13 reasons why you should avoid Facebook in 2013

If the arrest of girls by the police in Mumbai on posting personal views on Facebook, the fact that your information is sold and also that recruiters look around at facebook to judge you were not enough reasons to moderate your activity, here are the top 13 reasons (since its 2013 and 13 is an unlucky number!) why I think facebook is a big evil and why many of them should realize its negativity before they drown in it.

13) I think the inception of this idea was when I used to meet my school friends and we would enthusiastically share the latest bytes of our lives. The plans and meetings were something we looked forward to until facebook happened. In the FB era when we met shared our stories, all of us already knew what was happening in each other’s lives and there was hardly anything to talk about or it just took the excitement away.

12) People add you so that they can be in touch with you (Blah!!!). I guess the last means of being connected with someone is at least wishing them on their birthday. Obviously you don’t have to wish every person you know. But when someone wishes you, be courteous enough to say thank you. Have we lost all the basic courtesy?

11) So a friend of mine picked up this fight with me that why didn’t I comment on her picture. I tried explaining, I am not that frequent with facebook and asked, was is it not important that I actually call her and even meet her whenever I am in town to catch up so that I can state my thoughts in more than 140 characters. But efforts of personal touch are not important since the are not on public platform.

10) So I was talking to this friend and he complains about another friend of his being too inquisitive and practically questioning him on everything on facebook. I told him; if you do not want somebody to ask you something about it, then why post it. It’s as simple as that! Remember that high school time when somebody would start a topic in front of you and would not broach it further. Well, duh if you don’t want people pestering you, don’t publicize it.

9) Did I mention the most obvious thing of the amount of time you waste on it which can be used to do something more constructive? Also bullying is such a huge menace because you are sitting behind the comfort of the screen and nobody will be able to punch you. The amount of negative things you could actually say there, I bet you would not dare to tell anyone on their face ever. Quite a lot of kids have gone into depression and some even beyond the veil all thanks to the virtual bullying and peer pressure including the gender bias which makes you feel completely insignificant and this is proven research!

8) Recently a friend of mine argued with me that he did not feel the need to talk or even message me because he already knew what was happening in my life through facebook and that is how I should keep a track of his life updates as well. I was flabbergasted for two main reasons. One, I am just putting up a sentence, not the story behind it and would want to share that with close friends. Like if I get a job, I will put that but I am not going to say about the interview and maybe all the anecdotes that went into getting it. Alternatively, if you are putting up the whole stories with your 1000+ “acquaintances” then what privilege do your close friends have. They are supposed to know you the best and know stuff about you which nobody else does right? But here, I walk around and meet people who tell me more about my closest friend then I know myself!!

7) You have an information overdose with so many people literally stuffing information in your face. Like one of my friends put it, she said “ Nemi, I log in, once in a few days and by which time I miss the link of the blog you post but I notice what other people are upto because they post every single day. That’s stuffed, in your face marketing”. It so happens, you are really exhausted to find out what your best friends are doing simply because you feel overdosed with information.

6) This one came straight from a professor. She said that she stopped logging on facebook because, when she would comment on one person’s status or write on their wall, another of her friend would get offended saying “You have time to talk to them but no time to talk to me”. And I may not be off the mark if I said that many of our friendships would have been broken because you grew close to people in the virtual world that you lost track of your real relations (Refer: Mal in Inception)

5) Do you remember the old joy, when you used to run down to your friend’s house or call them up immediately because you had amazing news to tell them and you wanted them to know it before anyone else did? Well what the hell happened to that?? Something really amazing happened to a friend of mine and I told him, well why you didn’t tell me about it. He is like, Dude I posted it on facebook for everyone to see it. You should have seen it there as well. I simply miss the joy of seeing/calling somebody up and celebrating that joy rather than just get notifications and think, “Oh yeah, people noticed my achievement”.

4) The third to make it to the list is very technical. Take out some time and go through their privacy laws and FB policies. You will be left aghast!! Pretty much everything you do, remains out there and gets used in the most negative way possible. Also, since the genesis of graph search, I feel more scared and vindicated. Imagine, if you can set the search parameters correctly, anyone can look you up just because you have liked few pages and written a few things about yourself and can be easily predicted by someone to manipulate you!

