The Little Green e-Book: http://www.morganstanley.com/about/community/littlegreenebook/

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Recently, I was invited to write a paper, on ‘The Future of Asian Cities’ for an international conference. It somehow went beyond just the context of Asia; turning out to be a rather personal piece of writing, touching upon ‘Nature, Art, Service and Spirituality’ - some of the recurring themes of my life.

If inclined, you can read the entire paper here: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dd65pgjh_14hbts3hdm

Question: Some of my friends have remarked that, although they find your sayings intensely interesting, they prefer service rather than too much thinking about questions of truth. What are your observations on this point?

J Krishnamurti: Sir, what do you mean by service? Everybody wants to help. That is the cry of those people who think they are serving the world. They are always talking about helping the world, especially those people who belong to sects. It is their particular form of disease, because they think that by doing something, it does not matter what, they are going to help, by serving people they will help. Who is to say what is service? A man that belongs to the army, prepared to kill the barbarian that enters his country, says he is serving the country. The man that kills, the butcher, says he is serving the community. The exploiter who has the means of production in his hands, monopolized, says he is serving the community. The man who exploits beliefs, the priest, says he is serving the country, community. Who is to decide? Or shall we look at it quite differently? Do you think a flower, a rose, is ever considering that it is serving humanity, that it is helping the world by its existence because it is beautiful? On the contrary, because it is beautiful, supremely lovely, unconscious of its own magnificence, it is truly helping. Not like a man who goes about shouting that he is serving the world. That is, each one wants to use his means, or his ideas, to exploit the world, not to set the world free. Personally, if you will not misunderstand me, that is not my point of view at all. I do not want to help the world, as you would call it. I cannot help, it naturally happens. That is service. I do not desire to make others come to my particular form of belief or ask them to come into my particular cage of thought, because I hold that to have a belief is a limitation. To really serve, one must be supremely free from the limited consciousness we call the “I”, the ego, self-centred consciousness; and so long as that exists, you are not really serving the world. Unless you really think, you cannot find out if you are truly helping the world. So let us not first consider whether we are helping the world, but rather find out if we have the capacity to think and to feel. To really think, mind must not be tethered to a belief. That is very simple is it not? To think really profoundly, frankly, completely, your mind cannot be held by prejudice or a certain belief, or by fear, or by preconceived ideas. To think, the mind must start anew, afresh, and not with a background of tradition. After all, tradition is only valuable when it helps you to think, not when it overpowers you by its weight. Let me put this thing differently. We all want to help. When you see suffering in the world there is an intense desire to help; but to truly help people you have to go to the fundamental cause of things. You have to discover the cause of suffering, and you can only do that if there is profound thinking. And this thinking is not mere intellectual delight, but it can only take place, this thinking, in action.

AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND 1ST TALK IN VASANTA SCHOOL GARDENS 30TH MARCH, 1934
J Krishnamurity [read more]

What happens when Nature is overwhelmed by greed , … ?!
As the remarkable natural farmer, Bhaskar Save (86 years old), says: “A child has a right to its mother’s milk, but if we draw on Mother Earth’s blood and flesh as well, how can we expect her continuing sustenance?”
The following article, published on 8th March, 2009 in the New York Times, is certainly worth reading. Here’s an excerpt:

Let’s today step out of the normal boundaries of analysis of our economic crisis and ask a radical question: What if the crisis of 2008 represents something much more fundamental than a deep recession? What if it’s telling us that the whole growth model we created over the last 50 years is simply unsustainable economically and ecologically […]
“We created a way of raising standards of living that we can’t possibly pass on to our children,” said Joe Romm […]
We have not generated real wealth, and we are destroying a livable climate …’ Real wealth is something you can pass on in a way that others can enjoy.”

{Read full Article}

Yesterday was a gloomy day for me, a day full of tensions as i hadn’t completed my assignments as usual….My whole day passed by doing them. At last by God’s grace i did finish them all and therefore i finally felt proud of myself having finished my work on time though by bunking lectures..but still.

In the evening i had to go grocery shopping for mom as some guests were supposed to drop in. I took my friend along. I parked my Activa just oppposite to the store which provided a parking parking place. And I promise it was’nt a no parking zone. My dad never believes me about it but still!!!

Now comes the THRILL…We shopped our hearts out, shoppin even those things which were’nt on the list but- we enjoyed a lot. We came out only to find that my scooter was missing…and  the funniest part is I searched it at places where it was impossible for it to reach on its own. So, I asked the watchman about the last option left-”The Towing Van”. He affirmated to the same.I asked him whether this was a parking area and surprisingly he did confirm the same. Awww poor me with all those heartiest shopping bags felt disgusted.

