Dear God

Dear God, 

You may still remember the pristine prayer that I sang to you everyday in the school assembly. I innocuously thanked you ‘for the food I ate, for the clothes I wore, for the birds that sang and thanked you for everything’. As child, I wondered what contained in thanking you for ‘everything’. To date, I devoutly tumble on this thought that vaguely describes your art. I certainly imagine thanking you for my material existence that spurs my life in day and night. But that would be morsel of my gratitude. So I am writing to you about what subsumes of thanking you for that ‘everything’ unknown to me as child. At the outset, I would like to accede with my habitat’s preeminent contributions that have been substantial in valuing what I have than what I don’t. This feeling perhaps enunciates that life is beyond our control and sometimes its course gets haywire. In moments when logic appears irrational, your stupendous milieu guides and sustains me and my fellow inhabitants. Your signs reinstate that when things go wrong, there is a purpose and that you have something daring and exciting planned for us. 

God, alongside your immaculate lessons, yet another earmark distinguishes us in this habitat. It’s the disposition of your children. Besides physical self, our mind is most visceral. It reins our thoughts and feelings and often hobnobs with our relationships. So sometimes we fight, brush along with ego, meddle in other’s family matters and disturb someone unrelentingly instead of sharing love. In such instances, your blessings are colossal in reminding us of the one’s who express their cheer and ardor for us. You remind us of looking up to those who inspire us and accept us for who we are instead of picking on us. Besides, your sanctity and faith generates might and keeps us away from those who spite us or are vindictive. 

Dear God, your omnipotence is your third eye watching us all from a celestial cinemascope. Its mammoth screen is like a mirror that captures good, sad and changing moments of our lives. Besides, it reflects on the magnitude of our musings that quite often absorbs us in self-praise without any heed to self-blame. In such occasions, we get preoccupied with selfdom, criticize and conceal against the one’s we dislike. Sometimes, we may even go overboard to denigrate others with our one-sided judgments. God, this is when your prayers invoke hope and conveys that no matter what, truth shall always prevail. 

God, although your supreme craft sometimes appears absolute. It however leaves us with invincible quest to look inside before we look outside at others. Such self-exploration helps in coexistence. Unmasking ourselves even for once makes us realize that even if we are different, yet we synchronize as pieces of an unending puzzle. Now that awareness certainly seems magnificent! It indeed is a chunk of ‘thank you for everything’ that you gifted me and my fellow inhabitants in this abode that we call life. 

Signing off with reverence,

Barkha Dhar  

Copyright (c) 2011 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot

Video Courtesy: http://www.youtube.com/user/BarkhaDhar

Voice-over: Ash D.

A Blessed Acknowledgement

My toddler boy’s ethereal psyche as my chariot of change each day pulls me inward to spiritual spunk. Listening to his innocent and enigmatic expressions often seems like divine recital. Such platonic relationship between a mother and her child is a route to bliss and benign emotions. My first born, whose plush gazes and fervent heart that has uniform feelings for birds, animals and all living beings, is my pioneer retreat to a conscious state. His playful and magical enchantments is realization that children as god’s cherubs are the hymns of nature. Their eternal kindle illuminates our life with love, hope, care and courage.

At a nascent age children have the capacity to sense parent’s changing colors. They are the midget stars of a celestial empire. They show us that enthusiasm and excitement are unique ways to subsist. Nurturing a child is like rearing an angel. Their magnificent innocence instills that surrendering to god is a mode of attuning to self. With their wish lists to celebrate life our children signify the ‘power of now’ as a distinctive hallmark of living mindfully. Their glee as the adornment of our joy and a veil for sorrow helps us steer through transitions in life. As our significant couplers they are a mirror to our solemn state. They are the best cohorts one can have. With their mesmerizing ways they help expound on the fact that God resides in all, irrespective of abilities. As parents honoring these angelic protégés is respecting righteousness to commune with god. 

