Socially Acceptable

There is no logic to what is deemed as socially acceptable and what must be hidden from plain sight. For instance, stalls on Indian thoroughfares which sell underwear, which is displayed in all its glory. Men and women who have all appearances of being conservative and god-fearing feel no shame in examining and purchasing underwear on the street. Like in most things in life, women are more daring. Most of the shopkeepers are men but women buy from them without any apparent qualms. Also, I have seen women buying men's underwear at such stalls but never the other way around.
This evening, I went shopping for a friend who had asked for some traditionally styled handbags from India. In the beginning, I was feeling a little awkward about shopping for women's accessories. but the awkwardness disappeared once I got into the mission. I ended up visiting four shops before returning to the one I liked the most. One good thing about Bombay shopkeepers is that they are so foccussed on  the job at hand that they don't let trivialities like why is a man shopping for ladies' handbags get in the way of business. 

Death of Nail

I am happy to report that the big toe nail that was giving me trouble came off yesterday, and there were no blood or tears involved. Its passage was aided by regular baths in hot water. I was hoping it would come off before I returned to England, and I am glad it did.
I have reached that age where one has a reasonable idea of which body parts will give trouble in advanced age. My big toe nails are one of those, the other being my eyes, my right knee and my left lower back/hip. Even though none of these body assets are a major cause of concern yet, the hypochondriac in me gives them special attention, especially my eyes. So, its good to discover a tool to cope with one of them at least. Frequent baths in hot water keep nails clean and also help loosen those that have started to wobble. Troublesome toenails might not seem like, and are not, a major health issue  but they can be painful and throw your daily routines in disarray. I have extensive experience of trying to bathe without getting the dressing on my injured toenails wet, and it never gets easier. I was dreading the possibility of the toenail coming off in England, where winter is not completely out of the way. Leaving aside the fact that I am scared of any engagement with England's National Health service, there is also the problem of closed footwear not being conducive to large bandages. Yes, I think of the most minor of details, and, yes, I know its weird. But, it is what it is. 

Punching Down To Punch Up

As election season rages on, our Supreme Leader has added the title of "Chowkidar" (Watchman) to his name on Twitter. This act has deservedly earned a lot of ridicule. But, today I was watching a clip of a stand-up comedian taking a dig at the Supreme Leader by pointing out similarities between chowkidars and Narendra Modi, mainly how lazy and incompetent they both were.

I always feel uncomfortable when members of the middle- or upper classes complain or joke about the perceived laziness or unprofessionalism of the blue-collar service class, like maids, drivers, watchmen, etc. We pay them third-world wages and expect first-world levels of service and professionalism. The difference between white-collar and blue-collar service  wages in India is staggering, and it is this difference that allows upper middle-class families to employ a phalanx of maids, drivers, bearers, etc. Life in a city is rendered bearable by this arm of underpaid labour. 

Maybe I am being too harsh. But, I have found that living in India as an upper-caste, upper middle class male is a endless series of moral conundrums and guilt trips. When one lives here, one learns to unsee these conundrums because otherwise life would become an unbearable train of existential guilt and angst. 

However, the least we can do is not punch down on the people trying to eke out a meagre living by using them as a vehicle to punch up at the Supreme Leader. The Leader has a countless number of faults but being crass and unpolished is not one of them. Out of all the assaults he has carried out on the country and the people over the past few years, the assault on urban middle-class sensibilities matters the least. 

Tummy Travails

After holding up very well for a month and a half, my tummy has given way again. I am putting it down to the change in weather from balmy to steamy, and I hope its not an infection. As I have a bad habit of imagining the worst when it comes to my health, I have already been to hell and back. Chances are its just that the last couple of days have been a little stressful and I have been pushing myself hard while exercising. My body's way of telling me to lighten up? I hope so.
I had a niggling tummy upset for my first few weeks in India. I had dismissed it as acclimatization pains. Let's see what it is this time. If its one of those beastly tropical infections, the only consolation is I will be too enervated to feel bad about falling ill. The recovery period is often the most painful, especially if one has to be on a diet and restricted activity, but I am trying not to think about it. 
It never ceases to amaze me how I only fall sick when I have people around to take care of me. In Bristol for all of last year, I was the picture of pink health. Well, what will be will be. I have fallen sick like people do sometimes, I have imagined worst-case scenarios that would make anyone's hear curl. All is right with the world!

