iSi ShauK kA imTihaAn ZiNdaGi Hai! | ईसी शौक का इम्तेहाँ ज़िन्दगी है

Diary of an Introvert

2011-12-14T17:23:00.000-05:00

Diary of an Introvert

a few common misconceptions about Introverts:

Myth #1 – Introverts don’t like to talk.

This is not true. Introverts just don’t talk unless they have something to say. They hate small talk. Get an introvert talking about something they are interested in, and they won’t shut up for days.

Myth #2 – Introverts are shy.

Shyness has nothing to do with being an Introvert. Introverts are not necessarily afraid of people. What they need is a reason to interact. They don’t interact for the sake of interacting. If you want to talk to an Introvert, just start talking. Don’t worry about being polite.

Myth #3 – Introverts are rude.

Introverts often don’t see a reason for beating around the bush with social pleasantries. They want everyone to just be real and honest. Unfortunately, this is not acceptable in most settings, so Introverts can feel a lot of pressure to fit in, which they find exhausting.

Myth #4 – Introverts don’t like people.

On the contrary, Introverts intensely value the few friends they have. They can count their close friends on one hand. If you are lucky enough for an introvert to consider you a friend, you probably have a loyal ally for life. Once you have earned their respect as being a person of substance, you’re in.

Myth #5 – Introverts don’t like to go out in public.

Nonsense. Introverts just don’t like to go out in public FOR AS LONG. They also like to avoid the complications that are involved in public activities. They take in data and experiences very quickly, and as a result, don’t need to be there for long to “get it.” They’re ready to go home, recharge, and process it all. In fact, recharging is absolutely crucial for Introverts.

Myth #6 – Introverts always want to be alone.

Introverts are perfectly comfortable with their own thoughts. They think a lot. They daydream. They like to have problems to work on, puzzles to solve. But they can also get incredibly lonely if they don’t have anyone to share their discoveries with. They crave an authentic and sincere connection with ONE PERSON at a time.

Myth #7 – Introverts are weird.

Introverts are often individualists. They don’t follow the crowd. They’d prefer to be valued for their novel ways of living. They think for themselves and because of that, they often challenge the norm. They don’t make most decisions based on what is popular or trendy.

Myth #8 – Introverts are aloof nerds.

Introverts are people who primarily look inward, paying close attention to their thoughts and emotions. It’s not that they are incapable of paying attention to what is going on around them, it’s just that their inner world is much more stimulating and rewarding to them.

Myth #9 – Introverts don’t know how to relax and have fun.

Introverts typically relax at home or in nature, not in busy public places. Introverts are not thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies. If there is too much talking and noise going on, they shut down. Their brains are too sensitive to the neurotransmitter called Dopamine. Introverts and Extroverts have different dominant neuro-pathways. Just look it up.

Myth #10 – Introverts can fix themselves and become Extroverts.

A world without Introverts would be a world with few scientists, musicians, artists, poets, filmmakers, doctors, mathematicians, writers, and philosophers. That being said, there are still plenty of techniques an Extrovert can learn in order to interact with Introverts. (Yes, I reversed these two terms on purpose to show you how biased our society is.) Introverts cannot “fix themselves” and deserve respect for their natural temperament and contributions to the human race. In fact, one study (Silverman, 1986) showed that the percentage of Introverts increases with IQ.

courtesy: Carl

Clay- Thinker #1

2011-12-02T08:12:00.001-05:00

Clayton Christensen's Acceptance Speech

At the beginning of our career; our LIFE, do we have a strategy to be sore and recluse in the long term..?

Then why is this that most of us land that way..!

Why a stunning number of people execute a strategy that they never want to pursue in the first place.

Why do we go through a broken marriage; alienated children, unhappy parents, friends; genuine friends, now totally forgotten, etc.. the list goes on!

How many of us have a clear-cut Deliberate Strategy and an Emergent Srtategy and in what sphere of our life (Personal vs Professional)? referred to Henry Mintzberg's work.

Awesome video! Must watch!!

Rockstar movie review

2011-11-22T14:18:00.001-05:00

It’s been quite a while that I’vewritten. … in fact none of the instances recently were inspiring enough tocompel me to the state of feeling forwriting.

It doesn’t mean life recently hasbeen any lesser. In fact I’ve witnessed quite a few facts that I till now hadonly wondered about; things like Fear, Fantasy and ability of Facing the truth. I’ve really beenblessed and lucky that I’m still Sane and Ready for taking things Head-on. Thecourage only comes when you genuinely feel that you can never be involved insomething that the Almighty doesn’t want you to be in. Very complex feeling asthey say …

Jo bhi mai kehna chahun.. barbaadkare; alfaz mere!

Yes, the inspiration to writesomething has come from the Movie; Rockstar.

For me; who’s never been relatedin any possible terms with the movie making Industry, movies (or even booksthat are always inspiration to motion pictures) have always been a thing towatch, get entertained and analyze if the expenses were worthwhile. Then therewere a few that provoked me to think of something that I rarely thought or knewabout; a bonus that I take home. But these were all, till now.

Watching Rockstar has provided mewith a third dimension; a different Take-home. The finest form of one’s own life.Think of your best interest and you shall live another day without dying. And soyou live-on, despite pain, grievances, anxiety and anticipation…

Actually I’ve been closelywatching the progression since the Inception and the announcement made by Mr.Imtiyaz Ali. I’ve been listening to the music since last three months. A raresituation; where I waited weeks for the music launch, and maybe I was among thefirst few who got it when it was made available. The album seriously grows onyou. But to like it more, you will have sure learn a few very interestingthing. You’ll know about it if you have touched and even slightly liked it. Itreally grows on you…

Kun fayakun!!

The Music is a treat in itself, andit surely brought me to a level where I started looking forward to the movie..and when it really happened an entire week was spent just thinking of managingtime to get to watch.. Finally yesterday it happened. And I’ve been in acomplete trance since then. It has happened probably for the first time in mylife that I’ve actually meditated with the movie.

Speaking more of the movie andmoviemaking process I suggest it being second only o the RDB in terms of awesomescreenplay and editing. The Intensity is to the extent that you miss the entireintent of the movie the moment you even blink. A rare thing in usual Bollywood.Rockstar is a compact movie with a powerhouse performance from RK. …and that’sit, as far as my critique is concerned. I’ll not delve into how others haveperformed, because the protagonist has so much influenced me that I totally got-inwith him. It’s a Journey of Jordan and I went-on (..and I still am travelling;beyond the closing credits) along with him. As a matter of fact I don’t reallycare for the crowd moving along; I’ve been like that, always.

Thank you team Rockstar for taking me back to my writing. God bless us all!!

Other Side of the Table...

