Porn isn't Sexy & Sexy isn't Porn

Attractiveness is usually considered to be an important part of one's personality in a civil society. If you have substance in your personality and is embellished by good looks, that makes an unbeatable combination to give you self-confidence to face life gracefully. Though there has been a huge impact of the fashion industry and the media on our contemporary lives, we should teach our kids that a phenomenon like "sex" is too much over-rated by the corporate sector and fashion industry. This is one good thing about religion that it doesn't over-rate sex and keeps it where it should be and not in the head all the time ;) but "sexual repression" is a pretty hypocritical reality of a conservative religious society. Though statistically, the sale of porn DVD's and photos has always been recorded much higher in the conservative areas, one must create a personal discretion and draw that thin line between sexy and porn.  Though this notion would vary from nation to nation as something which would be called sexy here in India would be called porn in the middle-east and traditional/ ethnic in the west. I'll just use the photo of a renowned porn star here.

This is definitely not a porn image as per the Indian fashion industry. But there need to be clear-cut guidelines differentiating soft-porn and hardcore-porn. If used positively, soft porn can be considered as a great source of sex-education for teenagers and hardcore porn should be legally and strictly made to view for adults above 18 or 21. Now, at the age of 32, I can share an experience of watching a hardcore-porn film for the first time (of course in privacy) at the age of 19 or 20. I was about to puke looking at the visuals of oral sex and swallowing of the semen etc... Sh*t.... I just freaked out even while writing this. And I won't consider that as a very soothing or a pleasant experience. So I can clearly say out loud at the top of my voice that "Porn isn't sexy...."

Now, on the other hand being an individual who values physical fitness, good looks and dressing sense, I won't shy away from admitting that a beautiful, well-dressed woman having a well worked-out or a well-maintained body is a good enough reason to turn you on. Getting turned on doesn't exactly mean that you feel like having "sex" with that woman, it's just that the particular woman acts as an external stimulus to turn on my own sensuality and I too feel the need of looking good and attractive. In simple words, I get inspired to look hot and sexy from that individual. Even a well-built guy does the trick at times. Doesn't mean I'm a gay or a bisexual. So, I can say this too, out loud at the top of my voice, that "Sexy isn't porn....". It is a very positive force to make you feel young about yourself. Hence, we must create that differentiation at the personal level and open to young kids to teach them that difference.

Demigods and Goddesses- mere personality types

If we assume that demigods and goddesses are merely mythological creatures who have no bearing of resemblance to the existing people, then we need to correct ourselves. Demigods and goddesses are mere personality types having a certain set of qualities and characteristics which may be considered as divine or heavenly by common man. Though the existence of demigods and goddesses can be observed in almost all the mythologies across the globe cutting across cultural or geographical boundaries. These mythological characters bear a clear-cut resemblance to each other. The best example that I can quote to support my argument is that of the Greek God Zeus and that of the India God Lord Shiva.

The most powerful of all the Greek demigods, Zeus.

The most powerful of all the Indian demigods, Lord Shiva.

We can clearly see some striking similarities between the two. Both the gods have muscular bodies, curly and matted hair (jatta dhari) and they are carrying an exactly same weapon called the Trident (Trishool). Though both these gods are believed to have an extremely destructive wrath of the highest order and are believed to have the ability and the powers to destroy the entire creation. Now this personality type can be clearly related to that of an "Alpha male" who prefers to keep a low profile and is usually the head of a clan or a family and is revered by all and is an authoritative position to destroy someone's life if he gets angry.

There are innumerable examples of such demigods that represent a personality type and can be directly linked with the individuals of certain types. there are examples of female goddesses as well. goddeses like Venus, Durga, Saraswati etc. are worshiped for the attainment of particular goals. Where goddesses like Laxmi and Saraswati are worshiped for wealth and knowledge, Greek goddess Venus/ Aphrodite is worshiped for earthly love and beauty. The Indian version of Venus would be Goddess Kameshwari.

