How To Guide - To Avoid Taking Things Personal and Avoid Hatred Due To This

Before I proceed to provide you a solution to this problem, we must analyze your problem first by a small fable. My apologies as the inclusion of this fable will make this very long, but it’s somehow needed. This is how the story goes.

In a jungle of modern times lives one Wolf and Hyena. The Hyena always jokes or passes sarcastic comments about Wolf and also to other animals in his friends circle. He makes fun about everything, their looks, the way they work, the way they talk, about their community and also about any achievements they made. Everyone including Wolf does know the Hyena‘s behavior, so they try to avoid or ignore him when his personal jokes started about them but do enjoy it when he do the same to any other animals. In contrast, other animals find Wolf very calm and composed in nature and very likable.

Gradually wolf started taking the things personally whenever Hyena jokes about him. On the passing of each day, he started getting irritated easily and Hyena is now started getting into his nerves. Wolf thought to ignore this problem of growing hatred against Hyena. In reality, this hatred is started destroying him internally.

He is not able to focus on anything fully; his hunting his personal life all started getting impacted because of this hatred. He was once a star hunter of that jungle now became a shadow of his own self. His failure in work started impacted his personal life where small incident caused huge fights with his wife and children. Since he kept everything to himself nobody knows what the actual problem is. He even thought of switching his friend circle to ignore him as far as he can.  Since their line of work forced them to keep crossing their path so avoiding him fully was near to impossible. Soon wolf started feeling that Hyena’s joke about him are no longer joke but are personal attacks fueled from Jealousy or something else from Hyena’s side. Wolf keep assuming things about Hyena and the fire of hatred started to fuel further than to extinguish.

One fine day the king of the Jungle declared a party where every animal was invited including the Wolf and Hyena. There are amazing food, fun, and party games. One of the party games was to aim water balloon to a target, not to any animal since their party dress should not get ruined by water. 

Once all the activities are over Hyena took the advantage of spare water balloons and started throwing towards other animals. He started throwing the water balloon close to the other animal but not on them so that animals have to save themselves from the water of the balloon which popped near them. Even if you get wet it will be always only your legs. Soon everyone found this game interesting and got involved in it and started throwing balloons filled with water towards each other. Wolf also started enjoying this game and since he has good reflexes got saved by most of the water balloon been thrown towards him. After a while playing this game Hyena came very close to Wolf with a water balloon and jokingly said “I will pop this balloon on your head.” Wolf thought, it’s not a joke, so to save himself he tried to move his whole body but Hyena being close enough, that movement actually caused the balloon to pop on Wolf. He got all wet and everyone started laughing on him. Hyena being finds this as his mistake ran away to another place of that huge party. This action of Hyena triggered the burst of anger in Wolf. In terms of everyone’s eyes, this is an accident and fun, but maybe not for Wolf or Hyena.

Wolf thought Hyena is trying to humiliate him in public and that hit his limit of patience to the maximum. He tried to find Hyena in the party and ran towards him and started a huge fight. Hyena also in his defense retaliated. All animals in the party got amazed by this behavior of Wolf. They thought what a spoil-sport this wolf is. They tried to stop this fight, but Wolf and Hyena got insane and want to rip each other apart. Finally, somehow all other animals are able to stop this fight and blamed everything to the Wolf and thrown him out of the party. Wolf by seeing this mean behavior of other animals can’t hold his tears and started crying.

He realized that he lost from Hyena in every aspect. Then he also thought everyone is against him and all are here to do just, personal attack on him. Now Wolf’s problem of taking the things personally started for other animals too. This behavior gradually made him the most quarrelsome animal that does the most arguments or fighting with others. Who was once liked by many became likable by none.

Here in this fable Hyena’s are the people who trigger these kind jokes or sarcastic remarks knowingly or unknowingly towards other peoples and Wolf are the peoples who do take them personally and continuously fuel the hatred inside them. None of them is fully sane or totally insane, but finally they behave it that way.

I assume if you can relate yourself somewhat to this story then you are either at stage mentioned in Paragraph 2, 3 or 7 of this fable.  Each paragraph of this fable defines a stage of the hatred you are going to accumulate and the fate it’s going to receive at the end.

Stage 1 -> Paragraph 1 –> You enjoy when it happen with others but try to avoid the joke on himself.

Stage 2 – Paragraph 2 –> You started taking things personally.

Stage 3 – Paragraph 3 –> This get converted to hatred and then started impacted other aspect and relations in life. The fire keeps on igniting.

Stage 4 – Paragraph 4 –> That one fine day comes when it’s going to meet its fate.

Stage 5 – Paragraph 5 –> The moment arrived when it’s going to meet its fate. It’s the moment when the volcano of hatred inside you erupts out from you.

Stage 6 -> Paragraph 6 –> The eruption will always be in the form of negative emotions, arguments or fights. Although the chances are, peoples who witness this incident judge this incident in favor of other persons only.

Stage 7 –> Paragraph 7 –> You will start feeling the whole world conspire against you and you will go forever in loop from Stage 2 to 7 and sometimes directly to 6 or 7 by skipping some of the in between stages too. You will no longer remain same. The chances are you may give your impression to peoples around you as a confrontational person.

Before I provide you the solution and you start searching the internet about this fable, I must tell you this fable is self-written and I had closely followed this incident to unfold in front of my eyes. Where, they were two of my very closely known persons involved in this incident and just used Hyena and Wolf to symbolize them.

Mentioned below is the solution if you are facing any of the problems mentioned above.

Don’t do what you don’t like – Yes, if you don’t like someone tease you then you should not tease others too or enjoy when someone else tease others. If you like making fun of others then when someone makes fun of you takes that as a sporting spirit rather than a personal attack. Try to make fun of yourself, crack some jokes about yourself too but do not try to degrade yourself via those behaviors. This is the start point, as long as you are able to recognize the fun side of the thing which comes towards you, your mind will not recognize it as personal attack so the hatred will not grow up. Joining a laughter club will be a good idea for those who forget to laugh.

