Escaping Reality

The mundane is crippling the imagination The drudge takes the soul in its merciless grip A wandering fancy is brought to cessatin The soldiers of duty have cancelled my trip Reality striking my barricades in spasm Jolting the spirit if wonderous yearn The hole it inflicted becoming a chasm The words disappear on the pages they burn Be gone daily duty and leave me to wander Fresh smelling fields or in dungeons so bleak Breaking the spell means that I'd have to squander The depths if the person I so fondly seek.

Untitled

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high 
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments 
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way 
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee 
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Stagnancy!

Of all the posts I have written so far this one gave me real hard time to fall into place. Its a weird situation when it almost become impossible to find words for your post especially when till then you have seen times where words used to flow smoothly. The problem intrigued me to look for possible reasons for the same and here are the top possible reasons I came across.

1. Fear

Here are the set of my fears at this moment:

Fear of being dishonest.

Fear of being brutally honest.

2. Discouragement

Never ever did I encourage myself to write, writing changes my perspective for things, flushes my mind from gibberish and helps me to think straight. These are the few things that have been my set of motivation factors and I don’t think that has changed either.

3. Procrastination

On the contrary, I have all the time (those couple of hours I managed to get after the taxing wedding preparation)

4. No Idea

Instead I am brimmed with ideas, all that I have always laughed at, questioned and enjoyed, I am living all of it lately. Welcoming new relationships, new responsibilities and all that come with it.

5. Loneliness

If loneliness is defined as the absence of appropriate company to talk to, to hang out with then I wonder what kind of intellectual outbreak my mind is looking for ‘coz honestly that has always been a tricky company to find and not very often I have had the privilege of bumping into one. So I still lie fumbling with various other reasons to cure this wordlessness.

This is my first attempt to break the inertia, do share your thoughts in case you too have been through such stage of stagnation would love to hear it from you.

Untitled

Of all the posts I have written so far this one gave me real hard time to fall into place. Its a weird situation when it almost become impossible to find words for your post especially when till then you have seen times where words used to flow smoothly. The problem intrigued me to look for possible reasons for the same and here are the top possible reasons I came across.

1. Fear

Here are the set of my fears at this moment:

Fear of being dishonest.

Fear of being brutally honest.

2. Discouragement

Never ever did I encourage myself to write, writing changes my perspective for things, flushes my mind from gibberish and helps me to think straight. These are the few things that have been my set of motivation factors and I don’t think that has changed either.

3. Procrastination

On the contrary, I have all the time (those couple of hours I managed to get after the taxing wedding preparation)

4. No Idea

Full of ideas, all that I have always laughed at, questioned and enjoyed, I am living all of it lately. Welcoming new relationships, new responsibilities and all that come with it.

5. Loneliness

If loneliness is defined as the absence of appropriate company to talk to, to hang out with then I wonder what kind of intellectual outbreak my mind is looking for ‘coz honestly that has always been a tricky company to find and not very often I have had the privilege of bumping into one. So I still lie fumbling with various other reasons to cure this wordlessness.

This is my first attempt to break the inertia, do share your thoughts in case you too have been through such stage of stagnation would love to hear it from you.

The Little Price: Audio Book Review

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"Öne runs the risk of weeping a little, if one lets himself be tamed..."

 

Never ever did a  mere 100 paged book moved me so much like the way this book did. The little Prince makes several profound and idealistic observations about life and human nature. This book describes the perception of a small kid about the way adults take things in life. Short discoveries like the king who can control the stars but only by ordering them to do what they would do anyway. Businessman who is stuck in an vicious circle of counting stars he thinks he owns to own more  stars , the geographer who spends all of his time making maps, but never leaves his desk reflects the dichotomy humans/or so called adults  strive to feel while differentiating between the so called  consequential and inconsequential  matters of life  they pursue.   Suddenly while reading you will bump into phrases which can exemplify the “Less is more” theory and you will wonder why till date you never realised you were just feeding yourself with garrulous banter, instead you should be just focussing on things that matters. Lovely read, don’t go by the cover and think its a book for kids ‘coz as it is said “What a strange illusion it is to suppose that beauty is goodness “

Art Gallery Visit!

One good thing that contextual advertising do to you is to feed you with fodder, you have shown interest in at some point of time. Though the success of this strategy cannot be undermined but it comfortably manages to eliminate diversity from your interest bucket. Everywhere you tend to see like, read about the same kind of stuff, may be because the search, browsing etc.. Are so slick these days that you tend to lose your appetite to discover new things that falls beyond your current interest funnels. Recently I have had such an experience while visiting an art gallery. The occasion was an art exhibition by a friend, after postponing the visit till the last day of the event I finally chose to go at the closing time of the gallery, so as to avoid any communication with all the art connoisseurs there. Not because I have anything against them but because I am still quite ignorant about their area of operations. My Facebook newsfeed also fails to offer any help for the same.

