The Brother Karamazov in 3 minutes

 

We should not be afraid of AI - rather embrace it

 

ode on a grecian urn

 

Arriving early!

 میرے ابو ہر تقریب، ہر جنازے اور ہر موقع پہ آدھا گھنٹہ پہلے پہنچ جاتے تھے.. ہم سمجھتے رہے ابا وقت کے بہت پابند ہیں ۔ لیکن حقیقت کچھ اور تھی 

میرے ابا کبھی دیر سے نہیں پہنچے۔

نہ کسی شادی میں۔

نہ کسی جنازے میں۔

نہ کسی ہسپتال میں۔

نہ کسی سکول کی تقریب میں۔

ہماری پوری زندگی میں ایک بات ہمیشہ یقینی رہی:

اگر تقریب پانچ بجے ہے تو ابا ساڑھے چار بجے وہاں موجود ہوں گے۔

ہم سب اُن کی اس عادت پر ہنستے تھے۔

امی کہا کرتی تھیں:

"تمہارے ابا نے شاید گھڑی بھی اپنے وقت کی الگ رکھی ہوئی ہوگی"..

ہم بھی یہی سمجھتے رہے کہ وہ بس ضرورت سے زیادہ وقت کے پابند ہیں۔

مگر پچھلے مہینے، جب میں اُنہیں ڈاکٹر کے پاس لے جا رہی تھی، نہ جانے کیوں میرے منہ سے نکل گیا:

"ابا، آپ ہر جگہ اتنی جلدی کیوں پہنچتے ہیں؟"

وہ خاموش ہو گئے۔

کافی دیر گاڑی کی کھڑکی سے باہر دیکھتے رہے۔

پھر آہستہ سے بولے:

"تمہیں واقعی جاننا ہے؟"

میں نے مسکرا کر کہا:

"جی۔"

انہوں نے ایک لمبی سانس لی۔

اور ایک ایسی بات بتائی جس نے میری پوری زندگی بدل دی۔

انہوں نے کہا:

"چالیس سال پہلے میں ایک نوکری کے انٹرویو کیلئے آدھا گھنٹہ پہلے پہنچ گیا تھا۔"

انتظار گاہ میں ایک اور آدمی بیٹھا تھا۔

بہت گھبرایا ہوا۔

بار بار اپنے ہاتھ رگڑ رہا تھا۔

بار بار پانی پی رہا تھا۔

ابا نے اُس سے بات شروع کر دی۔

موسم کی۔

عمارت کی۔

اور اُس عجیب سے پنکھے کی جو ہر پانچ منٹ بعد چرچراتا تھا۔

تھوڑی دیر بعد اُس آدمی کی گھبراہٹ کم ہو گئی۔

اُس کا نام پکارا گیا۔

وہ اندر چلا گیا۔

ابا بھی گئے۔

شام تک نتیجہ آ گیا۔

نوکری اُس آدمی کو مل گئی۔

ابا کو نہیں۔

میں نے پوچھا:

"پھر؟"

ابا مسکرائے۔

"گھر آتے ہوئے پہلی بار مجھے احساس ہوا کہ نوکری ملنے یا نہ ملنے سے زیادہ اہم ایک اور چیز تھی۔"

"وہ آدھا گھنٹہ۔"

میں خاموشی سے سنتی رہی۔

وہ بولتے گئے:

"بیٹا، اصل ضرورت تقریب کے بعد نہیں ہوتی۔"

"اصل ضرورت اُس سے پہلے ہوتی ہے۔"

"آپریشن سے پہلے۔"

"امتحان سے پہلے۔"

"جنازے سے پہلے۔"

"عدالت میں گواہی دینے سے پہلے۔"

"کسی مشکل گفتگو سے پہلے۔"

"اُس وقت انسان سب سے زیادہ تنہا ہوتا ہے۔"

"شاید کسی کو میری ضرورت ہو۔"

