I got a comment on one of my previous mails. The comment is given below in italics.

I know this is late, but still...


You know what I'm thinking? When you/I/we say that love is "earned" by means of 'virtue', 'virtue' needs to be defined. And virtue - like anything else that is moral - is a very subjective thing. After what I've been through, 'virtue' has begun to acquire a new meaning these days. So, I think to resolve this argument -- for my sake -- for once and for all, let us try to define virtue.

Initially, I used to believe virtues could be 'counted', as in I could make a list of characteristics -- which I (again it's 'I' - a subjective issue here) deemed worthy -- and then say whether I loved (I'm talking of all kinds of love here) a person or not depending on how many of these characteristics he/she had. And then when he/she started losing these characteristics, I would then stop loving that person. I've since come to realize that this is wrong.

So, back to defining virtue. This is what I believe in now: the only virtue that ultimately matters in a person is whether that person is 'good' at heart or not. Again, by trying to see whether a person is good or not, I'm wary of falling into the 'characteristics list' trap. To me, whether a person is good or not, is solely based on the same three principles
Ayn Rand propounded -- egoism, reason and freedom. A set of core values -- that is all! And this is where I believe I'm making the shift from being judgmental -- which is what made me 'love' people on the basis of my 'characteristics list' -- to being perceptive and understanding -- which is what now makes me aware of the "goodness" in them.

When we start disliking people on the basis of the 'characteristics list', I feel we are being less understanding of their situation and circumstances. Like Atticus Finch, we need to put ourselves in their shoes and feel what they are feeling. What we dislike are merely faults in them. The faults don't matter -- they just obstruct our view of the bigger picture. Working on them does, however. And this is where the 'goodness' comes into play.

Not having the courage to make a life-altering decision might be an indication of cowardice, which could make you not 'love' someone. Throwing insults out of anger is also not justified, which could also make you fall out of 'love'. But when someone tries to undo every 'bad' thing -- by summoning the courage to make that life-altering decision, by regretting every insult -- that is when you need to stop, become Atticus Finch, and start feeling.After all, we are beings of emotion, even though we bide by reason. Maybe it makes us weak, but then it is also what makes us love.-- The double dashes give me away.PS: Turn on the word verification.

Now to my reply .

I realize the importance and implications of what you have stated above fully, It was mighty important for you to make the shift from being judgemental to being perceptive and understanding, that’s the only way you could have done certain things which you couldn have done otherwise. You believed in certain core values or rather the 'characteristic list' and am sure you still continue to believe them but you were caught in the classic inner conflict of heart vs mind(emotion vs reason). Your mind said that she doesn’t meet your characteristic list or rather a part of it and hence you cannot love her the way you want to but your heart refused to take this as a justification. Though your mind damned her your heart still longed for her and you had to come up with some thing really convincing that would resolve this conflict and this has to be done before taking any further steps. And trust me the explanation above was quite convincing.


You said "To me, whether a person is good or not, is solely based on the same three principles ,Ayn Rand propounded -- egoism, reason and freedom. A set of core values -- that is all! " You agree that these are core values , these form the basis on which a person should base his code of life. And I hope you also agree that what ever virtues or the 'characteristic list' we form, every virtue can be traced back to one of these core values. Lets say we call the core three as primary values and the rest of the virtues in the list as derived values. Now it is safe to assume that a person who meets all the primary virtues requirements would inevitably meet the derived virtue requirements. Now if you see that one of the derived values is not being met in a person in whom you believed all the primary virtues were met, then there exists a contradiction, being a proponent of Ayn rand its not much use to tell you that "Contradictions doesn’t exists' remember A is A . Then where did this anamoly creep in, the only place I see is that you have made an error in judgement when you believed that the person met all primary virtues.

You said " And this is where I believe I'm making the shift from being judgmental -- which is what made me 'love' people on the basis of my 'characteristics list' -- to being perceptive and understanding -- which is what now makes me aware of the "goodness" in them. " I have a clarification here what do you precisely mean by goodness here? You seem to suggest that charateristic list and goodness are two different planes . For me they are one and same, I don differentiate between the two for me if a person meets the charateristic list he is good and if a person is good he meets my charateristic list. Going by what I have stated, a person is either good or bad (absolutes black or white) but I guess you are ready to accept people for their varying levels goodness ( grey areas) i.e giving justifications to peoples vices and accepting them for the fraction of goodness in them, this is what I infer when u say "What we dislike are merely faults in them. The faults don't matter -- they just obstruct our view of the bigger picture. "

And to your final comment " After all, we are beings of emotion, even though we bide by reason. Maybe it makes us weak, but then it is also what makes us love." I believe being beings of emotion or reason has nothing to do with our ability to 'make us love' .