So anyways I did go and visited the gallery. Though the gallery was as quiet and stranded as I wanted it to be, the silence haunted me. It was just 7 in the evening and there was no one to hide from except the caretaker who was also the owner of the gallery, a short old man. It was quite disturbing considering the hoopla and huge fan following we see these days for all the music, dance events happening around. I blamed it on the weird timing I chose to visit the exhibition. So it was a two story building and after the casual exchange of greetings with the owner I started browsing through the lovely paintings around. Just when I got done looking at the paintings at the ground floor I realized the exhibition is at the first floor and all this while I was just staring at some leftover stuff. So anyways I gathered myself again and climbed up to the first floor. The owner was diligently following me and I every part of my creative mind pleaded for some space in this otherwise silent gallery. It was an exhibition by three artists. I finally managed to spot my friend’s name on one of the canvas and believe me I was so happy to see it, atleast there is something I know about. The good thing about abstract art is it gives you enough space to create an imagery of your choice but sometimes you miss the molds which are so implicit in  your otherwise outlined life, which can help you streamline the thought process or atleast save you from the one. So coming back to the exhibition, for first few paintings I did try to think about the possible motivation/ideation  the artist must have gone through while drawing it but trust me it gets all the more unnerving when there is someone right behind you expecting to hear some feedback. After the tenth painting my interest changed from the concept to just the color combination the artist had used. After appreciating the synchronization of different colors and themes the artist had played with my focus shifted to the possible monetary value of this piece of art. Mind you I was just done with the 20^th one now. I broke the silence between me and the owner by asking if people are buying paintings. After 2o minutes of our meeting and curiously examining so many paintings I broke my silence with this question and I didn’t know who to blame, I am sure neither did he.  Just when I was done with the first floor and was preparing for a safe exit the owner asked me if I would like to see his paintings as well. I was so exhausted with the probable visualization of the featured paintings in my living room, dining area, work place etc.. I had no energy left to survey more of them but the sheer excitement in the owner’s eyes to showcase his work left me with no other choice. So now I climbed the second floor and was taken aback by huge canvases all painted with bright, dull and gleaming colors. I could see human figures, portraits sketched all over and I was so happy to finally see recognizable figures and patterns just to realize the last bulb was switched on suddenly and there again I saw huge abstract paintings. I was so worried about the huge expectation mismatch that I decided to give each painting 20 seconds of my life. I stood there counted 20 19 18 17….and so on, ofcourse I wanted the owner to believe I understand all of it. Suddenly in midst of all this I managed to recognize one pattern in one of the huge abstract painting and thrilled over my discovery I checked.

Here goes the dialogue

“Me: This painting is amazing, is it Lord Ganesha?

Owner: ummmmmm, hmmmmmmm, ya you could say that as well!!”

Really and I thought I cracked the puzzle. But nevertheless I really enjoyed the paintings and hope to see more of it. One of the painitng I liked a lot!

PS: Ritu just for you :-)

Untitled

One good thing that contextual advertising do to you is to feed you with fodder, you have shown interest in at some point of time. Though the success of this strategy cannot be undermined but it comfortably manages to eliminate diversity from your interest bucket. Everywhere you tend to see like, read about the same kind of stuff, may be because the search, browsing etc.. Are so slick these days that you tend to lose your appetite to discover new things that falls beyond your current interest funnels. Recently I have had such an experience while visiting an art gallery. The occasion was an art exhibition by a friend, after postponing the visit till the last day of the event I finally chose to go at the closing time of the gallery, so as to avoid any communication with all the art connoisseurs there. Not because I have anything against them but because I am still quite ignorant about their area of operations. My Facebook newsfeed also fails to offer any help for the same.

So anyways I did go and visited the gallery. Though the gallery was as quiet and stranded as I wanted it to be, the silence haunted me. It was just 7 in the evening and there was no one to hide from except the caretaker who was also the owner of the gallery, a short old man. It was quite disturbing considering the hoopla and huge fan following we see these days for all the music, dance events happening around. I blamed it on the weird timing I chose to visit the exhibition. So it was a two story building and after the casual exchange of greetings with the owner I started browsing through the lovely paintings around. Just when I got done looking at the paintings at the ground floor I realized the exhibition is at the first floor and all this while I was just staring at some leftover stuff. So anyways I gathered myself again and climbed up to the first floor. The owner was diligently following me and I every part of my creative mind pleaded for some space in this otherwise silent gallery. It was an exhibition by three artists. I finally managed to spot my friend’s name on one of the canvas and believe me I was so happy to see it, atleast there is something I know about. The good thing about abstract art is it gives you enough space to create an imagery of your choice but sometimes you miss the molds which are so implicit in your otherwise outlined life, which can help you streamline the thought process or atleast save you from the one. So coming back to the exhibition, for first few paintings I did try to think about the possible motivation/ideation the artist must have gone through while drawing it but trust me it gets all the more unnerving when there is someone right behind you expecting to hear some feedback. After the tenth painting my interest changed from the concept to just the color combination the artist had used. After appreciating the synchronization of different colors and themes the artist had played with my focus shifted to the possible monetary value of this piece of art. Mind you I was just done with the 20th one now. I broke the silence between me and the owner by asking if people are buying paintings. After 2o minutes of our meeting and curiously examining so many paintings I broke my silence with this question and I didn’t know who to blame, I am sure neither did he. Just when I was done with the first floor and was preparing for a safe exit the owner asked me if I would like to see his paintings as well. I was so exhausted with the probable visualization of the featured paintings in my living room, dining area, work place etc.. I had no energy left to survey more of them but the sheer excitement in the owner’s eyes to showcase his work left me with no other choice. So now I climbed the second floor and was taken aback by huge canvases all painted with bright, dull and gleaming colors. I could see human figures, portraits sketched all over and I was so happy to finally see recognizable figures and patterns just to realize the last bulb was switched on suddenly and there again I saw huge abstract paintings. I was so worried about the huge expectation mismatch that I decided to give each painting 20 seconds of my life. I stood there counted 20 19 18 17….and so on, ofcourse I wanted the owner to believe I understand all of it. Suddenly in midst of all this I managed to recognize one pattern in one of the huge abstract painting hunged there and thrilled over my discovery I checked with the owner.

