The complete Works of Swami Vivekananda

Swami Vivekananda famous for his Chicago address, was born on 12 January 1863 and left his earthly abode on  4 July 1902. He has been a great inspiration, and I have always loved reading him and his books. But this is the first time, I read his Complete 9 volumes of work, each around 600 pages. So can we call these 89 to 97 of 2020?

Bliss!

"We have what is not only a gospel to the world at large, but also to its own children, the Charter of the Hindu Faith. What Hinduism needed, amidst the general disintegration of the modern era, was a rock where she could lie at anchor, an authoritative utterance in which she might recognise her self. And this was given to her, in these words and writings of the Swami Vivekananda."

In his Master, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, living and teaching in the temple-garden at Dakshineshwar, the Swami Vivekananda — "Naren" as he then was — found that verification of the ancient texts which his heart and his reason had demanded. Here was the reality which the books only brokenly described. Here was one to whom Samâdhi was a constant mode of knowledge. Every hour saw the swing of the mind from the many to the One. Every moment heard the utterance of wisdom gathered superconsciously. Everyone about him caught the vision of the divine. Upon the disciple came the desire for supreme knowledge "as if it had been a fever". Yet he who was thus the living embodiment of the books was so unconsciously, for he had read none of them! In his Guru, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, Vivekananda found the key to life.

Volume I

Addresses at The Parliament of Religions

Response to Welcome, Why We Disagree, Paper on Hinduism, Religion not the Crying Need of India, Buddhism, the Fulfilment of Hinduism, Address at the Final Session

Karma-Yoga

Karma in its Effect on Character, Each is great in his own place, The Secret of Work, What is Duty?, We help ourselves, not the world, Non-attachment is complete self-abnegation, Freedom, The Ideal of Karma-Yoga

Raja-Yoga

Preface, Introductory, The First Steps, Prana, The Psychic Prana, The Control of Psychic Prana, Pratyahara and Dharana, Dhyana and Samadhi, Raja-Yoga in brief

Patanjali's Yoga Aphorisms: Introduction, Concentration: Its spiritual uses, Concentration: Its practice, Powers, Independence, Appendix

Lectures and Discourses

Soul, God and Religion, The Hindu Religion, What is Religion?, Vedic Religious Ideals, The Vedanta Philosophy, Reason and Religion, Vedanta as a Factor in Civilisation, The Spirit and Influence of Vedanta, Steps of Hindu Philosophic Thought, Steps to Realisation, Vedanta and Privilege, Privilege, Krishna, Gita I, Gita II, Gita III, Mohammed, Vilvamangala, The Soul and God, Breathing, Practical Religion: Breathing and Meditation

Volume 2

Work and its Secret

The Powers of the Mind

Hints on Practical Spirituality

Bhakti or Devotion

Jnana-Yoga

The Necesssity of Religion, The Real Nature of Man, Maya and Illusion, Maya and the Evolution of the Conception of God, Maya and Freedom, The Absolute and Manifestation, God in Everything, Realisation, Unity in Diversity, The Freedom of the Soul, The Cosmos: The Macrocosm, The Cosmos: The Microcosm, Immortality, The Atman, The Atman: Its Bondage and Freedom, The Real and the Apparent Man

Practical Vedanta and other lectures

Practical Vedanta: Part I to IV, The Way to the Realisation of a Universal Religion, The Ideal of a Universal Religion, The Open Secret, The Way to Blessedness, Yajnavalkya and Maitreyi, Soul, Nature and God, Cosmology, A study of the Sankhya philosophy, Sankhya and Vedanta, The Goal

Reports in American Newspapers

Note, Divinity of Man, Swami Vivekananda on India, Religious Harmony, From far off India, An Evening with our Hindu Cousins, The Manners and Customs of India, The Religions of India, Sects and Doctrines in India, Less Doctrine and more Bread, The Religion of Buddha, All Religions are Good, The Hindu way of life, Ideals of Womanhood, True Buddhism, India's Gift to the World, Child Widows of India, Some Customs of the Hindus

Volume 3

Lectures and Discourses

Unity, the Goal of Religion, The Free Soul, One Existence Appearing as Many

Bhakti-Yoga

Definition of Bhakti, The Philosophy of Ishvara, Spiritual Realisation, the aim of Bhakti-Yoga, The Need of Guru, Qualifications of the Aspirant and the Teacher, Incarnate Teachers and Incarnation, The Mantra: Om: Word and Wisdom, Worship of Substitutes and Images, The Chosen Ideal, The Method and the Means

Para-Bhakti or Supreme Devotion

The Preparatory Renunciation, The Bhakta's Renunciation Results from Love, The Forms of Love — Manifestation, Universal Love and How it Leads to Self Surrender, The Higher Knowledge and the Higher Love are One to the True Lover, The Triangle of Love, The God of Love is His Own Proof, Human Representations of the Divine Ideal of Love, Conclusion

Lectures from Colombo to Almora

First Public Lecture in the East (Colombo), Vedantism, Reply to the Address of Welcome at Pamban, Address at the Rameswaram Temple on Real Worship, Reply to the Address of Welcome at Ramnad, Reply to the Address of Welcome at Paramakudi, Reply to the Address of Welcome at Shivaganga and Manamadura, Reply to the Address of Welcome at Madura, The Mission of the Vedanta, Reply to the Address of Welcome at Madras, My Plan of Campaign, Vedanta in its Application to Indian Life, The Sages of India, The Work before us, The Future of India, On Charity, Address of Welcome Presented at Calcutta and Reply, The Vedanta in all its phases, Address of Welcome at Almora and Reply, Vedic Teaching in Theory and Practice, Bhakti, The Common Bases of Hinduism, Bhakti, The Vedanta, Vedantism, The Influence of Indian Spiritual Thought in England, Sannyasa: Its Ideal and Practice, What have I learnt?, The Religion we are born in

Reports in American Newspapers

India: Her Religion and Customs, Hindus at the Fair, At the Parliament of Religions, Personal Traits, Reincarnation, Hindu Civilisation, An Interesting Lecture, The Hindoo Religion, The Hindoo Monk, Plea for Tolerance, Manners and Customs in India, Hindoo Philosophy, Miracles, The Divinity of Man, The Love of God, The Women of India

Buddhistic India

Volume 4

Addresses on Bhakti-Yoga

The Preparation, The First Steps, The Teacher of Spirituality, The Need of Symbols, The Chief Symbols, The Ishta

Lectures and Discourses

The Ramayana, The Mahabharata, Thoughts on the Gita, The Story of Jada Bharata, The Story of Prahlada, The Great Teachers of the World, On Lord Buddha, Christ, the Messenger, My Master, Indian Religious Thought, The Basis for Psychic or Spiritual Research, On Art in India, Is India a Benighted Country?, The Claims of Religion, Concentration, Meditation, The Practice of Religion

Writings: Prose

Is the Soul Immortal?, Reincarnation, On Dr. Paul Deussen, On Professor Max Müller, Sketch of the Life of Pavhari Baba, Aryans and Tamilians, The Social Conference Address, India's Message to the World, Stray Remarks on Theosophy, Reply to the Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, Reply to the Madras address, A Message of Sympathy to a Friend, What we Believe in, Our Duty to the Masses, Reply to the Calcutta Address, To my Brave Boys, A Plan of Work for India, Fundamentals of Religion

Writings: Poems

Kali the Mother, Angels Unawares I-III, To the Awakened India, Requiescat in Pace, Hold on Yet a While, Brave Heart, Nirvanashatkam, or Six Stanzas on Nirvana, The Song of The Sannyasin, Peace

Translations: Prose

The Problem of Modern India and its Solution, Ramakrishna, his Life and Sayings, The Paris Congress of the History of Religions, Knowledge: Its Source and Acquirement, Modern India, The Education that India needs, Our Present Social Problems

Translations: Poems

To a Friend, The Hymn of Creation, The Hymn of Samadhi, A Hymn to the Divine Mother, A Hymn to Shiva, A Hymn to the Divinity of Shri Ramakrishna, "And let Shyama Dance there", A Song I Sing to Thee

Volume 5

Epistles - First Series

Note, I Fakir, II Panditji Maharaj, III to V Alasinga, VI Haripada, VII Friends, VIII Alasinga, ..........CXXIII Dhira Mata

Interviews

Miracles, An Indian Yogi in London, India's Mission, India and England, Indian Missionary's Mission to England, With the Swami Vivekananda at Madura, The Abroad and The Problems at Home, The Missionary Work of The First Hindu Sannyasin to The West, Reawakening of Hinduism on a National Basis, On Indian Women — Their Past, Present and Future, On The Bounds of Hinduism

Notes from Lectures and Discourses

On Karma-Yoga, On Fanaticism, Work is Worship, Work Without Motive, Sadhanas or Preparations for Higher Life, The Cosmos and The Self, Who is A Real Guru?, On Art, On Language, The Sannyasin, The Sannyasin and The Householder, The Evils of Adhikarivada, On Bhakti-Yoga, Ishvara and Brahman, On Jnana-Yoga, The Cause of Illusion, Evolution, Buddhism and Vedanta, On The Vedanta Philosophy, Law and Freedom, The Goal and Methods of Realisation, World-Wide Unity, The aim of Raja-Yoga

Questions and Answers

I Discussion at The Graduate Philosophical Society of Harvard University, II At The Twentieth Century Club of Boston, III At The Brooklyn Ethical Society, Brooklyn, IV Selections from The Math Diary, V Yoga, Vairagya, Tapasya, Love, VI In Answer to Nivedita, VII Guru, Avatara, Yoga, Japa, Seva