Questions ????

Why did it happen?
Where did I go wrong?
Whose fault is it?
Who is to blame for the state of things?
Where am i to find answers to all these questions?
Some body is accountable for this, who is it?
Why cant life be clearly visible?
Why so many grey areas?
I want every thing in black and white when can I have it?
Why do people expect so much from me?
And when they don get what they expect why do they get disappointed?
Why do they hold me responsible for atrocities in their lives?
Why are they so keen in passing the buck around?
Why do people always choose the easy way out by evading the problem or by just blaming it on others?
How can I ever come to terms with such a world or even if I can when will it be?
Why should I come to terms with this world?
Cant I be left alone and not be bothered?
Is it ever possible to live that way?
Am tired , I really am, of putting up an act every second and making a mockery of myself, my self esteem, my principles, my code of life.
When will I be able to live the way I want to?

I donno if I will ever find answers to these questions, but still outlining the questions that haunt you day and night does help.

P.S : Today is my birthday :) and i turn 23 :(

Numb 03:05

I'm tired of being what you want me to be
Feeling so faithlessLost under the surface
I don't know what you're expecting of me
Put under the pressureOf walking in your shoes

[Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow]
Every step that I take is another mistake to you
I'veBecome so numb
I can't feel you there
Become so tired
So much more aware
I'm becoming this
All I want to doIs be more like meAnd be less like you

Can't you see that you're smothering me
Holding too tightlyAfraid to lose control
'Cause everything that you thought I would beHas fallen apart right in front of you
[Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow]

Every step that I take isAnother mistake to you
[Caught in the undertow, just caught in the undertow]
And every second I wasteIs more than I can take

And I knowI may end up failing too
But I knowYou were just like me
With someone disappointed in you

I just love this song and I personally feel this by far the best song by Linkin park. Have been listening to this atleast twenty times a day in my phone.

An End or a New Beginning

I have quit my old job and took up another job. One of my friends gave me an advice that I should treat it not as an end but a new beginning. I just got thinking that how can I treat it as an end, I mean what signifies that it has ended and what is the precise definition of end she was talking about. She gave me an impression as to I was going to severe all the ties with my current world and start out a totally new chapter, as if I was going to forget all the people I know now. Is it ever posible to comment on life, that this chapter has ended and a new one has begun? Just to draw an analogy, Life is like a book, ofcourse its divided into chapters but each chapter has its own relevance and its own bearing on the plot of the book. Can you think of a book in which the characters which appeared in one chapter never appeared in another? I certainly cant think of any unless ofcourse its a collection of short stories or a collection of essays. But am sure life my not a collection of short stories book but a single entitiy which has one plot, in such a scenario every chapter and every character are not forgotten when one moves onto the next chapter.

She just accused me that once I get on with the new job I would forget her because she believes distance plays a large role in keeping people together or apart, but I fought back saying that it depends on the people more whether they keep in touch or not and distance do play a small part but its not the deciding factor. But she refuses to believe me and she also accuses me that am not as sad about as parting as she is. Then I ask her that how can she say that? she replies me back saying that I don appear sad. I am kinda confused and shocked that she judged whether I was sad or not just by the appearance. She said she aint a mind reader and she can only believe what she sees. Well fair enough if she goes by "seeing is believing" then I should say that she is justified when she says that am not sad as she is because I don appear sad. But to tell the truth I do miss her and yes I have no way of proving it other than calling her up and saying that I miss you but well am not built that way and I aint even sure whether she would believe me when I say I do in fact miss her because my tone would still not be sad.

Love Conditional ? Unconditional?

When I started blogging my first post was on Unconditional Love. The Post is given below in Italics.

