Sometimes a post is written through a few days and then all of a sudden I feel , that's not the way how I would like to look back at these thoughts in future. This is one such post .
Today's post is possibly about the same theme which has been occupying my thoughts for a few months now . What defines our pursuit ? How is that some find their pursuits and others don't ?
My conclusion now is that we are all different kind of travellers , we have very different pursuits . Even when our pursuits are similar , our journeys are so diverse in their routes and thats because our composition as a traveller is different. So what defines this traveller , is it inherent or acquired. Do we ever evolve as a traveller or we stay the same. Do we ever look back and say , I have changed so much .
This week had these prominent thoughts .
Nobody Really Wants to go Anywhere or be Free
Have you noticed the Travel itineraries that people have ? Known flights, known airports , cabs , familiar places and even ratings and experiences of earlier travellers are checked before booking . I ask myself if the road has been walked before , what new are you likely to find ? I will possibly repeat the experience someone else had , but isn't that a second hand experience . Everyone wants to walk on walked paths . Who else is doing it , people often ask ? Does it matter ? Life doesn't come with an instruction manual , people just make one up . Everybody wants freedom as far as talking is concerned, but nobody really is free and nobody really wants to be free, because freedom brings responsibility. It is so unpredictable . Slavery is so safe, we all make an excuse , Society, Kids , Family, law , Job, Career , Money and above all "log Kya Kahenge" It does not come alone. And to be dependent is simple: the responsibility is not on you, the responsibility is on the person you are dependent on. So blame all , but yourself .
"So people have made a schizophrenic way of life. They talk about life, they talk about freedom, and they live in lies, they live in slaveries – slaveries of many kinds, because each slavery frees you from some responsibility. A man who really wants to be free has to accept immense responsibilities. He cannot dump his responsibilities on anybody else. Whatever he does, whatever he is, he is responsible.".
I remember in December 1995 , I left my Brisbane house , in my 1988 model Nissan Sunny , just filled with petrol, stuffed my belongings in the boot , kept the cardboard box of cassettes next to me, on a 1700 km journey to Melbourne . I hadn't ever been there . On the way , I gave lift of backpackers , stayed at a one horse town, and Discovered so much at age 25 .
We are such frail travellers yet expect life to make us experience bliss . Bliss wont travel to us , we must travel to the bliss . Guided navigation in life and safe travels will never make you a Columbus . Bliss is in being a maverick .
मैं अकेला ही चला था जानिब-ए-मंज़िल मगर, लोग साथ आते गए और कारवाँ बनता गया ....
One of the examples I quote of maverick Travellers is Neena Gupta, the actor. She acted in "Jaane bhee do Yaaron "in her initial days . She comes from a very conservative Middle class family in Delhi, went on to be a Single Mother . She was way ahead of her times when she took the bold decision to go ahead with her pregnancy with one of the world's finest cricketers, Vivian Richards, 27 years back (their daughter Masaba today is 26 years old). She is honest, hardworking and impulsive with simple needs. She has high self- respect, but is shy and reluctant to ask anyone for work. Her perception may be that of a strong woman, but, in reality, she is quite a housewife, who is happy to adjust and is extremely vulnerable. e married Vivek Mehra in 2008 at age 48 .
In an interview she says "it is because of media, who made my reputation of being a strong woman and a strong woman is a bad woman in India. In reality, I am very vulnerable and honest, so people feel scared of me".
तलाश ए मज़िल ए जाना .....तो एक बहाना था , तमाम उम्र मैं अपनी तरफ रवाना था .....
My journey to find my beloved soul mate was just an excuse , I was in fact searching for my own soul.
मैं उसको हश्र में किस नाम से सदा देता , के मेरा उसका तारुफ़ तो ग़ायबाना था
What would I address my soul mate as (when dying), my connect was so nondescript.
The seeker is the sought .......
Nobody is outside of the fence .
A few days ago , I was telling someone that I find it hard to push myself out of the house on weekend , I find peace in my space. he was a bit taken aback . Bangalore has an amazing phenomenon, first people will spend 50% of their income in buying concrete slabs (aka apartments ) and then more in a bigger car to run out of town . Isnt this a huge contradiction ?
Houses have become just boxes -- boxes upon boxes. They don't have the beauty of a house. They are no longer houses; the space has gone on shrinking. Small rooms which perhaps are not natural... they are claustrophobic. And every being, man or animal, has a territorial imperative -- an area of big space around himself where he is totally free to move.
Scientists have researched that the most difficult thing for animals in zoos is that they lose their territory. If you go to a zoo and see a lion, you will be simply surprised: he is simply going round and round, round and round in his cage. What is he doing? He is trying, by traveling so much, to deceive himself that he has his territory.
All the animals, lions... and we know about dogs because they are more common. You may never have thought about why they do it -- dogs will go on pissing on this pole, on that pole, on this stone.... If you watch, the same dog will do the same thing on the same pole, on the same stone every day -- because animals are very very sensitive in their smell. He is creating a boundary: "Beware, this area belongs to me!"
He is creating a fence of smell. You may not smell it, but other dogs smell it: it is dangerous to enter. And it has been observed that if another dog comes, he immediately stops at an invisible barrier and thinks twice, whether to enter or not. And the dog inside looks at him, but he is not agitated or ferocious or angry because the other dog is still outside his territory. One step in and he will go mad. He knows where the territory is, the outside dog knows where the territory is.
And in jungles, all animals make their territories the same way, and most of their territories are respected by other animals. But you put them in a zoo, in a small cage, and you destroy their freedom. Perhaps something of their soul is crushed.
What about man? If all animals have a territory, a certain territory, a determinable territory -- if lions have only that much territory, all the lions -- then what about man? It is not possible that he has no territorial imperative. He also has it. But in the crowds of a city how can he manage a territory? And if he cannot manage a space around himself, perhaps he is losing something of his inner being too. We mark our territory at home and at our workplaces , because we have been restricted , insecurity comes naturally to us .
So it is not strange that when we go out of the city, in the open -- in the forest near the ocean, or in the mountains -- suddenly you feel an expansion of being. That expansion of being is a very scientific phenomenon -- nothing poetic. It is your territory; there, you can have it.
When people go out of their self created cages , they crave for the cage again, because the cage is safe .
We're fish of a known pond , but the pond will eventually stink , if the water is still , Lets Go back! Go to the world where we belong he trees, to the birds, rivers and mountains .
यह जो सुबह शाम में अपना गाँव ढूंढ़ता हूँ..... यकीन करो , मैं अपने हाथ और पाँव ढूंढ़ता हूँ…....
यह जो सुबह शाम में अपना गाँव ढूंढ़ता हूँ..... यकीन करो , मैं अपने हाथ और पाँव ढूंढ़ता हूँ…....
यह तुम जो मुझसे जज़्बातीयत की वजह पूछती हो , समझो एक पेड़ हूँ.…कहाँ छाओं बेचता हूँ.……
Today's ghazal is by Dr Waseem Barelvi, sing by Lata and Jagjit . one more masterpiece ...
मिली हवाओं में उड़ने की वो सज़ा यारों, के मैं ज़मीन के रिश्तों से कट गया यारों
वो बे-खयाल मुसाफ़िर मैं रास्ता यारों , कहाँ था बस में मेरे उसको रोकना यारों
मेरे कलम पे ज़माने की गर्द ऐसी थी, के अपने बारे मैं ना कुछ भी लिख सका यारों
तमाम शहर ही जिसकी तलाश में ग़म था , मैं उसके घर का पता किस से पूछता यारों
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