What does it mean to live life on your terms?

Does it mean that you need to live for yourself?

Does it mean that you need not care what others say?

Hell, YES!

It does include (but not limited to) both the statements above. But don’t be under the impression that by ‘others’ I mean everyone. No!

There are people who are right for you, and also, people, who are not-so-right.

Living life on your terms means that you need to take care of the right people in your life, and ignore the rest. (ahem..people, please get aside)

There will always be some people disagreeing with what you say or do, but that does not mean they are necessarily dumb and unintelligent. (It only suggests that they are not the right people for you)

Channelize your enthusiasm, love, and support towards the right ones. And also, be willing to accept love and support in return from them (giving and taking are both part of the process)

Keep eliminating the ‘Wrong people’ consciously.

Keep connecting more and more with the ‘Right people’

And, decide the way you want to live-don’t let others do that for you.

When you are clear about the terms you want to live on, (most) things start to fall in place.

But it needs to start with you.

And it needs to start TODAY!

Blaming the government for most, if not all of our problems has been an age old fashion. We, as a society, as a country, have become habituated to criticize the government for corruption, pot holes, dry taps, mosquitoes, epidemics, illiteracy, unemployment and what not. And it’s obvious that we do so because it’s easier to blame the government rather than correcting ourselves.

Have you ever considered that you too, have a hand in most of the problems you face in your daily life? (But you thought you were the victim, right?)

Have you ever considered that as a citizen, you also have certain civic responsibilities to take care of?

It seems easy to blame the government, because when you criticize the government (MLAs, Councilors’, MPs, Authorities and Bureaucracy) you get support from most of the people, because just like you, they too, don’t want to accept their responsibilities.

You say the roads are dirty. Who littered? Your MLA?

You say the drains are blocked? Who threw poly-bags into them?

You say the drinking water doesn’t reach your home. Who misuses and wastes water?

You say your city experiences the worst traffic jams ever known. Who encroached the road?

Agreed, there have been some corrupt people in most of the governments so far, who have been looting public money, and are responsible for many issues in our lives, but blaming the government every time you face a problem…do you feel it’s the right thing to do?

You should not forget that there are non-corrupt people also, who work for the betterment of the country.

Before you blame the government, you need to see if you have taken care of your civic responsibilities or not.

I would like to share with you one incident to make my point clearer.

Back in 2010, I visited Subharti University in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, for delivering personal development training classes to B.Tech students. One room had been allotted to us for keeping our belongings etc.

One day, we ate some snacks in the room. My fellow teachers littered the room with waste. When we were about to leave, I took a poly-bag, and put all the waste in that.

One fellow teacher interrupted “Sir, please don’t bother. The cleaning guy will take care of all this.” But I insisted, and did what I should have done. I threw the poly-bag in the dustbin.

I have the freedom to eat whatever I like, as long as I clean my shit. I can’t expect anyone else to do that.

That’s the real deal. You expect the government to clean your shit.

You want smooth, congestion free roads but don’t want to give up encroachment.

You want the city clean, but don’t want to give up littering.

You want clean drinking water but don’t want to give up habit of wasting water.

You want to cross the road walking on zebra crossing, but rarely think of pedestrians when you drive.

You need to understand, that the government and you, both have certain limitations.

You can’t do BIGGER things since you have the power to do smaller things. (You can’t make a flyover or road, while the government is perfectly capable of it)

The government can’t do smaller things since it has the power to do BIGGER things. (You can’t expect your MLA to come and throw the wrapper of ice-cream you enjoyed in the nearest dustbin. Only you have the power to do it)

You and the government, both are equally important. And the country progresses when both works together towards a common goal-Development.

So next time, when you feel tempted to criticize the government, stop!

And ask yourself the question-Have I taken care of my civic responsibilities today?

Recently, a news channel raised an intriguing and interesting question about a self-proclaimed guru and metaphysical healer, known as Nirmal Baba. The channel asked if he is a healer or a ‘Thug’.

Well, in simplest terms, a thug is a person who deceives people and robs them of their money and possessions by making false claims.

The channel said that this miracle guru earns almost 1 crore rupees from one Samagam.

