The Alchemist…

I have wanted to write this entry since the time I finished reading “The Alchemist”. It is definitely one of the most beautiful books that I have read. The central character (Santiago) has been so wonderfully presented that every person can see a small part of himself with the central character. Apart from being a very good read, the book also made me ask myself some very deep questions. What is my destiny? Am I traveling the right path? Will I end up being a baker who was destined to find a pot of gold? Frankly, I am very much afraid to even think about these questions, let alone answer them. It is said in the book that when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. I wonder when my teacher will arrive. I wonder if I am ready enough for a teacher.

But there is one thing said in the book which I believe totally. It is about the so called “Old man in shining armor” helping you in your life’s path. Ever since I was a kid I have always felt that there is “Someone” watching over me. Someone, whom I have never seen or met, but who always has my best interests in his mind. I call him God and the people who have read “The Alchemist” can call him the old man in the shining armor. Every time I have a bad experience he seems to be whispering in my ears – You will very soon understand why you went through this. 

Let me try and explain by taking someone examples from my life. Early in my childhood, I had to leave my hometown and study in Delhi. I am talking about a time when I was in 6^th standard. It was a new place and I absolutely hated being there. I had no friends in the place and almost always felt as a south Indian outcast among North Indians. I remember wondering why I had to go through all this rubbish. Three years later when I was leaving Delhi and going back to my hometown, I again felt miserable. This time it was because, I had made so many new friends and I will now never be able to see them again. Now, after 15 years due to a strange twist, I had to go to Gurgaon for my work and one by one I am getting back in touch with all my old friends. You cannot imagine how happy I feel whenever I meet my “long lost friends”!!!! I am glad I came here, went back and again came here. It was as if everything was planned. 

I am an electronics and communication engineer by education. I had always wanted to be a software engineer. Fate made me a telecom engineer. I was very angry on God to have made a telecom engineer out of me. It did not take me long to know that this job was “Charming”. In fact I began to love it. Everything that I had studied in my four years of engineer was proving to be useful. Today when I call my “Software engineer” friends that are more bitter then me. They are angry that studied electronics and are working on a computer. They are angry that the market is so over crowded that they have become just another person in the crowd. They are angry that their day start starts staring into a computer and ends with staring at the same computer. Today I am glad I am communication engineer and am enjoying every moment of it. It was as if everything was planned.

I used to hate traveling a lot. I liked to be in familiar surrounding with familiar faces. I hated the uncertainty that traveling brought you. My job as a communication engineer involved a lot of travel. The first time I went on a travel, I was so bloody scared and nervous that I lost 17,000 Rs from my purse. Just imagine how I felt!!!! But slowly as time went by, and I traveled more places, I began to see why people enjoy traveling. I in fact began to love it. My hate for traveling began to be replaced by a love for it. As I did so I also began to feel more confident about myself. Today I have traveled to more places then many of my “Software engineers”. I love the challenges of going to unknown places and visiting unknown people and finding friends. Now I am confident that I can go even to the North Pole and make friends there. Traveling has become such an inseparable part of me that I now wonder I did not like it before. It was as if everything was planned. 

Like all people of my generation, I too got hooked to the internet. I loved to chat my heart out online. It was during this time that I found a very interesting lady online. She was so cheerful and bright that I thought it was her that I was waiting for all these days. It was not to be. And it turned out that it was just my hormones and infatuation that were fooling around with me. She was not the girl after all. But all these chatting session somehow made me feel good about writing my heart out. I realized that I loved to put my thoughts on paper and publish it. It cleared my mind and lightened my heart. I turned to blogging. I started to write my “own” articles. Tough I do not have a big fan following, I enjoy publishing my thoughts online. What started as a routine chatting with one girl online ended up with me trying my hand on blogging and to this day I have written about 60+ blogs. I plan to write atleast a 100 more. I have found some geninuly good bloggers/blogs online. I have inspired some of my own friends to start blogging. I am loving it. It was as if everything was planned.