In any case, if you still not able to recognize the fun side of anything then learn to ignore. If you keep ignoring certain peoples or things then after some time they will stop coming to you. It may project you as a rude person, but it will be far better than projecting you as a quarrelsome person.

If you still can’t ignore people or things then switch company, job, home or your current location. There must be some way to avoid those peoples or incidents, try to find what works for your case. The people who try to drag you down should always be avoided.

Never allow growing the Hatred inside you – The seed of hatred once planted it will always keep growing in some form or the other. If there are cases when you don’t like something been told about you, then say it then and there itself to that person to stop. Most of the peoples do listen and try not to repeat that again. If you find the person persists even after your frequent ultimatums then the simplest way to stop the hatred inside you is to forgive and forget that person and turn his behavior into some form of love. The elaboration follows.

If you find someone is persistently irritating you and even after asking to stop had not helped then find some of the good quality of that person and try to appreciate him whenever he tries to irritate you. So he will keep spitting venom and you will keep showering love. One day he will fully stop spitting venom's toward you. This policy had given the whole country India to independence, so will work for you as individual too.

The bad part of hatred is, it keep on working even when the person is not in front of you.  If you are the victim of that, then the best way to stop that is to forgive that person. You may need to imagine regularly in your mind that you forgave him for all the wrong doings he is doing or did. Gradually with a lot of practice you will able to forgive him/her to restore your inner peace. Although forgetting that person will be totally up to the individual and their techniques. Do meditation, yoga or exercise which will help you in achieving this step. This step may be necessary even when you find a way to ran away from that person as described in technique 1 above.

Go behind the scene of the actual behavior – That person may be frustrated about you or a sadist and want to frustrate you or he doesn’t know he is frustrating you and that’s his natural behavior. The behavior of a person is totally dependent on the perception you have about that person. If you like that person, then anything they do you will find is fine with you and if you hate the person, then their showcase of love may also irritate you. So find out the real culprit, is it the person or it's you? This task goes complicated when you have more than one person in the list of hatred.

Fortunately, we have a solution here. First rate the entire list of persons in terms of the hatred you have for them. Then find the reason why they behaved that way with you and why you hate them. If you are able to have some logical conclusion then use the Technique 1 and/or 2 above to stop the hatred about that person. Do this for the entire list one by one and at the end you will have the solution. You will realize even the hatred for every person is same, but the solution to handle them will be different for different persons.

In short the solution of the problem lies in resolving the step 1, 2 and 7 of the fable. All other steps are just the by-product of these steps. In my real life, I really surprised to find the calm and composed wolf to behave something like this suddenly.  The hatred took the toll on him and busted as a form of anger without him know about it. So do not try to be that wolf of that story and if possible try to avoid being Hyena too.

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Originally wrote for my answer to this question How-do-I-stop-taking-things-personally on Quora. Image coursey Google.

©Tapas Majumdar, Not for reproduction without Author's permission.

Extremely Short Stories - Part III

This is the continuation of the series where earlier parts are Extremely Short Stories Part -I and Part-II.

Horror Stories

It’s been three days, since the last day of the month and my salary is yet to be credited.

On the grave of my beloved wife, I was crying by remembering our past which was so happy. Suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder, when tried to look back I found that hand has exact same ring my wife was wearing before she died. When I turned back to look her face, she resembled exactly like my wife.

My driver had a heart attack and died behind the wheel, now it’s my turn to have a heart attack while controlling the car from the passenger seat.

Hearing a loud cry of a woman from the adjacent room separated by a wall from my newly rented apartment, I decided to take action about this then realize mine is the last apartment and there is adjacent room.


Sad Stories

I have seen the whole world collapsed around me and wonder why I am the lone survivor among my family and friends, and now even when I had lost both my legs and hands and left with a heart that can cry more than it beats – An earthquake survivor.

“I want to help you out and become a farmer like my father” her son told her but then she said “No, you will not”, in her heart she do not want her son to commit suicide one day, the way her husband did this year.

14^th April 1912 10:00 PM,

It’s been few days since I wrote in my diary that I won through lottery a ticket of a huge ship named RMS Titanic, and now on my way to give a surprise visit to my wife at New York and my 6 month old daughter whom I will meet for the first time; I am so excited and can imagine the happiness they are going to have soon.

Elaboration: Titanic being hit an iceberg at 11:40 p.m. and sank at 15th April 2.20 a.m. In this case, someone is writing in his diary and thinking about happy moments, few hours before his death. If you think in his wife perspective she may never know as it’s a surprise visit from his side.

Patriotic Stories

I had a choice to live with my mother or die for my mother, it turned out that I love the mother India more than my own mother – The Freedom Fighter.

“It’s Time”, the jailor said before my execution. I would love to hear “It’s time for my country’s freedom”, may be in next birth.


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Note: Many of these stories were originally posted at some of my Quora answers and some are original specific for this blog only.


©Tapas Majumdar, Not for reproduction without Author's permission.

The Bright Red Car - Revealations

If you are coming to this part of the story directly please read the Beginning Part first. It's a continuous story so read that part before this one.

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My head is still spinning and I think that idiot doctor had drug me or I had blabbered everything from my unconsciousness, I don’t know. I never thought one small session could cost me so much in my life. I am never going to go for any therapy again. What so ever I am going to reveal now is either from the recording of that session or from my memory based on what I am able to recollect from that doctor Bairagai’s chamber.

The moment he took me to my last birth, I am able to see the red car approaching towards me. This time I managed to reveal the number and it is “MH-16-DW-3489”. Then he took me to the running towards the car incident, the moment window of that car is getting closed, he asked me to find my face in the glass pane of that window. Since everything was happening from my point of view, that’s the only way to reveal my face but the window didn’t reveal my face at all.

