The Spirit of Enthusiasm…

...hit me today when I met her – a random stranger. Her first glimpse revealed a lady surprisingly skinny, but extremely defiant to cold (for a cold 8 degrees in Gurgaon, she chose to wear a thin, front-open jersey).

She is not much different than anyone of us at all. Simple, really. But not ordinary— very special – one of those who leave you better than how they found you. Her spirit of enthusiasm is catchy and so is her love for life. She speaks humbly. There is no need for conviction for she knows her passion (education – her field of expertise) is real; and she has so much to tell you: about a simple idea, an idea with the potential to abide in the smallest of us.

And just like that, she makes me realize my New Year resolution. Her talks infer with my thoughts and give them a push of urgency. I become conscious about the need to work on my dream project. I need to start it, do it & finish it. I need to live my truth. Express my love. Share my zeal. Take action. Walk my talk. Dance and sing to music. Embrace my blessings. Make today worth remembering. That’s my resolution for 2014. What’s yours?

Simple Ways to Improve Life

Here is a list of few simple ideas to improve the gift called 'Life'.

1. Smile. 
2. Don't lie.
3. Show compassion. 
4. Be a world-class listener.
5. Preach less, observe more.
6. Don't give advice unless asked.
7. Leave people better than you found them.
8. Say Please, Kindly and Thank you as many times you can.
9. Learn to ‘let it go’ and discover the joy in 'forgiving' others for their mistakes.
10. Give something to everyone you meet - people don't need things - they want feelings. Share your calm, make the environment peaceful.

Change your Thoughts to Change your Life

I call it “The Time to Charge the Self.”

You can be a good parent, a committed high-paying executive, an attentive child, a responsible spouse and a happy person with time for hobbies. How on earth is this possible? Stop creating waste thoughts and begin integration of your mind with the self.

Begin with a clear view of what you are – and what you can contribute to every domain of your life – self, home, work and the community. Carefully consider the type of thoughts you create each moment, without ever thinking the repercussions -  and think if all that you bring into mind is that important. Experiment with some minor changes – try SOS – Stand, Observe, Steer – during your normal day routine, take a break from whatever you are doing (this exercise doesn’t take more than 10 seconds), observe your thoughts and steer them in the direction you want. It is important because most of the times you would just not know what is going on in your mind.

Over a period of time, we all have become keenly attached to the perceptions that we’ve created that our mind has become accustomed to accept that as a reality. When thoughts go on for long without getting checked, they become habits – and that’s how we develop tendencies we don’t like in ourselves. Anger, frustration, depression, aggression etc. are the tendencies which are not normal and have been developed out of irrational thinking.

So if you want to change the self, change your habits and for that you’ll have to change your thoughts. It will happen only if you develop the habit of sitting with yourself – or in other words meditate.

People generally confuse meditation with a difficult process. It is in fact, a simple procedure which involves taming the mind to see what you think. In other words, it involves raising your visualisation to a point that you are able to create a scene in front of you of every thought that you create. Since visualisation is a slower process, it will instinctively reduce the frequency of your thoughts, thereby forcing the unwanted beliefs and theories leave your mind.

I can see that some of you might be hesitant to begin this. But if you can pull this off, you can ramp up your mental insight to win your own personal race of existence. So - good luck and I hope you have a healthy life ahead.

Killing English - Desi (and sometimes Videshi) Istyle

Hi Folks,

Here's the collection of some English errors I've found during the last six months of observation. I have tried to distinguish these commonly-found English errors under some basic heads. Let me know if there's a better way of sorting.

Print errors that made it to the common man:

English error in Times of India 

No link between the two - how can they make such errors

Print errors in English

The Story of Fuelling a Change: How I Began Getting Up At 4:00 am

How to Get Up Early?

Getting up early is the best gift my life has given to me.

To me, it means being awake during that part of the time when there are no distractions. It means starting my day well in advance from the Rest who are still snuggling under the covers to dream. And in the evening, use the same time to foster hobbies rather than working late – or to get to sleep early while others are eating out, partying or watching TV.

From Apple's Tim Cook to Cisco's Padmasree Warrior, Starbucks' Howard Schultz and Pepsi's Indra Nooyi, this is habit is common to tons of famous leaders. Whether they were born early risers or learned good sleep habits, they know how to seize the day.

My story

The year 2005-2006 marked a drastic change in my life. I had lived pretty casually before, and my lifestyle was kind-of irregular one like anyone of my age. I had a good-paying job, a vibrant social circle and the zeal to do big, but something was missing. It kept me awake during nights and made me worry about the possible “Whats, Whys & Whos” – What if I keep on living like this with no clear path of life (though the job was good and I had a thriving career laid in front, but I wanted more from life). The questions did not stop there. I thought about life, death and more. I wanted to know why do we live? Who’s God? What's there that we can’t see but is right in front? What happens after one becomes completely contented?