3) So this realization came to me when somebody took advantage of my name to get in good books with someone and spoilt my reputation. I found out, that the professor actually thought that this other person was one of my closest friend just by the mere amount of knowledge he rattled on about me. This was highly surprising since I never used to speak to this person and he found out everything about me from facebook and ultimately, I had to go through a long road to sort my position, all because, somebody knew a lot about me. It just requires a minuscule common sense to understand the kind of people you add/delete from FB to keep the wrong characters at bay.

2) So there is this close friend and we were just talking generally and he went on to tell me lots of things about everyone and who is up to what. I casually asked him, if he knew what I do, what I study, what do I work on, stuff I do outside of the classroom and he went completely blank. Knew where some random person went to party the previous day but didn’t know what his close friend was even studying. How about making an effort to find out stuff that matters rather than just gossip virtually about people that don’t even matter on who went where, with whom and did what.

1) And the award for quitting facebook goes to the feeling of insecurity and negativity that you get out of it. Facebook is a tool for those who wish to fan their egos and prove superiority over others by posting indulgence in a kind of exhibitionism that helps them achieve their end-goal: to raise their bar and overcome the existing (common!) sense of low self-esteem! People are in a race to show how amazing their life is and where you feel left out or simply annoyed that people won’t stop bragging!

In a place, where relations are not listed as per truth, where the photos say a different story from your words about your life, where narcissism and boosting your ego to leave an indelible mark in the quickly passing time overpowers the true nature of relations, it definitely marks a source of feeling unwanted because either your life doesn’t match up to someone or you don’t feel a part of theirs.

In this revolutionary age when facebook is supposed to bring us closer more than ever, don't you think its time we re evaluate if it is really doing that or pushing us further apart and get back to a real world?

I would love to hear your stories and experiences on this as well people since I may have missed out some things myself. Do post your thoughts with your names.
Cheers!

P.S:Facebook addiction is a clinical disorder!! Check it!

Doomsday Deed

Blimey!...I am still Alive. Well that’s something to be happy for unless you are dragged by family to watch the first show of Salman Khans Dabangg 2. So my mom being an ardent salman follower goes like, “see today the world is going to end and hence they decided to show this movie before that”, whereas my opinion were quite contrary, arguing that the world will end because of these kind of movies!!. I will delve deeper into the denigrating of Bollywood some other time.

For now, the world hasn’t ended but if you look, the world that you knew has ended. I was arguing that with a friend that everyone and everything has changed quite a lot and the relations aren’t the same the way they used to be. Just start off with the mass shootouts in Connecticut, the Dark Knight Rises Movie, at the gurudwara and you start wondering on where you stand. My parents are not that well acquainted with the map of USA and whenever they hear of any problem in and around California, they immediately call me up to check if I am ok, for all I know, it could have been us.

Well I always used to tell people proudly, that India is super safe and to quite an extent I still maintain that about Mumbai. However the recent happenings in Delhi were blasphemous and even though we knew at the back of our head on how the situation is, we always try to neglect it and await a huge cataclysmic event for it to be brought to our conscious thought from the sub conscious. There are hundreds of shootouts and rape that happen in smaller numbers or to a smaller atrocity but it took something so huge to gain attention. What I would like to underline here is that, face what you know sub consciously but try to elude before it gets blown out of proportion. Sometimes that voice comes internally; sometimes it is an external force that guides you through the matter that needs attention.

So while the sci fiction fans can remain disappointed that no aliens or asteroids are going to hit the earth, it is an even greater worry for the human race though. You can face and survive from what you can see but how do you deal with the negativity of the mind which does not manifest itself in an explicit manner. Today you may protest or grieve about something, and it might well be forgotten tomorrow. But stop, pause for a second and think, if in this end of this world which originates from within the human race, what if it was you or a loved one that got sucked into this apocalypse.

How would you feel? Would you want to live your life with regret that you could not say that sorry, or give that smile or hug and thank someone or simply grab that moment slipping from your hand like the sands of time. Well for today you are alive, but as the Mayans might have actually said “That the world is changing from the way we have known it”. There are thousands flocking to purify their souls or welcoming the new lease of life by blind faith at the Mayan ruins. But you don’t need to go that far.

If you are glad that you are alive today, take that minute, hour or the day out and do what you need to!

Cup of Coffee

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, when you walk around as a zombie with coffee as your respite, remember the jar... and it's story...

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was. The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with an emphatic "yes." The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed. Now," said the professor, as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life.

The golf balls are the important things. Your family, your children, your faith, your health, your friends, and your favorite passions. Things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the other things that matter. Your job, your house, and your car.