He safely kept all the car numbers I recited during our session. The most important was to find out about “MH-16-DW-3489” car which actually caused my death in my past birth. He was driving in so much speed on night with a very low visibility. I was also able to reveal the number of other car which left me and drove fast. That car’s number was “MH-12-EU-2175”

The doctor waited for me to come back to my senses. He looks quite sceptical to reveal the truth, although it was proven now that what so ever troubling me was from my past birth. I am just waiting for the doctor to take the cat out of his bag.

Doctor Bairagi: Listen, the results we have now is amazing. This is the first time we have this kind of accurate results. Even the car’s number looks familiar to me so we can trace that guy who killed you in your last birth but before that there are some interesting revelations which I don’t know could have exists in this world or my machine can pull that up …

 “Please, cut the crap and come to the point.”  I interrupted him in the middle and said “What I remembered I was in some foreign country in my last birth by the looks of the freeway. The car’s number which killed me in last birth will help me to trace the person behind the wheel. I am definitely going to put him in jail. That kid and lady was my child and wife in my last birth and seeing the dog chasing me they actually drove the car. I am fine with that, that’s why it never occurs to me as a nightmare. So tell me something which is new to me and I do not know.”

Doctor Bairagi gave me a surprised look and stare for some moment. Initially, I thought I accurately revealed his analysis but the conversations he had after that had actually jumped me up from my seat.

Doctor Bairagi: Actually that’s not a freeway in some different country it’s an expressway in India only. Both the car numbers you revealed starts with MH so the probability of that occurrence is in Maharashtra, India. Now did you remember the face you have seen in Mirror?

Me: No, the angle of that glass reveals only the dogs.

Doctor Bairagi: I don’t want to say this, but dogs were not chasing you. It’s you who is chasing the car. You were the leader of the pack of dogs who were chasing that Red car. That child found it interesting and tried to watch you all catching his car, but that lady took him inside for his safety, closed the window and instructed the driver to speed up the car.

Me: What!!! Are you gone mad? That’s the happiest dreams I ever have.

Doctor Bairagi: This whole chase had given you that sense of achievements. Either by making that car flee or by leading the pack or by winning some kind of race with your fellow dogs or shouting your lungs out to release your frustration, I don’t know for sure. What I know whenever you are unhappy in your life, your mind searches for the happiness or the moment of pride from this life. Unfortunately in your case it didn’t find anything and in your deep sleep it goes back to your past life and finds this moment of success “Chasing a Red car by leading it from front”. This is the reason this dream keep coming to you when you struggle in your current life.

I am kind of surprised, shocked and apoplectic after listening to this side of my story. Who the hell is he to call me a street dog, even if it’s in my past birth? He was continuing while looking at the car numbers, I had provided.

Doctor Bairagi: You will be the best research material IIRRR had ever found. We only have the concept of reincarnation happens between human lives. No one has any proof of animal to human transitions. You broke that hypothesis. Even all the Bollywood and Hollywood movies I watched, any book I had read had never handled this side of reincarnation story. Although this concept of soul transits from one body to other always exists.  I will start researching on you from tomorrow onwards. You need to be just here. This is the first time we have achieved something more than 50% accuracy.

Doctor Bairagi was grinning from cheek to cheek. I can see the sense of achievement he was showing in his face and I thought enough is enough. I stand up from where I was sitting and showed my anger visible.

Me: Are you an Idiot?  I am going to get marry soon, what my future wife will think if she knows I was a street dog in my past life. How sad my parents will be when they came to know about my revelation.  They hate any kind of dog. What about my friends, colleagues, boss society and status?

Doctor Bairagi: Nothing will happen; this is all about your past life not present. Look for the brighter side. After completion of research, IIRRR will definitely award you for your contribution. You can even put all these achievements in your Resume for your job interviews. I am sure you don’t have any achievements till now. Media will be behind you for your amazing transition. You could be the examples of many religious lectures. You can be the role model for the NGO’s that work for street dogs or for the municipality which catches street dogs. There are so many possibilities which I can’t even count off hand.

Me: So you want to make me a guinea pig to just satisfy your curiosity.

Doctor Bairagi: No. Not my curiosity, the whole mankind curiosity about why dog chase car? I want to give my institute IIRRR and you a global recognition.

Me: What the hell is IIRRR?

Doctor Bairagi: O my god, you don’t know that? I should have told you earlier. It’s very famous institute fully known as Indian Institute of Reincarnation Research and Revelations.

Me: Are you serious Mr. Bairagi? O, My God!!! I always had the feeling that any institute which starts with double I are prestigious institutes. Like IIT or IIM etcetera but IIRRR, are you really serious? Thank god you guys don’t give advertisements about your institute. I am leaving now to never come back.

When I started walking towards the exit door of the chamber hurriedly and doctor Bairagi called me from my back. “Wait!!  Don’t go. I have some more revelations for you” I stopped and turned back with a surprised look with a thought about what worse can happen to me today and he continued “I could have easily hid this information from you but since you came to me for analysis so you have the right to know.” He again paused for a moment to collect his thoughts and finally said.

I am able to recognise the car which killed you in your past birth. I know the number of the car which you had provided. Actually, that was my sports car 30 years back. I was young full of energy coming back to my home town Ahmednagar from pune on newly constructed Nagar road which was deserted at that time compared to what it is now. With heavy rain and very low visibility, I am able to see you only at last moment. If I put the break my car would have toppled so it was best to hit you up. I am sorry!! I did this to you but it seems you did very well for yourself in this life. See it’s not your fault that you had born as Street dog and not even mine since you are crossing road without watching traffics.

His dialogue felt like I have been hit by that car again. I can’t even give a reaction. I was confused, should I cry because if not got hit by that car of Dr. Bairagi I would have able to created some more happy memories or should I be happy to find the killer of my last birth. 

