One afternoon while speaking to a friend about individualism, she suddenly asked me "Do you love yourself?". "Yes, very much", I replied. And then I asked myself, am I being selfish? May be I am. I thought back and I realized, I have never been ashamed or scared of calling myself selfish. Am I mean? In a sense I am. If one ever wanted volunteers to sacrifice a part of their living, in order to shape up someone else's, I'd probably be the last one to voluteer.
How does individualism, selfishness and meanness come togther? They don't. Not in their classical meanings. A school of thought says, if everyone just took care of one's self disregarding everyone else... mind you, everyone else, the world would be a better place. The only catch, and a big one, is that, no one is evil; no one is illicit or immoral!!!
Close doors on your expectations; open up to voluntary collaboration. Love yourself, more than anything!!!

Would the world have been any different if Einstein was born in 2089 instead of 1879? Would music have seized to exist if The Beatles weren't formed? Would the world still have been in darkness if Edison never lit his first bulb? Will the world be annihilated without the Apples and the Microsofts?
You might feel a strong urge to say Yes. But think again!!! Were Einstein or Edison the only scientists the world ever saw?
They say each one of us is unique. May be that's true... may be you have that tiny little edge over the other... may be there is someone with that very edge over you. If not you, the world would have found someone else to run the show. The show... does go on!!!

*My all due respect to all the great personalities/institutions/groups referred to in this blog.

James Farmer Jr.'s arguments in favor of "Civil disobedience is a moral weapon in fight for justice" from the movie "The great debaters".

In Texas, they lynch negros. My teammates and I saw a man strung up by his neck and set on fire. We drove to a lynch mob pressed our faces against the floor board. I looked at my team mates, i saw the fear in their eyes, remorse, the shame. What was this negros's crime, that he should be hung without a trial? Was he a theif? Was he a killer? or just a negro? Was he a share cropper? A preacher? And who are we to just lie there and do nothing? No matter what he did, the mob was the criminal. But the law did nothing. This set us wondering, why? My opponent says, nothing that erodes the rule or law can be moral. But there is no rule or law in the south. Not when we negros are denied housing, turned away from school, hospitals and not when we are lynched. St. Augustine said, an unjust law is no law at all. Which means I have a right, even a duty to resist, with violence or civil disobedience. You should pray I choose the latter.

Howard Roark's Courtroom Speech From The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand

Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light. But he left them a gift they had not conceived and he had lifted darkness off the earth.
Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads armed with nothing but their own vision. The great creators—the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors—stood alone against the men of their time. Every great new thought was opposed. Every great new invention was denounced. But the men of unborrowed vision went ahead. They fought, they suffered and they paid. But they won.
No creator was prompted by a desire to please his brothers, his brothers hated the gift he offered. His truth was his only motive. His work was his only goal. His work not those who used it. His creation, not the benefits others derived from it. The creation which gave form to his truth. He held his truth above all things and against all men. He went ahead whether others agreed with him or not, with his integrity as his only banner. He served nothing and no one. He lived for himself. And only by living for himself was he able to achieve the things which are the glory of mankind. Such is the nature of achievement.
Man cannot survive except through his mind. He comes on earth unarmed. His brain is his only weapon. But the mind is an attribute of the individual. There is no such thing as a collective brain. The man who thinks, must think and act on his own. The reasoning mind cannot work under any form of compulsion. It cannot be subordinated to the needs, opinions or wishes of others. It is not an object of sacrifice.
The creator stands on his own judgement, the parasite follows the opinions of others. The creator thinks the parasite copies. The creator produces the parasite loots
The creator's concern is the conquest of nature. The parasite's concern is the conquest of men. The creator requires independence; he neither serves nor rules. he deals with men by free exchange and voluntary choice. The parasite seeks power. He wants to bind all men together in common action and common slavery. He claims that man is only a tool for the use of others. That he must think as they think, act as they act and live in selfless, joyless, servitude to any need but his own.
Look at history, everything we have, every great achievement has come from the independent work of some independent mind. Every horror and destruction came from attempt to force men into a herd of brainless souless robots, without personal rights, without personal ambitions, without will, hope or dignity.
It is an ancient conflict. It has another name, "The individual against the collective". Our country, the noblest country in the history of men, was based on the principle of individualism. The principle of man's inalienable rights. It was the country where the men was free to seek his own happiness, to gain and produce, not to give up and renounce; to prosper, not to starve, to achieve, not to plunder, to hold as his highest possession a sense of his personal value and as his highest virtue his self respect. Look at the results, that is what the collectivists are now asking you to destroy, as much as the earth has been destroyed.
I am an architect. I know what is to come by the principle on which it is built. We are approaching a world in which I cannot permit myself to live.
My ideas are my property. They were taken from me by force, by breach of contract. No appeal was left to me. It was believed that my work belonged to others to do with as they pleased. They had a claim upon me without my consent, that it was my duty to serve them without choice or reward.
Now you know why I dynamited Cortlandt. I designed Cortlandt. I made it possible. I destroyed it.
I agreed to design for the purpose of seeing it built as I wished. That was the price I set for my work. I was not paid.
My building was disfigured at the whim of others who took all the benefits of my work and gave me nothing in return. I came here to say that I do not recognize anyone's right to one minute of my life, nor to any part of my energy, nor to any achievement of mine, no matter who makes the claim.
It had to be said, the world is perishing from an orgy of self sacrifising. I came here to be heard in the name of evey man of independence still left in the world. i wanted to stake my terms. I do not care to work or live on any others. My terms are, "A man's right to exist for his own sake".

