did not know what came over me. Maybe its greed" The cow, feeling sad, asked the owner to race again, and bet again with double the lost money and, to bet that he will pull 200 carts this time around. Owner did as the cow told and he bet double the money he had lost. Merchants on the other hand knowing what happed last time were confident that they would win. But on the day in front of thousands of spectators the cow pulled 200 carts. Easy as it could seem, with only few kind words from the owner. So, flattery and kindness are better than punishment, so choose your words wisely. In summary: Flattery gets you nowhere is a historical mistake. Flattery gets you everywhere is the correct term to use. Thank you for reading, nicest bus driver ever. You may also like to read: Floating leaf of life.

There are thousands of ways to spend your money. This article is not about your day-to-day expenditure, or occasional vacation. This is about what to do to your excess money when you are rich, or if you are rich. Let's build up a scenario of a rich person. Making yourself is rich, is not an easy process, it needs hard work and perseverance. Specially if you are starting from zero in life. If you have no prior capital, inherited, you will spend most of your life to find out the financial freedom that you are looking for. And most of us would never get there. Yet, some of us will do. And most of the time it would be latter part of your life, and there will be few or more grey hairs, start to creep in and wrinkles start to form. Let's imagine an engineer, who is in his fifties. He has liberated himself from his financial shackles and have excess wealth to last him until end of his life. Imagine he has two kids as well. They are about to be engaged and start a life on their own. What is the moral duty of the engineer to the society, or how should he spend his wealth? He should keep aside enough sum to live comfortably (not luxuriously) rest of his life. He should welfare his family, so they do not struggle like he did. He has a moral duty to donate some to charity. Would you agree? Let's us carefully examine each. He should keep aside enough money to live comfortably. Of course you can spend your money, nobody would argue if you chose to travel the world in a five-star floating hotel, spending every penny you have earned. But that is not what Andrew Carnagie suggested when he wrote the Gospel of wealth in 1889. He suggested we have a moral duty to avoid a luxurious life as, our money have ability to save lives which otherwise would end up being dead, and suffering in gutters. This doesn't mean we can ever eliminate the poor. Yet, I think if we get together and be noble, that is not an unachievable target even. It's just we are selfish, trying to catch stars. If you would like to read about our moral duty, I have written previously about, Singer's famine relief argument. He should welfare his family. Similar argument follows. He should welfare his family, so that they do not suffer, or undergo hardships that he faced. Of course, we cannot treat our family members like equal to any other person in the society. We have not gained that God's nature of seeing everyone equally. So, as long as you are human, you would treat your family special. However, like in case of yourself, this doesn't mean that we should buy horses and jaguars for each and every family member. Gospel of wealth or How to spend your money? This brings us to the last part of our argument. What would the engineer do to his excess wealth that he saved by means of sacrificing a luxurious life for himself and his family? He has moral duty to donate to Charity. But how? This is where The Gospel of wealth comes handy. Imagine the engineer has two kids, nothing extraordinary in them. If he divides his wealth equally among two kids, how successful are they going to get? I would say chances are very less. Often it happens our own offspring behaves differently than us, and often it is the case that they have different values and means. It is likely that they end up being ordinary, and not reach the heights that the engineer did himself. It seems not a good idea. How about donating all of it to charity? He could cash all his savings and drive in the country into rural areas and donate it from door to door of poor. What would happen? That seems to be not a good idea after all. They will just spend their money and still be poor at the end of the day. Instead Carnagie argues that our engineer should spend his excess wealth in a meaningful way to reduce the poverty and suffering, to empower the poor society to build up their own out of the rabbit hole. How can he do this? He should identify, individuals and organizations which aims to do just that. Or he could build his own organization, after all, for a man how faced such challenges in life this would not be a difficult task. Imagine he builds a school in a rural part of the country. And provide enough to sustain this school for a few decades till his death. The children who will be educated in this school could get out of their poverty themselves and help their families. And one or two of them would become engineers and if they know the "Gospel of wealth or how to spend money" we can carry on the good deeds over time. Just then, you can relax, without killing yourself like a Dorien Grey.

