What life experience means

When was the last time you sought advise from someone else about what you should be doing?
And when was the last time you really heeded that and the advise didn't "bomb", i.e., proved good

Who is the best person to conduct your life?

When you are little, you rely mostly on your parents. You act like they tell you to. In turn, they have told you to act as per their experience as to what works for them

It is like this. You buy a spanking new pair of shoes, and the shoe feels tight in the beginning (maybe even bites), then it adjusts to your feet, and slowly takes the shape of your feet.

Suppose you were to hand over those shoes to your younger sibling, would it work?

Your parents' environment is the new pair of shoes. Their feet are their way of behaving. With time, the environment has jelled with their behavior, and the two have adjusted themselves so that it no longer "bites"

But what happens afterwards? They lend you their feet (behavior), and they try to become the "environment", so that they and you will get along.

What is the result when a person has gone through a lot of conflict within his environment? Perhaps he grew a thorn, or his environment did. And THAT's how your parents' life influences yours

Time for a little course correction: let me pull back in place the tangent -- what life experience means. It means, you have a way of interacting with your environment, in such a way that you can predict the outcomes.

But it's not as simple as that. The depth of its meaning is proportional to the mastery you have on this matter, and several different ways of examining the concept, and I'll try to leave it at that...

Exhilarating Kung Fu scene

I often recall one Kung Fu scene that impressed me more than anything else, including Bruce Lee's Enter The Dragon. But don't remember the name of that film

The scene is like this. There is this old, blind woman, whom the Chinese government wants to arrest. If memory serves right, she was one of the rebel Shaolin monks.

What ensues is that a couple of soldiers try to attack and overpower her, but the gallant thin old lady, with only a thin little stick, proves more than a match for them despite being blind.

So the officer commands more soldiers on her, thinking this is taking "a little longer than expected". But we find that the woman is too much even for half a dozen soldiers. Now the general loses some patience and orders a dozen men more into the fight. But lo! there is no sign of her being overpowered! Now that was the last straw for the general. And so he sends in armed soldiers. And guess what? They are thrown back too!

It is one amazing fight and I wish I had a recording of it on my hard disk. If you recall that movie, do drop me a comment and let me know.

What happens at the end of that fight? The general calls in the archers! Now, that's a no-brainer to say she's gonna get killed. Or is it? No! The woman's senses are too keen, and picks up the trajectories of the arrows -- and swipe, swipe, swipe .. the arrows are swept off in precise movements of her stick. HOW can you beat this lady?

Let me know if you find out anything about this movie

Of Vicious Cycles

I am surprised sometimes, at the amazing regularity at which I can observe the "Monkey closed fist syndrome"

"Monkey closed fist", if you need an explanation, is about the story of the monkey that clenched a fistful of gram in a jar, and couldn't take its hand out because the fist was clenched

Often, our resistance to something becomes the reason why it happens. Thank self-fulfilling prophecies

An everyday example, that I have missed till recently in life, happens when we meet some new people.
When we meet a new person, we start from ground-0, and try to understand the person, his qualities, his motivations. Needless to say, this can be an important situation in many, many contexts.
When we meet a person who holds any kind of power over us, we often are in Porus's shoes when be was captured by Alexander the Great. Asked Alexander: How do you want to be treated?

This conversation, I have observed, is very familiar to us at a subconscious level. The car salesman, or the Driver inspector, or your job interviewer -- they all want to know how you should be treated, and do so accordingly

And THIS is the reason you should have a positive self image. You beget what you ask for, subconsciously

Ok, getting out before I rob the post of its succinctness

Of weakness and strength, and rule of opposites

What are you really good at? And how did it come to be?

The story of J C Owens, (at least as I remember it) is that of a polio stricken urchin in Africa going on to becoming a star athlete and breaking running race records

Many a thing in life begins with a period spent in weakness. The story begins with one of hopeless and pathetic dependence, progresses to recovery, resolutions, effort, and overcoming. And once in the position of strength, the character has enough motivation in her to continue and complete her mastery over the situation

To see the weakness in a strong person; to see the strength in the weak person, requires special insight

Sometimes the story is about bringing out such strength in a person in times of profound depression

But exactly what am I driving at? I dont know ..

I guess, this is another page from life learnings. And hope you enjoyed reading