Here goes the dialogue “ Me: This painting is amazing, is it Lord Ganesha? Owner: ummmmmm, hmmmmmmm, ya you could say that as well!!” Really and I thought I cracked the puzzle. But nevertheless I really enjoyed the paintings and hope to see more of it. Posting one of the painting I like da lot!

PS: Ritu just for you :-)

There is a mad world out there!

Disclaimer: Its a long post, read only when you think have some time in hand :P

Yea I know you must have heard a lot about it. Whenever I hear or experience it, it reminds me of my Mom, worried for me all the time, for the amount of pain this experience could give me considering the assumption of an idealistic, unpretentious world I live with.

In my little experience of working with a large IT company, a product based small startup, association with various entrepreneurship based workshops as an organizer, volunteer or participant I managed to meet great mix of people. People with varied interests and perspectives, people who have read about great things, people who are learning great things and most importantly people who practice great things.  Nothing managed to awe me more than the humility of the person and nothing troubled me more than the pretence of a person. The lightheartedness and triviality of pretence clogs my mind to further process the feasibility of any association with the person.  One such excruciating experience I had recently was with a startup I had shown interest in to work with. After the customary process of exchanging couple of mails conveying my story so far and the interests ahead, I was invited for a telephonic interview which was quite subjective in terms of the things discussed (my take on goals, entrepreneurship, challenges, communication skills etc…) I was finally called over to their office for a face to face meeting with an assignment in hand given to me over the call.  Considering I was unemployed at that time I had a lot of time in hand to pull up a hard bounded thick copy of the theory I was suppose to present there, but the three months of sabbatical had rusted my documentation skill and I finally ended up with a four slide presentation. Yes thats it!!

Before I run you through my experience of the meeting I would like to share the expectations and assumption I had before the meeting, since this was a 20+ team startup

1.       I was expecting an office of atleast 3 bhk or a double storey bungalow (they are fundedJ)

2.      A personal interview implies a direct meeting with the founder and the team if we click.

3.      That’s it!

So, as I reached the office I was taken aback by the big conference room/head office (I assume founders’ office) and in my attempt to look for the founder I peeked inside what looked like a big hall adjacent to the office! And OMG it was like a human factory, people cluttered together around multiple tables in front of their computer screen, coding, chatting I don’t know what! AS I peeked in for a second I thought the entire herd was staring at me with an air of contempt, curiosity etc…  I shuddered and stayed outside and decided to sit on the couch outside the fancy conference room. Thousand things running through my mind OMG! they were too many, OMG! Y the heck I didn’t wash my hair today and came with oil stricken hair (did I look bearable) OMG! Were they all coding (techie, geeks)…grhhh. Just when I was going nuts about everything there came a young girl may be in her early twenties (I am trying hard here to make at least someone happy). She was the HR of the company. And I said HR really!!! Just when I thought joining a startup will save me from this HR crap here I was in front of that HR trying to face the volley of questions she was throwing at me. My long term goals, my short term goals, my learning and realizations so far, my priorities in life, hobbies, time I spent pursuing them, salary expectation blah blah…! I realized why am I going through this, I didn’t even knew this female before coming here and she didn’t inspire me to hijack vehicle from my friend and travel 20 odd kms just to see the possibilities of working with this company. How would she know if I am lying when she can’t even make out how disinterested I am to talk to her, nevertheless the first impression was so torturous I quoted double the salary I had in mind (safe escape). But nevertheless the moment came when I got to meet the founder finally (after 45 min..(HR) + 20 mins waiting). He was all suited up (unfortunately that’s not I generally envision founders of a startup to be, I always expect them to be shabby in their appearance, but I agree here that could be too much to ask for J), so as I continued my conversation with the founder, by this time I was already too tired to articulate my story again, after that introspecting HR round that I gave it a miss and DIDN’T answer! I just didn’t care too much but yea I was excited to present the assignment (ppt), wanted some feedback.

I presented it and got a standing ovation…just kidding, I presented and was praised by the founder not because he was impressed by my understanding of the theory/concept but because everything that I explained was crap (It was half baked and was anything but awesome).  I was so disappointed with my performance that now I wanted this job all the more (may be to prove myself that I am good :P) so the discussion lasted for another 1.5 hrs with the founder explaining me the theory, how they practice it in the projects they undertake, how they engage with their clients, how  processed and neat their work is etc..By the end of the meeting I was so exhausted by the explanations given that all I wanted was to run away. But alas once again I was handed with one more assignment (like a pseudo project) to submit as a last protocol to pass through before I hear a YES or a NO from them.