Change of Season

Its become noticeably warmer over the past few days. I knew I would catch the first few weeks of the Indian summer on this trip, but nothing can prepare one for the severity of it. A few days ago, a friend had quipped that summer was late this year. He spoke to soon, because it became noticeably hot the next day. In England, the onset of winter is heralded by the end of daylight savings time on the last Sunday of October.
I have learnt that it is best not to fight the change of seasons, but to adapt to it. In England, that means reducing my level of exercise activity as energy levels are noticeably lower in winter, even for a fitness freak like me. In the Indian summer, it also means reducing physical exertion as well as food intake. My appetite has taken a hit over the past few days, as hot weather make the digestive system sluggish.
In the age of climate change, summer throws up plenty of moral conundrums. Should I switch the AC on during the afternoon, or just at night? Should I get cooked in the local train or just take an Uber? The question is how much  inconvenience for the sake of slowing climate change is worth it.
In India, the conundrum effect is magnified by economic equality. A majority of Indians lack uninterrupted power supply, let alone airconditioning. Using AC is not only bad for the environment but also an implicit assertion of privilege, it could be argued.
But being too sanctimonious about these things can drive you crazy. 

Reasons For Being On a Dating App

What are the reasons for joining a dating app? I can think of three broad reasons--out of boredom, out of a need for self-validation or actually wanting to meet new people. One often start out wanting to meet new people and ends up bored and slightly addicted or anxiously seeking self-validation after having less success on the app than anticipated. And, that's not a good place to be. 'Liking' someone on an app just to see if they will like you back when you have no desire to interact with them starts to weigh on the heart. The pinpricks of rejections and the pops of validation start to add up, and it also seems so pointless and soul-wearying. Dating apps are not games--those are people on the other side of the app and while you don't owe them anything, neither do they deserve to be messed around. Some people might see unmatching with someone on a dating app as quite a benign act. But sensitive people are not good at taking or delivering rejection, which is why they have to be particularly careful. They carry the burdens of being rejected as well as those they have rejected. 

Which is why it helps if you selective. You can always change your mind about someone but when you feel like immediately unmatching people you have matched with, its not a good sign. Time to take a break from the dating app. 

Head Trouble

Today, I read an article by a famous Hollywood actress who suffered a brain aneurysm a few months after becoming famous for her role in an iconic TV show. A few years later, she suffered a second even more severe aneurysm. The article details her struggle, the excruciating pain, the fear of losing crucial mental faculties, the fear that death was just around the corner, all when her life dreams had started to come true. She came through and is perfectly healthy today.

Her story resonated with me, not because I have been through a serious illness or cheated death but because I am a bit of a hypochondriac when it comes to my health. I must confess that there have been times when I thought death was imminent, which feels embarrassing after reading this actor's story and her far more serious physical symptoms. But, the point of this post is not to beat myself up for having an anxious personality and overactive imagination. And symptoms like light-headedness and chest pain could be unnerving for many people.

The point of this blog post is to reflect on the connection between trauma and fortitude. The other day, I told my mother that a few people are emotionally resilient by nature and predisposed towards happiness, while most others have to work harder. Often, those of us in the second group undergo trauma, and it is in overcoming these circumstances that we develop strength and fortitude. Trauma is, so to speak, the furnace in which our spirits are tempered. After going through the furnace, the lesser problems in life,the forest fires if you will, seem much less daunting. 

