The Joy of being Numero Uno

Perfect is the key word of our lives these days. Technology, science, approach-wise, everything has to be perfect. If it is not, then it is trash for us. Perfection has become an obsession. A couple of days back one of my colleague was upset because his aspiration was to be perfect at work. Truly ambitious I must say. It is no where wrong to strive for perfection, rather it is fair enough in the world of cut throat competition. If you don't match up with the pace, you will be last in the race.

However, this hunger for perfection should be moderated with hints of breaks. We are not machines after all. Our focus should be on the learning curve. The means should be important than the ends.We must learn to strike a balance between unambitious and over-ambitious approach. We should keep challenging our capabilities but only to an extent where it keeps the flame within us burning. It should not destroy the magic of being alive and turn us into a success- hungry monstrous machine.

It is important to be on the top, however the journey to that top is also important and beautiful. While you climb the mountain, keep your mind on reaching the top, but also, stop for a while, look at the beauty of the landscape around you and keep it in your heart. Similarly, when you work towards perfection, put in your heart and soul in it, but also, take a small break, look around you, people are brimming with joy and love, spend a little time with them, share a smile with them and keep those moments in your heart, they will inspire you in times of failure because you never know, you might be all alone at the top.

I have always believed that strategies can never be formulated at once, they keep evolving. Similarly, perfection is also a state that keeps evolving, as with every new moment, a new aspect will be added, there will be a new challenge  a new lesson. So practically, we can never be perfect, we can only work towards achieving perfection. So one should realize that perfection is a relative term. We should keep on working, keep on learning, and refrain from the ultimate state of perfection. The reason is that once we start believing we are perfect, we become rigid, we don't want to learn or change. The feeling of complacency creeps in and results in a complete destruction altogether.

So I would rather say that when you embark on a journey towards a destination named PERFECTION, focus only on the path and not the final destiny if you want to be a dynamic and happy human being. The race for becoming numero uno is fun till the time you want to work towards becoming one, the moment you grab the title, the fun is over.

Mister Prime Minister

I have been feeling the urge of having a conversation with you over a cup of coffee, which doesn’t seem feasible in the near future, so I thought of atleast writing this to you. What I have learnt about India is that it is one of the most successful democracies in the world, which has been inherently blessed with abundant diversities. From modernists to fundamentalists, from liberals to leftists, from NRI’s to illiterate villagers, from pearl white to pitch dark, we have all varieties of human existence here. And you are the proud head of such a state (which now sounds like a joke).

The head of the state, which is politically you, is the subject of most of the jokes which lie in my inbox today. I have been an admirer of your intellectual prowess, however, last couple of years and the events which have taken place have completely brainwashed my fondness for you. A political figure, who was mostly apolitical, highly intellectual, backed by vast sea of knowledge, has now become a mere puppet (your de-facto might be the coalition dynamics or Sonia Gandhi or Rahul Gandhi for that matter). How weird does it sound that the PM of world’s largest democracy is nothing more than a rubber stamp. Okay, knowing that the fault is not completely yours and I do pity your situation,but still is it fair enough for a common man to repose his confidence in you?

We are a developing country doesn’t facilitate the masses to avoid the dominance of scams in the newspapers every second day. Poverty doesn’t facilitate bribery nor does illiteracy facilitate crime. All these scenarios depict something which is tantamount to the failure of the system of democracy as a whole. The dirty politics being played in the parliament makes us think of the concept of democracy in India as nothing more than a fallacy, and Mr. Prime Minister do you have an answer to the question that what has given you the comfort of becoming impotent while holding such an important office in such a vast country with enormous human resource at your hand?

We are moving towards a better future, but how? And what is your baseline? Events taking place in every nook and corner of the country don’t say the stories of progress. We encounter that a 5 year old child dies after being stuck into a borewell for 86 hours, a woman is raped in police station when she goes to lodge an FIR about being gang raped, where pilots go on strike, where a majority of people can’t even read or write INDIA, where farmers commit suicides in high numbers, where health and sanitation reforms sound like a taboo, where child labour is as regular as watching porn ( ministers are good at the latter), and the list might go on endlessly. However, we are so busy at handling 2G and CWG, that we can’t even procure the basic living conditions for each one of us, let alone talking about growth, prosperity or development.

As the head of an elected government, you are answerable to each one of us for how could you trod upon our expectations and aspirations and make us a subject of global mockery.  