Watch video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc7oZ9yWqO4

Complete Speech: http://www.nasonart.com/personal/lifelessons/fountainhead.html

I started off writing something about rock music.. May be advocate this form of music a bit, to those who haven't tried and those who call it "Noise". But I failed to make the right begining.
I guess i'd have this to be a forum to share ideas n opinions.
Some of my friends call me a "Creed worshiper"!!! Did u just say "what is that?"
Well "Creed" is a rock band... or should i say "was" a rock band... Scott Stapp the lead singer, Mark Tremonti the guitarist and Scott philips the drummer... I've always loved rock music for the passion and energy it bears...for the kind of purging it does to my mind and soul... for the kind of serenity it bring along... Creed added a new dimension to my philosophy of life...
Check out extracts from some of their songs...
-----

1) Higher from Human Clay
When dreaming I'm guided through another world
Time and time again
At sunrise I fight to stay asleep
'Cause I don't want to leave the comfort of this place
'Cause there's a hunger, a longing to escape
From the life I live when I'm awake
So let's go there
Let's make our escape
Come on, let's go there
Let's ask can we stay?
Can you take me higher?
To the place where blind men see
Can you take me higher?
To the place with golden streets

2) Don't stop dancing - Weathered
At times life is wicked and I just cant
See the light
A silver lining sometimes isnt enough
To make some wrongs seem right
Whatever life brings
Ive been through everything
And now Im on my knees

But I know I must go on
Although I hurt I must be strong
Because inside I know that many
Feel this way

Children dont stop dancing
Believe you can fly
Awayaway

3) One Last Breath - Weathered
Please come now I think I'm falling
I'm holding to all I think is safe
It seems I found the road to nowhere
And I'm trying to escape
I yelled back when I heard thunder
But I'm down to one last breath
And with it let me say
Let me say

Hold me now
I'm six feet from the edge and I'm thinking
That maybe six feet
Ain't so far down
-----
My own prison, human clay and Weathered are the albums by Creed in order of their release. Scott stapps later went solo with "The Great Divide" and Tremonti and Philips started playing for "Alter Bridge"...

I and my friend often talk about it... sometimes jokingly... sometimes on a bit of a serious note... But when I sit back and think to myself... it really appears like a question I can't find an answer to...
Going to work, hanging around with friends, movies, malls, coffee shops, ice cream parlours... is this what a life is meant to be?
Some say, its the sense of achievement in what one does...
some say, its the path OR the process of what one does...
some say, the purpose of ones' life is to give back to the society and our near and dear ones...
....
...
..
Definitions and more definitions is all I have found... but nothing convincing enough.
May be I'm too small and stupid to ponder on this... may be its too early...
but I guess it would be nice to wake up in the morning, all geared up; knowing what u're gonna do and exactly "why"...
I guess it would be nice to breathe ones' last, with the believe that ones' life hasn't gone waste...
if only...