Certain thoughts create a very deep impression on one’s mind and one is tempted to share such thoughts with a larger audience.

Came across a reel on FB, in which Swami Premanand very lucidly differentiates between karna ( effort, action or service) and karmayog ( path of selfless service). As he explains, when a doctor considers his patient to be a god and treats him to the best of his ability it becomes karmayog as against the mere discharge of duty, which also cures the patient, but without the desired results for the doctor.

What we conveniently forget is that whosoever we are – doctor, engineer, public servant, banker or even an entrepreneur- we shall survive only if there are users of our skills and services. It’s, therefore, imperative for all of us in any profession to welcome the user of our services – patient, associate, customer etc, and discharge our services in the spirit of serving the human kind rather than treating it as part of our profession or job.

Unlike Holi, Diwali, Ganpati – the major festivals, whose dates are etched in mind and celebrations are elaborate, Guru Purnima comes in quietly and solemnly and I come to know about it when nudged by friends and formal colleagues, wishing me. It’s embarrassing, to say the least, being placed on such a high pedestal by these people as I don’t consider myself worthy of such respect and honour. Like other ordinary mortals, I have several deficiencies and imperfections and even a lifetime of effort may not take me anywhere close to becoming a person who can be idolised or adored, leave aside becoming a Guru.

However, without any further ado or modesty, I gratefully acknowledge these wishes and in return wish them all the well in life and exhort them to groom their youngsters and become gurus and this rich tradition of our generation culture should continue with newer gurus producing better talent and citizens. Lastly, I also pay my obeisance to all those who played an important role in reaching wherever I am today. 

On the international yoga day,  my yoga Guru has reaffirmed the most famous learning from Bhagvad Gita  in yogic context. He says, “Yogi only focuses on his sadhana (efforts) without waiting for result ( outcomes or rewards).”

I myself have got initiated into yoga at this ripe age of 63, and my ability to emulate my Guru is severely limited. However, having made an effort and  that too every day, is greatly fulfilling. I am sure rewards will be reaped eventually, but some rewards such as calmer mind, are already trying to make their presence felt. But my dharma (duty) is to keep up my efforts, with or without matching rewards.

No wonder the said shloka ( Karmanye vadhikaraste …..) is now being heralded as the most effective management mantra and has relevance in our professional, personal and yogic lives. 

Happy international yoga day to all! 

Yes, you have read it correctly! The famous English phrase “ Lull before the storm” has been deliberately reworded to the aforementioned! 

What we have witnessed over the past few days is nothing less than a tsunami of tragedies and unsavoury developments! Starting with the dastardly act of killing innocent tourists in Pahalgam, followed by Operation Sindoor, stampede at Bengaluru, crash of Air India’s Dreamliner, Israel – Iran exchange of missiles that’s threatening to become a full fledged war to yesterday’s helicopter crash and caving in of a bridge over river Indrayani near Pune, our cup of woes is overflowing! And here, I am not even mentioning never ending Russia – Ukraine and Israel- Hamas sagas that seem to be never ending and worsening. 

Lull before the storm is eerie, chilling and disconcerting. On the contrary lull after the storm is painful – witnessing all the signs of destruction left behind by the raging storm, but relieving and comforting at the agony having gotten over! Let’s pray and hope for this lull. 

 If 2022 was to be 2025, today would have been my last day of working, 31st being a Saturday. However, in 2022, the year of my superannuation, 31st was a Woking day and accordingly, my last day in the organisation. 

Well before my last day before superannuation, I had started looking forward to the life post retirement. Having worked without a break for almost 4 decades, I was excited to have all the free time to myself to indulge in the activities that I along wanted , but never found time. Travelling, reading, exercising, writing and doing some voluntary work were a few things on my agenda.

On my third anniversary of retirement, after penning two books, reading a hoard of books, travelling inland and overseas and actively engaging in yoga, I have started missing the things that I wanted to be freed of- routine, office, active engagement, meetings, deadlines etc. 

Not that I am writing this post to announce my “ availability to work “! It’s just to tell all those actively engaged in work, especially the youngsters, to cherish their work life, instead of feeling burnt out, frustrated and demotivated. We always yearn for something that’s away from us! Each phase of life has its own significance that must be enjoyed! Retirement is interesting, but let’s make our journey to retirement interesting, productive and reasonably long.

 If 2022 was to be 2025, today would have been my last day of working, 31st being a Saturday. However, in 2022, the year of my superannuation, 31st was a Woking day and accordingly, my last day in the organisation. 

Well before my last day before superannuation, I had started looking forward to the life post retirement. Having worked without a break for almost 4 decades, I was excited to have all the free time to myself to indulge in the activities that I along wanted , but never found time. Travelling, reading, exercising, writing and doing some voluntary work were a few things on my agenda.

On my third anniversary of retirement, after penning two books, reading a hoard of books, travelling inland and overseas and actively engaging in yoga, I have started missing the things that I wanted to be freed of- routine, office, active engagement, meetings, deadlines etc. 

