Links

In Denial of Fukushima

Fukushima also demonstrated unambiguously that communities living near nuclear facilities would be the worst affected in the event of an accident, a lesson that hasn’t been lost on the local populations in Koodankulam and Jaitapur.
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The first point to note is that the very statement that the likelihood of an accident is zero is scientifically untenable; every nuclear reactor has a finite, albeit small, probability of undergoing a catastrophic failure. What’s more, because of the complexity of the system and the many ways in which accidents could occur, this probability is never calculable with full certainty.
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A second question: is the confidence on the part of officials about the zero probability of accidents good for safety? This is not a question about technology but about organisations. The problem is that because of the potential for accidents, nuclear technology poses extreme organisational demands.
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Safety scholar James Reason once noted: “If an organisation is convinced that it has achieved a safe culture, it almost certainly has not.”

Why I am leaving goldman sachs

It makes me ill how callously people talk about ripping their clients off. Over the last 12 months I have seen five different managing directors refer to their own clients as “muppets,” sometimes over internal e-mail. Even after the S.E.C., Fabulous Fab, Abacus, God’s work, Carl Levin, Vampire Squids? No humility? I mean, come on. Integrity? It is eroding. I don’t know of any illegal behavior, but will people push the envelope and pitch lucrative and complicated products to clients even if they are not the simplest investments or the ones most directly aligned with the client’s goals? Absolutely. Every day, in fact.

Why I left google

Google was the rich kid who, after having discovered he wasn’t invited to the party, built his own party in retaliation. The fact that no one came to Google’s party became the elephant in the road.
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The old Google made a fortune on ads because they had good content. It was like TV used to be: make the best show and you get the most ad revenue from commercials. The new Google seems more focused on the commercials themselves.

Quotes from the book Living from the heart

Some really wonderful quotes from the book - Living from the Heart: Heart Rhythm Meditation for Energy, Clarity, Peace, Joy, and Inner Power by Puran Bair

• Trust requires honesty and reciprocity. We don’t trust someone who doesn’t trust us. Where does it start? It starts with someone who has found something in himself or herself that is trustworthy and who looks for the same in others. Such a person is often a 'deep' person, who thinks about things deeply. This quality is developed by meditation.

• Practicing meditation has been compared to exploring a castle - the castle of the mind. As a result of this exploration, the mind of the meditator holds fewer surprises than that of one who has not yet explored the inner depths and heights. Consequently, the meditator is more reliable over a greater range of unexpected events.

• To be what you want to be, you need the help of your closest allies: your body and your mind. If you have trained them through concentration and rhythm, they will respond to your wish.

• The mind follows the tuning of the heart. If you try to control your mind directly, it easily escapes. But your thinking follows the desire of your heart like a raft follows the current.

• Drugs don’t produce energy in the taker; they only borrow it from the next day. Taking drugs is like taking out a shortterm loan with high interest.

• It is the stream of desire flowing in the heart that gives us our sense of direction. When we are unaware of this stream of emotion, we waste our time in pursuit of things whose attainment doesn't bring us happiness, and neglect those things that would fulfill us. The Heart Focused state can be disruptive to a life organized to avoid emotion and fill time with unimportant activities. Your heart will remind you of what you have always wanted, and then the question is, "What are you doing about it?"

• Although upward meditation provides relief from stress, downward meditation increases one’s ability to handle stress. What was stressful before will no longer be stressful or as stressful. We cannot remove all stressors from our life, and life would be boring if we could. What we can do is increase our physical and emotional strength, the strength of the heart, so that we can better handle the stress we have. Then, without making any changes in our life situation, we are at ease where we used to be tense.

• Don’t row against the current, and don’t simply float with the current, but direct your will along the current. In meditation we are consciously aiding an experience that we do not create consciously.