2011-07-16T17:31:00.000-04:00

Other Side of the Table... Kshitij Bansal

Congratulations for your promotion Guys! You have done it again. No doubt you deserved that. But before you take on your new responsibilities, I think you must read a story. As they say *‘Power is a necessary evil’, if used to do well, it can create revolution and if mishandled, can create havoc.* When my heart provoked me to share with you, a lesson that I learned from my uncle, I penned it down in form of this story. The story is about a guy who got to learn the real meaning of progress and power. With a hope that the message reaches you in high spirit, I wish you all the best. Enjoy reading… *Other side of the table…* “Really?” was his first word when that sound fell on his eardrums. “I mean thanks! Thanks a lot, Sir! Bye…” He couldn’t believe his ears what he had heard just a few seconds ago. After all he had been waiting for this for years now. He still remembered the day when he became Technical lead. His manager called him in his cabin and handed over his promotion letter. The excitement, happiness and zeal that he was containing that day had vanished over the years now. 7 years were more than enough for this erosion. Every time he saw his team members getting promoted, a dense darkness used to engulf him. “Where am I going wrong? My reviews are good. In fact, my work is good. I am managing my team mates well. So, what is the issue? Is it because I spilled the steaming soup on that over smart American client? or maybe because I was last to wish my manager on his promotion? No... It’s not...or may it be yes? He fought with these questions every time but there was no one to satisfy his queries. Gradually his questions became- “Is my career ruined? Will I remain stuck here only? What is the use of being a team lead if I remain the lead and team members become managers? In past seven years no employee has been designated to report me…God! What is this? Please help!” But today when Suresh heard from his onsite manager that he has been promoted to the post of Project Manager, his questions subdued; he could hardly contain his excitement which was much larger than the day when he became the lead seven years ago. His complaints became compliments. “Thank you God for these 7 years. I am now able to appropriately value the sweetness of this fruit… Thanks a lot!” But suddenly his lines changed, “Now all of them will report to me. I am their boss. Let me tell them what a boss is…” His words were new but certainly not unexpected. They were a result of the frustration and anger that he became pregnant with when he joined this company as a fresher. His first manager was a retired army colonel in his 50s. Colonel had certainly learned how to respect and serve his country. But in this process he forgot to learn how to respect his countrymen. So when Suresh joined him, it was like he has found an undisciplined brat whom he has to train. Although Suresh was a careless and frank guy like all collegiate, but he never shirked his responsibilities. He needed time to acclimatize to a professional environment but Colonel was never in a mood to grant him the same. Every day or the other he became the victim of colonel’s nasty remarks or insult in the front of other colleagues. “I will ruin you and your career!” became his nightmares. For every task he did, credit went to colonel. Although that colonel did not remain in Suresh’s life for long, but the events certainly changed his outlook towards office relationships. For him the relationship between a manager and his employee was no better than a master and a slave. And today he knew he had a chance to satisfy his ego; to take revenge of all those days. He was having first meeting with his new team as a manager. Overexcited, he reached the conference room 10 minutes before the scheduled time and buried himself in the chair on the head side of the conference table. This was his first time on this side. Till yesterday he used to sit on the right side of the head chair. “The world really looks different from this chair…All other chairs seem powerless!” He thought with a proud smile. Within another 10 minutes, all but one of those ‘powerless’ chairs were occupied. Meeting started exactly on time. Suresh stood up from his chair, cleared his throat and said “Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen! I am Suresh, the project manager for this project. This is my first meeting with you all and I hope we will have a fruitful association ahead. Before we move on, I would like you people to introduce yourself”. And the introduction phase started. The team was an appropriate combination of technical resources. There were 3 highly experienced guys, 2 moderately experienced and 2 freshers. As the last fresher finished“and sir I hope this project opens new doors of opportunities for us in the future”, there was a cranking sound on the door and a shadow appeared, “Excuse me sir! May I come in?” The shadow gradually transformed into a girl. She was fair, average heighted, and wore specs. Her salwar kameez made her look completely conservative Indian girl. But her profile had become irrelevant to Suresh at that time. “Yes, please come in”, Suresh said. “Sir, I am also part of this team. Sorry for being late”, she said. “What’s your name?” asked Suresh “Nisha, Sir!” “So, you think we have all time in the world to wait for her ‘royal highness’ to come for the meeting and oblige us. Is it?” he shouted. “But sir...” she tried to explain. “Look madam I am your manager! M.A.N.A.G.E.R! It will cost me hardly a minute to finish your career. If this is your attitude on day one, then I fear that by end of the project you would…” “Sorry sir!” “You better be! So, folks I think the introductions are over. Let me gather the important details for the project and I would be sharing it with you people by EOD. Then we shall meet again”. Although the meeting ended, its hangover didn’t. Suresh was still dancing to its music. “That’s why everyone wants to be a manager. You are the authority dude!” Days passed…Months passed. But with each passing day, his thinking and behavior with his team worsened. Now his position used to give him words. Suresh – The Project Manager had completely resurrected from Suresh. “God! Why Robert is after my life? I have many more tasks to do…but his queries seem like infinity”, thought Suresh, pissed off by the 22nd mail in past 40 minutes from his client in UK. “Country bears them for 200 years, but in these 40 minutes I can empathize with my then countrymen. These people are the scum of the earth...muddleheaded idiots. God please save me”. Regaining his calm Suresh typed his reply: *Dear Robert,* *PFA the release schedule. I again assure you that the project is on track. And I am going to communicate the same to the senior management in a meeting. So, I would be out of office for 3 hours.* *Regards,* *Suresh* “Phew! Finally the ‘leech’ won’t trouble anymore”. After that ‘sticky’ encounter, he got on to check the requests pending for his approval. Actually, it had been the part of his daily routine now. “Sanjit needs that tool…OK approved! Then it’s a leave request from…” The name he read brought a cunning smile on his face…“Nisha?” He immediately wrote: *Nisha,* *Please come and meet me.* *Suresh* “Excuse me sir! May I come in?” “Yes please come!” “So, Miss. Nisha, why do you want 7 days leave?” he asked. “Actually Sir I am having my M.Sc. exams.” “So? Don’t you know that our project is in deployment stages? At this moment I need each and every resource. Sorry I can’t approve your leave.” “But sir these are my final exams. If I don’t take them now, I will have to wait for a whole year.” “That’s none of my concern.” “But sir I am a new resource, still not well trained. I don’t think my absence would affect your project.” “So now you will tell me who’s important? As a matter of fact, we are not discussing it further madam. You may leave now.” Teary eyed, she left his cabin. “Why do people work when they have to study? First complete your studies then join companies...Morons!” he thought after she left and turned his face towards the laptop screen. But suddenly a bright flash blocked his vision and mind. 10 years ago… October 2001 “Dad I’ve got a job…yeah!” Suresh came in rushing. Obviously he had the reason to celebrate. After all it was his first job. He was carrying a box of rasagullas. “Bless me Dad” Suresh touched his father’s feet. “God bless you Beta!” His father’s eyes filled with the tears of pride. His son had become a Software engineer that too in such a reputed company. Now he could clearly see his dreams fulfilled through his son’s eyes. “When do you have to join, Beta?” “Dad, the day after tomorrow”. Suresh’s father realized that the time has come to pass on the true lesson which he had learnt from his father before his first job. That night they had celebration dinner and after that Suresh’s father called him in his room. “Dad” “Yes Beta, please sit.” “Beta, now you are going to enter a new phase of your life in fact, the longest one. So today I am going to tell you something which will help you throughout your career. In your career you will come across with many people, many places, many situations, and much many advices. Everything you will experience will be much different from the other. Sometimes things would favor you, and at other times they may go completely out of control. But amidst this chaos, never lose yourself. Only you are your true identity. Still whenever you are in doubt just recall the table lesson which I am going to tell you now. Many a times in your professional life you will come across a conference or meeting table. Like any other table, it has four sides and some chairs placed around it. But always remember that each chair represents a distinct epitome of power. You will start with one chair on a side with the least power and will get to switch the chairs and sides as you rise. But remember; ALWAYS VACATE YOUR PREVIOUS SIDE COMPLETELY BEFORE OCCUPYING A NEW ONE. I mean do not forget to collect all your belongings which includes your behavior, your values, your ethics, your knowledge, and your self-respect before you move to a new side. If you leave behind any of these items, you would remain devoid of that in the new chair and your old chair would be uncomfortable for the new person to fit in. This will not only impact your career but will also adversely affect that new person. No doubt you will get to understand this in your life but the earlier, the better. I think you are getting the point Suresh…Suresh??” but Suresh was in the sweet dreams of his new career. His father decided to leave the job of explaining him the lesson to the time and switched off the lights. Present Day… 2011 The darkness of that room had now filled Suresh’s cabin. But amidst this darkness was an enlightened mind. “It took me 10 years to understand the lesson behind that sentence?? I wish I could have understood it earlier. All these years I had been ruining myself and others. Whenever I was promoted, I got a chance to switch my side to a more powerful one on the conference table. I grabbed the chance too. But under the influence of ego and sense of revenge, I forgot to carry my simplicity, my truth, and my goodness to the other side. What I took with me was my bad past which murdered my present and future. I am not that Suresh! I have changed! What am I doing God? Actually those chairs were never powerless, I deemed myself to be powerful. And now what have I gained, only their hate, their curses. Maybe because of me others have also become like me.” His eyes filled with tears. He suddenly recalled the teary eyes of Nisha. “What was I doing? Destroying that innocent girl’s career?” He didn’t even have the courage to think about the consequences. Today Suresh had learnt the biggest lesson of his life. Time had done its job. Suresh- the manager had again become Suresh. That day he wrote two mails: *Dear Nisha,* *I think we would be able to manage in your absence. So, I approve your leave.* *All the best for your exams!* *Regards,* *Suresh* And the other one… *Dear Team,* *Tomorrow’s lunch is on me. See you all at the Dominos adjoining our facility at 2 pm tomorrow.* *Cheers,* *Suresh* A tear of repentance and satisfaction rolled down from the corner of his eye as he pressed the send button. He dragged himself to the conference room. But now, the feeling of omnipotence was nowhere to be seen in his eyes. He pulled his chair and very gently occupied it. And then it was something really new. Tears started flowing from both his eyes and at that moment he cried to his heart. “Excuse me Sir!” A familiar voice reached his ears. Suresh opened his eyes. Nisha was standing in front of him. “Sir, are you all right?” “Yes, I am fine. Why?” “Actually Sir, it’s been long that you are in the conference room.” “What’s the time?” “It’s quarter past six, sir.” Then he realized that he slept after crying and slept for long. “Oh! Yes I am all right Nisha, Thanks!” “Actually, I must thank you sir. You approved my leave...” “Oh, that’s ok. You study well and give your exams.” “Thanks Sir, Bye!” She left the room. After she left, Suresh looked around the conference room. The room was much brighter than all the times. The brown Oakwood table was appearing the same. But this time, the once ‘powerless’ chairs on the other side of the table were fully vacant and were basking in the glory of pride and responsibility. Thanks for your precious time!! Friends, as they say, “With Great Power Comes the Great Responsibility. To test a man’s character, give him the power. When we get power it’s our responsibility to fulfill our duties while making others comfortable”. I hope you people had a great time reading the story and I also hope that you will carry out your responsibilities towards others very well.

LOVE

2011-06-21T23:32:00.001-04:00

li'l antithetic look at LOVE.

Love is generic and Pure only when SEX is not involved! any affair involving opposite gender with such mortal afflictions is kinda always very complicated.

when u love someone so very deep, 

more than everything; u so very want to weep. 

Tears are one that come out, 

but it's ur heart that always goes out. 

Love is so very like the river, 

always a free flow; tearing, fighting but alwyas giving. 

... even the sunshine drags the drops out 

but thr is never a fight on pegging so many trouts. 

Love hurts, love give u pains, 

if u want sanity never ever fall for any so called gains.

Do u say soulmate exists, ask urself and answers always acquiesce

if you want to be accepted as trendy n cool, 

don't fall for love or be an emotional fool! 

-ManTak 

tirade against this immoral n arrogant govt. Shame for mother India

2011-06-06T05:05:00.000-04:00

Some assuptions about Scorpion

2011-04-05T09:01:00.000-04:00

1. Scorpios are passionate. They are so intense in their feelings that many a times they scare people away with the power and sheer magnitude of their inner intensity. And they’re not passionate just about love, but about everything that is close to their heart.

2. Scorpios are brutally honest. You ask them what their opinion is, and they’ll give it to you. Point blank. No pretense, no flattery, no diplomacy, just the plain and naked truth. If you are not comfortable with it, don’t ask a Scorpio. Because sometimes, truth hurts.

3. Scorpios are brilliant at camouflage. The only organ that deceives them is their eyes. So if you want to know what they are really feeling inside, try to read those eyes. If they let you read them.

4. Scorpios are totally aware of what they are, and what they are not, and they really don’t have the time to analyze what others’ opinion about them is. So don’t feel bad if you compliment a Scorpio and he/she simply says, “I know. Thanks.” because they don’t mean to be rude, its just that they are already aware of what you have just said and for them its commonplace.

5. Scorpios can be the quintessential Scorpio, who will plan the destruction of their enemy with utmost ruthlessness, and will ensure that the destruction is complete and merciless. They can be the Eagle, who will win over its enemy and leave the battle field after teaching the enemy a lesson he dare not forget. They have that strength and courage to soar high above the worldly worries and frustrations. The last type is the gray lizard, who sulk and withdraw to the dark recesses of the mind, seething with vengeance but not manifesting it. These are the ones who harm themselves instead of the person who has dare crossed their path, but sooner or later, the gray lizards transform into an Eagle or the nocturnal predator. A Scorpio may forgive, but rest assured he’ll never forget.

6. Scorpios push themselves to physical excesses. They always want to test the limit of their own physical abilities and see what is their level of incompetence. For example, they’ll continue burning the midnight oil where none is required, just to remind themselves that they need to be ready for the hour when it is required of them to be at work for extra longs stretches.

7. Scorpios don’t like unanswered questions. There is a perpetual quest in their minds about anything and everything mysterious, like understanding the girl they love, or life and death. It is one of the reasons why it’s said that Scorpios make the best researchers and scientists.

8. Scorpios need to have an extreme self discipline, for it is said that they can tread both the good way and the evil way with equal ease, and they have to put in extra reins to prevent themselves from going down the devil’s way.

9. Scorpios are short tempered, and they are very low on tolerance. They have to practice immense self control from saying anything that will leave a life-long wound, especially when its someone they love like family or friends or partners.

10. Scorpios may seem selfish, but their first and foremost rule says, “Be true to yourself.” They figure that if they’re true to themselves, they cannot be false to others.

