Skin deep

So, I am in India right now. Beautiful country, beautiful people. But some of the most misguided, disoriented people I find here too. There is transformation of course, from the India of my childhood. But its not all good.

The innate culture of acceptance, tolerance and peace has been hijacked by right-wing fanatics (seems to be  a world-wide problem). The quest for knowledge is now lost in the harried run for a placement in a college of the latest fad in professions. In a country that developed Ayurveda and Yoga, there is no commitment to conscious living or holistic healing at all.

But what is really disturbing is how trend-dependent people have become. How susceptible to magazine fads and advertising gimmicks. Yes, brands rule here. People automatically assume foreign cars are better. The more expensive something is, the faster it seems to sell.  All value is directly proportional to monetary value. Also, any photoshopped image that catches the latest wave is the look they will all aspire to.

What is really galling is the total lack of acceptance of any individualism. Everyone can either be a doctor or engineer. Or die. The only face-cream you can get are 'fairness' creams. In India. Where fair skin is, in general, neither natural nor healthy. But superficiality has increasingly become the bane of living here. There is a despicable fixation on color and size.

Tell me, how is it possible that a person is defined only by how fair/dark/ tall/ short/ small/big he or she is is? What of mind and manners, of conversation and kindness?! Can you imagine making a lifetime commitment on a photograph? Yet it happens all the time here. Professional photographers are having a field day shooting potential brides and grooms. It baffles my mind because even that photo does not matter. The layers of cake batter or clay (I think) that the bride will have on her special day make her unrecognizable anyway!

How a person looks is the least impactful part of a personality. If we are to define our relationship and attitude on that, we are the ones at a loss.

No two people (except if they are from one split egg) are ever going to look exactly the same. The wonder of human creation is the amazing variety that it comprises. How we can arbitrarily say which shade or size is better? Yes, everyone will have preferences, though it does seem now even personal preferences are eliminated. When we get stuck in the media-designed bubble we lose our own ability to make decisions on what we like or don't. Among the amazing range of shades of skin, how can everyone just like 'fair'? I prefer light chocolate. When we cannot all have the same taste in home decor, if we cannot all like the same friends, then why do we tell little girls to stop eating just because the magazines have thinner models? The 'I care for your health' aspect is really a lie. There are perfectly healthy overweight people and very sick ideal-weight people. There are all kinds of short, and all kinds of fair. There are also all kinds of thin and tall. The idea of physical pulchritude is entirely subjective, and very fickle.

In a very short time here in this visit I have seen wonderful people being put down for their skin or for their BMI by others who have no business saying anything about them. That kind of empty unwanted speech comes from pure rudeness and superficiality from people who are really, really dumb.  It takes a high level of stupidity to box someone into a category because of the how they look to you. How limited would your perception and understanding have to be to pass judgment on someone arbitrarily on one look - be it skin, figure, clothes or makeup? And how immature would you have to be to  take what is portrayed in the general media, and accepted in a susceptible society, as the best look? I see it equally applied to clothes and cars. And I don't know if it is sad or amusing.

Its great to hear 'you look fabulous'.  But we must learn to accept that the compliment is based on someone else's idea of fabulous, not necessarily ours, or even a third person's. Take it with grace and a pinch of salt. It is not you, it is their own vision they are acknowledging. You are fabulous all the time, whether dolled up or not, because it is the only you there is!

A Life of Meaning

Meaning is attached to life only when one’s own living makes a difference to others.

I think all of us know this somehow, somewhere, within our hearts. And make an effort to add this meaning to our lives. Let's face it though, we can all point out a few people who lead meaningless lives. Rich and easy maybe, but meaningless all the same.

There is an old Bollywood song which has my favorite line of all time "Jeena uska jeena hai jo auron ko jeevan deta hai'.  (roughly, and less poetically-  a person is really living life when he/she is giving life to others)

It makes me think of my dad because to me he symbolized what the song meant at its very basic. A doctor in government service, my father worked to save lives for a considerably nominal salary. He had a lot of respect and perks. We were nowhere near rich, but we did get a lot of hand-embroidered linen and home-cooked meals as thank-yous after successful surgeries :).  

