Mental Peace

There are times at random, when your mental harmony is disturbed for no reason whatsoever. Or that is what it apparently looks like.

Upon closer observation of yourself, you begin to understand the nature of the problem. Once you have identified, you can solve it easily.

The mental harmony cannot be restored by external factors, nor can it be disturbed by external factors. It is something that you need to restore through soul-searching, resolving internal conflicts, introspection etc. All this can happen when you spend some time with your self.

My mental equilibrium was suddenly disturbed yesterday for no apparent reason. Something had happened at the office front, and I was about to go into the same old trap. But after spending some quality time alone, with my self today I could control it.

I will act on things asap - without critically over-analyzing and over-assessing things. I will limit my thinking to things of the present, rather than the past. Future is what I make of present, so I am not worried much about it.

Flying is for lazy people

After many days today, I went for a morning walk with my cousin. On our way back, I shared my thought about how spectacular it must be to fly around.

To which he promptly replied, "Flying is for lazy people who do not like to run/ jog!". He continued, "What's there - you just have to think about it and you start flying. While running, you actually exercise. That's better."

I had no answer to this. I think I was too shocked to hear it. Perhaps, I had expected him to empathize with me and say, "Yeah, how interesting it must to be like Superman!".

But anyway, I guess, there is nothing right or wrong - only opinions. I just kept the possibilities of flying to myself and felt happier later.

Not a child anymore

Last Sunday my mom and my wife had organised a ceremony for our daughter. It was basically an all-ladies and all-children event. Gents had nothing to do it. So my cousin bro, my dad and I planted ourselves in front of the TV in our bedroom.

However, I was the official photographer of the program. This is when the reality dawned on me. When I was clicking photos of the event and the people, it struck me that I wasn't a child anymore. I took a moment to register that. "I wasn't a child anymore," I thought again.

Just few years back, my friends would come over to celebrate my birthday. I was still cutting cakes and singing 'Happy Birthday to me!". And now, there were children who had assembled for an event of my daughter! WOW! I have really grown.

Celebrating Birthdays was the in-thing for me. But the fact that Birthdays brought out the child in me, excited me even more. I used to prepare a list of 'buddies' coming over to celebrate, mom and dad would ask me about the food to prepare and what gifts I wanted. But now, I would be doing it for my daughter.

All my buddies have grown up and married, having to take of their spouses. Celebrating Birthdays 'together' seems a distant reality, with the responsibility of 'our family' resting on our inexperienced shoulders. No, something has to be done about it. Some sort of celebration, may be a get together. With everyone involved in it. I will be a child again.

I suddenly think about an earlier blog I wrote about 'Old Times', where I had stated my desire to meet my young self when I am old.

Really. Times change. People grow. You grow. :) It's all for good. Seriously. Godspeed.

Sales! Sales!

I am averse to going to shops which display 'Sales! Hurry.. Offer Till Stock Lasts!'. I am trying to assess why I think like that. I think I have at the back of my mind that this 'stock' is not the best of the lot. I buy things that last long and are of good quality. Therefore, sometimes, I overlook the cost factor and purchase something that is of the quality I want.

There's another issue: You are tempted to window shop in these places initially. You visit these shops, and end up shopping way over your budget. Which is funny, you never went in with a budget because you were just window shopping. In hindsight, during this fast-paced, and sometimes mindless, shopping you end up having things you may not like, and sometimes things you don't need.

I remember some catchy lines to grab some attention: "Buy 2, Get 10!". What they are actually saying is, if you buy 2 items, you get 8 items on them, which totals to 10. The salesman had clarified it to me once.

The pace at which these shops are mushrooming around, I am begining to change my mind. They are actually making money! They have tied with companies to give them a huge cut on margins, so that they can offer bulf discounts to customers. It's a consumerist market afterall. Good for us! I already see 'Sales!' signs coming up on prominent brands like Adidas, Reebok, Arrow, Bata, Metro, and Fastrack showrooms. I had seen similar signs just 4 months back.

It's sometimes good to visit these places. You get to meet lot of old and new acquaintences at 'Sales!' shops. I am also going to visit these shops, but will be taking a considered decision and will purchase something I need.

Happy Shopping!

Old Times

Yesterday the following thought engulfed me: How must it be like to be old? How must our grandparents be feeling at that age of 65-70? Will I feel any different at 60? Hard to say, because I have not been through that experience.

Time-wise I would have grown, yes. At the family front, I might have become grand pa. But at the thought-level, at the mind-level, spiritual level, would I be any different than what I am? Hard to say. No clue whatsoever. Relativistically speaking, I have not grown in time with respect to myself.

I don't ask this question to senior citizens I meet, because of their seniority! But I want to ask someone, inquisitively, about how they felt when they were younger.