The sand is everything else. The small stuff. "If you put the sand into the jar first," he continued, "there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness.Take care of the golf balls first, the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.

One of the students raised his hand and inquired what the coffee represented. The professor smiled.

"I'm glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend."

New Ad(age)

It's the beginning of the end if you believe any of those crappy prophecies. So if it is the last year let me put everything to use that I have learnt over the time to make the rest of the period a happy place and make it seem worthwhile. In an age where values, ethics and relations are broken quicker than new year resolutions, the question always pops up "Is it really worth it?". Days change and so do people and equations and it might all seem to troubling. Well here are a few "Quick Fixes" to bring about the desired new year transition.

The world was created for people to be loved and things to be used, but it is in a state of chaos coz of the reverse following. Try sticking to the actual rule!

If Time=Money then why isn't the gift of time revered by this society driven by a materialistic outlook. In my opinion the greatest gift you can give someone is your time coz you are giving them a part of your life which you will never get back. Value That!!

The happiest feeling is to see someone you care about smile and know that you are the reason behind it. So go ahead and set that straightness into a curve you'd love to see.

Words don't justify anything. So if you really mean it then prove it with your actions.

Feel free to voice yourself and take a stand against hypocrisy and for you righteous behaviour.

Sometimes you need to run away. Not to be alone but to see who cares enough to run behind you. The distance currently helped me understand that.

People who want to, make a way and the others make excuses. So I guess it's not that difficult to spot genuine people.

You don't love a person. You love those qualities that describe them. Once they cease to exist well so should the person for you. Stop fretting over changed attitude. Its anyway not the person u knew.

Never hurt people who love and care for you coz they will never hurt you back and they will have no option but to leave.

Don't run behind worldly acceptance. Care for those who really matter.

Don't just exist, Learn to live. Create your bucket list and go out and do all the things you wanted to.

I know we all make mistakes. I am proud to have made and learn from them for Life doesn't come with a user's manual.

If people criticize you, hurt you or shout at you, remember that in every game it's the audience that makes the noise and not the players. You gotta up your game

Choices are sacrifices we make. Don't blame it on circumstances for we always have a choice. Stand by them.

If you feel vindicated and that your trust was broken it is totally your fault to have put blind faith in someone.

A person who does not stand by his words is not to be respected or trusted.

The person who cares for you the most is the one stares back at you every day.

Respect people who find time for you in their busy schedule but love the ones who don't look at their schedule when you need them. They are the ones who truly care for you.

Don't fret too much. People who don't have time for you don't deserve your attention either.

And lastly its tough, but to be accepted that some people can stay in your heart and memories but not in your life. So move on.

So you see guys it really no reason to fret over things. Apply whichever of these solutions are applicable to you. This was from my experience. However Id like to know you adages and quick fixes as well.

P.S: Do include your names as always.Cheers!

Aam Zindagi

Moving a bit away from philosophy, I thought to write a bit about commonplace
observations and occurrences about regular humdrum.

1)Mom calls out enthusiastically "You got mail from USC"
I yell from the room "It must be UCSC and not USC"
Mom:"No its definitely USC, I think you have been accepted!!"
Me:"Let me apply there first Mom! and anyway this is just a brochure"
Mom:"They specially sent you a brochure, that means they are interested in accepting You :)"
Me:"Yeah Right" (frowns and leaves)

2)Dad is calling the office peon and inevitably my cousin sister answers the phone each time. Surprised he patiently waits for the peon to come back.

On his arrival I check his phone and to no surprise he had call Fwd on.

The peon by the way is a really dumb guy who just cannot get any instructions
correct. He comes and starts telling me that some machine is needed. I failed
to comprehend his signs and gesticulations. In the meantime my cousin sister comes
stating that she wanted the Blood Pressure Machine.

I ask my dad how could he bear with him considering he is so dumb. My Dad told
me just one sentence

"That is the reason why he is doing the job he is doing and not my job"

Which is true isnt it, that if they were so smart, they wouldn't be working as
peons.

3)Recently I was having sandwich at a stall in Parle East. There are these bunch
of irritating girls around and they made quite bold statements.

Sandwich guy:"Please 6Rs change do"
Girls:"Hum chillar nahin rakhthe...woh mummy apne chote baccho ko chillar deti hain"
"Hum sirf ekdum kadak wali notes rakhthe hain"

Now i am kind of perplexed on their audacity and whether to appreciate or criticize
their attitude.
One point of interest however is that is they dont keep chillar...why did they take
it from the sandwich guy!!