I think of hospice nurses.Those who are there with you at the most important juncture of life - death. They mean so much to families and patients, and provide such comprehensive support, I cannot think of more meaningful work.

And I also think of mothers who bring people into this world and nurture them. That is giving life of course, and so is fostering and adopting children.  

But life is so much more then just breathing and surviving. Saving or nurturing physical life is not the be-all end-all of giving. Mothers and doctors and nurses play an amazing meaningful role, but it is, after all, relational to those we are responsible for. And that elusive joie de vivre we pursue can be ours only when we try to give that joy to others.

So who shares or gives the essentials of life- peace, belonging, happiness? Who really does the 'jevan deta hai' part?  

You do. When you reach out to a lonely neighbor, you add a sense of companionship and safety to their life. When you reach out to catch someone tripping, you literally are giving them balance. When you crack a light joke to lighten the mood of a queue of impatient people in a bureaucratic office, you alleviate some stress. When you bring home a pet from the shelter, you have given a haven to the homeless. When you explain to a child that him being slower or shorter or darker is what makes him beautifully unique, you have made someone feel very special.

Live that kind of a life where the fact that you were here in the world, or rather that you were there at that specific point in space-time, is a cause for joy and solace for someone else. I believe that is the very purpose of us being on earth.

Of course we all have family and friends who make our lives worth living. Those special people we matter to. But there is whole world of people we can matter for. And we don't have to rush off to refugee camps and help provide much-needed relief there. We do not all have to set-up big start-ups or make politically grand gestures. We can add meaning by those little things we do everyday. Helped someone load groceries in the car? Fill a form? Cross the street? Bought coffee for someone waiting for a bus in the rain? Whether consciously or unconsciously, that someone is glad you were there, that you were living. You mattered, your life had meaning.

We cannot possibly be doing wonderful and sweet things everyday. I know. I tried. As an experiment, I decided to check every night if I had done something good during the day. Dropped it pretty soon because I was getting to feel worthless and depressed. And I did not want to turn into a maniac who might pull an old lady across a street she did not really want to cross!

Prophet Muhammad said a smile is a good deed. It is a proven fact that looking at someone smile makes you happy. And sometimes it just the mirror we need to smile at to add that little bounce of meaning to our own lives. That is great work too.

Making a difference does not have to be a plan you get up with. It is an ingrained attitude we all have. We just have to act on it when we see a situation we can make better. I believe it is as natural as breathing, but sometimes circumstances (or really, really evil intentions) change that natural setting. We all want to live good lives. A life well lived is not just one that you enjoy but one that has made some positive difference to another's life.

Mind your manners, not my weight

This has been festering inside me for sometime. The way some people base their entire perception of a person based on his or her shape. It is making me really intolerant of such people. I guess that is why my parents said I should stay away from bad company. They probably sensed that such superficial empty-headed people could potentially bring out a violent me.

We are all made of different colors and different shapes. For the most part, it cannot be changed. Physical appearance is not what we should focus on anyway. Certainly not someone else's. I have had friends who have insisted that we 'must' do something about my daughter's looks. For no other reason than that they think it is better if she is thinner, or has better skin or wears 'other' clothes. It took a lot of control for me not to foam at the mouth. Years of culturally-ingrained hospitality ensured that I kept smiling. But I can mouth off now. 

First, there is nothing 'wrong' with her. She is healthy and happy. More importantly, she has more brains and heart than any other young woman I have ever known.  And she has immense patience. And scarily calm level-headedness when things get tough. She is honest to a fault, and very loyal to those she cares about. Her span of reading matches her awareness and knowledge of  the world around us. She is fantastic company, with both her friends, and my oldies. And her flexibility in yoga class infuriates my stiff self. So excuse me if I am not impressed by your daughters spending more time in front of the mirror than is normal. Or by their obsession of what goes in their mouths even though they are magazine-approved. Of course, you have the right to be happy with that, but don't force that vision onto us. 

