conversations.


  A photograph from a street at Yerevan, Armenia.

” When was the last time you listened to someone? Really listened, without thinking about what you wanted to say next, glancing down at your phone or jumping in to offer your opinion? ” – Kate Murphy

This message that I read somewhere really made me give a thought to it and decided to add my two cents to it. I did some reading on it and it can be realized that the above quote’s concern is actually pretty widespread in our day and age. It’s hard to find a good patient listener these days. Comparing to a few years back, I can relate that I really find a hard time reading a full-length editorial page or a long format post. Right after we delve in, we are constantly distracted by a notification or a call or something else of that sort. The short attention spans of people are the reason that most ads these days are very short. While exploring this theme and reading on it, I happened to read about Kate Murphy’s book titled “You’re not listening“. As she explains it, the theme is on the erosion of listening skills.  I’m yet to read it, but my initial impressions remain pretty optimistic.

“Despite living in a world where technology allows constant digital communication and opportunities to connect, it seems no one is really listening or even knows how. And it’s making us lonelier, more isolated, and less tolerant than ever before. In this always illuminating and often humorous deep dive, Murphy explains why we’re not listening, what it’s doing to us, and how we can reverse the trend. She makes accessible the psychology, neuroscience, and sociology of listening while also introducing us to some of the best listeners out there.”

In its review, The Guardian referred to it as sort of an exploration into the modern epidemic of self-absorbed talk. They tag it with

” Restaurants are noisy, social media connections are shallow, giving a TED talk is living the dream. What happened to conversation? “

She writes:

“At cafes, restaurants and family dinner tables, rather than talking to one another, people look at their phones. Or if they are talking to one another, the phone is on the table as if a  part of the place setting, taken up at intervals as casually as a knife or fork, implicitly signaling that the present company is not sufficiently engaging…people just as reflexively reach for their phones. Like smokers and cigarettes, people get jittery without their phones.”

She puts in a lot of interesting statistics and some surveys on how quality time is sabotaged by the sheer absence of listening skills. I’m yet to read the book completely and have only gone through some excerpts. As I understand from reviews, she puts in a lot of interesting suggestions to better engage in profound conversations.  I’m looking forward to reading this sometime soon. She writes in the book  “Our devices indulge our fear of intimacy by fooling us into thinking that we are socially connected even when we are achingly alone.”

interpretive

A photograph of a world traveler that I took on a visit to Princess Islands in Istanbul. Remembering the words of Eliott Erwitt that “Color is descriptive. Black and white is interpretive.” She was delightfully surprised at the seagull glancing at her through the ferry window. The year is 2014.

“ Perhaps I am old-fashioned, but black and white films still hold an affectionate place in my heart; they have an incomparable mystique and mood.”

― Ginger Rogers

certain tracks

I stumbled across this gem recently. There’re certain tracks that set you on that apt calm temperamental disposition to create and work passionately on what you love. This is one of those. And that’s one step more to the corpus of the garden of thoughts.

“A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one’s neighbor — such is my idea of happiness.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness

the flicker of leaves

My vehement fascination with petals and the art in their arrangements transcends to tree trunks and stems as well and this is what we have pulled off  : )

This is a mobile photograph taken from Al Ain Oasis. Down the memory lane, my 2019 year started on top of a mountain in the UAE. Instead of chasing fireworks, we pursued mountain trails in 2019. In place of the rabble and gaggle of a fireworks crowd, we tried to embrace the assuasive and soothing equanimity in the mountains.

“You are most beautiful in your purest form. You are a manifestation of God himself. Open your eyes and let the light flow right through to your core. All it takes is for you to notice a flicker of leaves, a momentary glance from a loved one, or for a wave to hit your toes and freeze you in that timeless place where you know with every cell in your body that God, indeed is real.”

Soroosh Shahrivar, The Rise of Shams

stumble over pebbles.

These are some pebbles that I randomly glanced at Corbin’s Cove beach in Port Blair during a visit with Netta in 2018. It’s a beautiful palm-fringed beach with pleasant blue sea water and lush green coconut palms. They’re enriched with colorful corals and artful rockfaces at the peripheries. I have some vague recollections of an old post that I read on medium portal which spoke about the art of seeing beauty in the everyday. Pebbles purvey such thoughts on appreciating such beauties around us. The detailing and subtleties of these pebbles graciously nudge of themes in a philosophical context. As Emilie Cady puts it, ” Men stumble over pebbles, never over mountains“.

“A rock, a large piece of rock weathers off a cliff and dives deep into a pool of gushing water. Back washed, It journeys roughly and knocks of other rocks, smashing through the waves as it loses itself in scattered pieces except for its core. That core travels far and wide, it coarsely gets ground by gravel pieces smaller than itself and bullied by boulders all of which it bears up as it withstands the pressure of a distant journey off the shore. At some point, it gets dry and it encounters mud, it gets smeared dirty but the mud doesn’t stick, the rain washes of the mud and it rolls off into the sand. It dances in the sand and dives into the bottom of the waves.

Rising like a phoenix through the ashes, it emerges polished, looking more beautiful than it did when it got edged of the cliff. It rises a pebble, smooth and sleek. Coveted by rocks starting their dive.

To be a pebble you have to run the turbulent tidal race.

― Victor Manan Nyambala



heart is your sky.

“The sky is the limit for the extraordinary, the universe is not even the limit for the divine.” “The world is young, the sky is old, the cosmos are ancient, but the universe timeless.” “He who owns the sky owns the stars.” “Your mind is your world, your heart is your sky, your soul is your universe.” ― Matshona Dhliwayo

new year greetings! May Almighty bless us to have twenty-20 to be a year to be meaningfully purposeful, thoughtfully worthwhile and consequentially pithy. Your heart is your sky. Cherish every moment as you unlock your destiny & unlatch the divine scheme of things.

tranquil | fine art

“The more tranquil a man becomes, the greater is his success, his influence, his power for good. Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom.” (As once said by James Allen)

[Original illustration by The Border Of a Mind Studios]