اچانک مجھے اپنی پوری زندگی یاد آنے لگی۔

دادی کے آپریشن سے پہلے ابا ہسپتال کے باہر کسی اجنبی کے ساتھ بیٹھے ہوئے تھے۔

محلے کے جنازوں میں وہ سب سے پہلے پہنچتے تھے۔

میرے سکول کے فنکشن میں بھی وہ ہمیشہ وقت سے پہلے موجود ہوتے تھے۔

میں سمجھتی تھی وہ بور ہو رہے ہوں گے۔

مگر حقیقت میں وہ کسی نہ کسی کے ساتھ بیٹھے ہوتے تھے۔

کسی پریشان باپ کے ساتھ۔

کسی گھبرائے ہوئے بچے کے ساتھ۔

کسی ایسی ماں کے ساتھ جس کا دل خوف سے بھر چکا ہوتا تھا۔

ابا بولتے رہے:

"آدھا گھنٹہ پہلے لوگ ابھی کردار ادا نہیں کر رہے ہوتے۔"

"اُس وقت وہ ویسے ہی ہوتے ہیں جیسے حقیقت میں ہوتے ہیں۔"

"اور اکثر انہیں صرف ایک انسان کی ضرورت ہوتی ہے جو اُن کے پاس بیٹھ جائے۔"

Kapil Dev

(Anil Sachdev)

 Yesterday I changed flights from Delhi to Chennai and was allotted a seat next to the great Kapil Dev.

I was going to Chennai for a workshop for a client and for the launch of my book!

He was going for the launch of Shyam Srinivasan ‘s book ‘Better Never Stops’ !

I listened to him for over two hours and this is what I am moved to share:

What struck me was not just his achievements, but the simplicity and wisdom of his life lessons.

Some insights that stayed with me:

• Passion gives life meaning.

Whether it was playing marbles as a child, flying kites, excelling in sports, playing cricket, taking up golf, or now helping set up hospitals, passion has been the driving force throughout his life.

“The day you no longer have passion for a cause, you are not truly alive.”

• Stay curious.

His habit of constantly asking questions helped him learn and also helped his coach learn. Curiosity creates growth for everyone involved.

• Wise people listen more than they speak.

Intelligent conversation is valuable, but wisdom often comes from listening deeply.

• Learning comes from meeting new people.

Every interaction is an opportunity to learn.

• You can learn from anyone.

Never underestimate the insights that can come from unexpected sources.

• Contentment is essential.

Success without contentment is an endless race.

• Seek balanced perspectives.

Do not dismiss people who disagree with you. Different viewpoints enrich our understanding.

• Leadership is about the team, not the ego.

As captain, he faced the media when the team lost, taking responsibility himself. When the team won, he put the players in front to receive the applause.

• Give your best, then move on.

Do not overstay your time in any role or cling to what once was.

• Never live in past glory.

Celebrate achievements, but keep looking ahead.

A masterclass in leadership, humility, and living with purpose.

He also shared how he requested the producer and Director of the movie on the 1983 World Cup win to talk to every member of the winning team to get their perspective- true team project!

They still meet twice a year!!

Values

 

Heart of Medicine

There is a reason this painting still works.

The doctor is not doing anything dramatic.

He is not performing a procedure.
He is not speaking.
He is not surrounded by machines.

He is watching.
Sitting in that uncomfortable space between uncertainty and responsibility.

That may be one of the oldest truths in medicine.
Before medicine was data-rich, it was attention-rich.

A physician noticed the small change.
The altered breathing.
The color that was not quite right.
The silence in the room.
The look on a family member’s face.

AI will change medicine in extraordinary ways.
I hope it does.

It may help us find information faster, recognize patterns earlier, draft notes more cleanly, and support decisions with more evidence than any one person could hold alone.

But medicine is not only a knowledge problem.
It is also a discipline of presence.

The question is not whether AI can help us think.
It can.

The deeper question is whether, as the tools get faster, we preserve the part of medicine that stays close enough to the human consequence to notice what still does not fit.

The room still matters.

So does the person willing to sit in it.

So True - as Joan Aliya said

 

Woman!

 

Love persists!

