It's never too late

Category: Uncategorized

  • What you seek is seeking you – Rumi

    A reflection from a coastal cycling tour through India

    Daily writing prompt
    What’s a quote that perfectly describes your outlook on life?
    View all responses

    There’s a particular kind of silence you find on a coastal road early in the morning – before the fishing boats go out, before the heat settles in, when the only sound is your tires on wet tarmac and the sea breathing somewhere just out of sight. I’ve been chasing that silence for days now, thinking I was chasing distance. Kilometers logged, villages and towns crossed off, a finish line somewhere further North. But somewhere between the backwaters and the temple towns, I realized the math was wrong. This trip was never really about the distance.

    I keep thinking about that quote — “What you seek is seeking you.”

    I used to read it as something poetic and a little abstract, the kind of thing you nod at without really feeling it. But out here, it’s stopped being abstract. It happened in small, specific ways. The old fisherman who waved me in for chai without either of us saying much, because some hospitality doesn’t need language. The sudden monsoon shower that soaked me completely and somehow felt like a blessing instead of an inconvenience. The stretch of empty beach at dawn that I didn’t plan to stop at, but stopped at anyway, because something about the light made it impossible to keep riding.

    None of that was on my route plan. I didn’t seek it out. Not directly. But it found me anyway, at exactly the moment I needed it, as if the coast knew something about my pace and my mood before I did.

    I think that’s the real shape of a journey like this. About life. You set out looking for scenery, or fitness, or solitude, or whatever story you told yourself or goal you set before you started. And the road and life gives you that, sure. But it also gives you the things you didn’t know to ask for – the encounters, the weather, the stillness. Somehow those end up mattering more than anything you planned.

    So maybe seeking isn’t just an act of chasing something forward. Maybe it’s also a kind of opening , a willingness to be met. The horizon doesn’t just wait at the end of the road. It moves toward you, a little, every single day, if you’re paying enough attention to notice.

  • Taking the middle ground

    My dreams have changed over time. As I grew older, they matured. Now that I’m approaching my senior years, I realize that my biggest dream has, hopefully, evolved into something more reasonable — from wanting to come first in class, to becoming a good scientist, to doing well in my career, to publishing papers, to earning patents. Those were all dreams that made sense at their particular time.But my biggest dream now — the one I believe will last — is to take the middle ground: to be happy with what I’ve achieved, without either chasing more or renouncing everything. To me, this means living minimalistically — not out of restraint or deprivation, but by deliberately choosing to keep only what truly adds value and letting go of the rest. It is a choice for simplicity, not a sacrifice, and in that simplicity, I find real contentment. I believe this balance brings peace to the individual, and on a larger scale, leads to less conflict in society, a cleaner environment, and ultimately, a more sustainable planet. That has become my biggest dream.

  • Before the Dice comes to Rest

    Life is, in many ways, a roll of the dice.

    A person buys a lottery ticket and wins a fortune. Another places a bet and loses everything. Yet gambling is not confined to casinos or games of chance. Every living moment contains an element of uncertainty.

    A child runs across a busy road. A vehicle passes a second earlier—or a second later. A surgeon, exhausted after a difficult day, makes a momentary error. A routine operation becomes a tragedy. An unexpected illness appears in someone who has lived carefully, while another person neglects their health and survives into old age. We make plans, calculate risks, and convince ourselves that we are in control, but chance remains an invisible participant in every human life.

    This does not mean that our choices are meaningless. We may not control everything that happens to us, but we can still control, at least to some extent, how honestly, responsibly, and compassionately we act.

    The uncertainty of life should not become an excuse for carelessness or wrongdoing. On the contrary, it should make us more thoughtful. When we know what is right, we should try to do it—especially when doing the opposite would be easier, more profitable, or more convenient.

    We cannot command destiny. We cannot guarantee that good actions will bring good outcomes or that bad actions will always be punished. Sometimes decent people lose, and sometimes dishonest people prosper. That too is part of life’s unpredictability.But perhaps the purpose of doing the right thing is not to control the result. It is to remain true to ourselves despite not knowing the result.

    The dice will continue to roll. What they reveal may never be entirely in our hands. But the manner in which we face the outcome—and the choices we make before the dice come to rest—still belong to us.

  • Does there have to be a reason?

    Daily writing prompt
    Do you think everything happens for a reason?
    View all responses

    I have come to believe that everything happens for a reason. Some events arise from conscious effort – the choices we make, the risks we take, and the work we put into our lives. Others emerge quietly from forces we do not fully understand – chance, timing, instinct, circumstance, or the unconscious movements of the mind.

    When I am delayed, I sometimes wonder whether the delay has altered something – a meeting, an encounter, or an event that might otherwise have unfolded differently. The reason may lead to something good, or it may protect me from something difficult. I may never know. Yet the possibility reminds me that life is shaped not only by what I intend, but also by what lies beyond my awareness.

    The same is true of winning and losing. A victory may encourage us, but it may also test our humility. A loss may disappoint us, yet redirect us toward a path we would never have considered. What appears unfortunate in one moment may reveal its meaning only much later.

    Believing that events have a reason does not mean surrendering responsibility or refusing to act. We must still make decisions, work sincerely, and accept the consequences of our choices. But we must also recognise that our control is limited. We influence life; we do not command it.

    Perhaps “wisdom” lies in holding both truths together – to act with intention, yet remain open to uncertainty; to pursue what we believe is right, yet accept that life may lead us elsewhere.

    We like to imagine that we control the journey, but often we understand the road only after we have travelled it.

  • The Roads Along the Sea: The Malabar and Coromandel Coast (Kindle version being released on August 15th on Amazon)