The 3 goals of my life

I have always asked myself if i was really lucky. No no...this is not a comparison game where i am trying to see if i am lucky compared to someone else. I am just simply trying to ask myself if i was lucky at some point. More so, i was trying to understand a while back what the term luck meant to me. The dictionary definition of the term luck goes like this:

luck

   [luhk] Show IPA

noun

1.

the force that seems to operate for good or ill in a person's life, as in shaping circumstances, events, or opportunities:With my luck I'll probably get pneumonia.

2.

good fortune; advantage or success, considered as the result of chance: He had no luck finding work.

3.

a combination of circumstances, events, etc., operating by chance to bring good or ill to a person: She's had nothing butbad luck all year.

4.

some object on which good fortune is supposed to depend:This rabbit's foot is my luck.

Note all the key terms in the above definition: force, good or ill in a person's life, circumstances, events, opportunities, good fortune, advantage, success, by chance.

Funny as it may sound, for me "good luck" amounts to happiness. That brings me to the next question: On a scale of 1-10 where does my happiness quotient lie? The day i joined one of the finest universities in this country, my first love, my first rejection, the days i was out of job, the day i got a job with one of the best internet brands, the day when my best friend betrayed me, the day when i started my own company, the day when i shut it down too, when i didn't know where to go or stay the first time i reached bangalore, the day when my dad died. At different points in this story, i might have been at negative sometimes and i might been at 9 or sometimes even at zero. Over the last few months and years, the good part is, this number is constant - am i getting content with life? But the bad part is, its not high enough - have i become a sad person?

What i have realized through some of the above incidents is that i get lucky when i stick to 3 simple goals:

1. I want to be happy

2. I want to eradicate unhappiness in my life.

3. I want every day to be as smooth as possible. I DO NOT want any hassles.

That's it. Am i asking for much? I need simple goals. Are the above simple goals to achieve? Most of us may agree these are pretty simple goals....turns out achieving them however is not as simple as it looks(well atleast for me).

There have been multiple times in my life where everything seemed so low that i would not even be able to achieve a single goal on any given day. Months would pass this way and there are many a times i have felt that the world would be better off without me. Other times, i was stuck at crossroads not knowing which road to take. Sometimes i bounced back. Over the last few months, bouncing back had become far more difficult than before - age, lack of motivation, lack of personal excellence, deteriorating interests from existing hobbies and passions are a few reasons for this. So every time i think of going for that long awaited run in the morning or visiting a temple, my only question to myself is: "What is the point?". It has become a negative feedback cycle of negative emotions fueling more negative emotions. Laughter has seriously become a luxury. Bottom line - I have become cynical, as someone pointed out today.

When i am looking at these incidents and points when i was low and i had bounced back, i am coming to realize that there is a common thread. Each time, there were 4 things and only 4 things that somehow helped me bounce back:

1. Physical Existence: Being in shape. Doing some form of exercise(sex included :)). This is not to develop those 6 pack absa or get to a size zero. Its just about staying healthy. They say you can't be happy if you aren't healthy.

2. Emotional Existence: Sometime back, if someone was a drag on me, i cut them down. If someone lifts me up, i brought them closer. Nothing or no one was sacred. Family, friends and people i care about - i was always there when they needed me. But i never got close to anyone bringing me down. Unfortunately, this rule does not exist in my life anymore. Energy leaks out if someone is draining you. And i have never owed anyone an explanation. I have always believed that explaining is draining. Don't get me wrong. This does not mean abandon those who might need you. Its quite the opposite. If you are a clean river, then people can drink from you. If you are dirty water, then people will get sick. Another important rule is honesty. Unfortunately, i am not a great communicator even among the closest of friends. I talk a lot but i am not necessarily good at communicating what i feel or think. Hence, my most honest opinions gets misconstrued most of the times. Should i stop being honest...sometimes i did that. But yet again, i wasn't feeling right about it. I have finally come to realize that this is the person i am. If people have a problem with my honesty, its their problem, not necessarily mine. So if someone gets into a disagreement because i was honest about what i felt, too bad, i don't know how to fix it for them.

