Riding home

Two months back when I entered the bus for the first time there was no familiar face. It was actually a smaller vehicle than a bus, to be precise - a 20 seater swaraj mazda. But all 20 faces were new to me. I might have seen a few of the faces at the work place but didnt know anyone in person.

Its exactly 2 months since that first day. Today I know who everyone is, I know a bit about their families, I know everything that I would know about any normal acquaintance, and we talk as if we had known each other for ages. We share jokes, share gossip, share anecdotes, share food, pull each others leg, have fun and try to get closer all the time. Its been long forgotten that we have known each other only for 2 months now.

I find this as a classic example of how Indians socialise. We like to talk and never hesitate to make acquaintances. People always say that in a long train journey you will always make friends. And that is very true. Put a bunch of Indians together for sometime and everyone will know about each other in no time. Soon each will get introduced to each others family and then there will be dinner plans and outings!!

That is exactly what is happening in my cab too. I always used to tell them that I have two vada for breakfast everyday and today I was actually asked to get 20 packets of vada in the morning to have as breakfast in the cab!! And there is a plan to have a "cab dinner" (with family) tonight!!

Yes / No / Cant say

I was reading an article in ET about the inability of Indians to arrive at decisions. The author takes the example of the numerous surveys that happen, over the net, through sms's, in the televions, radio and also polls that happen face to face. We always see a column that says 'Cant say' or 'Dont know'!! He says that the west usually want answers in black and white and hate contradiction but we Indians thrive on contradiction.

He quotes someone

"If life is simple and you only have to keep your eye on the ball in order to achieve something, life is controllable.
If life is complex and subject to changes of fortune without notice, it may not matter where the ball is;life is simply not easily controlled."

He then says that surveys show that easterners fell themselves to be less in control than their western counterparts. And rather than trying to control the situation they are likely to adjust to them.

I was just wondering how true this is. We can see examples of such scenarios in all facets of our life. Let us take a small situation where we need to buy something. The amount of research that we do is huge. We compare prices, see reviews, consult people, rethink about the idea of buying hundreds of times, then say 'We leave it to God' before we actually go and buy it.

In order to take a decision we debate, discuss, consult and always try to choose a middle path for the answers. As the author rightly mentions - "Indian thinking is more inclusive and interrelated compared to the focussed and directional approach of the west"

And he gives a beautiful example -

"To a seemingly innocuous question like "Are you in love?", more often than not the answer would be "Pata nahin, yaar" (I really dont know). This is not a simple act of not knowing or confusion. If the answer is a no, it denies the virtues of falling in love. If the answer is yes, it ends the thrill of searching for love. There is some truth in both the search and the commitment. The Indian mind will typically look for a middle path which will accomodate both the truths."

And just how true is that!!!


pS :

Inner Conscience : How is it going guys?

Heart : The sun is shining!!!

Brain : Yes brighter than ever!!!

Inner Conscience : Hmm...make hay while the sun shines!!!

Happy and Gay

I was reading a supplement of the Economic Times last week in which I came accross an article which talked about the life of gays/lesbians in the corporate world (I am going to use only the word gay from now on in the post but it includes lesbians too). It talked about the way gays are handled in companies and how they are coming out the closet. But the corporate world only covers a small portion of the world's gay population.

I was wondering whether we as Indians are ready to accept the concept of gays. A lot has already been debated about this and conclusions drawn. Though we would like to be liberal enough to embrace them its only a wish and we want to show the world that we have no problems with the concept. I feel its not the gays who need to come out of the closet but its the society. Now society in itself is a very large collective noun and so in order to understand I thought I would break down the word.

Let me consider only a small cross-section of society - my friends circle. Let me assume that one of them is gay and we get to know it. Let us say we get to know it without his knowledge. What would our reaction be. Would this change our behavior towards him? At the beginning maybe we would be in shock. Then his close friends might try to confront him with this knowledge to make him accept it. This might tarnish the relationship that he had with his friends. If the guy is pretty smart and cool about it then he may even choose to tell them the truth and make them understand that its normal. But that cant be expected always. He might become a loner. Some friends may start making fun of it. He might become the victim of all kinds of sexist jokes. And I am sure that other than his really close friends the rest of his so called friends will not be the same as before.

