Everything Is As it Should Be

My youtube yoga guru Adrienne has a penchant for delivering disarmingly simple yet profound quotes. At the start of the pandemic, I pinned some of them on the wall above my desk to bolster me. I have written about them here. But, one quote of hers that I have always recoiled from is 'Everything is as it should be". She says it in here cozy Winter yoga video, which is one of my favourite practices that I do only during autumn/winter. Everything is obviously not as it should be, and never is. If one were to pick the present moment, the war in Gaza, the rise of fascism, climate catastrophe are just a few examples. But, today, as I came across the quote during practice it landed differently. I felt like the quote was targeted at my inner world where everything is always as it should be. Why is that the case? Because the mind is either in one or two states. Either it is calm, or it is aware that its not calm. There are several ways to deal with the latter state. Take action, talk oneself out of the funk  or do nothing or wait for the storm to blow over. Tacked on to this maxim is the acknowledgement that the world works in mysterious ways and that sometimes blessings can, at first glance, seem like curses. I don't know how much sense I am making but these are my initial thoughts on the subject and may need to be fleshed out further. 

Tummy Upset before UK Return

 I meant to title this post 'Tummy Travails" but of course that title was taken. Its 1:30 am but my upset tummy is keeping me from sleeping. Tomorrow, or rather today, is going to be a long day as I fly back to the UK, but tell that to my stomach. I always have tummy troubles when I visit India, and this time was no different. One night of excess early in my trip turned an unsettled stomach into an upset stomach, and my constitution hasn't been the same since. My stomach had take a lurch for the worse in identical circumstances last year, but as I told my Mother, sometimes you have to make the same mistake twice to learn your lesson. Suffice to say, I am not going near pot for a long time. Maybe it is a question of quantity rather than the substance, but I am not interested in ascertaining which one it is. My upset tummy was a big theme of last year's trip to India, so I went back to my posts from that period to see what I had written, and whether there were any pearls of wisdom I could pick up to see me through the next 24 hours. I am no insomniac but I have enough experience of sleep problems to know that sleepless night=horrible next day. No such luck. That period was towards the end of my lean blogging phase. So, I suppose I will be blogging a lot over the next few days. Blogging forces me to lift my chin up, because nobody wants to read a mopey blog. And, when you write about something you are forced to put some distance between yourself and what you are writing about to see it clearly. And, that distance can be quite useful in difficult situations because you stop identifying with the situation so closely, even if for a brief interval. 

Debate on Politics

I mentioned to a family friend that I had participated in the Palestine protests, which triggered a lengthy debate about political action. This blog is not about politics so I will spare you the details, but I was a bit offended by his initial remark, and also disappointed at my inability to hold my own in the ensuing debate. As a result, I said some things that were not downright rude but showed bad form. And, now I am feeling uneasy about the whole exchange. I am not convinced by his arguments, which are similar to some other loved ones', but I am not able to articulate my position well. I am not going to deny that my ego has been bruised, but I feel like there is more to it that even if I can't put my finger on 'that'. Maybe I should just sleep on it. 

Individual Responsibility vs Social Reform

 Today, I mentioned to my granny that I was trying to fly as little as possible to reduce my carbon footprint. My uncle responded that that wouldn't make a difference, which started the well-worn discussion about the best way to tackle the climate crisis--to encourage individuals to reduce their carbon footprint or to push governments and states to take action. The easy answer is both--this is a battle that will have to be fought on many fronts, etc. etc. But, let's go over the arguments for either. The doctrine of individual responsibility has  a murky history as it was propagated by oil majors to obfuscate their own role in the climate crisis. From a tactical perspective, pushing a doctrine of individual responsibility can open the door to charges of hypocrisy from bad-faith actors as almost no one can lead a carbon-free lifestyle in the today's world. At the same time, there is no chance that the world can support the current ecological footprint of our class if everyone in the world had our class' standard of living. And, surely, we cannot advocate for some (actually a lot) of people to lead less comfortable lives than us. That is not a morally sound position. So, a non-sanctimonious approach to individual responsibility is that one is simply preparing for a substantially less comfortable low-carbon future. Also, if one spurns individual responsibility, surely it becomes difficult to argue that people should stop flying in private jets? Why should filthy-rich individuals not be exempt from individual responsibility for the climate crisis? However, I do feel its not simply that we should do both individual actions and agitate for systemic change. Its that we cannot do one without the other. The consumption decisions of individuals  in aggregate drive the capitalist engine, but individual actions might not add but not quickly enough to cause systemic change by itself. But, creating a critical mass of people agitating for systemic change that is not eco-fascistic requires people to acknowledge that climate change affects people to different degrees as individuals and that the biggest polluters will have to make the biggest sacrifices. Creating a low-carbon world would entail a radical reimagining of our wants and needs (and the line in between) as individuals. 

