Sthit Pragya

When it all passes by and the consciousness remains still-observing!

Starting with identifying just One moment of Clear Observation ...usually it is difficult to identify if you observed well. The moment of clear observation comes when the mind is temporarily free from defilement- greed, avarice etc. giving way to some concentration, focus, some power of will over the mind, some awareness to observe the non-stop reel of thoughts, some stillness of the mind...
Thereon, when one stills the mind, to objectively experience whatever experience is available at hand-pain or pleasure, pleasant or unpleasant, that one discovers a new dimension of observation that does not directly 'suffer' the 'experience' but is just aware - a still mind unaffected by pain, pleasure...very rare moments, very delicate moments for a starter. Even starting to identifying these moments seem like a move closer to being right, only with practice can I sustain this observation even in strong, more intense experiences. Right now, I cant hold it even if I start speaking to someone, it is only when I am quiet ...

So I realized with an oz of deeper understanding the stith pragya must be reference to a person who could sustain this equanimous understanding even in the most intense human experiences, in all experiences in fact! These people conquer not only terror or torture or bliss or elevation, but establish themselves in concentration and awareness. Thus, they fathom not just the conscious mind but also the sub-conscious. Sportsmen too sometimes use somewhat a similar technique to conquer boredom, to achieve concentration, and to better their game through practice, the will to take one more lap, even faster

Another winter afternoon passes by

I hope to spend this evening with some yoga, plan to take no dinner ... and to sleep with a clear, calm, and aware mind

sans desire to be ... or to not be (something/anything)
Loads of metta

#read some quotes by Nietzsche ... think he was seeing some profound glimpses, glimpses that open up the pathway to wisdom ... towards becoming a true saint )

Once upon a time was born a fairy child ... she wailed on her birth, wailed like wild. And then she grew up and she became lady luck. Fair ways were her fare and love and comfort she will share.
And then...
Aye old man, before you could tell she grew old, and by and by dwellin in joy, she left this world.

Why did the fairy die in joy? Fairy can be assumed to be a being with a lot of goodness, apart from the wings. Even as the best of us suffer sadness, I think she made no extra effort to keep herself happy. It is so evident. This is unlike ignorance (esp. for women). I like to think kids are innocent, but even they sometimes kill ants.
But then I am assuming to know … like we laugh at older myths wherein people believed the heart to be the organ of thinking before they discovered it was the brain, our coming generations will have reasons to laugh at us.
It is inexhaustible. Some make good progress...but do they know?? No. We are all seeking to be aware.
Stick to your values, and keep back straight when you walk till then. I will be writing more stories, and just little stories

A friend asked me to write on grief, of separation, or earthly desires and the post came up. I said sadhu sadhu sadhuI am writing from office and it seems years since I last wrote. I see How much being in media had affected my writing and has made it impersonal ... I think it is also because I feel less of an individual and more a part of the environment and the world now, it is a shift in sensibility with significantly lot more information, never enough though.
lv

A Night without light

Its winters

Chilliest winters as far as I can remember. This year in Himachal (we had gone for a field trip there to collect data for our dissertation, on Kangri) we stayed in villages, though the main city wasn't far frm there, but it wasn't as chilly as it is right now in Delhi. It snowed in Kashmir, heavily, and it is 2 C here. man! without electricity on fourth floor with big windows and a door covering almost all breath of the room with nothing just palm trees outside, it is beautiful yes, but very cold.

Studying linguistics, in comp room, they hv electricity here in A block, it is past 12

posting pic o me and classmates in himachal, above

my gmails status message today

in the job world, either you earn for others or make others earn for you, to work for oneself and fair distribution of income are sure signs of a civilised economy

Amartya Sen I Kapila from Trishur

After the Eric Maskin talk I was going towards the hostel thinking about the question s people had asked Eric.
These kind of questions come from the same collective mind-set amongst our audience time and again. A generalised (and a wrong context) with a backing of self-proclaimed spiritual arrogance (from which the generalisation that all material knowledge is incomplete) and motive of not asking but trying to suggest one's profundity from an extremely twisted questions, rooted in no evidently factual basis pertaining to the speaker's subject.

With such thoughts I was walking back to my hostel.
Entered the hostel gate and went straight to the lab to check my mail ignoring the Spic Macay dance organised in our hostel, some classical music shit. Checked my mail, lot of editingwork had arrived from Oxford University Press (Delhi). Going back up to my room felt like taking a peek at the dance, first few minutes I wanted to get up and leave, but then as if one of the drummers saw me and I felt he'd be hurt if I just turn back and go. Haven taken my shoes off I st down in a dark corner away from the small bunch of audience huddled together looking at the small stage temporarily set up in our mess for the natya (performance).
Next 2 and half hours I witnessed the best dance I had ever seen in my life.
It was a solo classical dance performance, depicting only in mudras (dancer's expressions and poses, with 3 completely synchronised drummers) Lord Vishnu's mythical incarnation, some tale I wasn't aware of. I didn't know what the different poses meant ... but the stamina, the brilliance and slowly the understanding and appreciation for the performance arrived. I understood the rise and fall of emotions, the victory and defeat, the war drums, the massive armies, the bloody fights, the gory death, fear, apprehension, courage and valour all depicted in that dance performance, the stage became the stage for not one, but three worlds (mythical belief) ... I was stunned by this living tradition

Later on, the person, who was with the lady who perofrmed the dance and d three drummers (they had sweated while drumming in temperature close to 6 degrees, someone told me that during one of the performance they continued drumming even as their fingers started bleeding!) told me that the I have a keen observation, the tradition is indeed living, and then he added the dance was spontaneous when I exclaimed at the number of hours of straining performance the performers were capable of. Amzed me, the synchrony was spontaneous, and so perfect!


Amartya Sen's lecture was the next day, attended it in the convention hall with Robin, standing, the hall was packed with audience. He spoke on how important it is for the public sector to make available basic facilitated like education, for all. The topic was 'Inequality and the Public Sector'

The talk today at Vice chancellor's office

Eric Maskin came for a talk. He got the N prize for economics this year.

People who came for the talk were mostly old professors. The hall was not full, as I had expected. He spoke for fifteen minutes. Then it was open for questions. People asked, he tried to reply ...questions were such. The battery of the mike went off, the projector threw a tilted projection. People wore blank looks and kept dripping in to the hall during the lecture ... oof