My thought broken by Bairagi’s voice which said

Now we know the place too, as the other car’s number is of Pune so definitely you were a street dog from Pune-Nagar road. You were 100% a street dog in your past life. That’s the reason you can’t recognize the numbers and it felt hazy in your dream, since dogs can’t read. My machine helped you to be in that birth as human where you can read and able to reveal both the car numbers. See I did the analysis of your dreams with 100% accuracy and you are lucky as it happened for the first time. Your further involvement will help a lot to know many unknowns. Remember we know almost everything about Planet Pluto in the universe but no one knows why dog Pluto chase a Red car or even any car. Dogs are our oldest friend they deserve to know the truth.

I can’t stand in front of him further and came out of the chamber without saying a single word. My friend who was waiting outside for quite long asked me what happened and I said the machine didn’t work so I need to come back sometime soon.

I was kind of walking in full speed towards the parking lot and my friend is trying to catch me up. I asked him “Do you love dogs?” he responded “My wife love them a lot”. “What you love about dogs” my next question came up in no time and he thought for a moment and responded “May be when they chase birds, balls, sticks or Frisbees”.

I stopped walking at that moment and turned towards him and asked “Do you know why they do so?” He seems too exhausted while catching me up nodded his head in denial “Probably that’s their style, Doggy style!!!” His ignorance amazed me “Are you sure that’s called doggy style?” I am sure he would have again nodded his head but before he could have gave a reaction, I turned back walking towards the parking lot and realised doctor Bairagi was correct there are so many things people don’t know about their oldest and the most faithful friend, the dog.

In case you are wondering about my recurring dreams, then have you ever seen a human being chasing car, just for any reasons?

--The Begining--

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Disclaimer: All the peoples and incidents depicted in this story are the mere act of fiction. No person living or dead exists.

©Tapas Majumdar, Not for reproduction without Author's permission.

The Bright Red Car

It’s the middle of the night and raining heavily. A car was fast approaching towards me and I didn’t notice. The moment it came closer to me I can see its bright red sports car and before I can react it just ran over me.

I woke up again with this nightmare. This is happening every night and now even the sleeping pills are not working. The number plate of that red car was always visible it ran over me in my dreams. I can recognize the colour make and model of the car, but the number always shows up hazy, not sure if its due to the rain or my near or farsightedness vision.

It took me many nightmares to trace out only 4 letters out of 10 of that car’s number plate. All the letters are written digitally. The first and sixth letters are ‘M’ and ‘W’. 4^th and the 10^th position has number two and five. If the numbers I concluded are correct then the number of the car looks like “M_ _6_W_ _ _9”. There will be lots of blanks to fill. The only thing I figured out from that number plate was the number I depicted are mirror reflections of each other.

I spoke about this problem to my family and close friends and also tried every option they suggested. The results are not hopeful and improving and gradually degrading to a situation where I started hating any cars with bright red colour.

Although it did stop momentarily when I got promoted recently and found the girl to get married soon. Then tonight the occurrence of that dream started again.

When next day, my doctor found even the high dosage of sleeping pills are not working, he said “Utkarsh, I am recommending you to the best analyst of this problem”. When he found me curious, he continued “He is Mr. Bairagi, the best research scholar from the prestigious institute IIRRR. He will analyse your dreams. Remember no one can actually analyse that dreams fully. We do not know if the incident is symbolic or from the past or any indication about future. I am sure he will able to closely predict the reason. Just visit him directly”.

I took all the necessary details and booked an appointment with Doctor Bairagi. On that day, I took one of my friends to the clinic but he was asked to wait outside the chamber. After filling up all the formalities when I went inside, I found the man of age almost 50 to 55 years came out to greet me. He has all grey hairs entangled in ponytails. He has a moustache which is also partially turning white. It gave me a feeling that he might have that crazy scientist look if he makes his hair all loose but just for the patients he made this ponytail to his hairs to appear cool.

I went inside with him to his chamber. There are many big machines in the chamber. Most of those machines looks more like astronomy machines rather than medical ones to me. I was wondering where I have been sent and what this man is up to? He asked me to sit on the couch nearby and started a conversation which went something similar to this

Doctor Bairagi: I am aware you already know the accuracy of this result. The maximum accuracy we received so far is 25 to 30 percent only. Since we do not know how this dream planted inside your mind. So first will go digging at past. If we can’t find anything there then only we will safely assume it as some symbol or some intuition for nearby future.  So before can I proceed further I want to know when this event was actually started.

Me: It first started when I was really frustrated with every aspect of my life, few years back. Hitting by a red car was not my original dream.  The first time a red car came to my dream was different.

Doctor Bairagi: I want to listen to that story, Utkarsh. It is very important for me to know every dream you have.

I tried to recollect my other nightmare with a hope that this will help in this therapy.

Me: One fine night I had seen this weird dream. I am running as fast as I can. I have never run that fast in my life. When I turned back I found, I am running from the pack of dogs that are hysterically barking and chasing me. When I looked in front I found a slow moving car with bright red in colour. It does look like moving slowly for me and from the car’s rear window a small boy most probably of age 4 to 6 years smiled and raised his hand with a gesture of saying bye to me. Then I saw a woman’s hand took that child’s face and hand inside the car and closed that rear window of that car. Within a moment, the car zooms out of my sight.

Doctor Bairagi: Hmm Interesting. What happened to you after that, in that dreams?

Me: I don’t know it always stopped there. Unlike my other dream, I never wake up in the middle of the night after seeing this dream. I always find this dream pleasant. When my life started improving I stopped having this dream. Since the past couple of years, I am having this dream of been hit by a red car in the middle of a rainy night. Although, the car which hit me and the car which I am running towards are no way related to each other except the red colour and the occurrence at night.

There was pin drop silence for some time. I can see the doctor is in deep thinking, taking some notes. After some time, he asked me back. “Do you know the kid or the woman in your dreams?” I said - “No, I never seen that Kid and I can’t see the face of that woman. I do see this dream when my life is stressed out otherwise it was the dream mostly of the car hitting me.”

