Heart Thoughts: A Treasury of Inner Wisdom by Louise L Hay

Louise L Hay is a famous metaphysical lecturer and teacher known for her bestseller ‘You Can Heal Your Life’. She has inspired millions of people to discover the vast treasure that lies within our hearts. She advocates our need to connect to what she calls ‘Inner Self”. 

In the book "Heart Thoughts", she celebrates the power of our own hearts to heal ourselves and adapt to the changes in life. The key idea in the book is the need for responsibility as the ability to respond to life in order to get the best out of it. The first steps in connecting with our inner selves are to get out of the victim mindsets and abandoning the illusion of someone rescuing us from the mess we are in. 

The knowledge of our power to respond creatively to life is liberation and it frees us from our old way of thinking and feeling. This enables us to shed our old beliefs and welcome the new in life. With the release of the past and acceptance of our own selves come the innumerable blessings of life. My favourite thought comes under the title of good health. Good health, according to Hay is “ having no fatigue, having a good appetite, going to sleep and awakening easily, having a good memory, having good humour, having precision in thought and action, and being honest, humble, grateful and loving”. 

Heart Thoughts celebrates change as the rule of life. Dedicated to our own hearts, this collection of meditations about day-to-day issues by Louise L Hay can change our lives or make us aware of the powers that lie within us and thus create richness in our lives. 

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Ammaykku

It's been years since I started writing. But even now, when I sit down to write, I feel like a schoolboy sitting in the examination hall before an empty page. In my younger days, writing was a hobby. Now, it's a struggle; a prayer to bring about words in the most satisfactory order; an exorcism of memories.(Free Translation) MT VASUDEVAN NAIR

 

In a previous blogpost,I'd written about a revival of my interest in Malayalam literature. This experience was like walking through old familiar paths once again. The best book I read as a result of this renaissance (if I can use it in a very personal sense) was a memoir Ammaykku written by great Malayalam writer M T Vasudevan Nair. In a simple, direct and intimate tone that takes the reader into confidence, he describes his transformation from a voracious reader into a literary phenomenon.

Most writers have evolved out of a life of strife and struggle. Like the pearl out of the oyster, literature is mostly about transformation of rather painful experiences and memories. Here, MT also describes a similar metamorphosis from a schoolboy into a writer overcoming several obstacles and limitations.

The book's title translated as 'To Mother' is meaningful in that it is his memories about his mother and the people who have influenced him considerably in his life. He lovingly recalls several people who influenced him and encouraged him in his literary pursuits. He recounts his intimate bond with the great literary genius, Vaikkom Mohammed Basheer and his brief encounter with madness.

Gentle, honest and memorable, this memoir from a literary genius is a worthy gem in any literature reader's collection. Read a story Oppol  by MT!

Say You're One of Them

One good writer that I have read recently is Uwem Akpan, a Nigerian priest who has an MFA in Creative Writing. His debut collection of short stories Say You’re One of Them won the regional prize for Best First Book from Commonwealth Nations, The five stories in this collection are narrated by children, aged between six and sixteen, in five countries in Africa. They are surrounded by genocide, wars, human trafficking, AIDS, corruption and communal and religious conflicts. The stories show a shocking glimpse of Africa- street life, politics, prostitution and bloodshed. 

The Valkyries

Reading Paulo Coelho is like talking to yourself. The flaws and imperfections of the protagonist are often the flaws that you see in yourself. The wild speed in reading it in 4 or 5 hours could be because of this curiosity that grapples the mind as to what will happen to the protagonist in the story.

His books like The Alchemist, Zahir, The Warrior of the Light, Brida, The Witch of Portbello, Like the Flowing River and the Maktub creates a sense of déjà vu. The Valkyries is no exception. His books refresh the mind and give insight into the flaws of human nature.

There are always several places in the book, where you stop and think, "Where have I read that before?" and then realise that it was not in a book but in your own mind that you created a thought similar to that. Coelho's magic has worked once more. Waiting to read the next book that I can get hold of.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Mark Twain (1835-1910) was the pen name of Samuel Langhorne Clemens, one of the greatest writers in American as well as world literature. Famous for his boyhood novels, he is considered a realist, humourist and satirist. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885) has been hailed as a joy forever and one of the masterpieces of American and world literature.

