I wish.. For the Wisdom

I wish to have the wisdom to know that what matters today, will not, tomorrow.
I want the wisdom to know that superiority and inferiority are manifestations of the human mind, and in reality are non-existent. How can one be superior or inferior when performance itself is defined by a state of being?
I want the wisdom to know that the ones you hurt are usually the ones that’s closest to you: And that is the law of nature because they are the only ones to whom you matter. And vice-versa.

I wish to have the wisdom to know that more than what you believe in, it is in how you act on that belief that defines the person you turn into.
I wish to realize that the only thing that is fixed each day is our effort, and that the rest of it is transient. We too, are transient. Our desire manifests in ways we cannot tell. It is better to have more beliefs than desires.
I wish to always know that the only meaningful barometer to live by is yourself, and to use external measures is like using a measuring tape to judge your health.
I wish to know that shackles are in the mind, and only in the mind.
I wish to realize that the only strength is Faith, and that God alone is the strength of the strong. All other strength emanates from this, and the weakest of them all is physical strength.
I wish to always know that to deny kindness to a loved one, is like starving the soul for a week; for each kindness carries a message with it- of love, and forgiveness.
I wish to know that what I prophesy for tomorrow, is as simple what I believe in today. :) Each thought is powerful. Each thought is a creation. Each thought will manifest itself. Slowly. But surely.
So watch your thoughts! They are the true index of your Person. :)
I wish to always know that Life itself is..so fragile... And love and kindness, are perhaps the only things that do justice to it.

Almost there... not just yet!

This is that feeling of being almost there… You know… when you think that you are just a second away from where you want to be and then something terribly horrible happens… and then you aren’t quite where you ought to have been.

You have been planning and strategizing and making your moves carefully all for just being there. You gave up things on the way, made sacrifices... big and small, had sleepless nights, you did everything that you didn’t have to… all for this one future moment which you want to hold in memory forever… the moment when you will be the happiest…

Take a simple example… you plan a special birthday gift for a close friend. You go around for a whole month, getting the perfect gift, pre-booking the perfect dinner joint, getting all close friends together, planning the whole day, maybe a trip to one of the close by resorts… or a long drive… and when you reach the restaurant, you realize they haven’t made your reservation and you’ll have to wait a long time… that is just one factor… the other factors could go for a toss as well.

Another home example: You’ve been dying to watch a movie for the last one year... a friend tells you in passing that the movie is on the TV this weekend. You are very excited, work more hours on Friday, cancel your lunch appointment with friends, have a brunch on Saturday morning so you wouldn’t have to get up in between the movie for lunch, make you kids take an afternoon nap or pretend that you are letting them stay over at a friend’s place so you can see the movie in peace, make sure your generator is working ok, why take a chance with the power supply? Finally, everything is perfect... you can now see that movie in peace on Saturday afternoon. As you turn the TV on and sit with the remote control in your hands, the advertisements are on and you can barely wait… and then as the titles of the movie begin to scroll, the cable connection’s gone. Simply gone. If you are in Kerala, you’d understand what I’m saying. Frantically, you call the operator and he tells you... please hold on madam… and you know exactly what that means… you hold till you are sure the movie must have reached interval and you finally give up. Then when you switch it off, you realize the kids are sleeping, your friends aren’t there for lunch, there’s no office work left to do… so just kind of sit around…!

Life has it’s funny ways… there are so many instances… some as unimportant (or important, as the case may be) as this and some of very grave consequences… and all this effort suddenly gets flushed down the drain… and you feel so pained and there is nothing you can do about it. No, it definitely wasn’t because you didn’t take precaution… you did. And it wasn’t because of others... what vendetta would the cable operator, for example, have against you?

So I guess that is why they say… what has to happen, will happen. You can go only so far to ensure all might be well. If it is meant to be, it will. What is our take home then? Do your bit. That is all! :) Leave no room for regret. There is probably something better waiting for you just around the corner!

The Anti-Indian At the Oscars!

On International television, at the premier Oscar Awards Ceremony:

 

Interviewer: “I will give you thirty seconds… What message do you have for the Indians? What do you have to say to the audience back home?”

 

Anil Kapoor: “We love you all, we love Mumbai, we love Maharashtra!”

 

My response: What the heck?!

 

Amidst the pride that Rahman and Pookutty have brought upon India, there we have Our Hero, from Amchi Mumbai- proclaiming his undying love for Mumbai residents and those in Maharashtra!!

 

America brought to the tables a brand new term… ROW- Rest Of the World. Anil Kapoor has clearly indicated his contribution to this new phenomena- ROI - Rest of India! As a representative of 1.3 Billion strong population, Our Hero goes on to say He loves Maharashtra! What does India mean to him?

