Illusions: There’s more than it meets your eye

Illusions: A Book Review

 Beauty enwraps me as I weaved the last thread of the page to the first few pages, knitting a world for my self – that which has always been mine and will stay as long as I choose to.

Very rarely do authors offer pearls of wisdom in such a beauty that they are conversations and not advices . perhaps it is these conversations that make you reflect- I feel that wisdom can never be fidted, beautifully enwrapped with all the decorations, nor can it be received like a blessing. However, it can be felt like a halo, which illuminates itself peacefully, knowing of its worth and inviting others to seek enlightenment. Richard Bach, is an author whom I truly admire and respect. His words are for all. Jargons, fancy words never reach the souls, for the simplest of the words have an immense potential to strike many a chords. His words are pure, ethereal; no facades or masks.

Illusions is a rose which exposes its depth with every petal it sheds, to leave its fragrance lingering on to your senses, even as the flower dies, leaving something to live--------inside you.

Bach, you give us answers which which we have always known. This book is a conversation with the unknown yet known parts of our self and that’s what adds magic and splendour as we soak our beings into his lake of wisdom.

Some of the words I loved, the rest I shall leave it to you to explore....

P.S: This may be one of my first authentic book review, even as I have read many a books:) 

On why we need not publicise and yet we are worthy

It’s interesting how the human experiences have evolved over these 25 years. For some it takes a decade to realize the changes around us homo sapiens, for some it takes changes to realize but to further culminate into becoming something more- an experience of its own. There has never been a doubt of what the human mind can create and do with it. But when a human starts controlling millions of other humans through nothing but technology, I wonder if it’s an invention we need to be proud of    ( read: Facebook) or lament about. While social connectivity is what it aimed at, it has created a new society with rules of its own, only to lift the true connectivity and morph it into a dwelling where the virtual relationships begin to be considered real and the real ones are forgone for the virtual ones. To say that the author is not a part of it will be truly false. To say that this is a society the author wishes to step out from yet stays for reasons, some known, and many unknown, will be partly whole.

As a teen, the author never thought that there would be a time when gadgets is what would replace handshakes and emoticons is what would stand from true feelings. Never was a world imagined where humanity would lose its being to nothing but technology. Here we are, in the era of 2015 where the role reversals have begun. To say that soon homo sapiens shall be digitally loving robots, is an epoch which is not far. Feelings are extremely close and incredibly far. The truth has found its co-existence with the false, which was always there, lurking down deep, like sharks waiting to pound on. Connect, is what it aimed for, and yes it has happened, but only with plugs. Of those who say they have actually connected with people, the author says “Give her the number of those you have actually connected with”. Or is it that their fake smiles and all happy lives have burnt you alive to ashes, so much so that you are nothing but a burnt charcoal, with your fingers still on the screen and heart thrown inside in a corner?

Like that little sapling in the movie Wall-e, which is the only source of life left, we homo sapiens are on the brink of extinction. It is seething us slowly and you ask what is global warming? That stranger who smiled at you and whose smile you never bothered to return did something out of a warm choice. You, however, chose your screen over a true contact, scrolling over the contact list which is long and meaningless.

And then the author asks: to become so narcissistic that the true soul is lost to an object, to lose that one touch of humanity that is left to save the planet, to network over wires than hearts, to live life over the ‘last seen’ than the actual meeting, is this what we call ‘evolution’? It’s time, we define our lives for like they say it with the hastag #YOLO.

Growing up means forgetting tagging along and being on your own

As I look back now, growing up in the toddler years meant forgetting a thing called separation anxiety and being brave to go out with your head held high to the school where our rest of the years would be spent. I still remember crying like a small baby when my younger brother went to ‘the big school’. He didn’t cry but I did.

Growing up in school meant socialising, making friends and telling them that my mommy and daddy are nah! Not best but the best! It meant walking in a line for assembly, getting enamoured with eyes and voices and inanimate objects and thinking together how fascinating the adult worlds were. It meant punishments and rewards and a world where lots of ‘no’s’ and ‘yes’s’ existed. It was almost like Yes and No had become invisible people who were extremely important.

Then came the teen years, where growing up was of a different kind. One wondered how some boys were smaller than girls in class eight and suddenly got stretched in class nine?!! One saw bodies changing, pimples on faces that were clean and clear a year back. One heard ‘hush hush’ whispers. Rumours would be spread of someone having said ‘I love you’ to a girl and what not. Suddenly cute looking boys became more interesting, how come that never happened before? Yet the Chicken Soup for the Teen Soul series seemed more apt for the West than ‘our culture’. Growing up then also meant coming back home with the house key and giving food to your younger bro.

Then came the High School where ‘We were the Senior most’. The world, even as it revolved around studies, had a lot happening. Boys and girls would be called to the Princy’s office for God knows what. Every boy and girl that roamed around together would be tagged to be in a relationship. This heart kept the crushes for fear of rumours. The mind worked well for who was interested in some lame relationships? Yet this heart accepted and soothed pained tears of friend’s broken relationships. For years long this heart never understood the complexity of the phase called ‘being in love’; was it that complex? May be, just like 11^th Grade Trigo was!

