Tag: life

Knowing Yourself

Water water everywhere!

We hardly thank water for its role in construction, however, without it, the building would just collapse.
Be like water, my friend.

We hardly put water in the list of ingredients of any dish, however, I’m yet to see a dish that doesn’t involve water.
Be like water, my friend.

We set big menus to serve to our guests in parties, however, they would complain for centuries if they were not served adequate water.
Be like water, my friend.

Water brings everything together, yet makes itself feel redundant.
Because it knows its value, it does not crave for others to know it.

Be like water, my friend.

Life

Three truths of life

1. You always somehow know what is going to happen next.

2. Keeping yourself busy is the ultimate anecdote to keeping yourself free.

3. Procreate is a cool place 😊

People

The saint and the prostitute

There was once a saint who lived up there, in the mountains. To meditate. And think positive thoughts.

In the hut, just opposite to his, used to live a prostitute. Every day, she used to look at the saint and be inspired – as to this is how I should be living my life – filled with positivity, and thinking of God.

Meanwhile, the saint used to look at the prostitute’s house, and think about how she is ruining her life, how her life is terrible, and how he would never want a life like that.

Several years later, they both died.

Up in the clouds, it was decided that the prostitute will go to heaven and the saint will go to hell.

“Why, I was meditating whole day?” rebelled the saint.

Here’s what the administrators up there told them:

It is not what you do, it is what you are thinking about whole day, that makes the difference. While you were busy mocking the prostitute in your mind, she was busy idealising a meditative lifestyle.

It turns out, our thoughts actually run or ruin the world.

Uncategorized

What happens after your time comes?

I read a post of a very successful business owner.
Started his business from scratch – 4 years back.
Quit his handsome day job.
To pursue his passion.

During those days, as he mentioned, his father was asked by a friend about his son. When the father told of him quitting the job, the friend mocked him.

The business owner, who is quite successful these days, went on to add about son of father’s friend, who is now looking for a job due to being laid off during the second wave.

The guy went on to remark about times changing over time 🙂

While time does change, if it also changes you from a humble human to a mocking man, the better things that time brought with itself are of little use.

The real richness is in staying humble. That is when you are able to enjoy the flavours of money.

Money without modesty is a misery.

Life

45 KM per hour

I drove 70KMs yesterday.
All the way to Manesar to my place.
Took 1.5 hours – typically less time, but it was good because the roads were empty, because of Sunday.

If we calculate the average speed, it is 45 KM per hour, as per this.
However, did I drive at that speed?

Not at all.

Rather, for most part of the journey, it was 80-100 KM per hour, due to national highway being empty.

It was rather the slow movement at some traffic signals, that brought down the overall speed.

We all know this. We’ve all experienced this. We are at a place of accepting this.

However, this is what makes life go average:
Small useless insignificant things done small number of times, come down to reduce the overall average of your phenomenal epic performance.

Our days, certainly, aren’t any different from those drives.
The question that might help us, is: Are we setting ourselves up for the 100KM per hour drive, or the 20 KM per hour, that brings the huge average down?

Thoughts

Travel diaries

Travelled from Kota to Delhi via train today.

The view itself made me more productive. Nature, itself, is a great healer.

Some lessons:

  1. Travel gives more ideas. Why not travel to nature, daily?
  2. I was surrounded by a Punjabi family, who spoke to me in Punjabi. What a great way to assume 🙂 Btw, nicely generous people (and I will ignore the fact that they pushed their daughter to look up to me to see how I was working! Can you guys give yourselves a break? Dude, you were returning from Goa, why do you expect anyone to be working when they are returning from Goa?)
  3. Half of the coach was empty. A good way to live luxuriously.
  4. Did I tell you, my productivity was at its peak? None of my colleagues knew I was travelling (not to hide anything from them – we are anyway a chill lot), nor did I tell them – because work was getting done.
  5. It is important to give yourself some treats of solitude.

Had some more reflections, however, for now I want to sleep. So, see you tomorrow! Good night 🙂

Success

What made me happy today?

