Time for yourself

We are willing to sacrifice a lot for our office work; willing to sit late hours, skip meals, cut back on sleep, just to meet deadlines. "Boss wants it till tomorrow morning". "Kal demo hai. Late tak baithna padega".

Deadlines are real; they should be respected. Agree. But at the end of the day, they are usually set to help someone else's dream materialize. How many of us are willing to have the same attitude to achieve our dreams? Small dreams, big dreams. Playing the guitar, starting your own company. Learning juggling, getting into a good institute for post graduation. Singing, making your own software product. The list is endless.

Many 'small dreams' usually take no more than 20 minutes of practice per day. How many of us are willing to extract 20 minutes per day to live our 'small dreams'? Of course, 'big dreams' could require a lot more than that, but then, if we can spend such a lot of effort for some deadline, can't we spend the same amount of effort for our dream?

Marathon Magic

On Sunday 18th January, I had been to the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon. I participated in the 21 km race. I have been to a few huge gatherings, but the marathon was a class apart. There was something magical about it.

I reached Azad maidan, where the marathon was supposed to start, at 6:40 a.m. (That in itself being a big feat for me). Soon, I met my friends and started the run at about 6:50-6:55.

Not much after the race started, I witnessed 'magic'. I had been practising for the marathon for around one week. Every single day that I paractised, my shins would ache after running for about 15-20 minutes. I was quite worried that I would have to walk most of the distance in the marathon. However, things turned out completely different than how I had anticipated. My shins did not hurt at all throughout the run! Not a single bit!

When I had completed around 5-6 kms, I saw a car with a huge LCD panel displaying the time, coming from the opposite direction. The leader of the half marathon was coming from the opposite direction. He had completed around 15 kms when I had barely completed 5 kms. Moreover, when I had completed around 9 kms, a fellow L&Tite told me, "Run fast! The Kenyans are here!". The Kenyans were running the full marathon and had started from the same location as ours an hour after we had started. I knew that the race leaders ran fast. These two events made me realize what running fast really meant.

There was no energy drink - Electral - in the first half of the race, only Cadbury's Bournville chocolate posters teasing me. I was completely exhausted. That's when someone, recognizing my bright yellow LnT T-Shirt, came up to me and said, "Hey, I've been trying to catch up with you since quite some time. Even I am from LnT". After having a little chat, he offered me Cadbury Fruit n Nut. Bliss.........

The enthusiasm shown by people was overwhelming. People had come down from their homes and were offering Neembu Paani and Parle-G biscuits to the runners. One hotel owner had gone as far as offering samosas and monginis slice cakes! Some people were there just to motivate us. It did help. Just after I had finished half the race, I was walking when someone from the audience shouted, "Come on LnT! Run!". I had to run.

With the help of people's motivation, Cadbury Fruit n Nut, Parle-G biscuits and Electral, I finished the race in around 2 hours and 55 mins. It left me with a sense of great accomplishment. I wasn't even sure of completing the race and I ended up finishing it in 3 hours.

Then came the toughest part. We had to cross Azad maidan to get the refreshments - 2 bananas, one orange and one packet of chocolate chip biscuits. These 200-300 metres were tougher than the 21 kms. But the walk was worth it. Bananas had never tasted better.

I completed the race and it helped me realize a few things.

• People can run fast, really fast.


• You cannot refuse water from a cute little three year old even if you are not thirsty.


• Even strangers can motivate one to push himself further.
  


• To truly appreciate something, earn it. Parle-G biscuits and bananas have never tasted better.

Of Dreams and Rat Races

I've come across many people talking about (not) running the rat race. The question of why we shouldn’t run the rat race being apart, the real question is why are there so many people talking about the rat race.

People say that they don't really know what they want to achieve in life, what they want to make a career out of. Hence, they are left with no option but to choose from one of the several standard streams offered by our state/universities depending on what percentage they’ve secured an then make a career in that field. They may or may not like that stream. Eventually though, they learn to live with it. It’s like having an arranged marriage with life.

I believe that everyone has the potential to at least have a dream. The problem lies in our mentality – we just don’t give non academic dreams much weight. Ergo, we discard our own dreams even before considering them as options. For example, even if some loves to play basketball, playing basketball for India won’t even be considered as a career option.

Undoubtedly, there is a huge risk involved. What if one can’t really make it big? Hence, one should have a fallback option. However, the fallback option should remain a fallback option and not take preference over one’s dream.

As the quote goes -

It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.
- Alfred Lord Tennyson

I think I thought

A few days ago, I thought of something; something profound and of deep significance. I was so happy of having thought of it! After all, you don't really have those 'eureka' moments everyday. I also thought that I would translate these thoughts into a blog post.