With all these possibilities will the guy be ready to come out of the closet. I think we have a long way to go.

Weekend updates

On the guest post thing I have received the first post!!! Did take a bit of cajoling and some phone calls and some mails and some blackmail and some threats and some sweet talk and in the end I got it. So out of the seven people I have received the post from one. There are 3 more who have said they will do it or giv it a try. Lets hope they honor their commitment. There are 2 more who may or may not have read the request. But I am going to keep my fingers crossed. And there is this last person who has outrightly said he will not do it. But let me see if I can coax him to do it!!

So when am I going to publish the first guest post? Well I think I will wait for some more time till I receive posts at least from three more. I sometimes feel I should have keep some early bird prizes to entice people!!!

I have spent most part of the weekend listening to this. Watch the video and the song might grow on you just like it did on me!!!

Anyway I watched the movie Life in a metro and I think I will try to write my thoughts about it in the next post. But the highlight of the weekend is my trip to the temple in the nearby BDA complex. Nah - I do go to the temple often, so nothing new with that. But its an ad that caught my attention there that brightened my weekend. The ad was placed right in the sanctorium and it read :

God may call you

But it is unlikely he will call you on your mobile phone

Please switch off your mobile phones.

- Hutch

One of the many reasons I am still with Hutch!!!

Food for thought

Who has not been amazed to learn that the function y = e^x, like a phoenix rising again from its own ashes, is its own derivative?

-Great currents of mathematical thought, vol 1 NY : Dover publications


It is statements like this that keeps me going through the day!!!

E-G-O

"You need to leave your ego aside for sometime if you want to spend a happy life"


These were exactly the words that a friend of mine told me today. Well actually SMSed. I have always wondered what the word 'ego' means. But now it looks like I am a walking example of it. So its time for some introspection.

Let me not delve into the details on the context in which he mentioned this as that can become the topic of another post on this blog. But let me just consider the word ego. How much of it is necessary in one's life and where do I need to draw the line so that it doesnt become too obvious and frustrating for people.

Ego I think is more of a quality (I am not going to debate on whether its good or bad) that tends to affect your relationship with people. But what does ego mean. Let me not consider the dictionary meaning. Maybe I talk only about myself, maybe if I give my opinion more importance and not be willing to consider other's opinions or feelings, maybe if I give more weightage to self-importance, maybe I give more importance to self-esteem, self-image, maybe I use the letter 'I" a lot, and maybe thats why people think I am egoistic.

Or maybe I am just reading too much into it. But 'ego' is something I am sure people can manipulate. I can manipulate myself to portray myself as less egoistic or maybe more. But I can do that only if I get the feeling that people think I have crossed the line.

So now in order to bring this thing to conclusion I would like some 'honest' feedback. The cross-section of readers on this blog (though small) is pretty diverse. Some poeple have known me for 23 years, some for 6, and some for 1. I am going to request your opinion on 'ego'. Comment on the post if you want to remain anonymous, or just send me a mail. Though it will be a pleasant surprise if any of you actually do either!!!

Servicing Society

I have always wondered, what should I be doing to make the world a better place to live in. For sometime now after I have started earning something more than whats needed to sustain me, I have often got the feeling that maybe I should donate some money to charitable causes. But then I feel that rather than just sending money to some organisation and not really knowing whats happening to it, maybe its wise to get involved in some social service.

Something like sponsoring a child's education is a noble act, but do you really think the money is used for this in the end or does it just end up somewhere unaccounted for. But what if you actively participate in such organisations. That would give more visibility into the process and the results. Maybe volunteer on some projects.

But I guess this needs some commitment from my side.....

Dont know why

There are strange things that happen in ones life.

Sometimes we are self-motivated, Sometimes we look for encouragement.

Sometimes we dont know what is happening in our life, Sometimes we exactly know our ambitions.

Sometimes we just wonder what if our life was different, Sometimes we are just satisfied.

Sometimes we dont understand why we are sad, Sometimes we dont know why we are happy.

Sometimes we wonder if we are in the right job, Sometimes we just dont think and carry on.

Sometimes we know what we are doing will never succeed, Sometimes we just dont give a damn

Sometimes we wonder if we should be different, Sometimes we think we are just fine.