I was super charged because of two things today:

  • Animal flow workout
  • Dancing – on videos by Team Naach (Gotta make it a daily feature)
  • Taking out an hour just to read

It turns out, it takes the simplest of things to solve complex life problems.

Knowing Yourself, Life

The only problem with our problems

The only problem with our problems is we think we shouldn’t have them.
We, thus, go about hiding them from others.
In so doing, we aren’t doing well either – neither at work nor outside of work.

What’s the solution, then?

The solution is to tell those around you, that you are going through some problems, that might not make you your 100%.
If we don’t tell them and try to do whatever we can, “whatever we can” becomes our default standard.

This is not who we are.
And living life as someone else, helps no one else.

Success

Three things to change your life right now

1. I could list out thirty things

2. But you already know of

3. The One Thing that will change your life.

It is all about what you do right now, once you know that you know.

Work & Business

Productivity in WFH

  1. Read a book for 10 minutes in breaks.
  2. Don’t worry about WhatsApp validation. If it comes one day, some day you will be sad about WhatsApp criticism. Calmness in either is the juice.
  3. Write that mundane activity also down on paper.
  4. You have a life beyond the screen.
  5. People are good. Just that so much exposure to screen has lead their mind to stop being empathetic – which usually comes when we go out and have a walk 🙂
Art and Creativity

Conversation with an artist

Yesterday I had a conversation with a colleague of mine, who happens to be the video editor.

Of the kind and cute fellow he is, one line stayed with me:

“The only thing I don’t like is bad quality videos.”

Wow!!! That is an artist.
He is willing to learn.
Super happy to have 1000 feedbacks.
Rather DMs me often to share feedbacks.
And, LOVESSSSS his work – and that is visible from his art.

It is such an absolute pleasure to go through his videos.

Life is great when you are surrounded by artists.
Life is wonderful when you choose to be an artist.
Life gets gratefully incredible when you love your art. There is no one who can take it away from you. Unlike people who come and go, the art is a part of our existence.

In the process of making that art come alive, we come alive.
Isn’t that incredible?

Career

It’s been a while

It’s been a while, and all this while, I have been thinking of what I’ve lost. I never knew I loved my old work so much. Who misses work so much?!

Everyone has to lose everything some day. What stays back is how you responded to such losses.

You know what’s the worst part? A friend of mine is dealing with another loss and all this while I have been bringing her back. And she’s recovering quite well, despite the fact that she is the most vulnerable om the weekends.

Another example I see is of Brahma Kumaris. They had a well established network of services in India, when a senior Sister of the organisation was told to leave this and begin her services in London. And as much as she resisted it, her stint in London paved the way for more and bigger services.

Strange how “me” and “mine” works. While in reality, only God is mine. Because I am not this body, I am the observer in this body. That observer is answerable to God – to create karmas that set an example, not something that sets ego boundaries.

Nishtha, no we are not going back. Staying true to your karma is your dharma. And life always moves beyond.

Books

Open, by Andre Agassi

Sometimes I find myself walking to my bookshelf, pick up Andre Agassi’s memoir Open, and look at this back cover pic of Agassi.

The kid is quite confused.
The kid hated tennis.
The grown-up Agassi hated tennis.

But with the weight of that racquet too much to handle, he managed it for one of the greatest careers in history.

And perhaps even found himself in the process.

This kid gives me power, strength, and often vulnerability, to not resist what’s coming.

In what lies unseen, you will see yourself.
In what you don’t know, you will know more.
In what you hate, you will end up loving yourself.

Manager

The making of a Manager

The more you care only about getting positive feedback, the more you will escape your growth.

Your work is to excel at your work. If you’re constantly degrading at it, you’re making it impossible for others to trust you.

Don’t focus on being liked. Focus on being curious, learning, and really really listening!

Don’t send that angry message / email. Calm yourself down.

People are people. They are going to overestimate what they do. So don’t feel let down when they

You won’t be a superhero when you commit to doing 10 projects and you do 6. You will be a superhero when you commit 6 and do 6. Your words matter. A lot.