Conversations and Dialogues (Recorded by Disciples - Translated)

I Shri Surendra Nath Das Gupta, II - V Shri Surendra Nath Sen, VI - X Shri Priya Nath Sinha, XI - XV From the Diary of a Disciple, Shri Sarat Chandra Chakravarty

Sayings and Utterances

Writings: Prose and Poems - Original and Translated

Reason, Faith and Love, Six Sanskrit Mottoes, The Message of Divine Wisdom, The Belur Math: An Appeal, The Advaita Ashrama, Himalayas, The Ramakrishna Home of Service, Varanasi: An appeal, Who Knows how Mother Plays!, To The Fourth of July, The East and The West

Volume 6

Lectures and Discourses

The Methods and Purpose of Religion, The Nature of the Soul and its Goal, The Importance of Psychology, Nature and Man, Concentration and Breathing, Introduction to Jnana-Yoga, The Vedanta Philosophy and Christianity, Worshipper and Worshipped, Formal Worship, Divine Love

Notes of Class Talks and Lectures

Religion and Science, Religion is Realisation, Religion is Self-abnegation, Unselfish Work is True Renunciation, Freedom of the Self, Notes on Vedanta, Hindu and Greek, Thoughts on the Vedas and Upanishads, On Raja-Yoga, On Bhakti-Yoga, On Jnana-Yoga, The Reality and Shadow, How to Become Free, Soul and God, The Goal, On Proof of Religion, The Design Theory, Spirit and Nature, The Practice of Religion, Fragmentary Notes on the Ramayana, Notes taken down in Madras, 1892-93, Concentration, The Power of the Mind, Lessons on Raja-Yoga, Lessons on Bhakti-Yoga, Mother-worship, Narada-Bhakti-Sutras

Writings: Prose and Poems - Original and Translated

Historical Evolution of India, The Story of the Boy Gopala, My Play is Done, The Cup, A Benediction, The Hymn of Creation, On the Sea's Bosom, Hinduism and Shri Ramakrishna, The Bengali Language, Matter for Serious Thought, Shiva's Demon

Epistles - Second Series

I Sir, ................ CLXVII Joe, CLXVIII Nivedita

Conversations and Dialogues (From the Diary of a Disciple)

 Volume 7

Inspired Talks (1895)

Date wise. 

Conversations and Dialogues

From the Dairy of a Disciple (Shri Sharat Chandra Chakravarty)

Shri Priya Nath Sinha

Mrs. Wright XXXII, The Appeal-Avalanche XXXIII, The Detroit Free Press XXXIV, The Detroit Tribune XXXV

Translation of Writings

Note, Memoirs of European Travel I, Memoirs of European Travel II, Addenda

Notes of Class Talks and Lectures

Notes of Class Talks

On Art, On Music, On Mantra and Mantra-Chaitanya, On Conceptions of Godhead, On Food, On Sanyasa and Family Life, On questioning the Competency of the Guru, Shri Ramakrishna: The significance of His Life and Teachings, On Shri Ramakrishna and His Views, Shri Ramakrishna: The Nation's Ideal

Notes of Lectures

Mercenaries in Religion, The Destiny of Man, Reincarnation, Comparative Theology, Buddhism, The Religion of the Light of Asia, The Science of Yoga

Epistles - Third Series

Note, I Sir,  L Mother, LI Mr. Leggett, LII Aunt Roxy, LIII Alberta

Volume 8

Lectures and Discourses

Discourses on Jnana-Yoga

I, to IX

Six Lessons on Raja-Yoga

Women of India, My Life and Mission, Buddha's Message to the World, Discipleship, Is Vedanta the Future Religion?

Writings: Prose

Struggle for Expansion, The Birth of Religion, Four Paths of Yoga, Cyclic Rest and Change, A Preface to the Imitation of Christ

Writings: Poems

An Interesting Correspondence, Thou Blessed Dream, Light, The Living God, To an Early Violet, To My Own Soul, The Dance of Shiva, Shiva in Ecstasy, To Shri Khrishna, A Hymn to Shri Ramakrishna, A Hymn to Shri Ramakrishna, No One to Blame

Notes of Class Talks and Lectures

Notes of Class Talks, Man the Maker of His Destiny, God: Personal and Impersonal, The Divine Incarnation or Avatara, Pranayama, Women of the East, Congress of Religious Unity, The Love of God I, The Love of God II, India, Hindus and Christians, Christianity in India, The Religion of Love, Jnana and Karma, The Claims of Vedanta on the Modern World, The Laws of Life and Death, The Reality and the Shadow, Way to Salvation, The People of India, I am That I am, Unity, The Worship of the Divine Mother, The Essence of Religion

Sayings and Utterances

Epistles - Fourth Series

Volume 9

Letters (Fifth Series)

Lectures and Discourses

The Women of India, The First Step towards Jnana, Bhakti-Yoga, The Mundaka Upanishad, History of the Aryan Race

Notes of Lectures and Classes

Note, The Religion of India, Christ's Message to the World, Mohammed's Message to the World, Class Lessons in Meditation, The Gita, The Gita — I, The Gita — III, Gita Class, Remarks from Various Lectures

Writings: Prose and Poems (Original and Translated)

The Ether, Notes, Lecture Notes, Macrocosm and Microcosm, Footnotes to The Imitation of Christ, The Plague Manifesto, One Circle More, Facsimile of One Circle More, An Untitled Poem on Shri Ramakrishna, An Unfinished Poem, Bhartrihari's Verses on Renunciation

Conversations and Interviews

Excerpts from Sister Nivedita's Book

Note, Foreword, I The Home On The Ganges, II At Naini Tal And Almora, III Morning Talks At Almora, IV On The Way To Kathgodam, V On The Way To Baramulla, VI The Vale Of Kashmir, VII Life At Srinagar, VIII The Temple Of Pandrenthan, IX Walks And Talks Beside The Jhelum, X The Shrine Of Amarnath, XI At Srinagar On The Return Journey, XII The Camp Under The Chennaars, Concluding Words Of The Editor

Sayings and Utterances

Newspaper Reports

Part I: American Newspaper Reports

Note, Chicago Newspapers, September 11, 1893, Chicago Record, September 11, 1893, Chicago Inter Ocean, September 21, 1893, New York Critic, November 11, 1893, Daily Cardinal, November 21, 1893, Daily Iowa Capitol, November 28, 1893, Iowa State Register, November 28, 1893, Daily Iowa Capitol, November 29, 1893, Iowa State Register, November 30, 1893, Des Moines Daily News, November 30, 1893, Daily Iowa Capitol, November 30, 1893, Iowa State Register, December 1, 1893, Minneapolis Journal, December 15, 1893, Minneapolis Tribune, December 15, 1893, Detroit Tribune, February 18, 1894, Detroit Tribune, February 19, 1894, Detroit Journal, February 23, 1894, Detroit Evening News, February 25, 1894, Detroit Tribune, March 11, 1894, Detroit Tribune, March 20, 1894, Detroit Evening News, March 21, 1894, Bay City Times Press, March 21, 1894, Saginaw Evening News, March 21, 1894, The Lynn Daily Evening Item, (Date?), New York Daily Tribune, April 25, 1894, Smith College Monthly, May 1894, New York Daily Tribune, May 3, 1894, Evening Tribune, May 16, 1894, Lawrence American and Andover Advertiser, May 18, 1894, Boston Evening Transcript, August 11, 1894, Greenacre Voice, 1894, Boston Evening Transcript, August 15, 1894, Baltimore American, October 13, 1894, Baltimore News, October 13, 1894, Baltimore Sunday Herald, October 14, 1894, Washington Times, October 29, 1894, Washington Times, November 2, 1894, Baltimore News, November 3, 1894, Daily Eagle, April 8, 1895, New York World, December 8, 1895, New York Herald, January 19, 1896, Hartford Daily Times, February 1, 1896, Tribune, March 5, 1896, News Tribune, March 16, 1896, Boston Evening Transcript, March 21, 1896, Boston Daily Globe, March 24, 1896, Boston Evening Transcript, March 27, 1896, Boston Evening Transcript, March 30, 1896, Los Angeles Times, December 9, 1899, Los Angeles Times, December 13, 1899, Los Angeles Herald, December 13, 1899, Los Angeles Herald, January 3, 1900, Los Angeles Times, January 17, 1900, Los Angeles Herald, January 26, 1900, Unity, February (?) 1900, San Francisco Chronicle, February 24, 1900, Oakland Tribune, February 26, 1900, The Alameda Encinal, April 5, 1900

Part II: European Newspaper Reports

Maidenhead Adviser, October 23, 1895, Standard, October 23, 1895, London Morning Post, October 23, 1895, Christian Commonwealth, November 14, 1895, The Queen, November 23, 1895, Daily Chronicle, May 14, 1896, Light, July 4, 1896, Light, October  28, 1896

Part III: Indian Newspaper Reports

Madura Mail, January 28, 1893, The Indian Mirror, November 28, 1893, The Indian Mirror, December 7, 1893, The Indian Mirror, June 14, 1894, The Indian Mirror, July 20, 1894, The Bengalee, May 18, 1895, The Indian Mirror, June 29, 1895, The Indian Mirror, December 1, 1895, The Indian Mirror, March 25, 1896, The Indian Mirror, June 19, 1896, The Brahmavadin, July 18, 1896, The Indian Mirror, September 22, 1896, The Journal of the Maha-Bodhi Society, November, 1896, The Indian Mirror, December 16, 1896, The Amrita Bazar Patrika, January 8, 1897, The Amrita Bazar Patrika, January 20, 1897, The Indian Mirror, February 24, 1898, The Indian Mirror, April 24, 1898, The Indian Mirror, February 15, 1901, The Indian Social Reformer, June 16, 1901

There is so much in here, that I would like to keep revisiting, a treasure house indeed. Would want to remember the lines below:

My whole ambition in life is to set in motion a machinery which will bring noble ideas to the door of everybody, and then let men and women settle their own fate. Let them know what our forefathers as well as other nations have thought on the most momentous questions of life. Let them see specially what others are doing now, and then decide. We are to put the chemicals together, the crystallization will be done by nature according to her laws. Work hard, be steady, and have faith in the Lord. Set to work, I am coming sooner or later. Keep the motto before you — "Elevation of the masses without injuring their religion".

