A Myth in Creation

Once upon a time I was falling in love But now I'm only falling apart There's nothing I can do A total eclipse of the heart Once upon a time there was light in my life But now there's only love in the dark Nothing I can say A total eclipse of the heart Meat Loaf & Bonnie Tyler , A total eclipse of the heart

A relationship is like a plant in a garden... the gardener looks at it, and he is instantly reminded of all the toil and effort he has put through the months and years to develop and nourish it... that time, that effort binds him and the plant together... and that is why when he looks at it, he looks with tenderness, affection and care. Imagine what would be the gardener's feelings if the plant is razed in front of his eyes. Or, you can also compare it a with painting... the artist draws it with passion, inspiration and caution... concentrating on every line... pondering over every stroke of his brush... and when he sees that painting, he feels a bond because of all that time, all that effort he has put into it... and that is why when he looks at it, he looks with warmth, love and attention. Imagine what would be the painter's feelings if the painting is burned down in front of his eyes.

The Abstract Russell Drawn by me for the Arts exhibition in King Edward Medical University. In case you have difficulty identifying what it is, it is an abstract sketch of Bertrand Russell. :)

"If I had to live my life again, I'd make the same mistakes, only sooner." Tallulah Bankhead Same here... strange how you can begin to value even some of the apparent 'mistakes' that you have made in life.

X: She is going. Y: And this troubles you? X: Of course, it does! What else do you expect? Y: Have you not read La Rochefoucald, "Absence diminishes the lesser passions and increases the great ones, just as the wind extinguishes candles but fans a great fire."? Perhaps it will only serve to enhance the relationship, make it more durable. X: It is this ' perhaps ' which terrifies me. What if it extinguishes? Y: There will come many more 'what ifs' in your life... will you allow yourself to be paralyzed by them? Learn to be strong, learn to be resistant.

X: Sometimes when i see her face, her expressions, especially when she is trying to avoid my gaze, i feel very afraid; a strange fear clutches my heart... Unknown phantoms fight their way through into my consciousness. Y: You are projecting your own fears and doubts on her actions, dear boy. It's not her expression per se what troubles you, it is you yourself. In this case, your mind does not see what it wants to see, but rather, your mind sees what it is afraid of seeing. And who knows how many of her subconscious uncertainties does she cast on your conduct?

X: At times i feel like cursing... her, myself, the time when i fell in love, because now i have to suffer through all this pain. Y: Why do you curse? Did your mother curse you when you were born, despite all the pain and trouble that you caused her? She didn't... she still looked at you with affection, love and longing. Be like a mother in your love. If you are unwilling the pain in love, then you are unworthy of tasting it's joys as well.

Philosophers rarely resort to poetry, and mystics rarely employ logic.

"I loved her, but in the crazy world into which i was blindly plunging, my heart was far away, trying to adapt to something it possibly knew, but couldn't accept: being large enough for two people." Paulo Coelho, The Witch of Portobello

I have been pierced by the arrow of love, what shall I do? by Bulleh Shah English version by J. R. Puri and T. R. Shangari I have been pierced by the arrow of love, what shall I do? I can neither live, nor can I die. Listen ye to my ceaseless outpourings, I have peace neither by night, nor by day. I cannot do without my Beloved even for a moment. I have been pierced by the arrow of love, what shall I do? The fire of separation is unceasing! Let someone take care of my love. How can I be saved without seeing him? I have been pierced by the arrow of love, what shall I do? O Bullah, I am in dire trouble! Let someone come to help me out. How shall I endure such torture? I have been pierced by the arrow of love,what shall I do? I can neither live, nor can I die.

Nothing leaves a more bitter taste in mouth than the feeling of loneliness.

Consider an argument of this form: Since the intellect of any person is of finite value, it means that a person of greater intellect might detect a logical flaw in his arguments. This implies that any argument advanced by any person has a logical possibility of being wrong, the logical flaw being visible only to a person of greater intellect. The only argument that would have no possibility of being wrong is that which would be given by a being of infinite intellect. Since there is no such being, it follows that one can never be 100% certain that a particular argument is correct. The interesting thing is that this argument leads to a paradox. If all arguments have the possibiltiy of being false, then it means that this very argument also has the possibility of being false, and hence the conclusion that one can't be 100% certain of any argument is also not 100% certain!