Don’t try to impress your boss. Or anyone. The more you try to do that, they will sniff it. They just expect you to be real. And do the good old hard work. Along with the smart one.

Talk to your boss. Talk about your problems, what’s troubling you, what isn’t working, etc. Don’t expect him to get back to you every single day.

But, at the end of the day, you should be happy going to work each day 🙂

Uncategorized

So much injustice?

Think of a team of 20 people.
All are doing their work.
Some are rockstars, some are just getting along.

But you see the management treating everyone at par.

When you are a rockstar, this might irk you.
Someone else who is not performing is also being treated as well.

But…there comes a time, when things get levelled up.

We’ve all experienced this before.
The question is: What are we experiencing even when we are doing our best work? Envy or happiness?

Life

Chemical reactions in the body

The body – how it responds to chemical reactions is very very weird.

A few days back I mentioned how I bingewatched Dill Mill Gayye on a weekend.
The TV show, in many ways, was an inspiration for the people of my generation.
The cute people, the pure love, the sparks flying at workplace – everything.

Until I spent some time alone for so many years, getting to know the reality.

This morning I was reminded of one instance from the show – where the male protagonist goes on with a friend and feigns as her husband in front of her family, so that her family members stop pressing her for marriage. He does all this without informing the female protagonist, with whom he is deeply in love with.

Today, just by remembering that instance, I was sent into a state of feeling like crying, as to how this could happen.

Of course, a lot of this relates to the past mistakes I made.

Which brings me to the question – do we really forgive people or does our body remember everything?

If the body remembers it, it is up to the mind to practice focussed forgiveness – for a long, long period of time. Even when it is not asked for. Not for the other person. So that we go beyond our limitations that didn’t even exist.

Don’t we owe this to ourselves?

Process

There’s nothing wrong with Instagram!

Today I attended a wonderful master class by Nir Eyal, author of the book Indistractable.

Some wonderful things he said:

1. Schedule everything – learning, work, leisure, family time, sleeping time, free time social media and even OTG!

2. To-Do lists should be done away with, because no one accomplishes all of those daily.

3. Instead, do whatever you had desired to accomplish during that time. That is powerful! You’ll then end up achieving MORE than your To-Do list.

4. Life is NOT about getting things done. Rather spend 30-45 minutes daily, thinking.

5. And last resort, make an identity pact: Is what you are doing aligned with who you are?

Very very thoughtful! This master class is definitely going to be a masterpiece.

Process

3 Habits That NEVER Go Out Of Style

  1. Saying thank you to everyone (PS: My email signature is “Thank you”, that I type every time instead of keeping it auto, because I wanna really mean it!)
  2. Having a schedule for your day (Even rest and leisure, otherwise Parkinson’s Law is wise enough :D)
  3. Speaking your truth, even if you are disliked.
Success

I’d never thought I’ll do this!

Off-late I have started teaching Maths to my nephew and niece.
9th standard kids. Unable to understand it in Zoom classes. So we do another Zoom whiteboard instead 🙂

Here’s what few days of teaching have taught me:
Pros:
1. Be enthusiastic with kids and they will reflect that back every day.
2. If you clear their basics, they will we propelled themselves to go to RD Sharma (I know!) to do further.
3. Damn their innocent voice! Or maybe its my love for them <3

Cons:
I discovered one about myself: To accept everyone at their own speed instead of expecting everyone to be at the same one.

Life gets so much better when you hang out with the right people, in whatever manner 🙂

Life

Five fave one-liners

  1. We are our strongest when we listen to our inner voice more than what our idols say.
  2. The only birthday preparation introverts make is turn on phone notifications the day before.
  3. The doers have one core value: They never talk much about their future plans. They just let their work do the talking.
  4. When someone asks you: “How you did it?” and you stumble for a bit instead of showing, “This is how…”, you’re truly humble.
  5. Do it even if your parents disagree. They will disagree to things they themselves said once. Why not actually go live your life? (PS: Disagreement does not mean being disrespectful.)