The story depicts the life and struggles of Huckleberry Finn, a teenage boy who runs away from his adopted family in Petersburg fearing the attacks of his greedy and drunken father after faking his own death. His companion on the journey across the Mississippi river is Jim, the Negro slave of his adopted family. They travel over a thousand miles on their raft going through a series of adventures that reveal their good luck and practicality.This lovable hero wins hearts not by his nobility or valour but by sheer practicality and lack of hypocrisy.

Providence

The Classics of the Macabre by Daphne du Maurier

Though not at all psychic- I have never seen a ghost or dabbled in spiritualism or the occult- I have always been fascinated by the unexplained, the darker side of life. I have a strong sense of the things that lie beyond our day-by-day perception and experience. It is, perhaps, an extension of this feeling that makes me live through the characters that I create.

The Classics of the Macabre(1987) is a collection of scary stories written by the queen of macabre writing, Daphne du Maurier. This book published at her 80th birthday showcases six stories noted for their drama as well as emotional intensity.

In "Don't Look Now" (1970), a couple on holiday meets a pair of twin sisters, who claim that they are psychic. They claim that they can see the couple's recently dead daughter and advises them to go back home. The couple is shocked by the sudden turn of events in which they pay a heavy price for their cynicism.

"The Apple Tree"(1952) is about a man recollecting his dead wife at the sight of an apple tree in his yard. This tree sprang up in the garden after her death and he doesn't like remembering his barren and rather cheerless wife. So he decides to cut down the tree only to put his own life in danger.

"The Blue Lenses" (1952) narrates the story of Marda West who undergoes an eye surgery and has blue lenses temporarily fitted in her eye. To her horror, she can see only animals in the place of her near and dear ones. Her husband and her nurse have changed shape.

"The Birds" (1952) is like a nightmare. Birds come in large numbers and start attacking people. This is the reverse situation of nature attacking human beings.

"The Alibi"(1959) is about a man who is about to kill a family. The woman of the family believes him to be a painter and so he tries his hand at painting. But the evil inside him needs release more than ever.

"Not After Midnight" (1971) is equally scary in that a schoolmaster meets a couple who tell him what happened to the last inhabitant of the place where he lives.

Though most of the stories are scary and unputdownable, the best in this collection are defintely "The Apple Tree" and "The Blue Lenses".

Re-reading "Tintern Abbey" by Wordsworth

Recently, I re-read William Wordsworth's "Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey, On revisiting the Banks of Wye during a Tour, July 13, 1798" officially known as "Tintern Abbey" to all literature students. While, I was reading the poem (later teaching it as well), it suddenly occurred to me that the consciousness that Wordsworth talks about in the poem is something that modern people are trying hard to achieve: harmony with nature.

For the poet, nature was a form of escape in his early years. Later she became "all in all" to him- "the anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,/The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul/ Of all my moral being". When weighed by the troubles of the world, he could easily think about the beautiful scenes of nature and forget his sorrows.

This habit of storing the sights and sounds of nature in his mind's eye helped him to recollect such sights when he wanted them. Such memories flooded his mind, filled it with tranquility and gave rise to a pleasant frame of mind devoid of all angst. Such a tranquil mood increased in its intensity until the poet was no longer aware of the functions of his body and instead became a living soul that partakes in the mystery of the universe.

Wordsworth describes his hour of ecstasy as:

...that blessed mood,
In which the burthen of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight
Of all this unintelligible world,
Is lightened:--that serene and blessed mood,
In which the affections gently lead us on,--
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.

For the poet, this poem tracks his growth as a mature person from the immature boy he was. It shows the poet as meditating on nature, which is commonly used to calm the monkey mind in meditation.

Note- Read an interesting article about the need for being close to nature from Charity Focus.

The Name of the Rose

The good of a book lies in its being read. A book made up of signs that speak of other signs, which in their turn speak of things. Without an eye to read them, a book contains signs that produce no concepts; therefore it is dumb. This library was perhaps born to save the books it houses, but now it lives to bury them (Eco, 396).