Bachelors was another stepping stone. There I was imagining pursuing my subject in a co-ed college, sigh, they were none. It’s indeed surprise how life moves/runs/stops. When it does, it takes a while to get in sync with the pace, for you know you were walking as she was sailing. Studying in a hot girl’s college meant posh chauffeur driven cars and girls entering college with clutches and hot pants. The mind wondered if the girls were here for clubbing?! The level of studies increased. Looking back, the basic skills for life were gained then. This was also the time of leaving behind school buddies and looking forward to make new pals. Groups got formed, that of nerds, chilled out people, elite people and well rest I don’t remember.

The Masters called for an entrance exam. This mind only wonders the courage it took to leave a clichéd good university to get into a newly born university. Wow!!pat on the back! That was one Masters Program! The mind’s level increased. It studied Philosophy and got enamoured this time by the way those Great men thought. Growing up meant looking into your unconscious and realising the vast depth that lay in the mind and not only in the Sea. These years saw best buds getting into relationships and heart feeling immensely glad for them. It also meant waiting for dreams to get fulfilled of lovely blossomed roses and career that was yet in waiting.

Masters finished and the lil tiny foots then which had grown with years finally took some steps out in the world. Times went chasing, howling, cribbing, with moments of monotony of life that only felt dull and lifeless than anything. The life had come to a halt. The depressive halt moved gradually. When life stops, the air stops. The earth moves yet we are at halt. Not a single thing seems exciting for why would it, as others move your clock doesn’t tick tock!

And as the wind of the years long gone

Blows by my face today

I wonder, Oh Lord

How delightful has been life’s ways

Here am I, spending time with Life

She is beautiful to the core

Her magnanimous and magical rays

Now life is not about people

For the special  loved ones are intact

It’s about leading oneself ahead

Loving the self I have

Growing up evolves

Tears and laughs change

For reasons then seem petty now

Yet not so petty to forget……

Sense and Non sense

I have been reviewing past one semester on the readings which are given to us, in my Masters Pro gramme. Though initially it was a boring job, later only turning out to be monotonous, I'm glad that this semester we get to read Philosophy, and 'reflect' on what philosophers wrote, and because of that the word review has been now changed to 'reflections':)

Often many of us have wondered, what is is that caught the attention of the philosophers? that all they do is babble in a language not only hard to understand, but harder to hear. However that is not the case. This is a piece I wrote reflecting on a chapter written by Bryan Magee titled "Sense and Nonsense". Go ahead...take a look. Who knows, it might just make a lot of sense to you....:)

The question of the ‘sense’ and the ‘nonsense’ in Philosophy as put forth by Bryan Magee, itself seems like a philosophical surge to seek an answer to a problem or perhaps a notion that has been associated with philosophy since decades or so.

The question that ‘what’ philosophers write and the ‘way’ they write, does it make sense at all? Not only to those in the profession, but to those outside it? And the innumerable questions they raise about the ways of life etc. are they relevant to ‘us’ humans in any ways?

More often than not philosophy as a subject and a field has been considered akin to something that is ‘complex’ and incomprehensible. While all philosophers do not fall in this bracket, but the reason, that many do makes philosophy a seemingly or perhaps ‘actually’ a ‘difficult’ subject to make sense of, and comprehend for students and many others. However, as Magee says, there were philosophers like Bertrand Russell, Austin, Moore, who did made an impact both within and outside the field of philosophy by their style of writing and more significantly by the clarity of thoughts which they penned down on paper.

The author presents to us two critical thoughts as far as the matter of ‘clarity or complexity in writing style’ is in philosophy. One, where he quotes Weisse when he justifies the much critical lack of clarity in his writing style by contending that the deepest problems of the human spirit could not be solved for the benefit of the mob. On the other hand where he says that philosophers want to portray themselves as individuals who are ‘clever’ and these they very well reflect in their writing style. Weiss’s justification can be questioned, as it itself raises a question against the value of philosophy as a discipline, when he says ‘that the deepest problems cannot be solved for the benefit of the mob’. Certainly, many people do think of philosophy as a useless discipline not contributing to the mankind the way the natural sciences do, but this is not to negate the ‘human’ qualities we essentially possess today and the evolved mind of ours, all thanks to the questions raised on many matters, which our ancestors indulged in.

The author further tells the readers that many philosophers are intentionally unclear, for they fear that their popularity or the reputation of a philosopher might undergo a drastic change lest they be clear. Thus in order to show that ‘they’ have gained mastery over some (difficult) aspect that bothered the human race since time unknown, what they engage in is in a style of writing that comes to be far more complex than the thought is.

Magee makes a profound impact in this essay of his when he reaches out to the readers sharing with them what truly an impressive style of writing is. He tells us that it is not something that is obscure, and creates a mist in the thoughts and the minds of the readers that counts to be as ‘rich’ in philosophy, but that which is simple and clear, for the clarity is what reaches out to people, and instead of undermining a philosopher’s position rather creates more respect. The reason being, that the philosophers’ thought then reaches out to the masses in a way that is understandable and makes an impact for itself. His thought may ignite many more thoughts in ways which can lead to any kind of a change unknown to the philosopher himself!

Many a time’s beginners in the art of writing have this misperception that ‘only’ the writing or the writers who use an excellent vocabulary or a heavy language are ‘good’ writers. But the points which Magee makes the readers come across are substantive and reasonable enough. He makes his point, in a clear, precise and in an extremely effective way. This is to say, then, that it is not being vague or obscure that counts, for it only adds to the confusion. What matters is the clarity and the lucidity of the thought and the way it is expressed in writing, as the impact which a clear mind makes is far more powerful than a complex one!