"Right from the childhood have repeatedly heard a word called "unconditional love". Have been preached that only the unconditional love is the purest form of love and have believed it till some time back. But if one closely inspects the defnition of unconditional love what he would understand is that it implies loving an entity for absolutely no reason. I have taken it for granted and spent all my life till date loving people for no reason. Have always had this nagging emotion that why should i love this person, he has got nothing to offer me in return, that thought always used to make me feel uncomfortable and at times even guilty. But tell me some thing what would make u more happy, people loving you for your virtues(assuming u have got some) or people loving you for the nothing u have become. If you would appreciate for being loved for what you have got then why does this phrase "unconditional love" bores any meaning in your lives, I shall say love the person for what he is, what he can offer u and what u gain by interacting with him. I refuse to accept "unconditional love" from any body and i refuse to give it to any body. If my virtues permit u to love me and if u love me for that i would appreciate it, i shall not appreciate any form of love or give any form of love that is irrational and unconditional. "

Yesterday I was having a conversation with one of my best friends on this topic. Thankfully he also lives by the same code as I do. All the proponents of Unconditional Love out there I would Like to ask you one question , If at all Love were unconditional how come you say you love a few and you hate a few, shouldn u be able to love every body and every thing irrespective of what they are? (Don tell me actually you do love everyone and everything) . If U love somebody then it implies that you love him for certain things (or Virtues) and if U hate some one U hate him because you don like the way he is. Then how can Love be unconditional at all? Have seen people staring at me when I say that "I love a person because he has got something to offer me and I would stop loving that person when he has lost his ability to offer me the very something which was the basis of my love. " People expect me to love them no matter what they have become, Once I start loving a person, I am expected to love him forever no matter what he does. There is friend of mine who proudly proclaims that if she loves a person and later even if the person rapes another woman or if he commits a murder or if he becomes a drug addict she would still love him because her love for him is unconditional and true. I resent the very idea of unconditional love it doesn make much sense to me. In my view love has to be earned not given on charity.

There will be more posts in the future on this topic. All the view points are welcome. What I have expressed here are purely my views.

Conversation 3

.........
She : :)
He : Finally squeezed a smile from u.
She : :)
He : Wow incredible its raining smiles .
She : Get an Umbrella.
He : Let me get wet.
.........

Conversation 2

........
........
She : History Repeats itself
He : Lightning doesnt strike twice.
.......
.......

Conversation 1

.........
She: I donno Am feeling too low, nothing is going right for me.
He : Don worry everythin is gonna be jus fine, things will be alright.
She: Yeah right, things will pick up how will they pick up? Oh, Am so dumb, My attitude sucks.
He : Hey jus be calm don blame urself for every thing thats wrong under the sun.
She: Shut Up. I dint ask for ur advice. U guys are always like this , given a chance, start Lecturing. Why don u understand that we gals jus want u guys to listen thats all.
He : Hmmm, Ok.
She: What was that "Hmmm" for?
He : Hey sweet, was jus acknowledging thats all, Don get sore at me now.
She: Don call me sweet .What are u trying to say? that i get sore at you all the time, that I am not an amicable person, Then why did u choose me in first place?
He : Hey come on thats not fair when did I say that U r not an amicable person why u trying to read between the lines?
She: Enough is enough. First u say am not an amicable person and then u say am not fair. There is a limit above which I cant take insults and U have crossed that Limit.
He : Hey come on I dint mean any thing the way U have intepreted my words, Any way If I have hurt U am sorry.
She: Yeah Sorry, do everything and say sorry, a typical guy's behaviour.
He : Now what do U want me to do?
She: Nothing.
He : Ok am really sorry , I dint intend to hurt you but it happened that way , am really sorry.
She: Ok forget it, I should have expected it. Ok Bye I gotta leave.
He : Ok bye, good night.
She: Why dint u say good night sweet?
He : U only asked me not to call u sweet.
She: So U wont call me sweet huh? If I say don ever meet me again, you wont meet again huh?
He : But I thought U din want me to call U sweet.
She: U have changed a lot these days. U were so good and nice when we met for first time , now U have become so cold and mean.
He : Ok jus relax, I guess U have had a tough day at office. Go home and have some good rest, we shall talk about it again tomorrow.
She: We are in the middle of a crisis and u ask me to go home and sleep. How insensitive!
He : What crisis?
She: We are on the verge of breaking up and U ask me what crisis?
He : What crap? who is talking about breaking Up?
She: Yeah yeah its all crap for you now, i should have known better. I guess now U don like me any more the way U used to like me thats why U R behaving, the way U r. I guess its over.