3. Mental Existence: There was a time, every single day i used to write down ideas. For example the other day i wrote down about 25 alternatives kids could do beyond engineering, medicine and commerce. The next day i came up with another 10-15. When i started running out of ideas, i started memorizing all the 3 letter words i could use in the game of scrabble. Or just the other day i came up with about 25 chapters that should necessarily go in anyone's autobiography. All of these is like a cheap psychological trick. Most of us get a sense of accomplishment by filling up pages quickly.

4. Spiritual Existence: No I AM NOT talking about god or religion. What i mean by spiritual existence is to indulge in one of the following spiritual exercises:

• Pray: Doesn't matter if i am praying to god, or to dead people, or to the empty chair in front of me. Its just a means to be thankful and not taking all the credit for just a few seconds of the day
• Meditation: Meditation for more than a few minutes is boring. Sometimes its hard to keep your mind focussed on "nothing". I generally use a simple technique of sitting on a chair, back straight and simply observe how i breathe. I slowly went from 5 minutes on this to about 30 minutes a day at some point.
• Being greatful: I try to think about all those people to whom i feel greatful. Then i try to think of more people and more...till it gets really hard to go any further.
• Forgiving: Harder to implement and easier to talk. I do tend consciously these days to let go of people who have done me wrong. I try and see if i can visualize greatfulness for them(not necessarily pity).
• Studying: Sometimes when i read spiritual or inspirational books(not necessarily self help), i tend to feel good. This is not really as powerful as meditating but its a way to gain knowledge of some kind.

A walk with wisdom....

In that star studded night,
amidst the beauty of the stars and the stillness of the night,
she dropped by my bed and stood beside me staring.
Her name, well is spelt, WISDOM.

She looked upon me, like a tender mother looking at her child,
She wiped my tears,and she said,
"I am here to comfort you, my child.
When you open your eyes, i shall fill your heart with light.
And whenever you call out to me, i shall show you the way to truth and life".

And i said:
"Who am i, really mother?
Why did i come into this frightening place?
What are these thoughts of hope and despair, that pass me every day, every night?
And these moments, griveous and yet joyous,that embrace me and my spirit?
And what about the sweet music of desire,sung by delight?
This youth, playing with my longings, mocking my desires, forgetting yesterday's actions and mourning about tomorrow's sunrise?

What is this world, that leads me nowhere, nor here, nor there?
Why i am submerged in my own ignorance?
Why am i unable to recognize who is friend and who is foe?
What are these mother wisdom? What are these?"

And She replied:

"When the evening comes, the flower folds her petals, and sleeps waiting for the morning.
At the morning approach, she opens her lips to kiss the first ray of light that might fall upon her.
The life of a flower, is filled with longing and fullfillment, of tears and a smile.
So is the life of a cloud,parting and meeting,with a tear and a smile.

And so does the spirit seperates from the greater spirit,
moving into a world of matter,
and pass over the mountains of sorrows and the plains of joys
to meet the breeze of death and return to where it came from."

(Inspired from Khalil Gibran)

On Search!

A few days back something had upset me. One of my friends asked me what is bothering you. I said, i can't find something i am searching for. He casually replied "Life is a search". I didn't know the impact of this statement till i started wondering about it. At the outset, it is one of the casual statements all of us seem to have made or heard at some point in our lives. But somehow, this time around, when i heard it, it was having a far greater impact on me. Indeed, life is a search - a constant search, a desperate search, a hopeless meaningless search for something one knows not what. And then there is a deep state of our minds in which whatever we get is not going to give us any satisfaction. Frustration becomes a means to an end because whatever we search becomes meaningless after a few moments(i mean days/months or weeks) after we got we started to search for. Then another search continues.

The search continues, whether you have it not. The poor are searching, the rich are searching, the ill are searching, the well are searching, the powerless are searching, the stupid and the wise are also searching. Sometimes, we try to find our solutions in money, in power, in prestige, and sometimes, we seek it in god, bliss, love, meditation, prayer...but does the search stop?

