Skip to main content

Inspiration for beginners

 


Book Review

Title: Inner Feelings

Author: Cindy D’Silva

Format: PDF E-book

Dag Hammarskjold’s Markings is the best diary I have ever read. I don’t think he wrote it with the intention of publishing. It is a collection of the author’s personal inner struggles. The entries started when the author was 20 years old and ended at his death by a plane crash at the age of 56. The entries reveal the deep psychological and spiritual struggles that the author passed through and the lessons he learnt from them. You will find such gems as “Never measure the height of a mountain, until you have reached the top. Then you will see how low it was.” And “Like the bee, we distil poison from honey for our self-defence…”

I was reminded of this classical diary while reading Cindy D’Silva’s short e-book whose entire title is Understand and Accept Your Inner Feelings to embrace life wholeheartedly. This is not to suggest that this book reaches Hammarskjold’s profundity. But there is the striving. There is a strong desire to overcome the hurdles on the way and conquer heights. Moreover, the book reads like a personal diary written in order to come to terms with the author’s own inner struggles.

Look, for example, at this observation on guilt: “No, I’m not perfect. As a parent and spouse who takes care of numerous tasks, including the 2-minute jobs in between them, I have sometimes: 1. Burnt utensils to charcoal; 2. Slept through a messy house…” It’s a pretty long list which concludes with the counsel: “You see, no one is SUPERHUMAN. We just organize our priorities differently…”

Occasionally there is poetic irony in the writing. “I wanted to be an actor or a model but did not grow more than 5 feet.” At times there is pain. “Some people probably thought it was a joke but sadly their words stuck with me and gave me such low confidence that I could barely introduce myself without a pounding heart.” The confessional vein juts out sometimes. “When I wanted to lose the fat which I felt wobbling every time I danced, I tried hitting the gym and got bored in two weeks. I preferred sitting and hogging in front of the idiot box instead.”

The book presents 27 themes for the reader’s contemplation. The themes vary from ‘appreciation’ to ‘passion’, ‘hope’ to ‘vanity’, and ‘gaslighting’ to ‘gossiping’. The blurb ‘warns’ the reader not to read the pages in a hurry. “Take your time and read it,” it counsels, “feel it and absorb it.”

The book, in other words, is not for casual reading. It is not even meant for enhancing one’s knowledge about the themes. It is meant to inspire, to make one meditate, to help one introspect and improve oneself.

Having said that, I must add that I was left finally with the impression that the author could have made it a little less preachy and more suggestive. Of course, the style and tone of a book depend largely on the targeted readership. This book seems to be meant for novices in self-exploration.


The book can be downloaded here.

PS. The above book is part of the Blogchatter Ebook carnival and my own modest contribution to it is LIFE: 24 Essays, absolutely free to download.

 

Comments

  1. Cindy D'SilvaMay 25, 2021 at 1:05 PM

    Thank you for your kind words!! Appreciate it!! Love this 'It is meant to inspire, to make one meditate, to help one introspect and improve oneself.' ... For the novices in self exploration ... On the spot! Thanks!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownMay 26, 2021 at 7:33 AM

    I have downloaded the book, Yet not started to read. Your honest review is encouraging me to give it a read very soon! Thank you Sir!

    Archana
    archusblog

    ReplyDelete
  3. Rajeev MoothedathMay 28, 2021 at 11:22 AM

    Will take a cue and read this in a leisurely manner, slowly and deliberately.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Chinmayee Gayatree SahuMay 30, 2021 at 1:31 PM

    I have downloaded the book and will start reading it soon. Your review has given me a direction.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Kratika DixitJune 20, 2021 at 2:27 PM

    I am glad to know about you sir :)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