 

Siddhartha to Buddha – Journey of a young man

Remember I told you that recently I brought a few books t read? Presently I am reading the book “Buddha – a story of enlightenment” by Deepak chopra. It’s a very good book and truly a page turner. I am happy I purchased that book.

I have always been attracted to Buddha and his teachings. In fact I still remember the first book I read on Buddha’s teachings when I was in 12th. His teachings are simple, practical and scholarly. It now feels good to read about how Siddhartha – the prince renounced everything and became a God.

Siddhartha was, like any one of us, a mortal when he was born. I am sure he felt all the emotions that we feel as humans. I am sure he was not a god from the word go. Definitely he might have had all the shortcomings that we have as humans as well. But then, what is it that made Siddhartha, a mere mortal to be included into the ranks of the god?

I think the reason why Siddhartha became Buddha was because he listened to his heart. He had the entire world at his feet. He was prince of a state. He was having riches that any of us would give our life to have. He was destined to be a great worrier to rule over the four corners of the world. But he renounced all that. And his renouncement was that of a highest kind. What’s the meaning of renouncing wealth if you are beggar? What’s the meaning of renouncing if you are already old and about to die? What’s the meaning of renouncing if you don’t of anyone who cares about you?

Siddhartha was bold enough to leave his wealth, crown and family members at a very young age and walk into the realm of the unknown. He followed his heart and set on a journey to find his destiny. It just takes a split second to think how difficult and courageous a decision he took at that young age.

No, I am not a Buddhist. No, I don’t plan to become a Buddhist in near future. But what I do like is a young man’s journey to know himself. I do like a person who fights against all odds to find his destiny. I do like a person who becomes a god from human with sheer will power. I do like a person who has nothing in his heart but love for his fellow creatures. I do like Buddha as a person. His life inspires me.

Through this Book I intend to walk with Buddha on his journey for enlightenment. I intend to at lest make a feeble attempt to know his joys, fears, loss and triumphs. Don’t worry! I will keep you posted about anything beautiful that I come across

 

Leadership…

I have now become paranoid about my MBA exams. I want to clear the Exam at any cost. Of course, the fact that I have taken correspondence course makes the matter a little more difficult. On top of that I am having a very demanding Job, a Job that is full of mental pressure and also requires me to move “on field” now and then make the matter a little more complicated.

But the fact that I have always loved to read and immensely enjoy being a student has helped me a lot. I thought how I can make my preparation and revision interesting. I got a very brilliant idea. I decided I will play by my strengths. This is how I am tackling it.

I love being a student, so I have drawn up a strict time table for studying even after a hard days work. I have always loved reading, so reading the courseware is in fact an enjoyable experience – once a strict time table is set. I also like to write down my thoughts. I decided, instead of being philosophical, I will write about what I have read on that day, there by effectively revising what I read – Hobby and study both accomplished. Last but not the least; I love to post my blog with relevant photos. I will browse the net and find some photos/articles that are relevant to what ever I have read on that particular day and pot it in my blog. Today will be first of these series of posts.

Well, today I learned about leadership in an organizational setup. I learned about the various theories of leadership and how communication skills are very important for an effective leader.

Leadership, by the way is the art of influencing the behavior of your collogues/subordinates in a positive way so that the goals and objectives of the organization are met. Many scientists have done a lot of study to understand this “art”. The various studies can be broadly classified into Trait theory, behavioral, Situational/contingency theory and finally transformational theory.

