Challenging the status quo: What is the objective of an interview or a panel discussion?

It is quite interesting to see reactions to interviews. "He was not grilled enough", "They never ask him the hard questions", "Awesome!! That's how you should humilate these @#$#@!", "Only Arnab has the courage to yell at .."

In short, the man on the chair is the criminal. The interview is simply meant to prove what we already know. 

Is that what a talk or a discussion is about? Confirming, agreeing upon what we already know or have assumed? Even if we succeed at doing that, what have we achieved? What have we improved? What have we achieved? Aren't we exactly at the same spot we started? The sides are already chosen, and the man in the center is the judge. Whare's the fun in that?

I think a good interview approaches not from a position of close minded aggression, but a position of open minded humility. "I don't know" rather than "I will tell you what's wrong". The objective is not humiliation, catching them on the wrong foot; but understanding the other person, his perspective. Not to be confused with agreement. The talk becomes a mutual investigation - the aim is to find out the truth and move on, not to catch the lie and badger him down. 

The same goes for panel discussions; even the mature ones Arnab's being the least). The aim is still to trap - but in a quieter way maybe. 

I wish interviewers would ask themselves the following questions:

- Am I trying to prove him wrong, or to find out the truth?

- Once the answers make the truth obvious, is it worth getting the person to admit it?

- What is the issue? People lying or the impact those lies create?

- What am I aiming to LEARN, rather than PROVE from this discussion? 

- What issue am I aiming to achieve clarity, not a conviction - through this discussion?

- Am I behaving like a judge or a student?

The masses enjoy cheap rhetoric. But I strongly believe an intelligent investigation - produces a positive transformation in the overall situation by itself. It is a step forward for everybody. Rhetoric simply hardens the polarities.  A real conversation has to be tasted to be believed. We are just too used to blind rhetoric, that's all!

War - From the eyes of a child

I woke up early on Christmas morning and couldn't believe my eyes. There were no soldiers on the road, no tanks and guns, no sound of bombings. After 5 long years would I have a real Christmas I wondered. Yes it was 5 years ago that it all started, when my world came crumbling around me. I was at exactly the same spot. A stray bullet had just pierced my Daddy's chest. 

Democracy Vs Dictatorship vs Leadership

Majority opinion reflects perception - not reality. Democracy is based on the perception of the majority - which might be wrong. Hence, we create the concept of dictatorship - which is again based on the perception of one(instead of majority)

But the underlying malaise is still the same: Being influenced by perception rather than being grounded in reality.

The Peacemaker

The mind-boggling crowd, the unbearable noise, the horrific crime news on TV...
Amid the total chaos...you watch a baby sleeping peacefully. And you know: 
It's OK. There's still hope. 

Sometimes its hard to understand who reassures whom.

A Rainy Day

(This was written on June 12, 2013 :) )

The last time I wrote on such a topic might have been in elementary school :-) But you must admit, it always is special 

Have you felt the loneliness that a cloudy, rainy day brings? Its the only kind of loneliness I love. Holed up safely at home, enjoying the battle of rain drops from my window. 

Blurbs of people, vehicles, shops, kids, umbrellas - their outlines gone awry. Like a water color painting on which a child has spilled water. Blissful destruction. As if trying to break their moulds and unite into each other. 

The trees sway in the strong winds in a gentle dance, the occasional soft thunder adding percussion to the mix. It seems like entire nature has become a big smiley face. Wet, Fresh, young. As if given another chance. To be reborn. 

Even the traffic noises take on a special tone. Try to hear them. The aggressive vroom of a car, the irritating rat-a-tat of the auto, the deep baritone of a truck - their sharp edges softened down by the gentle pitter-patter of raindrops everywhere. And if you are lucky enough to experience a pause of the traffic, leaving only the raindrops - do not forget to close your eyes. Its even better than the 'garam chai' you thought was the best part about a rainy day. A moment of unison with nature. Aurally. Soothes the mind. And when the same 'noises' resume after that, the peace prevails. The same struggling world, suddenly seems easier. Hope rekindled.

And finally when the showers stop, the colors come out. As if mother nature has got an amazing face-lift :-) Her wrinkles, crinkles all ironed out. As the drops of life give her the much needed respite, it is as if she has shed her skin of grime and dust, bringing out the tenderness within. 

"Mother" Nature never sounded more real.

The meaning of K's quote: "Relationship is the mirror in which we view ourselves"

Had a moment of epiphany today. Jiddu always said "Relationship is the mirror in which we view ourselves". And then proceeded to explain how we have perverted relationships etc. Never made sense. Of course, it could not mean the simplistic 'Gives us a mirror to COMPARE ourselves with others'
because as he already repeats and explains: 'Comparison is the root of all conflict'. So that what does it really mean?

Struck me when I read another quote:

Questioner: Can one love truth without loving man? Can one love man without loving truth? What comes first?

Jiddu Krishnamurti: Love comes first. To love truth, you must know truth. To know truth is to deny truth. What is known is not truth. What is known is already encased in time and ceases to be truth. Truth is an eternal movement, and so cannot be measured in words or in time. It cannot be held in the fist. You cannot love something which you do not know. But truth is not to be found in books, in images, in temples. It is to be found in action, in living. The very search for the unknown is love itself, and you cannot search for the unknowable away from relationship. You cannot search for reality, or for what you will, in isolation. It comes into being only in relationship, only when there is right relationship between man and man. So the love of man is the search for reality.

Love is a process, rather than a stage. If we say we KNOW it, it's already dead, conceptualized, abstracted into a projection of the mind. That is clear. On the other hand, you cannot love something that is unknown. That's illogical.  But he clearly puts it: "The very search for the unknown is love itself". That might be so.
Because it needs sincerity, seriousness, to pay the price, to be ready to lose what you HAVE/KNOW because what you are looking for is much more precious. 'Love' might be a good word for that. But how does this search happen? You cannot say "I am searching for the unknown".

The only way to do this is to start from what you HAVE, from the known. That is your mind. You have to UNDERSTAND the mind, and hence transcend into the unknown. Now the thing is, the mind exists in RELATIONSHIP TO SOMETHING only. It cannot exist by itself. Its content is memories, the responses to them - which is thought, and our subjective extrapolations in between - which can be called our beliefs/opinions. 

So we have to start be examining what we HAVE, our mind. And since mind exists in relationship only - we can understand its working only when it exists. That is, when there is a relationship. Only a relationship gives us the chance to OBSERVE, not compare. To see what happens, how the mind reacts, how thought forms, how fear arises, how we judge. If we don't have a relationship, we are left with nothing but our own concepts(form the past) and we can concoct whatever we want to believe.

Without relationship, we will not get the chance to OBSERVE, because there is nothing LEFT to observe.  There might be a lot to ANALYZE and to conclude from, and add it to the existing accumulated content. But nothing to observe. The process of doing this, of observing, without judgment, without concluding, that is love perhaps. 

India needs leaders, Indians want saviors.

Passion might not be something we do successfully. On the contrary, it might be something we enjoy doing despite making mistakes. Then success might of course become a highly probable coincidence