My journey of 28 yrs seems to have gone in a blink. On a computer you can create progressive versions of your files, and can subsequently view the changes/ modifications done in that file. In life, it does not happen. Every second, millions of varied inputs are acting on you, millions of improvizations taking place within you, millions of developments happening, millions of cells dying, millions of cells getting created, millions of thoughts shaping you into a better human being. But there's no way we are able to refer to our 'previous' version later... atleast for reference.

We just grow. Retaining memories which have influenced us in some way. Others, which have faded into oblivion.

There should be some way to compare notes between a person when he is young and when he is old. Someway, our young-self should be able to interact with our old-self or vice versa.

May be by the time I am 60, time travel would be a reality. And I would re-visit 8 Jan 2010, and meet myself to answer these questions.

Happy New Year 2010!

The New Year has come at the right time. I somehow resolved my 'self-generated' problems very recently and am taking life ahead with renewed vigor and enthusiasm. I am back, again!

This new year celebration was memorable. We had invited two of my closest friends and their families over to my place to celebrate the new year. And we did celebrate it well. We had prepared 'Misal Pav', a heavy Maharashtrian snack that is easy to cook and yummy to eat. All the credit goes to my wife, mom and dad. All the material supplies, logistics, transportation, preparation, serving, arrangement etc was done by them.

During these days, exactly when they needed me, I had to put in long hours at work due to high absenteeism. While work was satisfying, it was difficult to see the same 'satisfying' expression on my wife's and mom's face! Especially when I wasn't there to help them. They still managed well, naturally.

My wife's busy work schedule did not prevent her from making delicious 'Gaajar ka Halwa' for everyone. Those who know how to make it, also know how time-intensive it is. Of course, it was amazingly made!

All of us (totalling 3 families) appreciated the menu. The credit, I reiterate, goes to my wife, mom and dad. Considering that I did not contribute anywhere, I was happy that they just let me eat it!

My daughter has completed 7 months a day before the New Year's eve. And she carried herself really well! She was attentive, fun-filled and responsive. She was the centre of attraction at the event. With the little vocabulary and ample mischiefs she has mastered, she had put the place on fire. We just laughed, and laughed. It was an evening well spent.

After playing Antakshari for about 3 hours, we all got tired at 2am. We decided to call it a day and others left for their respective homes to have a good night's sleep. Me and wife realised it almost at the same time - how the hell are we going to get up at 6.30am to be able to go to office at 8am? With that pleasant thought, we just slept.

I woke up very late at around 9am with happy thoughts of last night's celebration. Somehow, I managed to get ready quickly to reach office at 10am, surprised to see that several others had reached late after their late-night celebrations.

The new year had arrived - with new hopes, new aspirations, new events, new celebrations, new thoughts, new ideas, and most importantly, NEW LIFE! Happy New Year, again! :)

Perception, Pretense and other Pastimes

From some days, I have been doing some soul searching.

Why is life the way it is? Could it be anyway different than what it is? What are others thinking about me? How will others react to my comments? Will others like my comments? Is he pretending to be what he is? What is his ulterior motive? Will others feel about what I am going to say? I have not been in touch with X person, what will he/she feel about it? Is this a good time to get in touch with X? Will X mind that I am getting in touch after ages?

All these questions, and many more, bothered me a lot for a very long time. I was too sceptical about expressing my own opinion, which is wierd because I always propogated that one should voice his/her opinion.

But sometimes you just need some 'time-out' from your routine. That is what I wanted. I was unable to focus on work, nor on family. Effectively, making me suffer in the process. I thought if I was able to spend time with myself for a while, I could sort out my messy life.

I was experiencing the widening communcation gap between my family, friends, near and dear ones. For no fault of theirs, I was going away from them, and I didn't know what to do. I just wanted the situation and my life in general to improve. I was neither opening up to others with my problems, nor solving it myself.

Somewhere I knew that I had the solution within me. Only, I was not able to find it. I was just moving along, without making any efforts to solve the problems. I was just waiting for things to get worse before I start controlling them. In this process, I was becoming more introvert and I was just growing an impenetrable shell around me. I had cut all communications with my friends and families, but still pretended that things were all fine.

Then came a point when I was no longer able to sustain the self-developed mountain of problems. I just had to find a solution. The phase of finding a solution was very revealing.

I spoke to my family about it. They offered me a simple solution and the root of my problem was identified rightaway. My problem was, I was doing too much thinking. I used to always think of things too critically - irrespective of their degree of seriousness. I used to think of all the possible outcomes/ possible responses/ possible turn-downs. You get what I am saying? I anticipated responses/ solutions/ problem-areas/ 'their' thoughts - positive or negative, and I refrained from acting on them. Thus, there was a huge delay in 'actions'.

These had become my bottleneck - my work, my family and I was suffering from it terribly. I was not open enough to do radical things, which was again very wierd because I am known to be a radical/ creative thinker.