4) The following one was the most touching one

I was crossing the road in a hurry and this impoverished street dweller catches
my hand and holds me back from crossing in this hurry.
Astonished and kind of disgusted, I am just looking at her. She tells me
"Arrey itni jaldi mat karo...Zindagi bus or train se zyada important hain.
Har jagah sambhal kar aur dheere chaloge toh hamari jaisi halat nahin hogi"

Its true, that many of us move too quick, and I just dont mean the roads.
I will definitely write more in detail about this one.


So thats it guys, how minuscule things in your everyday lives tick your grey cells
to entertain you or to teach you something.

P.S: Great to be back after a hiatus. Some asked me to tone down the language.
Hope the simplicity appeals.
Cheers!

What goes around comes back around

(Do have a look at first part of this "All good things come to an End")

It had only been a few weeks since it ended and it was already happening.
Time, blunting the edges of those sharp memories. You close your eyes to concentrate and remember the details.
With the passing time you would slowly tire of this exercise, finding it extremely excruciating to conjure up, to dust off, and to resuscitate once again what was long gone.
Soon there would be a day when you would no longer bewail the loss. The intrinsic details of the talks, the memories, the laughter, and the smiles would begin to slip from memory’s grip.
The ache of the absence would become the unremitting companion like the phantom pain of an amputee.

But is that all to it?

The previous article said that “All good things do come to end”. Well yes they do but the end could be bitter or sweet. Either way you would want things to come back the same way to feel exulted or to settle your scores.

It’s the clandestine law of the universe. The majestic planets also cannot escape it.
Moving around the source of their existence, they come through a full circle. Revolving through ages, testifying time and going through the same cycle of rotations and revolutions they speak out loud
“What goes around comes back around”

Sitting idle in physics lectures and daydreaming bought me ideas.
I am solving this sum on how two people start off together in a race and the velocities with which they are travelling and at what instant they will cross paths.
So figure this out, while you might have started running in the same or the opposite directions, there will be a time where at least once when you shall cross the paths again. There could be more than once when you shall have the same alignments like the planets do.
I mean even consider throwing anything up in the air; it’s bound to come down.

You could be physically travelling away from the situation you had, good or bad. However, here most of your good things end not because of a physical separation but because your thoughts and feelings run at a different speed than somebody else’s. But even the products of the gray matter will travel back and things will turn back

The bottom line being is simple; as much as you evade your feelings they will confront you again. The scores shall be settled and the ball shall be in your court.

Do I think it’s not really over? Well maybe not but yes even though its ended it shall come back again coz

“What goes around comes back around”

P.S-Please please do leave your thoughts guys..motivates me write.Cheers!

All Good Things come to an End

It seems as if it happened just yesterday. It was this same place and maybe the same time, the happiest moments of my life. Ecstasy and euphoria filled up my senses. Exulted by the fact that dreams do come true after all and gratification to an unknown force for delivering me what I wished for. Contented, that I wished for no more because this was the source of my happiness which put me on the seventh heaven. I believed that some things could be truly immortal but then a ray of light falls upon me like a realization, jolting me from my slumber that
“All good things come to an end”.
I reminisce those moments we created together, the nights to remember as I pass by those places. I walk away. I look back but I continue drifting apart. I question myself that am I just running around from the place or myself?
We must have experienced moments, events or people which we assumed to be perennial but little do we realize that a different game is being played by fate.
Silent tears roll down thy face feeling somber and trying to understand the rules of the game of fate.
I cannot evade the gloom because of the vacuum created by the moments and the people.
There is a feeling of acute emptiness as if there is a dementor around.
Ironical as it may seem but I fear treading those paths again. I would stay aloof and enjoy the ethereal way rather than bare my heart and soul again. I will fear experiencing those joyous ways for I shall always be anxious and dread that what I consider the best part of my life shall end and I’ll be left asking “Why Me?”
They say that “All that happens is for ones good”. But are you ready to waste the most important years of your life only to find out some 10-20 years later that what happened was beneficial. Good Deal?
For the people who have always been tormenting, you could very well try and comprehend the despair on the other side. And for the ones who have always been on the receiving end, “Is it really over?”


P.S- Watch out for the next part of this 2 part article. “What goes around comes around”