I came back home and as expected a ultra formal mail from the pretty lady with the assignment attached and the deadline mentioned was lying in my mail box. This time I put in a little more effort to at least make it little bearable. I submitted it before time and never heard back from them for almost four days of long impending wait. In the meantime I appeared for one more interview, where I did speak first to the founders for three consecutive hours and then the HR (who instead of grilling me with her questions engaged me with a light conversation, asking almost everything the pretty lady asked about).

I joined the latter company on the second day of my interview and rejected the first one after they finally called me (20+45+90 +6*24*60 minutes) for another round of personal interview with another founder. May God bless the perfectionists there who seem to have a huge respect for a candidate’s time.

 

Audio Book Review- Alchemy of Desire

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Unlike many books I have read where I tend to develop a consistent sense of liking or disliking for the book and the protagonist/subject it talks about, I have had a surreal love hate relationship with this book. When I started of, the first three pages made me feel disgusted with the selfishness and unreasoned honesty of the character.  The cursory transition from an incestuous relationship he shared with his girlfriend, seeking peace and pleasure in her body in times of extreme disgust or exhilarating achievements, to just a perfunctory act made me question his sensibilities and existence of anything real in life. I got harrowed with the justification given for such acts. Though the book discussed the alchemy with utmost honesty and elaborative/seductive/erotic plots, the uncertainty in behavior, attitude, feelings, acts it uncovered at times made me feel helpless and announced the act of controlling things/situations futile.  Just when I summoned the theory it advocated, the youthful and crude description by which he weaved the vivid heuristic assumptions we make for ourselves and world around us took me by an awe, I wanted to critique each one of it but I just couldn’t. I would like to share couple of notes I made from this book

“Each one thought his self-worth was directly proportional to the number of people who read him. It had little to do how much you knew or how good you really were- things outside of yourself determining your sense of yourself.”

”The universal law of men, you are not what you see reflected in the mirror you are who you see shining in other men’s eye.”

“Petty success is a disaster.”

“My life was a lie and I couldn’t suspend disbelief forever”.

 “When lovers bare their bodies they have sex, When lovers bare their souls they taste Godhead’

 “It [Mahabharata] understands the world is powered by desire, and that desire is an unknowable thing. Desire conjures death, destruction, distress. But also creates love, beauty, art. It is our greatest undoing and the only reason for all doing. And doing is life, doing is karma.”

“Desire is a wonderfully promiscuous thing, but when it is trapped in monogamy it cannot survive without love”

I can go on forever here but I would rather let you read this book to understand it better. My takeaway would be “Immortality is farce, the sooner we understand it the better it will be for us to calm down our ever rattling mind.”

Audio Book Review- Alchemy of Desire

VR0001[1].WAV Listen on Posterous

Unlike many books I have read where I tend to develop a consistent sense of liking or disliking for the book and the protagonist/subject it talks about, I have had a surreal love hate relationship with this book. When I started of, the first three pages made me feel disgusted with the selfishness and unreasoned honesty of the character.  The cursory transition from an incestuous relationship he shared with his girlfriend, seeking peace and pleasure in her body in times of extreme disgust or exhilarating achievements, to just a perfunctory act made me question his sensibilities and existence of anything real in life. I got harrowed downwith the justification given for such acts. Though the book discussed the alchemy with utmost honesty and elaborative/seductive/erotic plots, the uncertainty in behavior, attitude, feelings, acts it uncovered at times made me feel helpless and announced the act of controlling things/situations futile.  Just when I summoned the theory it advocated, the youthful and crude description of the vivid heuristic assumptions we make for ourselves and world around us took me by awe, I wanted to critique each one of it but I just couldn’t. I would like to share couple of notes I made from this book

“Each one thought his self-worth was directly proportional to the number of people who read him. It had little to do how much you knew or how good you really were- things outside of yourself determining your sense of yourself.”

”The universal law of men, you are not what you see reflected in the mirror you are who you see shining in other men’s eye.”

“Petty success is a disaster.”

“My life was a lie and I couldn’t suspend disbelief forever”. 

“When lovers bare their bodies they have sex,When lovers bare their souls they taste Godhead’

 “It [Mahabharata] understands the world is powered by desire, and that desire is an unknowable thing. Desire conjures death, destruction, distress. But also creates love, beauty, art. It is our greatest undoing and the only reason for all doing. And doing is life, doing is karma.”

“Desire is a wonderfully promiscuous thing, but when it is trapped in monogamy it cannot survive without love”

I can go on forever here but I would rather let you read this book to understand it better. My takeaway would be “Immortality is farce, the sooner we understand it the better it will be for us to calm down our ever rattling mind.”

Untitled

Book Review-Six Thinking Hats, Edward D Bono.

I recently read this book and quite liked it.

Here is the book review

VR0007[1].WAV Listen on Posterous

 

I was amazed by the simplicity of Edward’s theory and the difference it could bring to our day to day life, though leveraging from the theory would require a lot of practice on our behalf.  I was very happy reading about such a singular and channelized framework for thinking, though I was just getting the information about the same but somehow it felt right. My next task was to find out how I can practice it in my daily life what sort of exercises can be built in and around the concept. Here is what I came out with:

 

Every color has its own mantra or one word definition, every time you try to come out with an appropriate approach to start thinking about it! STOP

1.       Go blank for some time and just imagine the color bands we use to see in good old days on Doordarshan when it used to go blank.