Trait theory says that leaders are born and not made. This theory says that leaders are a gifted lot. It tries to describe the various traits that leaders somehow acquired. But, the crux here was that many successful leaders had contradictory traits. This theory was hence not successful. The next theory propounded was behavioral theory. This theory says that leaders can be developed. They have certain set of behavior’s that make them an effective leader. Any person who consciously learns and adapts himself to these set of behavior, will become a leader (like consideration for employees, consideration for achieving the goals etc. Based on the behavior the manager himself they can be classified as an autocrat, Benevolent, consultative or participative leader. One particular theory I liked was the “Management Grid” theory. In this the consideration for the employee is on the x axes and the productivity on the Y axes. Value of these axes can range from 1 through nine. Based on this grid the leader can be classified as impoverished leader, Autocratic leader, Country club leader, middle of the road leader and finally Team leader. A person should always aim to be a team oriented leader (High consideration for employees and productivity). But this again failed to give a permanent solution to the question. So, situational theory was proposed. This theory says that a leader must always change his leadership style depending on the situation. He should ask himself certain basic questions before adopting a particular style. Or, he could use the path goal approach in which he defines the goal for the subordinate and depending on the personality of the subordinate lay out the path to achieve the goal. Finally the Transformational theory was proposed. Transformational leaders are the ones who inspire phenomenal output out of their subordinates. Nobody till date has been able to pin point the way transformational leaders are developed.

Finally, today I read about the various communications that flows in an organization (Downward, upward, horizontal and crosswise), Model of communication process, barriers of communication and finally the ways to overcome communication barrier.

Hmmmm….a lot of stuff read. Personally I have some opposing views on what ever I read – but about that later. For now, I am pretty paranoid about my exam and “I want to do well”

 

MBA…

Well…I am having my MBA exams on 20th and 27th of this month. This leaves me with seven more days to prepare for my exams. Of course I am tense. I need a lot of good wishes and good luck – both for preparing as well as writing for my exam.

I have been reading my MBA courseware voraciously off late. What I have learnt till now is that management is all about five things – Planning, Organizing, Staffing, leading and controlling. Each of these five fields forms the cornerstone for Management study.

Planning is the phase wherein you plan for your Goals, objectives and mission as an organization. Organizing deals with giving a formal structure to your organization. It involves creating various hierarchy structures of employees, breaking your organization into departments and divisions etc. The main thing here is that your organizing should be in line and complement your plan/goal for the organization. Staffing is the process of putting the right people in the right places in the hierarchy structure developed in the organizing phase. Leading is then guiding and influencing the behavior of the haired employees so that “they” can help you to achieve the goals of the organization. Controlling deals with the various ways in which you have to control you finance, communication, morale etc for the smooth functioning of the organization.

I personally like the leading part of management. The main reason I like this is because in today’s scenario to be become a true leader, you have to truly understand and know people. You have to know what is it that motivates people. Why do people behave the way they do? How to get along with people to achieve a common goal? How to handle conflicts in work place? Etc. It feels good to get into the minds of some of the greatest of Physcology/management thinkers. It’s good to know what their opinions are on these topics (like Peter F. Drucker, Abraham Maslow, Victor H. Vroom, David C. McClelland etc…)

The another reason why I like the literature on leading is because I truly believe that each and every person is a leader in his/her very own way. A father is the financial leader in his home. A mother is the emotional in her home. A teacher is a leader for molding a child’s character. A sweeper is a leader of cleanliness of his area. I am a leader for myself; I am responsible for managing myself. So, I think everyone is a leader in one way or the other. And the literature present in management for organizational leadership can also extended to personal/family leadership. Maybe we will have to modify it a bit to take care of the human element. For example, have a look at Maslow pyramid proposed to know the motive behind people’s work in organization. A look at it and you will know how relevant it is in our personal life as well. We too – maybe unconsciously – Plan, organize, staff, lead and control ourselves in our life.

All said and done, days are slipping by, and I need to write my Exams. Wish me luck

 

Never Ever Give up!!!!!!!

I have always wanted to be a “Never say die” person. I don’t want to give up, I don’t want to give in – when I know I am right. No matter what the situation.

I simply love to read any story that has people showing this “never say die” attitude. And if this happens to be a real life story, it also inspires me.