“You may charge me with murder- or want of sense (We are all of us weak at times): But the slightest approach to a false pretence was never among my crimes!”

courtsy: Scorpio venom

2011-03-11T10:54:00.000-05:00

Have you ever gotten lost on a dark night while out driving? Imagine you’re travelling down a country road. For miles you see no other vehicles, no reassuring headlights anywhere. There are no homes or businesses either, so there is no one to ask for directions - just miles and miles of hilly and chilly unending mountainous road, dimly lit by a crescent moon. The farther you go, the greater is your sense of panic. You’ve been watching the gas gauge fall, and it’s nearly on empty. Suddenly, you see the road sign you’ve been looking for, and you turn onto it. You’re on your way home..

My Year 2011 started on the very same note... :)

Beyond AYN RAND

2010-10-20T16:31:00.000-04:00

The Bitch is Back

2009's most influential author is a mirthless Russian-American who loves money, hates God, and swings a gigantic dick. She died in 1982, but her spawn soldier on. And the Great Recession is all their fault

By Andrew Corsello

Illustration by John Ritter

October 27, 2009

goddamn, the experience of being 19 years old and reading Ayn Rand! The crystal-shivering-at-the-breaking-pitch intensity of it! Not just for that 19-year-old, but for everybody unfortunate enough to be caught in his psychic blast radius. Is "experience" even the right word for The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged? Ayn Rand's idolization of Mickey Spillane and cigarettes and capitalism—an experience? Her tentacular contempt for Shakespeare and Beethoven and Karl Marx and facial hair and government and "subnormal" children and the poor and the Baby Jesus and the U.N. and homosexuals and "simpering" social workers and French Impressionism and a thousand other things the flesh is heir to: experience?

Does a 19-year-old "experience" the likes of "She looked at the lone straight shaft of the Taggart Building rising in the distance—and…understood: these people hated Jim because they envied him"? (The lone straight shaft—get it?) Please. Ayn Rand is an imbuing. A transfiguring, even.

A weirdly specific thing happens with the books of Ayn Rand. It's not just the what of the books, but when a reader discovers them—almost always during the first or second year of college. Rand grabs a reader at a time of maximum vulnerability and malleability, when he's getting his first accurate sense of how he measures up in the world in terms of intellect and talent. The longing to regard oneself as misunderstood and underrated can be powerful; the temptation to project oneself as such, irresistible. But how? How to stand above and apart?

Enter Howard Roark, the heroic and misunderstood architect, square of jaw and Asperger-ish of mien, who at the end of The Fountainhead blows up his own masterpiece after a bunch of sniveling "parasites" and "second-handers" tinker with the blueprints.

GODDAMN!

Then enter Atlas Shrugged's John Galt, the heroic and misunderstood engineer, square of jaw and Asperger-ish of mien, who, after persuading "men of talent" to retreat to his Colorado aerie while the country goes to seed (in order to show the "mediocrities" left behind what life is like without their betters), delivers a 35,000-word speech decrying bureaucrats and regulators.

SIXTY PAGES, BITCHES!

Finally, enter Objectivism, the name Rand gave to her moral defense of "reason," individualism, and unfettered capitalism.

SCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!

The days during which that 19-year-old has Rand's worldview vectored into his cerebral cortex are feverish and sleepless. Days of beautiful affliction during which the intransigence of others—roommates, a coed the patient has been hitting on, professors, parents, everyone—are shown to be the product of their shortcomings, their idiocy and sublimated envy of the patient's intelligence and talent. Days during which the infected comes to see himself and Roark/Galt as avatars of one another: superheroically mirthless protagonists in a drama of historical import. It's the damnedest thing. One day you've got a bright young kid dutifully connecting the dots of his liberal-arts education; the next, he's got Roark and Galt in the marrow and has become…an insufferable asshole.

None of this matters, right? We're talking about a phase, no different from purple hair and lip rings, right? Well, yes, it's true that in most cases, the fever breaks. That kid stands up, walks outside, and reflects on the 727 pages of Fountainhead and 1,168 of Atlas he's just wolfed down. And realizes: That was nearly 2,000 pages (more, really, given that Rand's loathing of collectivist parasites is matched only by her loathing of paragraph indents) without a single instance of irony or humor. Or subtlety. Or grace. Nearly 2,000 hectoring, brook-no-ambiguity, you're-either-a-lion-or-a-leech pages of breathtaking psychological obtuseness.

In time, he begins to understand that his ordeal consists of two phases. There is the reading itself, which is one thing. And then there is the digesting, which is quite another. Overall, the experience eerily replicates that of devouring a family-size bag of Cheetos in a single sitting.1 During: irresistible, bracing, the thing at hand imparting vitality, fertility, potency. After: bleccchh.

Make it go away, he thinks. The metallurgist protagonists. The operatic rapes heralded by whips and rock drills. The pirates with cat-coughing-up-hairball names like Ragnar Danneskjöld. Please, God.

He may even feel his "recovery" marks him as a savvy and well-adjusted individual, yes?

No. He is a stupid and insolent boy. No one gets done with Ayn (rhymes with "mine") Rand. It is not in one's power to do so. That boy (or you, or I) can dismiss the books as a "phase" and attempt to busy ourselves with the kind of degenerate "stylists" Rand scorned (Faulkner, Nabokov). But none of us can escape the shadow of the lone straight shaft of the Taggart Building tumescing in the distance.

1. An association bolstered by Howard Roark's flaming orange hair.

This is because there are boys and girls among us who have never overcome the Randian infection. The Galt speech continues to ring in their ears for years like a maddening tinnitus, turning each of them into what next year's Physicians' Desk Reference will (undoubtedly) term an Ayn Rand Asshole (ARA). They constitute a relatively small percentage of Rand readers, these ARAs. But they make their reading count. Thanks to them, the Rand Experience is no longer limited to those who have read the books. It's metastasized. You, me, all of us, we're living it. Because it's the ARA Army of antigovernment-antiregulation puritans who have spent the past three decades gleefully pulling the cooling rods out of the American economy. For a while, it got very big and very hot. Then it popped. And now the rest of us have to spend the next decade scaling the slippery slopes of the huge suppurative crater that was left behind.

Feeling fisted by the Invisible Hand of the Market lo these past fifteen months? Lost a job lately? Or half the value of your 401(k)? Or a home? All three? Been wondering whence the too-long-ascendant political and economic ideas and forces behind Greenspanism, John Thainism, blind Wall Street plunder, bankruptcy, credit-default swaps, Bernie Madoff, and the ensuing Cannibalism in the Streets? Then you, sir, need to give thanks to Ayn Rand Assholes everywhere—as well as the steely loins from which they sprang.

*****

does that moniker "Ayn Rand Asshole" strike you as a contrivance? Do you disbelieve the proposition that a person could read Atlas Shrugged almost purely at the level of injunction—taking the things John Galt says and does as straight as a biblical literalist takes the eye of the needle?

Then meet Michael Malice. No, really. That's his name. He's a New York City author and blogger who calls himself both a genius and an "elitist anarchist." What's that mean? It means that if a panhandler asks him for a little money or food, Malice says, "I could, but then you might live longer, so you see my dilemma."

Does Michael Malice admit to being an unreconstructed 33-year-old Ayn Rand Asshole? He does not—he proclaims it. "My reviews were incredible," he says of 2006's Ego & Hubris, the story of his life that Harvey Pekar of American Splendor fame told in graphic-novel form. "The Village Voice called me 'the face of jackassery.' Your magazine called me a 'slacker genius.' Did you know that? The Onion called me 'a hateful blowhard who touts his genius-level intellect and dismisses most of the world as inferior, deluded, or hypocritical.' They also called me a 'human cockroach,' because I'm indestructible. Which I am.

"I own Ayn Rand's personal first-edition, first-print copy of The Fountainhead," Malice continues. "I got it for my twenty-first birthday. It came from her estate. Whenever I'm with other Randians, I so have the biggest dick in the room. 'Oh yeah? You've read all her books? Well, check this out, bitch!' "

Malice also possesses an arguably rarer relic: a copy of Atlas Shrugged signed by William F. Buckley Jr. Only another Ayn Rand Asshole can properly appreciate such a curio. Rand, who died in 1982 at the age of 77, was prone to barking, "What are your premises?" when shaking strangers' hands; upon meeting the devoutly Catholic Buckley, she demanded to know how a man so evidently brilliant could truck in such piffle. Buckley later returned the compliment by assigning Whittaker Chambers to review Atlas Shrugged for the National Review. Money quote: "From almost any page…a voice can be heard, from painful necessity, commanding: 'To a gas chamber—go!' "

"Buckley didn't know what he was signing," Malice explains. "It was a little personal triumph for me."

Malice also owns the domain name…eh, forget it. You'll just think I'm making this stuff up. Here's the interview transcript:

mm: It's funny you should call me an Ayn Rand Asshole, because I happen to own the domain name assholism.com.

gq: Ah, now you're fucking with me.

mm: Really. I own it.2

gq: Really?

mm: I really do.

gq: If that's true, you are not a Randian Asshole. You are the Ayn Rand Asshole.

mm: Well, an asshole is just an assertive person you don't approve of, right?

2. Go ahead. Type it in. You'll see.

During my own college days, I did observe that a number of the fresh-minted Randroids in my midst became intellectually disciplined to a degree I wouldn't previously have thought possible. I also admit that a few of them became better questioners of ideas and of themselves—which in turn made them more honest people. But most fell into that hapless group of Rand readers—the ones whose postadolescent insecurity was alchemized upon contact with The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged into a bizarre unlaughing superiority. Some snapped out of it after a semester or two, becoming people who later in life—like Hillary Clinton—could refer with a shake of the head to their "Ayn Rand phase." Some didn't, and I lost them as friends. And for years I've wondered whether they:

(a) bolted upright in bed at three in the morning a year or two after we'd graduated and exclaimed, "Mon Dieu! I have been an Ayn Rand Asshole! I must immediately cease and desist!"

(b) took it all the way, and now spend their days in the bowels of the Cato Institute, stroking hairless lap cats and smirking sourly as they develop strategies for deregulating the law of gravity.

*****

"as a fiction writer, she's absurd," says author and Vanity Fair columnist Christopher Hitchens, who is arguably the most opinionated Homo sapiens since Rand herself. "But if you're young and not particularly wanted and not particularly brilliant, reading Atlas Shrugged provides all the feelings of compensation one might need for any period of terrifying inadequacy."

"Atlas Shrugged was a life-changing event for me," says John Allison, who recently retired as the CEO of the BB&T Corporation and remains the chairman of the huge North Carolina-based bank. During his last five years as CEO, BB&T's charitable arm awarded nearly $13 million to support the study of capitalism from a moral perspective on college campuses—in most cases with the stipulation that Atlas Shrugged be required course reading.

"I was a 19-year-old at the University of North Carolina the first time I read it," Allison recalls. "I was already struggling with my religious beliefs and with what my parents had taught me. Then, on top of that, I had to contend with my professors—this was the 1960s, so even at UNC the intellectual environment was socialist. It was tough for me, because as Ayn Rand herself says, we think alone. And then to find this book, to have somebody defend ideas I agreed with, ideas that were inconsistent with what I was hearing at the university—it just gave me great comfort and strength."