2.      THINK of this jumbled word ‘Framework Facts Emotion Problems Opportunities Action Items’  (FFEPOA), I tried coming out with a word for this but could only come out with this “Filthy Freaks Espouse Problems  for Others All the time”, ok I know it sucks but I just came out with it. You can come out with your version of definition.

Here each letter gives the mantra of each hat described in the book:

Framework- Blue Hat

Facts- White Hat

Emotion- Red Hat

Problems- Black Hat

Opportunities- Yellow Hat

Action Item- Green Hat

Once you are done with this exercise start thinking again, and you will notice how naturally you tend to start filtering your thoughts under various hats.  Now consciously try to segregate them. The motive is to streamline the process and make it simpler and not always postpone it for better times or be miserable/impulsive/indecisive with whatever you decide to pursue. You don’t need to be an expert in any of the hats but you should know about all of them while you are consciously investing your time to think about a situation.

It’s a good/effective practice to indulge in sometimes. J

 

Inertia of Crying!

Yes we do think we don’t want to cry/crib about our problems all the time but unfortunately sometime here also we tend to give up for the veiled pleasures crying brings with itself. ‘Coz I’ll be using crying/cribbing a lot of times let’s give it a sexy name just to make the post little happening: P. Let’s call it Robbed (isn’t sexy though!)

Here are some immediate traits/symptoms of getting Robbed:-

1.       Generally happen when there is sudden change in the assumed trail of events in your life and you lose control over things.  There is a spurt of uncontrollable negative emotion inside (cheated/hurt/ agitated/anxious etc…)

2.      The first question that props to your mind:”WHY ME?”

3.      The second question “What wrong I ever did to anyone to get this?”

4.      The third worry “How am I going to survive this?”

5.      Fourth realization “How can I not see this coming?”

Now this Robbery brings with it:-

1.       Immediate love and sympathy from the near and dear ones.

What it means: Some acceptance in your otherwise tormented life.

Expected Action Item from others- Nothing

 

2.      An immediate/long release from your work.

What it means: Ah ha!

Expected Action Item from others - Nothing

 

3.      Assuming you have at least one friend in your life you like to confide in, you get a little time with him/her (which might not be so easily available otherwise) where they are all yours.

What it means: A gaping attention and an authority to be judgmental from your otherwise greatest critic (yea honesty is what differentiates this special friend from others)

Expected Action Item from others-  Nothing.

 

4.      In case you are alone it gives you an opportunity to not be judgmental about everything off beam you tend to get involve in (smoking, overeating, creating a remorseful aura around, shouting etc...)

What it mean: There is just no nagging voice of conscience but self pity embracing your shattered ego. No shaking of comfort zone.

Expected Action Item from yourself: Nothing

 

5.      Emotional turbulence  

What it mean: Which is really sad but it’s just because you still have enough emotions alive and they really seek some acknowledgment in your otherwise fast and monotonous state of life. You just need to fasten your seat belt and stay upright (ok bad joke)

Expected Action Item: Patience till the turbulence lasts.

 

I might be wrong in the analogy I tried to draw here but replacing crying with robbery didn’t feel like a replacement really, instead it explained the similarity between the two just that the former deals with your material belongings and the latter to your emotions. Yes not every loss in life is this easy to take but if we don’t consciously nudge our control system (like we expect from police in case of robbery) we will just be making it more difficult and draining. Don’t just keep blaming the ill fate and the inappropriate lock (no action item involved) but try finding/going after the robber instead and beat the shit out of it.

Happy Crying!

There is nothing as “Out of Box " thinking!

It was one of those times when you subtly try to impress your company by your “out of box” thinking and end up making fool of yourself, just to make the matter worse this time the company was too smart to see my attempts inside out and very brutally dismissed it all! But the good thing that came out of the entire drama was an intriguing discussion on what exactly is “out of box” thinking.  If we are not born with that sort of intellect is there any scope that we can get it/ learn it from somewhere.

The discussion started with the generic interpretation of intellect, not many of us will deny that the guy who scored maximum in school exams was the one who was tagged as “Intellectual” and we complacently believed it. Since then our mind has made this as a boxed definition, a pattern of what being an “Intellectual” mean.

Second point that was discussed was “When do you practice thinking?” I was anyways not very comfortable with the question, why the hell do I have to practice thinking it’s just a means by which you try to sort out your problems, isn’t it? I remember ever since I appended startups as my area of interest I am trying to find out problems that my amazing idea can sort out for people and hence make money from it, I am restlessly trying to excavate problems just to come out with a good business idea. Although back in my mind the initial idea behind Twitter did distract me sometimes thinking as to what problem did it sort and why did it even start. Anyways getting back to the point I answered I practice thinking to solve a problem. I thought that was the most concise and clear reply I could give for this question but to my surprise he (company) laughed and declared “I can never think Out of Box”. Honestly that really hit me considering already I was deeply saddened by the absence of Chocó brownie missing on my plate which he ate while I was trying to think.

