Hello… I don’t seem to have much free time nowdays with college work and all. But I do have time to sing and post some songs. So do look forward to them. I won’t claim to be a great singer or something. But I love singing and these are some of my amateurish attempts at singing. I’ve tried my best and will improve as time goes by.
So here’s a solo without any music. It’s a song from the movie Dum Dum Dum, Un Paerai Sonnaale:
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Hi! Ok, I made this podcast a long time ago. But still, I hope you find it nice. It’s on ARR, my favourite musician!!
http://podbazaar.com/assets/emff.swf
Recently, I have been thinking about the purpose of my life. Naturally, it’s a topic that everyone will certainly ponder about in some stage of their life. There have been two views presented regarding this topic. 1) There is absolutely no purpose in life and that people just live for the sake of surviving everyday obstacles. It’s not like we really had any choice of being born on this planet. This is kind of a pessimistic approach to life, obviously speaking. 2) Your purpose in life is to serve others. This can be interpreted in any way.
These two views are what I have generally observed among most of the people I have met. Christians obviously believe in serving others. Nihilists are those who belong to group 1. If there are any views at all, I am still not aware of it/them.
So, why worry about our lives at all? Why do we have to think about a purpose for our life here, why bother at all? Why are there so many people around this world, going about finding a purpose for our lives, when maybe none might exist? Or why is it better to have some purpose rather than no purpose at all?
First of all, I believe that everyone should lead a life with a purpose. They might discover it later or earlier in their lives. But it is much better to have clear view of where your life is heading. Ayn Rand says,
“The man without a purpose is a man who drifts at the mercy of random feelings or unidentified urges and is capable of any evil, because he is totally out of control of his own life. In order to be in control of your life, you have to have a purpose — a productive purpose.”…”A central purpose serves to integrate all the other concerns of a man’s life. It establishes the hierarchy, the relative importance, of his values, it saves him from pointless inner conflicts, it permits him to enjoy life on a wide scale and to carry that enjoyment into any area open to his mind; whereas a man without a purpose is lost in chaos. He does not know what his values are. He does not know how to judge. He cannot tell what is or is not important to him, and, therefore, he drifts helplessly at the mercy of any chance stimulus or any whim of the moment. He can enjoy nothing. He spends his life searching for some value which he will never find.” (1964, Playboy Interview)
A purpose in life, will direct you in your life. Of course, you can resort to flexibility. You don’t have to be focussed on just one purpose in your life. So, this is actually a subjective topic. But I completely disagree with people, who believe that “you live life as it comes by”. Or something like, “you should learn to accept and live with what you get, rather than dream about what you might want to get”. I do not tolerate such views. I believe that everybody has an unconscious purpose in life. I believe that everybody has an unconscious affinity towards a certain area of interest.I cannot name the reasons behind such beliefs clearly. I don’t know more about them yet and wish to learn more. But this is certainly what I believe.
Now, coming to the topic on whether the ultimate purpose of our life should be to serve others. As I said earlier, this could be interpretted i many ways by different persons. You can say “making others happy” or you can also, like Christians say “serving others”. But for me, I do not consider it to be my ultimate purpose in life. I am not born to serve others, I am born to serve myself. I strive to keep myself happy, and to do this, I will keep my friends happy. Because seeing them happy, makes me happy. So the basis/motive is the difference here.
One might strive to serve others on the basis of ‘duty’ and ‘God’. My basis is my own happiness. Every act I carry in my life, has my own selfishness in it. Even love, I believe is a very selfish act. Ayn Rand puts it very clearly,
“When you are in love, it means that the person you love is of great personal, selfish importance to you and to your life. If you were selfless, it would have to mean that you derive no personal pleasure or happiness from the company and the existence of the person you love, and that you are motivated only by self-sacrificial pity for that person’s need of you. I don’t have to point out to you that no one would be flattered by, nor would accept, a concept of that kind. Love is not self-sacrifice, but the most profound assertion of your own needs and values. It is for your own happiness that you need the person you love, and that is the greatest compliment, the greatest tribute you can pay to that person.” (1964, Playboy Interview)
So therefore, we need to define a purpose in our life. But we haven’t come to the part where we have to think about why bother at all with a purpose in life? Do you believe that you are already assigned a purpose by some omnipotent being? This is the one topic that is running on my mind right now. Maybe you readers can help me…
Just a few days ago, on last sunday, I had to accompany my parents to the temple again, grudgingly. I don’t know why I just didn’t refuse to go to the temple. They told me that according to the Indian astrology, my timing is not good at the moment. So I should go to the temple and do some simple rituals that might neutralize my bad time. I was really reluctant to go, but I didn’t want to spoil the my day and their day, so I went with them eventually.
