Chronicles of Nikhil Baliga

Swami Gulagulaananda quoted Hajime Saitou: " A man who cannot uphold his beliefs is pathetic; in this world or the next " Let's assume you are all set to sit in your room and do some light reading or work on your laptop. Or perhaps you are tired and it's time to sleep. Suddenly you see a hint of movement in the outer regions of your field of vision. You exhibit animal like reflexes and turn around and behold a small pesky mosquito manoeuvring effortlessly like a heat seeking cruise missile. You let out a slight tsk  or a  mch at the thought of getting bitten in the least accessible area of your body, perhaps your leg under the table or perhaps your toe. So what would you do? Would you make a move and kill the mosquito immediately? Or take some kind of action like spraying a mosquito repellant or turning on one of those mosquito repellants? Or would you ignore the mosquito? The question is not a simple one - but rather one with a slight philosophical twist. C...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " They argued over Schrodinger's cat and on opening the box saw a rock in it... " Dasa looked at me in disbelief. "Are you saying there is no God?" he asked. "I didn't say there is no God. I said that I don't think that God looks like a person" I replied. "Why not? What according to you is God?" he asked. "I am not sure. But I don't like the idea of a personal god. To me, the idea of God has to be intellectually stimulating. For instance, the idea of Brahman as God is something I'd like to pursue. Like energy, perhaps. That which is subtle, with no characteristics, present in everything... Maybe energy. Or many something like string theory with all the subtle vibrations. But the idea of someone who can give curses is something I'd not subscribe to" I replied. "That's Mayavada philosophy", spluttered Dasa, "Are you saying Krishna is not God?" I smiled at him...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " The moral fabric is netted, the sizes of holes not constant " Let me start off by saying that the attitude in this post is intentionally cynical As kids, we are taught a series of moral lessons - " Don't hurt others ", " Don't steal from others "... and as we grow up " Don't covet others' wives " and so on. As children, we are taught to take these statements as truths, we don't question them, we simply accept them. The reason being that we don't have the maturity and experience to validate them. So we accept them, and we follow them. As we grow up, we gain both experience and maturity. At this point, we can begin to validate our lessons and accordingly strengthen those that matched with reality and discard those that didn't. AI junkies will consider this as strengthening of synapses and those who've read 'I'm OK, You're OK' will relate this with the PAC model. ...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " Problems don't arise due to beliefs... Problems arise when you force it upon others " Religion has been around for thousands of years and I am sure it is not going to go anywhere anytime soon. With the advent of Social Media, information can travel across the world rapidly. These are two facts. There is nothing wrong with believing in something. We all go through life's ups and downs - and some times we are alone when we are down. Sometimes, we don't have anyone to fall back upon though we would have loved to have someone to reassure us. And when you feel all is lost, you find solace in God. You pray to God, pray that all your troubles go away. You derive strength from faith. Even if your problems don't all go away, you feel invigourated. Problems are given to you only because God knows you have the strength to solve it, they say... And even if you didn't, it works - perhaps a placebo effect. People do remarkable things b...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " Majority wins, minority loses... A large unit divided is smaller than a whole small unit " Imagine you are with four other friends and you decide to go watch a movie. However there is the question of which movie to watch? Some of you want to watch movie A, and some of you want to watch movie B. The question is, how do you decide? The answer is simple (if you are normal) - Poll and majority. If you look around you, you will see that most decisions are made in the same way. Whether it is decisions in companies (based on share percentage) or in politics, this concept of 'majority wins' is the common way of deciding. My first question is, why do we consider majority? And my take on that would be - So as to appease most number of people, piss off least number of people thereby having increased general happiness (You know, if each person's happiness was measurable in units, we would have had more such units). The real question is -...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " It's good to be proud, it's bad to be vain " There are times when arrogance creeps into our minds and hearts, when we begin to think that we are the greatest and none come close to us. And this could be due to your qualities - be it wealth, beauty, talent, popularity or intellect. But what we fail to understand is that there's always someone better right around the corner. If you think you are rich, there's someone richer... And even if you are the richest, how long will you be like that? For, like Ozymandias and his fate, this too shall pass. Both good and bad are passing phases in the eternally volatile time. Let's read a couple of short stories and pick some nice pearls of wisdom along the way. Bhima humbled Bhima was the strongest among the Pandavas and indeed one of the most powerful warriors. He could easily overpower anyone without breaking a sweat. And as is the theme of this post, he had grown quite arrogant. On...