Power, Freedom and Grace by Deepak Chopra

 

Power, Freedom and Grace by Deepak Chopra has been my 100th of 2020.

Vedanta declares,  "know that one thing by knowing which everything else is known, " for one who knows the self, the limitations of the world disappear"

Your essential being is the source of all being  the field of pure consciousness that manifests as the entire universe. In this very moment, pure consciousness illuminates and animates your mind and body, and it is powerful, invincible, inbounded and free. When you know yourself as this field of consciousness, you have power to manifest your desires, you have freedom from fear and limitations, and you live in grace, which is that state of consciousness where things flow and your desires are easily fulfilled.

Joy and sorrow, happiness and suffering, are the play of opposites, they are transient because they are time-bound. Spirit, the essential you, is independent of the play of opposites; it dwells in the silent bliss of the eternal. That's why the key to happiness is to identify with the unchanging essence of your inner self - to live and play in the field of intelligence that is beyond positive and negative. This field is your source, and it is magical, holy, joyful and free.

To experience lasting happiness, you have to go to a place beyond thought and experience inner peace. It's not that you have to have a positive attitude. It's not that you have to shed your sadness and bring in happiness. You have to go beyond the world of duality to the field of pure potentiality and live from your source. 

Happiness and sadness are different faces of infinite consciousness. Both are transient, and you are neither because you are not a state of consciousness. You are consciousness itself expressing all of these states. Why would you want to identify with a wave on the ocean or a mere drop of water when you are the ocean? You are not the ever-changing behavior of the ocean. You are the water-i-ness of the ocean. And this water-i-ness does'nt change. 

Chopra has organized the book in three parts to address it.

Part I: The Problem: Not Knowing Who We Are

Chapter 1 What do I want?

The world has been waiting for our transformation because it, too, wants transformation. When we are transformed, the world is transformed, because we and the world are one. 

Happiness:

• Happiness is the goal of all goals, and it's a state of consciousness that already exists within you
• Happiness for a reason is a form of misery because the reason can be taken away from you at any time. To be happy for no reason is the happiness you want to experience.
• When your life is an expression of your inner happiness, you feel a sense of connection to the creative power of the universe. Having that connection, you feel that you can accomplish anything you desire.

Chapter 2 Who am I?

Universe:

• You are a field of awareness; your real essence is pure consciousness, or spirit, which become both the mind and the body.
• The intellect mistakes the image of reality for reality itself, and this image overshadows the real you.
• When you identify with your real essence, your escape the prison of the intellect, and enter the world of the infinite, inbounded and free. 

Chapter 3 Why do I forget who I am?

Superstition:

• You forget who you are because you have been socially conditioned to trust your senses and to believe in the superstition of materialism.
• You are inseparable form the field of intelligence that creates the entire cosmos. Knowing this frees you from the hallucination of a separate self that lives inside a separate body.
• When you realize that your body-mind is a field of pure consciousness, then you know that you have power, freedom and grace. Therefore, happiness is knowing your true nature, which is all of these things. 

Chapter 4 How do I participate in creating my reality?

Causation:

• You participate in creating your reality by interpreting your sensory experience. The world is a construct of your own interpretations.
• The human body is a field of ideas, and the body you experience is a expression of all the ideas you have about it. 
• When the rhythms of your body-mind are in synch with nature's rhythms, everything is effortless and the universe flows through you in joyful ecstasy. 

Part II : The Prescription: Remembering Who We Are

Chapter 5 where do I go when I die?

Discontinuity:

• When you die, you don't go anywhere; your soul is simply vibrating at another frequency.
• All is transforming, and yet nothing ever dies. Just as in life, so beyond death you continue to transform.
• When you identify with the external spirit, the unchanging essence of consciousness itself, you transcend all suffering, including the fear of death.

Chapter 6 What is the key to lasting happiness?

Source:

• The key to lasting happiness is to identify with the unchanging essence of your inner self, your source, Then you no longer look for happiness because you know that you already have it.
• More important than a positive mind is a silent mind. A silent mind is a nonjudgmental, nonanalytical, non interpretive mind. 
• When you can accept all the contradictions that life offers, when you can comfortably flow between the banks of pleasure and pain, experiencing both while getting stuck in neither, you have achieved freedom. 

Chapter 7 How can I live with effortless ease?

Flow:

• You can live with effortless ease by allowing universal intelligence to flow through you without interference in the form of fear, resistance, or attachment. 
• Inherent in every desire is the mechanics for its spontaneous fulfillment. Desire is pure potentiality seeking manifestation. 
• When you are stressed, when you anticipate problems, when you use too much effort, you constrict the flow of nature's intelligence as it moves form the unmanifest to the manifest. 

Chapter 8 When will I be fully awake?

Wholeness:

• You are fully awake when you see and feel the presence of spirit in everything
• The universe flows though you and plays through you in many different frequencies simultaneously. 
• When you remember you true nature, you return to the memory of wholeness, and you are healed. 

Part III: The Practice: Experiencing who we Are

Chapter 9 What is power and how do I obtain it?

Power:

• Spend time in silent communion with your soul
• Pay attention the the qualities of pure consciousness
• Never stop asking questions

Chapter 10 What is freedom and how do I experience it?

Freedom:

• Practice life-centered, present-moment awareness.
• Observe your addictive behaviors without judgment
• Transcend your fear of the unknown

Chapter 11 What is grace and how do I live it?

Grace:

• Listen to your body's wisdom
• Maintain inner-body awareness at all times
• Pay attention to the rhythms and cycles of your body-mind

Chapter 12 The infinite

The winds of grace are always blowing, it is for us to raise our sails. Just allow the universe, the infinite to express itself though you without interfering. When we eat - it is the light of the sun and the starts and the moon that made the food we eat. At the deepest level of your being, you are already powerful and free. When universal intelligence is flowing though you without interference, your life flows with effortless ease. This is the experience of grace. Though your body-mind you create and experience the world of objects and events in space-time. Through your intellect, you create and experience the world of ideas. Only through your soul can you create and experience the world of power, freedom, and grace. In the depth of your being is the light of pure being, pure love ad pure joy. When you live form here, a new world opens. This world is unbounded, infinite, eternal, joyful. In this world there is no limit to your power, freedom and grace. Once you know your true self, you will know true happiness, the intoxication of love, spirit flowing in its pure essence - unimpeded, unrestricted, full of mystery, magic and adventure. Happiness resides in the realm of spirit. To find happiness is to find your soul. To find your soul is to live from the source of lasting happiness. This is not happiness for this or that reason, which is just another form of misery. This happiness is true bliss, and it follows you wherever you go. 

Vedanta tells us that our true nature is divine. The divine self is the underlying reality and source of all that exists, and to realize this truth experientially is the goal of Vedanta. Revered for its enduring wisdom, Vedanta is a timeless philosophy that expresses the heart of all religions and spiritual doctrines. 

                

Three Men in boat - Jerome K. Jerome

 

Three Men in a Boat, a witty novel, published in 1889,  by English writer Jerome K. Jerome of a two-week boating holiday on the Thames. This  has been my 99 of 2020 and one that I have loved since my school days.

The movie Sound of Music, and this book, has always been my favorite. It is about Jerome himself (the narrator Jerome K. Jerome) and two real-life friends, George Wingrave (who would become a senior manager at Barclays Bank) and Carl Hentschel (the founder of a London printing business, called Harris in the book), with whom Jerome often took boating trips. The dog, Montmorency, is entirely fictional. 

For some reason my favorite has been chapter 4, may be because it was part of school curriculum and I had so much fun reading it, especially thinking of how packing could be done, the story of cheese, butter and adjusting time to wake up are all so nostalgic. Upto chapter 5 are their preparations, and from Chapter 6 on begin the real trip of a fortnight, where boat was their home.  They travel from Kingston upon Thames to Oxford and back to Kingston, and describe the places enroute and is like a travel guide from three friends afloat on an open boat. 

A great Career - Loyalty, Trust and Potentials

A great career is all about solving great problem, meeting great challenges and making great contributions. 

This requires both:

a) A desire and skill to contribute,

b) A character worthy of trust and loyalty of others.

Become indispensable solution to important problems. There is no job security.

Find Your Passion, Achieve Your Goals, Love What You do.

Interesting, as I type this; I see there is a book on this.

 

Better Under Pressure : Justin Menkes

Better Under Pressure : Justin Menkes was my 98 of 2020. The flap of the book say, Most business leaders can take only so much pressure before their performance slides. Yet some CEOs deliver their greatest successes when times get toughest—when customers’ preferences are shifting away from a company’s products, when new regulations are shrinking profit margins, when political unrest is destroying supply lines.

