Dasvidaniyan

Hi guys … hope you people had a great weekend. I watched Dasvidaniyan over the weekend & to be true was deeply touched by the movie. What if I was to die after 3 months? What would be the last 10 things I would want to do before I die? I pondered a lot over the question which was the central theme of the movie but realized in the end that 10 is too small a number. There are umpteen number of things I would like to do before I die and for which 3 months would be too less a time. And I believe like me each one of you has a big list of things to do before you say Alvida. But will you do those things within your lifespan. I think for the majority of you that answer would be a “NO”.

You get so embroiled in the day-to-day happenings that the things-to-do list becomes blurred beyond recognition. As you grow up, you lose touch with so many of your bosom buddies, your childhood dreams remain dreams & are rather blown away like dust particles to some faraway land, you forget your main goal in life & get so busy in making the present likeable that in the process you don’t realise you have ended up announcing the doom of your future because your future depends on that main goal in life. You are so persistent in chasing the dreams of the present that finally there comes a point in life when you are forced to ask yourself why you are there in this world & then you realise what you have missed out on.

You realise you have not taken that vacation you had been planning since the past so many years, you realise you have not got in touch with your bosom buddy whom you have been wanting to talk to since eternity but never got the time for it, you realise you have not been able to save enough for your future because you were so busy in making the present better & at this juncture you feel like a loser because you had planned this in your mind all life but never executed these plans. You were so busy executing the small plans for the present that you forgot to see the bigger picture. But buddies remember one thing the bigger picture does matter because in the end when you are about to say Dasvidaniyan you will surely feel the pinch of not having executed the biggest plan of your life…

Live to the point .

Robin Sharma has put forth a philosophy in his latest book “live like this pencil and you’ll have a fine life” which has been lying in the storehouse called my brain. So finally today I decided I need to address this dormant thought and what better way than blogging so that my friends can help me to further decipher the true meaning of the philosophy.

Let us analyze this quote. What does a pencil signify? The first thought that comes to my mind is the power of words. A pencil however small can write words that can move the hearts of millions be it Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” or Jawaharlal Nehru’s “tryst with destiny”. So I wonder how an inanimate object like a pencil can be part of such greatness and I find the answer floating before my eyes. The pencil knows only one job-writing. It has been made for it and it continues to do so till it perishes. 

The above answer further stimulates my grey cells and I realise we have been made by God for some purpose too but the question to be asked is-are we actually living for that purpose. The answer that I get from my heart and mind is a doubtless NO. We think about so many things at the same time that we lose our focus from those goals which are the very reason of our existence. And I now start to understand the meaning of the philosophy. We have to be like a pencil with sharpened focus and live to achieve our dreams/goals, to achieve what has been destined for us else we will forever keep procrastinating and end up with a duck on our life’s scorecard. 

We need to live to the point like a pencil and be focused on our goals and in the process fulfill the reason of our existence. We need to live life in the present because who knows how many tomorrows have been destined for us by God. So let us live to the point and live our dreams today…

Time Management

When i wrote the last blog on optimism, I had not decided on which topic will I write next but as i sit idle now for a few mins in the middle of what has been a very hectic day...I thought why not write about time management. If i were to ask each one of you what is time management, some might say it is creating a balance between time for work and time for family whereas others might say it is managing all chores within 24 hours with ease. In my eyes time management is a simple funda -finding out time from the busy schedules to do what i love be it talking to my girlfriend or writing this blog or pondering over a cup of coffee or listening to music and releasing stress. 

It was the summer of 2007 when i realised what time management is about. I had just started CAT coaching classes and also taken up a part time job plus there was my college St.Xavier's. My schedule for the first month was something like this- 5.45am wake up, attend tuitions from 7.30-9.30 attend college from 9.50-1.00 (mostly bunked classes after 1.00), office from 1.30-6.30, home by 7.15pm sit to stdy at 8.00 and study till around 2.30am with a dinner break in between. I could not watch Tv, could not listen to music,could not hangout with friends and sleep used to chase me every hour. 

I had to find a solution but initially could not understand what to do. It is then my grey cells came up with a gem of an idea. If time was not available i must search for it like a lost treasure. You must be thinking what do i mean by this. Well the theory is simple-time is always there. We have to just look for it in the right way. So began my search for time, time to do what i like. And you know what in 2 weeks time i actually had time for stuffs i could not even think of earlier. I could listen to music when i was searching for articles on the internet, after my mock tests i could hangout with friends even if it meant we were discussing the mock test, when sleep chased me i could ponder over a cup of coffee and de-stress. My worries were mostly over and my schedule was still the same.I had finally found the remedy to my worries without use of more time. 

