Festivity and Technology

Hey folks,

I have always been an ardent supporter of technology and an advocate of its inherent positives. But, today, I am going over to the other side to talk about how technology has mechanised the traditions of Indian festivity to a sizeable extent.

I woke up today morning to find my GMail Inbox overflowing with Diwali ‘wishes’ emails. Some of them were personalised and had content known only to myself and the sender. But, by and large, most of them had a generic ‘wish’ and were most probably sent out as a broadcast.

I sat down to think how things used to be (just about) 7-8 years ago! Sending emails was only a means to reach out to expats where the cost of an ISD call was unreasonably high. That is an understandably reasonable use of technology.

Also, speaking ideologically (like Srinath), a wish is a genuine transfer of goodwill from the heart that is converted to a verbal or textual form in order to be able to be communicated across. However, I can still wish Srinath wins in life all the time, without letting him know. Both of us still know that we would support each other irrespective of our own states of existence or any other tangible aspect of life. We have never wished each other for anything in the last 4-5 years. This goes for Arun, LVS, Pavithra, Ash, (the other) Srinath et all too! Sowmiya is a little particular about wishes, though. I still don’t wish her. But again, we know we’re there for each other irrespective of the presence or absence of any tangible aspect of life!

Today, I had to import all my business contacts and send them ‘Diwali greetings’. I did it. For reasons best left untold here.

But ever since I hit that ‘Send’ button, I kinda felt a bit uncomfortable about the lack of personalization and unconditional genuineness in such a wish.

So, here’s the official line. I have now taken a resolution to send out personalised emails to the folks (whose names are) mentioned above and to a select few (who’ve made a difference to my life) other than them.

Why email? Why not a phone call? You may ask. I chose to use the same ‘cold’ and ‘impersonal’ medium to create goodwill in a way that’s similar to a good old phone call. Just to prove one point I’ve always advocated, ‘Technology is only a medium, a tool. How it is used could drastically change the way you or me or the World function(s)’.

What better a way to announce this than a good old blog post?!

Yours Skeptically,

P.S. Please gimme some time, guys! Writing personalized emails back-to-back isn’t an easy task!

Man and Emotions

Hey folks,

It’s been quite a long time since I posted on this blog. Not that I’ve been busy, just didn’t have the inclination to sit down and post. A lot of draft posts lined up but nothing completed. To those of you looking for a cheerful light-hearted post, don’t bother reading further. This isn’t it. On the other hand, if you’d care to know what’s been going on in my life in the last 3 weeks, please read further.

The last 3 months in life have been totally amazing. Not only on the work front but also w.r.t personal life. People who’re close to me would know that I’m a born Leo. Arun would vouch for how short-tempered I used to be whilst in college. Probably, Sathya might vouch for it too.

The day myself and Srinath started Sit, to discuss our personal value and belief systems on a quasi-public platform, we (knowingly or unknowingly) ushered into our lives a movement towards increased tolerance and openness. To many, this might sound like a statement worth ridicule. But to the few who have known either (or both) of us well pre and post Sit, the difference would be quite visible.

To this day, there are people in my circle who laud this openness and there are people who criticise it to the core. The truth is that neither of them is wrong. I chose to go ahead with the openness because somewhere inside me, it felt good to continually keep changing for the better. Irrespective of who or what brought about the change.

About three months ago, I told Srinath I would make the first ever attempt in life to remain a lot more patient. To tolerate a lot more destructive and constructive criticism. To remain calm and react to them with a balanced state of mind. A lot of people were responsible for this little attempt. Namely, Dr Annamalai from Gandhi Study Centre, Milind Jadhav, Srinath himself and finally, my greatest inspiration in life, M K Gandhi.

Randomness has been my best friend and worst enemy, both at the same time. It waited for 22 long years to let the above mentioned piece of wisdom dawn upon me. But, fortunately, it gave me enough chances to test my patience and my conviction towards the word I gave to Srinath.

As my Facebook and Twitter trail would indicate, work-life has had a lot of positive progress. So much so, that a few people who had written me off have bothered to contact me and let me know I’m doing a good job. Nice. But there have also been some really pressurising times when I used to work hours together for no apparent progress to take place.

Those pressurising times made my process of transition towards a calm, balanced self a bit more elusive. Every human being has an emotional high point and every human being makes mistakes. But, fortunately or unfortunately, they had to take place at the same time in my life. This led to a lot of unnecessary complications and a lot of emotional pressure.

I have always kinda had a fear of offending people. As a result, (in recent times) an apology from my side would never be a moment too late, if the mistake is/was on my part. Sometimes, the apologies would get a little too much. People are different. So, there is also a chance that someone would get offended by an excessive apology!