• Doing Meditation is like swimming in an infinite ocean of energy or, some would say, of love, spirit, or peace. As in swimming, there is a little technique to be learned, and there is a risk of the unfamiliar. When we learn to swim, entering the water seems like taking a risk, even though our bodies are mostly water and even though our natural buoyancy makes swimming easy. We don’t have to support our weight—the water does it. The water surrounding us has a current, making movement in one direction easier than in others. We learn to trust the water and then to direct our motions to navigate through it, diving deeply, swimming far, and generally enjoying our fluid nature. Swimming, like meditation, allows movement through a space that would otherwise be a barrier and an experience of an otherwise inaccessible portion of the world. When there is a barrier on land, one can go by sea.

Life and Death

ஓரில் நெய்தல் கறங்க, ஓர்இல்
ஈர்ந்தண் முழவின் பாணி ததும்பப்,
புணர்ந்தோர் பூவணி அணியப், பிரிந்தோர்
பைதல் உண்கண் பனிவார்பு உறைப்பப்,
படைத்தோன் மன்ற, அப் பண்பி லாளன்!
இன்னாது அம்ம, இவ் வுலகம்;
இனிய காண்க, இதன் இயல்புணர்ந் தோரே.

-- puranaanooru 194

Witnessed live the first two lines yesterday! :)

Transcend it by perfecting it

We transcend that which we have perfected! Yoga assists us in this - identification and perfection of the various dimensions of ourselves!

குழம்பி உலகம்

கழுதை கெட்டா குட்டிச் சுவரு
பார்த்தா கெட்டா குழம்பி உலகம்!
அதான்பா, காபி வேர்ல்ட்!

Keshavaya Namah, Madhavaya Namah

Links

Do not disagree

Nothing is more fatal for disagreement and dissent than the idea that all of it can be reduced to hidden sub-texts or external agendas. You may be a supporter of Bt brinjal or nuclear energy. But you ought to worry if we became a culture in which no one was spooked after Fukushima, or suspicious of data on agricultural technologies. The idea that anyone who disagrees with my views must be the carrier of someone else’s subversive agenda is, in some ways, deeply anti-democratic. It does away with the possibility of genuinely good faith disagreement. It denies equal respect to citizens because it absolves you from taking their ideas seriously. Once we have impugned the source, we don’t have to pay attention to the content of the claims.

IPS officer crushed to death by mining mafia in Madhya Pradesh

Prabhakaran’s son was killed in cold blood by Lankan forces?

ரௌத்திரம் பழகு!
Practice righteous anger!

Heart Index Questionnaire

Take a few minutes to take this questionnaire! Pretty useful :)
Heart Index Questionnaire

Purpose of Sattva

The purpose of sattva, is to transform all of rajas and tamas into sattva and then to perform self-destruct - much like the shutdown process, which first kills all other processes and then kills itself!

When any of these qualities are needed later, they can be created on the fly!

பதிலளிப்பீரோ சங்கரரே?

நிற்பதுவே, நடப்பதுவே,பறப்பதுவே நீங்களெல்லாம்
சொற்பனந்தானோ? பல தோற்றமயக்கங்களோ?
கற்பதுவே, கேட்பதுவே, கருதுவதே நீங்களெல்லாம
அற்பமாயைகளோ? உம்முள் ஆழ்ந்தபொருளில்லையோ?

பதிலளிப்பீரோ சங்கரரே?

First thing in awakening

Neo was sleep walking in the matrix. One of the first things that was done to awaken him was to take charge of the physical body!
Regular, appropriate asana / pranayama practice anyone?

Future worry

Q: How to stop worrying about the future and start living in the present?
A: There are many answers. One is to gradually learn to train the breath to be deep, rhythmic and subtle. Another is to gradually restructure ones life to be in alignment with ones life purpose, which will give us the energy to always stay ahead of the curve.

Another important way is penetrating insight - the insight that this question recursively applies to itself! The more we stay with this insight, the more the many dimensions of this will open up and the better clarity one will possess.

Wind in the pines!