In Better Under Pressure, Justin Menkes reveals the common traits that make these leaders successful. Drawing on in-depth interviews with sixty CEOs from an array of industries and performance data from two hundred other leaders, Menkes shows that great executives strive relentlessly to maximize their own potential—as well as stoke their people’s innate thirst for their own triumphs. To do so, they draw on a set of three essential and rare attributes:

• Realistic optimism: They recognize the risks threatening their organization’s survival—and their own failings—while remaining confident in their ability to have an impact. (i.e. they are aware of the circumstances, and has a sense of agency - they change the rules)

• Subservience to purpose: They dedicate themselves to pursuing a noble cause and win their team’s commitment to that cause. (i.e. they equate progress toward goal with emotional satisfaction; affiliations are based on shared dedication and affect tolerance)

• Finding order in chaos: They find clarity amid the many variables affecting their business by culling data and forming the conclusions that matter most to the company. (Maintain clarity of thought, have the drive to solve the puzzle - Become masterful listener)

The good news: these three capabilities can be learned. Drawing on a broad range of examples from real companies—including Avon, Yum Brands, Southwest, Procter & Gamble, and Ryerson Steel, to name just a few—Menkes demonstrates how each psychological attribute manifests itself in real life and enables top performance under extreme duress. He also shows you how to develop and deploy those attributes—so you can transform yourself into a leader who only shines brighter as the pressure intensifies.

Deeply personal, brimming with compelling stories from real-life CEOs, and packed with powerful insights, tools, and practices, this book is a potent resource for aspiring, emerging, and seasoned business leaders alike.

Leaders and the lead are influenced by those around them in their quest for success. Most important lesson about what sets the best leaders apart under today's extreme conditions is the gratification that comes from rising to ever higher levels of achievement - fulfilling potential. Leaders ability to realize their maximum potential and the potential of their workforce is the most profound way that they can differentiate themselves. 

1) Leadership means realizing potential - in yourself and in the people you lead. 

2) Because the external environment around leadership has changed dramatically, how leaders realize their own and others potential has changed dramatically as well.

The three catalysts for realizing potential are: realistic optimism, subservience to purpose, finding order in Chaos. 

Chapter 1 explores deeply the core-driving principle of realizing potential. Chapter 2 through 7 details the components of the three catalysts we need to realize our potential in a fast paced world. In the concluding chapter 8 is an example in which one leader illustrates how all three drivers are leveraged toward realizing the potential of a workforce. 

From the mid-1950s to the mid-1990s, the list of the top 100 companies largely stayed the same. From 1992-2002, more than half of those companies no longer existed. Pressure, the result of more competitors emerging from more parts of the world, and every business becoming more an more global, means an inevitable increase in the number of variables that influence your business, and the sheer speed of change. The resulting psychological experience of these of leaders is universal – increased pressure.

The new world of ever increasing complexity and intensified pressure is indifferent to our opinion of it, whether or not it is a good thing, or whether we wish it would go back to the way it was. It just is. Those that have learned how to thrive in it are the ones that will win. - So we need to Be Prepared. 

Complacency is the enemy of making things happen. Chapter 1 say don't be complacent. 

Relentless leaders who fully realize their potential never stop pursuing new challenges and opportunities. And in so doing, they have learned to first recognize and then satisfy an urge that has been with them since birth. They never retire. They constantly improve and make meaningful contribution and motivates others to do so. The realize the importance of balance, of enjoying the family life. Greatness doesn't come from robots. Greatness comes from people who have figured out how to build around themselves a system that allows them to be almost an archetypal parental figure at work, the kind of person who helps others pursue their ultimate abilities in life. 

Key tool is making the real world palpable, bring to the forefront the threats and uncertainties from the external environment. This tool can only take hold if people believe that what they are doing matters. Have and make people aware of purpose and ownership.

Leader should tolerate uncomfortable affects in order to achieve a broader, more meaningful outcome. Affiliations should be based on a shared dedication to the group's goal. 

People do not act as isolated entities, but are reflections of an essential interaction between themselves and the context in which they are placed. 

Through these interactionist models, we can far more accurately understand the causes of professional success and, consequently, achieve that very success ourselves. 

(Justin Menkes is an acclaimed author and leading expert in executive assessment. A consultant for the influential executive search firm Spencer Stuart, he and his colleagues advise the boards of the world’s leading companies on their choice of CEO. He authored The Wall Street Journal bestseller Executive Intelligence: What All Great Leaders Have and has written articles for Chief Executive and Harvard Business Review.)

The Room

The Room is a 2019 English-language French thriller film directed by Christian Volckman and starring Olga Kurylenko, Kevin Janssens, John Flanders, Joshua Wilson, and Carole Weyers.

Matt and Kate, a young couple, move to Westminster, Maryland having purchased a secluded manor. While renovating, they discover a large steel door that leads to an empty room. After experiencing frequent electrical shortages, the couple call an electrician to learn that the wiring in the home is a tangled mass that runs along the walls and floorboards of the property. As the electrician drives off, he exclaims his surprise that the property finally sold considering the previous owners were murdered on site.

That evening, Matt finds himself unable to sleep and ends up drinking while researching the murder. He learns that the killer is a "John Doe", i.e. his identity is not known, and that he is still alive, in a psychiatric hospital. He stumbles into the room and drunkenly wishes for another bottle of alcohol, which the room promptly grants him. The next morning, Kate finds Matt in the room surrounded by many expensive paintings. He encourages her to wish for money- and she does, wishing for millions. Over the next several days, the couple quit their jobs and party in the room, which continuously grants their wishes and desires.

Kate begins to fall into depression when she realizes that nothing they wish for has any real value. To cheer her up, Matt tells her he wants to try for a child. He was planning to have thier own child, Initially she was hesitant, but wished for a child while in the room, and she got one instantly.  They decide to give back the child, but is unable to do so. When the couple is unable to bring themselves to wish away the child, Matt leaves the home in search of John Doe.

At the hospital, Matt speaks with the "John Doe" and doesn't learn much, but is warned that he and his wife should leave the house and forget about the room. Matt drives away only to find that the money he placed in his pocket has turned to ash. They realise any wish granted when taken out of the house soon grow old and turn into ashes. They are interrupted by a call from the "John Doe", who reveals to Matt that he was a child wish granted by the room, and in order for Shane to live, Kate must die. Kate overhears the conversation and flees the home in an attempt to crash her car but cannot bring herself to do so. When she returns, the couple reunite tearfully and have sex in the kitchen, unknowingly being watched by Shane.

The next morning, they are awoken by the slamming of the front door and discover that Shane went outside and aged himself into a man, though he still has the mind of a child. He exclaims that Kate lied to him about everything. He threatens the couple with Matt's gun but is distracted by Kate telling him she promised they could be together forever. Matt knocks him to the floor, pushing his wife into the piano during the scuffle. When she awakens, Matt tells her he killed Shane while they fought for the gun. Though she is heartbroken by the news, she accepts the outcome. Later Kate realizes that Matt is Shane in disguise. She pushes him away, but Shane overpowers and attempts to rape her.

The real Matt comes to and realizes what happened. Matt tunnels through the walls next to the room and manages to break into the alternate "outside" that Shane created. He locates their replicated property and breaks into the home just as Shane is assaulting Kate. The two Matts come face-to-face with one another and try to sway Kate to their side. After pushing the fake Matt down the stairs, the couple flees the house makes their way back to the room. They manage to trick Shane into going outside into the real world. Locking the door behind her, Kate watches as Shane ages rapidly and crumbles into ash.

Later the couple has abandoned the home and Kate stares at a positive pregnancy test, when a lamp flickered, she is shocked to realize the child is Shane's.

Ishq not a love story : Malayalam Movie

 

Written by Ratheesh Ravi and directed by Anuraj Manohar, the film revolves around the life of a man from Kochi, named Sachi (Shane Nigam) and his girlfriend, Vasudha (Ann Sheetal) with the base theme being Moral Policing. 

Sachi works at an information technology firm and takes time off from work to attend his sister's wedding. While on leave, he and his girlfriend Vasudha go on a date where they encounter Alwin (Shine Tom Chacko), sitting in a car with Mukundan (Jaffar Idukki). Alwin and Mukundan convince Sachi that they are police officers and that he and Vasudha will be arrested if they don't escort them.

Sachi and Vasudha are mentally tortured while driving around with Alwin and Mukundan. Alwin tries to make a move on Vasudha while Sachi is away. Tired of Alwin's actions, Mukundan leaves the three of them alone. Alwin continues to harass them but leaves after Sachi pays him off. The two then go to Vasudha's hostel without speaking. A frustrated Sachi asks Vasudha what Alwin has done to her. Upset by his question, she gets out of the car and Sachi angrily drives back home.

While Sachi is restless at home, he decides to take revenge. He goes back to the place where he originally met Alwin and discovers that Alwin is just an ambulance driver and Mukundan is a tailor. Sachi finds Alwin's address and goes to his house while he is away. He is greeted by Alwin's wife, Maria, (Leona Lishoy) and his daughter, Mia (Lakshmi Nanda Kishore). He enters the house and makes a scene. When Alwin arrives home, he and Sachi get into a fight, with Sachi breaking Alwin's legs. Sachi attempts to leave but is stopped by a procession on the road. Sachi begins to torture Alwin's wife and daughter in the same way Alwin tortured him and his girlfriend.