Though talking about sex has become a taboo in the Indian society, the sculpture art of Ajanta and Ellora caves in India clearly show that the phenomenon of "sex" was revered as divine in the ancient India. There is no denying the fact that the greatest ever encyclopedia on sex called "Kamasutra" written by Maharishi Vatsyayan owes its origin to India. Similarly, Lord Indra (god of rain) as per the Indian mythology can be related with an individual who belongs to an influential/ lofty clan and likes the material comforts and likes to stay surrounded by beautiful women called "Apsaras" and likes to party most of the time in his "Indralok".

Hence, we can conclude that demigods and goddesses are not merely mythological beings present in the olden history. They are very well present around us. But they are all subordinates to the omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient almighty lord whose presence is constant and eternal.

Magnetism- The force behind Cosmic Laws

We're all aware of the entity called the "Magnet" and its properties, if we've read physics during our school. It is not very tough to understand the properties of a magnet, its magnetic field and north and south poles associated with it. We would've also read about earth acting as a huge magnet and this theory stands proven with the existence of the magnetic poles of the earth. North pole- somewhere in the Arctic and South pole- in the Antarctic. But sometimes we fail to figure out that laws of magnetism not only operate at the level of earth's rotation or revolution, they operate at the micro level say human being too has the properties of a magnet and also at the macro-level say the movements of heavenly bodies or galaxies.

    

In simplest terms, all the entities existing in the universe have magnetic properties and have the tendency to attract of repel other entities which may or may not be favorable to them. As far as human being is concerned, if we assume human being as magnet, then the magnetic field would undoubtedly be the aura-energy carried by the human beings. We often hear people saying that I get negative/ positive vibes from some other person, place or thing, it's all because of the peculiar aura-energy carried by each individual separately.

Though aura-healing and transcendence is a very vast field of study and has dedicated courses available for it in some of the most reputed universities of the world, for this article which primarily has its focus on magnetism, I used a picture to represent different levels of aura. Also, there are different colors of aura energy and different healing techniques to have a desired Aura. Some western sciences use Aromatherapy for aura-healing but there are different sciences in India.

In India, the two very ancient and authentic sciences i.e. Astrology or "Jyotish vidya" and "Vaastu Shartra" are based on the principles of magnetism. Where astrology does the aura healing by way of recommending stones and metals to attract some particular form of energy, "Vaastu Shastra" emphasizes on  specific architectural modifications or specific interior design to be made while constructing a house in order to attract positive energy and repel negative energy.

Now, magnetism does not only operate via dedicated structures or stones, metals or accessories, magnetism also operates through religious insignia that people carry while abiding but their religion. Just like a "Janeu" and "Tilak" carry specific forms of energy, sikh-ingnia i.e. kangha, kara, kirpan, kesh and kachhera also carry some forms of energies. While a wooden kangha if used on the scalp helps in better charging of the electromagnetic pulse in the brain, kara and kirpan (made of "Sarb loh") alleviates the individual from unnecessary fears and inculcates a warrior-like spirit to face life challenges. "Kesh", the uncut hair keep a check on the anxieties, "Kachhera" keeps the sexual desire under control.

Though some may find it a little hard to believe or agree with but if the motion of celestial/ heavenly bodies effect the state of one's being as per Astrology, then vice-versa is also possible i.e. one's consciousness about his/ her magnetic field i.e. Aura energy and a conscious effort to keep the energy upright and undisturbed can control the positive and negative effects of the celestial phenomenons commonly known as the cosmic laws. It is worth noting here that cosmos immensely supports benevolence and selflessness and hence an attitude and prayer for the welfare of all stated by Guru Nanak as "Sarbat da Bhala" helps you attract immense cosmic energy from the universe to facilitate your existence in it.