There's a problem though. I can't remember what I thought. Worse, I now think that I just dreamt that I thought a thought. I'm not sure.

What do I do?

Many a times in life, I have come across a situation where I've had to choose from two paths :

1. What I should do.
2. What I want to do.

More often than not, I have travelled the first path. That's me. I do what I should do and sometimes feel good having done it or regret not having done what I've wanted to do or both - have mixed feelings.

However, now things have taken a turn. I have several options in front of me.

0. What I want to do (Not even an option)
1. What I should do.
2. What I should do.
3. What I should do.


.. all of equal importance. What do I do? Which path do I go? I cannot take any one path without sacrificing the others in some respect. I know that whichever path I take, later, I'm going to regret having not taken the other paths.

What do i do?

7

It's quite interesting how something generally considered small and insignificant can spawn so many thoughts in one's head. I got an email from a friend. The subject read 7. By the time I hit to open the mail, numerous thoughts flooded my brain.

First of, it reminded me of two things - The seven deadly sins (lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy, pride) and the movie 7 based on them, and a friend I used to call '7' in Engineering.

I got reminded that I had decided years ago 7 to be my lucky number because the board game 'Business' that I used to play with my brother (long before we had a computer at home), a score of 7 on the dice on the first roll would fetch me Rs. 2000 (or was it dollars?).

Such unrelated events brought together and thought about almost simultaneously just by the subject of a mail. And all this in a matter of only a few seconds. The mind works in mysterious ways!

Am i losing it?!

This post is some what related to my previous blog post Too or Two?!?.

Yesterday too, I did some really weird things. I dont exactly know what made me perform these actions, but well, i did perform them.

It was morning. I was asleep. Mummy rang the bell (Its a system in which mummy rings the bell and i have to pick up the phone).

Here's what i was supposed to do:
1. Get up.
2. Go to the phone.
3. Pick up the receiver.
4. Hold the receiver to my one of my ears.
5. Say "Hello".

Here's what i actually did:
1. Partially got up.
2. Plugged the mosquito mat out of the socket forcefully.
3. Held the mosquito mat to my left ear.
4. Said "Hello".

That was okay to some extent. I was not exactly in my senses. People can do weird things when not totally awake. I think it had to do with me thinking about switching the mat off when i wake up or something like that. But what happened next was stranger.

I went down, ate, drank tea, finished the usual morning routines and thought that i'd play the guitar for some time.

Here's what a normal moi should've done:
1. Switch on the fan.
2. Go to the guitar.
3. Pick up the guitar.
4. Go to the chair.
5. Start playing.

Here's what i actually did:
1. Switched on the fan.
2 Switched off the fan.
3. Went under then fan.
4. Lifted my hands to pick the fan (as if it were the guitar).

What/Who/Why ? I have no idea! Ridiculous! What was i thinking? Was i even thinking?

Actually a little later, when i thought about it, i remembered myself performing such stunts a few times before.

For example, I wanted to sit on the computer. Here's what i did:
1. Went to the computer chair to sit.
2. Realized that the fan wasnt on.
3. Went to switch the fan on.
4. Switched the fan on.
5. Came back to the chair. By this time, the fan obviously hadn't picked up speed.
6. Thought that the fan was off.
7. Went back to turn the fan on.
8. Realized that i had done something familiar a few seconds ago.

And what scares me even more is that this has happened more than once.

Well another example. This happened a few years ago. We were supposed to have dinner in a little while. I was sitting on the sofa. Mummy came and asked me to open the table (the table fits into the wall and hence has to be opened). A little while later, mummy asked me to open the table again. I said, "Hey, i just opened it". Well the table wasn't open. I was sitting on the sofa in front of the table and no one could've closed the table and i was sure that i had opened it.

Here's what actually happened:
1. Mummy told me to open the table.
2. I got up, opened the table.
3. I sat on the sofa.
4. Remembered that i had to perform some operation on table.
5. Got up, closed the table.
6. Sat back on the sofa.


Another example. Dont really remember when this happened, but definitely not more than 4-5 years ago.
After im done bathing and i get out, here's what i do.
1. Pick up soiled clothes.
2. Get out.
3. Turn right and bend.
4. Open the clothes cabinet under the basin.
5. Dump the clothes.
6. Shut the cabinet.

One day, i had dumped the clothes into the cabinet and then gone* to bathe. Hence, when i came out, there were no clothes in my hand. Here comes the weird part. I performed all the actions 2-6 above, just that i didn't have any clothes in my hand when i performed action 5. I just performed the action of dumping clothes.

Do i really stop thinking at times? Or is it that i cease to pay attention to a few details and brainlessly perform some actions. What is it!?