“Your consent form revealed that you are yet to be married, so there is a possibility of this incidence relate to your future too” The doctor responded spontaneously. “Don’t worry we will analyze both of your dreams.  Let’s start our procedure” He continued and asked me to lie down on a medical bed with wheels, which gradually moves inside a huge machine.

While lying there looking upwards I am able to hear Doctor Bairagi’s voice which instructs me to think about things happened yesterday, then a week back. I keep describing the incidences it continued till my childhood and birth. Then he said now think about your past life. I just woke up inside the machine.

Doctor Bairagi: Why did you open your eyes, we will have to redo this exercise again.

Me: Are you going to take me to my past birth? I am not comfortable with that.

Doctor Bairagi: Yes, off course. I already mentioned we will analyse your past first. How will I know if the dreams you are having is from your past birth or not. We will take you to the last memory trace you have about your last birth or may be beyond that.

This is my nature to get agitated which other feel is small thing. With prolonged lack of sleep had actually increased this behaviour of mine.

Me: I do not believe in this reincarnation stuff. You said this is only 30 percent accurate what if I am not able to come back from that memory? I always stuck in that memory or my present birth memory erase. You never provided me any details before starting this therapy.

My sudden change in behaviour had put doctor Bairagi shock momentarily. He tried to recover as soon as he can and answered “30 percent accuracy is the analysis of the result, not the process to take you to your past births. This is 100 percent accurate. This is the result of my research in IIRRR of many years. Nothing that you have feared will happen”. I know I don’t have any choice, but his answer do convince me and obliged to do the needful again from the start. This time I am with more determination to uncover the truth.

Once I have passed my infancy I reached to my last birth. I can see a village and an expressway or a freeway where the cars are running in very high speed. The moment I entered further the machine started making loud noises, it seems the machine is not able to decode further.

In doctor Bairagi’s word “This never happened to any of his patients before”. I thought he will end the session today, but it seems this technical challenge had made him adamant to fix.  He tuned something at that machine then he suggested that he will make me unconscious and then take me to my past life directly. It will be his responsibility to bring me back from that unconscious state. This will be kind of driving in auto pilot mode in my past life. He was pretty sure that all keys to my dreams lies there only otherwise machines would not have behaved this way.

My concern was how will I know what happened. He suggested that every conversation in this room is recorded, so he will get it once the session is over. I do not have any option rather than trust him.

He came close to me with an injection with a smile and said “Everything will be fine Utkarsh”. I started feeling the dizziness, started seeing the darkness engulfing the brightness and started listening to a sound which is alien to me. I am sure what so ever happening inside my mind and body is not good but now I am too weak to resist that from happening.

Next Part

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Disclaimer: All the peoples and incidents depicted in this story are the mere act of fiction. No person living or dead exists.

©Tapas Majumdar, Not for reproduction without Author's permission.

Mom and Me

Gun is the most confused invention of mankind. No one knows why it’s been created, is it for murder or for protection. No one can justify, if the purpose of its mere existence is to save any life or to take. When you have the gun in your hand you will feel the power within but when you face it, you will feel helpless. No matter how much power you have in this world, you will feel it’s not enough. Same happened to the most influential person of the city Bhanu Pratap Singh when two of us had put the gun on his face.

“Nikitesh Verma, someone came to visit you” The voice was loud and clear.

I followed the guard to the unfamiliar corridors of prison towards the visiting area. This is the first time someone came to visit me, so I was curious. On my way, I found both my friend's looked towards me from their respective cells, I ignored them.

What caught my attention while walking was few prisoners standing with some other policemen; all of them were staring towards me. Their body language ensured that they were telling some tales about me. One of the policemen glared towards me and pointed his finger to my direction. It felt awkward to me but since no one ever came to visit me till date, so I wonder if this is kind of regular scene for someone who walks toward the visitor cell, for the first time.

We walked through a dark alley of the prison and then the guard took me in front of a door. He pushed the double door for me. When I went inside, he closed the door behind me. This cell is bigger than my cell in prison only difference it has thick chain linked fence than the iron bars. Although there is another cell which has bars similar to my cell and bigger than this one, separated by a gap of around 4 feet. The person who is visiting can come closest to the bar and the prisoner can walk up to chain linked fence and both will be separated by 4 feet. I always heard there are some Visiting Cells and Visiting Rooms in Prison, today I know why.

The door of visiting room opened and a lady walked in. I got surprised to find the person who came to visit me. Me with a surprised look said, “Mom you came to visit me at prison!!! I thought, like everyone you also abandoned me”

She comes closer towards the bar tried to touch my hand which I stretched from the fence, smiled and said “I can never abandon you; you are still the apple of my eyes”. She paused for a moment and said “I know you like apples so I bring some for you, but those policemen on the gate had actually taken all of them. They said for security reasons no eatables allowed.” She tried her best to finish this sentence with her beautiful smile.

I know, that smile is the desperate attempt to hide her tears, anger, frustrations, sadness and fear about me.  I smiled back. There are too many emotions in my mind too and just one face to hide them. We both are trying hard, not to reveal the correct emotions. I must keep the conversation rolling, to stop revealing the correct one.

Me: Does dad knows you came here?

Mom: He don’t need to.

Me: I always want you to come and at the same time I always prayed to god that you should never come here for a visit. I don’t want you to see me like this, in this dress, behind the bar. Like all other prayers, god didn’t answer this one too. You gathered courage and Dad even don’t know about it. Does sis know?

She just nodded her head while looking toward her own feet. She raised her head back and said.

Mom: Believe in God, he will definitely answer your prayers some day. Life is all about what we believe. Like they believe you are guilty and I believe you are innocent.

I exhaled a deep breath after hearing this. I looked at her, I found her totally changed since the last time I had seen her.

Me: In these few days you got leaner and aged like many years. You actually did makeup today so that you can hide your dark spots below your eyes. You now have gray hairs which were missing when we last met. Even the dress you are wearing became so loose; I remember to present this dress and it was perfect at that time. What are you doing to yourself? I believe neither you are eating nor sleeping.