Who builds prisons? Simply answer to this question is Governments and dictators. That is true, Governments build prisons to lock away the criminals form the normal society. Idea is to punish them or keep them away so they can do no harm to the anormal population who are otherwise loyal to the law. And our rules of law are used to pass judgments against such criminals in our justice system. Compared to dictators who are the creators of the rules and ultimate judges themselves. And it is obvious that these rules of dictators are not fair by all. Often dictators abuse their power to lock away all who oppose or threaten the dictatorship. And we are glad not be under the control of such dictators. However, there are enough and more examples from the past and in the world. Let's look at features of a prison to understand what it means to be imprisoned. Prison is a place with walls where you are not allowed to roam free in a society otherwise. There are grades of to these imprisonments. You may be totally blocked from interaction from other inmates, or you are allowed to some social function. Even when you are in good behavior for long time you may go out into the society under supervisor for some activities. In affluent countries prisons are so advanced even you may allowed with recreational activities, so you would not mentally be suffering, which is not the case with traditional prison. So, in modern world Prison means only physical confinement, not mentally you are suffering. This gives idea of physical prisons and mental prisons. Previously I have discussed about mental prisons. You can read more about this on the article here. However, I will expand more this mental prisons here as well. First of all, we will look at physical prisons. Letters to daughter Jawaharlal Nehru. For highly intellectuals' physical prisons doesn't affect their function. It seems it has the opposite effect. I can give you some examples. When I was in school, we read letter written by Jawaharlal Nehru to his daughter, when he was in prison. These were not ordinary letters. These were dreams of his vision about the great nation that India could become. These were letters about nature and world in a mind of a prisoner. So, did Nehru suffer in his imprisonment? I would not say completely. It seems a true prison is not a physical one only mental one cause us suffering if we are not allowed to think. But this leads us to think, who truly can make you suffer in that case. Who has the ability to control your way of thinking. It seems not obvious first, but it is only us have the ability to limit our own thinking. So, if there is something called a true prison, I would say it is mental. And such a prison is only can be built by you. Have you made a prison for yourself? Let's look at this closely. Mental prisons we build for ourselves I see people build houses. And they live their whole lives in it afterwards. They are limited to the walls of the house. Occasionally they go out of their house only to come back and spend their rest of the time in the house. At the end of the life, they die in the same house. Can you see a similarity of a modern house to a prison? It doesn't matter how much big a garden is as long as you are attached to this and your mind cannot get away from the boundaries of your own house, I would say it is a prison. I see people build careers. And they live their whole lives living in it afterwards. They are limited by the thinking which allowed in their career. Their friends there, behavior, their stress and happiness revolve around their careers. And without even knowing it they are at the edge of their lives when they retire. How unfortunate is that for a prison. And I can see some of them cry, and call it stress when the prison walls are too heavy for them to break out and fly. I see people build families. Once they do that, they fail to see kids, as kids. They see my kids and other kids. They see my family against other families. They see everything related to their possession as mine. This gives us an important perspective how these mental prisons are made. A lot of suffering comes from these prisons. It seems, everything has a prefix 'My' are of course adds to our list of mental prisons. How did this happen you may ask. I will give you yet another example. Choices as means to build a prison Imagine you are going to a bakery to buy some snack. Imagine suddenly a rack full of buns tip over and fall on the floor. Now these, edible newly formed buns falling all over, does it cause you any harm? No, it doesn't you would not be affected as long as you are physically away from it. You might enjoy this and even take a photo and post it on Instagram. But, in another hypothetical world, you select a bun for yourself and pay for it. Now, if you dropped this bun on the floor, it would affect your mood. What is the reason. It is the same bun which was on the rack. Was it in the bun there was the reason to affect you or was it in the thought that it is your bun. It seems so trivial. But it seems moment you choose something to be yours, it has enormous power over you. Even a tiny pin or a piece of rock, a flower has the ability to harm, when it is chosen for yourself. Can there be a life without such attachment? How can you well spend your life? How can we learn to leave things as it is. I think the key is in mindfulness wisdom is the guide. Thank you for reading mental prison building You may also like to read: Living in a dream.