I now wonder how much of this is true. Can one become strong and emotionally resilient even if one is of an anxious and sensitive disposition and hasn't experienced severe trauma, like cancer, or another debilitating mental or physical illness or death of a loved one? After all, don't strength and resilience in ordinary times manifest as kindness, empathy and contentment? What more can one do? Tragedies will come or not, whether we want them to or not and we may recover from them or not. One cannot change the past or will the future, so why not just make the best of the present?

The Cobbler

As I was walking home from Thane station the sole of one of my shoes came off. I had noticed that there was something wrong with my shoe just a few moments before, and when I looked down the sole was half off. I thought I could make it home but I was wrong. Within moments, the sole came off entirely. As if by destiny, it came off just as I was passing a cobbler's roadside shack. I plonked myself on the stool outside the  shack and asked him to repair it.
Living in India, isn't always easy, but this is one of the joys. Getting at least small stuff fixed--clothes, shoes, watches, utensils--is very cheap and easy. Damaged items that would have to be binned in England can be fixed quite easily. The other day, I passed another cobbler shop on my way home from work and had my laptop bag fixed. The Indian middle classes are fast moving towards a use-and-bin mentality, but the mend mentality still survives.
However, as with most things in India, there are no simple narratives. While singing paens of the mend economy, it must be acknowledged that wages that people like cobblers earn are barely subsistence wages. For people from my class, the mend economy is an indulgence that makes us feel frugal and fulfilled. Yet, for a large section of the economy, the mend economy is essential. 

Self Harm

There was news earlier this week of a suicide by a well-known professor of economics in the U.S. Going by the tributes to him, he was an extremely warm and helpful person, apart from being a star in his field. One question that has always plagued me is whether some personality types are more prone to externalize their mental issues (make life hell for people around them) while others tend to internalize their issues (get eaten from the inside rather than make others suffer). This is  more relevant to males than females because males as most aggressors and predators in this world tend to be male rather than female, thanks to patriarchy. The former type is more likely to react to mental anguish with anger, while the latter is likely to react by falling into depression or exhibiting symptoms of anxiety. Maybe I am completely mistaken, and as the #MeToo movement has brought up, a lot of men have used mental health issues as an excuse for preying on women. But, it is difficult to imagine despicable men, out-and-out predators, killing themselves (I am not taking any names here because I don't wish suicide on anyone).
On the other hand, it could be that people with more structural power respond to their mental turmoil by wreaking havoc in the lives of others because their power allows them to do so. People at the bottom of social hierarchies simply don't have that option. However, I still think personality has a part to play here. Gentle and sensitive men with mental health issues are more likely to self-harm than than boors.

'Nothing To See Here'

One good thing about being repeatedly told that your research is pointless because so much work has already been done on it by people who don't really understand your work is it forces you to think long and hard not just about the substance of your research but how you present it. The other good thing is you become to inured to the criticism. So inured that you don't even want to prove your critics wrong. You just want to get on with your research because you find it fascinating and you don't care if any of your critics ever read it. The way I see it is even if my work is bullshit at least I am trying to do something different. At least its not the same old bullshit.
There are two ways of being a conformist. One is to rail against established doctrine, either alone (which requires tremendous resilience) or as part of a tribe of heretics. The other is to disengage as much as possible with the mainstream and do your own thing. Don't debate or argue except to defend your own work. Definitely don't proselytize. Whether one chooses the former or  the latter is down more to one's personality than anything else. 