Airport blog Dec 2023

 As per tradition, another blog as I wait for a flight to the airport. The past week has been a bit of a blur even though it does not feel like I did all that much. I had a job application to finish, interviews to fix (which I didn't manage to do), and a bad cold to contend with, even as I wrapped up teaching for the semester. I also didn't participate in any Palestine activism, partly because of my cold, partly because my mind was occupied with this stuff. But, I did spend a lot of time on Twitter getting worked up about events in Gaza. Since India sharply swung rightward, it has been a reliable fount of bad news on the political front. For the past two months, India has been supplanted by Palestine. Now, for the next five weeks, I imagine Palestine won't be uppermost on my mind. The struggle for a free Palestine, and all it symbolizes for people of, from and for the Global South, will be a long one and I look forward to rejoining it when I return to the UK in January. But, right now I am looking forward to a break from it. 

Irate Student At Office Hours

 I had an unpleasant exchange with a student in my office hours today. He was unhappy with his mark on a recent assignment and two of his friends and his mother agreed that he deserved a higher mark. I tried explaining my feedback to him, but he wasn't convinced. The conversation became a bit heated, but I managed to just about keep my cool. We were going around in circles, and I had a tough time getting off the call. He later wrote to me apologizing for the tone of our call and asking for guidance on how to appeal his grade while also seeking advice on how to do better for his next assignment. It just occurred to me how bizarre that is. Why seek the advice of someone whose academic judgement you don't trust? Maybe he jsut wanted me to put some advice in writing that he could brandish if his mark on the next assignment didn't satisfy him. After the exchange, I was a bit shaken so I wrote to a senior colleague asking for a second opinion on the assignment. I was confident that the assignment didn't deserve more than 2-3 marks more at best, and I would have increased the grade if my colleague suggested it. No one likes being bullied into raining marks, but beyond a point I can't be arsed. The colleague replied that it was impossible to second mark every and if I was confident in my grade I should leave it be. So, I decided to leave the student's email unreplied. And, I am glad to report that I don't feel as shaken by the incident as I expected. 

Double trouble

When I got home yesterday and turned the light switch on, nothing happened. My throat had been itching all day and I was looking forward to a peaceful evening. I mentally prepared myself to go early to bed as without power on a winter night, there is absolutely nothing you can do. Luckily, it was a minor problem which got resolved within 30 minutes. Today, with my throat still feeling scratchy, I was looking forward to an early evening after meeting some people over drinks. And, as I and another person from the group got on out cycles, I discovered that my front tire was flat. Not a good day for a flat tire, and home would be at least a 90 min walk away on a cold evening. I toyed with taking the punctured tire on the bus with me, and leaving my bike behind, but that would mean another trek tomorrow morning. So, I decided to op my earphones and drag my bike all the way home. The not-so-good thing about walking your puncture bike on a cycle path is watching cyclists with intact tires whizz by you. But, today that was not the only sight. A pair of runners overtook me and I saw that they were tied to each other by their wrists. Shortly, another similarly tethered pair overtook me and I saw that one of them had 'blind runner' and the other had 'Guide runner' written on their backs. That sight filled me with a warm glow. Its wasn't just seeing someone worse off than me on a bad day. It was seeing someone worse off living their best life. As someone born with poor eyesight, losing my eyesight has always been one of my biggest fears. SO, it felt good to know that even if I lose my eyesight, it needn't stop me from running.