Sometimes we wonder what would happen if we try something new, Sometimes we despise change.

Sometimes we wonder if our dreams will come true, Sometimes we conclude that they are anyway just dreams.

Sometimes we try to find the reason for tears in our eyes, Sometimes we just brush them off.

Sometimes we wonder why we always choose chocolate flavoured ice creams, sometimes we eat strawberry too.

Sometimes we wonder why we like someone, Sometimes we just dont care.

Sometimes we wonder why we get senseless thoughts, Sometimes we just pour these thoughts in a blog.

Sometimes I wonder why I like Her so much, Sometimes I think I will never find out the answer to that question.

Through the looking glass

PS : On the guest post front I have not received any replies. Maybe the readers are busy. But I am not going to really bug them I think, let them take their time!!!


There was a weird feelin on my nose when I wore it. People looked taller. The floor looked farther. If I saw through the corner of my eye then objects looked smaller. Girls looked less attractive. Of course I havent seen Her yet through it so no comments there. That was my first experience when I wore my new spectacles.

Of course I am going to write about something as mundane as my spectacles. But writing about such things is a lot tougher than writing philosophy. My spectacles has been a part of my life since the age of 11. So after realising that I havent changed it since the last four years I decided to get my eye checked up. Not a lot of change but then I looked at the various frames in display and decided maybe its time to replace the glasses that gave me a school boy look and go for something different.

As usual the optician suggested contact lenses. But I have this small fetish with my eye. I dont like things getting into it. I dont like to even watch people getting their finger near their eye. I dont like to watch people playing with their eyelids to make funny faces. So practically I am very sensitive with anything thats got to do with eyes. Its like Rachael in Friends.

So after explaining all this to the optician and convincing him that the contact lens option was a complete no, I settled down searching for a frame. At first I wanted a lens that looked exactly like my previous one, a curved, big, black one. But then for the first time I heard that curved ones are for the females!! Dont tell me what I have been wearing till now is a feminine one. Then after exploring lots of options and finally narrowing down my options to two, looking in the mirror and then realising how does it matter how do I look; anyway its always someone else who will judge how I will look in it, I only have to worry on how well I see through it; I decided on this one

At last I shed my school boy look, But sometimes I think it was better!!!

Mundane Saturday Musings

After giving all the advice on work-life balance I am in the office on a saturday!!! But to my credit the last time I worked on a saturday was in october 2006. So its been nearly seven months since I have worked on a saturday.

You might have noticed that I write posts very regularly nowadays. And do you know why? Let me tell you the secret, its because She reads it. I will go back to being an irregular blogger the moment she stops visiting my blog!!!

There is something about The OC that fascinates me a lot. I have watched maybe 15 different episodes from various seasons thanks to Zee Cafe and Star World. Of course it has the beautiful girls in it. But there is something more thats attractive. It isnt melodramatic. It has a simple storyline and the life of Ryan could be just about anybody's. Anybody in the US of course!!!

Ok, I might have spoken a lot already about the new Harry Potter book. But just yesterday I saw a programme on some news channel about the new book. It looks like there are pdf versions of the new book Harry Potter and the deathly hallows already available on the internet. Now there are many versions of course but people say none of them match J K Rowlings writing skills. So no one is ready to accept that its the real book. We have rumours of Harry dying, Dumbeldore not being actually dead, Harry and Ginny taking their romance to new levels (Dont ask me what the new levels are!!!), and Professor Snape actually being a good guy!!! It cant wait to get hold of the book on July 21st. And I wont be reading any of the current copies on the internet.

Why am I loyal to Hutch even though Airtel is better in many ways like a better coverage. Its just the Ads. Yes the Hutch Ad campaign is the only thing that has made me stick to it. And I have always despised the Airtel Ads. The Hutch Ads are simple and pragmatic. So the right Ads can build brand loyalty. But believe me, the day a Hutch Ad is aired that doesnt live up to my expectations, its going to lose me as a customer.

I have always wondered what would be my mom's reaction if she reads my blogs. This is something I would never want to know!!!!

