Contemplation on CONTENTMENT

-Sukanya Krishnan

Self Contentment, to me, is the result of internal realization of who I am and what do I possess and how unique I am , which in turn results in further realization of one’s inner potential and total freedom from the bondages of expectations, complaints, disappointments, anger, ego and many such vices. A contended soul uses the physical eyes not to look out and compare with others but to look at others for tips for self development. Self contentment does not mean that the process of self development ceases but the process becomes much effortless and even inspiring for the others.

Being contended – Does it mean being enlightened? I feel Enlightenment is a process which doesn't end till there is existence. Then is contentment also a process which can only be continually improved and achieving the same would result in liberation? Indeed yes, till there is learning, changes and development are a constant process. In this process of life, nothing is permanent and what you hold as yourself also is subject to changes. Then how do I stay contended all time? Being aware of the self constantly helps out a lot. Almost 16 hrs of our day we spend watching outside. Do I watch myself? Am I aware of whats going on inside me? According to me, tuning the mind to listen to it for a while helps out a lot in the process of creating self awareness.

Contentment actually takes 2 different levels – Gross and Subtle. A gross level is always shallow, shaky and vulnerable to external conflicts. Subtle level is the outcome of self realization and requires sustenance. I still can bring back my childhood memories where I used to feel contended with things of small values like spending my holidays on a swing made from a sari hung from the hook in the ceiling, watching a black and white movie on DD during Sunday evenings, learning cycling without falling even once, using my first ink pen, watching birds, buying a new dress etc etc. But nowadays as I grow up the gross elements for gross contentment is taking a much bigger form. If I keep on chasing these gross level elements that might satisfy me for a meager amount of time, when do I realize that this chase will be a never ending one like the case of a dog chasing its own tail? It is time now to open the eyes of wisdom and look inside for the real elements of contentment and move on to the next level.

When there is so much of work to do within ourselves we are always doing something else as work in this mechanical world which just results in adding up to the chaos that is already in plenty inside. Then does it mean that one should stop working and remain idle? Nay… Extremes are not safe at all always. A balance is what makes a harmony.

"Serenity isn't freedom from the storm, rather peace within the storm" - is the truth after all.

Air Canada - II

-Vidhya Krishnan

Suggestion: Please read the ‘Air Canada –I’ blog first

After sorting out our rooms in ‘The Westin’ hotel, we got refreshed and the conference began at 9 am. As the day progressed, sleepless travel of more than 35 hours struck me. Nothing made sense to me. Although everyone spoke in English, it sounded like Greek and Latin to me. I decided to have a bit of sleep before I attend the poster session. There were two poster sessions. That particular day was fixed for our poster (that I prepared with my friends) and the next day was my PhD poster. I should say I was more excited for my PhD poster than the other one. Anyway, I put the poster up on the board for the viewers and I went to my hotel room in the afternoon to get a bit of sleep to sort my head out for the evening poster session. I went to bed at 2 pm. Suddenly, I was woken up by an alarm sound. For few minutes, I couldn’t understand anything. I collected myself back and saw the alarm clock in my room going off. I pressed the stop button and noticed 12.00 on it’s display. It was dark all around me. I opened the curtains and looked through the French window of the room. The city looked beautiful with all lights and huge buildings. The roads looked quite. I enjoyed the scene for few minutes and made a call to the reception. I asked the lady in the desk, “what time is it and what day?”. She said it is 12 am, Monday (I went to bed on Sunday afternoon). I said to myself, “Oops! The poster session must have been over” (I hope none of those friends read this blog ;) ). I went back to bed and slept. The next day really felt fresh and collected my poster and comments people posted for it. I enjoyed my PhD work poster session and the rest of the conference.

I went to few places in the city and had a nice time as well. I brought with me few maple syrup bottles as Canada is popular for Maple tree. One can see the maple leaf in the Canadian flag. It was time to come back to UK. Fortunately, our Greek colleague had to leave a day earlier than myself and my supervisor. Myself and my supervisor arrived at the Edmonton airport quite early and we checked in our baggage and roamed around the airport. This time there weren’t any delays and we flew to Manchester on time. We arrived at the Manchester airport and waited for our check-in baggage to come. We finally found out that it hasn’t come in the flight we came. I thought, “Oh! This time the baggage not the delay”. I have flown in many airlines and this is the first time I lost my check-in baggage. We filled in the lost-baggage form and described our baggage and left. Three days after the baggage arrived at door without fail. Fortunately, we didn’t lose the bags while going to attend the conference in Canada. Thanks to Air Canada - ‘the best airline of the year 2001’. J

Air Canada - I

- Vidhya Krishnan

During my PhD in 2002, there was a computational biology conference in Edmonton, Canada. Generally, conferences are held in nice and beautiful places so that participants can enjoy their visit. From our two of us along with my supervisor planned to attend the conference and present posters on our work. The airline we chose was ‘Air Canada’. It is the best airline for 2001.