From a Teacher’s Diary

Henry B Adams, American historian and writer, is believed to have said that “one never knows where a teacher’s influence ends.” As a teacher, I have always striven to keep that maxim in mind while dealing with students. Even if I couldn’t wield any positive influence, I never wished to leave a scar on the psyche of any student of mine. Best of intentions notwithstanding, we make human errors and there may be students who were not quite happy with me especially since I never possessed even the lightest shade of diplomacy. Tactless though I was, I have been fortunate, as a teacher, to have a lot of good memories returning with affection from former students. Let me share the most recent experience. A former student’s WhatsApp message yesterday carried two PDF attachments. One was the dissertation she wrote for her graduation. The other was a screenshot of the Acknowledgement. “A special mention goes to Mr Tomichan Matheikal, my English teacher in higher secondary school, whose moti...
10 comments
Read more

Waiting for the Mahatma

Book Review I read this book purely by chance. R K Narayan is not a writer whom I would choose for any reason whatever. He is too simple, simplistic. I was at school on Saturday last and I suddenly found myself without anything to do though I was on duty. Some duties are like that: like a traffic policeman’s duty on a road without any traffic! So I went up to the school library and picked up a book which looked clean. It happened to be Waiting for the Mahatma by R K Narayan. A small book of 200 pages which I almost finished reading on the same day. The novel was originally published in 1955, written probably as a tribute to Mahatma Gandhi and India’s struggle for independence. The edition that I read is a later reprint by Penguin Classics. Twenty-year-old Sriram is the protagonist though Gandhi towers above everybody else in the novel just as he did in India of the independence-struggle years. Sriram who lives with his grandmother inherits significant wealth when he turns 20. Hi...
9 comments
Read more

Water as Weapon

A scene from Kerala The theme chosen for their monthly blog hop by friends Manali Desai and Sukaina Majeed is water, particularly because March 22 is World Water Day. It is of vital importance to discuss the global water crisis because as the motto of Delhi Jal Board says: Jal hi Jeevan hai , Water is Life . The crisis is only going to become more and more acute as we move on. With a global population clocking 8.5 billion by 2030, the demand for fresh water will rise sharply, especially in urban areas. The climate change, particularly rising temperatures, prolonged droughts, and erratic rainfall patterns, will add significantly to the problem. Ground water is getting depleted in many countries. Consequently, water is likely to be a strategic asset in the near future. Powerful individuals, corporations, and nations may use it as a weapon in several ways. Rivers can be blocked with dams and water supply to neighbouring nations can be manipulated. Ethiopia’s Grand Renaissance Dam o...
9 comments
Read more

The Pope and a Prostitute

I started reading the autobiography of Pope Francis a few days back as mentioned in an earlier post that was inspired by chapter 2 of the book. I’m reading the book slowly, taking my own sweet time, because I want to savour every line of this book which carries so much superhuman tenderness. The book ennobles the reader. The fifth chapter describes a few people of his barrio that the Pope knew as a young man. Two of them are young “girls” who worked as prostitutes. “But these were high-class,” the Pope adds. “They made their appointments by telephone, arranged to be collected by automobile.” La Ciche and La Porota – that’s what they were called. “Years went by,” the Pope writes, “and one day when I was now auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires, the telephone rang in the bishop’s palace. It was la Porota who was looking for me.” Pope Francis was meeting her after many years. “Hey, don’t you remember me? I heard they’ve made you a bishop.” She was a river in full flow, says the Pope....
8 comments
Read more

Love Affair of Pearl Spot

AI-generated I am not fond of fish. Fish doesn’t taste like fish, that’s the reason. We get adulterated fish most of the time. In Kerala, my state, traders are reported to use formalin for preserving the freshness of fish. Formalin is used for preserving dead bodies by embalming. You will find me in a fish stall once in a while, though. My cats want fish occasionally, that’s why. Not that they are particularly fond of it. For a change from the regular pellets and packaged wet foods, all delivered promptly by Amazon. Even cats love a change. Most of the time, the entire fish that I buy is consumed by my cats. So much so, Maggie and I have come to think that fish is cat food, not human food. People may have different reasons for not eating any particular food. One of the most endearing reasons I heard recently is that fish is a symbol of the voiceless. People commit atrocities on fish, this person said [I forget who – I read it a couple of weeks back on Magzter]. They suffocate it ...
11 comments
Read more