سچائ یہ ہے کے

 نا تو ظلیخا پر مرنے والا مر چکا اور نا ظلیخا کی بڑھتی عمر اور کمر میں کوئ کمی آئ 

Filling up the horizon of the minds of the masses

“Heavy physical work, the care of home and children, petty quarrels with neighbors, films, football, beer, and above all, gambling filled up the horizon of their minds. To keep them in control was not difficult…. All that was required of them was a primitive patriotism which could be appealed to whenever it was necessary to make them accept longer working hours or shorter rations. And when they become discontented, as they sometimes did, their discontentment led nowhere, because being without general ideas, they could only focus it on petty specific grievances.”

– George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four 

Is this not the current reality that we are living every day

Crime and Punishment in 3 minutes!

 

On French etiquette of diet

(Stealing from a friend)

Today I had dinner at Entre Nous, a beautiful and classy French bistro. We were lucky to get a reservation, so I went in with a very clear and noble mission:

Grass-fed steak, French butter melting on top, and greens to my heart’s desire.

Of course, since I don’t drink alcohol, the waiter politely offered us French wine, especially Merlot. Very elegant. Very French. Very tempting for people who drink. We smiled and asked for our usual high-society beverage:

Diet Coke.

The waiter looked at us like we had asked him to microwave a croissant.

He said, very politely but firmly,

“We don’t serve Diet Coke.”

Then, before we could recover from this emotional trauma, the real French owner appeared. Heavy French accent. Serious face. Full culinary authority. The man looked like he had personally drafted the constitution of French food.

He said:

“Monsieur, we do not serve artificial drinks, chemicals, Diet Coke, or decaf drinks. Everything here must be natural. Whole milk. Real cheese. Real butter. Real ingredients. This is what I learned in France, and this is what I practice here.”

At that moment, I realized this was not just a restaurant.

This was a French nutritional courtroom, and Diet Coke had just been sentenced to life imprisonment.

No Diet Coke.

No decaf.

No fake cheese.

No chemical shortcuts.

No nonsense.

Only real food, real butter, real cream, real cheese, real coffee, and real attitude.

And suddenly, I thought of my visits to France.

Beautiful surroundings, clean air, greenery, parks, walkable streets, and a healthier lifestyle are wonderful goals. But the real question is:

Can we also build healthier eating habits?

Because healthy citizens are not created by parks alone. They are created by daily discipline: real food, smaller portions, walking, clean habits, and less dependence on fake, processed, chemical-loaded items.

Whenever I visit France, I’m amazed. You can walk through entire streets and barely see obesity. If I do see one or two obese people, I quietly think:

“These are probably tourists. The real French are inside, eating butter with dignity and still staying thin.”

That is the French mystery.

They eat butter, cheese, bread, cream, steak, and dessert — yet somehow they don’t expand like a Pakistani wedding buffet line.

Their secret is simple:

Real food. Small portions. Slow eating. Lots of walking. No fake chemicals. No emotional relationship with unlimited refills.

The lesson from tonight was clear:

A healthy society needs green spaces, clean air, walkable neighborhoods, and beautiful homes.

But it also needs a culture of wholesome food, disciplined portions, and respect for the body.

The French may have their Merlot.

Though I must admit, my Diet Coke is still in mourning!

Les Misérables in 3 minutes

 

khas!

 

On Blue Lizard

 

A unique Blue Lizard which is found in the Petra area of Jordan. The lizard is also called the Sinai agama. It is also found in Syria, Sinai, and Israel, but Jordan is still the best place to see it. It lives between the rocks in the Petra area. It avoids contact with people, so it has moved to areas that are inaccessible to tourists. That’s why it is hard to see it. It is a cold-blooded (ectothermic) animal, so it has to come out in the open in the morning on boulders, cliffs, or piles of stone to bask in the sun in order to store energy. Sitting in the sun, it frequently opens its mouth (‘gaping’). Gaping is used for thermoregulation by releasing excess body heat. This is important as the lizards do not sweat to cool down. Once energized, it goes back to its hiding place between the rocks. It is usually dull brown in color, but the male turns bright blue in the head and throat only during the mating season. So, there is a very narrow window of opportunity to see it in blue. The female doesn’t change colors. Its limbs and tail are long and thin, allowing for good climbing and running capability. It feeds on insects and plants. Unlike other members of the genus Agama, its third toe is the longest rather than the fourth. Please see the photograph. It appears that the lizard is quite low on energy to run away. The best it could do is to change positions. Once sufficiently recharged, it ran away. Wildlife is so unpredictable. You have to be at the right place at the right time. 