Alwin's friends arrive outside his house. Meanwhile, Maria overhears Alwin's friends talking about Sachi's incident. As his friends leave, Maria angrily questions Alwin, who confesses that he tried to sexually assault Vasudha, but she fought back. Sachi apologizes to Maria and leaves the broken family alone. Maria takes her daughter inside, while Alwin lies in the room immobilized. A happy and relaxed Sachi plan to meet Vasudha that night.

The next day, Vasudha joins Sachi at her college. Still angry at his question, she asks what else he wants to know. He pulls his car over and takes Mukundan out of the trunk. Mukundan apologizes and Sachi offers him money to get back home. Still angry, Vasudha asks Sachi if he would've abandoned her, had Alwin done something to her. Sachi refuses to reply and changes the topic by proposing to her for her birthday. She turns him down as she does not want to live with Sachi anymore. She realizes Sachi might not have accepted her if something bad had happened, regardless of who was at fault or how miserable the situation was.

On his proposing her with the ring, she fold her ring finger, and other fingers, leaving the middle finger open. Not sure, this movie story felt to be very familiar, either I have read a book with this story, or have seen a movie in some other language. But was unable to recollect! 

Helen - Malayalam Movie

 

Helen is a 2019 Indian Malayalam movie about a B.Sc Nursing graduate who attends IELTS coaching classes intended for a job abroad. Directed by Mathukutty Xavier (in his directorial debut) and produced by Vineeth Sreenivasan under the companies Habit of Life, this is based on real life episode. 

Helen (Anna Ben) is working part-time at a restaurant named The Chicken Hub, and lives with her father, Paul (Lal), an insurance agent. He does not like her going abroad.  Unknown to Paul, Helen has a Muslim boyfriend, Azhar, who is in search of a job. One night, while Azhar is riding Helen to her home, they are stopped by police who penalise him for not wearing a helmet and drunken driving, they both are brought to the police station. Paul is summoned to the station. Paul is sad seeing his daughter and does not talk to her despite her several attempts of creating conversation.

The next night after work at the Chicken Hub, Helen's manager Jayashankar unknowingly locks her in the freezer room. At -18 °C, Helen has to survive in the freezing cold and tries everything to keep herself alive. She tries to block the exhaust fan but ends up dislocating her leg. She starts to get frostbite and bleeding through her nose.

Her father is worried that Helen has not reached home. He searches for Helen with his neighbor, they call all her co-workers. Azhar, who was on his way to Chennai half-heartedly, returns and also joins the investigation. They go to the police station to file a complaint but they are greeted by the SI Ratheesh Kumar (Aju Varghese), who they had encountered the previous day. He suspects Azhar. Paul tries to defend him and this causes a feud between the sub-inspector and the search party. He deliberately tries not to help them by not sharing the last tower location of Helen he got from Cyber cell. They suspect the auto drivers in front of the mall who denied the allegation. At this point, they meet a watchman of the mall who says that Helen might not have left the mall because he usually notices her going in and out.

They rush to the Chicken Hub and opens the freezer. In the end, after 5 hours, they find Helen. She is taken to the hospital just before she had the last stage of hypothermia. Then Paul enquires with the watchman  how was he sure about the fact that Helen didn't leave the mall.  He says, Helen smiles at him every time she comes in and out of the mall. He did not see her go out on the day of her missing.

Helen reunites with her father and boyfriend. The doctor says that she is out of danger and she needs physiotherapy later. He continues that its difficult for any common man or woman to survive that cold weather and Helen is a brave girl. When the watchman asks Paul what his daughter's name is, Paul proudly replies, "Helen".

There is a cameo by Vineeth Sreenivasan, as Jail convict. Though a short role - it makes you ponder - about connections and coincidences. How the Police department function. 

The movie lingers with few questions popping up every now and then, even days after you watch it. All the awards it had received are well deserved. Released a year before; Thanks to Pandamic, could watch it. 

Perfect Tangerine - The gift of Miracle Daley : Sam Mukherjee

 

Perfect Tangerine The Gift of Miracle Daley by Sam Mukherjee was 88 of 2020.

It begins thus: ““I have never seen God. But when I looked at him, I knew there was one.” Those were the first thoughts that went through my father’s mind and nearly escaped his lips right after I was born.”

The world has been bereft of new babies for three long years. Humankind has all but given up hope for a future. And then, out pops Miracle Daley  to Doris and Tom Daley.— just the wonder the world was waiting for Overnight, everything changes for his family. While his parents try to keep the attention and adulation from going to his head, his ambitious grandmother has other ideas and it’s no surprise that Miracle ends up being a spoilt brat.

And with his Grannys support, Miracle grows up believing love and stardom are his birthright. From magazine covers to peoples hearts, Miracle rules for eleven uninterrupted years. But because of his spoilt ways, his popularity fades. Then the inevitable happens? the baby drought ends and Miracle becomes a has-been. When teachers stop home-schooling Miracle, he is forced to attend regular school and Joka Pack, the school bully, becomes his nemesis. One day, chased by Jokas gang, Miracle escapes into the woods. There, he meets and befriends a dolhorina-Vibgyor, who tells him that instead of creating problems, he should solve them. The deer guides Miracle on tackling the bully and gaining acceptance in school. As Miracle wonders if Vibgyor is real or just a figment of his imagination, he realizes it is time to get off his high horse and earn the adoration he so desperately misses. But can he do anything to win back the affection once showered upon him or will he need a miracle? Being the only companion to Stark Montana when he was unwell and reuniting him with his wife Chrissina, made him the Miracle boy once again.  

His Granny was missing, she was out making a call to The Newsworthy Network telling "I have some news you can use".

The voice of the narrator is discordant for a book that is targeted at a middle-grade audience. 

It is basically flat narration.

 

Inspirations By Paulo Coelho

 Inspirations  By Paulo Coelho, was 87 of 2020. 

This book was lying in the shelf for so many years, never felt like opening it, untill today, and once I opened it; every other book was kept aside. Was inspired by the way the titles were divided.

'Anthology' comes from the Greek word that stands for garlands - a bouquet of flowers. An anthology then, should be a sort of reminder of something else, a small token of something much larger. In the case of flowers, they bring with their fragrance and colorfulness the reminder of the fields, of a season. Coelho's anthology, therefore, is not only a collection of texts or poems, but a gift, something arranged according to his sensitivities, to give to others. The selection of books presented in this volume have been chosen as if from a vast field of flowers, stretching infinitely into time's horizon. He in his preface enlightens us as to what an anthology really means and goes on to tell us how difficult it was to choose not only the work but the passage within that work and also how to catalog them together that will make us not only open our “magic cabinet” of literature and reawaken our passion for that particular piece of literary history but for all of the choices he presents to us here.

Coelho's assortment of tidbits from many and varied classic tales of not only fiction but non fictions is ordered in to the four elements, symbolizing both our world on all its directions, and the way we dwell in this world, the way we say it. In :

'Water'  we find Hans Christian Anderson : the Ugly Duckling; 'The Prologue' from Tales form the Thousand and one Nights; Niccolo Machiavelli: from The Prince; Lewis Carroll: from Through the Looking-Glass -'Looking-glass House; Sun-tzu: from The Art of War - 'Forms and Dispositions'. 

Subtle Reams - Unconsciousness -Mind - Dreams - Strategy - Logic - Possibilities - Passivity - Mobility

'Earth' we find writers as diverse as Oscar Wilde: from De Profundis, Bram Stoker: from Dracula - 'Dr. Seward's Diary'; Hannah Arendt: from Eichmann and the Holocaust; W. B. Yeast: from Selected Poems - 'He wishes for the cloths of Heaven' and 'The song of Wandering Aengus' and D H Lawrence from Lady Chatterley's Lover

Winter -Body-Decay-womb-Mother-Receptive -Passive - Stagnation (prison) - Roots. 

'Air' Nelson Mandela: from No Easy Walk to Freedom - 'Black Man in a White Man's Court', Gabriel Garcia Marques: from One Hundred Years of Solitude; Robert Louis Stevenson: from The Stange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde - 'Henry Jekyll's full Statement of the Case'; George Orwell: from Nineteen Eighty - four; Jorge Luis Borges: from Fiction - 'The Library of Babel'.

Breath - Life - Communication-Action - Instability - Agitation (not action) 

'Fire' From the Rig Veda - 'Hymns to Agni, god of the Sacrifice', From The Desert Fathers - Sayings of the Early Christian Monks - 'Visions', From the Bhagavad Gita, From the Dead Sea Scrolls, Leopold Sacher - Masoch: from Venus in Furs, Kahlil Gibran: from The Prophet, Rumi: from Spiritual Verses, Rabindranath Tagore: from Selected Poems -Brahma, Vishnu, Siva and Mary Shelley: from Frankenstein; 

Spirit - Light - Heat - Darkness (smoke) Hymn - Hell - Motion: Root of all change

As you read the bouquet will come into focus. Coelho shows how  lessons can be learned in the most surprising places, and that books from  ancient Persia through to post-war Britain can each offer profound insights into our lives, our loves, and the truth in all our heart. 

Bible Stories - New Testament

With Paul  and road to Damascus this was my 80th of 2020

In almost all Christian traditions today, the New Testament consists of 27 books:

4 Canonical Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John)

The Acts of the Apostles

14 Epistles of Paul

7 General Epistles, and

The Book of Revelation.

The Gospel of Matthew, ascribed to the Apostle Matthew. This gospel begins with a genealogy of Jesus and a story of his birth that includes a visit from magi and a flight into Egypt, and it ends with the commissioning of the disciples by the resurrected Jesus.