We booked it from Manchester (an hour and a half from Leeds). We were quite excited about the trip as it is one of the biggest international conferences. We arrived at the Manchester airport with huge tubes that carry our posters. Everyone in the airport starred at us as though we were carrying AK47. Apart from my PhD work, I also carried a poster we prepared on our own with few of my friends (one of them is a last minute.com in submitting assignments or posters). He handed it to me at the last minute and was quite excited about me presenting the posters we prepared on our own. We stood in the queue waiting for it to move. For a long time, we stood in the same place chatting. There was an announcement that the flight is delayed by 5 hours. The queue dispersed and we went to the café shop to spend 5 hours. Myself and my colleague went around the airport. He is a funny Greek guy who doesn’t like to shut the mouth even for a second. Most of our lab mates often wondered where does he get the energy from! He can talk on any topic from politics, history to religion. My ears automatically got tired after an hour and I couldn’t hear any thing of what he said. My supervisor became the victim. Finally, we spent our 5 hours and were tired. Fortunately, the flight was ready now. Thanks to “Air Canada – the best airline of the year 2001”, we got the business class although we booked economy class. Very comfortable and posh seats. Luckily, I got a seat away from my Greek colleague.

We arrived at Toronto and went through the tedious migration procedure where there is no such thing called ‘privacy’. They checked all the personal belongings. Finally, when we came out we realized it is already time for our connecting flight. Toronto airport is a huge airport and we had to go to a different terminal. We collected our check-in baggage and literally dragged and ran in the airport. It looked as though we were on a race. My Greek friend didn’t stop talking even in the run. He was cursing the ‘Air Canada – the best airline of the year 2001’ for making us run like this in a huge airport. Finally, we ran for 20 minutes and stood in a long queue. Something told me it is not the right queue. We enquired and found out that our connecting flight had already gone. Hurray! We missed our connecting flight. Thanks to Air Canada -……………………..

We sat in the airport. It was nearly 11 pm. We (just myself and my supervisor) were quite tired. Our Greek friend had now started on the new topic- Canadian history. We were sleepy and exhausted. We waited for an hour for the next connecting flight. My supervisor heard all about the Canadian history like a story time for sleepy kids. I sat somewhere quite far away and had a nap. The connecting flight was ready. We boarded the flight and kept my bags and slept. After an hour or so, some whispering noise woke me up. I saw the flight was in the land. I thought it was a pretty quick flight. I asked the person sitting next to me, “We arrive at Edmonton so fast!?” He said, “No, we are still in Toronto. There is some problem in the radar.” We all had to get off the plane and wait for another one. Finally, we managed to fly to Edmonton and reached at 4 a.m. Since we didn’t reach Edmonton on time, the hotel we booked thought we won’t turn up and cancelled our bookings. After all the hassles we got rooms. Now, my Greek colleague was a bit tired! Thanks to Air Canada – the best airline of the year 2001. The story is not finished yet.

To be continued………….

TheLastMinute.com

- Vidhya Krishnan

Yes, I really love the experience of doing few things at the last minute. One of those, is catching a train / bus or flight! I think there is a thrill in catching train or bus in the last minute. I really don’t prefer waiting for long time in the airports, train station and bus station. Even if I have to I don’t mind observing the comics (people or events that happen) that goes on around me.

This habit of mine really annoys my other family members, especially my dad, who likes to be in the train station an hour before the time. I can’t imagine myself doing that. L Even now when I have to get a short distance train my dad gets ready 2 hour ago and make me aware of the train time.

Once I had to catch a train from Pune to Madurai. As usual, I started at the right time (just 30 minutes before) and there was a terrible traffic. The fellow who dropped me at the station drove like a mad. In spite of that, we were delayed by 10 minutes. I thought, “fine then. Missed the train”. We went to the platform and saw the crowd still waiting. The fellow who came with me said, “Generally, trains from Bombay are delayed”. Train was yet to come. I said, “I love my India!”. J

This is not the only chasing incident. I had to catch a train from Leeds (UK) to London. I started 45 minutes before the time (See, I learnt the lesson from my previous experience). When I came out to the main road, I saw the road was choco blocked. There was no hope of traffic getting cleared within an hour. I thought, “OK, let us try our luck today”. So I started walking to the train station. The train was at 3 pm and I reached the station at 3.05pm. But it is Britain where things happen right on the dot. So I saw the train moving right in front of me. Unlike Indian trains, once the train gets a green signal the doors are closed. So one can’t get into the moving train as we do in India. So I had to say bye to the train. In the ticket counter, I was told I had to buy a new ticket for the next train that starts an hour after (4pm). I thought let me try to talk to the train company. So I went to the office and explained my situation to the gentle man and asked him, “what do I do now?”. He said, “Don’t worry, you go in the next train at 4 pm with this ticket”. I said, “Oh! That is great. But what about the TT? In my ticket it is mentioned 3pm. He would ask me how did I get into the 4 o’ clock train.” But he said, “No worries, he won’t ask you and you would be fine”. I asked him, “How? How can you say that?”. He smiled and said, “I am the TT”. When he saw me again in the train, he smiled and punched my ticket without any question.J