One tight slap

He : Good Bye!

Mirror or a Candle

There are two ways of spreading light;
to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.


First things first, this picture was not taken by me ;), came in today morning as a forward. I normally shift + del my forwards but today since i had nothing better to do just thought of giving the forwards a try. I came across this one in one of those never ending good morning messages which start from morning 9 and go on till about 4 in the afternoon. Just read the words and looked at the picture and wondered what would I like to be a candle which is the original source of light or the mirror which just reflects light which is not its own. Well being an advocate of reason started analysing the pros and cons of being a candle or a mirror. If you be the candle you are the original source of Light, you can light the darkness and speaking metaphorically you can bring light into some body's life. But the candle melts as time goes on, its length decreases proportionately with time and finally it gets extinguished. Now look at the mirror it does nothing except reflecting light but gives an impression as if it is the never ending source of light. It just rides on somebody's achievement ( in this case the candle). But the light from the mirror lasts only the time the candle is burning. The moment the candle is extinguished there is no light for the mirror to reflect. The mirror exists waiting for another source but the candle is gone. This analogy can be applied to many areas in life. For instance there are two types of people in this world people who innovate and people who imitate. The second type rides on the achevement of the first and ironically in most cases the imitators gain more than the creators. Its a matter of choice to be an innovator or an imitator. So what would you like to be ?

Past is Past

In the Last Mock CAT, I had an RC about past influencing the present. This got me thinking about how much does the past influences present or how much should it influence the present or how well can we differentiate between them. Have heard people saying get over your past, Oh thats past now think about the future, why do u wanna still live in the past? But can one really ignore the past as if it never happened?, can one wipe out the slate clean and start again ? What i personally believe is one can never really erase the past though one might put up an act as if he never lived it but the fact that he lived that moment remains. The actions of the past does have a great influence on the present and similarly the actions of the present will have a huge influence in the way one's future shapes up. There is logical connection between all the three. Have heard people saying that "Why I am like this ? Why this is happening to me ?Why do I feel this way? " not able to explain their actions, not able to rationalize their emotions. When one does not find answers to such questions, in most cases he just blames it on fate, saying its out of his control, he is just a pawn and takes the easy way out. In such a case he does not give importance to the facts which will help him answer these questions but just relies on the crutches provided by entitites like fate, god etc. But i believe careful introspection of one's own self will answer all these questions. I don believe in denying the past because that would be equivalent to faking reality. Past is Past ,A is A, you denying the fact does not mutate the fact, the fact remains you consciously choose to acknowledge it or ignore it.

In the End

Have you ever asked yourself a question, Why me? Its quite natural to someone who is under tremendous pressure. There is nothing you can do about it, but take it as it comes. I really feel now that I shouldn have taken her to lunch today, if I wouldn have, I could have avoided such a predicament. But well whats the point in crying over spilt milk when its all over. I know i cant reverse things the way they stand now, If at all i could go back in time and cancel my luncheon appointment with her. But let me come back to reality, fine irreparable damage has been done but its time to move on, there is so much more to life, am hardly 23 years old. Self encouragement always helps in such situations, things like "Don worry dude, you are not the only one who goes through such phases, majority goes through it and there is absolutely no fault of yours in what happened", can help lifting the spirits. My conscience is constantly torturing , saying you could have avoided this mishap if you wouldn have taken her to lunch in first place but i retort back saying i did what i had to do what i wanted to do and now i don regret doing it. Amidst all the trouble cant help myself singing

I had to fart to lose it all
In the end it doesnt even matter....

Where do I belong?

Caught between tears and joy
Caught between care and indifference
Caught between sleep and dreams
Caught between smiles and sighs
Caught between wants and needs
Caught between courage and fear
Caught between success and failure
Caught between body and soul
Caught between day and night
Caught between mortal and eternal
Caught between me and what you want me to be
Caught between love and hatred
Caught between life and death

When you have no solid ground to step on, when you have no side you can take or nobody who can take your side, when you have no emotion you can feel, when you can neither live nor die, you are nothing but CAUGHT.