Jottings on Shoonya

Shoonya in Sanskrit could mean many things.

The common translation could be empty or emptiness.

It could mean the void.

It could be zero (a component of the computer language)

It could be vaccum,or non-existence,or even indifference.

Shoonya is full of meanings.My jottings on Shoonya are on Shoonya as void.

Jottings are thoughts on paper.Question marks.Shoonya is quite a popular concept both in Hindu( including Kashmir Shaivism) as well as Buddhist religious literature.

Could the Universe be an expanding Shoonya? With portions of it a contracting shoonya?

Can a void grow larger or smaller?

Can there be a void within a void ?

Is a dark hole in space  not a shoonya ?

Can a shoonya not explode ? Or implode?

If darkness is an absence of light,is not Shoonya  an absence of light as well as  space?

The big bang was born from Shoonya  and will end in shoonya.

The sun as well as the solar system as well as the planets and the earth have all emerged from  the void.

All humans too are a part of this void.

Death is accepted but the void is not.Why is this so ?

Enjoy and improve the present

“Look upon every day as the whole of life,not merely as a section,and enjoy and improve the present without wishing through haste to rush on to another.”
Richter.

“Your talent lies in your choices.”
Stella Adler

Look Back On Anger

Everybody gets angry and everybody feels bad about getting angry.
What happens when you get angry?
These are the visible signs of anger I have seen in myself as well as other  people.
1.Breathing goes all haywire.
2.The mind gets clouded,so speech pattern gets affected,volume level of voice increases and this in turn gives rise to more anger.You start to sweat and sometimes to suffocate.You will also tend to snort and flare your nostrils.In short you will get ugly and emnate bad vibes.
3.If the person you are lashing your anger on gets provoked this will increase your anger level.Anger escalates very easily.
4.Anger can throw the normal mind pattern out of control.The eyes will widen and be filled with venom.
5.When anger is caused due to an ego problem,then anger is likely to remain,even in a suppressed state,for a long period of time.
6.When anger is combined with frustration then it can lead to uncontrollable  violence.
7.When anger is combined with sex/lust,it can lead to rape or even murder.
8.Anger can be reduced if you anticipate it or learn the art of seeing it coming.
9.Anger can be slowly removed from your system totally with awareness.
10.When anger is caused by the other person’s stupidity, you can minimize anger by  compassion for that person.
11.If you look at the cause of your anger and mentally say to yourself”This too shall pass” you will get less and less angry.
12.Anger can be minimized if you think of people you know whom you have never seen get angry and using them as role models.

Anger is as bad as violence…anger is nothing but violence within oneself created by yourself.No matter what the cause is,there is no need to get angry.

Just as there is non-violence,there MUST be non-anger.

Be cool is a great phrase and that is possible if you decide never to get angry no matter what happens.

In praise of retirement

The biggest fear in most humans is death and the second biggest fear is retirement
I can understand fear of death but why are men so scared to retire?
Even if they are financially secure,men will not retire at 60,the earliest retirement age.

There must be something wrong in the very basic fundamental attitude that society breeds of a retired man-an image of boredom or of uselessness or sick and diseased or a parasite .
“You’re too young to retire” is the most common reaction you will face.
“What will you do the whole day?” everyone asks.
The women would worry about having a man on their hands to look after the whole day,and worry that their freedom would get curtailed.And you will find few women encouraging retirement especially early retirement.
And the men dont wish to retire because they have just started earning huge salaries with great perks so retirement would suddenly cut off all that power,the money etc. and would alter their lifestyle totally.
So greed keeps them going on and on and on.Work till you drop dead.

I think its sad that the system is such that a person becomes so productive only at such a late age that society would not want to give up the services of that person at the age of sixty.Its sad for the individual concerned,not for society.Its the individual who is missing out on the golden age.You have studied and then worked all these years,and you need to enjoy the remaining years of your life after sixty.Who knows when the end is going to come?
If all the top posts were to be given to men in their late forties then they could retire at sixty.
If all mortgages were planned so that by 45 you have no liabilities,you could plan to retire by 60.Wishful thinking,but possible ,if a whole generation is taught the value of time spent on yourself without feeling guilty or insecure.

What Bill Gates has done by retiring at 52 is simply amazing.Not for anybody else but for himself.
What growth he will discover in his early retirement ,only he will know.But I am glad he has set an example to the world.I hope many many others follow him.If the senior staff in Microsoft follows his example, en masse,it will be a revolution.The younger generation would all get promoted, and the retired seniors can help the juniors and also work towards making the world a better place.

There are so many joys,so many pleasures that life offers-and all these dont require a lot of money.But they do require time.
You have to take time off.And grow within so that you become richer and richer from inside.This richness cannot be measured by society.But a society which is full of Buddhas is obviously going to be a rich society.
I would like to end the post with an extract from the Tao:
“It is important to know ” When to Stop”,
Otherwise there is danger of becoming overfull.
If you keep on sharpening a sword endlessly
It is bound to become useless.
If you keeping on filling a house with gold and diamonds,
It is bound to fill you with tension and fear of being robbed.
The way of the Tao
Is to know when you have Enough.
To know you have Enough
Is to be filled with Joy and Contentment.”

When You have done your job…Retire.