What I realized is that my mind has boxed thinking as mere “Problem solving technique”, it may be because we never had Thinking as a subject in our school/college etc... And we always practiced it while we are on some issue which

1.       Needed urgent attention

2.      Promised immediate gratification if solved successfully.

So in our day to day practice we try to gather information around the problem and try to eliminate the patterns which are new to our mind and choose the solution that best fits the pattern already set in our mind through our past experiences, knowledge or previously locked assumptions. We very graciously eliminate any new assumption and thus bolt our self in the existing dominant patterns/boxes. However Thinking in reality has many facet to it, problem solving is just one plot where we practice it extensively.

 In order to make an “Out of Box” statement you have to carve out your own BOX first. We very often misjudge creativity with randomness/chances but I was surprised to discover creativity can also be constructively practiced with various design models (Six Thinking Hats/ CORT method), it involves change in perception, taking risks, provocation.  Horizontal thinking implies our dream stage and vertical stage implies the methodical implementation/execution stage, design thinking lies in between these stages.

So I guess Twitter was not launched to solve any problem it was launched to experiment one of these newly designed boxes (different medium of communication) and all the risks paid off today. As for my restless mind I got some respite in the fact that I can stop identifying JUST the problem to start and try practicing to carve a NEW BOX J.

 

There is nothing as “Out of Box thinking”!

It was one of those times when you subtly try to impress your company by your “out of box” thinking and end up making fool of yourself, just to make the matter worse this time the company was too smart to see my attempts inside out and very brutally dismissed it all! But the good thing that came out of the entire drama was an intriguing discussion on what exactly is “out of box” thinking.  If we are not born with that sort of intellect is there any scope that we can get it/ learn it from somewhere.

The discussion started with the generic interpretation of intellect, not many of us will deny that the guy who scored maximum in school exams was the one who was tagged as “Intellectual” and we complacently believed it. Since then our mind has made this as a boxed definition, a pattern of what being an “Intellectual” mean.

Second point that was discussed was “When do you practice thinking?” I was anyways not very comfortable with the question, why the hell do I have to practice thinking it’s just a means by which you try to sort out your problems, isn’t it? I remember ever since I appended startups as my area of interest I am trying to find out problems that my amazing idea can sort out for people and hence make money from it, I am restlessly trying to excavate problems just to come out with a good business idea. Although back in my mind the initial idea behind Twitter did distract me sometimes thinking as to what problem did it sort and why did it even start. Anyways getting back to the point I answered I practice thinking to solve a problem. I thought that was the most concise and clear reply I could give for this question but to my surprise he (company) laughed and declared “I can never think Out of Box”. Honestly that really hit me considering already I was deeply saddened by the absence of Chocó brownie missing on my plate which he ate while I was trying to think.

What I realized is that my mind has boxed thinking as mere “Problem solving technique”, it may be because we never had Thinking as a subject in our school/college etc... And we always practiced it while we are on some issue which

1.       Needed urgent attention

2.      Promised immediate gratification if solved successfully.

So in our day to day practice we try to gather information around the problem and try to eliminate the patterns which are new to our mind and choose the solution that best fits the pattern already set in our mind through our past experiences, knowledge or previously locked assumptions. We very graciously eliminate any new assumption and thus bolt our self in the existing dominant patterns/boxes. However Thinking in reality has many facet to it, problem solving is just one plot where we practice it extensively.

 In order to make an “Out of Box” statement you have to carve out your own BOX first. We very often misjudge creativity with randomness/chances but I was surprised to discover creativity can also be constructively practiced with various design models (Six Thinking Hats/ CORT method), it involves change in perception, taking risks, provocation.  Horizontal thinking implies our dream stage and vertical stage implies the methodical implementation/execution stage, design thinking lies in between these stages.

So I guess Twitter was not launched to solve any problem it was launched to experiment one of these newly designed boxes (different medium of communication) and all the risks paid off today. As for my restless mind I got some respite in the fact that I can stop identifying JUST the problem to start and try practicing to carve a NEW BOX J.

ROI of reading a book!

Disclaimer: If only you like to read a lot of good books please go ahead.

I have heard it quite a number of times about the importance of reading a book and to be honest I don’t deny it. If nothing else it makes you feel intellectual, boosts your social image and opens your mind to different perspective. But having read a decent number of books I sometimes wonder if the money I spend on reading a book  is actually worth it, and if it is worth then do we know how to efficiently harness the returns every book offers. We all choose books as per our area of interest defined back in our mind or accepted explicitly and we tend to read books that sync up with it (poetry, management, science fiction, psychology, philosophy, fashion) etc.. But after a point the takeaways from all these books feels the same. Let me try explaining it category wise:

Autobiography/Biography:

Timeline-15 days: As soon as you are done with the book you do remember the details about that person (Andre Agassi never wanted to play Tennis, Lance Armstrong went through gruesome pain while he underwent the surgery etc.)

Timeline-40 days : Generally these are successful people who had a struggling childhood, they started whatever they are good at, at really young age, there take on the situations (which were generally not rosy) was positive or they ended up being a drug addict, screwed up completely etc. . but finally they persevere, held their head high in the darkest of the times and came out with flying colors. And finally some dramatic incidents changed the course of their quest and they ended up being a great person they are today. Needless to mention they achieved what they ended up with only because they failed at so many other things.

Timeline- ever after: What you always knew about that person only with some fine-tuning.

