Obituary - Lalit Mohan.

SHARED THOTS...........20/09/12.

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Obituary – Lalit Mohan ( 01.07.1978 – 21.09.2007).

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Dear Lalit,

 

Today is the 20^th Sept. How well, I can recall the joy in your face, the spark in your eyes as you collected that dream Appointment order & Agreement from KPMG Kuwait. I was waiting for you outside the building… you crossed the road, jumped into the car, waving the sheets of paper. I had just a glance as I settled to drive. The Agreement was dated 20^th Sept 2006 !!

 

Alas, who knew but Him, that this Agreement had a validity of only one year !! 

 

Today is the fifth anniversary of the day, He decided your mission in this life is over. The Lord in his infinite wisdom took that arbitrary decision without a care or concern for the vast number of those who love you and would miss you forever in this world.

We all love the Lord, pray for His mercy, sing His praise, know well His Omnipotence … yet, He will never be able to remove the pain in our hearts left by his very rude decision, even as you are with Him and find everlasting Peace in His abode.

 

Hurt we are, we thank Him nevertheless, for granting the mercy of watching you born and grow to be a fine young man in our midst, for 29 short years. We love you and our only hope as we continue to obey His will in our own individual mission, is that sooner or later we would meet you and together we would enjoy once again His love and care.

 

Take care my dear and be there as our guide as we seek solace and directions in our mission seeking ultimate liberation... Lead us through the right path to love and be loved, as you have lived your life. We love you.

Yours forever,   

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O, Noblest of men, that person of wise judgment equi-poised in happiness and 
distress whom cannot be disturbed by these is certainly eligible for liberation. 
(Bhagawad Gita)
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Living In You

Some things in life never change,
Sometimes in life you don't find reasons,
Some moments in life aren't forgotten,
Sometimes you lose hope...
When time rolls by you to forget
What holds you on...

Some people in life are a part of you,
And when you let them go,
You never lose them.
Because... you find them living in you.

 

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Thoughts… and more thoughts ….coming in with a vengeance. .. flood of thoughts, like a deluge unleashing its fury mercilessly on our daily lives, rendering us helpless before its persistent barrage, about to burst open any time to take us along to its depth of unfathomable despair….. we fight, we resist, we push forward with all our strength.... even with the immeasurable sense of missing, within our hearts.!!
 
Thoughts…..and more thoughts…..  sometimes good ….and more often…. thoughts difficult to accept…..  denial mode continuing……… digging from memories …… re-living as if we could playback our life and go frame to frame and pause for  the moment to stay on forever…..or  to once again enjoy the fragrance of those lost moments…. As if we could capture or pluck those times, out of our recollections and once again live those treasured days and nights …and live in the past forever and ever…  and then the reality strikes …. rudely awakening us to the present, with a future staring at us… !!

 

We are on an escalator that pushes you willing or unwilling to go forward and forward …beckoning us to meet with our destiny..... NO CHOICE but to go on…  

 

(Shared Thoughts. 20.09.09)

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From the skies of life, 
tearing the clouds of sadness there comes a ray of hope.
Enlightens our world and gives us strength to cope.
It fills in light. It fills in strength And teaches us never to bend.
It makes us smile. It brings us joy. 
Makes us as happy as a child with toy.
A Ray of Hope is as beam of light which removes from our lives the darkest night.
(Pravsworld)
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we have faced the change of fortune in our lives in a way, everyone says we should,  to the extent, some people may even mistake… that the tragedy has not hit us hard...or for that matter, sometimes, even making us wonder, if there is something wrong with us....are we normal or how abnormal are we before other people who are just incapable of understanding what we are going through.. … how’s it that we can yet again, smile, joke and go about as normal…?!! ( "we smile not because we have no grief, but we are able to manage the grief better").

There is this QED formula I adopt to be able to cope with this stress ; ie – ‘reductio ad absurdum’ theory, which we have learnt in solving theorems in Geometry.... reducing rationale or reality into absurdity ; in short, to reduce our mental feelings to the level of near zero or in other words, near animal feelings.  