Whenever my family members travel with me, I can see their blood pressure shooting up. I say, “Relax! Cool! Everything will be alright!”. I can see my family members raising their eyebrows when they read this. ;)

The Global look

- Vidhya Krishnan

I would like to share some hilarious incidents that happened in my life based on the physical look.

Five years ago in Leeds (UK), I was walking in the street in winter. It was quite cold and had a black scarf around my head covering the neck just like Muslims wear. There was a guy walking behind me. I felt he was following me and came quite closer to me. Now I could hear him saying something. It became clearer as he came closer. He said, “Salaam Malekum” (Muslims greet each other saying this). He kept saying this again and again and expected me to answer him. I was all alone in the street and felt it is better to keep quite. He started talking in a language that I couldn’t understand. I walked faster. He never gave up. He kept talking and was behind me. OOPs! I thought what should I do now?

Suddenly, he overtook me and stood right in front of me. I looked at his eyes. He looked harmless. Immediately he realized he has some misunderstanding. He said, “Sorry, I thought you are an Arabian. That is why I spoke to you in Arabic. I am really sorry for bothering you”. I smiled at him and said, “ It is ok.” The incident really made me laugh whenever I think about it.

The other day in Leeds, I was waiting for the bus and there was a small group of Indians in the bus stop. They were having fun talking in Tamil. They thought I don’t understand Tamil and cracked jokes. I smiled and asked them, “where are you from?”. All of them looked at me with their jaws dropped. I asked them why do they looked surprised. One of them asked me, “who taught you Tamil?”. I thought, “Oops! Who taught me Tamil?” I asked him why. They said, “We taught you are a north Indian and someone taught you few sentences in Tamil.” I smiled at them and said it is my mother tongue. They felt a bit embarrassed.

There are many times when people have asked if I am from Bengal or Singapore. I really felt global. How freeing is it to belong or relate to many places? It is pretty interesting to observe that it is the general tendency of people to try to find someone’s origin of whomever they meet.

I have noticed that first ever time when I went out of my home town or state, people with lot of enthusiasm asking, “Oh! You from the same town / state as I am”. When I went to the north of India, I heard people saying, “Oh! You from the south? Me too.” When I went to UK, I saw people getting excited and saying, “Oh! You from India?” and all Indians clung together. I just extended the scenario and thought, “What if we go to mars?”. People would say, “Oh! You from the planet Earth?” J

How we try to cling to things or people that we are familiar with? Can I come out of the cocoon and see the bigger picture? Can I come out of the label and free others from this label as well? Can I feel that I belong to everyone, the whole world. Not just to a small town or a state or a country. Rather the whole universe is mine. Of course, embassies would not be pleased to hear this. This vision can bring peace all over the world although not an entry without a visa.

The perfect world

- Vidhya Krishnan

Many times I wonder why is this world around me not perfect? Why are people behaving like this? Why does this happen? So many such questions bombard my mind. In a quite moment, I found some intriguing answers. If the world outside is perfect how would one get an opportunity to turn inward? How would one know that there is a world beyond this physical world? If everything is perfect outside, one would never like to nourish the world inside, that is the source.

Many of us might have come across moments or events in life that we really don’t like. We wish it didn’t happen. But did we ever realize it is a great opportunity for me to go beyond and accept things as it is. My expectations prevents me from acceptance. It keeps me waiting, disappointed, anxious etc. It brings out various negative emotions / feelings with it. It makes me to lose myself and my precious time.

Do I really need a perfect world? Is there any other option? Yes, there is. To make myself perfect! :)

Yet another day…

-Sukanya Krishnan

My Mourning blues..Oops Morning blues…

Ok…So its time again to get up with the same thought about what am I going to do at work today!! Oh..yet another day to go through… sitting at my same old office, going through the same old stereotypic work, attending the same old meetings with all the HEADS’ heads put together - yet arriving at no conclusion and no clarity…what nonsense am I doing…Why should I do it this way..why not do it even better..why do these people work as if its jus for the sake of it…why can't they handle things better even after working over the same job for more than a decade…GOK…I mean God Only Knows….This same OLD office is the one am in only for the past 21 months..But it seemed like 21 decades…