It speaks to Rand's mojo that when an ARA as off the grid as Michael Malice speaks of the hour he first believed, his thoughts and words all but duplicate those of an establishment Randian like John Allison.

"There is a reason she appeals to the young," says Malice. "Because when you're young, you hunger for moralism. You know there are things that are right and things that are wrong. But the two choices traditionally put forward by mass culture are Jesus or 'helping everybody,' which are both fraudulent and ridiculous. And dull. And then you read those books and it's like a punch in the gut, especially if you're a gifted kid like me. To have her saying that you are right and that everyone against you is wrong… Well, it's just something that people who are gifted need to hear."

"In terms of literary influence, only Kerouac compares," says Nick Gillespie, editor-in-chief of Reason.com and Reason.tv (offshoots of Reason, the libertarian magazine founded in 1968 by a Randian). Pointing out that Atlas Shrugged and On the Road were both published in 1957, he adds, "Kerouac has had a more diffuse influence on American culture. He created a broad-based conception of what was cool and hip. Rand hasn't brushed the culture as widely. She touches individuals—immensely and deeply. It's useful to think about her impact in terms of Catcher in the Rye, another novel of individuation. Everyone agrees it's beautifully written, but it's losing its grasp on the public imagination. Same with Catch-22. Yossarian was a perfect antihero for the '60s generation, but does anybody give a shit about him now? Or about Portnoy? A few days ago, I was watching an old clip of Andrew Dice Clay's stand-up act from 1987. He made a joke about jerking off into a liver, and no one in the audience knew what he was talking about. Think about that. You can still make Howard Roark jokes that play, but it's been at least twenty years since you could do that with Portnoy. Portnoy's dead. Philip Roth is a great writer, but his signature character has had far less purchase on the collective imagination than Galt or Roark. No matter what you think of Rand, there's no denying that the woman just swings a really big dick."

It's curious, that dick of Rand's. In fact, one cannot understand what an Ayn Rand Asshole is without considering that dick. ARAs acclaim it with great frequency and passion. Its size. Its swing. The countless "nonentities" and "looters" who've been slapped upside the head with it. ARAs extoll the Dick for the same reason they embrace their own "asshole" moniker: to celebrate Ayn Rand's essential Us-vs.-the-Losers combativeness. For ARAs, being dickish is the point.

*****

the speech. To understand what an Ayn Rand Asshole is, you have to study that sixty-page Speech Rand stuffed in John Galt's mouth at the end of Atlas. She spent two years writing it. Her publisher asked for cuts. "Would you cut the Bible?" she snapped. Thing is, Rand was right. (And not just because a Library of Congress/Book-of-the-Month Club survey conducted thirty-four years after its publication ranked Atlas Shrugged the second most influential book ever written after, you guessed it, the Bible.) She viewed the Speech as the keystone to…everything. And to a degree that still confounds mainstream academic philosophers (most of whom find Rand's work laughable), that is how it has been taken. Which means there are three things that all Americans must know about it.

The first is that the Speech serves as both the foundation and finished edifice of Objectivism, Rand's utopian vision of an entrepreneurial elite freed at last from any obligation, financial or moral, to the hangers-on of the world; free from religious hokum and from having to feign concern for the wee; free to exercise the "virtue of selfishness" in pursuit of money and glory. (The novel ends with Galt atop a mountain, raising a hand to trace the sacred sign of the dollar over the desolate earth that he and his A-Team are at last ready to return to and revive.) Is greed good, you ask? My friend, in the Objectivist world of Ayn Rand, whose funeral featured a six-foot dollar sign made out of flowers next to the open casket, greed is God.

The second thing is that it is helpful to conjure Keanu Reeves in his What would you DO? proclamatory mode when reading it (silently or aloud):

Morality, to you, is a phantom scarecrow made of duty, of boredom, of punishment, of pain…and pleasure, to you, is a liquor-soggy brain, a mindless slut, the stupor of a moron who stakes his cash on some animal's race, since pleasure cannot be moral.

The third thing you must understand about the Speech is that it's extreme stuff—but it's not fringe. Not anymore. Randroids abound. They run influential libertarian think tanks like the Cato Institute in D.C., and that's one thing. But they also tend to be people who—unlike all those semiotics majors who'd written off Rand as Nietzsche in a bra even before they'd graduated—impact our lives in direct ways. Randians run some of America's biggest companies (Ralph Lauren, John Mackey of Whole Foods), hedge funds (Victor Niederhoffer, Peter Thiel), and banks. Clarence Thomas makes his clerks watch the 1949 Gary Cooper film version of The Fountainhead. Mark Cuban requires no explanation.

And as if the publication of a major new biography, Ayn Rand and the World She Made, by Anne Heller, weren't enough, there's this: In the first quarter of this year, as rightists shrilled about the president's "socialism," Atlas Shrugged (re)cracked Amazon's top fifty; early estimates place its 2009 sales at 400,000 copies—about double its 2008 total.

Ayn Rand Assholes, they're not just teeming—they're breeding.3

*****

pop quiz: Which individual has most influenced the lives of Americans in the past twenty-five years? He's an Ayn Rand Asshole, yes, but old-school. Married one of Rand's friends. Rand herself called him the Undertaker. A good moniker, with its whiff of luchador, but she should have dubbed him the Deregulator.

3. There's even an Ayn Rand dating Web site, for Christ's sake: the Atlasphere. Which presents two related questions: Do Objectivists look to the novels for amorous, as well as economic, instruction? If so, is a given Objectivist coupling what it was in The Fountainhead—"an act of scorn. Not as love, but as defilement…[by] a master taking shameful, contemptuous possession"? For which I have answers: Yes, and yes. I cite my junior year of college, during which I frequently experienced precipitations of plaster dust onto my face while lying in bed, thanks to the ARA who lived above me, and his girlfriend. I could never determine whether it was their Richter-scale copulations that shook the dust loose or the 120-decibel stereo blastings of the Ayn Rand-inspired band Rush that they used to soundtrack and enhance them. (No, his mind is not for rent / To any god or government!) I only know that whenever I trudged upstairs to ask him to dial down the fucking and the Rush (lest the lone straight shaft of the Taggart Building crash through the ceiling and impale me where I lay), the answer was always, merely, unsmilingly: "No."

Right: Greenspan. Man was there at the creation. A member of the so-called Collective that in the early 1950s gathered on Saturday nights in the sanctum sanctorum—Rand's New York apartment—as the master held forth on the evils of taxes and altruism and read from her Manuscript. According to My Years with Ayn Rand by the woman's acolyte/lover, Nathaniel Branden, Greenspan was prone to such utterances as, "Upon reading this one tends to feel exhilarated." After the Times panned Atlas upon its publication, Greenspan sent an oddly strenuous letter that the paper published:

To the editor:

"Atlas Shrugged" is a celebration of life and happiness. Justice is unrelenting. Creative individuals and undeviating purpose and rationality achieve joy and fulfillment. Parasites who persistently avoid either purpose or reason perish as they should.

Alan Greenspan

It's a remarkable letter for two reasons. The first, of course, is that Greenspan wrote it; a line can be drawn from that letter to the wholesale deregulation of the American economy, to the invention of hydra-headed derivatives and credit-default swaps, and finally to the collapse of the financial and housing markets. He may not be the Ultimate Ayn Rand Asshole,4, but no ARA has ever tucked the Objectivist football and taken it to the hole like Alan Greenspan.

The letter's second remarkable quality is its quintessentially Randian temper: absolute, proclamatory, severe. Rand writes at great length about the "joy" that results when "men of talent" are left to their own devices—but invariably in the most sneering tone imaginable. A reader wonders: Is it joy for which she and her followers salivate? Or is it the perishing of those parasites?

"Yes, Rand's writing is strident, but she's not concerned with aesthetics, and it's a mistake to judge Atlas by 'normal novel' standards," says Todd Seavey, a 40-year-old libertarian blogger whose politics were "substantially" altered after he read Rand as a college sophomore. "It should be read as if it's an extended philosophy word problem. You may want characters who are full-fledged psychological portraits unto themselves, but one of her arguments is that there are no moral grays, and that 'aesthetics' should be about romanticism rather than neuroses and flawed characters. She knows what she's doing. I mean, would you have gone to Nietzsche and said, 'You're not writing calm, balanced essays. You're writing like a crazed man'?"

I like to think I would have, yes. Because when it comes to ARAs, that dictatorial tone isn't just the how but the what. You can't spend more than five minutes on a Rand-related chat room without seeing a teacher (or social worker, or environmentalist) declaimed as a "risk avoider/merit denouncer." This affect, it should be added, is the trademark symptom of a collegiate Randian infection. Where, say, undergraduate Marxists share a certain narcoleptic insouciance, freshly afflicted Randians evince a showier disregard for those who can't or won't see the light. Showy—but serene, in a way that's cultish and weird. And unintentionally funny, since the only other young people possessed of such grim serenity are those homeschooled Christian fundamentalists who have the ability to transmit—with nothing more than a silent, pitying look—that they know (1) the Rapture is imminent, (2) they'll be taken up, and (3) you'll be spending eternity steeping in a liquid-shit Jacuzzi.

Not surprisingly, Christopher Hitchens isn't the only cultural critic who links the Rand and Rapture fascinations. GQ's own Critic columnist, Tom Carson, puts it best: "Her books are capitalism's version of middlebrow religious novels like Ben-Hur and the Left Behind series." Even Todd Seavey sees a parallel: "Hard-core Randians tend to regurgitate Randian observations in a way that's not mindless but very redundant. Unless you're fully signed on, they assume you're not getting it. Which is exactly the way some Christians are when they can't get somebody to accept Jesus Christ as their savior."

In the end, it's not the books but the smug, evangelical certainty of Ayn Rand Assholes that causes me to loathe Ayn Rand in a personal way. The thing I liked most about college was being around so many young people who were as earnest as they were dauntingly smart. People who didn't (yet) feel the need to own every room they walked into. People who knew how to ask questions. That was it. All that elevated question-asking, and the pliancy of temperament it entailed.

We were children. Then came Rand, "the Rosa Klebb of letters," as entertainment journalist Gary Susman calls her, to body-snatch some of the best of them. Rhetorical question: Is there anything more irritating than a 20-year-old incapable of uttering the words "I don't know"?

Actually, there is: an 82-year-old Alan Greenspan admitting in October 2008—at least ten years too late—that he'd found "a flaw in the model that I perceived as the critical functioning structure that defines how the world works."