Acting skills and spirituality

The basic assumption behind writing this article is the the entire universe is a "Cosmic-drama" which sometimes bypasses the human intelligence to realize. Shakespeare once said that "All the world ‘s a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts." That indeed is a very enlightened quote from an enlightened mind. In Sikhism, tenth guru, Guru Gobind Singh ji has also made a similar statement: "Main hoo'n param purakh ko daasa, dekhan aayo jagat tamasa" which means that "I am the servant of the lord and I have come to watch the world drama".

Even if we sometimes interact with those people who are considered to be really wise and enlightened about how to live a better life, we realize that somewhere they may get reluctant to share their secrets and would rather highlight more on their achievements rather than their failures as they very well know how to save their image. In fact, those who sometimes believe that they have a perfect understanding of life and are equipped with the intelligence to live it and handle any situation, sometimes they have to go though an ego-crushing experience and sometimes they end up messing up things.

What I exactly want to point out here is that intelligence, knowledge and resources are important for life but there are some important skills that we need to be equipped with for making better choices for ourselves in our own lives. Once I just came across a quote that is worth sharing here:

You sow a THOUGHT, You reap an ACTION.

You sow an ACTION, You reap a HABIT.

You sow a HABIT, You reap a CHARACTER.

You sow a CHARACTER, You reap your DESTINY.

So, your DESTINY depends on your THOUGHTS.

Now if you are born and brought up in India, Cricket and Bollywood are bound to be your fantasies. There's a "wanna-be-actor" or a "wanna-be-cricketer" hidden in majority of the Indians. It's not that if you read my article you'll become a superstar overnight or you'll become a successful actor if you are pursuing that profession. "Acting skills" as mentioned in the title specifically points out the "Superficiality" in our lives. We all have a tendency to get superficial sometimes by choice and sometimes we're forced to get superficial by our circumstances and for a moment we say things or behave in a way that is not expected by us and deep inside ourselves we know that what we are saying or doing is not our real being. e.g. 

Situation 1: If we go to wedding of a distant relative, in order to show our involvement, we say hi and get into candid talks with people we don't like much or we haven't talked to for a long time or we try and be more polite and pretend to be closer to people than we actually are.

Situation 2: if we go to the funeral of a distant relative or an associate, we make sure that we don't smile or laugh or get into a candid talk with people around so that we can have a better projection of our concern for the deceased and we look wiser in our community.

"Superficiality" doesn't end here, we inevitably get superficial in a group of people and sometimes in handling our immediate family members as well. I believe that our thoughts, words and actions are in harmony only when we are alone but as social animals our existence is impossible in isolation and we're bound to confront the group situations in our day to day lives. But whatever we say or do in those situations, get buried deep down into our sub-conscious minds and has a lasting effect on our being. Hence, we must choose our words and actions wisely. In order to be wiser, we must choose our thoughts wisely, as positive and refined thoughts will enlighten you to be or not to be a part of a group situation.

So from this article one must be able to figure out that CHOICE has a role to play in one's being, I will definitely touch this topic regarding the role and percentage of choice and role of destiny in some other article.

Does Heaven exist ??

Actually it does. Undoubtedly, it does. And I'm not speaking out of superstition or some other worldly or near-death experience. I'm actually saying it out of logic and understanding. To elaborate more on this, first we need to understand the difference between "this-world" and the "other-world".
"This world" can simply be defined as the world which can be perceived and experienced through the five senses via touch, smell, taste, hear and see. But the "Other world" can simply be defined as world beyond these five senses. Though there aren't much material evidences to prove the existence of the other-world as it transcends the realm of materialism and connects an individual to another realm called the "Realm of spirit" and the process of awakening and enlightenment towards this realm is called spirituality.

