What Are Friends For?

"A Friend  is a gift you give to yourself"- Robert Louis Stevenson

Friends are one of the very few relations you choose for yourself. Be it school friends, friends on social networking sites or the one's at work. The friends you choose are the reflection of your personality. Unlike most situations, here like-like attract. Friendship is a relation different from all others. The best part about friendship is that there are no commitments or boundaries. You can say whatever you feel like, do whatever you feel like without any restrictions.

I made my first friend in school. He & i used to board the school bus from the same stop. Though now, i am not in touch with him that much, he still is a memorable part of my life. One incident i remember from that time is when i had cut his school socks using a scissor in school & later his mom caught me. Nothing much happened & we remained the same way as we were. Until the Caste system (a.k.a. section shuffling) in school separated us(i got separated many times from my friends because of that).

Now when i turn back, i wonder how & why i dint had any close friend after getting separated from him. As a kid, i used to be very emotional & sensitive(I don't know if all kids are like that) & maybe that's the reason i never got time to make friends or to look whats happening around. I used to be deeply drowned into emotions. The first one being, me undergoing a major lung surgery when i was 6. I skipped the whole class II because of that. Despite of the fact that i dint gave even a single exam the whole year, my class teacher passed me anyhow(she really used to love me a lot & i too respect her from the bottom of my heart for what all she did for me). The next year i saw my maternal grand mother pass away followed by my maternal grandfather after about two years. No one around me knows it, that my maternal grandfather's death left a huge impact on my mind. If anybody has ever come across the poem "My Mother At Sixty Six" by Kamala Das, I used to feel the same way that girl used to feel. I developed a fear of losing my parents, the way my mother lost her's. I just wanted to be with them all the time. This made me avoid school. I used to make new excuses every other day to take a leave. I went so deep into it, that i started thinking that i spend hardly 4 hours(6-10 in the evening) with my parents whereas i spend 6 hours in school. I just wanted to stay with them anyhow. I went into a state of partial depression when one doesn't even knows what depression actually is. And maybe that's the reason, i have hardly any memories of school of that period.

It was then in 8th std., I made friends after a long time. It was four of us, be it roaming around in school, sitting in class, having lunch, we did it all together. That was the first time i got a reason to go to school everyday. Maybe they also dint knew what they meant to me. They were my life. But then again, the caste system in school separated us. But this time, it dint affect me that deeply & i made a new friend, moreover a best friend  in 9th std. Then again got separated in 10th, made more friends. Made many everlasting friends in 12th std. We used to go home together after school. That roaming around, those after school fun was the best part of the day for me.
And the series of making new friends is still continuing. Be it school, outside or pen pals, i have friends everywhere & some mean more than a sibling to me(they'll get to know, that I've written this about them).

Friends are an integral part of life. And like any other relation, they are an important part of your life. Some don't get them easily(like me, earlier) or some times you get separated from them because of no reasons.
But trust me, its never to late to start or make up. Your ego might stop you from approaching them again, but remember, one day you'll regret not even trying to make up with them. Maybe he/she would be waiting for you to approach. So go for it, make the most of every chance you get, because a friend lost is a part of you, YOU lost!

So go out, make friends, stay happy & live your life with a smile because everyone is not as lucky as i am.

What is God?

"Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned."

Some say, its the super natural power which makes the world go round, some say, he's the creator of living beings, while others say, how can we believe in something which has never been heard or seen?

Personally, i am a believer of God, coming from a country where God is served food after every couple of hours while many sleep on the footpath empty stomach for days. A country where painted statues are given more value than living humans, where a cross is said to protect you from all evils & mis-happenings & where even a mere sneeze is considered to be portent. Its not, that my way of looking at God has changed, i look up to God this way since the day i started believing in him.

A term which is often associated with God is Religion. An infant's religion is decided even before his name. Since the day a child is born, he goes through various types of religious practices, be it Thread Ceremony in Hindus or Baptization in Christians & many others. He becomes a part of the community even before he can pronounce its name.

The Super-Human's who brought religions into existence had the thought of creating world peace & keeping Humanity above all other things in mind. But nowadays, Religion has become a luxury for people, where they use it, the way they want to. People commit sins, seven days a week while pray once a month & expect everything would be, the way they want to. Abusing people around, mis-behaving with women, not respecting the old are few examples. People often forget, that one day, they too would get aged , they too might have a daughter. What you do today comes back to you sooner or later.

My friends often say, i am too religious. Just because i fast on several occasions or go to temple twice a week. i do things because i want to, not because my family says so or something like that. Though its a fact, that my dad wakes up early in the morning(usually) & the first thing he does is to have a bath & worship. But he never told me to follow him, i started doing it when i felt like doing.

God is as powerful or weak as you make him. I practice religion till the extent i find it sensible. This thinking developed in my mind when i was 16. I had a teacher in school, though she used to teach Hindi language, her thoughts on religion & its practices for me were nowhere less than those Super Humans who brought religion into existence. Unknowingly, she left a huge impact on my mind & changed the way i used to look at God. She made me see all those Holy Practices from a whole new perspective.
Just as an example, there is a ritual in Hindu's, that after attending a cremation, one should have bath as soon as he reaches home. The way people look at it is, that its just a custom being followed since ages, but she had a totally different & real view about it. It has been scientifically proven, that after a person dies, various infections & disease causing microbes leave the body. Way back million years ago, even before this discovery was made, those super humans named it as a custom keeping in mind the health of an individual.

Long back, people didn't had such thought process nor did science existed which could reason these customs. But today, it does & answers many such followings. People need to understand that there is a difference between customs & superstitions. Today, people who believe in God name superstitions also as customs & those who don't believe in God name customs also as superstitions. Taking fasting as an example, Hindu's do it as a custom on several occasions. The one's who believe in God take it as a way of pleasing the lord, while those who don't, say 'how would staying hungry please the God'?
The way i look into it, is that if some people would fast for a single day, then that day's food sale would go down(maybe in a negligible count, but it would) & maybe somewhere, a person who finds it hard to earn a meal a day might get food at a lesser cost. This is Humanism(a.k.a. Religion).

Religion were started to keep people binded together, but today, the only thing they are(rather, the one's following it as a luxury) doing is creating divide. Its better not to believe in God rather than distinguishing people on the basis of religion. We are humans first. Spread love & happiness around rather than fighting over useless issues(like the Ayodhya dispute). I don't know if God exists or not, but i am sure about one thing, that if he does, he would never want people to fight & kill each other on his name.

For me, God is the ultimate source of positive energy. A very good friend of mine & my girlfriend too, dont believe in God that much. There's nothing wrong in being an atheist. But in the end, "You got to believe in something". It can be your parents or your loved one's, because life can't be traveled alone.

For the theists, "Never give up on God, because he never gave up on you".
For the atheists, "Two hands working can do more than a thousand clasped hands".

-Quotes by unknown.