4. That would be the abovementioned Nathaniel, the twentysomething grad student who, after joining Rand's inner circle, changed his surname from Blumenthal to Branden—Rand folded within ben, the Hebrew word for "son of." (A coincidence, he claimed.) The protégé and his fiftysomething mentor eventually called their respective spouses to a meeting where it was announced that for self-evidently "rational" reasons, the master/apprentice relationship would henceforth be sexual, with twice-a-week scheduled trysts.

No, wait, forget Greenspan, who avoided both purpose and reason when he declined to comment for this story.5 When it comes to irritation, the capo di tutti capi is an Ayn Rand Asshole who responds to the headlines of the past fifteen months by…doubling down. Who claims that there should have been less regulation of the markets. Who admits that, yeah, Alan Greenspan was the one who put this country in an economic hole—but only because he wasn't nearly Randian enough.

"There is no question in my mind that it's government policy that created [the financial meltdown]," says BB&T's John Allison. "It began with Alan Greenspan's mismanagement of the Federal Reserve, which controls monetary policy. Look at his early writings! He strongly recommended getting rid of the Federal Reserve and going to the gold standard. Once he got in power, he never moved at all in that direction."

How to respond to this kind of resolve, this kind of faith? There are no words—you're better off trying to convince a birther that our forty-fourth president was born in our fiftieth state—save those I've been sitting on for more than twenty years.

Fuck you, Ayn Rand.

Fuck you for turning some of the most open and interesting people I ever met into utopian dickheads.

Fuck you for injecting them with a sneering sense of superiority, and with the tautological belief that anyone who didn't "get it" was a jealous know-nothing—which, ipso facto, only proved that superiority.

And fuck you for prose so bad that the only way to measure it is with a meat scale.

There. I feel better.

But wait—Ayn, you know that letter I just got informing me that my equity line of credit is being frozen despite my perfect credit history, and despite the fact that I bought a house I could actually afford?

Yeah, fuck you for that, too.

5. He will perish as he should.

Is the relationship really worth it?

2010-07-21T15:51:00.001-04:00

Read/ saw some important lessons on relationship and intimacy.. a presentation by Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love. Really worth a deep contemplation!

The hedgehog's dilemma, or sometimes the porcupine dilemma, is an analogy about the challenges of human intimacy. It describes a situation in which a group of hedgehogs all seek to become close to one another in order to share their heat during cold weather. However, once accomplished, they cannot avoid hurting one another with their sharp quills. They must step away from one another. Though they all share the intention of a close reciprocal relationship, this may not occur for reasons which they cannot avoid.

Both Schopenhauer and Freud have used this situation to describe what they feel is the state an individual will find themselves in relation to others. The hedgehog's dilemma suggests that despite goodwill, human intimacy cannot occur without substantial mutual harm, and what results is cautious behavior and weak relationships.

With the hedgehog's dilemma one is recommended to use moderation in the affairs with others both because it is in self-interest, and also out of consideration for others. The hedgehog's dilemma is used to justify or explain introversion and isolationism.

How Will You Measure Your Life?

2010-07-20T15:52:00.000-04:00

How Will You Measure Your Life?

A wonderful work I found on HBR... and the forum that it created.. I'm still in the awe of these wonderful people around!

Thank you Clayton for reminding us in such a brilliant and clear way that life is multidimensional; and for bringing sense to it.

It is easier to hold on to your principles a 100 percent of the time; but whether or not THAT is the right/better thing to do - must be subject to the scrutiny of your very principle.

After all, its our moral frigidity that creates conflict, prevents co-existence and tolerance and brews superiority and judgement.

The choice and successful pursuit of a profession is but one tool for achieving your purpose. But without a purpose, life can become hollow.

Ironically, a man realizes the true meaning of his life only after the stark realization of its transcience. If more people follow the path of their heart rather than the crowd mentality of commercial success, the world would be different. Of course, they may have to tread a thorny path many a time without giving up on their goodness

Nothing goes a waste if we are able to retrospect the outcome of our past actions and a hope of growth and better future in mind. Everything start with self; an enormous tree can accomodat more than a few inhabitants without a tiff!

With the busy, $$selfish$$, materialistic & monotonous life style, we seldom realize what we have lost and the continuum.

Striking the correct balance between purpose of one life and professional career, along with an empathy for the one and all that co-exists, is so very much required as it helps attain a realization in life. Energy transpires; meanings of real success change, and it all creates a chain reaction full of positivity and universal happiness.

The question is; -how many people- and -for how long- they remain unperturbed in the fast track of intrigued life can be relate to the humane spirit and undaunted faith on "inner Godly self-strengths".

...It is a new beginning that opens the door for many to attain self realization.

Mitch McCrimmon: I'm sure that people who can find a purpose for their lives early in their careers might be happy but I'm not convinced that it is all that easy to do. It sounds like trying to decide whether you like a certain kind of food before you have tasted it.

I think one's purpose is something that has to be discovered over time, through experience. I find that regular reflection over many years increases my self awareness and my sense of purpose but I don't believe it is something I could have decided in my university days.

Also, I think it is possible for one's purpose to evolve and change over time. I think that the best we can do is to expose ourselves to multiple experiences and reflect regularly on what they mean for our purpose.

It's like house hunting. You can set out a few criteria you want in a new house before you start looking but, as you look at houses, you see features you like that you hadn't thought of before so you go home and revise your criteria. Making such decisions is a process of discovery.

I don't think that a process of regularly reviewing and revising your purpose is the same as merely drifting. But in an age of rapid change, I doubt if many people can fix on a single lifelong purpose very early in their lives.

We have to discover our purpose en route - it is like what Henry Mintzberg calls emergent strategy. www.lead2xl.com

2010-06-29T09:12:00.000-04:00

"Personally, I'm always ready to learn, although I don't always like being taught. "

— Winston Churchill

2010-06-23T14:21:00.001-04:00

ihatequotes

You're going to mess up sometimes.

But the good part is, you get to decide how you're gonna mess it up. -Marilyn Monroe #ihatequotes

She’s outta maah league!

2010-06-21T15:46:00.006-04:00

I had this lesson learnt very early in my lyf to put-in the highest possible efforts to things that is aimed for! Today, I’ve realized that there exists a flip side to this theory.

I have always believed in giving-out my best & in totality to things that I want in my lyf. Things never retorted to say if they ever wanted me..!! J J J

Even at the deepest level of emotional involvements, a valid and equally important consideration remains; that of the reaction received, ..and that severely affects the interpersonal affairs. May be that’s why chemistry comes in picture. There has to be a reaction.. and it decides the outcome!! It has to be rightly sighted and righteously accepted.

I am grateful to have experienced this and can proudly say, now, that there is more to the theory of ‘Interpersonal Cognitive Complexity’, than just an explanation to the morality of behaviour.

Ms Harshika says...

2010-05-20T11:12:00.001-04:00

Harshika writes:

"What Happened to All the Nice Guys?"

Something I found on a site and thought I should totally share it with you all. Unfortunately , most men and women would relate to it.

"I see this question posted with some regularity in the personals section, so I thought I'd take a minute to explain things to the ladies out there that haven't figured it out.

What happened to all the nice guys?

The answer is simple: you did.

See, if you think back, really hard, you might vaguely remember a Platonic guy pal who always seemed to want to spend time with you. He'd tag along with you when you went shopping, stop by your place for a movie when you were lonely but didn't feel like going out, or even sit there and hold you while you sobbed and told him about how horribly the (other) guy that you were fucking treated you.

At the time, you probably joked with your girlfriends about how he was a little puppy dog, always following you around, trying to do things to get you to pay attention to him. They probably teased you because they thought he had a crush on you. Given that his behavior was, admittedly, a little pathetic, you vehemently denied having any romantic feelings for him, and buttressed your position by claiming that you were "just friends." Besides, he totally wasn't your type. I mean, he was a little too short, or too bald, or too fat, or too poor, or didn't know how to dress himself, or basically be or do any of the things that your tall, good-looking, fit, rich, stylish boyfriend at the time pulled off with such ease.

Eventually, your Platonic buddy drifted away, as your relationship with the boyfriend got more serious and spending time with this other guy was, admittedly, a little weird, if you werent dating him. More time passed, and the boyfriend eventually cheated on you, or became boring, or you realized that the things that attracted you to him weren't the kinds of things that make for a good, long-term relationship. So, now, you're single again, and after having tried the bar scene for several months having only encountered players and douche bags, you wonder, "What happened to all the nice guys?"

Well, once again, you did.

You ignored the nice guy. You used him for emotional intimacy without reciprocating, in kind, with physical intimacy. You laughed at his consideration and resented his devotion. You valued the aloof boyfriend more than the attentive "just-a-" friend. Eventually, he took the hint and moved on with his life. He probably came to realize, one day, that women aren't really attracted to guys who hold doors open; or make dinners just because; or buy you a Christmas gift that you mentioned, in passing, that you really wanted five months ago; or listen when you're upset; or hold you when you cry. He came to realize that, if he wanted a woman like you, he'd have to act more like the boyfriend that you had. He probably cleaned up his look, started making some money, and generally acted like more of an asshole than he ever wanted to be.

Fact is, now, he's probably getting laid, and in a way, your ultimate rejection of him is to thank for that. And I'm sorry that it took the complete absence of "nice guys" in your life for you to realize that you missed them and wanted them. Most women will only have a handful of nice guys stumble into their lives, if that.

So, if you're looking for a nice guy, here's what you do:

1.) Build a time machine.

2.) Go back a few years and pull your head out of your ass.

3.) Take a look at what's right in front of you and grab ahold of it.

I suppose the other possibility is that you STILL don't really want a nice guy, but you feel the social pressure to at least appear to have matured beyond your infantile taste in men. In which case, you might be in luck, because the nice guy you claim to want has, in reality, shed his nice guy mantle and is out there looking to unleash his cynicism and resentment onto someone just like you.

If you were five years younger.

So, please: either stop misrepresenting what you want, or own up to the fact that you've fucked yourself over. You're getting older, after all. It's time to excise the bullshit and deal with reality. You didn't want a nice guy then, and he certainly doesn't fucking want you, now.

Sincerely,

A Recovering "Nice Guy"

who said humanity

2010-05-20T10:58:00.000-04:00

Read a quote shared by my dear sir, Brigadier Naidu

“It is a little embarrassing that, after 45 years of research and study, the best advice I can give to people is to be a little kinder to each other”

- Aldous Huxley

I am just curious if any one ever asked Mr. Huxley on how being kind and accepting can lead to a state of infliction! These kind of people are considered rare or rather extinct species and it is a general knowledge that whoever enacts such is a dumb and fool or may be far more dangerous.

The mad Race that we are all in.. thr always remains a danger of meeting with accidents due to slightest of deviations.. The world has becm like dis whr distrust takes over any other form of humanitarian traits.

We are told from the childhood how important it's to mark oneself always ahead of the crowd. ...but When you are always ahead, you are also alone. How can kindness be shared in such a situation?