I work as a Production Engineer, in a place where except me all are men. I have to honestly admit I never came across any Gender Discrimination so far…But that itself was a slight discomfort for me most of the time…I had to sit with my ears closed…for some of the rubbish conversations going on around…for some of the stupid fights that will go up to the extent of personal abusing among themselves..for some of those immatured gossips …for some of their talks on their great experiences in bars.. for some of their proud boastings on that…oops…I was never prepared to take it…

This USED to be my level of frustrations which was getting increased day by day inside…
But I am not regretting even for the slightest extent for choosing this field of Manufacturing which is solely a man’s world (even now)…Instead I had my side clear…I started to move out of the place before I could sense any discomfort approaching…Fine..before my whole idea of this post takes an offset, let me come back to the point...How to overcome these morning blues…or even evening blues…or blues as a whole…What is it that I am expecting out of life..?
what is that I really think would keep me happy all the time…?
I knew the answer…Once I knew, it was not at all tough to come to office after that..i felt happy taking up the challenge..Not all people run the race…many prefer to be an audience..

I feel, accepting what I have this moment is the greatest strength I can show towards the situations. I can not change what happens around me..i can't change people..am not here for that..but..

I can have control over me..over my false expectations..over my perceptions..over my emotions and over my needs..My happiness doesn't lie outside..its well preserved inside…So just go for it..Grab this second..Make it eternal..and there is the happiness…Making each and every second successful and fulfilling for the self…

The best thing i can do to preserve my happiness is to stop looking outside and turn inward...

Still I sometimes feel dejected... but then I remind myself, the race is not yet over…its not yet another day now.. .but.. Wow!! There is another day more...

"The hardest thing in life, is letting go of what you thought was real."---- This was the simplest of the lessons i learnt recently...Lesson is simple..But way to go....

The beautiful mind

-Vidhya Krishnan

This is not a review of the movie, rather review of my own experience. Mind- Amazing, tricky, powerful. These are the words I think describe the mind.

I wanted to learn swimming when I was 28. I lived in UK at that time. People whoever I came across knew how to swim. I thought to myself, what if I fall in water by accident? I decided to learn swimming. One of my batch mates was a great inspiration. I went to the pool in the city of Leeds (town up north of England). It has a big pool (50 m and 6’ deep). Many competitions are held in the pool. I asked for a tutor. A black guy came as my tutor. You remember Morpheus in ‘The Matrix’ movie. He looked like him. He said to me “You already know swimming, what do you want me to teach?”. I said, “No, I don’t know how to swim. Believe me”. He said, “No, it is not true. Anyone can swim. It is just that you haven’t realized it yet”. He smiled at me.


I asked him, “how do I realize it?”. He said, “You got to make your mind believe that you can do it. It is a fact that anybody can swim and they can’t drown in water. The human body is mostly made of water (75%). The body is like a air sack. It can’t sink on its own. That is the reason why dead bodies float. The natural tendency of the body is to float in water not to sink. Since the mind doesn’t believe it (when we are alive) due to fear, the muscles become stiff and people instead of lying flat they try to come out of water vertically and fill their lungs with water and they drown. I shall demonstrate you right away”. He then asked me to push myself into water holding my breath. I tried hard and found that I couldn’t push myself into the water, rather the water pushed me back to the surface. That moment was a great experience for me. I realized and wondered why did I get scared of water. I did the same exercise again and again to see and realize. You won’t believe, I learnt swimming in a week’s time. When I showed him how I could swim, he smiled at me again.

Oh, my mind! How did you trick me? I realized then that how in real life as well when we face new or different situations/people/place, our mind creates fear about it. It is just that mind sees it as something unknown. Mind doesn’t like ‘Unknown’. That is why we see people clinging to people they know or habits or place or job they feel comfortable. They don’t want to try something different.

From the incident, I learnt that if I can see beyond what my mind sees, problems do not exist. I need to understand the role of my mind. Mind is to think. But not to make decisions or conclusions. Of course, when I jump into water I need to be prepared. I should not breathe in when I am inside water and adopt to the environment. But there is no need to panic. Panic drowns people, not water!
The enemy is inside – fear not outside. Probably, an article on fear, what do you say? ;)

My First Blog

-Sukanya Krishnan.

My first blog…but this is not the first time am experimenting on writing…Part of the Krishnans, I feel really thrilled to share my thoughts through this page…I do not want to introduce myself by briefing about my past or about my physical identities rather I feel my writings should best reveal my true identity in due course of time…Which I myself am in the process of realizing..

All of us are pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better at hiding it... So here is the place for all those bizarre thoughts to come out of its hiding…

My sister (Vidhya Krishnan) being my first and forever inspiring IDOL :-) (intended pun!!;-)) has been the initiator for creating this page…

I am looking for a wonderful experienc both inside and outside me to share with, in the coming days…


The hardest battle you are ever going to have to fight is the battle to be just you