The Gospel of Mark, ascribed to Mark the Evangelist. This gospel begins with the preaching of John the Baptist and the baptism of Jesus. Two different secondary endings were affixed to this gospel in the 2nd century.

The Gospel of Luke, ascribed to Luke the Evangelist, who was not one of the Twelve Apostles, but was mentioned as a companion of the Apostle Paul and as a physician. This gospel begins with parallel stories of the birth and childhood of John the Baptist and Jesus and ends with appearances of the resurrected Jesus and his ascension into heaven.

The Gospel of John, ascribed to John the Evangelist. This gospel begins with a philosophical prologue and ends with appearances of the resurrected Jesus. A little different from the other three, this has more of the various miracles performed by Jesus. 

Then we have acts, continuation of the Gospel of Luke, with the message that the Christian faith was the fulfilment of the Jewish religion. 

The epistles of the New Testament are considered by Christians to be divinely inspired and holy letters, written by the apostles and disciples of Christ, to either local congregations with specific needs, or to New Covenant Christians in general, scattered about; or "catholic epistles."

Pauls letter to prepare the way for a visit planned to various churches which include:

Romans , Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians

Pauls visit to various people: Timothy, Titus, Philemon

Then there are epistles from:

James, Peter, John and Jude

Finally Book of Revelation, also known as the Apocalypse of John.

What better time to go through this, than during Christmas!

Bible Stores - Old Testament

79th of 2020 was a peep into the old testament of Bible. The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first part of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the twenty-four books of the Hebrew Bible (or Tanakh), a collection of ancient religious Hebrew The books that compose the Old Testament canon, as well as their order and names, differ between Christian denominations. The Catholic canon comprises 46 books, the canons of the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Churches comprise up to 49 books, and the most common Protestant canon comprises 39 books. itings by the Israelites believed by most Christians and religious Jews to be the sacred Word of God. 

Christians traditionally divide the Old Testament into four sections: (1) the first five books or Pentateuch (Torah); (2) the history books telling the history of the Israelites, from their conquest of Canaan to their defeat and exile in Babylon; (3) the poetic and "Wisdom books" dealing, in various forms, with questions of good and evil in the world; and (4) the books of the biblical prophets, warning of the consequences of turning away from God.

My book had (1) The world of Genesis (2) The route of the Exodus (3) The Division of Canaan (4) The United Israelite Kingdom (5) Jerusalem in Old Testament Times (6) The Divided Israelite Kingdom

GENESIS (Origin)

The Beginning of Everything- Genesis - Origin

What was it like when there was no world? First God made matter arranging energy. Then he made light, space, water....plants, flowers, fish, birds and animals in 5 days. Then he made man and woman and rested on day 7.

Adam and Eve

To recount the tale of Adam and Eve, one can skim the pages of the biblical text found from Genesis 1:26 to Genesis 5:5. Genesis 1 reveals how God created humans (male and female) in His image, giving them the authority over all other living things. In his commands, he tells them to “be fruitful and multiply.”

The beginning of Genesis 2 depicts God creating man from dust and then blowing life into his nostrils. A garden is planted by God (the Garden of Eden) and man is placed there. He tells them that all the trees in the garden can be eaten from, but makes an exception with the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. He states, “for on the day you eat of it you shall surely die.”

God goes on to create animals, and goes about locating a mate for man, but nothing he had created at the time would make due. After God causes the man to fall asleep, he creates a woman using his rib. She is named “woman” because she is the “one was taken from a man.” This is why it is said that a man leaves his mother and father to “cling” to a woman. At the end of Genesis 2, it is stated that both man and woman were naked and not ashamed of their appearance.

The Serpent makes an appearance in Genesis 3 and is described as “slier than every beast of the field.” The serpent wishes to lure the woman to eat from the tree of knowledge, filling her head with the notion that eating the fruit will not cause any death. However, she falls victim to the serpent’s ploy, not only eating the fruit but giving some to man. This causes “the eyes of the two of them were opened.”

It is now that they become aware of their naked bodies, using fig leaves for coverings in an attempt to hide from the sight of God, who quickly notices that man and woman have disobeyed His commands. The two become cursed with hard work and painful childbirths. They are also exiled from the Garden of Eden. In the closing verses of Genesis 3, the woman is named Eve because “she was the mother of all living,” while Adam is given to the man.

Throughout Genesis 4 and 5, the tale of the family of Adam and Eve is told, focusing on their lives after they departed the Garden of Eden.

 They now have three children: Cain, Abel, and Seth. In coming years, other sons and daughters will emerge, as Adam lives for more than 900 years.

In Genesis 4 Cane kills Abel, is cursed by god and moves to the East of Eden and lives in a land called "Wandering" Seth replaced Abel and his wife was Enosh. 

Noah and the flood

His descendant was Noah. Genesis 6 speaks of Noah and The wickedness of Mankind. He had three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, whom he took on the boat.  Noah was a man who found great favor in God's eyes. The entire population of mankind had become evil and wicked and God decided to bring a flood to the earth to destroy everyone but Noah and his family. God told Noah to prepare an ark big enough to hold one male and one female from every kind of animal and creature.The story in Genesis is repeated, with variations, in the Quran, where the Ark appears as Safina Nūḥ. Before the Flood, people ate only vegetables. After the Flood, God gave Noah and his family permission to eat meat from animals. (Genesis 9:3) The water of the Flood symbolized baptism (1 Peter 3:20-21).

The Tower of Babel (Hebrew: מִגְדַּל בָּבֶל‎‎, Migdal Bavel) narrative in Genesis 11:1–9 is an origin myth meant to explain why the world's peoples speak different languages. According to the story, a united human race in the generations following the Great Flood, speaking a single language and migrating eastward, comes to the land of Shinar (שִׁנְעָר‎). There they agree to build a city and a tower tall enough to reach heaven. God, observing their city and tower, confounds their speech so that they can no longer understand each other, and scatters them around the world.

 God's call to Abram

Abraham is given a high position of respect in three major world faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. In Judaism, he is the founding father of the covenant, the special relationship between the Jewish people and God – leading to the belief that the Jews are the chosen people of God. In Christianity, the Apostle Paul taught that Abraham's faith in God – preceding the Mosaic law – made him the spiritual progenitor of all Christian believers. In Islam, the prophet Muhammad claimed Abraham, whose submission to God constituted Islam, was a "believer before the fact" and undercut Jewish claims to an exclusive relationship with God and the covenant.

Genesis 12 deals with this .  The history of the early ancestors of the Israelites. The first is Abraham, who was notable for his faith and his obedience to God.  

God's judgement on Sodom: The story of the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah is told in Genesis 18–19. When God revealed His plan to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah due to the wickedness of those cities, Abraham asked God to spare the people. In fact, Abraham engaged in a lengthy conversation to mediate for the cities. First, Abraham wanted God to spare the righteous people who lived in Sodom and Gomorrah.

The Battle of Siddim is described in Genesis 14:1–17. Lot is encamped within the borders of Sodom at a time when the men of Sodom are wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly. Sodom and Gomorrah are ruled by Bera and Birsha, respectively, although their kingship is not sovereign because the Jordan plain has been under the rule of Chedorlaomer the Elamite for twelve years.

Abram Is Named Abraham 17 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am El-Shaddai—‘God Almighty.’ Serve me faithfully and live a blameless life. 2 I will make a covenant with you, by which I will guarantee to give you countless descendants.”

Then follows the stories of his son Isaac name meaning " he will laugh", The story of Abraham and Isaac is one of profound faith and obedience to God. When Abraham was 99 years old, God promised him and his wife Rebekah, then 89, a son. A year later God's promise came true when 99 year old Rebekah bore their son Isaac! At some point in Isaac's youth, his father Abraham took him to Mount Moriah. At God's command, Abraham was to build a sacrificial altar and sacrifice his son Isaac upon it. After he had bound his son to the altar and drawn his knife to kill him, at the very last moment an angel of God prevented Abraham from proceeding.

Abraham had two recorded wives. Sarah, the Mother of Isaac, (the seed to Jesus Christ) and after the death of Sarah, Keturah the Mother of the Arab nations. Ishmael was born to Abraham and Sarah's Egyptian handmaiden Hagar. Ishmael meaning "God hears", he and his mother were banished to the desert after the birth of Isaac.  Hagar's story could be that of the first surrogate mother. 

Abraham truly fulfilled his title as “father of all nations” through the three women with whom he had descendants, although the lineage through Sarah’s son Isaac is the biblical focus.

 Isaac's son i.e grandson of Abraham was Jacob who was also called Israel and he was the Father of a nation : Genesis 25  His 12 sons were the founder of 12 tribes of Israel.  

Joseph and his brothers :  Joseph, son of Israel (Jacob) and Rachel, lived in the land of Canaan with eleven brothers and one sister. He was Rachel's firstborn and Israel's eleventh son. Of all the sons, Joseph was loved by his father the most. Israel's favoritism toward Joseph caused his half brothers to hate him, and when Joseph was seventeen years old he had two dreams that made his brothers plot his demise. In the first dream, Joseph and his brothers gathered bundles of grain. Then, all of the grain bundles that had been prepared by the brothers gathered around Joseph's bundle and bowed down to it. In the second dream, the sun (father), the moon (mother) and eleven stars (brothers) bowed down to Joseph himself. When he told these two dreams to his brothers, they despised him for the implications that the family would be bowing down to Joseph. They became jealous that their father would even ponder over Joseph's words concerning these dreams. (Genesis 37:1–11) They saw their chance when they were feeding the flocks, the brothers saw Joseph from afar and plotted to kill him. They turned on him and stripped him of the coat his father made for him, and threw him into a pit. As they pondered what to do with Joseph, the brothers saw a camel caravan of Ishmaelites coming out of Gilead, carrying spices and perfumes to Egypt, for trade. Judah, the strongest, thought twice about killing Joseph and proposed that he be sold. The traders paid twenty pieces of silver for Joseph, and the brothers took Joseph's coat back to Jacob, who was lied to and told that Joseph had been killed by wild animals.

