More Slogans and Vexations Explained
(with some messages)
By JIRARA
© JIRARA, December 2020
Published by JIRARA on matrubharti.com
All rights reserved. No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, for any commercial purposes without the prior permission of the author and/or publisher.
Disclaimer: This is the work of fiction as far as all the characters, their names and the names of all the events are concerned and all these are imaginary and hence any resemblance to the persons (and their lives) dead or alive, and any places are coincidental. Even if a few events might look realistic/’real’, these are fictionalised and the associated names are changed in order to maintain their privacy, honour, and security. No intention whatsoever is meant to hurt any feelings of whosoever, irrespective of their personal/cultural beliefs, social or political inclinations, religion-orientations/practicing/philosophy, life styles, and work/business. The ‘I’, ‘my’, ‘me’, and ‘mine’ (if any used) do not necessarily mean the author of this book, and these and other such pronouns: her, hers, his, he, she, him, you, your, yours, ours, theirs…; are used for effective personification and dramatization, and the readers should not take these on their ‘own persons’.
The readers should take these stories/verses/thoughts with/in good spirit. The presented ideas and material are based, where feasible, on readings and (thought-) analyses of scientific/other open literature (which seemed most profound and trustworthy), with as much care as possibly taken. The readers are requested to verify these notions on their own, and use their own discretion. However, these stories/verses/thoughts/ideas (mostly original) are expressed here with an intention of increasing awareness of the readers with a hope that in an overall sense, their (and ours) consciousness would be heightened (in all and multiple directions), so that we all can live our lives on this planet with true happiness, ever-lasting peace and real joy (irrespective of our orientations). The author and the publisher will not be responsible for any negative effects/situations arising as a result of reading these stories/verses and/or following the suggestions if any; and no discussions/dispute of any kind will be entertained at any time and in any way, manner, and/or forum; because the dictum is that if you like(-d) you read, otherwise ignore, what is the point in making a fuss about it?; anyway you are independent to judge the messages in the stories and utilize for your benefits if found useful, since here the idea is in the direction of ‘consciousness raising’. JIRARA.
Preamble: Some more slogans are explained here, a few may be familiar to some readers, and a few may not be. Some of my peeves are also briefly presented with some appropriate messages. The views expressed herein are based on my personal observations and experiences, and are from/of my own feelings, thinking and analyses; and the thoughts and opinions on ‘Life’ and ‘Soul’ in Slogan 2 are solely mine.
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More Slogans and Vexations Explained
(with some messages)
1. It is not true at all, that everybody can do everything.
It is unfortunate, but it is fact, that there are some people who believe that everybody can do everything; though the self-made persons might think that they could do everything, yet this is not true. There are hundreds of things around us and we can see that in our societies, communities, and neighbourhoods, and even in our own families (no offense intended), there are certain number of people who can do only certain things, and tasks; and there are certain other types of persons who can perform certain other tasks. Of course, there are lot of common things that we all have to do and can do (or at least we should do), and hence we do, since without doing these mandatory tasks we could not have survived: breathing, eating, and resting/sleeping/recreation (and even consummate unions with our wives/husbands/life partners). So, due to the nature of the things and due to our own physical, mental and/or intellectual capabilities, and limitations, everybody can do only certain specific tasks, provided that these people can do anything, or want to do anything.
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There are lots of heroes who can do a couple of more things like adventures, climbing mountains, diving, walking on hot-burning charcoals, and so on, but still they cannot do many other tasks, because in principle there are numerous tasks that might require a band of people to do. Also, nobody really expects us to do everything.
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So, it is better to be humble and accept our limitations, and venture to do the things which we can really chew. Once, we narrow down our focus on to certain specific tasks and be goal oriented, then we can apply our efforts and energies to these specific tasks, so that we can get some success in fulfilling our goals; it is better to traverse the path gradually rather than in haste, unless there are some emergency-situations; it is said in philosophy ‘hasten slowly’.
2. We often regret passing away of our near ones, and just write ‘RIP’ in WhatsApp (WA) and SMSs, this is too curt, though apt.
We are now a days becoming too quick, and apt in our comments on many things, including the condolence messages. We get so engrossed in our daily routine lives, and in the pursuits of our goals, that we are too busy or we don’t have time to send somewhat detailed messages. Also, by the same parameters and reasons, we might not have met them in the near past, and might have missed the opportunities to see and meet our own near ones; despite the fact that we might have spent many happier moments and days with them in somewhat far past.
