Have you ever got into the car and started to drive, only to realise that you have inadvertently left the parking brake on? For a while, you can’t work out why your vehicle is so sluggish. Then suddenly, it becomes obvious. I guess sometimes, we make a similar error with the vehicle of our life. We begin to wonder why we just don't seem to be getting anywhere and we feel frustrated because progress is so slow and sluggish. Then it dawns on us. We are holding ourselves back. We are letting ourselves be weighed down by irrelevant fears. Untill the pennies drop. Light bulbs illuminate. Realisations arrive. Suddenly we understand what had been a mystery. One part of us says, "Oh no!"and the other says, “Of course!” ...We all fear facts and discover that these can challenge our view of the world. No matter how open-minded than most people I am but I still prefer to see myself as a person whose insights are impeccable and whose actions are always beyond reproach. Of course, in reality, no such individuals exist. So I suppose all is left is that I have to be brave, to learn the lesson life wants to teach me today...Would life will get happier, instantly?

When you are hungry, the simplest question can seem like an intimidating challenge. When you are sleepy, the easiest task can appear like an entry test for MENSA. When you are running late, when your family are being grouchy, when your team have just lost a game, a pessimistic perspective soon develops. We rarely make enough allowance for the importance of timing. I guess I should remember that some things – for some people (including me) will prove easier to do or deal with tomorrow than today. So I guess I will stop thinking about what has put me through this shock today...and worry about it tomorrow!

He asked : When is the darkest hour?
She said : Just before the dawn!
He asked: When are things most likely to change?
She said : Just when we have got used to the idea that they will never change.
He asked :When will we have learned our lesson?
She said :When we realise that life holds more lessons than we can ever learn.

People love to make clear announcements in confident tones and lead us all to believe that they know what they are talking about. But they rarely do. Progress, comes in spite of – not because of – the intervention of experts. We can tell people that a situation contains little hope. As a white lie...we do it all the time at work...( I am a consultant..give me a break!)...but can we do that in our personal life, and with our friends. Just so that it might make them a little happier?? I guess not...That would be wrong! But then again...who sets the right and wrong? Is it like what they say "Medicine amuses the patient, while nature effects the cure"... I think not ...Nor is this the only realm in which credit is often wrongly attributed. The deeply superstitious will frequently testify to the efficacy of their plans to avoid spilling salt or walking under ladders. "Look,"they will say, "I did all the right things – and they must have worked because I am still here."But that would still have been the same even if they had done all the wrong things?". so does this mean that we need to follow an insurance policy so expensive that we need an insurance policy to cover our ability to afford it???

Why can't leopards change their spots? You would think that in this go-getting, commercial world of the 21st century, someone would set up a beauty parlour in the jungle. A chilled little place with a gym, a spa and an on-site laser tattooist. The beasts could come there for stripe adjustment and spot removal. The Elephants could wear their trunks, the leopards, their leotards! Actually, I don't even think we need to go to Africa to fill such a gap in the market. Right on our doorstep there are creatures of habit, insisting that they can do things differently from everyone else!! ummm...I shall say no more...can't give away too much now can I?!!!

Desires are expensive things to have. If we can only manage to persuade ourselves that we want nothing, we can save ourselves a great deal of money, time and "emotional investment."All business people know that it is much easier to drive a hard bargain when you feel dispassionate – and conversely, that you can soon be taken advantage of if you deeply yearn to take possession of something... or someone. That is going a bit too far I guess, the problem is we can't really own people...or can we? We can't change them to our likings… can we? It is like the cars and elephant metaphor; Cars, like elephants, have two distinctly different ends. Go round the front and they seem very appealing. Go round the back and you had better be wearing a clothes peg over your nose. Hey, that's life. Two sides to every coin. If you are hoping to persuade elephants to stop doing what it is that elephants do several times a day, you are not going to get far. Nor are you likely to find a combustion engine without an exhaust. So does that mean that no matter how possessive we may be, it is not easy to change things the way we want them to be? Especially if the so called "things" in question are the people closed to us? I guess we do occasionally get the option to position ourselves where we can enjoy the advantages of a certain situation without having to look so closely at what's wrong with it. But hey that is tough too!!!