The wind blows hard among the pines
Toward the beginning
of an endless past.
Listen: you've heard everything.
- Shinkichi Takahashi

ஆசனம்

காலை எழுந்தவுடன் ஆசனம்!
தமஸ் விலக ஆசனம்,
சத்வ கிரஹனம் நீங்க ஆசனம்!
அஸ்மிதம் மறைய ஆசனம்,
ஞான தீபம் ஒளிர ஆசனம்!
பிறவிப் பெரும்பயன் அடையும்
வழி பிறக்க ஆசனம்!

Shaping desires

It is not so much about culling desires as much as it is about shaping desires! But, many of our desires are in opposition with each other - leading to internal conflict suffering. But, if we build within us the capacity to find out our deepest desires, we will have the energy to cull distracting ones and manifest the real ones.

For example, we also want to be safe on the roads. But, we also want to get the kick of driving fast, or want to jump the signals out of impatience (at least in Indian roads). Clearly, they are conflicting. When one is calm and effortlessly focussed, it is natural to let only the desire to be safe manifest.

Likewise, there are many conflicting desires within us at many levels of our being. The varying tools of yoga are there to help us build in sufficient energy, focus, peace in us to be able to cull unwanted desires and let us manifest our deepest desires. The beauty of this is that, the deeper desires are naturally in sync with wholesome well being of the society. Do we have it in us to see this and to work towards identifying and manifesting our deepest desires?

Finding Bengaluru!

There were two people who wanted the route to Bengaluru - one from Mangalore and the other from Chennai. Someone who had been to Bengaluru told the former to travel east while another, who had also been to Bengaluru, told the latter to travel west. But, sadly, neither person who asked for directions reached Bengaluru but due to providence, crossed each others path in Trivandrum. As their ideas clashed, the two bravely fought arguing whether going east or west is the right way to reach Bengaluru! Apparently, as the centuries rolled by, it became an important chapter in the text books that talk about finding Bengaluru!

Satsang

Giving advice, is in a sense, throwing light. Of the five elements, the one that produces light is fire. Hence to give advice, one needs to invoke the fire element in ones mind. But, fire also has the nasty habit of giving away heat and that can hurt and/or turn off people. One solution to that is to keep the fire far removed from the recipient of light. This naturally implies that the amount of light that reaches the receiver is also less. Another option, is to be in touch with masters like Ramana. But, rare are such yuga purushas. To me, there appears to be only one other viable alternative - to bring the fire in close enough proximity so that necessary light is thrown but have a wonderful and genuine, deep trust / love based relationship between the giver and receiver of light which will then act as a cushioning medium for the heat. Thus, the necessary light is transmitted but the damage caused by the heat is next to nil or minimal. Do you have such a group of people around you - each of whom are absolutely committed towards discovering perfection / truth / god in their lives? Do you have such a satsang - who will show you a compassionate mirror to every single piece of untruth in you? This will rapidly accelerate the process of culling all falsehoods in one. Such a satsang can only be built up gradually over time. Are you putting in that effort now? It cannot come suddenly. But, it will definitely come if you are committed discovering perfection / truth / god in your life!

Amma

What gnana yoga calls maya (that which deludes),
what karma yoga calls duhkam (suffering or a world in crisis),
what raja yoga calls drsyam (matter or that which is seen),
bhakthi yoga calls amma (mom)!

I can wait

I offered you a flower,
But, sadly,
you saw that as a snake!
It was crushed under your heels!

But that is ok,
Ill keep offering
again, and again
and again
again!

There is nothing to worry
I can wait!
There is no hurry,
for
I am eternity!

River of tendencies

शुभाशुभाभ्यां मार्गाभ्यां वहन्ती वासना सरित् ।
पौरुषेणप्रयत्नेन योजनीया शुभे पथि
-- योग-वासिष्ठ

The river of tendencies flow along auspicious and unhealthy ways!
The wise work towards directing them on the auspicious ones!
-- Yoga Vasishta

My own note: The same applies at the social level as well as the individual. Our lives push the society on auspicious and unhealthy paths. The wise see this clearly and clean up their act to the extent feasible!