Having identified these 2 major bottlenecks (and this is a very recent development), I am feeling immensely relaxed. But I knew that I still had to act on them.

This time I have decided - I will act on it asap without critically over-analyzing and over-assessing things. From past few days, results have been awesome. I am discovering that all these problems were my creation. I was only 'speculating' them. And they were becoming real. And they began haunting me.

So now I take quick decisions, and act on them. Life is becoming better again! Cheers!

An example of this is: Earlier, I would think for a long time about blogging my personal thoughts and sharing it with netizens. What will they feel about my thoughts, should I share my personal thoughts with them, etc. But I didn't bother much before writing this post. :) It is important to share than to hide. Sharing helps one grow.

PS: Another thought just struck me: Beneath every problem is a solution waiting to emerge and free itself!

a new start

I want to be a blogger again. I have been thinking about it for long.

To start with, I will be writing just for the heck of it. Writing anything that crops up in my mind. Things I adore about my l'il baby, Swasti. The techniques I use to keep her from crying.

Watch out for this space.. :)

change in hand-writing

Over the years my hand-writing has drastically changed. May be evolved is the right word.

Till very recently, I was a cursive writer until I came across Hugh MacLeod's cartoons on gapingvoid.com. I studied his writing, and found it very practical. Very legible and very clear. But it was print-writing. I adapted it and started using it. Not that my cursive was not legible. I have received several appreciations during school level for my cursive writing. Anyways.

My logic was this: Others may find cursive writing slightly difficult to read. Since I write for others to read, I should switch to print-writing. I also got a good response for this switch. I keep writing oneliners, thoughts, project specifics, and other such stuff on board and the readers did find this type of writing much easier to grasp.

More about it later...

corporate alter-ego

We all want to be superheros - in corporate and personal lives. Somehow completing our target with unmatched accuracy and incredible speed. Saving some office guy from a big bully. Increasing team-work through mentoring or motivational blah. Saving the office from a mega-blunder by demonstrating "keen eye for detail" power.

Some remain shy and perform like Clark Kent or Peter Parker in their personal lives and transform in Superman or Spider Man in their professional lives. Some are like Bruce Banner who overtly transform into The Hulk and gets the work done. But their alter-egos don't have exciting lives. They're always struggling to keep up with their personal commitments.

I am wondering if a guy who consistently excels in professional and personal fronts is mythical.

I have recently become a great fan of Ben Tennyson (from Ben 10), a teenager with an Omnitrix having amazing powers of 10 aliens. Depending upon the situation's intensity, he summons his aliens using his Omnitrix and transforms himself into one. Then he goes on to "resolve the issue" at hand and ensures that the "problem" does not recur.

He is plain, down-to-earth, and balances both his lives with great dexterity. In our own lives, we should transform ourselves in our role models whom we actually look up to. Be it in managing teams, family, friends, projects etc.

my experiences in driving

This was officially my fifth day of driving a 4-wheeler on the busy streets. And I am begining to feel that driving is an adventure and I hope to become passionate about it very soon.

The opening line will give y'all a feeling that I have just learnt to drive. But it's not so. I 'know' how to drive a car since my first year of engineering (9 yrs back - yeah, I know, don't gimme those looks!). I knew the basics then but wasn't 'hands-on'.

I was somehow reluctant about driving a car, for no reason whatsoever. Lot many friends and family members forced me to actively start driving. But I had a stronger willpower. I stayed adamant. I did not even bother to get a car driving licence. I satisfied myself with the excuse of having lot of work at my workplace. My crooked logic was: Since I did not have licence, I should not drive on roads as I don't like to violate traffic procedures.

Then came a time when the government encouraged me not to drive. Yes when the fuel prices had shot up and Petrol was at Rs 55 a litre. Anyways, they were brought down to curb inflation later, which was the good part.

Sometime in between I got engaged and was about to get married. This probably was the single most important reason that urged me to get a licence and learn driving.

Just somedays back I got a learning licence, and I started driving on roads. I had to develop confidence about my ability to drive. I am now practicing to make it perfect. I dared (very late though), and did practice driving on roads (not on smaller lanes, not empty on roads but roads full of people and vehicles).

With driving being newly added in my skill-set, I can venture out and take care of the pt 7 in my previous article.

Will be sharing more of my experiences in driving with you....

a new begining...

Its been a real long time that I wrote anything. I really missed this period. But I was focused on my work and was settling in my married life.