Samagam is a mass gathering, where people gather in a large space, like an auditorium, to ask Nirmal Baba about what is blocking their progress in terms of employment, livelihood, marriage, foreign travel etc. The fee for attending a Samagam is 2000/- per person. Children above 2 years of age are also needs to be registered.

The channel further questioned, why he is charging money from people for offering his advice and suggesting remedies to remove obstacles from their life paths? (Apparently, he has his third eye open, through which he can see the cause of one’s misfortune)

The channel aired bytes of some people who take pride in calling themselves saints (self proclaimed people just like Nirmal Baba)

Those people said that anyone charging money for giving advice to make people’s lives better is not a saint but a thug.

Ok! My question to that news channel, those (so called) saints, and you, is…

Why are people attending Nirmal Baba’s Samagams in the first place?

People attend theses Samagams for either material gains, or peace of mind. They have their vested interests. They are seeking his advice to get rid of blockages in their life flow, and prosper personally and professionally.

If people are really benefiting from Nirmal Baba’s advice, then I see nothing wrong in him charging money for offering advice and remedies.

Don’t you visit your doctor for checkups, seek advice for your health related issues and pay him?

Yes you do. Everyone does. And you don’t expect him to treat you for free. Right?

The problem with the Indian mind is, we are conditioned to take spiritual and metaphysical phenomenon for granted.

We seek spiritual and metaphysical healing to help us get more money, bigger car(s), better career, more power or good luck, but we don’t want to pay for it. (Isn’t that funny?)

Agreed, serving people without charging money has been an Indian tradition since ages, but then who’ll decide if Nirmal Baba or for that matter, any other healer, should charge or shouldn’t charge for his services, and also if he is a real healer or just another thug.

Who will decide this?

A news channel, which, at most of the times, does nothing except sensationalize things up to gain higher TRPs?

People who call themselves saints? (And we all know what kind of saints they are)

People who call themselves rational thinkers, and disregard every supernatural or miraculous phenomenon they are incapable to understand, simply because they lack the kind of intelligence needed to understand such phenomenon?

These people with so called scientific outlook take great pride in calling people who believe in miracles superstitious. Now before we move any further, let’s talk about superstition also a bit.

I love Indian filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma’s definition of superstition when he said in the promo of his movie based on black magic- ‘Phoonk’ – ‘Everything is superstition until it happens to you.’

If someone is seeing spirits around his house, believes in miracles, or say that one shouldn’t indulge in bad karmas because ultimately it’ll come back to you, he is superstitious. Right?

Anything that doesn’t fit with your belief system or so called scientific and rational way of life is superstition.

And what is that, when you, wearing a suit and tie, sitting in your office or a pub or a five star hotel tell someone about your promotion or good fortune and then you look for a piece of wood, touch it with a grin, and say TOUCH WOOD. Isn’t that superstition?

Superstition is believing in something that you know nothing about.

And you don’t have any right to typecast a person, phenomenon or trend as superstition just because you don’t know anything about it yet.

Back to Nirmal Baba. The faces of people, who were calling Nirmal baba a thug, clearly showed that they were nothing but jealous.

. Jealous of the fact that in a small period of time, an ordinary man rose above them, and became a guru overnight (and allegedly earning crores of rupees a year)

. Jealous of the fact that now they don’t have access to him easily. They need to take prior appointments to meet him (clearly a blow to their egos)

Just like Nirmal baba, these people too, wants to make lots of money, but, since they lack the skills and cleverness to attract huge crowds and money, they can’t do anything but complain.

Why don’t these people talk about hundreds of crores of public money looted in so many scams. Scams that took place in the name of development of the country. People’s hard earned money (including yours) was looted shamelessly and still nothing significant has been done to bring those responsible to justice.

Why don’t these people call those daylight robbers, thugs?

I feel this guy-Nirmal Baba, has all the right to charge for his advice as long as he doesn’t make fool of the people in the name of faith.

And the people, who are not as capable as him, may continue to massage their egos by calling him thug.

(Interesting point: It seems that Nirmal baba is being projected as thug because he’s charging money. I wonder if he’ll still be projected as thug if he start giving advice for free)