Down Memory Lane

Today I attended an event that I had hoped but not expected would yield a few interview leads. I had very low expectations of this networking event, but I knew I would feel bad if I skipped it. At least now I can console myself that I did my best to make new contacts, but didn't succeed. I met a person whose contribution to central banking in India is immeasurably. But, when he swatted me away (politely) I was quite relieved. I am intimidated by his sharp intellect and he has already written a reasonably candid memoirs so I don't know what I would get from interviewing him. This way, at least I can tell myself I tried. The utility of being able to trick yourself consciously shouldn't be underestimated.
I ran into a number of journalists from the RBI pool, which I was an intermittent member of. None of them would count as friends, but some of them are quite pleasant chaps. However, meeting them didn't warm the cockles of  my heart. I had never felt really at home in that world, and always preferred to be the one in office taking inputs from the field reporter and writing copy. But, meeting them took me back to the world I had left behind. Some of them have been around from even before my time and they seemed pretty content doing what I know consider a mostly mindless job. But, who am  I to judge their profession or even possibly their vocation? All I can take away from this encounter is that if you find a professional world you feel at home in, embrace it no matter what others think of  it. Not every day will leave you feeling content and fulfilled. Magical days are few and far between and most days are about showing up and soldiering on. Sometimes it pays to  judge one's profession on grounds of least disliked rather than most liked.

Sense of Humour

It is a cliche that a person's sense of humour is one of their most attractive or repellent features. But, like most cliches, there is more than a grain of truth in it. It is difficult to be close friends with someone if your sense of humours don't resonate. You might individually have perfectly decent SoHs, but if they don't click, it can cause a commotion. Especially, if you have a wicked SoH and your no-go areas (everyone has them) don't match. Our SoHs say so much about how we view life and leaven it. The (at least temporary) antidote to despair and depression. But humour is not just a survival mechanism, although in these dark times it is increasingly being used as one. Humour is a way of expressing ourselves, our individuality. It is a way of showing trust in someone as we can only be funny around people we are comfortable with. 

Good News, Bad News

The nature of news is such that there is always more good news than bad. The threshold for good events to qualify as news is much higher than for bad events. And, most good news is of the form of individuals or groups responding to bad news/events with courage. So, bad news is an inherent feature of good news.

In order to not spent most of our days convulsed with anger or despair, it is important to create some buffers between us and news. For instance, I woke up this morning and checked the newsfeed on my phone to learn of the custodial death of two Muslims in Bihar. They had been tortured in the most gruesome manner. Not news you want to wake up to. So, I promptly deleted the news app as well as Google Chrome and YouTube for good measure, so that if I was tempted to check the news, I would have to go through the cumbersome process of reinstalling those apps. Sometimes, the best way to resist temptation is to make it logistically difficult to succumb to it. I have long maintained that diet discipline must be exercised in the supermarket not at home. Once a foodstuff is in the house, it will be consumed. If it is very unhealthy, one is tempted to consume it for no better reason than to keep it away from family.

I have also set a timer for Twitter on my laptop, which limits the time I spend on it to one hour per day. So far, I have only cheated once, when tensions between India and Pakistan threatened to boil over into a full-blown war. I wouldn’t even dream of installing Twitter on my phone.

Hope and Despair

If one had to chose a day that exemplifies our times, today would be a good candidate. Uplifting hope entwined with searing despair, spinning like a dervish. The schoolchildren's climate strike led by a 16-year-old girl with Asperger's, whose newspaper profile brought tears to my eyes. At the other pole, mosque attacks in New Zealand which killed nearly 50 people. New Zealand, of Lord-of-the-Rings, countless-sheep and billionaires'-doomsday-bunkers fame. The country considered too small, geographically blessed and remote for anything bad to happen. The long line of Islamophobic attacks, stoked by so-called liberal politicians, now stretches to "paradise". Of course, in India, Muslims have little to fear from rightwing lonewolf terror attacks because they live in a right-wing state that terrorizes them brazenly.