She replied spontaneously.

Mom: I am trying my best to get you out of here and I already found a good lawyer for the same.

Me: Do not waste your money on lawyers. I was involved in killing of the most influential person. They will ensure fair trial will never happen. Even the other party will have the fear; if any of us speaks then they will be in trouble. Every day I fear that this will be my last day and I will never able to see you again.

The tears started rolling out from both of our cheeks. I am able to restrict the drops to one or two, but my mom started crying. Wish I could have done something to stop that. If at least, my hands could have reached out fully to wipe out her tears.  Then she said these words while still crying.

Mom: I pray to god every day for your long life. I believe in God, he will definitely answer my prayers soon.

Me: I believe in god too. I also have faith in your belief but the things don’t work always the way we wanted. You know, I wanted to become a Charter Accountant. I did everything right to become one, but I have chosen some wrong friends. I know every one of you warned me about them, I never listened to any of you. I constantly argued with all of you about this friendship I have. What so ever is happening now, I did it to myself; god can’t do anything to change that.

Mom: Please do not blame yourself. It was just a coincidence. You were just at a wrong place at wrong time.

Me: Nothing was a coincidence. I believe you do not know the whole story. The night before that incidence, Aman and Vikash did tell me they will come to my home in the morning for something and asked me to keep my car ready. I was ready after that lovely breakfast you cooked. Vikash wants to drive so I gave him the car key.

He drove it to nearby Joggers Park and instructed me to accompany Aman into the park. I was confused but never questioned his intentions because he was my best friend at that time. We started walking and Aman handed over a monkey cap to me to wear it as a mask. It felt awkward to me and I refused to wear that one. He then wears that as a mask and started walking towards the location where Bhanu Pratap is doing some free hand exercises. I just started following Aman’s speed and directions. He went close to Bhanu, took out a gun and showed it on his face. That moment I can see the most powerful person of the city was standing still, helpless and shocked so also was am I at that moment. I was speechless to find this sudden change of scenario. He pulled the trigger and shoots him just between the eyes. Everyone around us started running towards Bhanu Pratap Singh, who dropped dead in front of me.  I do not know what to do next, when the whole world around me was full of chaos, running and shouting I felt it just soundless.  Aman dragged me by my neck and collar towards the car which Vikas drove to the nearby location. I was too stiff to run; everyone around there was looking towards me. Vikash drove really fast and we are out of the scene within the moment.

You see, there were no coincidences on that day. I just didn’t see it coming. The only coincidence happened that day was unknowingly you cooked my favourite breakfast, which was the last thing I ever eaten from your hand till date.

My mom was still sobbing. She tried to stretch her arms toward me with a gesture to console me. I wish the gaps between the rooms were not 4 feet. I always love when she put her fingers through my hair but this time it’s a distant possibility due to the gap between visiting cell and the room.

Mom: I wish those guards would have allowed me the food, at least the fruits. I also had couple of spoons in front of them to prove nothing is inside the food, but they still didn’t allowed it.

Me: Mom please stop crying, in this world so corrupted someone will definitely enjoy your food, even if it’s not me. In this prison only a life can go waste, food will never go waste.

I said this with a smirk on my face.

Mom: There are times in your childhood when you can’t speak a single word, don’t know how to act but I know what you want to say. I was always able to figure out what you meant by that cry or that gibberish word you spoke. Today you have grown so much that you are beyond my understanding. I can’t understand your gestures anymore. I do not know what wrong I did. Wish I could go back and correct something.

Me: Nothing is your fault mom. You did the best you can. You always did the correct thing, it’s just I never realized. When I became fugitive with them after that incident it’s you who asked me to come back and surrender since I didn’t do anything and reveal the correct story to police. This also helped police to nab Aman and Vikash. Soon all the peoples who are involved in this crime, indirectly will also be behind this bar.

Mom: After that incident, there was no trace of you. Who so ever was present at the park, on the spot, had seen your face. Your friends have used your dad’s car, for that murder. Police traced that and took your dad into custody. They started giving trouble to the whole family. Me and your sister are been questioned almost every day. They have put a constable outside our house. He will tease your sis whenever get a chance. It’s when your call our neighbor one fine day, I suggested you to surrender. 
I have to keep my family intact. Your dad became moody and petulant after this incidence. If you or any of your friends surrender then only your Dad will have the chances to be released from those charges. I do not have any choice, but I do make your life risky. I know, I am a bad mom.

Me: Stop blaming yourself; there may be many bad sons out there but there are no bad mothers. I am also trying my best to stop blaming myself. I am recovering from the betrayal I received. Whenever I felt like not eating I imagine that you are here to feed me.  When I can’t sleep I imagine the lullaby you used to sing in my childhood. I am able to eat and sleep now. It’s happens because I imagine your presence in my mind. If my absence is troubling you then imagine my presence and you will able to sleep peacefully. This will get rid of your dark lines below your eyes. You will able to recover your health. I wish Dad and Anjali would have came here today to meet me. Next time try to convince and bring them too.

Suddenly the door from my behind opened and two men wearing mask grabbed me by my neck and started dragging me towards the door.

While they were dragging me forcefully I shouted with all my voice I have “Tell Dad I loved him. Tell Anjali I missed her, she is the greatest sis I ever had.” 

Then one of them tried to put hand on my mouth, I somehow managed to shout “I love you Mom”.

“Nikit….” She shouted desperately “My Son.”  I can see her panicked “Where are you taking him?”

They haven’t taken me farther. They just took me outside the door closed the door in front of me. They forced me to lie down on my face.

I didn’t realised while coming from that door, there is a gap through which I can still see things of visiting room. I am able see her from distance. She is trying fanatically to look beyond that door. Due to the darkness at my end, I am sure she can’t see me anymore.

I heard a heavy voice from that visitor room saying to my mother “It’s time. You have to go now”. She was now feeling Antsy and shouted “My son, they have taken him. He is innocent”. Then that heavy voice replied “Calm down madam. Your son will be fine”.