But  I managed to gather all courage  to lift those heavy heaps of crap( I enjoyed them as shopping goodies till i discovered my vehicle was missing…but now they were crap for me coz i had to lift them all the way to the opposite side road to catch an auto) and crossed the road. When i was about to cross the road I accidently held a lady’s hand as she rushed hurriedly. I pulled her back so that she does’nt get thrown by busy traffic on  Drive-in-road, she looked at me and said  “Thanks”. I winked and gave her a smile.

Thankfully we crossed the road and I boarded an auto along with my friend. My friend forgot a bag inside the store so she rushed back to collect it while i was standing outside the auto waiting for her. I suddenly realized that the same lady whose hand i had accidently held was standing with her son making great efforts to persuade an auto-driver to give her a lift to her destination-ALL in Vain!!!

I waved at her and asked her where did she want to go. And guess what??? WE HAD THE SAME STORY!!! Even her vehicle was towed away from the very same place. And so our destinations matched -THE TOW PARK ZONE… but she wanted to go home because she didnt know the place where the vehicles after being towed away taken and she wanted her better half to go and rescue her vehicle. I told her that  she could  join me as our destinations matched but all she could reply was ” I am a lady how can I go there?”…..

My friend returned and I simply ordered that lady to join in(bad manners on my part but i don’ care). And she did. On our way I ate her head up talking about “Women Empowerment” and that she was an independent individual. Blah Blah Blah…. I was writing a research paper on the same issue as a part of my assignment and so I could make her understand what was it all about.

We reached the THE TOW PARK ZONE met the Police constable and told him that we had parked our vehicles properly and this time they should pay us fine for the negligency on their part but all he replied with a cool head was that we had to pay him.

Now comes the twist-”Honey we didnt have MONEY!!!”- All I had was a credit card which was not accepted . Even my friend didn’t have any Vitamin M so that we could survive so i told Mr. Constable about the serious issue. The lady then went near her scooter called the constable and paid him the fine. The constable returned and told us that we could go as our fine was paid by the lady. We went to the lady and thanked her for her act of kindness to which she winked back and smiled(MY STYLE- copyrights to which were reserved).

I asked her to give me her mobile number and address so that I could return her the money she paid on my behalf. But she refused. She told me that I had given her what nobody gave her till date. I thought she took me as her friend now and the context of me giving something was “friendship”-it was a wild guess…

“Courage” -she replied was what I gave her to become what she wasn’t till that day. She told me that she was independent now and that she does’nt repent being a woman any more……….

I was happy but I still insisted that I wanted to pay her…

“Consider me your sister” was all she said as she   vvvvvrrroooooooomeeeeedddd her scooter and disappeared on the busy road…

And for a change I kept mum thinking about it all for 5 long minutes…(trust me I cant keep my mouth shut even for a second) . But I felt HAPPY!!!

Ajahn Pasanno ordained trees in Thailand as a way of saving them, and Julia Butterfly Hill climbed into one grand old redwood in order to save it, creating news that inspired millions. Inquiring Mind editors Dennis Crean, Barbara Gates and Wes Nisker brought the two of them together for a conversation about trees, activism and love.
Read on…

The most important documentary I have seen in 2008: “Story of Stuff is a fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns.” Worth every minute!

Created by Annie Leonard, who spent 10 years of her life researching and putting together this 20-minute power packed piece.

Play it at www.storyofstuff.com

Love is not in wanting, neither is it in detachment.

You will know what it is only when you pour your self completely, till you give it all away. Pour yourself into the sunrise you see, pour yourself into the whiff of the flower you smell, into the touch of the tiny fingers of a child, into the bird that leaves no traces in the sky, into the eyes of the stranger who serves you tea, into your work, into every hug, into the earth you step on, into the breath you breathe, pour and pour and pour, without keeping anything, until you have emptied yourself. Till that day when you too are washed away.

In that nothingness you are complete.

The act of forgiveness.

As will always be the case in the material world, duality will show up in each and every aspect of our lives, similarly we shall always come across persons deserving forgiveness and those who do not. It is easy to forgive the deserving and there is nothing more to be seen in such an act as the person simply deserves it, he or she has earned it! But it is forgiveness of the un-deserving which is the difficult yet benevolent part. It is the un-deserving person who is ailing and as such in need of solace and a soothing balm. I suppose this is why the Lord Jesus said “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they are doing.”

Of course, it would even be better if I were to remain rooted in the Advaitic principle of “Who is there to offend and who is there to forgive?” But I realize that I still have miles to go before I reach that state of unshakeable stability in One-ness.

Born and raised in Vancouver, Severn Suzuki has been working on environmental and social justice issues since kindergarten. At age 9, she and some friends started the Environmental Children’s Organization (ECO), a small group of children committed to learning and teaching other kids about environmental issues. They traveled to 1992’s UN Earth Summit to Rio de janero, where 12 year-old Severn gave this powerful speech that deeply affected (and silenced) some of the most prominent world leaders.

Read the full text of Severn’s speech, and pass it on to another 12 year old you know.

Thanks to friends at Karmatube