I'm not sure if the cynic in me is taking over...! But I'm sure disturbed by the thought.

I pray to God... "please make me better so as to be of good use", ...but I'll sure not help with a fear quotient of being Used. Isn't this my emotional turmoil???

Jindagi Dhoop.. tum Ghana Saaya!

2010-05-03T14:23:00.003-04:00

Life will always put you to test.

It’s a friend’s shoulder that can give you some rest.

Take your time to contemplate and ponder.

Though, never loose base, where you get to wonder..

What is it that made me disconnected alone and aloof..?

Why r my friends just not there as my roof..?

Friendship makes your world full and alive.

So, never ignore a chance to communicate..

As it makes the lyf all jovial, jolly n jive!

tujhase naaraaz nahi zindagi. what a song!

2010-04-28T13:48:00.002-04:00

tujhase naaraaz nahi zindagi, hairaan hoon main
o hairaan hoon main
tere masoom savalon se pareshaan hooN main
o pareshaan hoon main

jeene ke liye socha hi na tha, dard sambhalane honge
muskuraoon to, muskurane ke karz utaarne honge
muskuraoon kabhi to lagata hai
jaise hontonn pe karz rakhaa hai
tujhase ...

aaj agar bhar ayi hai, boondein baras jaayengi
kal kya pata inke liye aakhen taras jayengi
jaane kahan gum kahan khoya
ek aansu chhupake rakha tha
tujhase ...

zindagi tere gum ne hamain rishte naye samajhaye
mile jo hamain dhoop main mile chhaanv ke thande saaye...

.....

.....

Muhabbat ki ek aur Daastaan!

2010-04-24T10:22:00.006-04:00

Soul Curry-timeslife. TOIM/2010/04/18

And they lived happily...

NOW their story can be told...

Gautam has returned home, cheerful and happily married. He has lost some hair though, and put on a few kilos. But that cannot be helped, after six months of sustained radiation and chemotherapy sessions.

We were always worried about Gautam, not so much for his health as for his being perennially “accidentprone”. That was the expression my wife had reserved for him for the way he used to fall in and out of love. Women, no doubt, found him handsome and flipped for him at first sight. But having known him for over 20 years, I knew that for all his charming ways and dashing looks, he was actually an old-fashioned bloke and painfully self-righteous — a trait many of his girlfriends found rather off-putting.

So when Sandhya walked out of an Internet portal and into his life, we were pleasantly surprised. They had a small engagement ceremony in Delhi. The marriage would be fixed once Sandhya got her job transfer and could join Gautam in Mumbai. At last, things were beginning to fall into place for my friend.

And then tragedy struck. Gautam was rushing for a client meet in town and had abandoned his car for the local train. While taking the stairs for the railway over-bridge, he felt a sudden stab of pain in his chest. He made a mental note to give up smoking. Late afternoon, the pain resumed and he called me. I gave him the number of my cardiologist. As expected, he was advised rest. By the third day, when the pain did not subside, he went to Bombay Hospital for a second opinion. It turned out that nothing was wrong with his heart, but he had developed acute lung congestion. Tests followed. They drained almost 750ml of fluid out his lungs. Before long, the biopsy report came in. It was a cancerous growth.

Gautam was shifted to Tata Memorial and from then on, life has been an endless whirl of multi-coloured capsules, injections and drips, of faceless doctors and nurses. Somehow, I was confident that Gautam had the mental strength to pull through. His sister and widowed mother were by his bedside.

One nagging question however, continued to bother us: How was Sandhya taking all this in Delhi? She would fly down every time Gautam was to go through a chemo-cycle. But what about their wedding?

And then, one evening Gautam called, asking for my opinion. He was already five months into treatment and beginning to show signs of recovery. I told him not to rush into marriage. I suggested, “This is not about you alone, you need to think of Sandhya’s future also. What does she have to say?”

“She says that I should go deposit my sperms in a sperm bank, just in case…”

I was stumped for words. In all my life, this was the bravest line I have heard coming from a woman. Here, like a coward, I was lamely beating about the bush on the rights and wrongs of their marrying. And there, marriage was not only a foregone conclusion, they were already planning a family.

It was not as though they were so blinded by love that they did not know what they were getting into. In fact, they hardly knew each other beyond a few phone calls and the e-mails they had exchanged before their engagement. They did not go through the rituals of conventional courtship.

They are from different backgrounds. One is from Delhi and the other is from Mumbai. One is an HR professional, the other is a filmmaker. One is a Malayalee, the other a Punjabi. And yet, they have found the courage to challenge fate and celebrate life together.

Whenever in Pain, I get a lot to gain.

2010-04-19T16:12:00.000-04:00

Had an evening that left me anxious n clouded enough.

One that compelled me to contemplate again with rather disheartened sense of being. Seldom it happens, when lyf is driven by you and you control the events.

How naive I was when I used to think of it in affirmation.

Still, I'm among the best of optimists. I will be like that... my very own choice.

-you get it right.

Whenever it's inexplicable and complex like this..

it's matter related to da heart; dat simply n in a jiffy

brings your head and the whole being to such a hapless mess!

Sometimes it all appears to be so very un-spontaneous n Induced. It's all like u being a creature in some funny n bizarre video-games; just that you are not aware of the outcome till the LEVEL is cleared. Things have left me in a state of sloppiness n am just not able to surpass this damn hurdle. WHEN WILL THIS END, ...and HOW??? NO ANSWER!!!

... with all these kinda thoughts I landed on my twitter page and it was all filled with #ihatequotes Hashtags. the whole compilation was something like the universe is aware of my condition and has spread strings all around me to pick and solve the zig-saw. The most I could do for now is assort them... I really wanted to!!

QUOTES!

Hearts are always damaged in the end. Don't be afraid to love!

As you get older, don't let society tell you what you can and can't do. That's what arthritis is for.

It's never easy to understand why memories hold our hand, but ppl let go.

I want my girl as one who saves my texts just to look at them when she misses me.

It's sad, but sometimes moving on with the rest of ur life, starts with goodbye. -Carrie Underwood

It's really frustrating when you don’t know what to do anymore when enough seems necessary to be done. The process, thus, becomes a pain!

Your words say friendship, but your eyes scream.. romance ;)

With a thousand different voices ringing in ur ear; listen to the whisper only the heart can hear.

I never stopped feeling for you, I just stopped letting it show.

I pretend to be happy so I don't have to explain myself to ppl who'll never understand

Never say u don't have a chance with someone when u haven't even asked. Let ur heart speak!

I wish my brain had a map to tell me where my heart should go. -Irving

Love is exclusive because God is love.

I love this quote.

2010-04-09T10:48:00.000-04:00

Common sense and flawed emotion don’t always mix ...and this allows for the most unfathomable tendencies, you might laugh at someone for, to have a realistic basis.

...how do you really differentiate b/w DareDeviltry & FoolHardy (???)

one more reason to Drink!!

2010-04-01T10:12:00.001-04:00

Leadership; April 1'st Style!!

2010-04-01T09:56:00.001-04:00

Putting the Ship in Leadership

We know you've waited for this for a long, long time. So here we are. What the hell were we saying?

Right. The thing you waited for.

It's what you were waiting for before you even knew you were waiting for it. Another blog on leadership. But this isn't just any leadership, see. It's leadership in a language you can understand.

You have a hard time with big words sometimes.

We understand. Un-der-stand.

So we took a long, hard look at what some of our common denominators were to better communicate with you. The list was short. It was either blockbuster movies of the 90's (because who could avoid them - then, or now on repeat over public broadcasting stations) or Twinkies.

We're sure there's a deep Twinkie philosophy buried in there somewhere, but we thought it might be a bit elevated for your vocabulary.

Vo-cab-u-lary. The words you know. Yeah, that's it. Good for you!

That left us with movies from the 90's. There were a number of movies that could fit the bill, but only one stood out. It had everything: guns, tough guys, gals in tight black pleather and awesome visual effects (pretty pictures). And a hero that said "woah".

Welcome to Leadership: Matrix Style.

We took some of the more memorable one-liners and broke them down for the leadership gems that we know they are - in some cases, we made them a bit more leadership adaptable.

A-dapt-able.

And of course you already know all of these things - you're very smart. Just consider this a bit of a refresher course.

Re-fre...oh, nevermind. Just read.

What happened, happened, and it couldn't have happened any other way.
Some may call this circular reasoning, but we call it making the ends justify the means. It's how you explain things not going according to the five year plan. You did a five year plan, right?
How do I know? I know because I'm supposed to know. It's my purpose.
This is a little like those pesky mathematicians when they're asked to define something really, really hard. Their answer: by definition. Since that was taken, we decided this line would be an acceptable substitute.
Not everyone believes what I believe. My beliefs don't require them to.
There's something in here about making the rules of the game fit your style of play, we're sure of it. But we're not sports-game people so we can't write a good sports metaphor for it. Met-a-phor. Go local sporting team.
Why am I here? Same reason as you. I love candy.
When in need of a solid deflection, this one's a good one. It asks the questioner to think about their own reason for being where they are. But not too closely, or they might find a level of discontent. Candy is the well-placed distraction. Have a bowl handy, just in case.
We're only what we're meant to do.
This is one of our favourites. Initially, it could be taken as an uplifting message for someone who might be a bit down on not getting a task completed, or not making it off off Broadway. However, if you look closely, you'll find that it's a nice little limiting phrase. They'll walk away scratching their noodle, for sure. Cookie?
There are only two possible explanations: either no one told me, or no one knows.
If there was ever take-charge kind of statement, this is it. Obviously, you know everything that goes on in your organization. Of course. If not, well, see the explanation above. Circular reasoning, welcome back.
There are levels of survival we are prepared to accept.
Think you know your bottom line? Truly? How low is your bottom line? Oh, come on - you can go lower than that. We know you can. We saw you do that trick at the retreat. You know, the one with the pool cue, toilet seat cover and the dixie cups? Lester had the incident with the hairball after that...
Choice; the problem is choice.
Indecision is a kill joy. Nothing interrupts a good strategic plan like choice. Then you have to consult, and talk to people - maybe even do some revising. Who has time for that? You have a company to run. We recognize that. And so, when all else fails, blame choice. What is choice, anyway? It's neither one or the other. Can't even make up its mind. Huh. Don't you hate that?
Time is always against us. Please, take a seat there.
Enough said.

Courtesy: Paige

Mighty Boss n Poor U!

2010-03-24T09:17:00.001-04:00

Why you and the boss are totally different

When you take a long time, you're slow.
When your boss takes a long time, he's thorough.

When you don't do it, you're lazy.
When your boss doesn't do it, he's too busy.

When you make a mistake, you're an idiot.
When your boss makes a mistake, he's only human.

When doing something without being told, you're overstepping your authority.
When your boss does the same thing, that's initiative.

