Having expectations is the trait of a valiant

This is an excerpt from the book 'Manuscript in Accra', by Paulo Coelho. People are asking questions here, answers to which is being explained by the Copt (a learned character in the book). A merchant asks him, ‘Describe the defeated ones’, and the Copt replies. The snippet in the image is a part of that answer. I loved this part because it essentially focuses on having expectations. Yes, like all other traits of a valiant, having expectations is also one of them. It might make us disappointed when something does not come as expected. But to stop expecting in the next go is like letting go off the spark from our lives. Having expectations is like carrying the spark, the purpose within ourselves. And I believe it defines characteristics of a human. Why are we so determined to turn inhuman? Why are we so determined to let go off all the expectations? Just because we don’t wish to get hurt?

Getting hurt, nursing ourselves, and getting back into the battle should be the spirit of our lives. When expectations break it is a defeat. But it can also be a failure by our choice. Failure does not allow us to expect again. We should know that defeat is a part of our lives. Only the defeated know love. Only the defeated ones will know the honor of losing and the joy of winning.

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Calling Humanity

Once upon a time, there existed a land of Gods. The emblem of an ancient civilization, it was the kernel of culture with enormous values. That country was where love dwelt, the art grew, and harmony existed among people of different tastes. Its rare spices added an unforgettable flavor throughout the world.

But then there came an epidemic. An epidemic which diseased more than half of the population of that country. Gods had already departed from their homeland long ago, they left the remaining humans to trample in the waves of epidemic. Many waves came, and they kept spoiling the population. With consecutive spoliation, the ancient glory started to fade off. Love, harmony, peace, and humanity, they all started to pine away. That country now is at the verge where humanity ceases to exist inside people and their ruthless facets rule. The epidemic is killing us with its effects. A new culture has evolved which is the manifestation of this epidemic.

Today’s politics, the corrupt leaders, and their corrupt governance, these come much later. Before we comment on this why shouldn’t we contemplate where has the humanity at each individual level gone? Is it now a mistake to expect a person to behave humanly, and should we apologize for expecting this? Whatever views you may lay upon this, I personally believe that indeed that’s a mistake to expect of some humanity. From big cities to small towns, the new culture dominates now. Lets not talk of what big portion of the country has gone affected by the waves of this inhuman epidemic, and try to realize how less is left from being affected. In this epidemic what not is coming up on the population as its effects. Rape, abortion, child abuse, child abandonment and what not. Daily newspapers after advertising the Lotus and the common man’s hand, only mentions of these effects on the people. By the people, on the people, each day there is a new ruthless tale to read. Read, sympathize, and forget.

Like the way waves of this epidemic comes, waves to stand up for change and bring a revolution comes too. The only difference is that the epidemic’s waves never leave but waves to stand up for change and bring a revolution come and go. The churn to speak out on this issue came inside me after having watched 'Thanks Maa', directed by Irfan Kamal. I know the churn will subside soon, because like many I have grown a tendency to get used to and to move on. But I will never forget the inhuman sides of people now.

I own a very little knowledge about politics and the way it works, but I get to have at least the feel of what’s going on good and what’s not. And this post is not about the politics, it’s about social evils created by the people that exist around us. Those who have watched ‘Thanks Maa’, they would relate to this post quite easily. The movie focuses on the issue of child abandonment. One can easily make out from the movie that how much degradation has incurred to humans, and how they have been adding other evil as well into the society. At many scenes I kept saying to myself, ‘Oh God, no not this.’ Irfan Kamal through his movie has made his audience shiver terribly by some brutal depictions of truth published in the newspapers. Having watched those scenes in the movie was atrocious. It has been rightly said by someone that both heaven and hell exists on this earth.

If we try to mend our own localized holes, slowly we would find that the whole of the unified garment has been restored. The garment which covers all of us its underneath, needs to be refurbished. We can’t survive in the nakedness. The humanity is expected from each one of us. And to expect this should never be a mistake.

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The Third Eye

They have always listened to what they wanted to listen. They have believed what they always wanted to believe. Sacrifices, good deeds, love, affection, they are all tested by the terms they keep within them and by their mind’s frame. Someone might die caring, loving, or fighting for some cause, but those who cannot understand the true essence of it are bound to fail on their mind-frame’s test. Since ages the human race has stayed afflicted, and shall likely stay to be so tomorrow too. Truth, it will continue to stay obscured and people deluded. Because they will always see what they want to see, they will listen what they want to listen, and they will believe what they want to believe.