Dumb ways to die.. So many dumb ways to die.. Set fire to your hair Poke a stick at a grizzly bear Eat medicine that's out of date Use your private parts as Piranha bait Dumb ways to die So many dumb ways to die Dumb ways to die-ie-ie So many dumb ways to die Have you played the game the dumb ways to die? It starts with above lyrics which still ruminates my mind. It really feels like a joke, when we sing about so many dumb ways to die. And in real life it is far from a total lie. There are so many dumb ways to die. This article is about so many dumb ways to die and to open our eyes on reflection on life that we live. If you own a phone nowadays it is not very difficult to see the death on it. We see these dumb videos among many other Netflix specials, and you tube shorts. Often Isolated, and often we just have a look and pass them on. But I have selected few to discuss some aspects about life and death. Dumb Ways to die, Kerala elephants. I am a fan of elephants. So often I watch elephant videos. Mostly these magnificent, majestic animals are calm and smooth. They graze on a land. Slowly moving like boulders on wild trails and riverbeds. But human conflicts with these are growing large specially when their natural habitats are invaded. Occasionally I have seen a guy crushed by an elephant. But it is on you tube I saw a man actually getting killed by an elephant. Kerala elephants on rampage, often these videos are nothing but an elephant running on a road. But there was one video in which a domesticated elephant was on rampage. Surrounded by hundreds of people the elephant was aggressive and chasing people. And the mahouts are trying their best to keep the animal calm and collected. They try to restrain him. Once or twice a man almost got trampled by the elephant and narrowly escaped. This went on a few minutes, and I noticed one brave mahout who also helped others to escape, suddenly got hit by the elephant. And he was down in a fraction of a second. next second he was tossed over like a rag doll. That is only thing which can describe it. In a fraction of a second from a fully grown functional human being he went into a rag doll. And elephant kept tossing his lifeless body here and there. And I could see, he is lifeless as the joints were broken and they moved with unnatural bends, covered with dust. And it reminded me of the body I possess is not much different from a rag doll. There is only a fraction of a second need it to become a one. We are just lucky. Another scene which I saw, accidently is from a Facebook video. Trust me I have watched all the Saw movies and brutal killings in videos. Which are as true as possible. However on that video I saw a man being shot by terrorists. But it was slow motion. And fact that this was true account. I saw the man who was alive and in fear, going from live to dead in slow motion with a bullet. And it shocked me to the core. I started crying like a child and I could not stop for half an hour. Maybe I was not tough guy after all. And to this day, it is estimated that one person is executed in every minute on earth. How many so far today? We only hear about only a handful. If we take into account accidents, this number will be staggeringly high. So, even walking on the road is a risk on its own. So, we are just lucky not to get killed today. And life is fragile like a drop of dew on grass. I can give you so many stupid ways to die, which I have encountered in my life. Most recent being my Neighbour killed by crush injury from a lorry which fell on him when the Jack got jammed. He was a mechanic at a garage. So, the real question is how to stay alive when so many dumb ways are there to die? To stay alive as a species. Reproduction is the way to stay alive as a species. Truely speaking reproduction is one way to divide living from non-living. But if you go deep into the mechanism of reproduction, it is essentially a chemical reaction. One giant chemical reaction. Like everything else which is happening in our body. And at molecular level nothing is in our control. We can adjust macroscopic parameters of it and wait everything will fall into place. That is how far we have control over to stay alive as a species. And we cannot even 'Think' that it is our duty to survive as a species. Imagine nobody automatically gets these thoughts about our opposite sex as a craving. Do you think we would be focused on surviving as a species at all. Not at all. We all would be either running for other optimal experiences and that would be the end of the humanity. So, surviving as a species is not in our control. It is already programmed as a craving in ourselves. Surviving as an individual. Surviving as an individual is a game, which is lost even from the beginning. No matter what, we will be ending up at the bottom of the river. If you would like to read more about this, Life as a floating leaf is a good place. Here in this article, I have also discussed about possibilities of outcomes afterlife. So, what is it? What is the meaning if survival is not an option and not under our control? I hit a wall when I think about this question. I get around this question by looking at it. Maybe 'we' are not to be survived after all. Maybe there is no 'me' to survive in the first place. (most important question to ask) How are you going to survive? How would you answer such a question. Or would you just forget the question and live until the day comes that you end up in your dumb way of death?