Our children’s serenity has an invisible power to incapacitate any negativity or prejudice that could impair the aura of our home and the peace in familial relationships. As parents fostering devotion and karma through the principles of good and bad actions, early on, in our children can make their lives more meaningful as they grow older and independent. We parents are a child’s harbinger to this world. Through our spiritual chalk talk we can share chaste lessons that God is omnipresent and one. Among the poor, he is a destitute; among the rich he is opulent. Such teachings help imbibe transparency in faith and equal respect for all religion. Giving a boon to children’s apostolic self also advances their spontaneity and theological desires later in life. 

As parents, especially a mother who is a child’s first guide, such discourses with our children not only incite them to a new way of life but also awaken us to a new state of mind. Such precepts for our children become conscious alerts for us in turn. Charting a child’s life with honesty, truth and wisdom hence becomes a mother’s poise. Any deterrence of self from such tranquility and serenity that we want to blossom in our children hinders the opportunity to set ourselves as model of transcendental values and religious beliefs. Recognizing this altruism in a parent-child relationship is an inspiration to learn from a child’s immaculateness and clear conscience. As parents internalizing a child’s superego through these moral principles helps them to be positive change agents in community and society. Such incorporeal narrations between us and our children enable us to control our own ego and maintain a balance between our material and spiritual self. As revered Osho once said, “The moment a child is born, the mother is also born. She never existed before. The women existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new.” Thanks indeed to my son who made me one.  

Copyright (c) 2010 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot

Picture Courtesy: Barkha Dhar

Think Feel Act Now

If I had to ask about one critical function that activates our capacity to reason or imagine things, reflect on people or situations, I would vouch for the mind and its mentation in conscious, sub-conscious and unconscious states. As chief of the human body, it’s also the nucleus to our abundant emotions that aptly distinguishes between feeling and willing states and causes us to exert our energies to behave in a certain way through our actions. This synchronization of our mind (thoughts and emotions) with the matter (substantiality) has the power to transform us from potential to actual to motivate and introduce us to realms of change. Writing this post is one such attempt to attune to my sensibilities in order to connect to that of my readers. It’s an effort to unite, to think, feel and act as different identities that are living to form similarity to contribute to the completeness of our existence.

Thinking and feeling as the requisites of life, are also the cornerstones of our natural or superficial identity with its voltage to influence people around us. It’s the psychological facet of existence that differentiates us from one another. However it’s also a unique aspect of our personality dynamics that can incite appropriate actions to feat. Capitalizing on these faculties as our competencies for ‘collaborative change’ can indeed be a successful humanistic impression for wholesome life. Using at least one idiosyncrasy of our positive thought and affirmative feeling can ratify inspiring actions to sway back and forth in our courage to care and share, in our manifestation to lead and lend, in our adulation and respect for each other and in a presage to preserve and protect. By knowing thyself in such manner in spirit and touch, believe and esteem, idea and instinct, demeanor and devotion, experience and expression, a peerless mission of living life is accomplished. The video shared in this post, in its simple, plain message conveys that gift of integrity and the ‘power of being’ in each of us now, the power that has the strength and greatness to create and achieve now, and the bend to share our virtuous talents now.

Copyright (c) 2009 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot
Video Courtesy: Youtube/Sonia Ricotti

Adoption Is A Detour Of Love

As a little girl holding a newborn in my tiny arms was just as sufficing as playing with a new doll. Years later being a mother I felt the joy of million bucks to caress my son to feel his silk in my arms and his chaste in my heart. The weave of emotions that bonded us together was stronger and tighter than the umbilical chord that connected us for nine long months. Since then my home has the aura of my baby’s love and his soulful hugs. Parenting in my view is an enjoying endurance that enshrines us with blessedness. It's a developmental process that consecrates us with positive energy to rear children with love, no matter if they are birthed or adopted. Besides, motherhood being a poignant quality in parenting is like a divine endowment to every woman on this earth who can vent her maternal instincts to simulate colors through sweet lullabies. As a nectar of the spirit, motherhood is every woman’s yearn to cradle life in buoyant emotions, which in a way defines maternity as not just the joy of placenta but the state of motherliness in a woman. The eyes that see a child grow each day, the hands that imbibe faith in religion, peace for humanity, and the heart that seeks these values bud into strength of character, indeed is karma incomparable.