"A writer — and, I believe, generally all persons — must think that whatever happens to him or her is a resource. All things have been given to us for a purpose, and an artist must feel this more intensely. All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art." Jorge Luis Borges [Happy birthday to the great Argentine writer.]

X: But your family loves you! Y: If they really love me, they should accept me and respect my views, and let me live the way i am instead of trying to impose their beliefs on me!

This little dialogue in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows caught my attention: 'All right,' said Hermoine, disconcerted. 'Say the cloak existed... what about the stone, Mr Lovegood? The thing which you call the Resurrection Stone?' 'What of it?' 'Well, how can that be real?' 'Prove that it is not,' said Xenophilius. Hermoine looked outraged.'But that's -- I'm sorry, but that's completely ridiculous! How can I possibly prove it doesn't exist? Do you expect me get hold of - of all the pebbles in the world, and test them? I mean, you could claim that anything 's real if the only basis for believing in it is that nobody's proved it doesn't exist!' Compare this with the famous china tea-pot argument by Bertrand Russell: " Many orthodox people speak as though it were the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas rather than of dogmatists to prove them. This is, of course, a mis

"Love isn't a decision. It's a feeling. If we could decide who we loved, it would be much simpler, but much less magical." Trey Parker and Matt Stone, South Park, Chef Aid, 1998

X: Yaar, i really like her, but i can't reveal it to her; i don't think myself as being worthy of her. She deserves someone better than me. Y: It is not for you to decide. X: What? Y: Whether you are worthy of her or not... it is not your choice to make; it is her's. If you really do love her, then tell her! Confess! And let her decide whether she accepts or rejects.

Jeffrey Goines: You know what crazy is? Crazy is majority rules. Take germs for example. James Cole: Germs? Jeffrey Goines: Uh-huh. Eighteenth century, no such thing, nada, nothing. No one ever imagined such a thing. No sane person. Along comes this doctor, uh, Semmelweis, Semmelweis. Semmelweis comes along. He's trying to convince people, other doctors mainly, that's there's these teeny tiny invisible bad things called germs that get into your body and make you sick. He's trying to get doctors to wash their hands. What is this guy? Crazy? Teeny, tiny, invisible? What do they call it? Uh-uh, germs? Huh? What? Now, up to the 20th century, last week, as a matter of fact, before I got dragged into this hellhole. I go in to order a burger at this fast food joint, and the guy drops it on the floor. James, he picks it up, he wipes it off, he hands it to me like it's all OK. "What about the germs?" I say. He says, "I don't believe in germs. Germs is a

The thunderous voice fills up the court room: "You are like a vampire; you suck the lives out of other people and make them a part of your own. You are so hungry for experience, you don't even care whose life it is you are consuming. You are eager to reach out and touch people, but you infect them with your own corrupt ideas. You are an aberration. Maybe it is better for everyone if you are quarantined. You are sentenced to a life of isolation..." ... and i wake up from my nightmare, drenched in sweat.

"One's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions." Oliver Wendell Holmes Especially if the idea belongs to love or religious philosophy.

Danny : Does he make you laugh? Tess : He doesn't make me cry. Ocean's Eleven

The Radiance The radiance of this ring That i offer you May fade away one day But trust me Its limited glow Is more sacred to Apollo Than sun's light Shining bright Muhammad Awais Aftab 13 August 2007

Poetry gets away with a crime so innocently; it instils in the youth a spirit of romantic idealism, which has little in common with reality. What do these poets know what love is? The only kind of love they have experienced (if they have experienced love at all!) is unrequited love. But instead of recognizing their failure, they idolize it... they construct a whole myth of 'ideal love' around it, burying real love beneath layers and layers of poetic metaphor. They mutate it into something sterile and unrecognizable. Oscar Wilde was perhaps right when he wrote about love: 'The poets have killed it.' A person who has only learned to venerate the pain and bitterness of love, calling it 'sacred', begins to see the happiness in love as a sin. When a person stubbornly asks for 'eternal' love, he refuses the joy of the finite love which life does offer. These poets make you run after a dream, only that you may wake up and find yourself in a nightmare. It make

"The main things which seem to me important on their own account, and not merely as means to other things, are knowledge, art, instinctive happiness, and relations of friendship or affection." Bertrand Russell I totally agree. And much of the unhappiness and dissatisfaction i see around myself is because people have ignored these very things in their lives.

