Santiago! The boy's name is Santiago. He is born in a poor family in Mexico. His mother abandoned them when he was a small child. Later they migrated to America, illegally. He spent his childhood in poverty attending day school and doing night jobs. But he never gave up on something. Football. He is good at scoring goals. Indeed he is excellent. One day he is observed by a scout of a big football club from England. He was given a chance. He flew to England against his father's wishes. The scout got him a month to prove himself. Being a natural scorer, he got into the reserves team. Overcoming Asthma and news of his father's death, he made it to the first team and won his club glory.
Yes, I am talking about the movie Goal! Santiago!, what a beautiful name. The protagonist of Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist is also called Santiago. Both of these start a similar journey to their Personal Legend. All through the movie, I felt like I was watching a screen version of The Alchemist. Or may be, I became so obsessed with the novel that I see it in everything. Whatever it is, I found out that I am becoming more and more interested in movies like this. Movies involving some competetion. I think a struggle would be a more appropriate word. Struggle as in war, as in game, as in achievement. When you watch such movies, what you will find is that Santiago is all prevailing. He is in everyone of us. It is just that we do not see him often. Rather, we do not want to see.
So, for the Santiago in me, what is his Personal Legend, I do not know. Not yet. I only know this much that you should not wait till you know but do what you can do best at the moment. I am in a path to take on the civil services examination and I will. What happens afterwards, God only knows. Yeah, Santi will know it then. Lead me Santi!
Santiago! Santiago!
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Language of the Soul
What is I?
What is Soul?
What is Mind - Body Duality?
Why are Emotions attached to Heart when Reason is attached to Brain?
These are the questions I have been pondering over for a long time but I couldn't get a clear picture of these. May be I can't. I think the existence of answers to these questions negates their purpose. But I always believe(d) that there should be a theory that could explain all these. After reading quite a bit and after asking many people, I found out that this theory differs from person to person. And what more, each such theory is complete in itself. This could be the reason there are innumerable spiritual traditions in the world.
The Mind-Body Problem is one of the oldest and frequent philosophical issues ever debated. There are many explanations to what is mind and how it is associated with body. One such explanation is the duality of mind and body. It says that the physical processes related to thought go on in brain, but the mental processes related to it go on in mind. Everyone has both of them. The physical processes are not enough to explain the first person experiences as they differ in mental processes. The chemical reactions that go on in brains of two people while eating a chocolate are the same, but they experience it differently. It's like the chlorophyll experiment which says that though given all required chemicals, one cannot generate the photosynthesis process in a lab. There is something else attached to the process other than just chlorophyll, it is life. Similarly, for thoughts, we require a mind. Though a skeptic can argue against this, I am pretty convinced with this.
Reasoned enough about Mind and Brain, we can now associate reason and intellect with them.. But this does not end here. Where does the concept of heart come from? As I mentioned earlier, we associate emotions and feelings which defy reason and logic to heart. And sometimes we are asked to listen to heart instead of brain. Why is it so?
What is Soul?
What is Mind - Body Duality?
Why are Emotions attached to Heart when Reason is attached to Brain?
These are the questions I have been pondering over for a long time but I couldn't get a clear picture of these. May be I can't. I think the existence of answers to these questions negates their purpose. But I always believe(d) that there should be a theory that could explain all these. After reading quite a bit and after asking many people, I found out that this theory differs from person to person. And what more, each such theory is complete in itself. This could be the reason there are innumerable spiritual traditions in the world.
The Mind-Body Problem is one of the oldest and frequent philosophical issues ever debated. There are many explanations to what is mind and how it is associated with body. One such explanation is the duality of mind and body. It says that the physical processes related to thought go on in brain, but the mental processes related to it go on in mind. Everyone has both of them. The physical processes are not enough to explain the first person experiences as they differ in mental processes. The chemical reactions that go on in brains of two people while eating a chocolate are the same, but they experience it differently. It's like the chlorophyll experiment which says that though given all required chemicals, one cannot generate the photosynthesis process in a lab. There is something else attached to the process other than just chlorophyll, it is life. Similarly, for thoughts, we require a mind. Though a skeptic can argue against this, I am pretty convinced with this.
Reasoned enough about Mind and Brain, we can now associate reason and intellect with them.. But this does not end here. Where does the concept of heart come from? As I mentioned earlier, we associate emotions and feelings which defy reason and logic to heart. And sometimes we are asked to listen to heart instead of brain. Why is it so?
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