One of my friends when i asked her what she wanted to do, she said, she wanted to become the richest women in the world. I actually have a problem with benchmarks, though i love perfectionists. Let me explain : when you say you want to become the "best", it essentially means you might need to outdo all the others in the field. Which means, you first need to search and find ways to outdoo them. And even when you do outdo them, you need to retain it. Not to forget, the rest of them will also find ways to outdo each other. So, on the battle of retaining oneself on the "best" bracket, one has to search and find ways to remain there. And the others, have to find ways to reach there. Hence, there is this constant battle happening on who is going to be the "best", thereby opening more doors to "search". This, indeed becomes an endless cycle, because each one of us in the field needs to constantly find(search) for ways to be the fore-runners in the field.

Money, power, prestige and all the others above only satisfy us with a feeling that we are searching for something. That "something" is still undefined. It still seems vauge in most cases. So richness, power, prestige, respectability is not going to help. Is it to do with man's greed to amass more out of life or amass more out of his search for search? Is man ill with search?

Avoiding Fights and arguments

Some recent experiences have taught me some new lessons on the above subject. Have been trying for a while to sort of assimilate the information. Here are a few tips for avoiding fights and arguments:

1. Delay: This gives you time to think (of the effect of your words) before you speak. Use a niceness filter.

2. Never attack a weak-point : Every person has a shortcoming that he/she is aware of. Never hit the chink of their armour. For example never tease a short guy about his height or a dull girl about her intelligence.

3. Let go of your ego: If you stop caring about your own "importance" then you will hardly pay attention to any "affronts" to you - real or imagined. Then there will be no need to retaliate. This is actually the secret to never having quarrels/fights: Not minding.

1 is hard to do and requires a lot of practice.

2 requires that you know the person well. You might be unaware you are hitting on someone's weakness.

3 is hard even to accept; it is so contrary to what we hold on tightly to. But imbibing it will make you a much happier and friendlier person.

TheAtrix - The real germination

I had the pleasure and the opportunity to watch some of my friends(and well, part of the MISF!T family), perform an in-house play titled "The strangeness of reality". The script was written by amit, who also played the protagonist and he also directed the play...whew! That's in itself a lot. Unlike the traditional MISFIT plays, this was the first time without any involvement from anyone outside the cast. The 35 minutes that the play ran for, went on just fine, pushing the audience to their seats with the right amount of suspense mixed with emotions, that made the evening quite enjoyable.

The story starts with an actor(amit), shooting for his movie, where he realizes that he had actually participated in the shoot even before it had started, in the exact way it was about to happen. Similar incidents follow at home when he meets his wife(rency), so it kind of leads the audience into believing that the actor, has some kind of an ESP. Soon, he realizes he isn't normal and meets a doctor(ankur), who happens to be his friend. There again, he foresees that the doctor is about to get a call from his wife and also tells the doctor the prescription given to him, even before any of these occur. The doctor advises him to consult a psychiatrist, which in a way alarms the actor. As the actor steps out of the hospital, he realizes he sees multiple events that are about to happen at the same time. On one side is his elder brother(praveen), a failed actor, who is frustrated with life and his brother and attempts to commit a suicide. On the other side is his aged dad(praveen again), who is again about to die, due to his old age. Another side, he sees his sweet and innocent wife, plotting a devious ploy with his director(karan) to kill him. Will the actor be able to stop any of this? Will he save his brothe? his dad? Will he be able to save himself? Are all these real? These questions and their realities form the strangeness of reality, leaving the audience in a completely different end(which i don't think i should reveal now, just not to disturb the future viewers).