It is a little sad that I’ve been completely ignorant of that fact in life till now! A little incident involving such a person created quite a bit of emotional pressure over 3 weeks of time. Srinath, Teal, Pavithra, Arun and LVS would remember this incident. They usually know everything there is to anything in my life. I didn’t bother telling Vinay, Vinay and SrinathC for (their respective obvious) reasons best left untold here. At best, they would’ve noticed that I wasn’t normal.

I have to kneel down and acknowledge the support that all of them provided to me during this rough patch in life. But for them, I would’ve lost my cool completely, long ago. A special thanks to Saranyan for telling me a few subtle points about my own personality. Some things I had failed to notice even after some introspection.

It was VERY difficult, trust me. But, I’ve kinda made it through the rough patch with as much patience and balance I could muster on my mind. Naturally, due to work life and its pressures, I would’ve had emotional high points and would’ve lost my cool. I felt like a naxal who wanted to return to society and lead a normal life. Society would never accept him initially. But, over a period of time, even Society would change seeing the conviction of the guy towards leading a normal life and towards patiently awaiting forgiving. Though these emotional high points led to a lot of complications, all it took was one single long conversation to set things straight.

The first time I waited patiently for a person in life, it has turned out to be a nice outcome. The first time I tried to consciously maintain the balance of tolerance and self-respect-breach. The first time I stepped forward to admit all my mistakes upfront. The first time I continued to show respect for someone who was totally pissed off with me and kinda ignoring me. This moment in time, as I’m typing this post, I feel a sense of victory I have never ever felt before in life.

Not even when I’ve done my best feats and not even when I’ve won prizes. This seems beyond all that. The sense that I have won trying to do something I never believed I could do, only 3 months ago. It is truly an amazing experience.

Time might fly and people might come and go in my life. This incident will stay as the one that lead my transformation towards greater tolerance, greater patience and a stable balance of emotions.

I just felt like putting this up as a regular blog post. No specific reasons. More of gut feeling.

Will post in the coming weeks about a lot of positive and VERY happy things.

Yours Skeptically,

P.S. I have tried my best to put down the outline of incidents. The granular details need not be dealt with here. There is an alternate space for that.

When loved ones part with

Hey folks,

Yes, this is one thing that all of us wish doesn’t happen to us. The loss of a loved one. But given the abundance of randomness in life and the fact that it’s beyond human comprehension and control, one needs to cope with everything and life must just go on.

It is interesting to see a workshop being done on this. Most of us take this ‘coping with’ thing on an ad-hoc basis and don’t really realise the need to be prepared to bounce back into life after such a calamity. I am sure that attending such a workshop would be of immense use, not only when the calamity happens in your own life but when it happens in the life of someone you value a lot. This is more of a chain reaction but it is worth the process. Most of the initiatives I support are slow organic chain-reaction-based initiatives. I wish to see this one in such a way too.

Anyway, I’ve attached a DOC file about the workshop, here. Kindly look into it and see if you can attend the workshop. It’s about a month away, on July 17th and 18th. So, don’t say you weren’t informed well in advance!

Yours Skeptically,

P.S. The mini-workshops organised by Career Cats have been postponed. Will post again when they’re scheduled.

Reaching out

Hey folks,

A recent unpleasant happening in my dad’s extended family has totally shaken my belief system and has pushed me to look at the rest of the World with a lot more compassion and care.

I was thrown awake to the rude fact that the best metric to judge the quality of one’s personality is the number of people who genuinely cry when he is no more. This fact just made me see my own ‘close’ circle in a different way.

So, here it goes. If I have ever hurt your sentiments or have ever imposed my views upon you or have ever been a complete asshole, I unconditionally apologise for the same and assure you that I would put my best effort to see that I change for the better. I would also like to let each one of you know that I am there for you and that I shall help you out in whatever way that is best possible. I assure that I will give you a shoulder to cry on and a hand to pull you up when you’re down.

However, although I don’t expect any tangible return, I would feel better if I could get a little care from your side too. A pat-on-the-back occasionally and a good joke every now and then.

In the upcoming week, I shall personally contact every single soul I value and shall do my bit to make his/her life happier and easier. For others, I’m always there. All you have to do is just ask!

On a more serious note, I request all of you to make it a habit to get a master health checkup done every year on a recurring basis. In the most unlikely of cases, this should cost you around 5k. It is usually lesser than that, I think.

I also request you all to put in some effort and try to avoid procrastinating things. I am doing that from this very moment onwards. I will try hard not to procrastinate in life. For all you know, I might not be there to execute things tomorrow.

Yours Skeptically,

P.S. I hope this post finds you all in good health and a pleasant state of mind.