A herd of bison going in the African plains, do have a ruffle, when one in the group get caught by a predator ; they do not turn back , but just go forward,  they go on and on ; this attitude...of just going forward,  is what has enabled me to live with the stress;  

there is no other choice….. 

We grieve because we have set for ourselves certain rules of life. We ‘expect that our children should outlive us; we ‘expect’ they will be healthy in growing up; we ‘expect’ they will be well behaved ; we ‘expect’ they will continue to outlive us- parents, all thru; we ‘expect’ they will be successful in life & well settled ; we ‘expect’ they will take care of us -parents, in our old age… and so on...  Life being a journey full of expectations, that we have set for ourselves… and when that journey goes off course, and the destination we have expected to see, is not there anymore, we panic, worry, cry and lose our way in grief and become blind to see the road ahead... 

Accepting the change and looking for a new destination is a real challenge that requires every ounce of positive energy & thoughts, coupled with near absence of negative thoughts,  total focus on new or changed priorities ;  a high sense of responsibility ; honest approach to changed situations and above all, total family & friends’  support and understanding. 

………I read recently, about a lady who was grieving...... until one morning when she woke up, she looked out of the window and suddenly a realization dawned upon her, that instead of grieving over a loss, however important in her life, which cannot be retrieved, there are so many other wonderful blessings she should be thankful to God... so she set a pattern every day, to write down everything,  however small or significant, that she should thank God for.... and then she found to her amazement, this process gave her peace and strength more than all the words of consolation from all friends, relatives combined. Truly, we can find peace and strength from the belief that God has blessed us with a wonderful soul as our son .. who in his short and healthy life, had endeared himself to everyone around and gave us only good times and happy moments to share, remember and preserve in our memory and …  meeting his destiny 
was the way, God had willed, for him to attain ‘moksha’.... which may not suit our mortal ‘expectations’ we have set for ourselves ; but in the Divine Dispensation, he HAD to keep his tryst with Destiny.

As with everyone else, we too have many a thing to thank God for, even in our grief, that we can count as His blessings….which we can see only when our eyes are set to see them…Knowing all these and living by these thoughts, I don’t know to what extent, any philosophy can infuse more strength for us to face the change... Or if there are any more answers that we can seek....  

 

( from Shared Thoughts . 20.09.08…to remind ourselves; relevant for this day, all future years)

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…..If not for adjustment and compromise,
Our physical body in this physical world
Won’t last more than a second.

We have to learn, teach and train ourselves
To be no-one and nothing,
To be unknown and uselessly purposeless…..

-       Raheem

 

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MOHANDAS. KP.

http://mohandas-sharedthoughts.blogspot.com/

 

Do not seek God. Let Him find you.

 

 

SHARED THOUGHTS…..08.09.2012.

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Religion teaches us to pray. Pray to God. More often, we tend to think of God as a third person, to whom we address our problems and expect Him to hear us and expect magical solutions. Are our actions, speech and thoughts in line with our prayers? Can our prayers instill in us a sort of Godlinesswithin us, that would determine the quality of our actions? Is not Godliness more relevant, than being extremely religious. Is not God loving more important than God fearing? Some food for thoughts.

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MOOSA AND THE SHEPARD

A tale from Rumi’s Mathnavi

 

With so many recently on Haj, a tale comes to mind from Maulana Jalaludin Rumi’s Mathnavi, which is hailed as the Persian Koran. It is a tale that many non-muslims would find dear and familiar already, for it could be from anywhere in the epics written ages back. .

 

Anyhow, here was this unworldly shepherd whose heart overflowed with love for the Creator. All day long, as he tended his flocks, he would talk aloud to God: “Where are you, my Beloved? How I long to serve You!”

 

One day, Hazrat Moosa (the prophet Moses) passed by the meadow where our shepherd’s flocks were grazing and heard him call aloud: “Where are you, God, that I might stitch Your clothes, mend Your socks, polish Your shoes, comb Your hair and bring You a cup of nourishing milk?”

 

Moosa was horrified at what he considered as blasphemy of the Formless Almighty. “How dare you speak to God like that?” he raged. “Stuff cotton to your worthless mouth if this is how you blaspheme. At least others will be spared the sin of listening to your polluting words. Is God a mere human, that he needs to drink milk and have his hair combed and his shoes polished? You insult the Almighty by such talk, you enemy of religion. Let us pray that the Creator will not punish the whole human race because of you!”