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In WAs we see lots of ‘RIPs’, and at times I get confused if the senders had any relation to the deceased persons, or they knew these ‘expired souls', however it suggests some kind of Universal brotherhood, that is often seen missing in many other systems, and events; the historical brotherhood is now taking a new form via the facilities of WAs, and SMSs; phone communications have reduced somewhat. At least in the ‘death’-messages we all are united, since perhaps we all have to face the same fate, sooner or later; and we hope that by keeping in touch with RIPs, we might also be remembered by others after we have left this world; it is inherent desire of everybody that s/he be remembered after they have died; in my opinion whether we are recalled or not then, is of no relevance to us since we are not going to hear or know of what others are talking about us; I often remember my father who expired nearly 35 years ago, and even I talk to him in a one-way dialogue, and say lot of good things about him; but I am 99.9999% (I give 00.0001% chance to uncertainty since the entire Universe is so large and complicated) sure that he is not listening it at all; it is just in my mind that I am yet not able to forget him; more so it is for our own selves that we get engaged in this kind of mental activities; it is a psychological mechanism evolved in our brains to help bear the shocks and pangs of the untimely and sudden departures of our dear ones; it is the boon of evolutionary development for the humans.
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It is my strong belief that the artefact of rebirth, punarjanma, is such a wisely invented mechanism that when our near one is dead, we are told: you don’t worry, s/he will come back on this Earth, and would take the rebirth in some mother’s womb; so then we feel relieved, and are somewhat reconciled; and even when we are on our death-bed/s, we console our spouses and children that we would come back soon in this world; I am wondering whether the ‘soul’ really wanted to come back, having suffered lot of hardships, toil, and hunger in this birth itself in the present life; I feel s/he really does not want to put the leg on this ‘torturous’ world again, and go through the cycles of difficulties ever; I personally would not like to come to rebirth at all.
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In reality, we all and all the biological species are made from organic material and when we die we are completely destroyed (by one or the other method), and except the bones and/or the fossils, nothing remains on this Earth. In my (scientific) opinion, the so called ‘soul’ is a temporary ‘wave’ like or ‘energy’ like phenomenon that merges with the total energy of the Universe (and of course of the Cosmos), when the mass-ness of the bodies is burnt; here the energy is produced by chemical burning (like by fire, and not the nuclear fission or fusion); in other cases the bodies merge in the soil and get distributed in the related materials in the Earth in the long process of time. So, the concept of the ‘soul’ should be considered as a temporary artefact for our daily communications purposes, and any attachment should be minimized, as is also advised in our spiritual literatures/scriptures.
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I think we all the humans should think the concept of 'soul' and 'atman' as if it belongs to 'dark matter' and/or 'dark energy' (DMDE, or it is like these two enigmatic aspects), the latter must be existing to explain the balance/imbalance of the matter/energy in the Universe, but cannot be easily verified; or we can theorise that the 'soul' looks real as long as we are living, and when we leave this world the same 'soul' gets merged into DMDE, so we can die peacefully, and without any bondage/s, knowing very well that we all will meet eventually in the realm of DMDE!
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Only when such a ‘soul’, if dear to us leaves us for ever, we realise how much we miss them, and this is our life’s one of the vagaries. Best line of thinking would be: to do some sensible work, enjoy and live the life as beautifully as is feasible, and just forget everything and leave peacefully this world behind us, as if we would never be coming back; in my strong opinion there is nothing like coming back, in fact never at all.
3. Service to humanity is worship to ‘God’, and service to your own wife (I hope you have one) is service to the Universe. (Here ‘wife’ can/should be certainly and easily substituted by ‘mother’).
We all know that work is worship, meaning thereby that when we are doing good work to the satisfaction of the concerned people and to our own self, then it is almost like doing some service to ‘God’, i.e. doing prayers to and worshiping the ‘deity’.
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However, we should expand our work, as ‘service’ to a larger class of people, and in fact we should encompass the entire humanity, then this kind of service can and should be considered as worship to the ‘God’; of course this is not that easy as is said here, but our ultimate goal should be suggesting completeness, as is practiced by true and real spiritual masters of philosophies all over the world.
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It is unfortunate that even in this modern world, and 21st century, they are ‘husbands’ who don’t quite believe in doing ‘much service’ to their own wives (with no intention to offend such men); this is based on the old conventions and the mind-set; as an example, while a 90-year old lady is removing her plate from the dining table after finishing her dinner, a very young man in the same group simply keeps his plate on the table and leaves, very much hoping that his wife would do the job, because he believes that the clearing of the plates from the table was/is the job of the wife! However, they would help at least their own mothers in many such tasks, but would not help and would hesitate to help the ‘mothers of their own children’; what a dichotomy and hypocrisy of the well-educated and city-dwelling modern husbands; according to me they are where their own orthodox fathers and grandfathers were.