In Egypt, Potiphar, the captain of Pharaoh's guard "bought Joseph from the Ishmaelites who had brought him down there" (Genesis 39:1). While serving in Potiphar's household, Yahweh was with Joseph so that he prospered in everything he did. Joseph found favor in the sight of Potiphar and so he became his personal servant. Then Joseph was promoted to oversee Potiphar's entire household as a superintendent. After some time, Potiphar's wife began to desire Joseph and sought to have an affair with him. Despite her persistence, he refused to have sexual intercourse with her for fear of sinning against God. After some days of begging for him, she grabbed him by his cloak, but he escaped from her leaving his garment behind. Angered by his running away from her, she took his garment and made a false claim against him by charging that he tried have sexual intercourse with her. This resulted in Joseph being thrown into prison (Genesis 39:1–20).[3]

The warden put Joseph in charge of the other prisoners, and soon afterward Pharaoh's chief cup bearer and chief baker, who had offended the Pharaoh, were thrown into the prison. They both had dreams, and they asked Joseph to help interpret them. The chief cup bearer had held a vine in his hand, with three branches that brought forth grapes; he took them to Pharaoh and put them in his cup. The chief baker had three baskets of bread on his head, intended for Pharaoh, but some birds came along and ate the bread. Joseph told them that within three days the chief cup bearer would be reinstated but the chief baker would be hanged. Joseph requested the cup bearer to mention him to Pharaoh and secure his release from prison, but the cup bearer, reinstalled in office, forgot Joseph. After Joseph was in prison for two more years, Pharaoh had two dreams which disturbed him. He dreamt of seven lean cows which rose out of the river and devoured seven fat cows; and, of seven withered ears of grain which devoured seven fat ears. Pharaoh's wise men were unable to interpret these dreams, but the chief cup bearer remembered Joseph and spoke of his skill to Pharaoh. Joseph was called for, and interpreted the dreams as foretelling that seven years of abundance would be followed by seven years of famine, and advised Pharaoh to store surplus grain during the years of abundance. When the famine came, it was so severe that people from surrounding nations "from all over the earth" came to Egypt to buy bread as this nation was the only Kingdom prepared for the seven-year drought.

In the second year of famine, Joseph's half brothers were sent to Egypt, by their father Israel, to buy goods. When they came to Egypt, they stood before the Vizier but did not recognize him to be their brother Joseph. However, Joseph did recognize them and did not receive them kindly, rather he disguised himself and spoke to them in the Egyptian language using an interpreter. He did not speak at all to them in his native tongue, Hebrew. After questioning them as to where they came from, he accused them of being spies. They pleaded with him that their only purpose was to buy grain for their family in the land of Canaan. After they mentioned that they had left a younger brother at home, the Vizier (Joseph) demanded that he be brought to Egypt as a demonstration of their veracity. This brother was Joseph's blood brother, Benjamin. He placed his brothers in prison for three days.  The brothers conferred amongst themselves speaking in Hebrew, reflecting on the wrong they had done to Joseph. Joseph understood what they were saying and removed himself from their presence because he was caught in emotion. Joseph sent the brothers back with food but kept one brother, and the remaining brothers returned to their father in Canaan, and told him all that had transpired in Egypt. They also discovered that all of their money sacks still had money in them, and they were dismayed. Then they informed their father that the Vizier demanded that Benjamin be brought before him to demonstrate that they were honest men. After they had consumed all of the grain that they brought back from Egypt, Israel told his sons to go back to Egypt for more grain. With Reuben and Judah's persistence, they persuaded their father to let Benjamin join them for fear of Egyptian retribution. Upon their return to Egypt, the brothers were afraid because of the returned money in their money sacks. Then when they get there Joseph reveals to them that he is in fact their brother, Joseph. Then he has their father Jacob brought so they are all reunited in Egypt.

EXODUS (Departure) 

Departure of people of Israel from Egypt where they had been slaves. The Central character in this book is Moses, the man whom God chose to lead his people form Egypt. His successor was Joshua. 

He is the lawgiver who met God face-to-face on Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments after leading his people, the Hebrews, out of bondage in Egypt and to the "promised land" of Canaan. This is mentioned both in Bible and Quran

The Ten Commandments 

The most common form of the Ten Commandments is given in Exodus chapter 20 and Deuteronomy chapter 5.

1. Thou shalt have no other gods before me
2. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image
3. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain
4. Remember the sabbath day and keep it holy
5. Honour thy father and thy mother
6. Thou shalt not kill
7. Thou shalt not commit adultery
8. Thou shalt not steal
9. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour
10. Thou shalt not covet any thing that is thy neighbour's 

Samuel Man of god : Samuel plays a key role in the transition from the period of the biblical judges to the institution of a kingdom under Saul, and again in the transition from Saul to David. He is venerated as a prophet by Jews, Christians, and Muslims. In addition to his role in the Hebrew Scriptures, Samuel is mentioned in the New Testament, in rabbinical literature, and in the second chapter of the Qur'an (although here not by name). 

The Book of Ruth is a beautiful example of how God can take a hopeless situation and turn it into something glorious. The story begins in tragedy – with famine, and the death of Ruth and Naomi’s husbands. But because Ruth is loyal and faithful, God rewards her. Not only is Ruth redeemed by Boaz, but she also becomes an ancestor to the future king of Israel. What is particularly important to note in this story is Ruth’s heritage: she was a Moabite, a detail that is reiterated frequently in the book. In Ruth and Naomi’s lifetimes, the Israelites looked down upon the Moabites, considering them to be an inferior people. In selecting Ruth, God chose one of the “least of these” as the basis for the lineage of not only the future king of Israel, but for the Messiah who would save the world. 

David Slays the Giant :The Biblical story of David and Goliath is a well-known parable. David's precise throw hit Goliath in the head and knocked him out, allowing David to move in for the kill and win the war for the Israelites. David and Goliath is often referenced as a moral lesson of how underdogs can overcome the odds and be successful.

David - Chosen to be king: David was chosen by God to be the King of Israel.  We know him as the boy who kills Goliath and the mighty man of God who destroys the enemies of God.  He is the chosen King of Israel, the man after God’s own heart.  Yet, his own family had a very different view of him.  David was the overlooked son of the family.  He is the runt of the litter who does not get much respect from his own family.  Yet, God chose him to be His man.  Why did God choose him?  When push came to shove, David would always do what God said to do.  Obedience to God is what moves mountains.  God does not call the qualified He qualifies the called.  God works miracles with the simplest of people who are willing to listen to Him.

Daniel and his three Friends: Daniel and his friends—Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—have to navigate between the demands Nebuchadnezzar is putting on them and their own religious principles. They remain loyal to god After seeing God save Shadrach and Company, Nebuchadnezzar forgets the moral lesson he's just learned and keeps thinking that he's the center of the universe. Daniel sees various visions, all of them symbolizing future events that are going to take place.

Easter - she saved her people - The story begins with the Persian ruler Ahasuerus, a figure often associated with the Persian monarch known by his Greek name, Xerxes. The king was so proud of his beautiful queen, Vashti, that he ordered her to appear unveiled before the country's princes at a feast. Since appearing unveiled was the social equivalent of being physically naked, Vashti refused. The king was enraged, and his counselors urged him to make an example of Vashti so that other wives wouldn't become disobedient like the queen. Thus poor Vashti was executed for defending her modesty. Then Ahasuerus ordered the comely virgins of the land to be brought to court, to undergo a year of preparation in the harem (talk about extreme makeovers!). Each woman was brought before the king for examination and returned to the harem to await his second summons. From this array of lovelies, the king chose Esther to be his next queen. Then there were many events unfolding, By law, no one could come into the king's presence without his permission, even his wife. Esther and her Jewish compatriots fasted for three days in order for her to get up her courage. Then she put on all her best finery and approached the king without a summons. Ahasuerus extended his royal scepter to her, indicating that he accepted her visit. When the king asked Esther want she wanted, she said she came to invite Ahasuerus and Haman to feast.On the second day of banquets, Ahasuerus offered Esther anything she wanted, even half his kingdom. Instead, the queen begged for her life and that of all the Jews in Persia, revealing to the king Haman's plots against them, especially Mordecai. Haman was executed in the same manner planned for Mordecai. With the king's agreement, the Jews rose up and slaughtered Haman's henchmen on the 13th day of Adar, the day originally planned for the Jews' annihilation, and plundered their goods. Then they feasted for two days, the 14th and 15th of Adar, to celebrate their rescue.King Ahasuerus remained delighted with Queen Esther and named her guardian Mordecai to be his prime minister in the villain Haman's place.

Job is presented as a good and prosperous family man who is beset by Satan with God's permission with horrendous disasters that take away all that he holds dear, including his children, his health, and his property. He struggles to understand his situation and begins a search for the answers to his difficulties.

Then there are soothing Psalms and Proverbs and many more stores including that of Joel, Jonah, Nahum, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi. 