Maternity be it naturally or through fosterage is sharing fervor for raising a child with enriched opportunities. Maternity is also maturity to appreciate the inner wisdom and the power of expression that foments relationships irrespective of the ability to gestate. Like mother Mary who chose to rear Jesus as her own flesh and blood and Yashodha for whom Krishna’s pranks were more enchanting than the whole universe, there is cosmic momentum in any foster relationship. Besides a legal formality of entering into a new parent-child relationship, adoption is also celestial that unites souls across boundaries and beyond destinies. As a process of progression in nursing and nourishing a child, adoption facilitates felicity and fruition in the lineage of humanity. Couples who adopt children to raise them as their own express resilient emotions and rectitude of mind. Their adoptive effort goes a long way in contributing to a humane society where love is not bound by blood. Such unrelated yet unconditional involvement through adoption becomes an apostle of divinity in the society where thoughts and feelings are sometimes fabricated through superficial relationships. 

Adoption in a way is also karmic intervention that fills up vacuums in lives through spreading uncountable smiles. Such sensibility to embrace change in perception and action gives way to happiness over melancholy. In such elucidation, adoption becomes an endorsement of hope and feat that unfolds a child and an adoptive family to a distinctive semblance in life. With a nest of joy and serendipity that has familial security and happiness of home for a child shows the infinite power of adoption that accredits a couple  with compassion, abandons negativity and fears, and empowers a woman while making her capable of motherhood to save her from an emotional erosion. On opening up to such an ethereal vision, we adept ourselves to realize God’s ubiquitous power and his unique ways of making one a mom, ma, ‘la-madre’ or ‘amma’, an identity not through anatomy but the capacity to bestow love and honor a celebration called adoption. 

Copyright (c) 2009-present Dharbarkha.blogspot  

Photo Courtesy: sentimentalsilver

Love Inspires Us

Nature’s inhabitance of life through nesting and incubation is a unique example of love. Timeless and boundless, love is fulfillment in cheer and joy, charm and embrace. As a sanctum within, love unites us in benevolence, togetherness, yearning and desire. It’s the omnipotence of god and a divine endowment to humanity to value existence and appreciate the abundance of positive emotions inside. A synergy created through affection and compassion, inspiration and imagination, acceptance and forgiveness, love is unconditional and unbiased. Love also is consciousness where humility, sincerity and truth in thoughts, words and actions help sustain character, wisdom and intellect to achieve life’s goals and mission.

Love is an identity not by one’s professional degrees, awards, material gains, creed or caste but by a vent of genuine emotions though heart. Such care of sentiments brings excitement in life, heals past wounds, fosters strength to withstand crisis, empowers mind with determination and confidence and helps cope with vehemence and stress in emotions and relations. All the more, love is an exquisite service to self before service to others. It unfolds us to reverence for god and his creations by releasing us from negativities like anger, pride, jealously, fear and disgust. Such is love’s beatitude that evolves us to a higher state where positive emotions consecrate a humanitarian cause. 

As a transformational tool, love internalizes success through self-talk, focus on personal competencies and maintaining passion for life. A desire to connect with people and their feelings is the invigoration of love, known as empathy. Charting our life through love can even turn mammoth problems into magnificent opportunities for change. By sharing love, we expand the meaning of our life and contract selfishness that distracts us from our internal vigor. Capitalizing on love as core strength builds emotional profundity and aids self-introspection on a scale of social affection. Poetry of Shakespeare, inspirational quotes of Mahatma Gandhi, spiritual discourses of Dalai Lama, are all conquerors of love in common man’s heart. 