Separate Ways Me and thee, We met like two ships Thrown together In the tempestuous sea We talked and smiled And shared our lives Our tales of joy And the tales of sighs But passengers we were Of the stormy sea On different waves, with different ships Neither of us was free Had we met In another time In another place We might not be going On our separate ways When the world comes to an end On the end of days And the cycle of life begins again I’d pray to God To make this little change: Let us meet In that time In that place Where we would not be going On our separate ways... Muhammad Awais Aftab 11 August 2007

Loneliness By Faiz Ahmad Faiz Translated by Azfar Hussain Loneliness like a good, old friend visits my house to pour wine in the evening. And we sit together, waiting for the moon, and for your face to sparkle in every shadow.

A little family birthday celebration... the pictures were taken while we were at Spin Bar , an ice-cream parlour in Lahore. And mama says i hate milk... My cousin and me Me alone ( ignoring that guy behind me, sprinkling nuts on his ice cream ) Mama and Me

This is what my best friend Saad Javed gave to me as a birthday note, and that is surely the most special thing of today. A very sweet, special day! If people were jewels, Awais, you would be a ruby; not because it is red and brilliant but because it is the stone of passion and lyrical energy; the things your aura embrace so perfectly. If people were flowers, Awais, you would be a primrose, not because it is a 'rose' but because voodoo witchdoctors would use it as a wound-healer, an ointment and a painkiller. This is exactly what you have been to me. If people were edible, Awais, I know you would make a delightful lean meat steak. Not 'well-done', nor done 'medium'; rather a 'rare'... juicy, satisfying and divine. But jewels, I cannot afford; flowers wilt and food goes stale. But i have my very special gem, my garland, my gourmet... I have you. So look out, Awais. It might be raining. Not because it is Monsoon but because it is a very sweet, special day

Today is my birthday. :) The day uptil now has been a bit boring and disappointing, but it has not lacked in some special moments. I hope the rest of it is spent in the best possible way. I share my birthday (8th August) with the American poet Sara Teasdale. This is one of her poems which i really like, and which also sort of defines my today's mood. Love in Autumn I sought among the drifting leaves, The golden leaves that once were green, To see if Love were hiding there And peeping out between. For thro' the silver showers of May And thro' the summer's heavy heat, In vain I sought his golden head And light, fast-flying feet. Perhaps when all the world is bare And cruel winter holds the land, The Love that finds no place to hide Will run and catch my hand. I shall not care to have him then, I shall be bitter and a-cold -- It grows too late for frolicking When all the world is old. Then little hiding Love, come

"Are you fleeing from Love because of a single humiliation? What do you know of Love except the name?" Rumi

WHAT I BELIEVE Question 3: Can science give us certain knowledge about ultimate reality? In most aspects, my view of Science conforms to that given by Karl Popper. Popper denied the idea that any scientific theory can ever be verified as true. To the contrary, Popper believed that the only sure test of a theory being as scientific was its quality of being potentially falsified . A theory is to be considered scientific only and only if it is capable of being falsified. Why a scientific theory cannot be verified is because of its universality (Hume's problem of Induction). Let us consider a statement like ‘All crows are black’. Now this is a statement which can never be verified by no matter how many observations we make, because the hypothesis of crows being black extends to all existing crows, which may be beyond the reach of our observation. And therefore, this statement can never be conclusively verified. Discovering a black crow every time we make an observation does not confir

"There is only one good thing in life, and that is love. And how you misunderstand it! How you spoil it! You treat it as something solemn like a sacrament, or something to be bought, like a dress." Guy de Maupassant, The Love of Long Ago [Happy Birthday to Maupassant]

Taking the first steps of life so happily. :) Who could tell what this boy would turn out to be. But i simply love this photograph... always brings a smile on my face.

That's me. :)

This is my YLC participant trophy.

"The purpose of life is a life of purpose." Robert Byrne Ah, so beautifully and succintly put! This could very well be the conclusion of my post of the meaning of life .

An interesting application of Proust's quote about Voyage of Discovery to the field of love could be stated as: "The voyage of romance is not in seeking new partners but in seeing the existing ones with new eyes." :)

A lover becomes blind, not because of a lack of vision, but because everywhere he sees, he sees only love.

"The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." Marcel Proust

Saad: Aik waqt main aik hee dewi meharban hoti hay, qismat ki, ya muhabbat ki. [Trans: Only one goddess favours you at a time: either the goddess of fortune or the goddess of love.] These gods are capricious creatures, my buddy, you never know. :)