 

The poor shepherd was shattered. What had he said that was so wrong? Sobbing heartbrokenly, he apologised to the great prophet and led his flock away feeling wretched and bereft.

 

Proud that he had caught and taught an erring person, Hazrat Moosa marched away grandly, when the Lord’s annoyed voice arrested him. “Why did you interfere with Me and Mine, Moosa?” asked the Almighty. “Who authorised you to separate the lover from the Beloved? Did I make you my prophet to bring humanity to Me or to drive it away?” Stunned, Moosa fell to his knees.

 

“I did not create this world for my profit, Moosa,” said the Lord sternly. “My Creation is for the benefit of my creatures. I have no need of praise and worship; it is the worshipper who benefits, not Me. Nor do I care for what form the worship takes. It is the sincerity of the heart that alone interests Me. Those bound by outward correctness are unlike those bound by their love for Me. Those who love me know no religion but their Beloved.”

 

Humbled and repentant, Moosa went back to look for the shepherd. After much searching, he finally found him in tatters meditating by a spring. Moosa eagerly related what had passed, but the shepherd had no more to say. With a compassionate smile, he simply moved away.

 

Thanks to Late KG.Mukundan, & Renuka Narayanan

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Do not seek God… allow God to find you… God finds you when your Godliness shows in your actions.

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Father John Powell, a professor at Loyola University in Chicago, writes
about a student Tommy, in his Theology of Faith class.

“Some twelve years ago, I stood watching my university students  file into
the classroom for our first session in the Theology of Faith class.  That
was the day I first saw Tommy.

My eyes and my mind both blinked.  He was combing his long flaxen hair,
which hung six inches below his  shoulders. It was the first time I had ever
seen a boy with hair that long. I  guess it was just coming into fashion
then. I know in my mind that it isn't  what's on your head, but what's
in it that counts; but on that day I was  unprepared and my emotions
flipped. I immediately filed Tommy under "S" for  strange ..very strange.

Tommy turned out to be the "atheist in residence"  in my Theology of Faith
course. He constantly objected to, smirked at, or  whined about the
possibility of an unconditionally loving Father / God. We  lived with each
other in relative peace for one semester, although I admit he  was for me,
at times, a serious pain in the back pew.

When he came up  at the end of the course to turn in his final exam, he
asked in a cynical  tone, "Do you think I'll ever find God?" I decided
instantly on a little  shock therapy. "No!" I said very emphatically. "Why
not," he responded, "I  thought that was the product you were pushing."

I let him get five steps  from the classroom door and then called out,
"Tommy! I don't think you'll  ever find Him, but I am absolutely certain
that He will find you!" He  shrugged a little and left my class and my
life. I felt slightly disappointed  at the thought that he had missed my
clever line --- "He will find you!" At  least I thought it was clever.

Later I heard that Tommy had graduated and  I was duly grateful. Then a sad
report came. I heard that Tommy had terminal  cancer. Before I could search
him out, he came to see me. When he walked into  my office, his body was
very badly wasted and the long hair had all fallen  out as a result of
chemotherapy. But his eyes were bright and his voice was  firm, for the
first time, I believe.

"Tommy, I've thought about you so often. I hear you are sick," I blurted
out.
"Oh, yes, very sick. I have  cancer in both lungs. It's just a matter of
weeks."
"Can you talk about  it, Tom?" I asked.
"Sure, what would you like to know?" he replied.
"What's it like to be only twenty-four and dying?"
"Well, it  could be worse."
"Like what?"
"Well, like being fifty and having no values  or ideals, like being fifty
and thinking that booze, seducing women, and  making money are the real
'biggies' in life."

I began to look through  my mental file cabinet under 'S' where I had filed
Tommy as strange. (It seems as though everybody I try to reject by
classification, God sends back into my life to educate me.)

