The Futility Of "You Should Not Get Angry"

Let's consider different aspects of anger systematically:

Firstly: If someone shouts at you meaninglessly or behaves with you abusively because of his/her tendency to get angry unnecessarily, or inability to control anger, then simply tell them to seek help and sort things out and walk away from them. Maybe psychological counseling will help them, maybe meditation, maybe both. But you are certainly under no obligation to continue getting hurt on someone else's account.

However, I have also seen people behave in a manner that provokes anger in others and then try to give "moral advice" on top of that 😅: "It is not good to get angry".

This is unacceptable too. If you want others to hold themselves accountable for their emotions, you need to hold yourself accountable for your conduct first. Of course, some people get excessively angry over simple unintentional mistakes and that's incorrect on their part. But if you know that you do something that provokes anger in someone else, then you need to stop doing it. You need to take responsibility for this. You cannot be sitting and pointing fingers without doing your own homework first 😅.

And if you are the one being provoked into anger: Be alert! Observe and be clear about why you are feeling anger. There are some situations in which a certain amount of measured, controlled, anger does have a role to play and I discuss this below. But it can also happen that you are being deliberately provoked into anger by some people because that suits their agendas.  Don't play into people's hands. One of the easiest ways to get manipulated is to let someone push your buttons. Never let anyone make you lose control and speak and act in a manner that disadvantages you.

Then there's a whole another dimension: "Getting angry is incorrect in itself", "Those who meditate should not get angry", etc. etc. etc.

A certain amount of measured, controlled, anger certainly has its time and place. I want criminals to fear a honest police force's anger. I want corrupt officials to fear their supervisors' anger. I want undisciplined students to fear their teachers' anger. And I want honest police officials, supervisors and teachers to have the ability to direct their anger in an effective, controlled, manner. Reprimanding and scolding is ok when necessary. Disciplinary action is ok when necessary. And after the necessary action is taken, it's important to have the ability to drop the anger. Don't keep it burning within and hurt yourself.

At the end of the day, anger is an emotion like all other emotions. It is absolutely meaningless to say that "one should not get angry".

The point is to avoid unnecessary anger and seek psychological/meditative/spiritual help if anger rises unnecessarily. Likewise, we need to be able to keep our anger in control instead of letting anger control us. Again, if we are unable to do this, we seek psychological/meditative/spiritual help. It is also important that we don't allow ourselves to be provoked into anger by people who seek to manipulate us by pushing our buttons.

But to feel a reasonable amount of anger in the face of injustice and indiscipline and to be able to direct it into suitable action as necessary - and then let the anger go, to not keep it lingering on within us - I think that's quite normal. And, in my opinion, far better than suppressing it.

A 2-Way Migration Proposal As Taliban Takes Over Afghanistan

I think a proposal that might be worth considering for many countries at this point in time would be the following:

On the one hand, while keeping all necessary security checks in place, accept as many Afghan refugees as possible. No people should be forced to live in a certain way by anyone. So if people of Afghanistan seek asylum elsewhere as Taliban takes over, accept them. Let them have a shot at preserving what they can of themselves. Of course they will have to respect the culture and laws of the country that absorbs them. But give them the opportunity, the choice.

On the other, anyone who is feeling positive about Taliban and its ways: give them a free one-way plane ride to Afghanistan. Let them live there by all means. I for one don't want people around who think there's anything good about forcing women to wear burquas, asking for lists of 15 year old girls to provide brides to "Taliban fighters" (Oh, how brave!) and not giving women the same liberty and freedom as men. They are very welcome to go live elsewhere. This country is never going to move in such a direction. Never.

Everyone all around would be happier this way?

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Isn't Taliban the same group that shot Malala Yousafzai because she wanted women to get the same opportunities of education as men?

Groups that shoot 15 year old girls are not groups of brave men. And now they apparently want 15 year old girls to marry (see article link below)!

If we want to let smaller nations like Afghanistan fend for themselves against oppressive invaders, why have a body such as the UN? Why have the notion of human rights?

This is not making sense. We have to be wiser than this as a planet. Not every force should be allowed to grow in strength and reach.

Link to Article: Taliban ask for list of girls above 15, widows under 45 to be married to their fighters: Reports | World News - Hindustan Times

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What's going on in Afghanistan is all wrong. Everyone needs to see this. There are no "greys" on this one. It's all wrong.

And my disdain for Pakistan is just that much more today. Ugh! There are obviously some nice people there, just like there are some everywhere. But as a state, as a country, Ugh!

The biggest moral of the story to me is that every country needs to invest in its defence and make sure that they have a strong armed force : land, air, water.

Afghanistan folded too soon. Too soon. Almost no fight put up. US leaves - and that's it. They just folded.

The US should have at least given them a year's notice so that they had some time to prepare for an independent existence.

I worry. As much as perhaps Yoda would. This is a force that should not consolidate on our planet. Everyone eventually gets affected.

We are very very lucky that we have a strong armed force to defend our country. Very fortunate. And the investment, the budget allocations, the expenditure : all worth it. The capacity to protect our freedom forms the basis for everything else. Very fortunate.

Making Uniforms More Practical

Think carefully: Shouldn't police personnel, flight attendants, and anyone else who might need to respond to situations with speed and agility, ideally use track suits and sneakers for footwear as uniforms? This can be done without compromising on the "looking slick!" part one bit.

Instead we have tight trousers, leather shoes, skirts, sarees, salwar kameezes, sandals, heels, ...

Doesn't seem ideal to me.

Commonwealth Games

There seems to be a buzz all around every time the Commonwealth Games come around.

