An
Invitation
to
Reflections

What follows are not teachings, nor records arranged by time. They are recollections, reflections, and inward responses as they surface—often out of sequence, sometimes unbidden. Memory does not obey chronology, and neither does the spirit. These posts arise from moments of attention: to scripture and silence, to work and relationship, to failure and gratitude.

 

My own life, as I see it, has largely followed an inner calling, without calculation of reward or concern for recognition—something close to niṣkāma karma as spoken of in the Bhagavad Gita, and voiced by Krishna: action undertaken as responsibility, not as transaction.

 

In reflecting on my life so far, I find that what Paul Anka wrote in My Way rings true. It is, fittingly, also one of my favourite songs—immortalised by Frank Sinatra. Having lived in Chennai for most of my life—apart from a brief period of under four years in Kerala during my middle-school days, and over three years during my thirties in the United States—it is natural that much of what I reflect on is shaped by my life in Chennai.

 

Along the way, I have learned enduring lessons from many: the wealthy and the less privileged; the learned and the unlettered; bureaucrats and citizens, politicians and followers; the religious and the atheists; bishops and deacons; believers and pretenders; the police and thieves; judges and lawyers; duty-bound doctors and dying patients; friends—and friends turned foes—people from every walk of life, encountered in all their variety.

 

These writings do not claim completion or coherence, only sincerity. If there is a thread running through them, it is the slow movement from assertion to listening, from accumulation to recognition. You may read them as one walks a path—unhurried, without a map—trusting that what matters will reveal itself in its own time. |