The beauty of a woman
isn't in the clothes she wears,
The figure that she carries,
or the way she combs her hair.
The beauty of a woman
must be seen from in her eyes;
Because that's the doorway to her heart,
the place where love resides.
The beauty of a woman
isn't in a facial mole;
But true beauty in a woman,
is reflected by her soul.
It's the caring that she cares to give,
the passion that she shows;
And the beauty of a woman
with passing years only grows.
The strength of a man
isn't seen in the width
of his shoulders.
It's seen in the width
of his arms that circle you..
The strength of a man
isn't in the deep tone
of his voice.
It's in the gentle
words he whispers...
The strength of a man
isn't how many buddies he has.
It's how good a buddy
he is with his kids...
The strength of a man isn't
in how respected he is at work.
It's in how respected
he is at home...
The strength of a man
isn't in how hard he hits.
It's in how tender
he touches...
The strength of a man
isn't in the hair on his chest.
It's in his Heart,
that lies within his chest...
The strength of a man
isn't how many women he's loved.
It's in can he be
true to one woman...
The strength of a man
isn't in the weight he can lift.
It's in the burdens
he can carry...
If you fall in love because someone makes you laugh...
What happens when you no longer find them funny???
If you fall in love because someone is beautiful...
What happens when that beauty fades???
If you fall in love because someone can provide for you...
what happens when they lose wealth???
Real love defies all reasons....
When you truly love someone...
You do not look for reasons...
You see beyond reasons....
"Some words in life are best left unspoken"
I disagree with this quote...
because this is how misunderstandings
happen, due to unspoken words, this is the beginning of loss of trust,
of not telling each other our feelings.This is the main reason for
regret, wishing you had spoken your mind when the time was right but now
feeling regret for not telling how you feel. True love has nothing to
hide... the truth will be understood if there is power in your love.
A TRUE STORY SHARED BY A BRAVE GIRL:
I was almost raped on my wedding night.
I am sure it may not be this way for all weddings out there. I am not
even saying that this is the case for many weddings. But yes, if you are
getting into this, you should always know that this is a possibility
that you cannot ignore, and which no one would ever tell you.
I hail from a typical middle class background,
from a not-so-big town in South India, and after I turned 22, everyone
around me was worried that now is the time for me to get married
otherwise I would never get married/ bring shame to my family/ marry
after my younger siblings get married/ run off with someone (yes, they
said all these things in front of me!) so, yes, I needed to be married
off to someone, who was not my boyfriend.
Now, there's a culture in
South India, if a family doesn't have a lot of money - girls are married
to their cousins/ mother's brother, where the age difference is not too
much (say the mother was the eldest daughter, and brother was the
youngest, with a huge age gap). This way, a girl stays 'within the
family', and also there is no question of dowry, since they are family.
Similar to this, my wedding was arranged right after I graduated from
college, to my 'mama' (mother's brother) who was a few years older than
me. My case was complicated because I had a boyfriend already, and my
family didn't approve of him when I told them about him (he was not
South Indian, which was a mortal sin in my parents' eyes). I tried to
protest, but using the usual emotional blackmail arguments, my father
forced me into the marriage - he was very sick at the time, and the onus
was on me to 'fulfill his wishes'. (He's very much fine now, but I am
inclined to think he'll fall sick again when it's my younger sister's
turn to get married. Indian parents force you to think this stuff about
themselves).
I was forced to break off all contact with my
boyfriend (mobile, internet snatched away, I don't think I could even
have sent a letter, it was so bad) and forced to dive head-first into
the wedding arrangements.
The day of the wedding came, and
after a really embarrassing lecture from my mother, about my 'marital
duties' since I was the eldest daughter and no friends had been allowed
to my wedding (my parents believed they would whisk me away from the
wedding if they came to know), I got ready for the 'wedding night'. I
was already feeling completely shitty about the whole thing, having been
cut off from every person that I wanted to be with, being married to my
'mama' in secrecy, and not even knowing whether to think of him as a
husband or my mama, and just wanted to sleep hoping a new day would
bring a new start.