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To be humble for men is not that easy, and it has some roots in ‘evolutionary’ mechanism, the discussion on which we would, time being, differ to a later stage. This is to say that we cannot and shouldn’t blame the men and hence in turn the husbands for their such a behaviour totally, and as it is the case, the cultural effects and educational training take really several years and even decades to set in the minds of the men/husbands.
4. Anything you do, should be only by your own natural act.
Most of the times we all should follow this dictum. We can listen to the advices and suggestions from friends, relatives, and colleagues, but ultimately we should follow our own conscience, and put these in practice only if our own judgement and wisdom permit.
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The main reason is that we all have some personal limitations based on our own physics, minds and intellectual capacities, and even the chemistry (the physiological processes in our human-body systems). In principle we all are the same, but in practice we are different, and have differing abilities. Also, our trainings and work practices are different. So, it would be prudent that, in our social and communities’ environs, we should be very clear as to what we can do, and should do, and should not be under the pressure and duress of the others, since in life, always there are and would be advisors, who want us to follow their path/s and/or suggestions; we should study these of course with open mind, evaluate them and their efficacy and then if these fit into our system/s then only put in the practice. Some one has said: you can keep your minds open, but not so much that your 'brains' fall out!
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However, for certain basic things, when we don’t know anything and we are still on the path of learning, then we can follow the suggestions of others: parents, teachers, gurus, bosses, and senior colleagues. But, once we have become aware of our own strengths, and limitations, then we should exercise our own mind and judgement, and then we should act only by our own natural act. In that way we would get satisfaction that we have proved ourselves and we could do something sensible on our own.
5. When your stomach is full, and still your mouth is munching, you cannot utter the wishes to others.
There is a saying that: play while you play, eat while you eat, and sleep while you sleep. This is a matter of having a focus on one activity (at a time) on/at hand; for example as per the slogan, if you are not really hungry and keep eating something all the time, i.e. munching, then you don’t have a good time to talk to people in your neighbourhood, and you also wouldn’t, perhaps, like to wish them any good thoughts if they are passing by near from your side; This is to say that continually eating is not so good, and this is relatively a ‘bad’ habit, and even a wrong way to pass the time, in case you have lot of free time.
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Customary wishes are being expressed by many people and walking-mates/neighbours, and passers-by, which are only superficial and not coming from their deep-heart; however in the modern times, this is really a good thing to happen, at least some people are looking at you, and you feel somewhat elevated in your spirits (jutha hi sahi, even the false is ok); this way people remain connected and the web of life moves on from good mornings to good nights.
6. When your political agenda is full of your own selfish interests, then service to humanity recedes into backwoods.
Although it has/had been always there and even it was very true in the earlier times, now a days it is much more prevalent and true that several, or even all, the political parties have their agenda/s that are full of ‘false’ promises, and their personal interests, of course these selfish interests are hidden as sub-agenda/s and are expressed in a camouflaged language or style, and often these are in the terms of changing sub-laws and sub-clauses, which in fact when implemented, these winners would great lots of benefits mainly for the people of their kinds and themselves. In all these agendas there would be superficial statements, and of such a nature that the laypersons would get so much biased to vote such party leaders, and who then on winning majority would implement their highly ‘personalized’ agenda, and in most cases, there would not be any long term ‘humanitarian’ plans or programmes, and if they are there, these would be scanty.
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Over the decades it has been observed that such scanty and not well-posed and not well-planned programs have not brought any great succour to large classes of the people, and especially to the lower middle classes, daily wagers, migrant workers, and more importantly to the farmers who are in fact the ‘food-givers’, and our ‘stomach-fillers’ (annadata/hunger 'quenchers') without which we all would die and parish.
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Why this happens is, in all probability, due to the short-sightedness of the planners, how much educated these experts might be, also because these planners might be under the duress and some political pressures from the vested groups; and in many cases the top leaders even might not be aware of such tactics practiced by these middle-level people.
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However, the main reason in all these ill-planning seems to be that the underlying and overriding philosophy of ‘cause of humanity’, or the ‘need of kindness’ is undermined, overlooked, and its importance and necessity are either not understood, or intentionally ignored; mainly because these politicians are ‘selfish’, and implementing such programs that emphasize the aspects of kindness might be very costly, and they need to save or spare lot of money for their own personal benefits, which they want to have for their own life-times.