Non Fiction:

Books on cities/countries (e.g. Mumbai, Iran):

Timeline -40 days and ever after: An opportunist city for struggling writers, painters, singers, dancers, actors, businesses etc… Haven for dreams, prostitution, crippling buildings, indifferent governance, films, drugs, mafia, gang lords, corruption etc.. Which are the best places to get drugs from and what powers does Shiv Sena have on the city and how everybody there kow tows them just to save their asses. How disturbing life does a prostitute have, how and which social lymph fucked them for how much money, their desperation to articulate their life story and the never ending quest to find that ultimate love, how mafia is deep-seated till the grass root level of the society and how people in slums struggle to make their ends meet.

South West Asia is always about grotesque and miserable condition of females with a life like that of a slave.  Struggling to either get out of that place or retire in submission of their ill fate. Male chauvinism haunts the underdeveloped and archaic society, government plagued with terrorism and militancy and it always paints a gloomy and depressing world in my head.

I wonder what more did I learn other than what I read before buying the book based on the reviews and of course popularity for the same.  Of course you do enjoy the style of writing and the narration with the imaginative picture you envisage while you are on the GO but are these intangibles included in the ROI. Also what sort of stories do we discuss about the book with our fellow bibliophiles, do we really discuss the writing style? Or we end our discussion with just the name of the latest book we read.

Books on Management

Marketing/Branding

Timeline- 15 days: Just mention a problem to me and I know I’ll be able to help you to market your product. I have all the validated theories packed in my mind and I feel pretty good about it.

Timeline - 40 days and ever after: Time when you see a surge in your confidence level after reading that book. You feel yourself equipped with latest trend and modern theories which marketing gurus somewhere in the world are using. Books on SEO marketing, social media marketing, blogging etc… teaching you the basics of consumer psychology with detailed logical explanation.  I remember a book I read on Twitter and its various application which can be used to harness it for business (now I don’t even remember its name or anything that it elicit) and I feel pretty disappointed about it.

Self Help Book

Timeline- 15 days: I know next time when I’ll face a situation I am going to survive it unlike last time. I am going to be positive and will try to put my six thinking hats to evaluate it. Or when I am choosing I am going to not go with my automatic system but will logically siphon off the heuristics biases which I discovered in my decisions last time.

(I am currently in this timeline, will post in sometime which books inspired me to learn this laterJ )

Timeline- 40 days: I am going to be positive in every situation. Which I must honestly confess it still not the case with me,  I still take the same time to cope with the situation.

These are couple of genres I mentioned but the basis of the entire post is that mere reading a book doesn’t necessarily give you the expected ROI,  the real investment lies not in spending the money but it is in the time we spend while we read and most importantly the time we spend after we are done reading. Write, discuss and introspect (validate the theory/concepts with incidents of your life and not just the case studies they discuss) the book needs to be not just read but one should be able to feel it while and after reading if we really seek a return from it. Move beyond the generic discussions with your friends and always always try to write a review of the book for yourself so that when you move to the 16^th day of reading you have something to again think about.

Observations

Thought of sharing couple of things I closely observed recently 1. Cooking awesome food sucks if you happen to be the only one eating it. 2. Dance no doubt is the best exercise to de stress yourself. 3. FRIENDS is still the best series to watch over and over again. 4. Chai with a stranger in rains still makes you feel happy. 5. You still find people getting emotional on a sad (teary) climax of a movie. 6. You still make a book shopping decision based on book colour and title. (offline mode) 7. Cracking a daily crossword all by yourself can definitely give you a good night sleep. 8. Gifts and surprises are the best thing to happen in gloomiest days. 9. Men enjoy gossip as much as women do. 10. An unexpected phone call from your first crush still gives you goose bumps. 11. Villagers will love you from all their heart if you happen to speak in their language. 12. People/Strangers you meet while you travel will always remain in your contact list, even if you switch your phones zillion times. (even though you will never ever make a call to them) 13. Nothing gives you more joy than watching your clean cupboard, after a strenuous cleaning expedition. Not to forget the sight and memories attached with your long lost beautiful clothes you rediscover. 14. Change is always good, more so if you don’t happen to see its result immediately. There are many more which I keep writing down in my mini diary, but it really feels nice to see and experience these things again and again. Feels human 

100 words Photo Story

It shall also pass and go down to all those derailing pit stops I have been driving through. I do feel the destination in the vicinity just trying to cloak itself with the sheet of snow as they say. May be you don’t know it yet but my strength lies in your disapprovals, reinforcing the warmth my heart ooze out from the sincerity of this yearn. Don’t admonish the confluence so ruthlessly that this fire itself burn down the cloak of your vanity coz there is a long road ahead and you would need me to  wheel you through it.     

 

Faith

Literally means trust and belief in goodness of a person or a situation.

For me anyone/anything which helps to bring optimism in my perspective is the one I endow my faith in. I wondered how can perspectives are changed with the presence absence of anybody in your life and what solidifies the belief in someone.

We have faith in doctors for our medical queries, fashion designers for fashion, leaders for people, lovers for their support, counselors for their guidance etc… which clearly proves faith comes only when we are sure and believe in the capability of the person to handle the situation. So that defines the change in perspective as well ‘coz now the situations of your life gets shored up by the engagement of the person you believe is better to handle it.