Now for a normal person to perceive, material comforts definitely account to heaven. Quite rightly. Suppose you are travelling in your car in the peak hours of an afternoon of the north Indian summer, you can experience heaven right away sitting in your air-conditioned car on a comfortable seat and you can see people travelling on two-wheeler burning in the heat of the summer. And somewhere inside your head you be thankful to god for the air-conditioned car (material comfort) that he has given you and somewhere you feel for a moment that you are happier than the person travelling on the two-wheeler.

Now, as soon as that moment passes away, you realize that you have a destination to reach in time and your presence over there is very critical and any flaw could be fatal for your life e.g. you have a pending court case and you have to turn up in front of the judge for hearing, and suddenly you get stuck in a traffic jam. You panic and many thoughts run across your mind like- What if I get late?? What if I lose the court-case?? What if the judge gets angry and tells me to get out of the court room ?? What if this traffic jam never clears?? And, you look at the other guy on the two-wheeler standing next to you in the traffic jam looking pretty relaxed, seemingly going back home from work and starts relishing an ice-candy from a nearby ice-candy hawker, patiently waiting for the traffic to clear and smiling on the hopeless Indian traffic conditions. After 4-5 minutes, the traffic gets cleared and you are on your way to the court and the other guys fades away from your sight.

Actually, what happened is that you experienced HELL for those 4-5 minutes and the guy on two-wheeler, somehow experienced HEAVEN for those 4-5 minutes despite having lesser material comforts than you. Heaven and Hell can be both this-worldy and the other-worldly. For those who advocate excessively on material comforts and consider them as the ultimate goal for the betterment of life, I would like to share a theory once I came across, about the existence of material part and the spatial part in the universe. The theory goes as: Let's assume the size of the entire universe to be that of a hollow 20-storeyed building with 20 rooms on each floor, and there's only one grain of sand in it, then the empty part of the building would be the space and that one grain of sand would be the material present in the universe i.e. all the heavenly bodies, galaxies, stars, constellations etc.

Hence, if we believe that universe sustains and nurtures life, then we must value spirituality as that is the only thing which can open our gateway to heaven.

Heaven on religious parameters

Unless we do not understand what exactly heaven is, we try and judge it on our religious parameters. People who do not believe in the "other world" and aren't much spiritual in their outlook believe that heaven and hell is right here in "this world" sometimes look at it as an ideal society to live in. Their religious affiliations effect their conditioning of mind and hence their perceptions of heaven and hell. Though this topic is more social,political and religious but still I want to keep it in the spiritual category because it is the unsaid truth of many people's lives, somewhere buried in their sub-conscious minds.

Though the perception of an ideal society varies from religion to religion but people also idealize personalities resembling their prophets as perfect and flawless personalities who are actually divine beings and their calling and teachings need not be questioned in any way especially if you are living in a conservative country like India or some middle eastern country. Questioning or critically analyzing a prophet's personality will be directly accounted as blasphemy and hence the offender is most likely to get vulnerable to the public outrage or political/ religious harassment.

I have touched the topic of social or political vision of different religions before, but I would like to specify again here with some prominent examples.

RELIGION                                                              SOCIO-POLITICAL VISION
Hinduism                                                                  Ram Rajya
Sikhism                                                                    Khalistan
Islam                                                                        Dar-ul-Islam
Christianity                                                               Kingdom of God

Though there won't be any mention of these socio-political visions of various religions in their leading holy scriptures but there are secondary religious texts which somehow motivate people to define a particular code of conduct and hence making guidelines for a peculiar way of life which ultimately effects the conditioning of their sub-conscious minds in a particular way. This ultimately effects their ability to imagine differently and hence their creative skills find a different channel to walk upon e.g. the mainstream scripture of Sikhism is Guru Granth Sahib which is revered as the living guru of sikhs but it doesn't contain guidelines and instructions regarding the code of conduct or way of life which is specified in the "Rehatnama". Hence, a sikh following the "Rehatnama" and living according to it is bound to condition his sub-conscious mind in a certain way with every word he speaks, reads or every action he does in pursuing his/ her religion which effects his dreams, visions and innermost feelings and desires. Similarly, in the case of Islam, "Holy Quran" is the leading scripture but the code of conduct is specified in "Hadis" and hence it effects the state of mind of a Muslim who ardently follows the "Hadis".