 

Next question for a Million Dollars: Amongst all the categories of people who divide the Nation, who is the most dangerous?

1. Politicians
2. Ram Sena/Shiv Sena
3. Forefathers, when they divided the States, in 1947
4. Terrorists

 

Answer: None of the above!  The most dangerous are the insensitive idiots vested with the power of changing minds of others, like Our Hero, Anil Kapoor, and the other is the Common Man err.. Not to antagonise any group.. Common Man/Woman.

 

Are we one hundred percent sure of the answer? Oh yes!

 

Here is why: I was standing there, watching television, all goose-bumpy having heard Rahman bagged two Oscars and Pookutty bagged one, when Our Hero, Anil Kapoor came up with that brilliant message for “Indians”!! Er… I wonder if that message was incomplete… It talked about Indians in Mumbai first, then mentioned Indians in Maharashtra. What happened to ROI?!

 

That was Our Hero. Now I will address the Common Man/Woman.

 

When the awards were announced, I was overwhelmed and immensely proud… Two Indians finally bagged the much coveted and perennially evasive Oscar Statuettes. It took a couple of minutes to register… Indians at the Oscar… not as audience, not just as Nominees, as the Winners! Wow, that is making History. India witnessed History being made. And just when I was beaming with joy and pride seeing Rahman and Pookutty being aired on every channel, my Mera Bharat Mahan dream comes crashing with a comment one of my colleagues makes.

 

“Pookutty is a Mallu. He’s from Kerala! In fact, he is from Kollam!” Er… what?! So, he’s a Keralite, now what? Has Rahman ever been looked at as a Tamilian? He is the face of brilliant music. He is the Guru of Bollywood, Tollywood, you name it. He took India to the the World. He took India to the Oscars. To many, he simply stands for India! Pookutty has done us equally proud. He brought glory to India. A glory of the kind that has never been seen. India’s first Oscar this season. First Oscar for background mixing. Pookutty has made as much history as Rahman has, atleast in terms of Oscar, for honestly, I don’t know him that well. But what shattered my dream is not that he is little known (Not many knew him till Slumdog Millionaire happened). What broke my dream was the regionalism that came with that comment. Ok, he’s from some place. So what?! It has come to a low ebb now. What I imagined were two Indians winning 3 Oscars has turned out to be A Malayali winning one Oscar and a Half Tamil-Half Malayali winning two Oscars! How sad can it get?!

 

And here we are thinking that it is our politicians and the Government and miscreants and Shiv Sena and God knows who else who are creating the unseen divide in the Nation. It is disheartening to see that it is the highly respected, reputed and popular figures like Our Hero Anil Kapoor, and the well read, experienced, soon-to-be-Global Managers  who create the dividing lines.

 

I really think it is time we stop cribbing. It is time we changed. Not as far as how India should grow and change; let us begin at home- let us begin with us.

Jai Hind!

First post

I have been visiting this blog on and off, but never finding anything to write on. I kept watch over anything that' was added, very much like an eagle hovers over a prey from above. Even now I have nothing on my mind as I type. Maybe its the music, Tommy Emmanuel- he should be heard, or its the sleeplessness that drove me into it at this hour. I really have no clue about companies and shares and markets and whatnot, so anyone who intends to read my posts, please do not look for anything monetary. Its for people who like to keep it simple, though I'll have to warn you, sometimes you will find absolutely no connection between the things I write. But then that's the fun, you should try it. Write what you want, without pausing to give it the literary comprehensiveness.

That was some sort of an introduction I would say.

And I think that's all for now.

I will leave you with a thought that i have.

War is the true nature of man.

Life AA (After ASB)

It’s been a little more than six months since we ventured out to the wild in search of wealth and happiness, and if I were to comment on the status of our quest, I would have to say that the beasts are really trying us. For most of us, it turned out to be a bit different of an experience than what we had imagined it to be like sitting in the classrooms and canteens at Ettimadai. I have been on a self-initiated project since last month to gather and put together information about the experiences of my batch after having worked for six months. From the responses that I have got so far, I can say that most of us are doing well and learning a lot though the world seems to be a tougher place, and there is a lot in these responses for the School and my juniors.

I would like to, in this post talk about my journey so far, outside the Planet, particularly in my career. I will try restraining from bringing out greener memories from inside the planet as that had been the regular plot of my posts here. Before I start off, I start with an empathetic note. A year before as the member of the Student Council handling the Placements, I was in constant interaction with those in my batch who were yet to be placed. It was not that they were less smart than others; the companies that had visited us until then had failed to offer them what they wanted, or had just failed to see the worth in them. I empathized with their feelings. And today that feeling is six or seven times higher. Companies are still more blind and poor today. It will take time for them to stand back on their feet and see clearly. I say turn inward and hone yourself until then. And when they start to see, let them see an ocean of jewels ready to be taken away at Amrita.