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Any service to humanity needs lot of ‘guts’, courage, efforts, compromises of their/our own personal needs, sacrifices, and many more, and we aren’t ready for all such surrendering; and whatever we do in the name of cultural uplifting (temple visiting, religion congregation, conducting the festivals in the streets, etc.) is, mostly a show-off of the wealth, status and to tell the society that we are polished, and altruist ‘souls’; but in fact we (if not all, at least most of us) are the least in all the real virtues, most of us are ‘hypocrites’ (please do not mistake me), and many are quick-buck/opportunistic denizens/politicians; and this is not clear to me as to why this is the situation with us despite the existence, with us, of the Hinduism for thousands of years!
7. They are four types of people:
i) Who talk and work, ii) Who talk and don’t work, iii) Who don’t talk and yet work, and iv) Who don’t talk and even don’t work.
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i) Who talk and work: There are a good number of people who keep talking, especially about their work, and also keep working. Such people have lot of energy not only for doing their work, but also for talking. In most cases they keep talking about their competed or even incomplete jobs, yet they talk on many other subjects, sometime we wonder how they get so much power for talking and talking; they cut jokes, and narrate incidences, and so many things, as if they knew everything. One of my colleagues used to even barge in our/others’ meetings, in fact uninvited, and then would keep giving suggestions, which were also not sought by the presenter/s, on every aspect that was being discussed in the meeting, and that to the annoyance of the presenter/s, but that was always overlooked by the intruder, who was incidently also a great worker.
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ii) Who talk and don’t work: There are people who like talking so much, that the listeners get bored, and annoyed, and when we come to know that s/he has or had not done much work but just kept/keeps talking, we feel that s/he is ‘bullshitting’, (and ‘badaash maaring’); and even if we express our displeasure, almost shamelessly, the talker also would continue with the same vigour, and without any pity on the listeners, s/he would think it was their birth right to bore us.
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One colleague of mine was very intelligent, and highly well versed in the science of his assigned work, that he always and almost every day used to talk and explain the concepts he had learned from his degree courses, and then used to demean those who had similar degrees, but that they did not exhibit good and correct knowledge; to the level that the listeners used to feel insulted, but he never bothered about it. When we used to search for the records as a sort of proof of his works that he used to boast of, very little was found. It is not clear how such people get through their lives in their job places, I suspect they are/were there due to some nepotism, wherein some minimum work used to be enough to justify their existence in the technical/job arena; since hardly any of their close friends and/or colleagues say good words of compliments to such people; and the irony is that they are always happy, and they never feel/felt guilty at all. They justify their tenure saying that they possessed correct knowledge and their bosses depended upon their knowledge-based advices and suggestions that were required very often; a nice way of self-appreciation and self-gratification. Such people got away without doing hard work, being happy to be counted as supervisors or intermediate bosses, who according to me were none more than really ‘boring’ people; since I often used to supplement my deficient knowledge and information directly from library sources, and in the process I got much more educated than others who had formal degrees in such subjects; of course I did respect them for their acquired knowledge, but I thought to become more independent, and in the process I did not have to bear the daily insults from such 'hypocrites', who kept talking and boasting about their knowledge and work but were greatly hollow in their approach and achievements of having really done something sensible, even during their entire career, except acquiring additional degrees at the cost of the organization; they try to extract much more from the organization than to give back.
iii) Who don’t talk and yet work: There are people who always work but don’t talk about their work too much. These are a silent kind of workers, who are greatly satisfied about their performance that they feel it is not necessary to talk about their work. One colleague always obeyed the orders from his bosses, and kept working, and also he used to do excellent work with great precision and accuracy, and when we used to praise him he used to say that he has/had not done anything great or substantial. Such people are too modest. When he was proposed for some award for his excellent work, and then he went for the presentation to defend the proposal, there also he was modest, and said that he had not done anything more or great/new; and unfortunately he did not get that award; of course since he was known for his (super, often ‘not required’ kind of) honesty, and that he was also known for his hard work, he did gain good positions and came out to be very successful researcher and technical manager.