Words matter the most. And harsh words matter even more. Beneath the effect of few harsh words, millions of words expressing love and affection goes crushed. An honest heart has broken ten times more. A selfless action has always been challenged, and mutual profits have been praised. Comfort lies in staying deluded, and satisfaction in abiding by the terms within mind’s frame. But what forms someone’s mind frame? Words flow down, their meaning muster up, and start to build a mind frame. Who cares if the meanings were right? They will see what they want to see, they will listen what they want to listen, and they will believe what they want to believe.

The truth is strange, and people weird. Diplomacy is the tool to success, straightforwardness in truth a hindrance. Truth won’t win hearts, it causes suspicion and people believe easily on what they find near to reality. And the reality is a kingdom where corruption rules, and each government change places and take their turns. An honest truth is difficult to endure, a manipulated truth goes down easily. Everything that happens in and around us, and the way we accept them, it’s all guided by our mind’s frame.

I wish if the almighty had gifted a third eye to everyone. That third eye could have helped to see the truth in its purest form which we can't see now. I wish our mind’s frame is carved out only after having seen the truth. And the third eye could be the tool for making this possible. What we accept, what we perceive, and what choices we would make, I wish if these could be arrived at only after having seen the truth. That third eye, if it existed could have wiped out deception, delusion, and confusion from this world.

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Multiple Commenting System widget for Blogger using jQuery UI

This blog post covers in detail those steps that will help you include a jQuery-UI based multiple commenting box widget to your blogger blogs. jQuery user interfaces are being used extensively as they provide an eloquent user interface and are light weight, ie they are faster to load. Moreover, they are compact and in a small screen area more of controls can be dealt with within its interface. I used the same jQuery-UI and developed a multiple commenting box widget for my blog. Currently I have included the Facebook comments, Blogger comments, and Google+ comments. This post is in continuation with my earlier post, where I described how to add different commenting system except Blogger’s default commenting system. Lately, I figured out a way in which Blogger’s default commenting system can also be used in the widget. And thus, here I am to share my code. If you find my code not working, or you get struck anywhere, feel free to comment and ask your query. You can connect with me on various social media platforms as well. I will feel glad to help you.

Step1 > Make a Facebook App. I hope you already know how to make one. This is required because we need the ‘App id’ for Facebook comment to start working.

Now, in the template editor, paste the following code before </head> :

<link rel="stylesheet" href="//code.jquery.com/ui/1.10.4/themes/smoothness/jquery-ui.css">

<script src="//code.jquery.com/jquery-1.10.2.js"></script>

<script src="//code.jquery.com/ui/1.10.4/jquery-ui.js"></script>

  

  <script>

  $(function() {

    $( "#tabs" ).tabs();

  });

  </script>

<meta content='YourFacebookProfileUserID' property='fb:admins'/>

<meta content='YourFacebookAppID' property='fb:app_id'/>

Just enter your Facebook Profile UserID and your App ID in the required place before pasting the code.

Step2 > Go to Blogger’s Edit Html section, and find <div class='comments' id='comments'>. If you click just before <div class='comments' id='comments'> on the template pane, you will find that the code within this <div> tag gets collapsed. This will help us to select the entire content within these tags. 

(the highlighted one in the screenshot is what we will select and paste there the new code)

Now we need to cut this selected content and paste there the code below:

Step3 > Save the template. And refresh your blog. You will find my multiple commenting box instead of Blogger’s default commenting interface. You will get Facebook comments, Blogger’s and Google+ commenting system in this widget. If you wish to add some other commenting system, then that can be done too. Just leave me a message. And will help you out with that.

Note: This widget can be customized to different styles by overriding the default CSS. I am using the same widget with a slightly different styling done by me. The different styling can be done either by altering the default CSS or by explicitly using an inline CSS.

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Search for the life

As the train takes me through the darkness

My eyes search for the light,

To find in the thickets

If somewhere the life survives.

Rattling of wheels on tracks,

Keeps me mused and awake

Against the envelope of sleep

Embraced over the stretches of darkness.

Blindfolded on my open eyes

My ears make me see now;

Bridges, tunnels, plains…

All I hear, and in my mind I see.

But where is the life?

That, I can’t see.

I search for the light

To find in the thickets

If somewhere the life survives.

In sky is embellished,

Stars and the pearly moon.

And the rest is swallowed

In the endless depths of darkness

Through which I am moving

And in them my eyes keep looking

For if I can find light.

Who knows…

Somewhere out there the life still survives.

Image Courtesy: Google Images Search

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Looking back for a moment...