Recently I read a similar true incident that inspired me. It’s the story of the workers of Wilmington plant of general motors and their struggle to stop their factory from shutting down. Following is an extract of that story

In the early 1990′s, General motors (GM) decided to shut down its assembly plant located in Wilmington. They sent a group of executives to convey this message. The executives addressed the 3500 employees of the plant and told them about GM’s decision to shut down the plant by 1996 in order to reduce cost.

The announcement left the workers stunned. When the GM executives left, Ralph Harding, the manager of the plant, made a passionate speech to the employees. He said “There maybe nothing we can do to affect this decision. But there is something we can do: we can make them feel really stupid!! Because they are going to be closing the best plant in General motors!!” He motivated the employees with his speech and fired them up with the desire to make their plant one of the best of GM’s plant by 1996 – the year it was meant to be closed down.

The union leaders and management started to work together to reduce costs and to improve quality of production. The employees took it up as a challenge and started working towards reducing costs and improving quality of the products. Their motto was to become the best and thus make the top management feel ashamed of their plan of closing down the plant.

In less the two years, the Wilmington plant became one of GM’s best plants and the car dealer began making specific orders for car models Chevy Corsica and Beretta, produced in the plant. The employees succeeded in achieving what they wanted to do – To prove that GM’s decision to close down the plant was a foolish one. In 1996 GM decided against closing down the plant.

Such a great story, makes you want read it again and again….

 

Transactional analysis anybody??

Let me first start with the a little fact file – The attached photo is that of Dr. Eric Berne. He was a Psychology professor and propounder of Transactional analysis.

I came across this term when reading my MBA courseware. Must tell, suddenly I am feeling great interest for Psychology. Psychology truly is a very interesting and intriguing subject.

I really marvel at the human brain and the free will God has given us. It’s wonderful how we can first think and then think and find out exactly what made us think as we thinked!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have always been a Math Geek, an engineer at heart. As such I thought that science and math’s are the “Real sciences”. I thought that these are the only subjects that work on solid logical reasoning. 1+1 is always 2 be it today or a hundred years from now. Rate of change of momentum is directly proportional to the applied force and acts in the direction of the force applied, today, tomorrow or a hundred years later. But I might feel happy today, sad tomorrow and Jubilant 10 days later. I mean, this – feeling – thing is unpredictable.

I was charmed at my first encounter with Psychology. I was amused to know that the way I behave might have a logical reason as well. I read the transactional analysis theory proposed by Dr. Eric Berne. I fell in love with Psychology.

As per Eric, each person is made up of three alter ego states – Parent, child and adult. He then goes on to say how these alter ego states take shape. How they affect the way we respond to day to day situations. How and why – one Ego state is dominant at one time and the other at another time. I also read about “strokes”. Stroke is the term we use for the type of acknowledgement we give to a person. Stroke can be positive, negative or don’t care. The concept of strokes is then combined with child, adult and parent theory to know how the various ego states interact with each other. He then goes one step ahead and tells when and exactly why communication go wrong and the way to avoid it. The icing on cake is the real life example he gives, which are eerily accurate.

It was wonderful to read a different stream of science. It was an eye opener. In fact now I feel that Psychology in its most basic form should be studied by everyone. It tells a lot about yourself, which if used properly can improve you into a better person….

 

Gandhiji – My hero

Today is the Birthday of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, otherwise called as Mahatma Gandhi. I thought I will write down a few things about Mahatma in today’s post.

I have always admired Gandhiji. I prefer to call him as Gandhiji rather then Mahatma. This is because the title Mahatma makes him almost godlike and the expectation from him increases almost tenfold. What – I think – we should not forget is that Gandhiji was after all a human being. He was no demi God. He made his share of mistakes (like we all do). I see Gandhji’s life as a triumph of the human will. His life inspires me, and I am a great fan of his.

I am sure there will be a lot of people out there who will not agree to what I write. They will be people who criticize gandhiji, who feel that he was after all not as great as people project him to be. For them I have to say this – I respect your views; you have the freedom of your views. But in the similar way I have my freedom as well, and for me Gandhi is a Hero.