When you take a stand, you're being bull-headed.
When your boss does it, he's being firm.

When you overlooked a rule of etiquette, you're being rude.
When your boss skips a few rules, he's being original.

When you please your boss, you're apple polishing.
When your boss pleases his boss, he's being co-operative.

When you're out of the office, you're wandering around.
When your boss is out of the office, he's on business.

When you're on a day off sick, you're always sick.
When your boss is a day off sick, he must be very ill.

When you apply for leave, you must be going for an interview.
When your boss applies for leave, it's because he's overworked.

The TBs of Corporate universe

2010-03-24T09:15:00.001-04:00

Don't let the toxic bosses (TBs) get you down

Toxic bosses are an organisational reality. Unfortunately, the corporate universe values the knowledge of leadership more than the actual practice of leadership, which is relegated to showcasing by some iconic leaders. The corporate universe, therefore, finds itself strewn with toxic bosses or TBs; those who know their leadership theory too well but their horrific real-time leadership practices would leave even their teachers red-nosed and embarrassed.

However, success in the work-world belongs to those who have developed the ability to manage all kinds of complex bosses; they veer through the corporate maze much faster and with a lot more ease compared to those who never got such an opportunity or could tackle only simple passes.

Whether your boss is an indecisive chocolate wrapper, an unambitious grunt, a control freak, a politician or a whip–cracker, all TBs are a blessing; they help you build your long-term versatility to tackle complex power equations. However, the question remains: what is the strategy to tackle TBs?

Albeit not a panacea, my recommendation is that you first do a sanity check. Have a look around. Are you singled out or do others have a problem as well? Consult with your colleagues. Bosses have different experiences, styles, expectations and pressures for delivery. You have your own. Are the two in sync and aligned? He may just be a different boss and not a TB. It may just be a personality conflict or a temporary chemistry issue. I suggest if that is the case, don’t stand on egos.

It is advantage TB, as he has power on his side. Do not make any career limiting moves. Rather, invest time to understand, align and synchronise styles with your boss. Having a one-on-one meaningful discussion will help.

However, if your sanity check clarifies that the issue is not only with you but others in the department experience your boss similarly, then chill and relax with the knowledge that the trouble is generic and that your boss is a TB. He doesn’t lie awake all night masterminding special plans to torment you!

You can now plan to meet as a group to garner a collective view — however, there should not be a political agenda to this. The idea of this informal group meeting is to document all episodes of toxic behaviour of the TB and give him effective feedback. Seek an appointment with the boss to discuss critical departmental issues, before you do this group meeting. TBs often cultivate moles in the team. Use such group meetings with the positive agenda to help the TB realise his unhealthy ways. This will help. Pray it does.

Generally, TBs pretend ignorance, get into denial mode, justify their toxic behaviours to be in the interest of training the team members and so on. If TB behaviour continues, it is time to move further.

Get HR involved now. Brief him on the episodes discussed in the group meeting. Toxic bosses may sometimes need plain talking to, at times they could also be helped with mentoring, coaching or perhaps counselling. HR is expected to keep the manager of the TB or the CEO (as the case may be) informed of the facts whilst setting up a meeting to discuss and understand the issues first hand with the TB. I presume it should give results at this stage, as I have seen it happen in a lot of cases.

If despite this the toxicity does not reduce, approach the ombudsman. Approaching the CEO is the last resort for you and the group.

However, throughout this period:

Keep your professional face on and do not lose focus from the delivery of your KRAs.

Avoid gossip or unnecessary coffee machine discussions on the subject.

Continue respecting your manager, be personable.

Never publicly react or confront TB’s insinuations.

Develop Plan B:

Evaluate internal career options and keep an external search on Toxic bosses are like a demurrage to an organisation’s culture and the prime cause for people exits from good companies. Detoxifying the system of such leadership is critical to organisations’ success.

Courtesy: Adil Malia, Group president — HR, Essar Group

aaj ki Naari!

2010-03-18T11:46:00.000-04:00

Being bitchy is in.

Thu, Mar 18 02:50 PM

Cannot help but post it as is. Just to spread the awareness! :)

http://in.news.yahoo.com/248/20100318/1610/tls-being-bitchy-is-in_1.html

Sweet, goody- goody girls of the recession - move over.

Bitchy is back in business.

Here's our list of women who make the cut

It's the season of rich lists - the useful, if sometimes cruel, way of telling people where exactly they stand in the world; what exactly is their worth. Don't get us wrong - we don't have anything against lists. What we believe is that there are other ways of weighing self worth as well. Other ways that show how far you've come, or how far you'll go.

Other ways which measure how much power you have in you to intimidate the people around you.

Enter, The Bitch List. Recognising the merits of a list like this one becomes all the more pertinent this season. As we emerge out of the period of global recession, everybody's gotten a little tired of being told to be nice.

In case you took all that boho love and blunting the edges too seriously, LIFESTYLE decided to help you get in touch with your inner bitch.

Here are the general rules: Whether it's work, friendships, relationships, shopping, eating, holidaying... a bitch is someone who is neither a diva nor a doormat. She has learnt her lessons well. She is diplomatic without pussyfooting and assertive without seeming like an activist. Most of all, she has a plan. Get ready to tear the textbook and go by the bitch guide.

Here's our all - new bitch list:

Thou shalt wear your own fashion:

We are not telling you to be dressed in curtains and give a damn about what's in. Neither are we saying you have to wear unflattering clothes to exercise your going-against-the-tide look - Leave that to the 60s bitch, who, in all her feminist angst, would arrive at a party dressed in rags to prove the point that she is a non-conformist. Neither do you have to be like the Noughties bitch-the likes of Sushmita Sen and Victoria Beckham who made dressing and glamming up nonapologetic.

But while they made make-up and high heels very un - Barbie like and more as weapons of counter assault, they did it while looking too pretty-pretty. There was never a hair out of place, an accessory out of whack.

Thou shalt not be a yo - yo:

The old bitch guide said you could be in an open relationship of convenience, to hell with the world. The new bitch rule says, wait a minute. Know that eventually you'd want to be loved and taken care of. Stop pretending that you can handle being alone and don't care if you're in an open relationship. If he's not committing, tell him to ship out. While no one is judging your need to date a lot of people before settling down, don't give them the option to bail on you. If something is not working out, leave it. If he isn't committing or is not likely to do so in the next five years, forget him and move on.

Exert your need to have a fulfiling relationship. Preity Zinta and Deepika Padukone are two such girls who both admitted to being in relationships of their choice but were also the first to notice when things weren't going right.

Thou shalt rise at work:

The old bitch guide said you need to slog and toil away to get somewhere.

The new bitch guide says - get seen and noticed. If you are seen enough, heard enough and talked about enough, chances are you'd get ahead faster than colleagues that are invisible hard workers. In the age of blogging, tweeting and FB friends, make sure you pop up on your colleagues and seniors' computer windows doing something crazy.

Please all is being replaced by pi** a few people off. Also great ideas and the ability to communicate those ideas are two main ingredients for success.

Thou shalt leave behind BF baggage:

Best friends that constantly judge, mentor and psycho - analyse you are not what you need. The definition of the best friend is changing from 'teenage to old age' soulmates to BFFs who are not there to lecture you or compete with you.

The new age bitch does not need all that psychobabble.

It's enough that she has to deal with warring colleagues, bitchy cousins, unsupportive family from time to time. The last thing she needs is a friend who'd do nothing for her flagging spirit. If she needs therapy, she can afford it. What she needs is a happy yet fulfiling relationship where two friends can discuss lighter matters like where to go tonight and what to wear.

Topping the Bitch List in Friendships: Kareena Kapoor and Amrita Arora. They are super hot, fashionable and strong women who lead seemingly perfect lives. They don't seem to compete on looks, men or careers. They take holidays together, share shopping tips, party with one another and also say nice things about each other.

That's what you need in today's world. A girlfriend who not only looks good ( you don't want a loser sidekick but an actual girlfriend) but also makes you look good. A happy, strong pair that makes other people green with envy.

Thou shalt never be too old:

It's bad enough that this world is extremely agist when it comes to women, and women make it worse by conforming to the same damn idea. The old bitch struggled to look good, be desirable, have the right checkpoints on her resume; the new bitch could not care less.

She does not lead her life in a progressive pattern suiting her age but can shock you with antics that are not always becoming of her.

She doesn't mind making a fool of herself. She can date a man half her age, try new things and lead a highly independent life. She does not bow down to society just because age ceases to be on her side. It's almost natural and acceptable to rebel at a young age.

A true bitch is who can afford to do it at an age where she'd be mocked. Her life is not judged by how 'experienced' she is but how adventurous she continues to be.

Topping the Bitch List in Staying Young: Rekha and Madonna. The former continues to make her presence felt without conforming to anybody else's idea of beauty or fashion. Whether it's wearing a full black velvet sari or sindoor without being married, Rekha knows how to stay on top of the looks department. Her black, wavy south Indian hair and red lipstick is as legendary as is timeless. She doesn't feel the need to 'sober downâ€™ or 'fade out' at 60.

Madonna, at 50, constantly reinvents herself and doesn't mind being photographed in her negligee for an ad or date a man half her age. She also has the strength to not only walk out of a relationship that's not working but also give maintenance money to her husband. That's as new age bitchy as it gets.

Many things, called LOVE!

2010-03-15T17:07:00.000-04:00

Refer dictionary and you shall get the meanings like "a strong affection," "an unselfish, loyal and benevolent concern for others," and " to feel a passion or tenderness." Practically, LOVE represents a million varied feelings while visiting personal opinions and expressions of people. That truly recounts that one’s personal opinion about love is it's most complicated a FEELING and goes much deeper than any other such thing.

Traditionally, To love is to give up everything for another’s happiness. So says the high-esteemed narratives on love-tales of eternal lovers world over. Even in India, we have quite a few stories of selfless and devotional love not only of Radha-Krishna but a lot other mortal stories

Though, a pragmatic approach (as per my own feelings and observations..) is not to be just plane-irrational with state of affairs as it never culminates with the desired end. Likewise, it all operates in Love. The more you try to give//like/impress/devote to someone, the more you forget who you really are, and it really makes your very world very fragile and vulnerable.

Love is not something that you choose; it just happens. Love is the deepest emotion that a person could feel; it cannot be righteously expressed by words alone, but shown through actions.

Love does not always signify romance and fun. The dark side of love is tragedy and separation, coupled with the struggle to live together and to continue loving each other even in the face of self doubts relationship challenges and societal opposition.

To really love, to know the true meaning one must have felt the tender touch of the devilish angel. Love is not being able to sleep because all you can do is think of that person. It is what gives a desolate person reason to wake up in the morning. Love is to sacrifice yourself for another; to allow yourself to become spiritless in hopes that another will be blissful. Love is cruel to the touch and plays a very dirty game. To love is to let go and pray every waking moment in desperate hopes that one day your love will return.