This phase of life taught me something important other than time management. That whatever we need in life is like time. We have to search earnestly for it and we will definitely find it. If i could find out time for my interests even though on paper there was not a second to spare i could definitely achieve goals that were more feasible. Moral of the story: if you want something badly, you can achieve even the impossible. With this thought in mind i will sign off till the next blog as the time i could spare is over. Back to more work now..you see it is still a hectic day ;)

Optimism v/s Pessimism

  Lets analyse this scenario.Indian superstar Amitabh Bachhan's entertainment company ABCL Pvt. Ltd. has closed down due to bankruptcy and he is reeling under the mighty weight of debts.At this dark hour of his life the Star India Network approaches him to host an adaptation of the hugely popular foreign quiz show "Who wants to be a millionaire?" which they are to name Kaun Banega Crorepati.

  Now Mr.Bachhan could have looked at this situation in two ways-one,he could have been a pessimist and declined the offer as it was a big gamble to undertake the journey from the cineplexes to the drawing rooms and second,he could have looked at it as a ray of light in his dark life and taken the challenge.As we all know he took up the challenge and the rest we know is history.The show became a runaway hit and propelled him to such great heights that he became the cynosure of all eyes.All the leading filmmakers lined up to sign him and since he has not looked back since.So if someone says,"It is to better to be a pessimist.Either you are proved write or you are pleasantly surprised.",I would cite this among many other scenarios as a riposte.I believe ,"It is better to be an optimist who is sometimes wrong than a pessimist who is always right."

  A pessimist is always right as one who thinks negative has negative happening to him day in and day out.Positive incidents are almost extinct in his life whereas an optimist sees the sunny side of life and achieves success predominately.Another successful optimist is Mr. Ratan Tata who with his optimistic outlook towards life has scaled enormous heights.His company's acquisition of the European steel major Corus by outbidding Brazilian steel giant CNS is the mother of all acquisitions by an Indian company.Winston Churchill has rightly quoted,"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity,an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."Mr. Tata saw the opportunity and has thus become a pride for the nation and in the process he has put India on the global steel map.

  So i firmly believe that its far better to be an optimist and achieve success more often than not rather than be a pessimist and let go of opportunities for fear of failure.And to those who say that being a pessimist they have achieved more success than many optimists I have just one riposte-what matters is how you did and not what you did.

the sky is the limit

Who said living in an aeroplane is not feasible???

Check the interiors of an Airbus....

Sri Ram Sene:moral police or a political gimmick?

Every year as the day of love-yes my dear friends valentine's day or v-day as it is more commonly called by youngistaan these days-approaches, some group or the other starts protesting against it by means of rallies, posters,pamphlets,etc. This year it was no different. A group called Sri Ram Sene decided to act as a moral police and thrashed girls and guys in a pub in Mangalore for defiling the Indian culture and if this was not enough they picked up an MLA's daughter and her friend who were travelling together in a bus and interrogated them over their relationship. For v-day the group declared that their modus operandi would be to get any couple married off who are engaged in the outward display of love on Valentine's Day and if a boy and girl are spotted together as siblings, they would be made to exchange a Rakhi.

What i had been pondering over is are they actually trying to act as a moral police or is this just another political gimmick to get publicity and after much thought i have the following questions to ask Mr.Pramod Mutalik:

By beating up women have you not yourselves defiled the hindu culture you say you are trying to save from getting defiled?

By being against display of love and using violence as a means of protest in the times of terrorist attacks what are you trying to portray?Are you not being anti-socials?

Mr. Mutalik, i think instead of trying to protect the culture you should first yourself know what the culture is about. Its about spreading love, not trying to curb it. Its about respecting and protecting women,not beating them up in the name of moral policing. In my eyes all your events clearly portray just one thing you are here for cheap publicity, a clear political gimmick to garner votes. But the India of today does not think like you. Though you might say that you have received support from various sections of the society, the fact is that is a minority when compared to the vast majority who are against your thinking. Do not be happy that people were restrained in their activities on v-day because the fact is they were just afraid of their safety. You may have won the war but you will never win the battle because violence is never an option as George Bush must have realised by now. People's anger against you will someday erupt like lava and your Sri Ram Sene will become just another anti-social group voicing opinions in some corner of the lanes.