As we change calendars from 2024 to 2025, taking stock to celebrate what we enjoyed to keep the memories worth keeping and letting go of what did not serve us well, is a good way to make space for new dreams and aspirations. In 2024, my lesson is that we don’t fall apart despite the hardships that life gives to all when we accept that we have a part in life’s grand drama.
Travel
I was fortunate that my sabbatical and personal travels from the US to India and Mexico brought me many exceptional adventures thanks to my privileged position as a professor. It helped to refresh from the near burn-out many teachers faced after the long COVID years and its impact on students and institutions. My sabbatical work included delivering keynote speeches, conference lectures, and professional development workshops to the best of faculty and students at many prestigious management institutes at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Calcutta, IIM Raipur, IIM Bodh Gaya, Goa Institute of Management and Management Development Institute. I also managed to meet my family, friends, and some celebrities too!
I visited the Bodhi Temple where Buddha attained enlightenment but what stood out was my visit to the UNESCO world heritage site of the ancient University of Nalanda. It thrived for centuries as a renowned center of learning. The excavated ruins reveal a design that appeals to my aesthetics of simplicity, efficiency, beauty, and contemplative community. Its wide open green spaces and ancient trees invited a quiet walkabout.
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Children
As I walked through one of the monastic buildings there, a group of schoolchildren rushed in excitedly to see a deep well, climbing the walls and shouting to their friends. The peace I was enjoying was lost instantly. I felt compelled to chide them – “Ahista! Zara dheerey bolo!” but couldn’t raise my voice above their happy sounds.
No one paid any heed to me. I decided to not disturb their joy by choosing to walk away to another building to enjoy my peaceful communion with the ancient red bricks. As I was leaving a bearded man in a crisp white kurta and a sense of authority entered the site. I guessed correctly that he was their teacher and told him to teach his students to tune into the site’s contemplative vibe.
To my surprise, he agreed and invited me to speak to his charges, calling them to gather around us. From a guide, I’d learned that Nalanda Mahavihara thrived from 427 AD to 1400 AD as the greatest center of learning and the world’s first residential university. I asked the students to try to commune with the reflective spaces and and let their imaginations wander back in time to discover the stories that its walls, steps, and deep well might convey if they heeded their silent experience. The children were receptive and curious.
One girl asked “You say we should listen to the silence, but what should we do when the heart and head do not agree? Should I listen to my heart or head?” A good question about the eternal dilemmas of our human life, one that crosses all boundaries, cultural, national, and generational.
I told her I wish I had an answer for you. When I face such difficult choices, my heart and head take opposite sides. It’s a war within myself. I tend to withdraw – to write in my journal or to my quiet happy place, to walk in the park, or sleep on the question: what is my next step?
The body often knows the answer. You will know best what is right for you if you find the quiet to listen to your inner voice in this noisy world.
Generations
As part of my holiday celebrations, I checked in with some seniors in my life. Life’s most valuable lessons come from listening to those who have lived it well and paved the path for us. A few youngsters checked in on me to include me in their celebrations, giving me food for what collective dance drama poems we need to enable.
Poetry
Back in California, I was glad to resume the readings of my group, Poetry of Diaspora in Silicon Valley, an incubator of poetry lovers. In November, I released our fourth multilingual anthology called ‘Being, Becoming, Belonging.’ The first copy was presented to one of the poets in it, the Belmont Poet Laureate Monica Korde.
A highlight of my year was reading Hindi poems with my English translations at the South Asia Art and Literature Festival, a celebrity-studded event at my alma mater Stanford University.
The poetry section was curated by poet Shikha Saklani Malaviya. I got to hear Imtiaz Ali, Shashi Tharoor, Vijay Sheshadri, Salima Hashmi, Shehan Karunatilaka, Suvir Saran, Kausar Munir, and many leaders who make the Bay Area a vibrant hub, intellectually and culturally – Ritwik Verma, Vinita Sud Belani, Arti Shishoo Verma, Devi S. Laskar, Monica Korde, Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan, Lalit Kumar, Kohli Sundeep, Saswati Das, Tanya Momi, Moitreyee Chowdhury, Reena Kapoor, and Tomas Kailath amongst others.
The inspiration from being around creative folk in such an immersive adventure was enhanced by the surprise of running into old friends and unexpected green room conversations – about earrings made from recycled bullets worn by a multi-generation peace activist and artist, a hallway chat with a young poet reading in public for the very first time, and later, a chance to meet his parents and wheelchair-bound grandparent.
Creativity
It takes a very intentional and determined will to pursue a creative life.
Creativity is messy, challenging, punishing even. It takes determination and grit to stay committed. This obsessive pursuit of the unknown, unknowable even, is the madness of being creative in today’s world (kalyug).
Many of the stories I heard at the festival were tales of ordinary, unknown folk, from around the world, who endure, and spread the scent of human dignity in the sacrifices demanded of them by unjust, unfair, oppressive systems and power struggles between competing regimes. Their ghosts were visible and animated in the pages of books and in art created by those who refused to look away from suffering. Faiz’s Hum Dekhenge, the proverbial – jo duba so paar, or the Bible’s ‘The meek shall inherit the earth’ are anthems that bear witness and celebrate the ordinary.
Finding a space to gather, to listen attentively, to simply be present in the moment, to accept our human condition, and to be in community helps, and occasionally, heals. 99.9% of life is simply about showing up. A muse is nice, and a partner is better, but self-discipline to practice – sadhna for riyaaz, is the best.
Patience is a friend. That one can pursue what one wishes for is more than enough pleasure for this life.
Happy 2025!