Faith is association, which defines its nature as well. It isn’t perennial but fickle and every time it fails or succeeds it leaves you with many realizations about your incapability and capability as well to handle situations. 

Anyways the entire thought started with a visit to a temple  and the never ending queue of devotees ready to offer their prayers. Their strong belief seems to come from the ubiquitous stories of strong association of this power with the devotee till he successfully managed to sail through the situation. Each one of us approves or disapproves of these stories based on our understanding and probably that makes us an atheist or an atheist for the society but that’s very myopic criterion to define it.

Anytime in your life if you have believed in somebody’s capability to handle situation you know what FAITH means. 

Brilliance!

My heart goes for Djokovic today! It was Wimbledon finals and what a performance, he pounced on each and every shot, played a killer.

While the TV cameras were focusing on his winning moment what really amused me was the sheer pleasure, joy and proud his folks had for him. I wondered why I don’t feel the same amount of joy even though I also ardently watched the entire match and prayed for his win. I could see the victory but couldn’t really feel it. The next obvious reasoning was the difference in the atmosphere (home vs ground) but that too dint suffice the curiosity.

 It wasn’t just really the win they were happy for, match was just a part of it, it was the entire journey of this guy till this win that was beaming in their eyes. Winning the trophy is no doubt is an achievement but having a close gang of people who can feel your win is also equally important. How short lived the joy would have been otherwise.

In midst of all the fanfare, glory and noise around true humility comes only with attentive patience and those who can achieve it are the ones who will always have a box full of people ready to FEEL the win as well.

Growing Bigger than your shoes

It’s been four months I am working with a startup and it may sound a bit clichéd but my learning graph here is going steep. Trust me it’s a different world all together to be in, in one word it’s eccentric.

Eccentricity in itself throws the subject so open that it gets difficult to boil down your experience in bullet form Nevertheless I would like to give it a shot.

What did I get working in a startup?

Taught me to start acknowledging what I can deliver and what does taking ownership of things mean. Learnt to break free of the 9-5 work pattern ‘coz there is no such concept here, when you work with a startup you learn to deliver 24 * 7. Though some days you will hate it (mostly when you get your paycheck) but for the rest of the time it gives you a different sort of high.

Can I prove it?

Its past midnight already and I am writing this post from my office. I am exhausted by day’s work but more importantly I am contended with what I got/learnt today.

What did I learn professionally?

When I write this question, for some reason I find it amusing now coz earlier I could differentiate between my professional and personal life but now everything seems personal and professional or vice versa. So technically, in last four months I have written/drafted so many email templates for customers, teams etc… that I don’t wish to even count at this time needless to say that only few actually got implemented. YES I am still learning/or moderately learnt the skill of writing a good email. This might really sound a very trivial job but trust me it’s not, to know what to convey and most importantly what not to convey is a big exercise in itself. On one day I handle customer queries and on another I design posters, screens, product flow, protocols, processes and what not. In just a span of two months I worked/ or rather learnt how to work on three CRMs already.

Any specific character trait this helped me building?

Sometimes when the expected delivery gap between a query/request and the solution is just a couple of hours and I don’t know how to even start with the problem, and my entire mind is fucked up with the assumed outcome I learnt to manage my stress coz at that time I have no other way but to deliver things on time. You just can afford to loose on any single request from your clients. Another very important thing I learnt is to differentiate between getting things done and getting things done perfectly/correctly. Yes this might sound one and the same thing but it’s NOT. There is a whole lot of difference between the two. The latter requires hell lot of commitment. You got to deliver stuff end to end and not just a part of it and when I say end to end it simply means you are not just responsible for what you are expected to deliver but you also need to make sure others who are working with you do the same. You have to identify all touchpoints by yourself to make sure nothing goes unnoticed. In a startup you are expected to carry your own weight so technically you are your own manager and hence you should either learn to face the brunt of your mistakes or deliver properly. The best part about working in a startup is I discovered a lot about myself, I feel good to say that somedays I am just amazed at my power/capacity of handling things, so its not just professional grooming but personally also I feel growing in leaps and bounds. I learnt to extend my boundaries coz that’s where you are expected to prove your niche.

I also learnt to filter out Priority A and Priority B things in every sphere of my life and hence this helps me leading a clutter free and more streamlined life. The entire perspective changes into getting things done rather than expecting things to be done on time. I have become so open to iterations that setbacks/failures just seem like another thing I need to get done with or find a way out to. No doubt it turns out a bit frustrating at times but when I see the end result it feels worth the effort.

Working in a startup taught me  how to keep my words, there are so many things we commit/say/promise on the fly but in this case most of the time if you say something you are expected to educate your entire team how to take it to completion. So in another words I  learnt how to cut down on gibberish banters which otherwise makes us live our life on assumptions and fake promises to thyself. The best part about working in a startup is I found people who are there by choice which I really missed in my college life or my MNC job. So again I learnt how to save myself from helpless and hollow cribs.

In the end I would like to end this post with a quote by Rabindranath Tagore

“Taking shelter in the dead is death itself, and only taking all the risk of life to the fullest extent is living.”

PS: This is the post I wrote for Startup Garage recently. Check out their workshop details and do give it a shot if it interests you.