Now let me try and rationalize why I love Gandhiji. What is it in him that appeals to me? Why do I think he is great person? Well, one of the reasons for it I can say is I read his Autobiography – My experiments with truth – at a very early age (when I was in class eighth). This book of his has made a profound effect on how I see this person.

I learnt from this book that after all he was a human. He too has faced the same problem that we all faced. He too tried his hands on Beedi in his youth, he too used to lie like all of us do, he too felt angry like each and every one of us when we see injustice, he too used to spent his night with his wife when his father was n the deathbed ailing. He too felt strongly about what he believes in, and went all out to convince others when he felt that he was right. In short, he was very much human like you, me, or the person moving on the street.

If he had all the drawbacks like each and every one of us – what is it that made him Mahatma?? Why is it that even people around the world including Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther king Jr, Mother Teresa, Richard gere, Dalai Lama and countless other people around the world are charmed by him?? No, he did not have a great physique. No, he never used a gun. No, he was not a great orator. No, he was not rich. No, he was not an intellectual genius. He was a very common and passable Indian. No, he was no king. No, he was not vested with any power.

What is it then that made him such a phenomenon?? I personally feel the reason for this was that a common Indian man could connect himself with him. They could identify with what he said. They could easily walk his talk. That was possible because he did not tell people to go on war. He did not tell people to leave their near and dear ones and go into hiding. He did not ask for Blood – ours or our enemies.

Just take this small exercise frankly. Let’s say two different people come to you for a good cause. One of them asks you to take a gun and come along with him so that the root cause of the problem can be shot to death. The other person tells you to show small acts of defiance (like stop buying certain cloths, stop paying bills, stop using foreign materials etc) and assures you that doing so on a large scale will non violently kill the root cause of the problem. Whom will you follow??

He just asked people to be themselves. He asked them to assert themselves. He asked people to stand for what you felt was right. He walked with people. He lived the common man’s life. He was very Indian even in his stature. Indian people, by their very culture nature, could – as I previously said – connect to what he said. And it is this factor that made Gandhiji such a great person. He did not develop an Atom Bomb. He developed the concept of being yourself and nonviolently assert yourself for the cause of truth.

People will still raise 100 questions on gandhiji. Yes, maybe he might have been wrong at times. That’s because he was a human like each and every one of us. That is what makes Gandhiji such a phenomenon.

Gandhiji – you inspire me and you are my hero!!!!

 

What do I want to be??

I have now completely read 7 Habits of effective people by Stephen covey. There is one thing written in that book which made me think, deeply. That thing is to think about “what do I want to be”?

Pretty basic and a very boring question is what I thought about it when I first read about it. Nonetheless I went ahead and had a cup of tea with Mr. Covey over this topic (meaning I read what he had to say about this having a cup of tea). As I read further, I realized it is one of the most basic and life changing question that anyone can ever ask to himself. Made me think.

Covey is a very practical and a typical American author. He quantifies everything – from emotions to feeling to your goal in life, with clinical precision. But full credit to him, he has done solid work and I think the things he says have great relevance and they really do work.

Covey is of the opinion that the answer to the question – what do I want to be is four fold. In order to find an answer to this question, you need to know what your roles in life are. Once you know what are the different roles in your life, you can then reflect on each of the roles, think about what is the best you can achieve in each and every role of yours. Third step then is to have weekly goals you set your self in each and every role of yours which will bring you closer to you very best. Fourth step is to always try and improve, o keep raising the bar, to know how you can do whatever you are doing still better.

I know – all these things seem to like shit, something that seems very impractical. Even if you somehow agree to whatever he says and go ahead to it, I think such kind of an approach will take away the spontaneity out of life. In any case I thought is controversial and different enough to give it a try.

One day I sat alone and thought, what are my roles in life? Long after I am gone, how is it that I want my near and dear ones to remember me in each and every role I have in my life? Just pondering over this questions and trying to find answers was very liberating, different and good.

