Factory of The Mind

For thinkers like me,..........................What? Why the smirk? You think I’m flattering myself by calling myself a thinker, huh? I don’t have to be a Gandhi, Tolstoy or Vivekanand to be a thinker. Anyway greatness does not have much co-relation with popularity. Anyone who spends considerable time thinking is a thinker. Since I don’t have much to do, I think...anyway, let me not get distracted. For thinkers like me, majority of emotional upheavals (meaning a drop or surge in the emotional quotient like in case of anger, ecstasy, fear, jealousy, etc.) are caused by thinking of what my wife does, does not do, did, did not do, should do, should not do, should have done shouldn’t have done, says, does not say, said, did not say......I hope you get the drift. But it is not about my wife alone. There ought to be a comma after wife. After the comma, other entities like children, mother, father, siblings, neighbour, the mayor of my town, my subordinate, my boss, the managing director...

It’s the title of a Hindi movie. I quite liked the plot, the performances and the presentation of this rather off-beat story. I don’t care if it was lifted or inspired by another movie. I don’t know if the psychological disorder shown in the movie exists to that extent or leads to such actions, but the existence and dominance of negative emotions cannot be denied. I found myself empathysing with a brutal murderer. This guy is representative of contemporary criminals like the perverse rapists or fraudsters, who commit heinous crimes in complete consciousness. It may be an exaggerated narration, but I will not be really surprised to know that such persons exist. If one cares to give it thought, it is quite miraculous how we’re able to live with so much negativity around and about us. In the last decade or so, we’re able to communicate much better. But what is it that is getting communicated? All that newspapers and news channels talk about and highlight are a variety of crimes ...

“You’re lucky to have a spouse, whose thinking is aligned with yours”, we’re often told. Indeed. We’re lucky to have each other as companions. For both of us, it is difficult to imagine what life would have been if there was someone else. But I do not agree that many of those who say so are unlucky in this regard. In fact, in very few cases, I sense that one is held back because of his/her spouse. What is lacking is either clarity in thought, honesty of effort or endurance to stay put. A friend of mine, Sanjay has also been a colleague. We come from quite similar family backgrounds and academic paths. While in office, we spent a lot of time discussing life, gossiping of the irony of people, sharing practices for good health. Career-wise, both of us were quite un-ambitious. We often spoke of our exit from job and life thereafter. Then I quit job to move to a farm life and Sanjay thought that soon he too will move out. We did not have exactly the same vision of an ideal life, ...