Book Summary : The Power of Now

An excellent summary of the book : The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle by Andy is here:

https://www.clues.life/book-reviews/the-power-of-now

Andy's site https://clues.life/ is a great resource as well

Ennui

"For too long we have been dreaming a dream from which we are now
waking up: the dream that if we just improve the socioeconomic
situation of people, everything will be okay, people will become
happy. The truth is that as the struggle for survival has subsided,
the question has emerged: survival for what? Ever more people today
have the means to live, but no meaning to live for." - Viktor E Frankl

Book Excerpt : Its not about the bike

This is an extract from the book "It's not about the bike, My journey back to life" on Lance Armstrong the seven time Tour-de-France champion:-

THE QUESTION THAT LINGERS IS, HOW MUCH WAS I A factor in my own survival, and how much was science, and how much miracle?
I don't have the answer to that question. Other people look to me for the answer, I know. But if I could answer it, we would have the cure for cancer, and what's more, we would fathom the true meaning of our existences. I can deliver motivation, inspiration, hope, courage, and counsel, but I can't answer the unknowable. Personally, I don't need to try. I'm content with simply being alive to enjoy the mystery.
Good joke:
A man is caught in a flood, and as the water rises he climbs to the roof of his house and waits to be rescued. A guy in a motorboat comes by and he says, "Hop in, I'll save you."
"No, thanks," the man on the rooftop says. "My Lord will save me."
But the floodwaters keep rising. A few minutes later, a rescue plane flies overhead and the pilot drops a line.
"No, thanks," the man on the rooftop says. "My Lord will save me." But the floodwaters rise ever higher, and finally, they overflow the roof and the man drowns.
When he gets to heaven, he confronts God.
"My Lord, whey didn't you save me?" he implores.
"You idiot," God says. "I sent you a boat, I sent you a plane".
I think in a way we are all just like the guy on the rooftop. Things take place, there is a confluence of events and circumstances, and we can't always know their purpose, or even if there is one,. But we can take responsibility for ourselves and be brave.

Vivekanda's paper on Hinduism

This is a link to the paper on Hinduism presented by Swami Vivekananda,
at the World parliament of Religion at Chicago, 19th September 1893.
http://www.theuniversalwisdom.org/hinduism/paper-on-hinduism-vivekananda/
Bear with the considerably large no. of typos in this version.

Here are some of the lines that I liked:-

"Lord, I do not want wealth nor children nor learning. If it be Thy
will, I shall go from birth to birth; but grant me this, that I
may love Thee without the hope of reward - love unselfishly for
love’s sake."

"Unity in variety is the plan of nature, and the Hindu has
recognized it. Every other religion lays down certain fixed dogmas
and tries to force society to adopt them. It places before society
only one coat which must fit Jack and John and Henry, all alike.
If it does not fit John or Henry he must go without a coat to
cover his body. The Hindus have discovered that the absolute can
only be realized, or thought of, or stated through the relative,
and the images, crosses, and crescents are simply so many symbols
- so many pegs to hang spiritual ideas on. It is not that this
help is necessary for everyone, but those that do not need it have
no right to say that it is wrong. Nor is it compulsory in
Hinduism."

Verses from Gita - 3.27

प्रक्रितेह् क्रियमानानि गुनैहि कर्मानि सर्वशह्
अहन्कारविमुदात्मा कर्ताहमिति मन्यते

అహన్కారము యొక్క్ ప్రభావముచె కలత్ నోన్దిమ్పబదిన జివాత్మ
నిజముగ భౌతిక ప్రక్రితి యొక్క త్రిగునములచె చెయబదిన కర్మలకు తానె కర్తనని భావిన్చును.
(Translated by P.C Bhaktivedaanta Swamy (ISKCON founder))

Universe as a state machine

Was reading this book "Things a computer scientist rarely talks about" by Donald E. Knuth. In the book he ponders
about the existence of God and whether the universe is deterministic. He also mentions
the possibility of the Universe being a big state-machine. Or is it a huge cluster of
state-machines interacting with each other. If that is the case then SUPPOSING we
get to know the transition rules of the state machines then it could be possible to
predict our future :-). This makes me think of astrology and the art of prophecy. In astrology (AFAIK) the future is predicted on the basis of the positions of the stars
and other celestial bodies. And astrology is an old science. So long time ago itself this question had occurred to those founders of astrology, that can we predict future? And they tried to answer that.

WorldWide Catalog

Came across this largest online catalog of books, linking all the libraries worldwide.
It helps me in finding for books/videos/magazines etc. in my local libraries. This will
be very useful to me considering the fact that I dont have my own medium of transport and the public transport system here in the bay area is not good. So I would only go to the library if the book is available.
Found that currently libraries from only a few countries were linked. And there is not
even a single library from India :-). Currently, there are
over 10,000 libraries connected.
I was initially thinking when would Indian libraries have a similar kind of step. Wait are there any community libraries at all India? Except for the bigs cities and that too may be a couple of libraries in them. The situation is pretty bad :-(

Importance of Punctuations

This ones about the importance of punctuations in a language in it's written
form

    - from the book "Eats, shoots and leaves" by Lynne Truss

A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it,
then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.
"Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards
the exit. The panda produces a badly puncutated wildlife
manual and tosses it over his shoulder.

"I'm a panda," he says, at the door. "Look it up."

The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough,
finds an explanation.

"Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to
China. Eats, shoots and leaves."