Umberto Eco’s novel The Name of the Rose is a historical murder mystery set in a medieval monastery in fourteenth century Italy. What moves the story forward is the attempt of a medieval Benedictine monastery to preserve the aura of knowledge within its boundaries. Such an attempt to keep a work of art hidden, in this case, the second book of Aristotle’s Poetics, is not just for preserving the aura of arcane knowledge but not to destroy the order of the Benedictines. The book, which is believed never to have written or lost is in the library of the monastery but its existence is a secret as the library is not open to outsiders and functions by strange customs of secrecy. There are many secrets related to the library, which nobody know mainly because only the librarian knows about the contents of the library. The monks can only ask for titles but are not allowed in the place where books are kept. The library makes copies of the rare books with the help of illuminators and scribes but then the books are given only for that purpose. Murders happen because of this secret book of the ancients on laughter is lusted after by the scholarly monks. To investigate the murders, a Franciscan monk William of Baskerville arrives at the monastery along with his novice Adso of Melk. This monk, in a very Sherlock Holmes- like fashion deduces the truth of the matter from accidental incidents.

Chain of Custody (2016)

It was only in February that I read Anita Nair’s Alphabet Soup for Lovers, which was quite a memorable one. In her recently released Chain of Custody , the second of her Inspector Gowda novels after Cut Like Wound, she portrays the city of Bengaluru ridden with corruption, violence and child trafficking.

Inspector Gowda is shown to be a maverick in his investigation methods,  passion for his Royal Enfield and for the women in his life. Along with his assistants Santhosh and Ratna, he sets out to solve the case of a missing girl Nandita, his maid’s daughter.

A young girl Rekha is coerced into being an escort to a rich man by her boyfriend Sid. She lies to her family and discovers herself to be in danger when this rich doctor is found murdered the next day. She breaks down completely without having a soul to breath her troubles to.

Nandita goes to school and on her way back visits a church. She is kidnapped by child traffickers and brought to a brothel. There are others, both boys and girls, molested and killed by their abusers. She cries for help and there comes an angel in the form of a stranger.

An MLA is found to be a paragon of virtue as he had married his handicapped girlfriend. The two are an ideal couple but she finds out his secret phone conversations and interest in young girls. She decides to take action and searches all his files to find out who he really is.

Connecting these three parallel stories is the city of Bengaluru, where anything is possible according to Inspector Gowda. His case is solved in a gestalt moment when his son brings in a friend Suraj who happens to be Rekha’s brother.

The novel portrays a disgusting world of child trafficking , where children around the age of twelve are nabbed in clear daylight and later finished off after being sexually exploited. Written in a very racy style, the book keeps the reader on edge and is a good read a la the stories of Feluda, our good old Indian Sherlock Holmes. 

Amen:The Autobiography of a Nun

Amen: The Autobiography of a Nun, written by Sister Jesme of the Carmelite Convent has created repercussions in the religious and political scenario of Kerala as the murder of Sister Abhaya and the suicide of Sister Anupa Mary. Like these two incidents, the book offers flak against the strong belief of the laity in the institution of Catholic Church and in the theory of blind obedience as propagated by the church authorities. 

Sister Jesme was born in 1956 in Thrissur and joined the Carmelite Congregation because of her intense desire to follow Christ. She chose the name Jesme because for her it meant Jesus and Me. She has a PhD in English Literature and has published three books of poetry. She has worked as the Principal of St. Mary's College. 

In the book, she discloses how she was asked by the authorities to take long leave and undergo psychiatric treatment. Instead she leaves the congregation and her high post of a gazetted officer to live a life of a recluse. The author openly discusses several taboo topics in society like the low place given to women in a patriarchy, the greed of managements run by the Church, prevalent lesbianism and sexual perversions among the nuns, rivalries and advances made by priests towards nuns. 

The word Amen is used to conclude prayers in Christianity and means so be it. As its cover page says, the life of a nun should be like that of a pure and untainted white lotus that stands at a higher plane than the muddy waters it lives in. Written with an openness, quite shocking and sensational in nature, the book portrays the daring nature of Sister Jesme, who left the Church to live a life of independence and peace. Like a white lotus. So be it. 