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iv) Who don’t talk and even don’t work: There are people who don’t talk but also don’t work. They do not boast of their work, since there is nothing much to write home about. Such people are tremendously a burden to the society, and their own families. Whatever you do to them, nothing will happen, they will remain what they were/are. It is better to leave such people alone, lest we will be wasting our energy and valuable time. There was one guy who for whatever reason was sort of taking revenge on the parent organization, and hence when he was posted to one sister organization, he had stopped working. He took all the benefits, but did not do an iota of work for nearly decade or more; and there was no possibility to even remove or suspend him (for the case against him should have been built up much earlier, and a person cannot be removed suddenly), he was in a peculiar close-net-kind of protection, that the managers left him alone; and how the guy was psychologically able to manage this condition is a miracle to unearth. He was clever, he did not take VR (voluntary retirement) and superannuated, thus enjoying full benefits post retirement!
8. For our steady and sure progress, we should take some calculated risk.
We as humans need to plan our activities in life, although we would like to live a natural (and carefree) life, this we cannot do in all the aspects of activities. First, we should choose a goal, and prepare to walk on the chosen path to reach our goal; there are so many paths, and we should make a real good choice, lest we would be on a wrong path and we would miss our goal, like in a soccer match. On the path we would face several hurdles, and we have to continuously (at least continually) overcome these obstructions like a robot has to do while traversing its path and reaching its goal/destination; in fact the robot's path and motion planning are done by us, the concerned engineers and scientists. For this we should have taken some training earlier, since if we are unprepared, we might lose the goal and the game. We have to do many things intentionally, unlike what animals do, they live their lives naturally on the instincts; however if we live on similar instincts like the animals, we would be called animals by our fellow beings!
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There is no free path, like there is no free lunch as people often say, without any hiccups, and still we need to make a progress, otherwise, we will be called weaklings. More tough people take more risks, and achieve better results. That is how heroes are born, but the common/lay persons can make a steady progress with small steps taken at a time, in a calculated manner, and with a composed balance of their physical and mental strengths. The small rewards and small happiness are good enough for us for most of the times, with this, the experience of achieving inner joy is a fulfilling thing to happen. If we cannot jump, then let us at least walk swiftly yet carefully to our goal in a calculated measure.
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Over a period of time and experience, we would learn what and how to take as/the calculated risk, and then we can of course enhance the degree of this calculation and increase the level of the risk and our efforts; let me ascertain here that the safety is first and last always.
9. How much progress you make in your life, do not forget your roots.
If we have not inherited any prosperity, and have come up from poverty, and hard work, then when we reach much greater heights, we should not forget our basic roots, from where and how we came up to this new position of wealth, might, power, and confidence. We might receive several awards, and accolades, but we should often remember the difficult times that we might have gone in our earlier life (not the past life) way back in our trying and hard days, some or several years ago, may be in our native places. This act of un-forgetfulness will stabilize our mind and the acquired richness will not reach to our heads and make it heavier to bear; our ego would then remain contained. People can pay visits to their villages/towns, meet their old friends and relatives, and have chats and dialogues with them over teas and lunches. Scores of people will come and meet you, without wanting anything (most of the times) from you, and would like you to listen to their stories, and in turn they would also listen to your stories of the progress you made since the time you had left the village/town. Old memories would resurrect in the realm of your mind, and you would experience a new joy.
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After renovation of my mother’s house when we went to our native place in 2015 (she was then roughly 90 years old) nearly 200 persons, relatives and friends came to see and meet my mother and us over a duration of nearly 15 days; this was nearly after 8 years of the previous visit, and it was a great nostalgic drama that was brought forward after a decade or so, and we went flash-back so many years in the lanes of our own history 'live' in the houses and streets of our native place; we attended the Diwali festivals and garabas, had celebrations’ lunches and we (three brothers and mother) jointly hosted lunch for these well-wishers and relatives; and now at 95 also she desires to visit the native place!, and since I am also 73+, I am not sure that I can manage to take her again to my native place, especially with my new impaired physical conditions (you may like to read my story on this in 'bites' of matrubharti.com/MBapp); fortunately (and yet surprisingly) her condition in these parameters is much better than mine; meaning she was never careless in such matters, not even once!
10. Don’t be either too frank or too nonplus.
In many circumstances certain people often are too frank in expressing their opinions even at the dismay of the opposite party, and tell all aspects about a (gifted) thing or an event: i) I don’t like this colour at all, ii) I don’t like the shape and get up of this thing at all, etc.; and iii) the arrangements in this function are not at all convenient, and so on and so forth.
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In such cases the teller or commentator is trying to show off that s/he is very frank (and hence true), and does not like to hide her/his opinion. In many of these cases the frank opinions are not wanted or liked by the host party, but they have to undergo the torture of the ‘esteemed’ guests, having been called what could be done!