When one of those masked man trying he best to not get me up, from the corner of my eyes I can see the other man is now pointing a gun with silencer toward my back. In no time he fired a bullet on my spine.

I didn’t felt anything for a second, then I started feeling the extreme pain and it’s too difficult for me to breathe. In that very moment, I thought what will happen to my mom after my death? Will they spare my family? What will happen when my dad will know about my mom’s visit to me today? 
Wish I could at least say sorry to her for all the sufferings I caused to my family.

In that desperate moment between my life and death I put all my strength to turn my head towards the gap in that door. I can see my mom crying and murmuring something. I guess, I can lip read that. She is saying “Believe in God, he will definitely answer your prayers”.

I am feeling exhausted, so much that I am breathing blood now in place of air and few  more and then some more till I heard a lullaby in my ear. It’s the same lullaby I always imagine whenever I feel hard to sleep.  I feel my eyelids gone heavy. I guess, somehow my body and mind recognized, it’s time to sleep. Rather a very long and deep sleep.

©Tapas Majumdar, Not for reproduction without Author's permission.

Unknown Lessons From Mahabharata - Part I

Lesson I - Dream positive for your next generation. It’s worth it.

We all know about this story of Mahabharata, but we never realized it in this way. This is the moral of the complete story of Mahabharata. This may be a wrong analysis, many of you may not agree, but it’s worth believing in this way. Will also do some scientific analysis here.

The longest chapter in Mahabharata is the Aadi Parva, with so many plots and subplots the actual story of Mahabharata took off when king Shantanu wants to marry Satyavati, but she mentioned her condition that only Her blood will rule Hastinapur (In original story it’s her father who placed this condition).

Scientifically the ambition was only Satyawati’s Genes should rule Hastinapur. So is that dream got fulfilled? We all know what happened. She had two sons Chitrangada and Vichitravirya. One died young and other one died without any children.

Then Satyawati’s another son before marriage, Ved Vyas came into the picture and somehow her blood ruled Hastinapur in next generation too i.e. Dhritarashtra, Pandu, and Vidur. So what happened after the end of Mahabharata or post-Kurukshetra war? 

Yudhistir became the king of Hastinapur. Yudhistir being the Mantra Prasad of God does not have any Satyawati’s genes. In short, the whole Kurukshetra war actually triggered by someone seen an ambition few generations back. Even if Satyawati or her father did not cause any harm or did anything morally wrong still by the end of the epic Satyawati’s blood did not able to rule Hastinapur.

If you look on the flip side of this story, Dhritarashtra had exact same ambition that his blood will rule Hastinapur and did many evils to achieve it. In the end his all next generation perished. Probably this is how it ends when you have an ambition for your next generation and do some evil to meet it. Then why Satyawati or Her father’s ambition received the same fate? They didn’t plan or did anything wrong to achieve it? If you say about Bhisma pratigya, then Devabrata or Bhishma took that of own and no one forced him to do that.

Are there any differences between Dhritarstra’s Ambition and Satyawati’s ambition? As per what we all know there is no difference at all, then good and evil received same fate here. Then what about the most popular lesson of Mahabharata, Dharma will win over Adharma by any means? A food for thought.

Here is the twist to the tale and to understand this we need to go back to the birth of Satyawati. The father of Satyawati who actually placed the condition of marriage in front of king Shantanu was not her real or biological father. Satyawati was actually the daughter of a Chedi king Uparicara- Vasu. She was born with her twin brother. Her twin brother been kept by the King and Satyawati was given to fisherman or to the father we know originally. Now her twin brother actually founded the Matsya kingdom.

Now come back to the original context, Yudhistir (Who don’t have any Genes of Satyawati) was succeeded by Parikshit (Son of Abhimanyu) as a king of Hastinapur, which actually has the last reference of King of Hastinapur in Mahabharata and concludes Mahabharata. All stories of Parikshit’s next generation are actually part of different literature's and not of Mahabharata. If you still can’t guess where I am heading to then here is the complete moral of the story.

Satyawati’s twin brother carried same blood (similar genes) of Satyawati and founded the Matsya Kingdom. The blood or genes passes to some next generations and King Virata from Matsya kingdom got introduced in Mahabharata.

Virata’s daughter Uttara got married to Abhimanyu and Parikshit born or got introduced in Mahabharata. Since Parikshit was the person who ruled Hastinapur. Somewhere someway Parikshit was also carrying Satyawati’s blood as Uttara was an heir of the Matsya Kingdom which was actually founded by Satyawati’s twin brother. Indirectly Satyawati's blood ruled Hastinapur, that she desired at first place. So here also good and evil did not receive the same fate. To check the complete hierarchy Click Here.

Dhritashtra was alive to see his ambition diminished whereas Satyawati’s ambition got fulfilled even if she was not alive to see this. So the moral in my own word will be if you see an ambition for your next generation and don’t take any wrong way to achieve that in your whole life to fulfill, it will surely succeed someday, even if it’s beyond your life span.

If you don’t agree to this morale then if you go to the history of Indian independence way back Rani Lakshmi Bai dreamt that her son and grandson will live in independence (Her son was not even a year at that time, correct me if I am wrong). She may not able to see that day but today we are living in independence just because someone dreamt about it many generations ago. There are many people’s like this who have seen these dreams at that time for their next generation and they have not seen that dream fulfilled in their generation but their genes are reaping the benefit now.

So if we want something for our next generation, say a corruption free India then dream about it and try to achieve it without any wrong or evil means in our lifespan. We never know, if in this or next or some generations in future this will definitely be true, as history never tell any lie. Another food for thought.

Will continue this series for some other unknown lessons in Mahabharata soon.


©Tapas Majumdar

Yuga's In Hindu Mythology

In Hindu mythology, there will be multiple stories for same context. One such thing is the order of Yuga’s as per mythology. Questions like why yuga’s are divided into such a way or why Dwapar yuga comes after Treta yuga whereas two (Dwapar) should come before three (Treta) are some of the common questions related to Yuga’s. So here are three stories which depict the same logic.