I waited for my husband to come and when he
entered, we exchanged a few awkward sentences about the whole day being
tiresome. I then told him "I'm feeling very tired, I will change and go
to sleep now" but I was not prepared for what happened next. He suddenly
kissed me, and I was a little taken aback, but I just pulled away
slowly, and told him that I was not in the mood, and reiterated that I
was very tired. He ignored me completely, and kissed me again, this time
with more force, and when I tried to push him away, he slapped me. This
was followed by the most horrible experience of my life, the details of
which shake me to this day, and I somehow escaped by locking myself in
the bathroom.
I knew I had nobody to turn to - he was my mother's
brother, and my father was sick. Even if these were not the
circumstances, I doubt anyone would have supported me.
I stayed
in this abusive marriage for a few months, which was the darkest period
of my life. Thankfully, I was not foolish, and I had a job to support
myself, unlike a lot of other women out there, suffering daily. I ran
away, before it was too late. Now, nobody in my family knows where I am,
and what happened. I am sure they must say the worst things about me,
and mention my name with disgust and shame. But this is one decision
that I made with careful deliberation and I will not let myself regret
it. I am considerably happier now, very much single, with no intention
of getting married again.
I am happy to have put this behind
me, but want to extend my support for all those women who are in the
same situation as I was. One experience is enough to scar you for life.
Rape! Rape! Rape! Is this country going to the dogs? The thought can't
not be brushed aside easily. So much of hype about rape! So much of
protest against rape! So much of politics around rape! Has this country
woken up to a new era of rape?
What is the truth? When a father rapes his own daughter, an uncle his
niece and a female child of five is raped by an elder, isn’t it time to
ask what is wrong with our society? And why and how conditions have
deteriorated in Indian society?
What else can you expect from a country that has established ceremonial and sanctified rape in the Devadasi system?
The Delhi rape may have brought the student and activist
community spilling onto the streets in protest, but as long as society
accepts and endorses the ‘invisible violence’ occurring everyday, crimes
against women cannot be stamped out.
Our
society considers street sexual harassment and domestic violence
‘normal’. When young boys whistle at a girl on the streets, or comment
on her clothes or her body, society brushes it off as ‘boys being boys’.
Eve teasing is considered an expression of masculinity and we teach
girls to get used to everyday harassment, and ‘ignore’ the
perpetrators, this is the problem that had deep social
roots and had nothing to do with manhood or hormonal youth.
When India became Independent in 1947, the “middle class” averaged
around 2.4 per cent in a population of around 300 million people. By
2011 this percentage has risen to an astounding 37 per cent in a
population of 1.2 billion. It is this middle class that rules the
country and consciously or unconsciously lays down social behaviour, in
terms of dress and deportment, man-woman relations, inter-caste
marriages and the like arousing envy, jealousy and hatred among the
lower castes and classes, which feel frustrated. It is this frustration,
one suspects that is the main cause for the kind of violence we see
today in everyday life.
Unlike western developed nations which are largely mono-cultured,
India is sharply divided along caste and class lines each functioning
along established and well-laid out rules of social behaviour. It is
when such classes co-exist with the middle classes literally cheek by
jowl, as in Delhi that tension prevails which, in turn, ends in
violence.
Our middle classes don’t seem to realise that they are living in a
multi-cultured society functioning under different sets of values, often
in contradiction to each other. It is a fact that we ignore at our
peril. And yet it is a fact that the middle classes constantly forget
only to be reminded of it when violence takes an ugly turn. Then all
hell is let loose. Instances of rape and molestation are not confined to
one class or caste. They seem to cut across all social group. But why?