"But what I really came to see you about,"  Tom said, "is something you
said to me on the last day of class." (He remembered !) He continued, "I
asked you if you thought I would ever find God  and you said, 'No!' which
surprised me. Then you said, 'But He will find  you.' I thought about that
a lot, even though my search for God was hardly intense at that time.

"But when the doctors removed a lump from my groin  and told me that it was
malignant, that's when I got serious about locating  God. And when the
malignancy spread into my vital organs, I really began banging bloody fists
against the bronze doors of heaven. But God did not come out.. In fact,
nothing happened. Did you ever try anything for a long time with great
effort and with no success? You get psychologically glutted, fed up with
trying. And then you quit.

"Well, one day I woke up, and instead of throwing a few more futile appeals
over that high brick wall to a God who may be or may not be there, I just
quit. I decided that I didn't really care about God, about an after-life,
or anything like that. I decided  to spend what time I had left doing
something more profitable. I thought about you and your class and I
remembered something else you had said: "The  essential sadness is to go
through life without
loving. But it would be almost equally sad to go through life and leave
this world without ever telling those you loved that you had loved them."

"So, I began with the hardest one, my Dad. He was reading the newspaper
when I approached him.  "Dad."
"Yes, what?" he asked without lowering the newspaper.
"Dad, I would  like to talk with you."
"Well, talk."
"I mean . . It's really  important"
The newspaper came down three slow inches.
"What is  it?"
"Dad, I love you. I just wanted you to know that."

Tom smiled at me and said it with obvious satisfaction, as though he felt
a warm and secret joy flowing inside of him. "The newspaper fluttered to
the floor. Then my father did two things I could never remember him ever
doing before. He cried and he hugged me. We talked all night, even though
he had to go to work the next morning. It felt so good to be close to my
father, to see his tears, to feel his hug, to hear him say that he loved
me."

It was easier with my mother and little brother. They cried with me, too,
and we hugged each other,  and started saying real nice things to each
other. We shared the things we  had been keeping secret for so many years.

"I was only sorry about one thing --- that I had waited so long. Here I
was, just beginning to open up to all the people I had actually been close
to.

"Then, one day I turned  around and God was there! He didn't come to me when
I pleaded with Him. I guess I was like an animal trainer holding out a
hoop, 'C'mon, jump through.  C'mon, I'll give you three days, three weeks.'

"Apparently God does things in His own way and at His own hour. But the
important thing is that He was there. He found me! You were right. He
found me even after I stopped  looking for Him."
"Tommy," I practically gasped, "I think you are saying something very
important and much more universal than you realize. To me, at least, you
are saying that the surest way to find God is not to make Him a private
possession, a problem solver, or an instant consolation in time of need,
but rather by opening to love. You know, the Apostle John said that. .

'God is love, and anyone who lives in love is living with God  and God is
living in him.' Tom, could I ask you a favor? You know, when I had  you in
class you were a real pain. But (laughingly) you can make it all up to me
now. Would you come into my present Theology of Faith course and tell them
what you have just told me? If I told them the same thing, it wouldn't  be
half as effective as if you were to tell it."

"Ooh I was ready for you, but I don't know if I'm ready for your class."
"Tom, think about it. If and when you are ready, give me a call."

In a few days, Tom called, said he was ready for the class and that he
wanted to do that for God and for me. So we scheduled a date. However, he
never made it. He had another appointment, far more important than the one
with me and my class. Of course, his life was not really ended by his
death, only changed. He made the great step from faith into vision. He
found a life far more beautiful than the eye  of man has ever seen or the
ear of man has ever heard or the mind of man has  ever imagined. Before he
died, we talked one last time.

"I'm not going  to make it to your class," he said.
"I know, Tom."
"Will you tell them for me? Will you . . . tell the whole world for me?"
"I will, Tom. I'll tell them. I'll do my best."

So, to all of you who have been kind enough to read this simple story about
God's love - Thank you for listening. And to you, Tommy, somewhere in the
sunlit, verdant hills of heaven --- I told them,  Tommy as best I could.”


With thanks,
Rev. John Powell, Professor Loyola  University in Chicago

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happy weekend.  

 

MOHANDAS. KP.

http://mohandas-sharedthoughts.blogspot.com/