Capturing God

My 9 year old nephew Sai and my 5 year old daughter Lakshmi were in an interesting conversation  which I overheard. He was saying his evening prayers in the living room. Lakshmi said " Sai, please go to the Pooja room. That is where God is. Why are you saying prayer here?" For which he said God was everywhere and he can say the prayers in the living room too. But Lakshmi did not agree. Then I had to intervene and said " Chinnu, (to Lakshmi with love), God is everywhere. He is not limited to the Pooja room" Lakshmi said " May be. But he is not seen. He is seen only in the pooja room as he is captured in those pictures and the idols. That's why we need to say the prayers in the pooja room" I could not say anything - just remembered those rituals where gods are invited (Aavaahayaami) into the Kalasha, betel leaves and nuts during big poojas and yagnas at home with a small smile.

Journey of Life

  "I think this car in front of us is also going to Majestic" said my 9 year old son Vishnu looking at the car ahead and the google navigator. "How do you say that?" I quipped. "Because it is taking the same route as we see in the map". The car in front too religiously followed the same route turning left and right as depicted in the map till finally when the car took a right turn instead of left. Suddenly Vishnu realized that we are not going to the same destination any more. I tried to educate him with some philosophy. Similar to what you have seen now - we are together in the journey of our life as long as our paths coincide. We may have different destinations but our paths sometimes meet and we travel together. Then he said to my surprise - Dad, many people might be coming to Majestic from different parts of the city. We will meet them only at the Majestic. Yes that is also true. My son put my thought process in a different perspective.Person starting from Marathalli will not come across the person starting from Banashankari during their journey - they have a chance to meet only at the destination.

       We may have entirely different paths which may not even crisscross even though our destinations are the same. Overtaking somebody on the pathway to reach earlier seemed meaningless as the destination may be entirely different. And there may be unknown travelers to the same destination whom we just cant overtake as they are not in our path. So why RACE? Be calm and enjoy your own journey.