I went on AA to a shipping company’s back office. The profile was completely managerial. I was put, after an initial training, to a role where I had a team of seven doing shipping export documentation for VIP customers in the US. The team makes a document called the Bill of Lading, which becomes a critical part of the shipping cycle. It requires knowledge of customs requirements, customer requirements and adherence to the time that Hapag Lloyd commits to the customers. The process was newly transitioned to our center in Chennai. The role began as a challenge, and went on to become a bigger challenge. Regular systemic issues and people issues kept us from accuracy and TAT requirements most of the time. On the bright side, I had the help and support of an able and understanding manager. And in the process, what I gained was an on-the-floor experience and understanding of how to manage a team, their feelings, and their potential. The VIP team was and still is the best team in the US documentation team. But somewhere, I started to realize that what I was doing was not quiet what I wanted, the common symptom of dissatisfaction and what I would like to call the first symptom of self awareness. It started as a feeling of emptiness. Its then that I came to know from a good friend, about a research vacancy at UBS, Hyderabad. Everything followed the other after that and in a month, I was in Hyderabad in the Strategic Research and Intelligence team catering to the HR research needs of the Senior HR leadership in the Wealth Management division of the bank. The work here is much different that the one in Hapag. I am part of a specialist team that acts in a consulting capacity and therefore is flat and flexible. Most of the time in a typical day, I keep reading books and articles by thought leaders, and reports and survey analysis by large consulting organizations to be able to help the top HR management with HR trends and best practices. To have attended your first exit interview in the first six months of your career can have two different meanings; One that you have no idea of where you are headed or what you want, and two that you somehow took a while to realize what you want. In my case, I like to believe that it’s the latter. But we never know until we know when my next exit interview is… do we. ;)

To my Juniors (batchmates and seniors) in ASB who are passionate about HR, I would like to extend an interest of mine to have a network among us in which we can take HR research seriously. This network , in my imagination will help the alumni research contribution at ASB stronger and this can help us, future students, faculty and ASB. If you share this interest, do write to me sometime. (karunakarantk@gmail.com)

The Year 2008

I guess am a wee bit late in coming out with this blog about the year gone by but, as they say better late than never. So here are some reflections on the past year that has been quite remarkable in more ways than one. Well to be utterly honest, what triggered this blog was a visit to good old Planet Etti and a chat with the inimitable Deepak sir who insisted on seeing a post from me very soon. But I should say that work on this post had begun a few days before the visit to ASB, after a reading of The Hindu’s Sunday Magazine. So here I go without further ado…
I have seen people use quite a few terms to describe the past year but I guess every word falls flat when you take into account the plethora of events that have taken place. It was truly a year which had its share of happiness and grief in equal measure. It was a year that saw the stock markets tumble and crash, a year that found global financial giants like Washington Mutual and Lehman Brothers in murky waters. It was a year when the US had to pour billions of dollars into its sinking economy to save a number of big names like General Motors, AIG & Citigroup. It was also a year when an Illinois Senator with a Muslim middle name and a multi- racial background took the world by storm by becoming the first black president of the USA.
2008 also saw the word terrorism take on a much more dangerous and sinister meaning. A year that saw a bunch of guys with a few AK-47’s and hand grenades bring the great city of Mumbai to its knees. It proved yet again how unsafe our cities are and how ill- prepared our nation is to tackle such situations. Indian’s have been known to be a very resilient lot but this time around Mumbai was truly enraged with the way the entire incident was handled by the politicians and the media. The year saw a blatant disregard for something that the Indian media seems to have almost forgotten - media ethics. While the entire hostage drama was played out, the only thing the media seemed to be interested in was getting the juiciest stories with an almost inhuman disregard for the people held hostage. The year also saw a series of bomb blasts rock the nation starting with Rajasthan moving onto Bangalore and the Gujarat. Religious violence reared its ugly head yet again this year in the nation that prides itself on its secular nature. The Kandhamal violence was a silent testimony to this.
On a positive side the year saw India’s moon mission turning a spectacular success. A quite chap with a trigger happy finger bagged the billion strong nation’s first ever individual Olympic gold and took the focus off the gentleman’s game for a little while. Yet another man made history in black and white in Bonn by being crowned the king of chess. Yet another Indian bagged a Man Booker with a rambling but thoroughly distorted (according to critics) account of India. CERN, the European research organization made famous by Dan Brown’s “Angels and Demons” unveiled the biggest experiment in the history of physics- the Large Hadron Collider.
Quite a year isn’t it? And before I sign off on a personal note this year saw batch 2006-08 of ASB “officially” becoming MBA graduates although I must say the times are not rosy for a management grad. Anyways, all the very best to everyone, especially to my juniors. Don’t be bogged down by the bleak sentiment in my post or the depressing market conditions. Trust me landing a job is not a measure of your true worth. And like someone once said “You are not what you are in times of hardship, you are better than that”. Good luck and a happy new year.