For the last two months I seem to have become a big fan of the benne dosa (thats butter dosa for the uninitiated). I go alongwith my roommates to have the most yummiest benne dosa every weekend in a hangout called the BDA complex. Looking at the word hangout dont get the images of a coffe day or anything. This small eatry is called the Davangere Benne Dosa. It also seems to provide some different dosas like kali dosa and the open dosa. Also an item less known to people called the paddu is really good there. And some items which I had never heard of for example the girmitt!!. At least I have found the right place for one of my favourites - the dosa!!!

Meanwhile my Heart, Brain and Inner Conscience are making merry. They think I am going to forget about Her and move on and they dont have to do the dirty work like thinking on how to find out if She is attracted to me. But they dont know that disaster is waiting just around the corner!!!

Or'quit'

There are always somethings that an individual never likes. I have some such things on my hate list. Ok maybe I will not call it a hate list. Its a list of things that somehow has become a part of my life but somehow I just dont like them. I have never been able to figure out why I dont like them. I am sure everyone has such a list.

Do you know what is one such item on my list. Its Orkut!!! Yeah surprisingly its true. I have never been a big fan of it. I joined it at a time a couple of years back when it was just catching up and not many had heard of it. But somehow it just didnt impress me. I am not against the concept of social networking. Its just one of those feelings for which you never have an answer.

I have just invited just one friend till today to join. I have added just two people till today as friends. The rest are people who have added me and I have accepted. I usually never scrap people. I only reply if I get a scrap. I am first to scrap usually when its the other person's birthday or on some rare occassions. I didnt put in a photo till middle of last year. I dont use the features like the friend level thing, or rating them as cool, sexy, trusty or the hot list. I also added photographs to the album thing very late. Though I have added one person on my crush list!!! And still hope for the best and keep my fingers crossed!!!

I have never even joined any communities other then my old school. I dont like people telling "wanna be my friend" in some girl's scrapbook. And I dont know why the scrapbook is in the public domain. But yeah, who am I to complain - I check everyone's scrapbook on a "regular basis" (read as daily). I know I am not addicted to it. I dont know why I am frustrated with it.

But orkut doesnt know I am frustrated with it. And something happens that irritates me more. Now I have observed that at regular intervals a scrap gets deleted. I know the only two people who can do that is either me or the owner of the scrap. I dont know what I have done to anyone who has scrapped to provoke them to delete their scrap from my scrapbook. If any of you is angry with me just let me know - dont delete your scraps from my scrapbook - there's a scarcity of scraps you see!!!

But you know orkut is the only thing which lets me see her everyday. So I am going to hold on to it!!!

The balancing act

There was time in my life when I spent twelve hours a day on an average in the office. There were days when I carried my work home. There were also days when I spent nights in the office and even slept there itself. There were times when I had my work on my mind even when I was at home. Going to work on weekends was a common ritual.

But then something struck me hard after I returned from my first trip to the Netherlands. There was something I learnt after my three weeks stint there. The importance of work-life balance. The importance of effective time management. The importance of personal life. The importance of segregating personal and professional life. Understanding that work is important but having a productive personal life is equally important.

Giving your professional life more importance is necessary at times but not always. Staying late in office may be necessary at times but not always. We carry our work home many times since we have not managed our time efficiently. We stay late since we have not planned our day effectively. Thus we miss out on some of the most important things - spending time with the family, spending time with friends, spending time for some hobby that you have always wanted to pursue but have never had the time for, spending time reading books, spending time with newspapers catching up whats happening around the world, catching up on some music, and most importantly spending time on yourself.

So how do we achieve this work-life balance? How do we draw the line between our professional and personal life? The first thing is to understand the importance of balancing work and life. And there exists one tool to achieve the balance. A daily planner. Plan, prioritise and execute. I am not going list down the advantages of effective time management as that is well known.

I really hope people understand the importance of this balance especially during these stressful and competitive times. If anybody has actually used a planner and has observed any positive effects please let me know!!!

Laws of attraction

After my previous post which had a depressing feel to it I thought I will bring in my heart and brain along with my Inner Conscience to know what they have been thinking about lately

Brain : So its been some time now. Have you forgotten about Her.

Heart : No of course not. She has got embedded into me now.

Brain : Oh what a corny thought!!! But I dont see you taking any action yet. Now that we know what is the meaning of love what are you waiting for?