"Imagine there's no heaven, it's easy if you try... " Ah, but is it? Most of us find it difficult to envisage a world without a heaven. We may try hard to seem cynical but deep within, we are all idealists. Not only do we like to dream of an ever-after that is always happy, we also like to feel that heaven is a place on Earth. We keep hoping that any moment now we are going to enter it. ya right?!! Wake up... The "ever-after" bit I am not qualified to comment on. I have very mixed feelings at the moment of whether there is any truth on such a thing...or what the people who came up with that concept were actually thinking!!! My power of cynicism extends only to now ! And all I can think of is "when will I get a little taste of the heaven" they keep promising us?!

We live in an instant, just-add-water, push-a-button, microwaveable-in-under-three-minutes, zap-the-remote-control-and-see-the-war-before-your-very-eyes kind of a world. Not everything about it is good. Too often, we lose our appreciation for essential natural processes that need to happen slowly. We look for ways to hurry them just as we look for ways to depersonalise the injustices that we can see yet seemingly cannot influence. We end up feeling remote. And we end up looking desperately for something to put us right back in touch with the nicest part of reality.
Some people are now staring at their TV screens all day, watching the rolling news in a mesmerised daze. Others are getting the merest occasional glimpse of the war or shall we call it PWN ( Post War News). They notice a headline as they stroll past a news stand or catch a few words of the six o'clock bulletin. Who can say which group is better informed? The propagandists are showing us only what they want us to see. Even if it is not what we want to see at all. I guess it is up to us not to let others to warp our view of key situations and not get blinded by science. I suppose my granma is right when she says: "Ask your heart what it sees. And trust that."

This weekend I decided to retire...retire from this unfair and brutal game of give and take...perhaps retire to a little house on the priory with white fences and a cat who hasn't got a name! Perhaps I would sit on the porch on my rocking chair with the cat and stare at the lily path...! Perhaps I will take up knitting too...but who would I knit for...Perhaps I will make little outfits for the cat!...and perhaps the children from the village will come up to watch the old lady with the cat...Perhaps they will come and play in the yard and I sit there on the porch...on my rocking chair with the cat and watch them play...perhaps I will make them cookies! But then that would mean that I have to take my eyes of the path!
Perhaps a little bird will take refuge in the kitchen and becomes friend with the cat...an addition to our little family! Perhaps I never close my eyes...just in case I miss what goes on the lily path...Perhaps spring blooms come and go...Perhaps the summer warm wind blows...Perhaps the leaves fall as the autumn comes...Perhaps the snow falls and I watch the lily path covered with white crisp snow...closing my eyes...hoping for spring blooms again...year after year!

Some people say, "Don't sweat the small stuff." Others disagree. They say, "Little things count for a lot." To someone else, my current drama might look trivial. But from where I am standing, it seems like a very big deal. And how can any one ever really say what matters and what doesn't. If something is important to me now, it is important and I don't have to justify myself nor do I need to apologise for experiencing a perfectly reasonable reaction.

Have you ever started to feel like an arrow that is about to be fired by someone else’s bow? where you suspect you are being used as a pawn in a greater game!. And you feel a sense of the inevitable about what is happening, yet you are not sure whether you are happy with it, and you wonder whether you can turn back time? Can you stop what has already started? Can you Ignore criticism and suppress doubt? Go with the flow?, even if you are not yet quite sure where that flow is actually going?.
My Dad always says; you are never too sure of anything until it surprises you! But are there really such things as happy surprises?....

"Life is what happens to us while we are busy making other plans." This old Sufi saying, was one of Patric Walker's favourites. It became attributed to John Lennon after the late great astrologer quoted it to the Beatle in a New York hotel. Soon after, Lennon gave an interview and he used that phrase. Ever since he has been credited with this particular piece of wisdom. I am not sure if any of this really matter....Only in one way maybe. I think life is also what happens to us while we are busy watching other people. And the more energy we give their stories, the less time we have for our own!!!

Tried to put a picture up....but failed badly :(

Some things never change. They last forever. They will always be what they always were. Our deepest, most emotional bonds for example. They may deepen and strengthen or they may even suffer some stress and weaken. But in some shape or form they will be with us our whole life long. Even death cannot part us from the people with whom we have made a permanent connection! ....:)

I guess some things are just not worth thinking about. The more attention you give them, the more intimidating they seem. And, of course, they are almost always the things we simply cannot bring ourselves to ignore. It can be as hard to resist thinking a particular thought as it can be to stop smoking – or give up cheese cakes. We know we really shouldn’t but we just can’t seem to help ourselves. I don't know why I am talking about this kind of thing to you today!!! Hey this diet thing is making me cranky......