Yesterday, I had a chat with my friend and he told me that no one can be an atheist. He just felt it strange that I was an atheist. Here is a snippet of the conversation we had on gtalk:
(Some parts have been edited)
Friend: But what is he definition of GOD in your sense? You say GOD doesn’t exist, so no definition?
Me: I say supernatural GODs don’t exist.
Friend: But I say GOD exists in the form of energy, waves and vibrations. Wherever there is life energy, there is GOD. GOD is full form of energy…
Me: Ok.
Friend: So I believe there is energy within you and around you…so how can I say there cannot be any GOD? GOD is energy… So focusing this energy, our old people gave GOD a form. Form of Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu.
Me: Ok.
Friend: So when we pray brahma, we focus on the power energy of creation and creativity. Shiva energy is to burn your negative in around. Vishnu is to hav awareness to protect. So if you believe GOD is energy, you cannot say you are an atheist.
Me: Ok. I’ll say this again, friend, just for your clarification. I don’t give a heck for supernatural gods who punish us or send us to hell and all that. But I believe that man is God. That God is energy, the force. I believe in the ability of man.
Friend: Yea.. life is within you, you are GOD as said in Anbesivam.
Me: I completely agree with that.
Friend: See… we just naming that energy GOD. If you believe in the existence of energy, then how can you become an atheist? … No one in this world can be athiest.
Me: Why?
Friend: As you and I said, GOD is energy, you believe in energy. It means indirectly you believe in God’s existence as energy.
(End of conversation)
Well, later it all came to the conclusion that we were just playing with words; semantics. This chat with my friend made me think a lot on this subject. I have to think about my own belief system and do a little soul-searching. Do I really believe that GOD is energy? Where does energy come from? They say energy cannot be created, nor can it be destroyed. But where did that birst of energy come from in the first place, to bring about life on earth? What is this energy that moves us all? If energy cannot be created, then how can there be a GOD? If we can control that energy and manipulate it to suit our needs, then how can GOD be energy? How can GOD be manipulated if GOD is something above us? A lot of questions to think and ponder about. A lot of things to analyze and sort out.
My friend above puts this question forward to me. I say that I don’t believe in GOD. So I should naturally have my own definition of GOD, something that I believe in. But it doesn’t mean that all atheists have their own definition of what or who might GOD be. Then my friend postulates that if I do believe in that definition of GOD, how can I be an atheist?
Therefore, I have come to this conclusion. As an atheist, according to me, there is no such thing as GOD. My definition of GOD is a supernatural being who has been postulated to have created this universe and all it’s life forms. I say that kind of GOD does not exist. I also do not want to advocate metaphorical meanings to GOD, because people usually misunderstand that, like my friend did. It is still a vague concept and people will not buy it. I believe in natural phenomena. This energy that my friend talks about and I talk about, this mind power, the power within us and all that is just natural phenomena. Something that pertains to nature. I don’t want to name these as GOD, in case of any misunderstanding. I just want to name these natural phenomena. In this sense, I am an atheist.
In the conversation above, I have said a lot of things on the spur of the moment without thinking my response out. But writing this post has made it possible for me to lay out my thoughts. My friend said here that no one in this world can be atheist. But it is definitely possible. He might just have to look at them carefully and realise that there are people out there who completely do not believe in GOD. They might have a lot of reasons. Some find it unbelievable. Some lose faith on GOD and hence deny its existence. Some think scientifically and therefore deny the existence of GOD. There are a lot of reasons.