Now I want to do lot of things. I want to:
1. re-unite with friends with whom I was not in regular touch
2. re-start blogging
3. fortify relations with family members (near and far)
4. start enjoying work again. (There was a small period when work had become just work. Monotonous. I am passionate about work. But during this small 'dark-age-type' period, I was working mechanically. I will again be passionate about my work.)
5. re-activate my interest in photography and and start publishing it (may be in flickr, picassa etc)
6. re-start meditation (there was a sufficiently long period when I had stopped meditating for no reason whatsoever. Meditation helped me discover and maximise my potential.)
7. re-visit places which I have not visited so far. (These would be scenic spots around Nasik)

Here's looking toward doing all of these with a lot of zeal!

Cheers!! :)

a quick post

Yahoo is more popular than gmail although functionality and ease of gmail is better.

Currently we are facing tremendous issues with delivery to yahoo mails. We have tried lot of stuff to get rid of this problem, but to no avail. Tried to get in touch with yahoo customer care people, but I face a problem with such 'support teams' where they don't provide a telephone number. Lot of efforts but all in vain.

This is leading to high customer dissatisfiers. Yahoo has given some guidelines on 'best practices' during mailing. Well, to a layman like me, only 10% of those points made sense. Understandably, the problem remains.

But the rising customer escalations is a problem. Let's see.

Just had 5 quick minutes with me, thought of sharing my concerns with y'all!.

Sunday Times

This Sunday has come after a long time. With the mad rush of things I have recently gone through, I don't remember the last time I encountered a Sunday.

Yeah well, I got married, for one, then went to a week-long trip to 'God's Own Country' Kerela. After my return, I had to immediately rush to another friend's wedding 30 hrs away in Andhra Pradesh.

In my total travel to Kakinada, I only attended the function for about 6 hrs and then started my journey back. Phew! That was the day preceding last Monday.

The adjoining week was action-packed, with no time to breathe. And like a small commercial break in a long movie, came Sunday. It will fade into time as soon as it has appeared, while I try to figure out what I am going to do in it.

So while I make a check list of things to do, you go ahead and enjoy Sunday!

Happy Diwali!

A very happy and prosperous Diwali to all the readers!

May this Diwali bring new opportunities, hope and success to all of you!!

understanding the worth by spending more

have you ever experienced this?

you think something is worth something , but you had to pay more amount just to realise that it was worth less.

Free as hell

"Free as hell", an angel said while promoting heaven

"what price would you pay to get to heaven?" - "Life", said the angel

so why die, why not continue living and ponder upon more tangible things like Life and the Materials that it constitues, rather than speculate about such intangible notions.

Why dont we have the freedom to live, as we have to die? why can't we 'choose' to be immortal? how do some people die and still become immortal due to their deeds while others continue to just live life of a living dead?

"dont remember to forget" - I said to myself, "and dont forget to remember"

Should we be like lighthouses, who just stand at a place and show the path? Naah! "Thats just so passive". "Be Active. Get a torch in your own hand and illuminate your path"

"Choose someone who has faced bottlenecks, who has stumbled in a pothole sometime. Someone who can guide you and if you stumble, can come to your help to lift you and provide the necessary impetus and the drive and the energy to continue your journey"

Thoughts of an unarranged kind

[what appears in your mind is not to be ignored, but to be pondered and remembered; expressing free-flowing thoughts without speed-breakers or potholes] 

Striking similarities between two events,

separated by time and unassuming distance,

Unknown, and sometimes incognito, remaining in oblivion

two spirits finding their true mettle

Two turns facing each other,

oblivious of the road that passes through,

stand ignorant of the past and an unknown future

relishing the present that exists

saving thoughts of an unrational kind,

bridging void, searching for the l'il connect,

that joins the dots, to form the large picture,

two minds resonating, waiting to create...

...Like Hell

I hate him like hell...

I ate like hell...

Like hell I'll do it...

I am busy like hell...

where the hell do you think you're going?

To hell with you... 

what the hell is happening?

No seriously, what the hell is happening?

Sounds familiar, doesn't it? These are some typical 'like hell' statements we use in our daily lives. So now, if I ask you, which is more popular? Hell or heaven? Like hell I like heaven. Like hell I like hell.

We all want go to 'heaven', but still popularize 'hell' more than 'heaven'... what the hell!

If Hell and Heaven were celebrities, Hell would win hands down in popularity!! :)

Okay, again, which is the more popular word of the two? Of course, hell...

So what's the verdict?... To hell with it.

Feeling short of words

Really. I am.

There are moments when you have to say a lot. There are moments when you feel so strongly about a subject, but you curse yourself for feeling so terribly short of words. Have you experienced this before?

There are moments like these that annoy me. Is it why you can think and still not speak everything that you can think? Anyways. I am not making sense, am I? See, thats the point.

There are moments when you are full of excitement, full of enthusiasm, full of grief, full of anger, full of lot of things; but heck, those feelings don't form words. They just stay feelings. And nobody is able to clearly understand these feelings.

Even as I type, I am in desperate want of words to express something important, but I am just short of words.

Good, bad or ugly? I don't know. I am just short of words.