Heart : You know it took us one year to realise that She is the One. It took us one year to realise the true meaning of love. But all this is not sufficient to just let her know.

Brain : So whats stopping us now?

Heart : You realise that our priorities have career, education and family in the list. I get the feeling that these are the things on her list too.

Brain : So whats the problem?

Heart : Dont you get it? "Getting into a relationship" does not feature on both of our lists.

Brain : Sometimes I dont know how I miss the finer points.

Inner Conscience : Well let me ask the two of you a question. How many people are going to be involved in this relationship?

Heart : Two - Her and me.

Brain : Yeah ..... two I think.

Inner Conscience : I dont know why the brain thinks so much. But that answer is only partially right. Among the two, you are the one who is sure but have you ever thought about Her?

Heart : What a stupid question. I always think about Her.

Inner Conscience (glaring at the Heart) : No you idiot. Have you ever thought what She could be thinking. Remember that once a guy decides that He likes a girl there is one important thing he needs to find out. Is She attracted to him? Can any of you answer if She is attracted to you?

Brain : Hmmm.....I dont know.

Heart : No clue

Inner Conscience : Find that out. And just because you love somebody does not mean that you drop everything you are doing and get into a relationship. Remember that the first thing is that She should also be attracted to you and that a relationship in our culture is not just between two people but its the beginning of a bondage between two different families.

Heart : But how do I find out if She is attracted towards me?

Brain : Let me list down the options -
a. Ask her in person - Ruled out since we have no courage to even ask her out.
b. Ask her by phone - Ruled out since we neither have the phone number nor the
courage.
c. Ask her by email - Ruled out since it would look dumb to ask such important things by email and actually we have no courage to ask even by mail.
d. Try to find out without asking - I dont think we are that intelligent or observant.
e. Dont do anything about it - Safest since you wont be slapped on the face at least!!!

Inner Conscience : Why am I getting the feeling that both of you are going to opt for the last option.

Heart : I think you are right. Unless either of us gets frustrated and just blurts it out to Her!!!

Mind Games

There have been times in my life when I have felt lost. Lost into oblivion I could say. These are times when my otherwise sane mind is usually very vulnerable. Vulnerable to what, you could ask. Sensing that all barriers have been lifted, senseless thoughts enter my mind. My mind gets befuddled trying to process these thoughts. The grey cells refuse to work. Tiredness creeps in and this state of my mind I could say is my Achilles' Heel.

These are the times when I have lost focus. A Man's brain I know has none of the multitasking features that its better half, the Female brain has. Thoughts that tend to influence my practical decisions and make my mind go haywire make merry during this state. I start doing stuff like procrastinating even though I know its wrong.

These are the times when my morale is pretty low. I try to begin an activity and never complete it. You can see the disconcerted and dazed look in my eyes. At these times I am usually aware that I need to do a lot of things but my mind refuses to organise thoughts. The labyrinthine of thoughts meander through my nonplussed mind trying to find a purpose and a destination but usually perish somewhere along the arduous journey.

These are the times when frustration creeps in. I dont know what is right and what is wrong. I feel that I am leading life without a goal. The end is not known. My purpose, my aspirations, my objectives tend to obviate.

These are the times I am looking for motivation. That silver lining which will give me hope and faith during these morbid times. To put my mind back on track. To start building stepping stones out of the stumbling blocks.

Then I receive that bit of encouragement. It comes in the form of words, not by mouth, not by postcards, but by email. It tells me that life goes on. It does not wait. My mind needs to catch up with it. An introspection is necessary but not important. My mind gains back the confidence. It is trying to find the path that it had lost. My thoughts start organising themselves for the proliferant journey ahead.

Strange are the ways in which the mind works.

Its all relative

PS1 : One more person has assured that he will write a guest post. So totally four out of the seven have replied telling they will do it or at least give a try.

PS2 : I am seeing that no one wants to read the 7 habits book. Well some habits die hard!!!

Last weekend I met a cousin of mine. This was one thing I had been postponing for a year now and after quite a bit of forcing from my parents and at the same time me realising that I really have not reason not to meet her, I decided to finally catch up with her and it was a lovely experience.