Sunshine and Rainbows

As I sit down to write this, I am going through a major upheaval within. I feel so restless and so pressurized. It seems as if it is a real tough time for me as God is testing me in multiple chapters of life. And what do I do? Should I be brave and do my best or feel doomed by the thoughts of failure? It’s not that I have never faced failures in life; I have had a basket full of them. From a star to dust, I have faced a major downfall and here I am, back to my saddles, ready for another battle. At the most, I will lose and then again get up to move on.

From where do I get this feeling? The answer is very simple. We need abundant sunshine in life. That sunshine brings brightness to our days, calms us in the night, tells us that we are beautiful, we are smart, and we are capable of doing what we imagine. All we need is to discover that piece of sunshine. It is there around you, explore your world, something will be there which would tell you that YOU ARE NOT A LOOSER, it would be the feel good factor of your life. It can be anything, anyone. If you ask me for a clue to locate your sunshine, I would say anything, the smile of your lover, the hug from your father or even the pink roses of your garden, the kiss from a small kid in your family or a simple message from your mentor. All of them make you feel great and helps you keep going.

Every morning when you wake up, do you smile? Do you feel that wow it is a beautiful morning? Do you feel glad that you are alive and have one more day to explore this world, learn something new? All of these questions might have the same answer i.e. NO because we take our life for granted. What if you don’t wake up only? And what if you don’t get a chance to say your final goodbye? We all have so many problems, our managers are devilish, our parents don’t understand us, our colleagues hate us, our lovers have no time for us and these petrol prices are all time high. Gosh, life is so difficult and we just hate our lives. Is it so bad? Is it that nothing is good or worth loving in this life?

Or if at all, there nothing worth loving in your life, atleast you are there. While earning your bread and butter, struggling for good grades, working your ass off for a good appraisal, you have forgotten yourself. Parents, spouse, girlfriend, boyfriend, friends, children, neighbour and even watchman are important but what about you? Do you value yourself? How about finishing your work, going home, and after supper, going to terrace with a mug of coffee and feeling the cool breeze blowing over your face? Such moments make you feel alive. They give you strength for the challenges of the coming day. However, we hardly take out time to make ourselves feel good and feel charged up.

I often hear remarks like, “Life is unfair”, “I am fucked up”, “life sucks”, “I am fed up”, “I have had enough” and an entire sea of such small phrases which turn you into a big time looser. Don’t use them or atleast don’t use them seriously. Keep it simple and fun. If you had a bad day at work, come home and tell your sunshine person about it, spill that anger and disgust out of yourself and go to sleep. But please don’t wake up with the same pumpkin face. Atleast you be fair enough with the new day. Don’t pile on things, keep removing the trash out of your life, be it your old bike, screwed up assignment or even a not so happening relationship and most important believe in the line that WHAT IS GONE IS GONE.

New day, new start should be your action plan, love yourself and feel great about what you have. And have some sunshine in your life. And do come back to me tell me about what is your sunshine factor.

Looking towards the horizon

Woods are lovely, dark and deep

But I have promises to keep

And miles to go before I sleep

And miles to go before I sleep.

-          Robert Frost

I have always lived by these lines. Whenever I felt low and disturbed, these lines have played in my mind over and over again. They tell me that no pleasure, no pain should stop me, I should keep moving ahead, every day, every moment. Nothing should obstruct me or distract me.

 Infact life is all about taking up a journey, this journey starts the moment you open your eyes in this world and ends when you close them. The start and end point doesn't matter. What matters is the course taken between these two points. Ask yourself have you made the most out of what you have? Do you feel proud of what you are? Do you complain too much and try too less? You are the best person to judge yourself. No assessment, no appraisal can tell you what you deserve, provided that you know what you are upto and how much you are putting in.

Our problem is that we can’t ignore the unimportant stuff in life. If someone is trying to insult you, why should you even care? However, our general practice is to keep thinking about that same piece of shit again and again. And thus, we make things from bad to worse for ourselves. When someone says you are good for nothing, we actually prove them right by doing more mistakes rather than doing our work even more precisely.

What people think about you should not matter to you; rather what you think about yourself is of utmost importance. People will always pull you down; they will be arrogant and jealous. You need to keep your cool and excel. Make yourself happier and let their jealousy increase. You should accept your mistakes and learn from them and close the chapter, don’t carry it with you for the rest of your life. Stop feeling bad about yourself.

Every new day comes with a new opportunity. Make sure that you thank God for it and when you go to bed, you have something to discuss with him (Other than complaints). We hardly realize how privileged we are to lead such a life, we have abundant opportunities around us, we need to grab as much as we can and keep moving. We need to improve every day, and stop worrying about what has passed. Focus on your today, the days to come will become beautiful automatically.

                                                                              

                                                                 HAPPY JOURNEY