Hence, it comes down to realizing that different ways of lives and different living conditions end up in different visions, perceptions of heaven.

Khalistan from the eyes of an ordinary Indian Sikh.

There has long been a heated debate regarding a separate homeland for Sikhs carved out of India and Pakistan.

It all started with a dream of a Saint-Soldier who stood for the rights of his community. A community that has given away its sons to kick out the British Raj from India. A community that made India go from starving to having a food surplus. A community whose regiment is the most powerful regiment in the Indian army. A community that has been saving India from foreign invaders since ages.

The father of this community dispelled darkness from the world by teaching the oneness of mankind, by teaching the oneness of the Creator and the creation, Guru Nanak Dev, the first ever saint who unified the entire world into a single religion called humanity not separated by Hinduism, Islam or any other exclucionary belief.

From the birth of our community till now we have been facing something very familiar to us - resistance and suppression in one way or another - and we've been overcoming it by laying down our lives and always reducing our enemies to the ashes.

We've learned from our ancestors to serve the humanity and sacrifice ourselves for the rights of others to believe as they wish. We've been able to excel in various high-tech and sophisticated professions to harmonize with modern science, but aren't we getting detached from our roots?

Aren't we forgetting the teachings of our Gurus? Aren't we becoming egomaniacs trying to defy the will of the Lord Almighty? Aren't we giving modern science more importance than our religion? Aren't we becoming victims of our false intellect over the love for our Guru?

If so, why?

Because we have been badly conditioned. We are surrounded by people who've given us assault, slaughter and mental torture whilst we gave our unconditional service to their motherland. We are badly conditioned by the people who have made our community just a branch or offshoot of theirs in the history books. We were back-stabbed during 1984 and we were given another holocaust resulting in the deaths of thousands of innocent Sikhs throughout the country. And all for the greed and power of a woman from an Aristocratic family who served us as Prime Minister.

The only reason why a negative image of our community was portrayed was because Sant Jarnail Singh Ji didn't have an aristocratic image but rather a religious one. In fact, he was much more knowledgeable and sophisticated than the PM. The highly-educated lady who was very well groomed by her father and could not digest the overshadowing of a Saint over her as she established the reign of congress in Punjab, so ending up in a clash which engulfed thousands of innocents along with themselves into doom.

For one, it was for the pride, honor and identity of the entire brotherhood and for the other it was greed for more and more power.

This is what I have seen and heard from the elderly. This is what I have read and heard about my own community.

I have grown into a 25 year old adult with of this discrimination and partiality being an inseparable part of my childhood and teenage memories. I don't know exactly what can be done about it, but I don't want the same to happen with my children and the following generations.

Some wise visionaries came up with a notion of Khalistan - the pure land. a land without hate, anguish, poverty, corruption or discrimination.

A land full of science and spirituality. A beautiful land that will bring back the Sat-yug within the Kali-yug.

But, if it is meant to limit peace and harmony (with the will of Lord almighty) and restrict it to one place only, then we don't need it!

Because, Peace is meant for all - regardless of anyone's location, age, gender, education, profession, looks, color or financial status. PEACE is for all.

And if we can ensure all this in Khalistan, then I think we're already there!

We already have our country.

We already have a virtual Khalistan because every Khalsa envisions it and because Khalsa is spread throughout the world inspiring, fighting, winning and making an impact on our surroundings everywhere.

Every word and every action of every Sikh in the world that is done with the intentions of Chardi Kala (high spirits) and a motive to serve and bless all humanity (Sarbat da Bala) is making the vision of the Brave saint clearer and clearer and bringing us always closer and closer to our land... our home of Khalistan which already exists within the heart of every Khalsa.