Story 1 – Among all the stories about Yuga’s, this one is the most famous one to describe the order of Yugas and its name as per mythology.

Lord Brahma is considered as the creator of this universe, earth, and life. When Lord Brahma created the Universe, the Earth (Bhoomi) approached him in the form of a cow. She told him that she needed guidance on how to help and maintain the balance between good and evil. Lord Brahma told her that with each passing Yuga, the dominance of Evil would gradually increase compare to its previous Yuga.

Brahma said Satyuga would be the Golden age of man when good would overpower evil and Mother Earth (Bhoomi Devi) would stand proudly on her all four feet.

In Treta yuga (The Yuga of Three), the power of Evil would be more profound and the burden of evil would cause her to lose one leg.  Hence, the earth standing on three feet symbolizes Treta Yuga. As mentioned earlier Treta means three.

In Dwapar Yuga where Dwapar literally translates to two feet, the earth would bear more burdens of Evil and be forced to stand on two feet.

Kali Yuga is the time when evil reaches its peak and gains a human-like form as the demon Kali who chops off the Mother Earth’s remaining two feet. This also describes the precarious position of the world where good and evil are so deeply intermingled that it is impossible to separate the two.

Story 2 – This one is another explanation of the order of all Yugas which is based on the time scale.

The life span of the earth is divided into 10,000 parts called Charan and 1 Charana = 432,000 solar years.

So one Charana = 432,000 years.

Now the order and time span of Yugas are mentioned below

Satya Yuga      = 4 Charana  (4*432,000) years

Treta Yuga      = 3 Charana (3*432,000) years

Dwapar Yuga  = 2 Charana (2*432,000) years

Kali Yuga         =   Charana (1*432,000) years

Dwapar is twice the length of Kali and Treta is thrice its length. Due to this order Dwapar Yuga comes after Treta Yuga.

Story 3 - In this story, like other stories justify about the Treta comes before Dwapar yuga too, but it tells the other side that initially it Dwaparyuga was planned to occur before Treta Yuga. It’s a famous story happened during Satyayuga although it's a not so famous story about the order of Yuga’s.

During Satyuga, a beautiful woman named Ahilya was married to a famous saint, Shri Gautam Rishi. Lord Brahma had given Ahilaya’s hand to Gautam Rishi because of his rich knowledge and pious character. Ahilya was very beautiful and was among the most attractive women in the universe at that time.

Lord Indra was very much attracted towards Ahilya and have wrong desires about her. Indra thought of an evil plan. Every morning, Gautam Rishi got up before dawn and went to the lake away from his Ashram to take the bath. Indra thought it’s the best opportunity to go in the Gautam Rishi’s Ashram as Ahilya would be alone. Indra disguised himself like Gautam Rishi and went inside the Ashram. Ahilya could not recognize that it was the Indra under the guise of Gautam Rishi.

Indra had the physical relationship with Ahilya and one day while he was back to his original form Gautam Rishi saw him going out of his Hut in Ashram. Seeing Indra coming out from the hut he lost temper. He immediately went inside and blamed Ahilya and without listening a word of her cursed her that she will turn into a stone. The power of Gautam Rishi’s words was so powerful that Ahilya immediately turned into stone.

Narada muni who was aware of this entire thing explained everything to Gautam Rishi. How she was fooled by Indra’s deception and asked Gautam Rishi to get rid her from the punishment. Listening to the other side of the story, Gautam Rishi melted and said that he cannot take the curse back, but he assured that during Treta Yuga, when Lord Rama (Vishnu’s Avtaar), will come and touch her with his feet, she will be back into life from the lifeless stone. Listening to this solution of Gautam Rishi, Narada said that presently it is Satya Yuga going on and it will take thousands of years to complete. Thereafter, Dwapar Yuga will come which will take million more years to finish and after that Treta Yuga will begin. It will be very long for her to remain as a stone for such a long period of time.

It is said that, hearing to the pain poor Ahilya may go through, Gautam Rishi changed the ordering of the Yugas. With his power, he rotated the time span as such that Treta Yuga came before Dwapar Yuga. He did this so that Ahilya could get relieved from the curse as soon as possible.

I will add more stories whenever I find one, let me know if you find another story which depicts the theory of four Yuga's                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

Coincidences In Mahabharata

Mahabharata is the epic with lots of coincidences. Those coincidences actually make the stories and substories interesting. I have tried to list down some of those coincidences here, from the many co-incidences. As usual, starting with the most to least popular ones.

1. Karna, who was disowned by Kunti after his birth by putting him in a basket and float him in the river. Coincidentally been found and raised by the Charioteer of the same kingdom whose King later Married Kunti.
2. Pandava, who do not want to reveal themselves tried many ways to escape Draupadi's Sayamvar but destiny took them to watch that competition as Brahmins. Even when the stage comes up that Karna can actually win that Sayamwar competition Draupadi rejects him. That makes no Kshatriya can win the competition so eventually all Brahmins are asked to participate in the competition and, as they say, the rest is history.
3. Gandhari got pregnant first but coincidentally Kunti gave birth to the first child for Hastinapur of that generation, which causes the logical conflict of Throne in Mahabharata.
4. In some of the versions it's told that as per astrology, the Day Duryodhana born is not considered as good day as he had born with bad omen, coincidentally Bheema and Yuyutsu also born on the same day and became good human being as compared to Duryodhna.
5. King Shantanu was the youngest among three sons of Pratipa, and as per rule he should never become King of Hastinapur. His oldest brother Devapi suffered from Leprosy and later become a hermit. His older brother Bahlika abandoned Hastinapur and started ruling his maternal uncles Kingdom. These incidences not only ensure that no one except him will rule Hastinapur and the whole Mahabharata begins. To check the complete hierarchy Click Here.

©Tapas Majumdar