Khaled Hosseini

One really good writer who I have come across recently is Khaled Hosseini with two bestsellers The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns to his credit.

Both books can be called bildungsromans or novels of formation and development. The Kite Runner is a growing up novel that narrates how Amir atones for the betrayal of his childhood friend Hassan by adopting Hassan's son Sohrab. The first chapter is unforgettable while A Thousand Splendid Suns is about the relationship between two women in a war-torn Afghanistan. The struggle to survive makes them the wives of the same man, but the bond that develops between the two resembles a mother-daughter relationship. The final section of the novel is remarkable especially about the guessing games that Laila, Tariq, Aziza and Zalmai play for Laila's expected baby. THe naming game involves only male names. If it's a girl Laila has named her already.

Both the books are well-written and unforgettable with characters and the emotional intensity of their stay alive in the mind. His advice to the aspiring writers is :"I would give them the oldest advice in the craft: Read and write. Read a lot. Read new authors and established ones, read people whose work is in the same vein as yours and those whose genre is totally different. You've heard of chain-smokers. Writers, especially beginners, need to be chain-readers. And lastly, write every day. Write about things that get under your skin and keep you up at night". 

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Reflections of Madison County: A Visual Journey

In every bookworm's library, there are permanent residents or books that you return to time and again, to derive from them the same comfort and understanding that you felt the first time you had read it. These books can bring you back to the sacred space of your soul.

One such book is Reflections of Madison County: A Visual Journey by Mark F. Heffron. This book combines photography and poetry. Against each beautiful photograph of the Madison Country are a few lines from a classic writer like Rainer Maria Rilke or W.B. Yeats.

The visual journey offers a glimpse of the paths through the green fields, the serene rivers and the bridges that are synonymous with Madison County. The ordinary views of nature are transformed into the extraordinary in these pictures. The sunrises and sunsets reveal a landscape glowing with magical light. The fall season transforms the green landscape into a russet-clad one.

Adding to the visual treasure are excerpts from lyrical poets given along with each picture, making this book a form of soul space. I love this one by Rachel Carson:

Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of birds, the ebb and flow of the tides, the folded bud ready for spring. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature- the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter.

A sheaf of corn, the mist clad banks of a river, the shade of sunset in the river-water, a swing- impressions that remain in the mind even after you leave the book. Nature and art combines to create sense of serenity in the reader, so much that this book is sure a collector's treasure. 

The Alchemist

"Why dont you like your favourite book anymore?"A friend asked me when I told her that I didnt regard The Alchemist as my favourite anymore. "But why?", she was curious because I had told her the story with high spirits, of course without mentioning the end and I raved about its influence on my thoughts and life.

I had no convincing answer to give her nor I could understand why it was so.May be I have stopped dreaming about my future. May be I didn't  believe in dreams and mirages and hallucinations anymore.

Why?Why? Why? This time I asked myself the question. The same friend had told me that I overanalyse everything and think in detail about every minute thing. As she would say make a kheema out of it. So my mind started rewinding itself on all the memories available on The Alchemist.

What did I learn from The Alchemist?  Follow your dream, it said. I was fascinated by the idea of the universe responding to my desires if I wanted something badly. It motivated me enough to pass a test and reach a goal. I even recommended it to my friends who were also chasing some dream or the otherbut in most of the cases they were not sure of what they wanted. I was sure and felt very happy (may be vain too) about the fact that I knew exactly what I wanted and was confident of getting it too.

In the months that followed my thoughts changed. I had forgotten my own goal and my mind was immersed in other things. So when the results came I was not able to appreciate the glory of reaching my goal. I felt  that this sucess was was a hallucination I didnt deserve. It was a mighty accident after all.

I forgot that I had chosen this path fighting my parents' dream of me becoming an engineer. I knew I would have made an unskilful engineer at that and chose to learn literature instead. It was the thought of books that fascinated me. Yet I forget it all and about The Alchemist too.