How does one maintain a semblance of equanimity in these frothy times? Progressive forces are at the strongest they  have been in years. People of colour, minorities, survivors of unspeakable crimes, people with  mental health issues seem to be throwing off their cahins and speaking out with extraordinary courage and conviction. And a number of these people are women. On the other hand, fascist forces have never been stronger. Our times seeming to be calling the best and the worst, the angels and the devils, to come out and be counted. There seems to be no middle ground in the battle against fascism, misogyny, rapacious capitalism and climate change. I wonder how the status-quoist liberals feel? They, who have fanned the flames of both fascism and socialism. Do they live in a world they increasingly don't recognize? But, does anyone recognize this world? Back in the day, the socialists, fascists and liberal status-quoists were all secure in their own ideas about how the world worked and what they wanted to change (or not) in it. Can any of these groups say that anymore?

Rich Outer Life

I was with a friend the other day and she mentioned how much she had missed her husband, who was returning the following day after two weeks in the U.S. She asked me how I lived in comparative isolation, and wondered aloud if she was too needy. I reassured her that she wasn't and we just had very different personalities, but her comments got me thinking.

I have written about seeking a rich, inner life--a vibrant self-contained world that exists in our minds. The friend in question is an extrovert with a heart of gold. I suppose she has a rich outer life which relies on people and other active stimuli for vibrancy. People with rich outer lives, who bring love and warmth into the lives of the people around them with their glowing personalities, are valued by everyone, and rightly so. If only people with rich inner lives were appreciated more, or at least not seen as weirdos. They might not touch the lives of as many people as ROLs do, but RILs are generally happy and content in their own self-sufficient way (this doesn't mean they don't have problems, including to do with their mental health). That rubs off on the people who are close to them and on the world too. 

Interview Post-Mortem

Yesterday, I did my fifth research interview, and I am all but ready to throw in the towel.The research interviews that I am doing are semi-structured, which we means that the agenda is loose and I feel like I am throwing a net in the open sea with the hope of snagging a fish. That strategy is not going well--I am not good at fishing. A number of my interviews have ended with the interviewees telling me that what I was seeking was available on the organization's website. A kind way of telling me that I had wasted my and their time. It should be said that I don't enjoy doing interviews, especially semi-structured ones (even the thought of unstructured interviews fills me with horror). I would do reasonably well in a structured interview with to-the-point questions and swift counter-questions. But, exploratory interviews are not my cup of tea. 
The younger me would have dismissed these feelings as a mental block. I might even have done affirmations trying to convince myself that I am great at interviews. The older me can't be bothered, and I would rather expend energy trying to find a way around doing interviews.
I often wonder what pushed me to do interviews in the first place. It just felt like I needed to do them as I wasn't doing any statistical analysis, which seems to be the only respectable way of working with secondary data. But, interviewing is not my strength and I am still not clear about what I hope to achieve through them. Especially if I am interviewing people who have published work--if I want to know their views, shouldn't I just refer to their work? 

The Handcart Puller

As I was strolling down Yeoor Hills, with the endorphins from my run masking the nagging pain in my chest, I passed a man struggling pull his handcart up the hill. Picture a two-foot-wide wooden seesaw and replace its fulcrum  with a pair of wheels and you have a handcart. Goods to be transported have to be strapped to its surface. The puller has a strap going around his shoulders that is fastened to the cart, which makes it seem as though he is standing in for an animal.

There are some professions that should have been long extinct in India. Sewage cleaner is at the top of the list but handcart puller shouldn't be far behind. The sight of a man huffing and sweating as he pulls a cart through the heat and smoke of Mumbai is heart-rending. 

I know this post reads as though it has been written by a foreigner shocked by the scale of poverty and destitution before him in India. But, the truth is after you spend some time abroad, you see your country with new eyes. Sights and events that you previously wouldn't have given a second thought to, become jarring. Which is why I would never talk about this to anyone living in India. It is all very well for me to find faults in India from the distance and comfort of my university life in England.

Venting

I attended a public meeting with my parents today and both them and I left were quite fed up with it for different reasons. They had a problem with the political message, which they found to be ill-informed and misguided. My problem was that the speakers all seemed to be saying the same thing in marginally different language, which can be interesting if done artfully, I suppose. But, all they were doing was venting their anger with the current government.