Life!

کیا ھو گیا ھے وقت کو نجانے

لمحوں میں گزرتے ھیں زمانے 

Stereotyping

کبھی اپنی آنکھ سے زندگی پہ نظر نہ کی

وہی زاویے کہ جو عام تھے مجھے کھا گئے

خورشید رضوی 

To Be or Not To Be - Explained

 

Mehenge Tohfe

 

"200 bricks and 2,000 words a day"

 Winston Churchill has an enormous reputation for being an alcoholic, yet he remained such a powerful politician who could see the future and made many accurate calculations in his political moves.

Winston Churchill used to lay 200 bricks per day to keep his mind busy when feeling down. Depression hates a moving target. 

Bricklaying Goal: Churchill described his routine as producing "200 bricks and 2,000 words a day" to balance mental work with physical labor. It was in his rural estate in Kent.

A Huge Lesson From History

 When I see how MAGA people behave in today's America

Growing together (and apart)

 I was traveling through the small towns of the French Riviera last week and saw this simple yet profound artwork at the town's entrance.

Where Men and Women Differ

 

One Hundred Years of Solitude - in 3 minutes

 

Koe'L ki Kuk

 The birds don't sing, they screech in pain.

Tarbeeat

(Not necessarily to agree, but a powerful thought)

ایک شخص نے کسی سے پوچھا کہ مجھے بتلائیں کہ میں اپنے بیٹے کی کیسے تربیت کروں؟

انہوں نے پوچھا کتنی عمر ہے اسکی؟

آدمی نے کہا:7ماہ

انہوں نے کہا کہ  : تم نے تو بہت تاخیر کردی ہے،اولاد کی تربیت تو ماں کے انتخاب سے شروع ہوتی ہے

Medicine and AI

 One of my mentors said something beautiful.

"AI may be able to build an algorithm to treat all diseases, but healing comes from the human touch to the human skin. The biggest healing power lies in holding human hands. There is a difference between treating and healing".

Humans and AI

 

My Coffee

 

Only 3 Lines :)

 

The Grapes of Wrath (Sufferings of Immigration)

 

Homer

 

Poetry and Literature - One of the finest of Robin Williams

 

Othello

 

A story posted on net

 I was in prison for killing a guy who had abused my 14-year-old brother. I served a 29-year sentence and finally got a release date. When I told my brother, he was so happy. I can still hear his voice saying, "I can't believe it! I'm going to talk to my boss about hiring you." Calm down, little brother, take it easy. I still have 16 months left. Anyway, eight months before my release, the captain called me into his office. It was full of guards. I was alarmed by how many there were. After a few minutes of them trying to convince me to sit down, I finally did, but only after they sat down first. They told me I could make a call. I called my brother, but he didn't answer. Then they told me my brother had died. I didn't believe them. I called again, his wife answered, and she told me everything. I was devastated. They asked me whether I wanted to speak with a priest or go to a private cell. I didn't. I went down to the courtyard, found a place where no one was around, and started to cry. It was the saddest moment of my life.

A lesson learned from Macbeth

 

A disturbing picture

 

Amaltas and Summer

“Still the Amaltas bloomed, a brilliant, defiant yellow. Each blazing summer it reached up and whispered to the hot brown sky, F*** You.” -Arundhati Roy

 

Dostoevsky and Hans Holbein's 'The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb'

 

(A conversation between Dostoevsky and Nietzsche) 

Painted between 1520 and 1522 by Hans Holbein the Younger, The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb shows Christ laid out in death, moments before any imagined resurrection. The painting is life-sized, roughly 30.5 cm by 200 cm, measuring like a real tomb, forcing us to see Christ not as a holy figure, but as a corpse.

