Wednesday, May 28, 2008

The word "Honour killing "is in much news nowadays however this word fills me with acute repulsion .Can any killing ever be honourable ?If we use the two words together does it mean that a murder can be honorable ?To take any one,s life can never be honourable .By using honour as an adverb for killing we are glamourizing as well as justifying the act of killing .
Another fact that has been bothering me is our tendency to believe the worst .In the Aarushi murder case the public wants to believe that the parents are the culprit because it is bizarre .It is the worst form of sadism ,maybe the psychologists can tell us the reasons why we revelin talking about misfortunes and tragedies .Is it because subconciously we are glad that we are not the victim of such misfortunes ?

Monday, May 12, 2008

I have been thinking about success and happiness .The Oxford dictionary defines Success as accomplishment of aim ,attainment of wealth ,fame etc."Happiness does not figure in this definition .So to define a person as successful can mean anything .He can be a successful physician ,an enterpreneur ,a lawyer ,a technician or a cheat ,a swindler ,a murderer .As long as all the three criteria are fulfilled all of the above are successful .
Happiness is defined as pleasure and contentment .So what is the relationship between the two ?
Success is related to any thing you have to work for while happiness is a state of mind.So if one works for and fulfils one's aim one is successful and if this fulfilment of aim gives him contentment he is happy also.Thus a murderer can be as happy as say a Doctor as long as he is content with what ever he is doing .By default both can be equally devoid of happiness if they are not content even though they may be successful in fulfiling their aims .Therefore success and happiness are totally unrelated .A successful person can be unhappy and a loser may be a happy person .I am talking about success from individual's perspective. Obviously from the point of view of the society a swindler can not be compared with an engineer even though both consider themselves successful .So what is the best situation to be ?Naturally the best would be to be both successful and happy but given the option of choosing one I would certainly like to be happy .