I got curious, what was in that book which motivated me so much. If it put me in my right path once, it can do it again. I read the book for the fifth time. Now this time I understood that the book didnt hold the same mystery for me. I realised that though the book remained the same, I had changed.

Finally I understood that the book was a milepost and a traveller can never hold on to a milepost. It is a treasure of the heart, something that taught you a lesson but at the sametime it urges you to move on. The next time you tread the same path, it is not a stranger anymore but the reminder ofyour first journey into the unknown.

Afterthought: I want to regain whatever I have lost because I thought I didnt deserve good things.

Upon Westminster Bridge

Do you prefer the stillness of nature in a village or the rush-hour traffic of city life? Most people love the village life. Was the great Romantic poet William Wordsworth an exception? Known as the High Priest of Nature, he loved the scenic beauty of the Lake District and celebrated scenes from rustic life. Then how could he write a poem on a scene from city life- a poem on Westminster Bridge situated in the heart of London city? You are not the only person to be surprised. Wordsworth himself was astonished at the sight of the quiet London city one early morning in September 1802. He was traveling with his sister Dorothy across Westminster Bridge on their way to France. It was between five o’clock and six o’clock in the morning. As opposed to usual, the city was silent and deserted. He realized to his own amazement that the noisy city he disliked was also a part of Nature than the face of commerce it was during the day.

In the morning sun, the poet found the city to be the most beautiful sight on earth. Only a dull person will fail to appreciate the calmness inspired by the quiet city basking in the morning sun. The landmarks of the city looked silent and bare without the rush of life across the streets. The river Thames looked as if driven by an inner force than the noisy place of commerce during the day. Yet was the city really asleep? No, the mighty heart – the capital of the most powerful nation in the world at that time and its people – will wake up soon.

This sonnet “Upon Westminster Bridge” is a passionate expression of Wordsworth’s love of Nature and his ecstatic astonishment at the peacefulness of London city early morning.

The Guide

They sat beside the Swami and read the message to him. He smiled at it. He beckoned Velan to come nearer.

The doctors appealed, 'Tell him he should save himself. Please do your best. He is very weak'.

Velan bent close to the Swami and said, 'The doctors say----'

In answer Raju asked the man to bend nearer, and whispered, 'Help me to my feet,' and clung to his arm and lifted himself. He got up to his feet. He had to be held by Velan and another on each side. In the profoundest silence the crowd followed him down.

Everyone followed at a solemn silent pace. The eastern sky was red. Many in the camp were still sleeping. Raju could not walk, but he insisted upon pulling himself along all the same. He panted with the effort. He went down the steps of the river, halting for breath on each step, and finally reached his basin of water.

He stepped into it, shut his eyes, and turned towards the mountain, his lips muttering the prayer. Velan and another held him by each arm. The morning sun was out by now; a great shaft of light illuminated the surroundings. 

It was difficult to hold Raju on his feet, as he had a tendency to flop down. They held him as if he were a baby. Raju opened his eyes, looked about, and said, ' Velan, it's raining in the hills. I can feel it coming up under my feet, up my legs----'He sagged down.

The novel The Guide by RK Narayan ends this way. A Swami named Raju refuses to stop his fast for rain and his condition worsens.  But the movie version of the book in Hindi, Guide directed by Vijay Anand in 1965 shows the villagers dancing to the music of rain while Raju’s mother and Rosie mourn over his death.

The movie version deviates in many ways from RK Narayan’s novel. For example, Rosie’s husband Marco is a womanizer in the movie, while in the novel; he is shown as an archaeologist interested only in his research. The music by SD Burman is memorable in that it beautifully captures the atmosphere of the story.

Both have as protagonist, Raju, a roguish railway guide from Malgudi. He lands in a village, where he is mistaken for a saint while he has no such otherworldly traits in his nature. His past, which he narrates to Velan, has dramatic incidents-such as seduction of a married woman of a client, living together much to the angst of his loving mother and a term in jail for forging Rosie’s signature on a document.