Manifestation of love can also lessen bigotry, superstitions, control our material cling and over ambition amid present times of fatal and excessive monetization, power and politics, professional excellence and outplay, personal and faith based rivalries. Epitomizing love both internally and externally can revitalize relationships in families and neighborhood, within communities and nations, among religions and cultures and between all ages. Love can also foment self realization when we draw its explicit energy from the bounties of nature. Spending time in silence, assessing our feelings periodically, playing with pets and children, participating in performing arts, tuning back to old hobbies, taking a day out with loved ones are  some ways we can rejuvenate love. As Morrie Schwartz once said, ‘The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in’.

Copyright (c) 2009 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot
Photo Courtesy:  flickr.com

Say No To Hitler Style Relationships

If anybody had to get a hindsight of who Hitler was as a leader and as a person, then learning about him through his sayings would be a flashback of terror. Most of his quotes on waging a war, leadership and governance, revolutions, and struggle are passionate, but also pugnacious. Hitler seemed to be a man defined by extremism and belligerence, which may have been a boon to the Nazi rule. As a leader, Hitler would be always remembered as a great warrior and an authoritarian for whom victory was a battle of conquest. However, most of us may know little about him as a person. Walter S. Zapotoczny’s Hitler’s Leadership style: The undoing of Germany mentions, ‘‘Hitler combined his insistence on personal control with a leadership style that often consisted of equal parts stubbornness and indecisiveness.’’ Hitler’s such mental state and emotional behavior is a subtle revelation of his psyche and selfdom, which also forms a contour to his relationship style. 


Not surprisingly enough, but leadership is an offshoot of relationships. In addition to the domain of traits and skills, leadership is a pilotage of emotions that navigates feelings to purpose. A positive leadership builds, strengthens, and defines relationships through exchange of ideas, fair participation, and welcoming change to adapt to newer styles. Such facet is an important dimension in relationships, which helps sustain a healthy and open minded lifestyle. In my view, hearty living starts with wholesome relationships where nourishment of feelings is generated through independence and providing space to people so that love flows naturally and not superficially. Feelings of control, superiority, and spurious means to provocation have no seat in a proactive relationship. Moreover, respect being a predominant aspect in relationships is not demanded, but earned through love and giving way to trust so that any relationship that starts fresh should not end while it’s still in its cocoon. Such principle is universally applicable, whether in love, or marital relationships, between parents and children, with in-laws, among friends and co-workers, or acquaintances. 


Also, nurturing relationships is a long drawn process that should begin on a leveled surface. When we enter into new relationships, thoughtful and careful dealings lessen our emotional stress of adjusting to a new way of life. For instance, a new bride hopes to enter her groom’s family with aspirations of affinity and not abomination. In parent-child relationships, clogging a child’s autonomy through excessive control hurts a child’s psychological development and emotional expression. Being a watchdog as a parent is certainly fair, but exceeding our relationship beyond limits where a child’s expression is controlled, or manipulated seems inappropriate. In marital relationships, sharing of equitable status among the couple goes miles in building the character of their marriage as an institution of love and faith. Giving dent to feelings periodically, carefully listening to each other, providing breathing space and scope to operate autonomously are some ways to sustain a healthy relationship.


It is important to note that keeping our emotions in check when in a relationship is more productive than controlling the relationship itself. Control freaks do not last forever. Their aggression ends relationships in a sour taste. A participative style of dealings is always better than harsh motives of conquering the relationship. Such preventive measures make a relationship more receptive and meaningful.  Healthy relationships infuse us with positive energy and give a humanitarian face to our feelings and not an egoistic visage. Hence, learning a lesson from a bygone era is to begin refinement of old habits and practices to set ourselves in motion for change.  History is reminiscent of Hitler’s relationships being disturbed since early childhood years with his liking for giving orders. His eccentric behavior and his additiction to creating emotional extremism through his eloquent speeches would put his audiences into a near state of hysteria besides emotions of anger and hate that often resulted in acts of violence. Hitler, however, would be remembered as a powerful personality and an impressionist, but his relationships shall always remain a predicament. For all of us, nonetheless it is time we extirpate the hidden Hitler in us, so that healthy relationships today ascend us to a state of fruition tomorrow. 

Copyright (c) 2009 - Present Dharbarkha.blogspot 
Phot Courtesy: Imageshack