I'm not against venting per se as it can be therapeutic. But it also demands a lot from your audience because being on the receiving end of a vent it can be very distressing and/or boring. When I took a therapeutic writing course, the instructor told us the purpose of the course was to equip ourselves to be our own therapists, so that we wouldn't have to use friends and family as 'garbage bins'. 

The popular conception of therapy is that it essentially involves venting. If you expel the garbage from your mind, you feel better. People who keep their emotions "bottled up" suffer. That is not wholly incorrect. But, it is also a very mechanistic view of the mind, no doubt inspired by our view of the body. If  the body is attacked by pathogens, they have to be killed or expelled, and the same goes for the mind. 

But, therapy and therapeutic writing are so much more. Yes, it is important to get all your garbage out in the open, but that is  just the first step towards healing. Sometimes that step automatically triggers the process of healing, but often it doesn't (I  suppose). There is no one path to healing and a good therapist has to find what works for a particular patient. And, that is an incredibly difficult job.

Peddling Stories

As the India-Pakistan continues to simmer, the focus is on Indian journalists on the national security beat and their unabashed jingoism, peppered with relentless warmongering. I came across this story on the most well-known hack on this beat. I don't want to talk about his/their blatant anti-Muslim bias, dubious sourcing and indifference to their wrong, and even dangerous, reports, because it is too depressing. But, the story reminded me about my own time as reporter and how I would struggle to 'break' news. The best newshounds are razorsharp, great with people and also very street smart. Whatever my level of intelligence, I am definitely not good with people or street smart (at least not by Indian standards). But, being reasonably smart and a good writer helped me stay afloat in the hyper-competitive world of Indian business journalism.
Deals reporters are considered the cream of the crop among business journalists. For one, much of deals reporting is market-moving and, potentially, money-making. If one were an intrepid but unscrupulous deals reporter, there is a lot of money to be made. But, the thing that makes deals reporting more difficult is that you interview sources will never see their names in print, so fame is not an incentive for them to speak to you. The only reason they would talk to you, is  a) they trust you b) you give them information about their competitors. c) you are nice to them (in print). Unfortunately, most journalism is a combination of PR, access journalism and information-broking. Its take a lot of talent, smarts and integrity to do good journalism without resorting to one of the above three, and I have immense respect for those who do.

The Right Questions

Another week, another set of interviews that left me tired and dejected. When I was chatting with my supervisor later, she said she was worried I wasn't asking the right questions. I told her I was pretty sure I wasn't. I feel reasonably certain that the topic I have chosen is worthy of study although I cannot yet put my finger on why. And, then, I run into a wall of certainty, which is the dominant paradigm I am interrogating. My as-yet-rudimentary and poorly-framed questions are no match for it. Questions circumscribe an issue and set the boundaries for  "reasonable" inquiry. Questions lying  outside that boundary are dismissed as irrelevant or silly, or worse, already answered. I am at that stage of my research where I am not satisfied with the interview answers I am receiving, but can't fully articulate why. It is easy to think of blunders as pointless detours from the  research process or even regression. In fact, blunders are milestones on the research path. When you are feeling around in the dark, you are bound to touch some thorns. The important lesson is to try not to touch the same thorn again, but to also resist the inference that the world is full of thorns. 

