Pride and Joy!

At long last, after many many searches in flea markets high and low : I managed to find an original 1975 copy of the Bridge over troubled water LP in a second hand store for 3 euros. What a find! I'm almost too happy for words. Evidently.

Simon and Garfunkel are one of my favourite artistes of all time and this is my favourite album of theirs. I only wish now I had a gramophone to listen to the record. But in the meanwhile, It's going to be my centrepiece - my pride and joy. I'll put it in my 'music room' someday when I have my own house.

Dad's going to be quite pleased to see this. His favourite songs are on it ! As are mine!

Anyhoo, I'm too thrilled for words , as aforementioned. :)

P.S : Sorry about the glare on the first picture and the yellowness of the second . The damn flash! And the damn lighting in my room!

Just A Thought..

I heard this on a popular TV show recently and it set me thinking . "Do you want a life of happiness or Do you want a life with meaning and purpose?" The character goes on to explain why the pursuit of both is futile and how they are two completely distinct paths , two different philosophies.

I agree, I think. In fact, I've been struggling to articulate this myself for quite a while now. In my experience, I've found that the times I'm happiest are not the moments with the most meaning. Happiness, I believe, is a state of contentment and harmony with one's present circumstances. In those moments you have to cut out the baggage of the past and block out the thoughts of future and focus on the step , the smell, the touch , the now!

To some of us, this comes naturally. To others, we will never see it. We think we are happy when things we want, happen. But that's just what we would like to believe. What it really is to our mind, when you get that promotion or win that medal, is a validation of our existence. It's a pacifying of the ego. It is corroboration to our mind's need to believe we have control. I've come to believe, after some reflection, that 'Real Happiness' is neither orgasmic nor exultant. That's muscle and chemicals. That's a very western conception. Happiness must be the mellow realisation that at this moment you are fine with how everything is, that you are not struggling, aching to change the state of how everything around you is.

Meaningfulness, however, is the antithesis of that. In fact it's a whole different ball game. Striving for meaning in one's life means you must keep looking back - to constantly learn - and keep looking forward to constantly create and manipulate circumstance so that you can incorporate whatever it is that you know from experience to mould your life as you desire it. It seems to me a lot more artificial and contrived (if you allow some degree of abstraction) because what you are trying to do is to coerce a particular sequence of events instead of making your self harmonious with what is happening.

Now don't start with me, I'm not saying you should take things as they happen to you. What I mean is, that to allow your mind to be eternally preoccupied with where you are going and where you want to go and how far you've gone can be quite tiresome and often futile. Instead, what if you don't struggle and fight so much. What if, you try to focus on finding a sense of equanimity while doing what you think gives you some sense of satisfaction at the end of the day. Will that make you happy?

Actually, now that I think about it, these two poles represent the deep chasm between Western and Eastern philosophies. Hmm.. Suddenly I think I see the wisdom in our ideology. We're too influenced by western ideas to be free enough to see how our own are actually superior. I need to think about this more before I can confidently write about it. So I will not go into why I think this. So I guess I will end rather abruptly on this note. But if you have any thoughts on this.. Do tell.

The Usual.. Diary-esque BS

Ingratitude is the most pitiful pitfall that a possessor of good fortune can fall into. In close pursuit for the title is Indifference- which might lead you to shrug at it- and Ignorance ofcourse is as bad a crime - to not even realise how fortunate you are. . I stand accused of all of them in turn.

Quel Dommage! Hiding like a turtle in a shell has long and often been only a confrontation away for me but it was always very temporary. I just didn't notice that along the way I began to lose my spirit! My 'wonderstruck eyes' have been in retreat. I've been too self involved in my petty little troubles and qualms with the world to live fully. My curiosity has waned. My concentration is non existent. I'm distracted and listless and completely self absorbed. The last few months, to call a spade a spade, I've been a whiny wimp. And I'm almost ashamed to look back and reminisce because it only serves to remind me of how utterly girly (in the cruelest sense of that word ) I've been.

It took a conversation with a young cousin to remind me of all the spit and fire I once possessed. Which is not to say, that I want the unrest of my adolescence to return. I only mean, that in the process of trying to get myself to be a little more lady like, I've gone and lost (or misplaced is the way I would like to put it) one of things that made me , me! A bit o' spunk!

I need some sense of balance. Most times, I rue my ineptness at handling situations, social and otherwise, with a truck load of self pity on the side and try to bumble along or I swing to another extreme and get all superficially fired up for a few days, pretending to be 17 again - But unco-ordinated clothes, 'I-don't-give-a-shit-what-you-think" , cynicism and a lot of swearing just doesn't quite cut it at 22.

So what do I do! What do I do??? Is it possible to have fire in the belly and peace of mind at the same time? Which do I even want? Problemen! Problemen!

Like a priest giving a New Years Eve sermon , I tell myself that the Impossible is often just seemingly so. Things are fixable!

It requires gumption and perserverance and I used to have reserves of atleast the former. As for the latter, I'm going to learn to. I'm really going to try. I want to. I'm hungry to be hungry again. How strange and Ironic it is, to realise that you are just another human being if one integral thing about you disappears (something you didn't even know was possible) .

I need to do this. What 'this' is, I haven't mapped out entirely just yet. But I will. Soon. And then maybe this feeling like I'm fighting windmills in my head will go away. This sense of not having lived the day well , the emptiness that comes of wasting away, of atrophy - of mind and body - is eating me up.