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In my opinion, such frankies should keep their mouths ‘shut’, if they cannot praise then they should be moderate in their expressions, because the guest (or host) might have spent lot of money, time and energy to search for a proper gift for you, and you in a fraction of a second put her/him in demure condition; and if s/he tells you something in a rebuttal, you wouldn’t like it at all.
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On the other hand if you don’t give any feedback then the guest/host would feel embarrassed, and feel that you didn’t like the gift. So, it is better to acknowledge the receipt of the gift with a ‘thank you’ and some similar gesture, since you as a host/guest also might be expecting similar mannerism from your guest/host. If you don’t give even a minimum comment, then the host/guest would keep guessing about your feelings, and would not be comfortable with you since he might be expecting/wanting to hear something about it from you.
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The foregoing discussion applies, mutatis mutandis to giving the feedbacks and comments on the events, and functions being attended or even being described afterwards in certain talks and conversations later on. It is of course important that we give some opinions on such of these matters, but the complete 'show off' of frankness and total quietness are not highly desirable. Moderation in many situations and comments is suggested.
11. Treat your daughter-in-law as (if she is) your own daughter, 90% of problems and issues would be automatically dissolved.
Often, this is not the case and hence there are always tussles and hassles between the daughter-in-law (DIL) and the parents of the boy/husband. In most cases the in-laws have accepted her just as a girl from the other family, and would be treating her as a girl, though she is their own DIL, from some remote place and family, and finding out faults almost daily on the routine basis; this is more so if the girl is of some outward-looking type, and if she does not know house-bound chores and menial tasks, then she is always for some kind of ‘banging’, and ‘taunting’; and would be dubbed as untrained ‘bahu’ (DIL), with the outbursts like: her parents have not taught her any manners, etc.; and in most cases the husbands of these brides would be the silent spectators.
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If the in-laws accept the new DIL as if she is their own daughter (Dikari), then the situation would drastically ease out, you would feel as if your daughter (who is say abroad, and you are not often able to meet her) has come into your house-hold, and in most cases you would not find faults with her, and it may so happen that you would start guiding and training her; and the DIL will feel very homely, she would not be missing her parental home so much, and she would gradually and psychologically feel part of the in-laws family; and there is not a single extra penny has to be spent for treating her in this way, it is just our metal makeup and mind-set; I have personally seen the benefits of such a good and acceptance treatment to the DIL’s, that in such cases when she goes to her parents’ home, she wants to come back soon saying that she wanted to go back to her in-laws’ place sooner than later, because she was missing them!
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A daughter who had stayed with her parents’ family for nearly two or more decades, and now when she suddenly/overnight comes into her husband’s home, would feel terribly lone, and when she has to listen to the in-laws’ narratives, she would feel utterly dejected, and left out.
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To accept your DIL as your daughter is not that easy, for this you must raise yourself at the higher plane of consciousness: i) you should not have any selfish expectations from her, ii) you must not demand anything from her, iii) you should not get work done from her as if she is a ‘house help’, iv) you should give her assurances of a protection from you all, v) you should be ready to resolve any issues faced by her in your house-hold, and vi) you should not overly criticize her parents, and that too out of context.
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Where the forgoing has not happened, I have noticed such cases in closer families, that the life of the members have been very difficult, and many times it has been so for very trivial reasons, and the parties are not able to compromise and reconcile with each other; however, had they been a little more mature and accepted their DIL as if she were their own daughter/dikari, the tensions and tussles would have been absolutely minimal.
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In the first place, you/we need guts to follow this slogan, and in any analysis (initial or even final) there would not be loss of anything, including your status and pride; in fact the latter will rise manifold, and you would feel greatly satisfied and elevated in your spirits for sure. It is an enigma of our mental world that many of us are not able to practice the dictum of this slogan.
12. Treat your son as your own friend, 90% of problems and issues would be automatically dissolved.
This is much more easy to follow, but many parents remain very possessive of their sons, and especially so is the case with the mother of the son; I have personally seen several cases in certain families closer to ours, that when the boys have not been treated as friends and not regarded as some mature individuals, the parents have undergone several tussles, hassles, and agonies, and they still (even today in December 2020!), the situation has not improved at all; the mother is not ready to quit at all the 'possessiveness' of her mature and adult son who is of the marriageable age.