Vipassana

As I was doing a short meditation session this evening, memories of my 10-day-long meditation course came to me. I had enrolled in the course in August 2011 to fix a nagging headache problem exacerbated by what I later realised was existential angst. The course itself is intense. We meditated for almost 10 hours per day for 9 days and were supposed to be silent at all times, except if we needed to communicate with the staff. The general expectation was that we would feel tortured in the beginning but by the  end of it we would be transformed into temples of equanimity. That didn't happen to me, but I know it happened to some. We all had fixed meditation spots, and the young lad meditating beside me couldn't sit without shaking his legs in the beginning. But, by Day 4, he was sitting still as a stone.
I didn't do myself any favours by hurting my back in a completely avoidable accident. Following that, I sat on a chair instead of cross-legged on the floor, and regret over the injury coupled with guilt that I was cheating by not sitting on my floor hijacked the rest of my course.
The essential teaching of the practice is the same as many that I tried after. That thoughts, emotions and sensations are transitory and one can train one's mind to not react to them to find a place of calm. Just let them pass (there was one practice that encouraged one to change one's thoughts by repeating affirmations and that didn't work for me at all). But, the fact that the gist of the messages are the same doesn't make the task any simpler. There is a world of difference between understanding a truth intellectually and being able to internalize it and make it's one own. To feel it. What meditation and a brief sojourn with a Bristol cult couldn't do for me, an abundantly wise therapist and yoga with Adrienne did. And, my only advice is, when you find something that works, embrace it and keep returning to it. There will be times when it feels like a drag, when you don't feel any different after. Soldier on. The benefits are incremental (sometimes marginal) and cumulative and trusting and surrendering yourself to a ritual (yes, you can call it a ritual) has its own benefits. That doesn't mean you have to do it for life. When it stops serving you, trust that your inner wisdom will tell you and you will let the practice go.

'If You Can Breathe You Can Get Through Anything'

This morning, I read a stirring story about a former Black Panther who had spent 40 years in prison, many of them in solitary confinement. Prolonged solitary confinement is regarded as one of the worst forms of torture and it takes extraordinary resilience to come out of it intact. The story went on to talk about the numerous hardships he faced and his personal growth. But what stayed with me was the phrase, 'if you can breathe, you can get through anything'. I have been trying to focus more on my breathing, as part of my yoga practice (I should probably do a separate post on the significance of the breath in yoga practice). Sometimes, just by focusing on my breath, I feel a wave of relief pass through my body, but not as often as I would like. Focusing on your breathe is the ultimate means of nourishing the senses without external support. It is a technique available anywhere and at any time.
But, coming back to the story I read, which was a tale of fortitude. The title of this blog post really stuck with me, because immediately afterwards, the author talked about how you can't take your breath for granted. When he received news in prison that his mother had died, he literally struggled to breathe. He felt like he wouldn't make it and he took more than a year to feel like his normal self. The way I interpreted it, the fact that he is still here is down to luck more than anything else. Which is why the phrase is so powerful--it is not a truism. There are shocks that can literally stop you breathing--not just physical shocks but mental and emotional shocks. You and your darned breath are powerful, but not all-powerful. 

The Mental Well-Being of Horrible People

One question that has also vexed me about (many) bullies is how come their actions don't cause them the mental suffering that many people who are much nicer to others face? And, the non-bullies can only imagine the paroxysms of guilt and misery that would follow if they were to act like bullies.
One of the hardest lessons of life is that as you sow so shall you reap but as they sow, so they may not reap. Someone of a gentle and sensitive disposition will wracked by guilt and regret if he hurts someone else, but people are habitually nasty to others might carry on that way for the rest of their lives without any physical or mental repercussions. Karma is a bitch, but randomly. And, I am not just taking about "damaged" people who have suffered  abuse in the past and lash out and everyone around them or people who are habitually nasty. I am also talking about people who are strategically nasty and untruthful. A prominent TV anchor in India comes to mind. I find it difficult to even watching as I feel forced to repent for his terrible behaviour, only because someone should. And, the frustrating part is that me might lead a very content existence for all I know. Some people can be  kind to themselves while being terrible to others, although its a relief that most of us can't.
Kindness and generosity are not seeds to be sown with the expectation of reaping good health and fortune. They ought to be ends in themselves or at least tools to secure one's own peace of mind, to  put it in utilitarian and individualistic terms.
We all have to figure what we reap when we sow a particular thing, and learn by trial and error. They best we can do is to wish mental torrent on the horrible people we come across in our lives. But, bad actions are no guarantee of bad outcomes and that's just the way it is.