If you want to believe in energy, power and all that, just believe in yourself. Everything is within you, and whatever is within you is around you. So just believe in yourself and do not rely on external things like GOD and such crap. I say people like that are cripples. They have not learned to walk without their crutches. I have learned it the hard way, but now I walk on my own. I feel proud and independent. You might call me arrogant. I do not care what people say about me, because I know what I feel. I know if it is arrogance or self-confidence.
I say they are cripples because everytime people are broke, or sad they want something or someone to hang onto. They desperately need that pillar of consolation and most of them find it through GOD or spirituality. Nothing is wrong here. But it is definitely not going to help them any better. Just take my case as an example here. My mum says that according to my astrology, it’s slightly bad time for me. In such a case, going to the temple and praying helps to relieve her and make her believe that nothing bad is going to happen to me. Now, in the first place, if she had not believed in the astrology thing, she wouldn’t have to do anything and nothing would have happened. It’s like GOD commands you to become the president of United States and therefore you become one. When will people realise that GOD is an invention made by man? Do you certainly believe that there is something above all of us?
I welcome all comments from my readers who are both atheists and theists.
It certainly has been a long time since I blogged last. I was really busy with other things pertaining to my University education. I got into NUS, as you all know. So now I am in the process of securing my modules for the first semester.
NUS truly fosters independency and self-reliance. I just love the University campus and I really can’t wait to start school next Monday, 13th. The matriculation fair went really well. My friends were such dears that they waited for me. Their turn was earlier than mine, but they waited for me too. I’m really touched you guys. Thanks:)
I saw and I know that a lot of Indians from India are staying in the campus or living outside. They are here to pursue their degrees. But they are in for a great shock, if they have never been exposed to such a learning environment as in Singapore. It is competitive, no question about that. But it is also knowledge-based learning. You have to think for yourself! It’s nothing like what or how they teach students in India. It’s not rote-learning.
NUS gives a lot of importance to critical thinking and innovativeness. A lot of rights to free speech and independence. You get to choose your modules too, you know. You get to take cross-faculty modules, other than those required to secure your major. That’s what I’m doing now. I was already allocated some essential modules that I have to take for the major I chose. I chose Life Sciences (Major in Biomedical Science).
So I was allocated some basic modules like Biochemistry, Molecular Genetics and Organic Chemistry. I am also in the process of bidding for General Education modules. I will be taking just one such module. It is titled “The Search For Life On Other Planets”! It’s a pretty interesting module. I love it.
I have also applied for this Special Programme in Science. A wonderful place, where I can get to interact with more people who love science just like me:) I attended the interview and I really really hope I get it!! Then I will have five modules to take this semester. Students can take only 5 modules per semester. But if their results are good, they can take upto 10 modules per sem!! That will be one crazy ride!! You will keep hear a whooshing sound going past you very frequently and that will be your life!
My wonderful dad bought me a new Sony Vaio laptop for my University studies! It’s simply great. And now, there is wireless at my home too. So I can surf the net from my room. I realise I’m getting more and more independent. I really like that. But it doesn’t feel as good as when I was going for my job. Because with my job, I had my own allowance money. But now I feel crippled because I am back to asking my dad for my allowance. I guess I have to study hard and wait until I finish my honours. Then I can start living on my own again.
Here’s my laptop:
At first, I wanted to buy coloured ones, like white or green. Pink was disastrous, eventhough it was my favourite colour. It looked very dull and was China-made. This model is Japan-made so it’s slightly better. The surface is rough and so no possibility of scratches. Lovely look and light weight of 1.85kg. Very suitable for student use.
So I guess enough of updates. I have to go back to bid higher points, so that I will get those modules. So did I forget to tell you that NUS modules have to be secured by bidding? We are given some points at first, and we use that to bid for the modules. Whoever bids the highest and is within the quota, gets the module. A bit confusing at first, but later I got used to it. So I’m whooshing off now:)
Priya Jayagopi 