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On the contrary, when the boys are treated as friends, the problems and issues are absolutely minimum, and in fact these sons pride their parents, and feel really good, independent, and even attain the state of maturity much earlier than if they were not treated so friendly (this may have roots in psychology which I have not studied as a subject, but I am telling from my observations and analyses). Such sons have got lot of thinking of their own, and yet are very obedient to their parents and are very helpful to them, especially in certain emergency situations which might have been faced by the parents. By treating them as friends, our mind opens up to them, and they also become frank with us, and the communion between the two is very smooth, useful and helpful to both the sides. In an overall sense, the mental status of the sons is enhanced, and they feel well respected by their parents, and feel treated as mature men; in fact we really wanted that to happen to them, but we ignore this aspect of our inner desire, and their aspirations, and start becoming so possessive that we really don’t see them beyond our own sons: oh, he is my dear and obedient son (sunny); then the lively and nice companionship ends here, prematurely!
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One must consider one’s son as an individual like ourselves, another point in this vast Universe, with his own mind, intellect, and desires; guidance may be required, but not too much goading and control.
13. My slogan-peeve is: I am just wondering, why people, in general, cannot or wouldn’t do full job (handed over to them).
Often people do not complete or finish the jobs and work assigned to them. There could be several reasons: a) they are of ‘don’t care’ type (chalta hai, it doesn’t matter), b) they are ‘lazy’, c) they are too busy with other activities, d) they don’t have enough time because they are wasting their quality time in odd and unnecessary engagements, e) they don’t have enough skills required to complete the work handed over to them (because they never opted for the training provided by their units, or absconded the classes), and/or f) they don’t have enough courage to handle the task, if it were difficult, and was not expected; but in the first place they would agree to do, knowing well that they wouldn’t be able to do, but they do not want to antagonize their superiors; they have courage to bear the blows later on but not immediately!
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Once, a middle level employee in a gov organization exclaimed in his room: ‘Nobody can do anything to me that I have now become permanent’; and just then his intermediate boss entered his room, but the staff member was not embarrassed at all, and of course the boss did not show any sign that he had heard the staff saying anything. And true to the fears of this boss, the guy really slowed down his activities for a number of years, and he became the type a) and b) person intentionally, and then he continued as such until one day he realized that he had not been called for his assessment interview, then only he got a ‘kick’, and started mending his ways.
14. My peeve is against a very close friend who sort of prevented my extension to an engagement of an important work.
Gatusko was deputed from his organisation to a foreign country to conduct research on a difficult subject of artificial intelligence for a period of nine months, where he successfully completed his tenure of assigned work, and published an internal report, and a paper (in an US high level conference) directly from the conducted research work jointly with the host scientist/HS (and published 3 papers on the closely related work that he had started earlier in his parent unit, but completed during this deputation period, in the reputed technical journals, Indian and overseas); in all these works Gatusko did not take much help and guidance from the HS.
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Due to his good work that was completed in the stipulated time frame, the director of the host institute then was too happy to have Gatusko again after a period of one year to work on a joint book project, and was assured that the remuneration would be double that of the deputation amount, and that Gatusko could come back here with his wife and stay at least for a period of one year.
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Gatusko came back to his organization and resumed his duties. And one day he received a letter from the host institution-director stating that the matter of his further tenure was discussed with the concerned HS and it was felt that since he is already with them, there was no need of the additional person! Gatusko was shocked and was disappointed. He had lot of questions in his mind:
i) it was already known that the HS was/is always there, then why even Gatusko was called to conduct the research?
ii) why then Gatusko was enticed with the new position with a good salary and perks?
iii) why the matter was not discussed and agreed upon between the director of the institution and the HS much earlier before offering the extended tenure?
Gatusko never got the answers to these questions and his relation afterwards with the HS, who happened to be very close friend of him was marred for the life time.
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Eventually, the HS published one book on his own name, and Gatusko published seven books; 2 on his own name and 5 jointly with his local colleagues; in an overall sense he not getting the said visiting position with enhanced benefits turned out to be more rewarding, satisfying, and beneficial to him as well as to his other co-scientists who otherwise would not have got the benefits to be the joint authors with Gatusko.
Message: It is better to resist a ‘half-cooked’ desire to show your goodness/gestures by giving ‘false’ promises to the innocent and sincere workers.
15. My peeve is against a professor who should have given me some position, but didn’t.
(This part of the story includes a funny situation that the professor went through).
Oksutag went to pursue his doctoral studies in the 3rd or 4th most popular University in Canada. He there completed his studies very successfully, and obtained the doctoral degree in the area that is one of the most difficult subjects in the field of the control systems engineering. He published 4 papers in internationally reputed conferences, and 3 in internationally reputed and high level research journals. He was hoping that his professor would offer him some position like a post-doctoral or a visiting assignment.