Love is not being selfish; not leaving the one that you care for over a petty disagreement. It is not simply infatuation; no, it is much more. Love is not defined by books, but by the heart. It is not simply giving up on something you truly cherish. It is not hurting, nor is it repressing the pain, because you have someone there to aid you during all the harsh times one endures. It is not chosen, but given.

In the end, when one realizes this sense of love, it shows that love knows no age, sex, race, weight, or any boundary. Love is knowing that you can share your deepest emotions know that the person will not only not laugh at you, but care for you all the more. It is not a sense of mere infatuation, nor is it fickle and feeble. It is the deepest sensation that keeps the human heart beating.

a Tribute to Marilyn Monroe.. my 1'st Dream Girl!

2010-03-11T14:20:00.005-05:00

Born, as Norma Jean Mortensen, but not many know her as that.

This is a woman who gave the word 'woman' a new meaning and terms like ‘seduction’ and ‘sexual appeal’ were introduced to a different level all together ..only through her demeanours.

...the legendary Marilyn Monroe

She is a complete history to me. I came to this world much later.. when she had already completed her stint long back, on planet Earth. ...same as Dinosaurs did. But these two remain my biggest fantasies, till date. What it would really have been.. like, seeing those creatures while having her by my side. I always keep on wondering!

I really owe her a lot for shaping my thoughts on women-charisma, charm and sexuality.

Ms Monroe says...

"I'm selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can't handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best."

"I believe that everything happens for a reason. People change so that you can learn to let go, things go wrong so that you appreciate them when their right, you believe lies so you eventually learn to trust noone but yourself, and sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together."

"Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring."

"Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition."

A career is wonderful, but you can't curl up with it on a cold night.

"Sex is part of nature. I go along with nature."

"It's all make believe, isn't it?"

"I don't mind being burdened with being glamorous and sexual. Beauty and femininity are ageless and can't be contrived, and glamour, although the manufacturers won't like this, cannot be manufactured. Not real glamour; it's based on femininity. We are all born sexual creatures, thank God, but it's a pity so many people despise and crush this natural gift. Art, real art, comes from it, everything."

Love and work are the only two real things in our lives. They belong together, otherwise it is off. Work is in itself a form of love.

Sometimes good things fall apart so that better things can fall together.

You never know what life is like, until you have lived it.

"The body is meant to be seen, not all covered up."

What do I wear in bed? Why, Chanel No. 5, of course.

It's often just enough to be with someone. I don't need to touch them. Not even talk. A feeling passes between you both. You're not alone.

No one ever told me I was pretty when I was a little girl. All little girls should be told they're pretty, even if they aren't.

The trouble with censors is that they worry if a girl has cleavage. They ought to worry if she hasn't any.

To put it bluntly, I seem to have a whole superstructure with no foundation. But I'm working on the foundation.

Random thought on the occasion of Women's day!

2010-03-08T14:30:00.001-05:00

I so very much know that "woman is the glory of creation" ...and the value that woman brings along with her on the planet earth. Beyond all the obvious projections of her being a so selfless.. Mother, Sister, Friend, Girlfriend, Daughter, and may be many more... I am forced to analyse it beyond all these manifestations... by taking some real life references and stark situations.

The idea behind the celebration of Women's Day was to showcase equality for women, but even now women are not treated with equality. Just the other day I was trying to get a rickshaw - already late for work and none of these miserable autorickshawwallahs were in sight. Five minutes pass. A triplet of college girls arrive to my left. Finally I see a rickshaw in sight and I'm waving at him like a madman. The SOB totally ignores me and stops for the females. And these females gladly step in and go off to their destination, which will probably be a college where they will sit outside and have a lovely chat about important issues such as lipstick and the 'red skirt that Neha wore yesterday'. Damn those females and damn the rickshaw guy. What was he thinking? “Oh! Let me ignore this guy, who seems really desperate for the rickshaw and let me drop these three females instead. Maybe they’ll pay me in kind for my amazingly good deed”. Woman equality… yeah right?

This isn’t one stray incident. Females get loads of favours every day, but none of them are reported in any newspaper. There is no bitching and moaning and raving and ranting. On the contrary, women will gladly accept the favour as if they earned it. It is not discrimination as long as you are the ones getting favours, right?

In buses sometimes men stand to give them seats. In fact in Mumbai, there are ‘BEST buses’ with seats reserved for women. If a male is sitting on one of these seats, women will stare at him as if he just passed a raunchy comment. If the staring doesn’t get the point across, they’ll verbally demand for the seat which they believe is their birth right. I’ll like to ask here, “You want to be treated as equals how about you act that way?” Why the double standards? We want the same job as men since we are equals but hey, that seat is reserved for me since I’m a female. These women live in a world of self-righteous delusion.

Also, what’s with the celebration when a female accomplishes something? She’s the first woman taxi driver. Oh! Good job! You know what’s amazing? Men have been doing the same thing for ages. I thought you wanted the job despite being a female, but when you get the job the first thing you flaunt is the fact that you are a female. Do everyone a favour, stop posing for photographs and get off the goddamn first page, everyone can see through your hypocrisy.

Some Facts.

Fact 1: It’s chivalrous to give a woman a seat.

Fact 2: It’s male chauvinism to think that a female is weaker than you.

Fact 3: Giving a female a seat shows that you can stand while she can’t.

From facts 1, 2 and 3 what’s the difference between chivalry and male chauvinism?

Strictly my opinion.. but I really second the thought that "women live in a world of self-righteous delusion" It is not discrimination as long as you are the ones getting favours, right?

PS: Part of the write-up is taken from JAM

My Intro to Adventure Sports

2009-07-28T10:16:00.001-04:00

I always had a dream to go close to nature without falling in a kind of Solitude.

...getting introduced to Trekmates straightaway did that for me. Thanks! Varun, it was you who deserved a pat for my voila!!

It all started with my intro to a group to which one of my colleague Prabir was already a part of.. (how lucky it really is to be with your buddies even after you complete your studies and continue to your work-life; that too in one of the best paying Industry, i.e, IT services--God bless America!!!) I really miss my friends and those days when we had a share of all kind of adventures that, till the time we experienced, were just a fantasy!

Enough history! So, here I'm, planning a trip with a group of complete strangers. I quickly scanned through the existing contacts who could be with me for my comfort..got just one (getting him is another story alltogether) Mr. Sunil Mishra. Thank you buddy for agreeing... So, after a long long time I spent sufficient time with (.. otherwise one of the most hated tool I possess) my Mobile Phone. Now I understand what a good use of materialistic possession is all about! So, here is everything arranged and I shoot for the trip with 16 other guys and gals from Pune. Around 40 more would be joining us from Bombay..(any objections..coz I like it better than Mumbai).

The Location is VihiGaon; a small village near Kasara Ghat en route to Mumbai-Nasik Highway.

Long Story cut-short..It was one of those experiences that will remain with me for my life-time.. One regret however, is that, I was not there with my pals. May be that's what lyf is all about.. Moving-on!!

Love to you all.

Five Indian banks among world's top 1000!

2009-07-02T14:56:00.000-04:00

Five Indian banks among world's top 1000
State-owned State Bank of India holds the first position among the Indian banks and ranked 64th position and ICICI bank ranked 81st among global banks. The other Indian banks in the global first 500 league are Punjab National bank, HDFC Bank and Bank of India at 239, 242 and 263, respectively.
Read on...
Do we consider this as a good news..?? Your views please!

Ye Duniya..Hai isme kitne Jhol!!

2009-07-02T14:14:00.000-04:00

The essence of Leadership has got so lost in the current scenario that everything has become materialistic and green-back driven. All what matters is how much do you earn and how do you flaunt it. All affairs of Heroism has become a matter of media attention and so short-lived. We are running, not because it's our hobby rahter because it's necessary for keeping us going.

Be it the 'Babudom' in the govt. sector or the 'work driven culture' in the private domain, what matters most is how well are you able to influence people up the order, and is least about how good you really are at what you do. In such a scenario the essence and meaning of a LEADER losses its relevance...

PS: This comes from my own experience, so far. People around have actually become so narrow and mean that they can just not think beyond their own-self. Leave the talk of accountability. All that prevails is back-biting and selfishness. Not that I'm paranoid, more so because my experience says so.. Disappointing!!

Change Vs Stability

2009-07-02T12:18:00.000-04:00

This post takes inspiration from here

Stability is an antonym to Change. or is dat so..??
Change is synonymous to Growth, and Growth almost signifies Stability (and that can be appliable to both Individual and Business Context).

SO, the conclusion is change is Stability and both are equally important till the time there is a degree of congruence between the TWO.
We change constantly in our life, sometimes for good and sometimes for worse (..if your can understand the context). We need to stablize (that accounts for a change..ain't it??) in times when we are going down. And if you are not thinking about stability all the time, then you are not gonna improve (again a change...!!!). Stabilty is nothing but a BALANCE AMONG THE CHANGES and this is the funniest part of the story.
PS: Taking reference from my Chemistry days.. All that are stable remain so, till they do not reach a threshold..Otherwise nothing exist, that can be categorised as Stable!! (not even the ARGONONs). CHANGE IS THE NAME OF THE GAME!!

Introspection in Retrospect!

2009-06-30T15:52:00.000-04:00

What is it, when I look back and observe things in light of my upgraded intelligence (with an assumption that age make things getting better; just like wines..!!!), I always feel I was constrained by circumstances more than just once... Has there been any single instance of not being contrite about one's past. I'm not sure...

How many people out there are having the gift of being really happy with their past. I always wish things would have taken a different course lest I was a bit more attentive, proactive, informed, lucky, ...it keeps going on. Is it some form of self inflicted state of remorse that is called Introspection. Am I being more cynical than the most..! I'm introspecting on these..., more than any thing else. Is it really worth being introspctive is one more area I'm pondering on these days..

I don't know why I suddenly started to give words to my feeling...It must be the awkwardness I am feeling these days. Why is situation alway so difficult. Why is it that you cannot think of a better tomorrow that takes inspiration from today. Why is it that till now I think I'm not able to create a foundation that guarantees a tomorrow that I wished for! Is it my over ambition or under achievement? I'm still clueless on this. All this and random keeps pestering me all while.

Contd..

Something to find solace in!

2009-06-30T15:05:00.001-04:00

गालिब, बुरा ना मान जो वैएज़ बुरा कहे,
ऐसा भी कोई है के सब अच्छा कहें जिसे!!!

How Difficult is it to be happy with what you have!

2008-10-04T08:07:00.000-04:00

I now realize it how materialistic I have become. There seems to be no contentment in what all I have.. There is always this feeling of having more n more n more.. Where does it stop..!!!

May be this world is not a place for those who are contented... Not sure about it!