Second and very pertinent: She will change what she wants to, when she wants to. For herself, and maybe for the man she will love. Though I do think he will need to be either Captain America or Cristiano Ronaldo if he asks her to.

I think that the culture of having a publicly-approved body shape is more dangerous than we realize. I have read that the 'fat-bias' in the medical field is leading to many missed and mis-diagnoses. It is, however, the 'beauty' concept that is more insidious because it is dangerously 'acceptable'. Having only one set of socially-approved looks plays havoc with impressionable minds, and damages them for life. How about looking up to having one particular set of skills, even a la-Liam Neeson in Taken? (see the violent side coming up?) But that is another blog entirely.

Don't get me wrong, I am not saying changing your looks is a bad thing. I plan to dye my hair blue some day when I am brave enough, and regularly color it a shade redder than I was born with. I am also trying to make sure my jowls do not touch my shoulders. I do believe that change is what keeps life, and us, interesting. Hair, clothing style, new exercise patterns, and yes, even weight-loss done right. Its great to want to look younger, fresher, more attractive. But if it is dominating your thoughts and your day, something is deeply wrong. And if you are opening your trap to give someone else unwanted instructions, it is simply criminal.

Honestly, Honesty is overrated.

It is a lovely day in Orlando today. The kind that makes your fears disappear and lends hope to all your dreams. That Somalians are starving, that the flesh trade rages on, that the terrorism of racism gets stronger, and that world peace seems more distant than ever, seem like nightmares that do not apply here.

 And that, I think, is why people can immure themselves from problems. It is very difficult to imagine the pain of hunger when your food-related concern is the amount of artificial ingredients in that jar of jam you bought. I realize that our comfort is the reason we do not care. The horrors of war that children and women are enduring right now seem too far away, physically and emotionally. It is so easy to blame the victims, so easy to say 'they should have', 'they could have'. The 'them-not-us' concept helps us ignore our responsibility, and alleviate guilt. If we are really honest about out attitude, we would admit that we are unaffected by what happens an ocean away. And in all honesty, it really does not affect us today (though it will, eventually, because the world economy is intertwined). But human beings should, and usually do, more than what honest analysis of their situation dictates. 

It rankles my soul when people say things that are stupid or downright mean with the excuse of being honest. Honesty in itself is NOT a virtue, certainly not in communications. Integrity and probity in action and work is a different matter altogether, but being upfront in what we say is not always good, or even correct. Saying 'that is so stupid', even to something that is, does not help in anyway. And we all know that the " let me be honest- you look (insert something bad)" - is just a way to  being hurtful. 
News reporting is mostly honest. People cannot but help colour a situation with how they are looking at it. I am not bringing down journalism. I understand and respect the need to bring news out to the rest of the world. But honesty in reporting is so subjective. Different words in the headline for the same story can make all the difference. It is honest enough. But it is not the complete truth.  

Our society worships success - however it may come, and whatever repulsive way it exhibits itself.  'I am for me and the rest be damned' may be an honest mantra, but even saying it aloud is pure selfishness.The virtue would be silence, not honesty. Politics are always better served with diplomacy and restraint than with mindless candor. It takes intelligence and strength of character to subjugate our own needs and thoughts (yes, even our most honest thoughts) for the greater good.  Trump's supporters extol his honesty. If that is how you think, dishonesty would be much more preferable. 

Not being honest is different from being dishonest. Dishonesty is a voluntary conscious effort to mislead or harm. Not being honest is holding back on the truth of a situation or a feeling. Nazis putting forth their views are being honest. That does make them less disgusting or less deplorable. What would be decent and correct would be for them to be ashamed to put forth those defective ideas.

I believe always spewing out 'honest views'  that do not help anyone smacks of a lack of integrity and humanity. I pride myself on trying never to say what I don't mean, but there are lots of times I won't say anything at all when the truth of what I think is not right for the moment. 

We all have our views on who is likely to go to hell, or who is headed to eternal peace. Should we be honest and tell a dying man what we think? I believe in more cases than not, honest speech is best avoided. Kindness is what should rule our interactions. And we certainly don't need to be honest to be kind.