What has started, will someday come to an end. Be it my journey, yours, or someone else’s, or be this universe, all that has started will someday come to an end. Our lives in totality comprise of several small and big journey’s whose start and end are the subset of the set ‘the life we lived so far’, which in turn is the subset of a Godly universal set. Human’s thoughts and perceptions, they belong to a range of output from a philosophical function. This function drives the way a person enacts. With experience this function updates, and so does the output. Sometimes I wonder, how closely related philosophy of life, mathematics and science are. I can mathematically, programmatically relate different aspects as I see in my life. 

At the back of my minds, I am being flooded with memories I reminisce about the start of my college life. I always aspired to be a Computer Science Engineer. Having failed at IIT-JEE, my moral was pathetically down. In the year 2009, I was sent to Kota for pursuing the coaching at Bansal Classes. Even after the rigorous study, I admit my mistakes had been there, all investments turned unsuccessful. I reattempted the IIT-JEE in 2010, and failed at it again. But through West Bengal Joint Entrance Examination, I secured a significant rank that helped me to get Computer Science at Bengal College of Engineering and Technology at Durgapur. The college life that started on 10th August 2010 is about to end now. As I said before, this journey is just like one such journey among many which is a subset of the set ‘the life I lived so far’.

I have always been a kind of person who develops attachments very easily, and finds it difficult to move on. I had the same feeling at its peak when I was about to leave Kota as I am having right now. Various incidents, good as well as bad, they start to toil down the memory lane as I sit back for a moment in silence. I still miss Kota, lovely people I met there, and my friends whose friendship I will cherish forever. And I will miss Durgapur too. With million slaps of bitterness, there are several notes to sooth me off too, which are like mementos for achievement. 

I remember, I even wrote a poetry to express my attachment with our hostel. In these four years, I am the one who have lived in the hostel for the maximum amount of time. I have written several short stories, many poems, and innumerable random blog posts. All of these, they will still be with me, connected with incidents from the past. Now that in a month I will be leaving college, I want to thank all of them who contributed towards building a better 'me'. Durgapur, it will be special to me always. A part of me will live here forever, amongst the silence of roads gushed with wind and dead leaves in them, in those corridors of hostel where I stood alone for hours thinking what I don't know, in all those rooms where I lived in these four years. Its not a ghostly feeling and its description. "I will come back", and this will give a hint of what part of me will continue to live in Durgapur.

But as I said before, this journey is just like one such journey among many which is a subset of the set ‘the life I lived so far’. There shall be more journeys for me.

(when I was in first year of my college)

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To be who you are...

‘Be who you are…’ I have come across this as a teaching in many books, numerous articles on the internet about self-improvement, as well as in the movies. I have no doubt on this that it is an instinct which successful ones had in them. Even in the book ‘The Winner Stands Alone’ by Paulo Coelho, the message has been delivered to stick to the original in you and you will stand away from the crowd but on the right track towards success. And this notion somewhere suffice to comply as a trait and add up with many other traits that a winner possess.  

But I seldom confuse myself. This may be because of not having much experience in life, or may be because I am not able to understand the message in the aforesaid line completely. I confuse whether the statement is conditional. Secondly, I don’t doubt on the statement but I perceive that the statement alone is not solely correct. I believe that I need to look into priorities, I need to judge what is right and what is not, and I need to foresee the outcome of my actions before I apply ‘To be who I am.’

Our mind is a factory of thoughts. Many thoughts produced go overlooked while many others make us contemplate. And I contemplate and I find I cannot be entirely who I am at all instances. I need to look if my team-mates are not being offended as a result of my strict nature towards achieving quality performance. I need to get a bit flexible to allow everyone to perform together, happily. I don't like to talk much, but when I am on the job as a salesman I need to be expressive, patient, and talkative. Stupid examples they may sound, but to me they are like few of instances out of many where I cannot be simply who I am. I need to look into other parameters like my priority, foreseen outcome of my actions, or to be say simply in a profitable position. To be who a drug dealer is, or a criminal mastermind to be what he is, that’s completely wrong and that cannot be preached. Wrong doing and right doing, and our ability to judge them, drives what we want to be and what we should be. The statement ‘To be yourself’ is a culmination of attributes that blend our stand in our lives. It stands above all in the hierarchy of self-improvement traits. When all traits below have been considered, then only the top one can be fetched, and that adds a whole lot of meaning to the statement itself. 