Needless to say, our sportsmen and athletes deserve our appreciation for their skill, effort and commitment whenever and wherever they represent our country.

But just to be clear about what it means to be a part of the commonwealth in the first place, take a few minutes to read this article: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Nations

To quote from it:

"Under the London Declaration, India agreed that, when it became a republic in January 1950, it would accept the British Sovereign as a "symbol of the free association of its independent member nations and as such the Head of the Commonwealth"."

Left to me, I would not want us to be a part of any group or body that has the british sovereign as its head in any sense. No matter what the advantages of doing so. Period.

Burma and Aden chose to *not* be a part of the commonwealth upon obtaining independence from the british. They have my respect for this decision.

We've had 74 years since independence. I think its about time we disassociate ourselves from this junk colonial legacy and host international level games in our own name instead.

We have the means and ability to do so. No doubt about it. 

#SelfRespect

Paper Napkins? Well...

I've been observing an increased use of paper napkins to wipe hands in eateries. This doesn't make sense to me from multiple angles:

1) Washing hands is actually more hygienic. If we use a paper napkin we don't really clean our hands. Sure we get rid of the bigger chunks of whatever we ate but we only rub the oil/gravy mixed with our saliva deeper into our skin. And we carry this around as we touch a million other things and shake hands with everyone around us.

2) All those paper napkin packets require many many many trees to be cut. It makes no sense to cut trees just to wipe hands 😏. Reduced tree cover, to me, is one of the biggest reasons behind many an environmental problem we face today.

3) And when we throw that paper napkin, we create garbage that has to then be dealt with. This point becomes even more serious when we use paper napkins / tissue paper to wipe our noses / backsides. We throw tissues with our snot / excreta stuck to them and that / excreta snot carries germs and ... One's snot / shit (and snotty / shitty opinions) are best kept to oneself 😁.

Many cultures, including mine, have traditionally used a mug of water to clean backsides after answering the call of nature - and then just washing hands with soap and water! I think that's more hygienic as well as environment friendly.

And if you have a cold: just use a handkerchief and wash it at the end of the day. If you have a really bad cold, carry 2-3 handkerchiefs with you. But using tissues makes no sense from any view point.

And no, we don't really end up saving water if we use paper napkins / tissues 😊. All those trees that get cut to make them consume lots of water when growing up. So growing trees and then cutting them to make paper napkins is not an effective water saving strategy 😁.

Small things matter. It all adds up. I think switching from paper napkins and tissues to using running water will go a long way in keeping ourselves as well as our surroundings cleaner.

On Indians Publishing (Or Not) In Indian Journals

[Read till the end. This post ends interestingly 😏.]

So there's this bias in the Indian academic community against publishing papers in Indian journals (to the extent that those who do this are "punished" when it comes to job interviews and promotions 😅!). I personally didn't understand these things at the time and quite happily published a paper in the journal run by the Aeronautical Society of India in 2011.

Couldn't help but chuckle to myself when I found that a US patent this year cited this paper (👇) 😁.

Folks within the country won't publish useful results in our own journals, they won't read our own journals, they'll scowl at those who don't have this bias against ourselves, but someone in University of Southern California finds a paper published by an Indian in an Indian journal useful.

Cool 😁.

PS-1: The most frequent (and rather lame) excuse given is "Oh, but how to ensure quality control?". Just introduce a double blind peer review process (neither the authors nor reviewers know each other's identity) and set up a high-quality editorial and review panel. That's it.

PS-2: There ought to have been no need for such a post 74 years after independence.

Samatvam

Success and failure are a part of life. Most of us experience both in different degrees. In our exams, college admissions, sports, extracurricular activities, career placements, promotions, ... Sometimes success comes and sometimes failure.

There's a beautiful word in Sanskrit for the capacity to handle both with equanimity, with dignity: Samatvam.

When success comes, sure you must celebrate it. But if you become pompous and arrogant, you miss the point. Not only will your personality become shallow and flaky, you are setting yourself up for a sharp fall when failure comes. Instead, just be normal. Carry yourself maturely. Stay humble. Stay cool. Stay decent. Not only will you earn more respect this way, when failure comes, you will be able to handle that too without going down mentally, without losing your self respect and confidence. Because you understand life. You know that both success and failure come and go. You just have to keep giving it your best. That's what's in your control. And you take care of that.

When failure comes, sure it hurts! But if you let it break you, or let it make you dishonest, jealous of others who might be tasting success, you miss the point! Just introspect! Have you worked hard? Have you given it your best? If not, start now. If yes, continue doing the same. Understand life. Failure and success both are a part of it. If failure is your lot today, success will knock on your door tomorrow. Or you will die trying 😐! Grind your teeth, fight! If you just do this much, I tell you, your self respect and sense of dignity will stay untouched. And from whatever I have seen in life, if you are exercising all your intelligence and putting in the best effort you can, success cannot elude you for too long. People who really love you will stay. People who were with you only for your successes are better gone anyway! Sooner the better!

Throughout, in success or failure, stay humble, stay honest, exercise all your intelligence, work hard, give it your best, and that's that.

Two of the worst personality traits to develop are arrogance in success - that you are somehow "fundamentally better and more deserving of success" - and jealousy in failure - that others too shouldn't get what you didn't - "that" college, "that" job, "that" pay package, "that" woman / man 😆. Both these traits are hooking you to external trappings and will sully what really matters : your character, your self respect, your dignity.

Just stay true, stay humble, work hard, wish everyone the best! Come success or failure! That's Samatvam! And Samatvam carries all the dignity, maturity and awesomeness anyone could ever have!

Samatvam! Make that your mantra! Samatvam!