Entries by Surendra James Conti

What’s Holding You Back?

Maybe it’s how you were taught to get ahead. I was raised to compete. “It’s every man for himself out there,” my dad used to say, “To get ahead, you have to outdo the next guy.” That’s how I was groomed to get what I wanted. Top of the list: to live the American Dream. […]

Still Trying to get It Right

I keep hearing these days that happiness is a choice. Apparently, it’s up to me to make it happen. “Okay,” says I, “I’ll give it a try.” I decide to decide to be happy. Then along comes a crappy encounter, and I react in my usual crappy-encounter sort of way. I get upset, and I’m […]

Ignorance: Bliss or Beware?

We’ve all heard it said that ignorance is bliss, and that what you don’t know can’t hurt you. But what you don’t know can hurt you. It can even kill you. I dare say that most of the people who die every year, die of some form of ignorance, whether slowly from decades of poor […]

Shiva’s Dance

In Hindu legend, Lord Shiva is depicted as Nataraja, lord of the dance that destroys the old and weary ways of the world. Whether by wisdom or whim, Shiva decides what must go, and with wild and ecstatic abandon, he performs its obliteration. His purpose, though widely misunderstood, is release of the soul from its […]

In Short…

Sadness comes of missing what is no longer there or never was: a lover, friend, material gain, a piece of the past, a harmony or wholeness. It may be what we have lost, or what we have wanted and cannot have. But beneath this sadness is a truth awaiting discovery, a truth that is meant […]