And how come? A woman accuses her brother-in-law of raping her. A
22-year old woman from Delhi was allegedly raped and dumped in a
Faridabad jungle by the driver of a car who had offered her a lift. A
report from Gurgaon noted that a 27-year old woman employee claimed that
she was gang-raped by two persons, including a colleague, in a moving
car.
From what one hears, in certain sections of society, for the average
middle class male, an educated, self-reliant and self-confident female
is an anathema. Unlike Khap which is largely prevalent in the inner
regions of north India states like Haryana, west Uttar Pardesh, parts of
Rajasthan and Punjab, the aggressive middle class male is a common
phenomenon throughout the country. It is for our active women’s
organisations to address themselves to societal changes in India and do
something constructive. Laws can only lay down rules, they can’t change
mindsets; to achieve the latter should be a matter of immediate concern
to our thinkers.
Let us then safely conclude that the caste forces, the religious forces,
the political forces, the ruling oligarchy and the different pillars
such as the media are raping India on the whole. Many are clamouring for
the blood of the rapists. ‘Kill them’ ‘hang them’ is the far cry of the
so-called protestors against rape.
The law may have allowances for hanging and punishing criminals but this
will not change the situation. Our behaviour is not controlled by laws;
it is the internal control or self-control that stems from each
individual’s conditioning that determines his actions.
Once I was on a
journey and someone asked me which word in a man's vocabulary was the
most valuable. My reply was, "Love". The man was surprised. He said he
had expected me to answer "soul" or "God". I laughed and said, "Love is
God."
Raising on the ray of love one can enter the enlightened
kingdom of God. It is better to say that love is God than to say that
truth is God, because the harmony, the beauty, the vitality and the
bliss that are part of love are not part of truth. Truth is to be known;
love is to be felt as well as known. The growth and perfection of love
lead to the ultimate merger with God.
The greatest poverty of all is
the absence of love. The man who has not developed the capacity to love
lives in a private hell of his own. A man who is filled with love is in
heaven. You can look at man as a wonderful and unique plant, a plant
that is capable of producing both nectar and poison. If a man lives by
hate he reaps a harvest of poison; if he lives by love he gathers
blossoms laden with nectar.
If I mold my life and live it with the
well-being of all men in mind, that is love. Love results from the
awareness that you are not separate, not different from anything else in
existence. I am in you; you are in me. This love is religious.
The
doors of love only open for the person who is prepared to let his ego
go. To surrender one's ego for someone else is love; to surrender one's
ego for all is divine love.
Love is not sexual passion. Those who
mistake sex for love remain empty of love. Sex is only a passing
manifestation of love. It is part of nature's mechanism, a method of
procreation. Love exists on a higher plane, and as love grows, sex
dissipates. The energy that has been manifested in sex is transformed
into love.
Love is the creative refinement of sex energy. And so,
when love reaches perfection, the absence of sex automatically follows. A
life of love, an abstinence from physical pleasures is called
brahmacharya, and anyone who wishes to be free from sex must develop his
capacity to love. Freedom from sex cannot be achieved through
supression. Liberation from sex is only possible through love.
I have
said that love is God. This is the ultimate truth. But let me say as
well that love also exists within the family unit. This is the first
step on the journey to love, and the ultimate can never happen if the
beginning has been absent. Love is responsible for the existence of the
family and when the family unit moves apart and its members spread out
into society, love increases and grows. When a man's family has finally
grown to incorporate all of mankind, his love becomes one with God.
Without
love man is an individual, an ego. He has no family; he has no link
with other people. This is gradual death. Life, on the other hand, is
interrelation.
Love surpasses the duality of the ego. This alone is
truth. The man who thirsts for truth must first develop his capacity to
love—to the point where the difference between the lover and the beloved
disappears and only love remains.
When the light of love is freed
from the duality of lover and the beloved, when it is freed from the
haze of seer and seen, when only the light of pure love shines brightly,
that is freedom and liberation.
I urge all men to strive for that supreme freedom.