The change process

And then it was the time for the “Change Process” to begin. It was the time when I got introduced to meditation, the subtle art of experiencing deep silence and attaining peace & happiness. To be honest, it was a very slow process, but I am glad that I became a part of it. When I began practicing it, I wasn’t sure whether I’ll continue because like the other youngsters of my age, it wasn't possible for anything to remain interesting enough for me to continue. But the meditation practice surprised me. I just got hooked to it. Such was the effect that I began getting up early at 4 (& sometimes even before that), just to get enough time to experience it in solidarity with the nature.

And that’s when I learnt three golden habits to wake up early.

The three habits

Happy Republic Day

Amar Jawan, Army Memorial, Kargil & Drass Road

Freedom in mind, faith in the words, pride in our hearts; memories in our souls. Let's salute the nation on Republic Day! Vande Mataram!!

Amar Jawan, Army Memorial, Kargil & Drass Road

Discipline, Patriotism; Patience to practice.

Happy Lorhi to All

One day Sunday went to Monday to see Tuesday and ask Wednesday whether Thursday has told Friday and Saturday that “SUNDAY” IS LOHRI. 

“HAPPY LOHRI”

Happy Lorhi to All

Smart Phones & Not-So-Smart Users

As a writer, I have developed an obnoxious habit of observing people, and it does irritate me sometimes to see how some people can waste hours of productive hours on mobiles. Why can’t an accounts manager remember that the payment is pending since 3 months? Why, over a course of 40 minutes, does a senior executive trade 15 emails to organise a simple coffee meeting, only to be postponed to the next day? Why does a manager from real estate company waste the entire meeting in talking about his inspirations that are not even remotely related to the project?

If you are an owner of a smartphone that has made it possible for you to read this on mobile, the surprising answer to these apparently unrelated questions might literally be stretching out in the palm of your hand.

With a massive and rapidly increasing user base, smartphones have now become a core part of our lives. Sprouting far beyond the basic productivity tools in the early 2000s, Blackberrys, iPhones and Android handsets have acquired a dominant position in the mobile industry. The value proposition? Work and play faster, smarter, longer, and better. I also found that over 50% of young professionals rank mobile phones as the most vital technology that helps them to work. Cloud computing ranked second at 14%.

More interesting than rating people’s dependency on their phones, is observing their behaviour behind the exploding usage. While speaking to some smartphone users, I found their ehaviour shifts very surprising. One user commented, “I’m always scheduling things on my phone and it tells me when to do what”. "By the time I check all my phone notifications, new ones just swamp me”, said another.

I am not a psychologist, but am not even so naïve to find out that the overall results are stunning: frequent use of smartphone imposes crucial psychological costs, and it impacts our professional and personal lives in four ways:

• ·         We don’t remember anything anymore because now smartphones do that for us.
• ·         We’ve forgotten to use our mind to work out simple calculations because our phone gives us inbuilt calculator
• ·         We are wasting time by indulging into irrelevant data downloads
• ·         It keeps us hooked to social networking and within FaceBook, Twitter, Linkedin – the actual me has got lost.

Craziest Things Employees Tried to Expense in 2012

Crazy employee

Dear naïve epitomes of corporate virtues,

Did you think that the days when employees could subsidize crazy expenses are gone? Not so easily dear. The report by Businessweek shows that almost one-fifth of the expenses submitted violate the company norms in one way or another in these days of cost cutting and austerity. Here are 7 examples of the most brazen expenses that were filed last year. The names of the companies are not disclosed due to confidentiality agreements.

• ·         Innerwear: Someone in the telecommunication industry thought their body looks best at the workplace with a particular set of innerwear.
• ·         Deer urine: The deer urine was a key requirement for an agricultural products manufacturing company employee’s successful hunting trip with a client.
• ·         Young giraffe and zebra: The baby giraffe and zebra were brought to an office party for a hospitality company. I suspect there was plenty of booze there, too.
• ·         Dunk tank: An auto parts supply company hired the dunk tank to uplift the moral of its employees. Every time they achieved a target, they got to dunk their boss in it.
• ·         Pink flamingo ornaments. The employee of a pharmaceutical company needed ten. For the home, it’s cheap, but for the office? That would have been fun!
• ·         Tattoo removal: Put forward by an engineer who wished to improve his image and sought to look more professional to clients.
• ·         $3833 for Screaming Eagle (1994): After supper, the finance Gods like to have drinks. One highly-sophisticated employee decided to taste one of the world’s most expensive wines on the company dime. 

Good luck, dear friends. You—and your brash expenses—will surely be a source of inspiration for the new hires of the coming year who, in my humble opinion would surely be inquisitive to know the best way to make use of company money.