There is no halo, no light, no suggestion of divinity. Holbein gives us a human body in decay: emaciated limbs, discolored skin, dead weight sinking into darkness. The only signs that this is Christ are the wounds on his hands, feet, side, and the stark inscription above him. According to legend, Holbein may have used the body of a drowned man from the Rhine as his model. The result is a painting so real it strips away hope.

In 1867, on the way to Geneva, Dostoevsky and his wife Anna stopped in Basel. They visited the Kunstmuseum. There, Dostoevsky stood before Holbein’s painting and was completely shaken by its brutal reality. Anna later wrote:

“On our way to Geneva, we stopped for a day in Basel to see a painting … [it] depicts Christ … decaying. His bloated face is covered with bloody wounds, and his appearance is terrible. The painting had a crushing impact on Fyodor Mikhailovich. He stood before it as if stunned. … expecting the attack from one minute to the next. Luckily, this did not happen. … he insisted on returning once again to view this painting which had struck him so powerfully.”

She added:

“Fedya … was enraptured by it and, wishing to see it more closely, he climbed on a chair.”

From Anna’s words, it’s pretty clear that it broke something in Dostoevsky. Because if Christ, the most perfect being, ends like this - what hope is there for the rest of us? And he really began to struggle with that.

Soon after, in Geneva, he started writing The Idiot. Holbein’s painting shows up in the book more than once. It hangs in Rogozhin’s house, and it’s not just decoration. It becomes a moment of deep crisis for two characters: Prince Myshkin and Ippolit.

Myshkin, who’s sensitive and pure, is shaken by it. He says:

“That picture! That picture!” cried Muishkin, struck by a sudden idea. “Why, a man’s faith might be ruined by looking at that picture!” (Part 2, Chapter 4)

Then there’s Ippolit, a dying teenager who’s been fighting his own fear of death. He stares at the painting and says:

“This blind, dumb, implacable, eternal, unreasoning force is well shown in the picture, and the absolute subordination of all men and things to it is so well expressed that the idea unconsciously arises in the mind of anyone who looks at it. All those faithful people who were gazing at the cross and its mutilated occupant must have suffered agony of mind that evening; for they must have felt that all their hopes and almost all their faith had been shattered at a blow. They must have separated in terror and dread that night, though each perhaps carried away with him one great thought which was never eradicated from his mind for ever afterwards. If this great Teacher of theirs could have seen Himself after the Crucifixion, how could He have consented to mount the Cross and to die as He did? This thought also comes into the mind of the man who gazes at this picture.” (Part 3, Chapter 6)

That’s what Dostoevsky saw that day in Basel. Not just a terrifying painting, but something that shook his core beliefs. It may have been the moment that started his deep wrestling with God, and with his own faith. You can see that struggle not only in The Idiot, but even more powerfully in The Brothers Karamazov, where questions about God, suffering, and the meaning of faith are pushed to their absolute limit.

#copied from internet

Rishte, zarooratain aur umeedain

 Sifawaye ma baap ke saare rishte zarooratoN aur UmeedoN ke mohtaj hote hain

Jab rishtoN se zarooratoN ki khu kam ho jaati hai, aur umeedoN ki lo madham paR jaati hai, to rishte bhi amar-des sadhaar jaate hain

I don't know (either)

 

Pretty Accurate

 

Constrains!

کیسے کوئی عزیز روایات چھوڑ دے 

کیسے کوئی عزیز روایات چھوڑ دے 

کچھ کھیل ہے کہ کہنہ حکایات چھوڑ دے 

گھٹی میں تھے جو حل وہ خیالات چھوڑدے 

ماں کا مزاج باپ کی عادات چھوڑدے 

کس جی سے کوئی رشتۂ اوہام چھوڑ دے 

ورثے میں جو ملے ہیں وہ اصنام توڑ دے 

اوہام کا رباب قدامت کا ارغنوں 

فرسودگی کا سحر روایات کا فسوں 

اقوال کا مراق حکایات کا جنوں 

رسم و رواج و صحبت و میراث و نسل و خوں 

افسوس یہ وہ حلقۂ دام خیال ہے 

جس سے بڑے بڑوں کا نکلنا محال ہے

(جوش ملیح آبادی)