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However, a funny episode happened in the fag-end of the prof’s career, and interestingly Oksutag was the witness to this comic event in which the prof. was actually ‘duped’ in a very characteristic style by another of his good doctoral student; this guy Taras used to remain very close to the prof. and his family, knowing well that the prof. had his two young and bachelor nieces staying with him and his wife (once Taras had brought bangles from his country and gifted to these girls, in addition to other gifts to the prof. couple); ironically Taras seemed least interested in the girls, yet for his peculiar plan, he kept good ties with the family; and here the prof. saw a good and handsome groom for at least one of these girls. In reality Taras was already engaged to a girl in his native place (this he had not disclosed to the prof’s family at all), and was very much interested in getting married to her and bring her in this country, however first he had to make sure that he gets a good job here, and he knew that his prof. had very good contacts in many places in this country as well as in US. So, Taras had a nice plan: keep the prof guessing that Taras would agree to marry one of the nieces, if the prof. makes a proposal after Taras completes his degree and secures a good job in US.
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The prof. had sent Taras’s thesis to another professor in UK, who was very close friend of him, and he gave a very good report. Also, due to his good degree, and with the intention to woo Taras for his niece, the prof. also contacted his earlier (senior) students who were in nearly top positions in some US companies, and fixed a very good position for Taras in one of the highly reputed companies in the US. So, Taras was well placed now, and was planning to go to his country and get married and come back and settle in the new job. Earlier on, the prof. had even given funding to Taras for attending conference/s to present papers there; and ironically the same prof. had not sponsored Oksutag even for a single conference despite he had four papers accepted in some three conferences; the entire fund earmarked for Oksutag (to attend the conferences) was diverted for the benefit of Taras; and when Oksutag approached for the conference funding, the prof. washed off his hands saying that it was too late to attend the conferences, and that the funding was exhausted and not available for him (Oksutag) who got disgusted and was disappointed, but could not do anything.
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Thus, in fact the prof. had done too many favours to Taras, hoping he wouldn’t refuse the prof’s proposal to accept his niece in the marriage.
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Prof.: Taras, now that you have got a good degree and also got a good placement, aren’t you thinking of getting married?
Taras: Sir, I am very thankful for the degree as well as the job, I will never forget that, I am too obliged to you for all that (as usual he was always overly polite).
Prof.: Then, it is high time that you get married, and I can help you in this direction.
Taras: Yes, as always you are very helpful, but since you have done a lot for me, I think it is not fair for me to keep taking more and more help from you.
Prof.: No, it is alright, it is my duty to you, for you have been very good and obedient student, and you also have visited my place a number of times, and you know that all the members of my family, including my two nieces who are of marriageable ages and are also fond of you.
Taras: Thanks, sir, actually I am planning to go to my country, and meet my parents, and in all probability I would get married and come back with my new bride, to whom I was already engaged before I came for my doctoral studies here.
Prof. (got a shock and was terribly disappointed, but said): Oh, I see, I did not know that you were engaged; (with great difficulty he said) congratulations to you both. After going to US, I hope you will be in touch with me, good luck and good bye.
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Taras thanked the prof. and left his office. The prof’s family was terribly disappointed, and felt that Taras took lot of advantage of the prof’s very soft nature, and that the guy finally ‘ditched’ them.
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Taras took lot of benefits of the good offices of the prof. and ‘duped’ him, and got married and occupied new job and eventually settled in the US with his wife.
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The same prof. did not do much favours to Oksutag, despite his very good performance (in fact the topic he dealt with for his doctoral thesis was much more difficult than that was given to Taras, the difference was that he was not a bachelor and Taras was!), except that he gave him one more month’s remuneration so that he can extend his stay in the country and try to find out a job or any suitable assignment for himself, if Oksutag ever wanted to stay in Canada; and yet in fact he was advised by the prof. not to work here, and was told that it would be better to go back to one’s own country and work there, and even he gave examples of some of his such students who had gone back to their native countries after getting the post graduate degrees from Canada!
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In the process of time Oksutag (not the original name) rose to the level of ‘International Scientist’ and featured in the list of the top 2% of the world’s scientists/professors/doctors/engineers, and was listed in the same category as one of the 1500 researchers of his own country for the year 2019.
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Message: It is better to be impartial as much as feasible, and one should not have any undue expectations from the concerned subordinates, in most cases this would bring disappointments.
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