The Mute Anklet - Radhika Nathan

86 of 2020, The Mute Anklet by Radhika Nathan, Set in the 1790s in India, against the backdrop of the third Anglo-Mysore War between the Kingdom of Mysore and the East India Company is also a love story between two extremely different people, Uma Brooke and Captain Trevelyan. It explores relationships and the search for identity.

Raised in South India, Uma Brooke is an Englishman’s daughter, in the care of Maharaja of Mysore. Though she has distinctly English looks, she is deeply attached to India and has developed strong prejudices against the invading Britons. Captain Trevelyan is a Briton and a man with an indifferent attitude towards Indians. While Uma believes in literary romantic love and feels ‘do not enter marriage if you do not love’, Captain Trevelyan does not believe in love. He says, “Marriage would be the fastest way to get me into all that I loathe.” He associates marriage with volatile mood swings, confrontations, complicated words, and worries on balancing one’s pocket. The two completely different personalities are brought together through unusual circumstances and married for strategic purposes. The maharajah wants her to marry Captain Ashton Trevelyan of the British army, a man he takes an immediate liking to. Uma has no desire to hurt her gentle guardian; yet, prejudiced by the circumstances of her birth, and vociferous about her attachment to India, she cannot conceive of a future with a Briton. Detached Captain Trevelyan, on his part, feels compelled to submit to this marriage  – after a failed siege, consenting to the maharajah’s demand is the only way of salvaging the battle. 

“Why did everyone think marriage was necessary for one’s happiness? She would have been perfectly content with her books, her chess games, and her debates with her papa and the maharajah”, wonders Uma. Radhika Nathan brings to light the various thoughts on marriage and relationships through her characters Uma and Captain Trevelyan.

Further, through their story Radhika conveys that changing one’s beliefs is not a sign of weakness. The strength of a relationship lies in accepting the other person and holding on to each other despite all the flaws.  Another element of the story is Uma’s journey to find her identity.  Being born with English looks, everyone considered her to be different even in her family. She had only her Maharajah to comfort her and her Ayah. 

Marrying a Briton and living among his people, helps her discover her past. Meanwhile, in the background runs another story of the ‘Mute Anklet’, which can be termed as one of the prominent characters in the book. Another unresolved mystery is that someone is chasing Uma and threatening her wherever she goes. A glimpse of history, food for thought and changing times is what I take at the end of it. 

Dr. Kamla Chowdhry

 Dr. Kamla Chowdhry was a pioneering management educationist and institution builder and the first faculty member of the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA). On her birth centenary (December 17, 2020), there was a short documentary paying tribute to her remarkable life.

I was taken to the book by Abdul Kalam, on his inspiration being Vikram Sarabhai, and how he was instrumental in having the IIM Ahmedabad set up, but then never knew there was someone called Kamla behind this. 

As I hear : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vE96oUU4aeY and read Chinmay Tumbe  a faculty member at IIM Ahmedabad and author of India Moving: A History of Migration and The Age of Pandemics in https://fiftytwo.in/story/kamla/?fbclid=IwAR0wvGLoS0Ex1b9_vU7Q3N_Bp3CI0CV9ZyRbsKmpMRyNiSWo3dgmoXyvejM

Today, on her birth centenary, it’s worth reflecting on her long and accomplished life, free of the shadows that others have cast on it for so long.

Kamla Chowdhry  was born in Lahore in 1920 to a Punjabi Khatri family where she was exposed to liberal ideals from an early age. Her father, Ganesh Das Kapur, was a leading surgeon in Lahore; her mother, Lilavati Khanna, came from a family of engineers involved in the building of the Sukkur barrage on the Indus river in Sindh. Kamla had gone to Rabindranath Tagore’s Shantiniketan, where she pursued music and learnt to play the sitar. After matriculating from Punjab University with a first-class degree in 1936, she earned a BA in mathematics and philosophy from Calcutta University in 1940: an unusual degree for women at the time.

She married a civil services officer, Khem Chowdhry, but the union proved short-lived. Khem, shockingly, was murdered by a person who had most likely been at the receiving end of his official strictures. He was killed as the couple slept: Kamla woke up to find him lying dead beside her. The murderer, a tribesman from the North West Frontier Provinces, confessed to his crime when he was apprehended in an unrelated case. The defence counsel for the murderer was a young Khushwant Singh, who told this story when he wrote Chowdhry’s obituary in 2006.

It would have been difficult, at that point, to imagine how her career would blossom. But inspired by Tagore and the ideals of Mohandas Gandhi, her life took a new turn. She dug her heels in and got an MA in Philosophy from Punjab University in 1943, where she stood first in her class. She went on to the United States to study further––by one account, a way to distance herself from the depression consuming her life. At Michigan University, she studied with Theodore Newcomb, who would come to be recognised as one of the most eminent psychologists of the twentieth century, and received an MA, and then a PhD, both in social psychology.

By 1949, she had become Dr Kamla Chowdhry, and was ready to come back to India. Her return took her to Ahmedabad, and to a job with Vikram Sarabhai. She arrived in Ahmedabad in 1949 at the age of 28.Cambridge-educated nuclear physicist, future icon of India’s space programme, Sarabhai was still in his twenties in December 1947, when he set up the Ahmedabad Textile Industry Research Association in his family’s hometown. ATIRA was one of the first in a list of trailblazing institutions Sarabhai went on to build. It was a business-oriented one. Until this time, management in India was a fiefdom of family-run agencies. Sarabhai, scion of a family of textile industrialists, intended for ATIRA to apply scientific techniques in the research of industrial problems.

IMA was founded in December 1961 as a public-private partnership between the government of India, the state government of Gujarat, local industrialists and the Ford Foundation. Several people played an important role in its conception and founding. One of these was Douglas Ensminger, Ford Foundation representative in India in the 1950s and 1960s, who pushed for the creation of a business school outside the traditional Indian university system, itself a British legacy. Another was Vikram Sarabhai. He pushed for an IIM to be set up in Ahmedabad along with Kasturbhai Lalbhai, and Jivraj Mehta, the other “founding fathers.”In 1962, the year IIMA's administrative office started functioning, its institutional partner Harvard Business School didn’t even admit women into its MBA programme.

 Between 1962 and 1965, Dr. Kamla Chowdhry was designated ‘Coordinator of Programs.’ But as colleagues of hers later reminisced, she was the de-facto director of IIMA. Sarabhai, the Honorary Director, rarely attended to day-to-day matters, and Chowdhry’s range of responsibilities was staggering. She recruited the first faculty members; convened faculty meetings; liaised with HBS and the Ford Foundation; and travelled across India to market the Institute. She even selected furniture. “She was looking after the whole thing,” the late Dwijendra Tripathi, a business historian who worked at IIMA from 1964 to 1990, remembered. 

Chowdhry’s major and lasting contribution during her time at IIMA was in designing the institute’s first educational offering. The Programme for Management Development, aimed at executives, was launched in 1964 and later came to be known as the Three-Tiered Programme for Management Development or the 3TP: it’s still offered today. 

Companies were asked to send executives across the three tiers of the organizational hierarchy: middle management, senior management and top management. The Institute customised programmes for each level, spread out over five to ten weeks. The first edition in Jaipur in 1964 was a roaring success—it attracted 40 companies and 120 participants. At least two executives from that cohort went on to become icons in the Indian business landscape: HT Parekh of ICICI and then HDFC; and Dr. Verghese Kurien of Amul. It formed part of the groundwork needed for the launch of the full-time MBA programme.

After 1965, Chowdhry’s focus shifted from administration to teaching and research. We know that former students have fond memories of her classes. Her case studies included research on firms such as Unilever and Sarabhai Chemicals, and Chowdhry maintained strong links with industry as a consultant.

In 1971, Vikram Sarabhai died unexpectedly in a hotel room in Kerala. Chowdhry left IIMA the following year, and moved to Delhi. The capital became the site of  further reinventions. In the 1970s, she worked with the India office of the Ford Foundation. In decades to follow, she moved away from management and took up environment and sanitation-related causes. 

She did not lose touch with the Institute she had helped build. In 1976, she donated the bronze bust of Sarabhai for a library that is named after him. In 1988, she was conferred an honorary doctorate by IIMA after JRD Tata and Prakash Tandon had received them in 1982 and 1984 respectively. 

For those who knew Chowdhry well, several traits stood out. Her mentorship abilities were as renowned as the flask of gin she never failed to carry on her trips. To women such as her niece, Nina Singh, she was a paradoxical figure who admired beautiful things like carpets and paintings, but spent too little time on her own appearance. In her later years, Chowdhry lived close to Delhi’s serene Lodhi Gardens. When not attending some board meeting or the other, she could be seen swimming powerfully in the pool maintained by the Ford Foundation.

After her death at the age of 85 in 2006, her well-wishers published a book of tributes. It captured some elements of her journey, mostly after the time she was at IIMA. Sunita Narain of the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) would write that she “was first and foremost an institution-builder and an institution-keeper.” Today, Kamla lives on in Ahmedabad in certain ways. Dormitory 1, mainly for women, at the Institute has been renamed in her honour. The Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), one of several organizations on which she left her mark, runs a restaurant named Kamala Café, where her photograph occupies a prominent space.

Yet there may never be anything like an adequate memorialization of the woman who once wrote: “Most changes that have altered the course of history have begun by individuals who by their examples and actions did what many thought was impossible. Underlying each one was a moral conviction, a fearlessness, that refused to be subdued.”