But then the this set me thinking about something. Do I really know my relatives. Having lived most of my life in a place little known to the people outside it, I have never been in close touch with any of my relatives. Of course I used to meet my grand-parents once a year when I was in school, but thats were it stopped. I do know I have quite a lot of cousins but since they are scattered all over the world, I have never really bothered to keep in touch with any of them.

But the same was not true with the previous generation. I can still see my parents keeping close contacts with all their relatives and cousins. But I think this is a problem with most of the people of our generation. This could be because in the older generations the family with all the relatives used to stay together or at least in the same town and there was quite a bit of bonding achieved. This surely is not the case with us.

But then I have not yet figured out why I have usually ignored my relatives. Today I get the feeling that keeping in touch with relatives and especially cousins of my generation is something I should do and it might develop into something fruitful.

Habituated!!!

PS1: On the guest post front one more person has given a positive reply. I am keeping my fingers crossed!!!

PS2: There is an important pS at the end of the post!!!

We are what we repeatedly do
Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

Aristotle

I just finished reading the book "7 habits of highly effective people" by Stephen Covey. Nah....I have not become any more effective than I was!!! But then I really feel that everyone should read the book. I had recommended the book just to one person till date and that person looked at the book and said "Hmm....looks interesting. But I dont think I will implement any of these things in my life!!!" This was exactly my thought too when I began reading the book. But as I read it I found that there are a lot of things that we need to understand about ourselves to be effective.

The author says that a man goes through three phases in life. He is born a Dependent, then moves on to become independent and then realises that Interdependence is the really necessary for being effective. As he goes through each of these stages there are some basic habits that he needs to cultivate to be successful. Let me just list them :

1. Be proactive
2. Begin with the end in mind
3. Put first things first
4. Think Win/Win
5. Seek first to understand...then to be understood
6. Synergise
7. Sharpen the saw

Yeah I know they are vague....they are things we all know....but can we make them habits?
He also gives a very good funda on response and stimulus. He says that

"Between a response and stimulus - man has the freedom to choose."

So we have the gift of self-awareness, we have imagination, we have a conscience - a deep inner awareness of right and wrong, of the principles that govern our behavior, and a sense of the degree to which our thoughts and actions are in harmony with them. And we have independent will -- the ability to act based on our self-awareness, free of all other influences.

When I look at things this way I realise that once we recieve a stimulus we can actually choose what the response can be. Thus we can control our actions, thoughts, emotions. I know this sounds dumb and everyone will say ... who doesnt know this. But the realisation is important so that we dont get influenced by external factors.

Once we achieve this amount of self awareness and control I am sure cultivating habits is not a big deal.

The book also gives pretty good perspectives on human relationships, love, management, leadership, the importance of listening with nice examples. The author talks of small practical things that can be implemented in life to make yourself more productive and effective.

As Aristotle has said and I have quoted in the beginning, Our habits define what we are. So why not try cultivating the right ones!!!

pS (read post - Script) : I would recommend that you people give this book a try. It gives you a whole new perspective of life. Please drop in a comment or send me an email at srinikeths@yahoo.co.in and I will send you the soft copy of the book immediately. I could have send it anyways to all of you but that would mean that I am forcing it on you and you might not even open it!!! But if you ask for it at least I can be assured that you will open it!!!

Slept away

PS1 : There has been an ok response on the guest post front. I received a reply from another friend who has agreed to give it a try. Lets hope She does it.

There has been something strange happening over the last few nights. I am falling asleep at 9 in the night. Yes people, nine!!! Now thats weird. I thought people who had a girl in their mind would loose sleep. At least thats how its shown in the movies in bollywood. But I seem to be sleeping more. But I have always had strange sleeping habits.

Till I reached the 7th std. I used to sleep at 8:30 in the night. I know its a bit too early but then I used to have my dinner at 7 and whats there to do after that? Then I increased the time a bit more and till my 10th std I used to stay awake till 9:30. Even during the 10th std with the crazy preparatory and board exams I always managed to sleep by 9:30!!! I still remember that the maximum I have stayed awake was till 10:45 the night before some social science preparatory exam.

But then during my 11th and 12th std I started staying awake till the 10 or 10:30. But then I guess thats was required. Back in college it was a different story. Since I was in the hostel there was no fixed timing. There were times when I never slept!!

