♥ It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured. I realized, somehow, through the screaming in my mind, that even in that shackled, bloody helplessness, I was still free: free to hate the men who were torturing me, or to forgive them. It doesn't sound like much, I know. But in the flinch and bite of the chain, when its all you have got, that freedom is a universe of possibility. And the choice you make, between hating and forgiving,can become the story of your life.
♥ Every life, every love, every action and feeling and thought has its cause and its reason and significance: it's beginning, and the part it plays in the end. Nothing in any life, no matter how well or poorly lived, is wiser than failure and or clearer than sorrow. And in the tiny, precious wisdom that they give to us, even those dread and hated enemies, suffering and failure, have their reason and their right to be.
♥ To know the truth, all you have to do is close your eyes…. We can know God, for example, and we can know sadness. We can know dreams, and we can know love. But none of these are real, in our usual sense of things that exist in the world and seem real. We cannot weight them, or measure their length, or find their basic parts in an atom smasher. Which is why they are possible.
♥ I clenched my teeth against the stars. I closed my eyes. I surrendered to sleep. One of the reasons why we crave love, and seek it so desperately, is that love is the only cure for loneliness, and shame, and sorrow. But some feelings sink so deep into the heart that only loneliness can help you find them again. Some truths about yourself are so painful that only shame can help you live with them. And some things are just so sad that only your soul can do the crying for you.
♥ There's a truth deeper than experience. It's beyond what we see, or even what we feel. It's an order of truth that separates the profound from the merely clever, and the reality from the perception. We're helpless, usually, in the face of it; and the cost of knowing it, like the cost of knowing love, is sometimes greater than any heart would willingly pay. It doesn't always help us to love the world, but it does prevent us from hating the world. And the only way to know that truth is to share it, from heart to heart, just as Prabhakar told it to me, just as I'm telling it to you now.
♥ I stood in the harsh electric light of that new tunnel, in Bombay's Arthur Road Prison, and I wanted to laugh. Hey guys, I wanted to say, can't you be a little more original? But I couldn't speak. Fear dries a man's mouth, and hate strangles him. That's why hate has no great literature: real fear and real hate have no words.
♥ My heart broke on its shame and sorrow. I suddenly knew how much crying there was in me, and how little love. I knew, at last, how lonely I was. But I couldn’t respond. My culture had taught me all the wrong things well. So I lay completely still, and gave no reaction at all. But the soul has no culture. The soul has no nations. The soul has no colour or accent or way of life. The soul is forever. The soul is one. And when the heart has its moment of truth and sorrow, the soul can’t be stilled.
♥ The cloak of the past is cut from patches of feeling, and sewn with rebus threads. Most of the time, the best we can do is wrap it around ourselves for comfort or drag it behind us as we struggle to go on. But everything has its cause and its meaning. Every life, every love, every action and feeling and thought has its reason and significance: its beginning, and the part it plays in the end. Sometimes, we do see. Sometimes we see the past so clearly and read the legend of its parts with such acuity, that every stitch of time reveals its purpose, and a kind of message is unfolded in it.
♥ Cruelty is a kind of cowardice. Cruel laughter is the way cowards cry they are not alone, and causing pain is how they grieve.
♥ Every human heartbeat is a universe of possibilities. Every human will has the power to transform its fate. I’d always thought that fate was something unchangeable: fixed for everyone of us at birth, and as constant as the circuit of stars. The truth is that, no matter what kin of game you find yourself in, no matter how good or bad the luck, you can change your life completely with a single thought or a single act of love.
Leaving you to appreciate and ponder over these for today. More later. Peace.
♥ Every life, every love, every action and feeling and thought has its cause and its reason and significance: it's beginning, and the part it plays in the end. Nothing in any life, no matter how well or poorly lived, is wiser than failure and or clearer than sorrow. And in the tiny, precious wisdom that they give to us, even those dread and hated enemies, suffering and failure, have their reason and their right to be.
♥ To know the truth, all you have to do is close your eyes…. We can know God, for example, and we can know sadness. We can know dreams, and we can know love. But none of these are real, in our usual sense of things that exist in the world and seem real. We cannot weight them, or measure their length, or find their basic parts in an atom smasher. Which is why they are possible.
♥ I clenched my teeth against the stars. I closed my eyes. I surrendered to sleep. One of the reasons why we crave love, and seek it so desperately, is that love is the only cure for loneliness, and shame, and sorrow. But some feelings sink so deep into the heart that only loneliness can help you find them again. Some truths about yourself are so painful that only shame can help you live with them. And some things are just so sad that only your soul can do the crying for you.
♥ There's a truth deeper than experience. It's beyond what we see, or even what we feel. It's an order of truth that separates the profound from the merely clever, and the reality from the perception. We're helpless, usually, in the face of it; and the cost of knowing it, like the cost of knowing love, is sometimes greater than any heart would willingly pay. It doesn't always help us to love the world, but it does prevent us from hating the world. And the only way to know that truth is to share it, from heart to heart, just as Prabhakar told it to me, just as I'm telling it to you now.
♥ I stood in the harsh electric light of that new tunnel, in Bombay's Arthur Road Prison, and I wanted to laugh. Hey guys, I wanted to say, can't you be a little more original? But I couldn't speak. Fear dries a man's mouth, and hate strangles him. That's why hate has no great literature: real fear and real hate have no words.
♥ My heart broke on its shame and sorrow. I suddenly knew how much crying there was in me, and how little love. I knew, at last, how lonely I was. But I couldn’t respond. My culture had taught me all the wrong things well. So I lay completely still, and gave no reaction at all. But the soul has no culture. The soul has no nations. The soul has no colour or accent or way of life. The soul is forever. The soul is one. And when the heart has its moment of truth and sorrow, the soul can’t be stilled.
♥ The cloak of the past is cut from patches of feeling, and sewn with rebus threads. Most of the time, the best we can do is wrap it around ourselves for comfort or drag it behind us as we struggle to go on. But everything has its cause and its meaning. Every life, every love, every action and feeling and thought has its reason and significance: its beginning, and the part it plays in the end. Sometimes, we do see. Sometimes we see the past so clearly and read the legend of its parts with such acuity, that every stitch of time reveals its purpose, and a kind of message is unfolded in it.
♥ Cruelty is a kind of cowardice. Cruel laughter is the way cowards cry they are not alone, and causing pain is how they grieve.
♥ Every human heartbeat is a universe of possibilities. Every human will has the power to transform its fate. I’d always thought that fate was something unchangeable: fixed for everyone of us at birth, and as constant as the circuit of stars. The truth is that, no matter what kin of game you find yourself in, no matter how good or bad the luck, you can change your life completely with a single thought or a single act of love.
Leaving you to appreciate and ponder over these for today. More later. Peace.
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1 comments:
An absolutely lovely read. Seems a bit exaggerated as an autobiography, but as a work of fiction is a thriller. Incidentally, this was the first book I read in Hyderabad after having picked it up in Bombay.
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