Life is not entirely about me and myself. I am just one of the person on this planet, which is just one of the planet of this unfathomable universe. To the life as I see, I don’t find there is anything that lies at the elemental level solely with all the importance. Life is all about totality, various constituents of it combining together to form a meaning. You add two independent things and we get a meaningful thing, you add two meaningful things and that would yield a third meaningful thing. Likewise, to be who I am, that signifies to its truest meaning when all forms of traits combine together. All those traits together would define me what truly I am, or what I choose to be. 

Image courtesy: Google Images Search

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The Love that I saw...

The dreamscape was not over yet… Stories within stories were still unfolding, and I was there the protagonist savoring the near perfect life. There were friends, relationships, and the love existed in those relationships. Life was not a cramp to live with in a city of hustle. It was winter, the moon shining white, and the musk floated in the air of a small town called Brotherhood. A colony of people dwelt there who loved to grow affection for others. They cultivated love, they ate love, but they never sold them. They had stored so much of love in their hearts that their chests were bigger than the people on the other side, separated from dreamy episodes by a thin film. ‘Those who rupture the film don’t get roles in our episodes’, he had said. They must cross over it, without tearing apart their own existence as well as that of the film.
I am not the creator of dreamscape; I am the protagonist playing the role that I wanted. He always insisted me to quench my thirst with Love and gallop on the pavements without the fear of falling down and getting injured. He confirmed, as long as I am in Brotherhood and my wishes are sacred I won’t get injured, although he never guarantees anything for the world on the other side. Everyone calls him the Grandfather. Big chested people say that he is the creator of Brotherhood.

I had always thought of love. I imagined that one day I will be at par with them who were loved on this side, in the real world. I was in delusion in reality. I was deluded till the night when the grandfather explained me the truth. I don’t remember how it happened, but I recollect that he had crossed the film, stepped into the real world, and carried me away to Brotherhood. In that episode, I spent the whole night at Grandfather’s mansion where he lives alone. He is the one with the biggest chest in his town. There we had dinner together; we had roasted turkey, sausages, and warm milk for me while he had wine for himself. He kept smiling at me in between his sips of wine, and through pauses in his speech. He explained me how deluding the world on the other side is, and how deluding its inhabitants are.

‘Love is not just between a girl and a boy. Love is so sacred that it exists between every two entities and more. Love is between sand and stones. Love is between air and the mountains. Love is between birds and the sky. Love is between a mother and her kids. Love is between me and you. And don’t forget, that the love is between you and yourself.’

As the grandfather spoke, his eyes used to get closed and his right arm swung here and there in air.

‘But do you know what is necessary for the Love to be present? It’s the truth and the honesty. And I doubt they don’t exist anymore on the other side’, his head bowed down, his eyes were still closed.

Grandfather sipped some more, and then followed his words.

‘You might get yourself hurt my son. Expectations have been killing people from inside. I have lived my whole life there, and I know how many times I was killed.’

‘Will I get killed too grandfather?’, I asked hesitatingly.

‘I will not let you. And I have brought here to prevent you from any injury you might incur. Expectations, wishing for love staying on the other side, these are potentially dangerous’, replied he.

‘Come on, give me your hand and lets go for a night stroll. Let me show you how the Love feels like in its truest form. But I suggest you not to expect the same when you wake up in your world. In Brotherhood we cultivate love, we eat love, but we never sell them. You must know what the true love is and this will prevent you from falsehood and delusions…’

The night was beautiful. Trees were dressed with shimmering lights from fireflies. The twilight was mused in the music of violin coming from a distant hut. I saw the moon through the clouds that were not polluted. I could see people with varying sizes of chest. And I could easily deduce who were more loving. ‘Truth and Honesty’, I was engrossed within depths of my mind with these two words told by the grandfather to an extent that I watched every movement in that episode to confirm that indeed the truth and the honesty existed there which made the whole ambience so loving. The truth and the honesty, they existed in families, between friends, and strangers. I was the protagonist, but I was the stranger too. But the showering love never seemed to go lesser on me.

I would never free my hand from the grandfather’s. I wish if I could stay here forever… I wish if…

I was about to mutter some more to myself but the episode ended. The night full of love came to an end with the warm sun overhead and with the alarm clock proudly at its work.

It’s not summer here, but still the heat is killing. I don’t focus on weather reports. I have a different measurement scale like the one that the grandfather used in his life here. I want to learn some more from him. But not right now. I must hurry for the school. I will be the protagonist in the next episode of the dreamscape tonight.  

PS: Every night I get into dreams, and they are like episodes of a tele serial where the life is what I have always wanted. Dreamscape is a tele serial, and I am the protagonist, and I will continue to be in each of its upcoming episodes.

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