But I have not been explain whats been happening over the last few nights. Since the day I have told that I want to go jogging all I have been doing is sleeping!!!

As luck would have it

PS1 (read Pre - Script) : First I would like to acknowledge Rupam's comment on this post. I totally agree that prioritizing is the major tool in effective time management!!! For my Heart's and Brain's take on this you might have to wait till I reach the point where I have to really prioritize some really important decisions in my life!!!

PS2 : On the guest post front, I have sent the requests via emails to all the readers. I know that out of the seven people (yeah a pathetic number, but 'special' people nonetheless!!!) around five have read the mail (how do I know if a person has read it - just my feeling) and one has actually replied telling he will do it! Lets see what the others do......

Now that I have found a somewhat rational answer for what is 'love' and am now trying to figure out if 'I love Her' is grammatically correct(!), I thought I will try to find out more about the concept of 'luck'.

The word 'luck' has also been bothering me quite a bit since it is one of those ambiguous things that people dont actually debate on. For eg I would say that the long weekend before last (when I had gone to my hometown) was the luckiest one this year. I got to meet Her twice. Now on the other hand the first time I met Her during that weekend She might have been thinking "This guy!!! Oh God how much I try to avoid him he is always there!!" and the second time when I met her after 4 days She might have thought "Oh no not agian!!! I dont know if he is lucky or I am unlucky!!!"

Now if you observe what some might consider lucky the others might not!!!

Luck, I believe also plays an important role in both planned and unplanned activities in life. Let us consider an exam - a planned activity. Its true that hard work and smartness are the only way to crack it. But even just before you write the exam, you always think - I have put in my best effort but I hope luck plays its role too!!! But getting to meet her twice - an unplanned activity, is something where luck plays a more important role than your hard-work and smartness!!!

As I see in Wiki, luck is viewed in various perspectives. A rationalist approaches luck using the application of the rules of probability. An excerpt from the wiki page on the rationalist approach

"In this particular perspective, probability is only affected by confirmed causal connections. A brick falling on a person walking below, therefore, is not a function of that person's luck, but is instead the result of a collection of understood (or explainable) occurrences. Statistically, every person walking near the building was just as likely to have the brick fall on them."

Though I am more inclined to believe in this view of luck, I dont want to. It always feels good to know you were just lucky enough to meet Her and not that any random guy also is as probable to get to meet her just as you were!!!

A Request

Given the fact that 50 posts have been posted on this blog till date I thought its time to break away from the monotony of posts on my views on stuff.

Also considering that my very few 'special' readers have always come back to read the blog (yeah at times I have held some of my readers at gun-point and knife-point to force them to read the posts!!!) I thought I should start a round of guest posts.

I will send a 'personal email' (not a common one with the names in bcc list - just to add the personal touch) to each one of my esteemed readers requesting for a guest post on the blog and also mention the guidelines - believe me there are not many guidelines!!!

Also I will post what is expected from the guest posts. I will also call up most of the readers for a reminder after a week - yeah 'most of the readers', I just realised there are some whose phone number I do not have - Shocking, but true!!!

So lets see how the guest post campaign turns out to be.

And I have begun loading my gun and sharpening my knife so that I can use them on people who refuse to write one!!!

Timed out

A couple of days back I was just having a conversation with a friend of mine and I said

"You know I am planning to exercise a bit. I know I am lucky enough not to put on any weight but I think a bit of exercise will surely do me some good. Maybe jogging in the morning. But I dont know if I will get the time. "

I was just pondering on that sentence of mine and suddenly I felt as if I was hit by a meteor. That sentence had the most inconsistent thoughts ever.

How can a person tell he doesnt have the time to do something. I am sure all of you have heard a number of times that we should never give "no time" to do something as a reason. But it sometimes takes 'meteors' and 'her' to actually realise it.

Time, I have learnt is the only thing we actually have control on. And the scarcity of time should never be given as a reason for anything. You might not be able to do something just because you have not planned your activities. That and laziness are the main reasons for missing out on many activities and never is it about less time available. A focused and planned approach towards life is the answer.

So I have decided that I will never give "no time" as the reason for anything.

Hmm...now that I have finished with my pep talk, Am I going to go jogging everyday???