Physical Defects

I am keeping a list of bodily things that need looking to before I return to Bristol and it keeps getting longer. Teeth, eyes, STD tests, Vitamin D tests, Vitamin B tests and now I am wondering if I should see a doctor for the nagging pain in my chest. I feel like I have broken my body down into a bunch of components which all need to be analyzed for defects individually. A very mechanistic view of the human body, which leaves no space for the head and the heart. No judgement there, but my mind goes back to two-and-a-half years ago when the troubles in my head had started to manifest as disquieting physical symptoms. I was thoroughly unnerved by the physical symptoms, yet I knew at the back of my mind that mental health problems were at the root of my physical troubles. At the time, a friend gifted me a self-improvement book that was an enormous influence on me at that time. The book's main message was that problems of the body could be healed by addressing mental issues, which required forgiveness and oodles of self-love. I don't believe so strongly in that message any more, but there is some truth to it. Just like most influential concepts have some truth/use but cannot capture the whole truth. There is a mechanistic view of the human body which sees it as a machine and there is the idealistic view of the human body, which focuses on perception and emotional states. Our health is nothing but our perception of it, and our perceptions are heavily influenced by mental and emotional factors. The key is to find which position on the mechanistic-idealistic scale works for  us at a particular point in time. The same thing may not work for someone else and it may not work for us at another point in time. And, it is important not to swing too heavily towards one end of the spectrum. 

Listening

I am trying to get better at listening. I believe we often place ourselves in uncomfortable and unwanted situations because we act against our better instincts. In the case of a fitness freak like me, that means pushing my body when I should be going easy on it. Thankfully, I haven't faced a serious injury as a result of this tendency yet. But, I have often wondered what's the point of exercising if one feels lousy afterwards. I don't finish every exercise session with my head swimming with endorphins, but sometimes after an intense session, I feel feverish and pop a paracetemol pill. Push yourself beyond the edge and then pop pills to ward of sickness. Not a very healthy way to live.
Knowing when to push yourself, knowing when to ease off and being kind to yourself irrespective: that is one of the secrets to mental and physical health. Which is why its not easy. It requires a lot of practice and trail-and-error--we often realizes our limits only after we have hit them hard and been floored by the impact. It also requires us to release ourselves from the weight of purown and of others' expectations. And, we doesn't always have that option if there are other people depending on us.
All we can do is try. Practice listening and have faith in ourselves that our mind, body and spirit will tell us when a particular situation is not serving us and its time to leave, if that is the option. That we will change a situation when we are ready to change it and there is little point in chiding ourselves afterwards for changing it too early or too late. 

Gyan

In my first job as a reporter, my boss was an relentless newshound. Since I am temperamentally the opposite of that, I relationship was rocky in the beginning, but once he saw my skills as a writer the sailing was smoother. I remember he would always caution me against interviewees who would give "gyan". By that, he meant their views on the Indian economy or the markets, instead of cold, hard news about the business they were running that could be turned into a new story. Since most bankers wanted to see their name print without revealing anything about their business, steering them away from gyan required some skill. 

Sometimes, I feel like in India we all treat gyan like a Bollywood movie. You (sometimes) enjoy it, but don't seek life guidance from it. As a markets reporter for a wire agency, I was at the centre of the gyan industry. A raft of professions are built around trying to predict where the markets will be a few days, weeks and months from now. But most people rely  on the same/similar models for their forecasts and essentially say the same thing in marginally different words. Being in that giant echo chamber began to grate on my nerves, and I left when it all began to get a little much. To be sure, not everyone is a muppet. There are some sharp commentators out there, but they are few and far between and one of them told me "My job is not to be right, it is to be entertaining".

I wonder what it would have been like if I didn't leave when I did. Would I have started to buy into the moonshine? Someone wise said "It is difficult to get a man to believe something when his salary depends on him not believing it". Who knows what would have happened to me.