Now, getting back into the stagecraft and associated mechanics, each and every character, completely fit the part. The cast had a mixed set of actors, 3 of them from MISF!T, who had done the level 1 and the level 2 workshops and 2 others(karan and akshay), who hadn't undergone any formal training. But whether it was akshay playing the DON in the initial scene as amit's co-actor in the movie, who immediately switches to this nervous first time actor when the scene is over, or karan as a very understanding director in the first scene, suddenly switches back into this absolutely devious person towards the end, there wasn't any difference from the rest of the cast. The interesting part to observe is each character had multiple shades to them, which was portrayed beautifully by the actors. Whether it was rency, switching between this absolute trophy wife in the first scene to this devious vamp towards the end and then finally the caring wife or Praveen who switched between the elder brother to the father, so effortlessly, or the doctor, who was caught between being a friend and executing his responsibilities, each one had done their job brilliantly. But honestly, my personal favourite, is the protagonist, simply because he had to handle a gamut of emotions, ranging anywhere between a state of insanity to helplessnes to fear to anger to joy and amit handled it beautifully.

There was nothing to complain about the story or the play, except a few things:

• The end came in too fast and a little abrupt. Maybe, the end needs a little more work and maybe a more concrete ending, not leaving too much room for interpretations.
• The last scene with the father's monologue could have been positioned better, since the father was lost and the audience could only hear his voice. Also, in my view, the father's role did not add any specific value to the entire script.
• The point where amit sees these events at the same time, he was completely upstage. Hence, the focus kept switching between amit and the rest. Maybe, it could have been positioned better.

Besides these minor issues, the play was worth watching. And as someone said, i would have definitely paid to watch the show(Yes! you read it right...it was a non ticketed show:) ). Overall, it was a very very enjoyable experience for me and it kept me completely engrossed. I would love to watch this play getting done once again. In "reality", the play was far less "strange" and far more entertaining. Hats off amit and your team for putting this up. Hoping to see more....

Why are you behaving differently?

Yes,thats what some friends asked me a few days back when i went to meet them. Well, to give you some context, the topic of discussion at that point was centered around women, attraction etc. And i just bluntly turned around and said, "Well: sex does not motivate me". I got some serious stares right then and there. Then this girl asks me :"Why are you behaving differently today?". I said, well, i am behaving myself today. All these days i was trying to be social and all that. And yes, in that process, it might have appeared very differently. Today, for a change, i am being myself. So is it difficult to accept me this way?

The point is, all this while i have been trying to cover up what i was actually feeling about a lot of things. Just to keep things social, i do not push myself; my joys, my sorrows, my anger, my frustration, my thoughts, my ideas and opinions onto my friends. But again, i am trying to please the people around me, some of whom i know and some of whom i don't know - being etiquette, you see(or seeking acceptance,as i would put it). As far as some of my close friends are concerned, i am most of the time, well, myself. As soon as my comfort zone starts disappearing, i start becoming another person - the put on charming, talk-a-tive jovial self of mine. For a change, i wanted to be myself and the reactions i got were...well, rather interesting:

1. Why are you being suddenly nasty?
2. What, if sex does not motivate you, what does?
3. Are you a even a man? (Well, i don't need to prove that, do i?)

Well, all these reactions did not happen this particular day, but these have happened every time i just wanted to be myself. No no, don't get me wrong, i am not blaming anyone here. I mean, everyone is entitled to their opinion. I am no one to pass moral judgements about what anyone thinks. In fact, i was amused that it was becoming difficult for others to accept me the way i truly am.

So i started going back thinking, why? I mean, why was it difficult. Well it all starts a few years back. I, was like any other normal fun loving guy back then in college. I had the same aspirations, same thoughts, same emotions and the same libidos like any other normal 20 year old would probably have. I had great friends(or atleast i thought until then), was in a great place learning my life skills and was having some amazing time. Then, this peer pressure started setting in : "You need to have a girl, thats what makes a true man". But hey, girls are not like apples, who might just fall into your lap. They probably require some work, said a few of my friends. Well, and i think that is where i learnt some really bad lessons, which have sort of become irrecoverable, now.

Lesson #1: You need to either have the looks or the money to attract women
Lesson #2: You need to talk to them well. You need to be social. You need to be fun loving. You always need to have something interesting to talk about
Lesson #3: There are 3 kinds of people : 1. The naturals 2. The learners and 3. The rest. The naturals are born with some skills. The learners learn them and the rest are incapable of learning them.

There were a lot more, but i guess these were a few important ones, given as gyan to me.