I recognized the different roles I have in my life which is of importance to me. These roles are that of a – Son, Brother, Friend, Colleague. I thought reflected about what I want to stand for in each of these roles of mine. I then noted in down in my “black dairy”… (Doesn’t worry, I wont repeat it here – because they are very personal to me ). This exercise is truly very good and I think every person should do it once in a while. It gives you a sense of direction. It also helps you to set your priorities right.

I found the step of having weekly targets in each role of mine to be still more enjoyable. For example, as a colleague for one week I set the target for myself to be very supportive to all my team members, even if they did something wrong. It feels great at the end of the week when you know that you achieved your target of the week.

But then again, as I said earlier it’s very difficult to maintain the tempo for a prolonged period of time. But that is something that I have to try and see. Hope I am proved wrong.

One more thing that I think will work still work better is if you have a role model with each of the role you have. This role model should be chosen carefully and he should be an inspiring person. He/she can be as real a person as your father/mother or as fictional as Prof.Dumbledore. But the key is your role model should inspire you. This way you will know your ultimate goal in each role. You can then move towards that epitome of perfection.

All said and done, the road is rough, twisting and full of difficulties before reaching the desired destination. Just like that path to the top of the mountain in the photo attached (it is again taken in Golconda fort in Hyderabad).

I pray to God to give me the courage and stamina to walk on that path and reach my destiny….Amen

 

The 7 habits of highly effective people – a critique

Hi there,

Recently I have been reading the book “Seven habits of highly effective people” by Stephen covey. Must say it’s a very good book. You cannot classify this one as fiction, Non fiction, adventure, self help….etc. It is more of a text book. It is a series of principles that the author thinks to be the corner stone for highly successful people or rather highly effective people (there is an actually a lot of difference between being successful and being effective).

The thing that is evident in this book – which you will know after reading only a few pages, is – you and you alone are responsible for what happens to you. Nobody can make you feel angry; nobody can make you feel sad, nobody can make you feel happy. It is totally you – your conscious decision – about your reaction to the situation. If your boss shouts at you, you have two choices – either go in the flow and shout back at him (in which case your boss is having control over your emotions) or you exercise your own free will to decide what you want to do when your boss shouts at you (in which case you are having control over your emotions).

After driving this point home, he slowly and clinically dissects everything and tells you how you can be happy, if you want to. How you can be successful, if you want to. In fact he has clarified it and expressed it soo well & in such a scientific detail that you tend to think everything can be planned and executed as per your will (Which of course is false)

The key here is, he says – to take total responsibility for your self. You and you alone have decided what you are now and not – your parents, the circumstances or the society. Strong Idea. So if I decide that my boss will not control how I react, it is just a matter of application of some will power before you relies that, yes – It is possible.

After hitting home the point about how important you are in your life with some solid example (which by the way is the first habit of highly effective people) he slowly builds up the remaining five habits. The habits too are devised in such a way that you will first gain private victory (that is victory over yourself) and then public victory (Victory over your surroundings). And finally he requests us to “keep sharpening the saw”. Meaning, keep improving, keep looking for new and better ways to do things, learn as you grow. For clarity purpose, I am listing out the seven habits.

Private victory

1. Be proactive
2. Begin with the end in mind
3. Put first things first

Public victory

4. Think Win/Win
5. Seek first to understand…Then to be understood
6. Synergize

And finally, the seventh habit which holds the entire development in place

7. Sharpen the Saw.

The author himself says that these seven habits are the cornerstone of highly effective people. But according to his own confession, it is extremely difficult to live these values. It is this difficulty, this mystery of wheatear we will be able to live these values is what makes it even more beautiful, timeless and rock solid.

At the end the author says that reading the book itself and committing the habits to memory will not do any help to us. We should “live” these habits before we start getting its benefits. You cannot read 100 books on swimming and say that you can swim. You have to shed your cloths, get into the water and start applying what you know to learn and truly swim.

All in all, a very good book to read and potentially life changing – if applied in true sprit.