 The story of his past shows how he falls in love with Rosie and causes a drift her and her husband Marco. He takes her into her home and lets her follow her dream of becoming a dancer. She succeeds as a dancer and brings money to him, who acts as her manager. But he forges her signature on a document and lands in jail. On his release, he finds himself in a village, where the poor uneducated villagers mistake him for a saint/sadhu.

What is amazing is the transformation the self-centred Raju undergoes as a result of the devotion and faith of the villagers headed by Velan. Though his guiding qualities are manifested in the way he entertains his clients and how he helps Rosie find her dreams, in his newly-donned role as a guide to the villagers he survives by his glibness and experience of the world. 

For free lunches, he becomes a spiritual guide, a solace to the worried villagers. When drought and famine hits the village, his words are misinterpreted as his intention not to have food till it rains. The villagers are astonished by this and Raju cannot fail them. So he decides to keep a fast for twelve days in order to bring rain to the starving villagers.The roguish hero turns a saint when he makes an effort to sacrifice his life for the villagers.  The end of the novel is ambiguous- whether Raju dies as a result of his unselfish act or whether it rains is not clear. But the movie depicts an outburst of rain while Rosie and Raju's mother mourn over his death.

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Love

The Kitchen God’s Wife

Amy Tan’s books are based on the lives and experiences of her parents and relatives, who had migrated to the US from China. She was born in Oakland in California and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has written several books The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses and The Bonesetter’s Daughter. Her novels serve as cultural documents that describe the immigrant experience in terms of communality and identity. They contain the customs and rituals of China that might get lost in the new country in the process of cultural assimilation.

The Kitchen God’s Wife (1991) is her second novel and presents a mother-daughter relationship complicated by secrets- the mother withholds information about the daughter’s real parentage while the daughter hides her progressive multiple sclerosis from her mother. The novel begins in the present time when the daughter Pearl is diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Then the story moves to the past as Winnie, the mother talks about her first marriage in China to a pilot named Wen Fu. All these secrets come out only because Auntie Helen, Winnie’s friend, who thinks that she is dying of a brain tumour, threatens to expose the secrets of both mother and daughter.

Winnie had lost her mother when she was a child and was brought up by her uncle’s family. She discloses her sorrowful past, her unhappy marriage, the deaths of her three children, her meeting Jimmy Louie, her escape from her first marriage and her marriage to Jimmy, whom Pearl calls father. Her bitter experiences at home after her mother’s escape (or death, she does not know the truth) make her angry towards her father. Later, when her marriage is fixed, her father asks her to spend a week with him. He asks her opinion about a painting in his study that she used to dislike. Then he adds: I liked this in you; so unafraid to say what you thought. Then he asks her present opinion on the painting and as she explains why she likes it now, he says:

From now on, he said at last with a stern look, you must consider what your husbands opinions are. Yours do not matter so much anymore (178).

During her times of trouble, she is helped by Auntie Du, Jimmy Louie and Helen. She was like the Kitchen God’s wife, who got no credit for her faithfulness and loyalty to her husband. Winnie, however decides to move and discards the image of the Kitchen God’s wife from her home because she feels that now that she has divorced her husband Wen Fu, this God has no value for her.

Once the secrets are out, both women try to come to terms with what they are entrusted with. Winnie wants to take Pearl to China to find a cure for her incurable disease. She brings the altar that Auntie Du had left for Pearl and finds a new goddess for it, a goddess with no name, obviously a factory error. She names the goddess Sorrowfree and tells Pearl:

But sometimes, when you are afraid, you can talk to her. She will listen. She will wash away everything sad with her tears. She will use her stick to chase away everything bad. See her name: Lady Sorrowfree, happiness winning over bitterness, no regrets in this world. Of course, it’s only superstition, just for fun. But see how fast the smoke rises- oh, even faster when we laugh, lifting our hopes higher and higher (532).

Tan portrays the miserable life of Winnie, who leaves China in search of a new life. She shows the patriarchal Chinese society that values boys over girls and does nothing when a man hits his wife in public. There is no one to stand up for the woman as it is considered to be her fate. Tan also critiques the generation gap that comes out of the prejudices that the old and the young feel toward each other. In the novel, the mother-daughter relationship becomes warm only when all secrets are let out and the prejudices overcome.