Now, i am not naturally an extrovert. I am quite shy as a person and extremely introvert-ish. Now, again, i was constantly told (both by men and well, and a lot more by women) about my lack looks. Fine, i am on the heavier side, but thats me. And i am definitely not the best looking guy around(i probably never will be). And yes, i wasn't obviously a rich dad's kid.

As far as lesson #2 was concerned, I had very different interests then, which obviously weren't lets say, "gelling" with the rest of my peers. In essence, lesson 2 didn't happen successfully.

Now, for the lesson #3, the only thing good about me, which i think holds good even today is that at my core, i am a very nice guy. Yes, you read it right :" Nice guy" :). Which means, i didn't have the skills necessary to attract women. Women could be friends with me, but thats that. Rejection after rejection, spending one of my b'days in the college lawn, stargazing and then going back to the lab, spending overnight there, coding something and then to spending 2 consecutive new year evenings with myself, in my room, watching tv, i had definitely learnt to live lonely. Not that i liked it, but well, my "friends", were entertained differently. As with this guy, who borrowed my dinner jacket to go out with his friends, but didn't even have the courtesy to invite me or even ask me how i plan to spend my new year eve, as if i am going to push myself into his group. Am i that ugly that not one girl even wants to spend some valuable years of hers with mine?, i thought. It affected my self esteem, i thought then, that i didn't have a girl in my life. Self-esteem, is something that originates from within, and i don't know why i placed my self esteem on other's opinions about me. I lost a few more opportunities later when this one girl asked me to go out for a dance with her(lesson #3 - part of the 'skill' training). I said, well i don't know how to dance, i said. Funny, as it may sound, even after a decade, i don't know how to dance. And in this decade, quite a few promised to teach me and a few of them didnt and the rest left me midway stating that it was beyond my scope to learn dancing. Well, i am sure they had their reasons(time, patience, effort required etc). No seriously, again, i am not blaming them. Fine, so be it. If and when the day is right, i will learn, i told myself. I don't wanna become an MJ or something. I will still learn it, maybe to prove a point to myself(or maybe to prove a point to them). And there were others, who wanted me to smoke-up and drink, both of these were a no-no for me. So, then i learnt to create this different self, which was fun loving, joking, and most importantly pretentious and yes, definitely not me.

Well, through these years, i did make some success on this front. But time and again, i have been told and beaten to death with my insecurities, everytime i tried being myself : "You aren't good looking, you don't know how to sweet talk me, you befriend a lot of male friends,so you must be gay, you are boring, ....YOU AREN'T GOOD ENOUGH". Not one, not two, but a lot of them.

Yes, maybe i am not good enough. But this is all i am - "A nice guy".

A Letter from my Past - A letter from my 20 year old self

I've traveled in life this far, from the year 2000 with some advice. Unfortunately, I can only time travel in one direction: forward. I can't go back and tell myself: "You should have gone out of this country and made a few more bucks than being here".

But perhaps some of my advice will be useful to people who were where I was then: 20 yrs.

Save, Save and Save More: I've always had good jobs, but I haven't always spent what I got wisely. I'm not saying that I should have been a penny pincher, exactly. But there's a big difference between buying everything on a whim, and buying nothing.

I wish I had been a little more conscious of that balance. Catching up later in life is much harder than starting early. Even starting a few years later can have a big impact. A Simple Recurring Deposit of Rs 1L for 20 years(at an interest rate of 7.75%) yields an interest of Rs.155000 + Original. 10 years later, its only Rs. 77500.

I almost wrote a Rs.10 Cr. (back then) check on my name when I was 20 to invest in my retirement -- as a kind of forced savings plan. I was good(or probably scared) at paying off loans quickly, but not so good at just saving money. I've regretted not doing that.

Buy just what's needed: In the movie Fight Club, Tyler says "The stuff you own ends up owning you". That statement has really resonated with me. On the one hand, everything is saying "buy more": TV, magazines, the Internet, buses and bus stops even. Everyone wants you to buy their stuff. Getting stuff is often much easier than getting rid of it. "Just throw it away" I hear you saying... I've found it's not as easy as it sounds to throw away a perfectly good - whatever, even if you aren't using it.

