Who wants to be a winner?

God: Hey Lokesh, you are here at studio cosmos to play “Who Wants to be a Winner”. Play well.

Lokesh: I hope so.

God: More than the hope, I want you to always play to the best of your ability. Ready or not, the game starts now.

Question 1: You wake up one morning and find that the newspaper delivered is ripped vertically half on all the pages, and that none of the articles and posts are complete, some are without a beginning, others are without an end. Would you believe something is amiss?

Answer: No.

Question 2: At the supermarket they are promoting a shampoo which suggests, “Use only on the scalp, any contact with the hair can cause baldness”. Would you find that product mindless?

Answer: No.

Question 3: On driving to the gas station, the attendant fills 25 litres fuel and refuses to fill any more, but charges for the full tank capacity of 50 litres. Would you feel cheated?

Answer: No.

Question 4: You take membership of a new gym which is advertised as 24x7. Few days into the membership, one morning you reach gym and it is locked. The notice on the gate reads, “Gym will henceforth stay close on any number of random days of the week. The management decision is binding.” Would you consider this as an unethical business practice?

Answer: No.

Question 5: You go to a cafeteria and order for a chai latte. The man over the counter erroneously serves you a coffee instead. You don’t like coffee, nor did you order one, as you bring this to the attendant’s notice, he nonchalantly tells you that the coffee can’t be returned now and instead you owe more money because coffee is priced higher than the chai latte. Would you find his behaviour nonsensical?

Answer: No.

Question 6: You reach the Cineplex to watch a new release. At interval the management announces that since the post interval portion of the movie is unavailable, the pre interval portion will be played again in the second half too. Would that logic appear silly to you?

Answer: No.

Question 7: You buy a best seller. After reading about 100 pages, you find out that the next 100 are blank and only the end chapters are slightly noticeable. You go back to the book store but the uninterested clerk interestingly imparts wisdom that be it any story, only the start and the end matter, the middle is of no consequence and suggests you read the book more as a time pass rather than trying to make any sense of it. You know that the gist of the story is in the pages that went missing. Would his reply be inappropriately audacious?

Answer: No.

Question 8: You go to a fancy salon which is advertising a 50% off on the pedicure treatment. It’s only afterwards that you become aware that the 50% off really meant pedicure of one foot but full charges. Would this cunningness alarm you?

Answer: No.

Question 9: During a routine servicing of your car at the service station, they clean and wash only the right side of the car. You are told that since the car is a right hand drive and no one sits on the left side, it doesn’t make sense to service the complete car. Would you realize that you are being misled?

Answer: No.

Question 10: Statistically speaking, 50% of all the wise people who know you consider you as dumb. The remaining others think that you are numb. You can’t differentiate between dumb and numb, and nor do you care. Have you ever wondered what makes them different and you indifferent?

Answer: No

God: Here we will take a small breather; we will be right back after this very short commercial break from our prime sponsors, Eternal Universe.

[During the break]

God: Such lame senseless answers. Why?

Lokesh: There was no course material that I could refer to, no phone a friend, no audience poll; what else did you expect from me? This sure is a tough game for a loner.

God: No wonder the wise in their profound wisdom believe that you are dumb and numb. I designed this game and it is a simple Yes or No game. Just like everyone else, you have a Free Will, use it along with the judgement and say yes where yes the answer is and say no where no the answer is. Situations, people and their bias neither help nor deter the winning my child. Anyhow, are you enjoying the game until now?

Lokesh: Err… No… But coming here to studio cosmos seems good enough.

God: Sorry, what? I don’t understand what “good enough” means. Does it mean to imply that you are having a good time or does it mean to convey that you have had enough of playing the game?

Lokesh: To be honest, my mind was in inertia after the first few questions, I was giving a standard reply to all the questions without even going into the individual merits, maybe it was the fear of answering wrong, maybe I was hoping to hit the elusive bulls eye with law of average. Basically, after a while, I had stopped believing I will win this.

God: Your lack of faith saddens me. If you choose to believe in YOU, and have the WILL, I shall see that you WIN. All you need to do is to apply the common sense. Don’t let the fear of answering wrong stop you from making an honest attempt. Exercise intuition, logic, and reasoning. At no point ever will you need the psychic capability; all that is essential is proper usage of the grey matter. Forget the sixth sense; start using the other five senses. I envision everything big for you, don’t settle for less, neither accept nor apply half measures when you play. Surrender only to my force, not to the game. I brought you here, in cosmos, to win, don’t fail me by not playing for the win. You can still win, there are many more questions to be answered as we go forward, but will you accept to use your brains, follow my divine guidance, surrender to my force and stop playing like a fool?

Lokesh: Yes.

God: Finally. It is the first yes I have heard you mouth all the while that you have been here. Am glad you realize that I have blessed you with a mind and a Free Will, for you to choose your answer other than an indifferent and monotonous No. Let’s play. Shall we?

Lokesh: Yes. And this time, I assure you that I will play to the best of my ability.

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Dear God, Dear Universe, Even though to the wise that surround me, may they always stay blessed, I am an epitome of dumbness and numbness, yet I am aware that the answer to each of the above questions should have been an emphatic YES. I have no explanation to why time and again I compromised rationalism, abandoned logic and accepted half measures where it mattered most when I don’t even accept or apply the same in the mundane. Yes, I plead guilty of entangling my soul believing it was in chains even though you had willed it to be free. Yes, I no longer live in denial. Yes, this awakening is the first step of a long journey. Yes, I will keep walking. I will keep walking towards you; towards positive and that in it will take me away from the entire negative. I am in gratitude, thanks for guiding me, I have learned and I am still learning, please help me evolve, help me become what you wanted me to be. Please let me find all answers within and never without. I release, I let go, I surrender, and I relax. I am open to and am receiving your divine guidance in its divine timing. I resolve to stay centred in goodness. I affirm that I will truly impart all that I have learnt and that I will learn in future, to my baby, my Gucha, my love angel, Kaynaat. In your grace, I will strive hard to protect her welfare with all my might yet at no point will I ever try to limit her learning to my learning or confine her wisdom with my limited knowledge. Bless her God, that at no stage of life she makes the mistake that I made, may she learn to compromise but never ever may she make it a habit to compromise, and with it compromise with life per se. Bless her, may she never accept nor apply half measures, neither small nor big. Bless her, may she always find strength in your divinity and stays liberate and literate. Surely at times she too shall learn to graciously accept the accomplishments to build upon along with learning to graciously accept the hindrances, and to move on. Surely the disappointments will teach her the value of success, but I affirm that I to the best of my ability and love will nurture her into confidence and self-reliance that she won’t gaffe in mistaking any setback as the benchmark. She will fly high and won’t be frightful ever of the cages that don’t even exist. She will have no fear other than the fear of God. So help me God, Amen.