Making a commitment

In case you always wondered what it was like to make a life-long commitment… I think its worth reading my post now. :)
I always wondered how I would do making a commitment to be there for someone else… all the time… anytime…?

Actually we guys and girls in India grew lucky.. for there is so much culture and tradition to draw from, that even without our knowledge… The concepts of unconditional…. Unconditional giving… stepping aside to make space… and prioratising another persons’ happiness above other things comes almost naturally to us. Think about it. We’ve done it for friends.. we’ve done it for Parents. I hope you realize how precious and rare this is. In so many countries… SO many people… live a whole Lifetime without ever knowing the peace that comes with giving.
I never thought I would write these words! :) But there is something divine… Love is truly the gift of God, for it can allow one (if you allow yourself) to discover oneself in ways they never knew before… and one can choose how they want to… they can experience most beautiful things by simply making another person happy.
Sometimes…. Cultures that grow without a strong family culture show the weakness… they begin to get confused… and unless one is willing to accept that giving to someone might actually be a responsibility, they wander around denying it until they find they have no one to come home to.
Receiving love is certainly one aspect of marriage… But then.. that is just one aspect…. Marriage is about giving of yourself to another person. The vows of marriage mean that you have sworn to make anothers’ Life your own… and share yours with them. Maangalyam tham thuraanena mama jeevana ek thuna…thanthe bhathnaami subhake thwam jeeva shathaa amshatham… Is the powerful mantra in my religion which proclaims that I now wed thee for ever more to share our separate lives as one.
Sometimes… for some people… they don’t even need the ritual of an elaborate wedding to join their hearts in union. After all… a ritual does not by itself, seal anything. Marriage is a meeting of minds. Everything else follows. Period.
Everyone keeps asking me… ‘How does it feel, to be married??’ I feel like replying… ‘Why don’t you try the vows yourself and find out?!!’ :D The point Im trying to make is: there is no one definition of a marriage… Its different for each individual. And yes, this blog partially in answer to that question. If at all this is an answer. :)
I should write another blog about how marriage can make one ‘grow up!’ :) Having said that, let me also say that… One becomes an individual in one’s own right… giving you the right.. the option… to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ as one pleases…. This freedom is in fact, a responsibility. For one’s decisions could actually have impacts. And you are no longer the only person who will feel it. Scary huh?
Marriage is something that can make you grow into the individual one chooses to be. At many points, there is a choice… How do you want to handle it? At those pivotal junctures, knowing one’s mind well enough… to foresee what will matter not only today, but tomorrow also… more than just foresight, to understand the person you want to be… Is the end objective.
So, my final take would be: Soak in experiences before you decide to marry… discover yourself… and then decide how you want your Self to be expressed in this World. If you find the other suiting your expression: then please marry him/her. If not: you can still choose to love them. :) Finally, loving someone means giving them the freedom to be who they are. And many times: that is when a communion of this kind will work!. :)
Finally… What I would like to sign off by saying is…Whatever happens…. Don’t let yourself be defined by roles that are set for you by ‘society’ or ‘tradition’… You are your own person and can afford to be intelligent enough to live Life the way that brings you maximum satisfaction/happiness. One can choose to follow tradition… But always bear in mind all tradition is a means to an end… an objective … an experience, but are not an end in themselves. Eg: Prayer is not the point. But peace and faith is the objective. Does that make sense?
The ones who conform do just that: conform. They rarely live a full life. Perhaps that is closer to what I am trying to say…
I sound too profound! Im scaring myself. I think I miss good old socializing… too much contemplation. :D ehehhe
Take Care all. A special mention of good Luck to my juniors with their placements. :) Remember: the interviewer is not the real measure of your worth. What you do after this ‘first job’ will determine how your careers will shape up. Don’t let this first step blow itself out of proportion. Everyone has a first break. A first job. People’s careers were rarely shaped by their first job. Many millionaire’s career began when they quit their first job. Does this help put it in perspective? :) Take Heart and keep that chin up.
Until later then
Raje