These days I think hard (and probably still not as hard as I should) before I buy something new. I admire the people who are trying to live with less stuff, even though I'll probably never be one of them.The more stuff you have, the more stuff you have to keep organized. The more gadgets you have, the more you need to ensure them and the more you need to protect them.

Follow Your Bliss: This has really made my life enjoyable(or sometimes miserable). I get paid for doing what I'd be doing anyway. For me, it's working with computers. I really, truly, love that. I'm convinced that everyone can make a living at doing something they really want to do. Well then you might ask, who is going to clean the garbage outside my house? Funny you should ask. I had a friend back in high school, his father was a professor at the University. During our summer holidays, he used to call the folks in our colony on every sunday morning and we used to clean our community. Figure out what you really like to do, and spend some effort trying to come up with a way to make money at it. I truly truly believe, that a job you love is worth much more than a job that pays well which you hate.

Follow through, till the end: I love starting new things, and i mean starting. It's easy and exciting to start something. Buying a fancy universal remote control kit is fun! Then you realize there are a zillion little pieces, all similar, that you have to, sand, glue, realize you did it wrong, and fix...

That thing that was so great when looked at from a distance can really become tedious when you're in the trenches doing the work to make it a reality.After a string of half completed projects, it starts to get pretty oppressive...and sometimes leads into severe trauma, that would take years to fix.

I am right now very very careful about starting new projects, be it my theatre, or my music or anything fun, outside my job. If I'm going to start something new, I have to decide what existing project I'll give up on. Or can this new, exciting project wait until an existing project is done?

I really enjoy the satisfaction of having something done, and being able to make use of -- whatever I was working on.

The tool called "Perception": For quite a long while, confused with the topics like "start with the end in mind", in any project, i was only seeing the boring things that stand between me and the completion.Very recently, I have started looking at similar projects and think about how good it will feel to be done with it. This has been instrumental in improving my follow-through.

And this all comes from (and trust me, I hate this cliche) looking on the bright side. So, don't concentrate on having to get up early, deal with the traffic and travelling, spend long hours inside an AC room, starting at your 17inch beast, among other things.... Imagine you are on a miracle flight, that could change things. I know, i know its a very very cheap trick. I know, but like placebos(The placebo effect: http://wn.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placebo), its shockingly effective.

Believe, Believe and Believe that you can do anything: This is almost my superpower. It's not so much that I know I can do anything, it's more the converse; I don't know that there's anything I can't do. And you would be surprised to know that i learnt that just a few days back, in a very trivial circumstance. That attitude has made it so that I pretty much can do anything... This is another cheap trick like the above, but it's one i believe is serving me well now. If you decide you can't do something, you're probably going to end up being right.

Learn to leave your frustrations: This has really been the hard part for me, all these years. The biggest stumbling block to the above idea in "Belief" for me, also stems from here. One thing, if at all, i have to say has been strong in my life, is the belief in God. And someone, recently told me this, which was very very inspiring(or cliche if you are an atheist): "God sends you flowers every morning. Trust me, he is crazy about you. God didn't promise days without pain, laughter without sorrow, sun without rain, but he did promise strength for the day, comfort for the tears and the light for the day. If God brings you to it, he will bring you through it". One of my friends recently asked me this : "What is that one thing for which you could give up anything else in your life". I probably didn't have an answer then, and then i realized, that when that one thing wasn't obvious then, why get frustrated about something because that "something" is not all that important in your life, probably.The band, the WeatherThans (http://www.theweakerthans.org/discography/reconstructionsite_content.html) have this song where they say "Throw away my misery; It never meant that much to me; It never sent a get-well card." Just let go of what makes you mad or sad. If you focus on it, you're just giving it power. Let your frustrations go and give power to the successes. I could go on with this, probably even publish a paper or two on this. For me, its more of an internal healing process.

And Finally: Now go forth watch of Bill and Ted (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt096928) who said "Be excellent to one-another." And party on, guys :). Life, is, after all a roller coaster ride :).