Did I ever say that the journey isn't important; it is the destination that counts? ...I am sorry if I did...because now I change my mind if I ever have committed myself to such idea...I took a completely different route to work today...walked a bit...even took the bus...I can confidently say the journey does matter and the destination is irrelevant...as long you have a set destination...how you choose to get there can make a big difference in the overall scheme of things!!!

The world divides up into two types of people. The pots... and the kettles! Or, if you prefer, the hypocritical and the inconsistent. We are all as bad as each other. We all look suitably horrified and outraged when we discover other people’s glaring contradictions. And we all manage to turn a convenient blind eye to our own, equally bad, double standards. The grass may be always greener on the other side of the fence but the snow always tends to be whiter, purer and more driven on our own side of it!!

What is the secret of true happiness? Over the centuries many people have asked this question but few have ever claimed to know the answer. Perhaps instead, we should ask, what is the cause of eternal sadness? The human heart is amazingly resilient – as too, is the mind. No matter what we experience, we can find some way to accept it or put it behind us. So if sadness cannot last forever, perhaps happiness cannot either. And perhaps, it is only when we understand this that we become truly happy!!!

I went through my phone book over and over...and it is amazing how I realised...I didn't actually had anyone I could call to cry for...some one who would just listen...or offer to hold my hand...some one who would tell me everything is going to be fine no matter how far fetched that might seemed!! some one who would simply offer an open arm...have I really hit rock bottom...what happend to my friends? I guess some where down the path of getting here things kind of changed...ya I guess they did!...So as I watched the Swans drift along the water playfully and the little girl feeding the ducks I realised... one is the loneliest number to be!!

We try so hard to take everything in our stride and to accept without question whatever life puts in our path. Yet every so often the devil takes hold of us. It pins us down, winds us up and says,"Go on, seek an explanation. Try to understand."No matter how often we have tried this in the past, we get sucked in by that idea. "Maybe," we think,"this time I will make sense of it."

Sometimes I just cannot relate to a certain person in the way I once did. Indeed, I seem to be changing one relationship with relationships! Is it because I want something different from them these days. Why?May be I shouldn't bother asking. Perhaps I should just trust that if I now follow what I feel,I won't go far wrong....! ummmmmm

Why do people talk about turning green with envy? If that's the colour we really go, we surely don’t have to worry about the colour of the grass on the other side of the fence. I am not trying to suggest that we are being unreasonably covetous. But if we want to understand the subtle motives behind various people's positions, we need to appreciate how potent desire can be. Someone we feel tempted to move in one way, when we know for sure that someone else is itching to go in a different direction. Both of us think this is the way to find happiness. But is it? I think not! It is through putting down, not picking up a passion, that life can be lightened.

Actually, you don't have to go to the other side of the fence to get greener grass. You can attain it just by pushing the lawn-mower in a particular direction. Some people become almost neurotically obsessed with getting the right stripes. They figure that if their lawn looks perfect, this will somehow help a part of their lives to be perfect. But, of course, we all know that appearances can be very deceptive. So If we want the grass to get genuinely greener, shouldn't we stop trying to sit on the fence!

Has someone slipped something in my tea? Everything seems a little more vivid than usual. Images are sharper, sounds more subtle, colours brighter, Ideas more exciting. And emotions are more intense. What could it be? oh...I get it...it is sunny today!!!!

In every busy street you will find an optician and a dentist. Clearly, a lot of eyes need looking at and a lot of mouths need looking in. Yet where are the people who check our hearing? We cannot even readily recall the name of these medical specialists? Can we conclude from this that the world is full of people who have no difficulty in that department? If this is so, how do we explain the fact that nobody ever listens to anybody else? If we are not all deaf, we are certainly terribly rude!

Every channel i flick through these days are showing images of the war...every conversation you have with people is about the war...I watched the fall of baghadad on CNN yesterday...I saw Iraqi people battering the statue of Saddam on CNN...I also saw an Iraqi girl shout go home americans and swearing at them on Jame-Jam...which one should we hear? which one should we believe? Is this why we are always told not to generalise?

When things change in the world, they change suddenly. The build-up may be gradual but the moment of truth comes from nowhere and establishes itself at the speed of greased-lightning. The whole thing is rather like watching a balloon being blown up to the point where it finally pops. It often seems amazing how much energy or air can be absorbed. it is like thinking, something has surely got to give soon but it doesn’t. And then, the point of no return is brief. What’s coming up for these people? Liberation! The imminent, instant end of a struggle they feared would go on forever?