Swami Gulagulaananda heard: " Ethics is how you are as a person, when nobody is looking " Imagine that life is a video that is constantly playing... For a moment pick up your remote control, and hit the pause button. Then, float out of your body, turn around and look at your frozen body stuck in the same position, reading this post... Now let's begin floating and looking around. Oh, and also, leave your ideas, opinions, prejudice and such behind. We, as people, have evolved over a period of time. I am not talking about the biological evolution and loss of tail. I am talking about society. Just today, one of my uncles had come over and was talking about his grandfather's grandfather who walked all the way to Tirupathi from some town close to Mangalore, and back. He said, " Those were the days of 'Athiti Devo Bhava'   and it was customary for people to stay in other people's houses, mind you, not relatives, and partake food as well, which would be...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " Krishna goes on to describe the soul as that which cannot be cut by weapons, that which cannot be burnt, made wet or dried in the immortalised Shloka - nainam chindanti shastraaNi....... " The caste system in India is a weird issue - people don't understand what it is... And yet, they screw around with it a lot. I happened to attend a function recently, where the poojari  told what caste is in brief - he said, people were divided into four castes on the basis of the kind of work they used to do. But then, God Himself said that the four castes are Brahmins, who are like My face, Kshatriyas, who are like My shoulders/arms, Vaishyas who are like My thighs/legs and Sudras who are like My feet. A quick glance by pseudo secular people (read Congress) would result in saying - Aha! See? Brahmins are given the position of the head, while OBC/SC/ST people are merely feet.  But then he continued. He said, note that they are all part of God, and tha...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " One sees what one wants to see " This is a short story I had read as a child in school, I think it was in the then-popular magazine for kids, Gokulam. The story begins with Krishna and Arjuna having a conversation. Arjuna asks Lord Krishna why everyone thinks Yudhishtira is considered as great. Krishna takes Arjuna for a walk. He calls Duryodhana and then calls a random soldier. He then points the soldier out to Duryodhana and asks him to tell one hundred points about that man. Duryodhana says that the man was lazy, got his wife to do every thing for him, used to squander earnings, beat her occassionally, etc. He thanks Duryodana and a few minutes later asks Yudhishtira the same question. Yudhishtira looks at the man and says that the man was one who had helped out his friends and neighbours, was a loving father, never cheated on his wife, religious, etc. Thanking him, Krishna turns to Arjuna and says - " Did you see? It was the same pe...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " When you set your expectations too high, you are bound to be disappointed " I happened to watch a very interesting video about choices. Today, we have a lot of choices when we are about to do something or purchase something. And while these choices may seem to be a good thing, an excess of choices creates problems. How can choices create problems? The video will answer all the questions. However, what I wanted to talk about was expectations. As technology and society advances, the kinds of expectations that we have keep going higher and higher. I had some of these experiences personally where I have a really fast internet connection both at home and work. And on one occassion, when I had to access the internet through the mobile internet devices, like Tata Photon Plus, I found the speed pathetically poor. It is not that the speed itself is poor, because I used to have a dial up connection before broadband, and I remember clicking the butto...

Swami Nikhilaananda said: " Prevention is better than cure, it is better to avoid than to lure " Today's newspaper article showed that the Slut walk campaign that was due to be held in Bangalore got cancelled because there was opposition from some groups against the campaign. I posted a link of one of my previous posts on Facebook, citing that the protest in itself was silly . Since were there were several discussions on that, I thought, let me put a clearer picture, solely dedicated to this protest here. == Note == Read the whole post, do ample research. Knee jerk reactions will be not be commented upon So, what exactly is Slut Walk? On January 24, 2011 Constable Michael Sanguinetti spoke on crime prevention at a York University safety forum. He said: "women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized." ( wikipedia ) Then what happened? This had happened in Canada. So people protested against it, saying that wearing provocative c...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " One cannot prove nor disprove fate and destiny - They are, thus, equivalent to God, or a parallel maybe. Everything can be God, everything can be fate or destiny... " Fate and destiny are very interesting concepts. When someone asks - Do you believe in the existence of God, the answers are one of the three. Absolutely yes, absolutely no, or maybe maybe not, I am not sure (Believers, Atheist or Agnostic). The reason for this is the lack of any absolute proof. One can give a long list of things that can't be explained, and one can give explanations with a thousand loopholes that are easy to find. A simple example was a brilliant show that I watched the other day which had Stephen Hawking explaining about the universe and how it all began. The show was very interesting, and Professor Hawking himself begins by saying that he doesn't want to offend anyone in the process - quite a way to begin, considering there are many who feel only thei...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " Know when to stop, lest you shalt drop... For greed is innate " A very short story for you guys - an old one that I had read a long while ago. There was, a long time ago, a greedy money lender in a village. He was as rich as he was greedy. He was the richest man among all the villages around his village, and yet, his thirst for money was not quenched. He, therefore, chose a lot of underhanded methods to rob the poor who needed money to grow richer. He would lend money at very high rates of interest, and the poor who needed and borrowed could not repay, and he would cheat them off their land. He would also scam the illiterate into parting with their land. He was despised, but yet, he grew richer. One day, an interesting bit of news fell on his ears. A wandering mendicant had arrived to a forest near the village. It seemed that the mendicant had mystic powers that he had gained through years of meditation in the Himalayas. Now, he was ju...

Swami Gulagulaananda said: " When it comes down to it, your behaviour determines your character " A lot of people often make tall statements. But, unfortunately, when it comes down to it, when they have to act on their beliefs, most people chicken out. A lot of people have the bark, but very very few people have the bite to go through. When people are in some situations, they tend to make tall promises. A classic example is shown in the Mahabharata when Drupada made bold promises to his best friend, Drona, that he would give half his kingdom to Drona, a poor Brahmin, when Drupada, a prince, would become the king. However, when Drupada was crowned and Drona came to him, Drupada said that he didn't even recognise him. Au contraire, he even insulted him and threw him out. When it comes down to acting on the promise made, people often back out. People often say that the circumstances under which the promise was made and the circumstances at which they break it are di...

Swami Gulagulaananda observed: " Control theory says positive feedback results in unstable systems, psychologists say positive feedback results in emotionally stable systems " People are different, and different people think differently. It is a well known thing about the two people seeing the same glass as half empty and half full. That being said, different people have different ways of leading lives, and they believe in principles of their own, formulate their own philosophies or sometimes follow those set by others and/or by God. The ability to formulate their own philosophies and principles, is developed after some experiences were had. Like, a man lied to his wife, said that he was with his friend, while instead he was dining with his secretary. Later, he got a bump on his head after the wife discovered the lie on interrogating the friend (sans the overhead glaring lights)  She subsequently relayed the illumination gained to him through her rolling pin. This man d...