Not that I am writing this post to announce my “ availability to work “! It’s just to tell all those actively engaged in work, especially the youngsters, to cherish their work life, instead of feeling burnt out, frustrated and demotivated. We always yearn for something that’s away from us! Each phase of life has its own significance that must be enjoyed! Retirement is interesting, but let’s make our journey to retirement interesting, productive and reasonably long.

A view says that birthdays represent the ageing process, wondering what there’s to celebrate ? While it’s true that we look forward to growing older when we are are young, say may be up to the age of 40-45, we yearn to remain young after a age – want our limbs, teeth, organs, looks to remain the same as they were in our prime youth. 

But time and tide wait for none. Ageing is part of the process called life and it should, in no way, deter our spirit to live life king size. And it becomes all the more possible when the friends from school, college, first organisation, last organisation, newly encountered etc all join in to wish you happy birthday, exhorting you to celebrate the day with full zeal. That’s what I am doing on my 63rd birthday thanks to outpouring of love by all of you. 

Birthdays remind you of your arrival and existence,

And should be celebrated as an important day of your life,

Each passing year is an achievement and bundle of memories,

That enriches our personality, character and life! 

Growing old is the law of nature,

That can neither be opposed or reversed;

Celebrating each day as it comes with gratitude,

Is what that should be on our agenda first! 

GOAT ( the greatest of all time) is a fascinating term that we all tend to describe a great achiever in his or her field- music, sports or any other discipline. However, in a dynamic world like today’s, it would be more appropriate to use this term as GOTT ( the greater of today’s time ) instead of Goat. Take for instance Tennis – from my living memory, it was Connors, Ashe, McEnroe, Borg, Sampras, Agassi to the trio of Federer, Rafa and Joker! Ditto females from Billie Jean King to Evert to Navratilova to Graf to Seles to Serena – the list has always been dynamic. 

In case of cricket, Gavaskar donned the GOAT head for a long time till Kapil, Azhar, Sourav, Dravid, Sachin and Virat followed. The spin triumvirate of Bedi, Chandra and Prasanna, once considered GOAT and irreplaceable were followed by the likes of Kumble and Ashwin. 

Therefore, I will refrain from using superlatives such as GOAT for Virat, who has decided to hang his boots after 14 years of test cricket. But the fact remains that he will always be counted as  one of the greatest icons of modern day cricket in all its three formats, a run making machine with humongous appetite for runs and a powerhouse on the field with unending reserve of energy and enthusiasm. His never say die spirit and extremely positive body language always inspired hope and confidence even in the most hopeless of situations. His statistics are there all over and are not that important as there are players above him and there will be players in future bettering his stats. But when it comes to spirit, lion heartedness, delightful execution, copybook style and consistency, Virat will remain a Virat chapter in the history of the cricketing world. 

All the best Virat! Hope you help the cricketing scene of our country by grooming more Virats in future and continue to spread your charm like only you can! 

The first thing that many of us do upon waking up in the morning is to check our mobile for the messages, notifications or mails that we  receive while being asleep. This engagement with our smartphone continues throughout the day with frequent surfing through social media watching reels, posts, updates and likes and comments received on materials posted by us. And forget the time spent on smartphones by working professionals. They receive mails and messages non stop, including during the wee hours.

Therefore, increasingly the advice from experts and influencers is to restrict the use of smartphone. While it may not be possible for working professionals to pay heed to this advice, what about students, self employed, home makers and retired persons? 

All the above is very effectively discussed in a small book “ Dopamine Detox” by Thibaut Meurisse, which was suggested to me by a close friend.  Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that stimulates us to do something in anticipation of a reward. But no amount of stimulation or anticipation for reward can give fulfilment. As per the author, social media capitalises on our preference for certain content and repeatedly serve us with what we want to see or know about, getting us hooked on to that particular theme. While the companies and the content creators actually get rewarded in the form of revenue, we end up wasting our precious time by craving for more of something that’s of absolutely no use to us. In the process the time than we should be devoting to creative or important things gets diverted and we end up procrastinating or altogether avoiding doing it! 

At this stage of my life, I do not require to be hooked on to my phone for aimless surfing, but smartphone being a one stop shop for wasted as well as creative energy, hopefully I will display enough maturity to use discretion. Professionals and youngsters should definitely pay attention to this important aspect of detoxing themselves of this dopamine effect and restrict usage of non work related phone/ internet. 

Friends is a famous US sitcom that ran for 10 seasons spread over 10 years between 1994 and 2004. When the sitcom finally ended in 2004, 266 episodes had been aired. 

Started with virtual unknown actors, the six main leads gained immense popularity as the sitcom progressed episode after episode and season after season. Today Jeniffer Aniston, Courtney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt Leblanc, Mathew Parry and David Schwimmer are well known names in Hollywood.  

I recently watched all the ten seasons on OTT and felt deeply connected with the 6 lead characters having this déjà vu feeling as to why 6 friends had to ultimately call it quits and go their respective ways! And there’s so much trivia around this iconic show – reunion of the protagonists after years, compilation of special moments, talk shows with the main actors, feelings of the actors for each other ( they continue to be best friends more than 2 decades after the last episode was aired) and death of Mathew Parry. 

The premise of the show is simple – friendship is above everything else. Characters have their angularities, ambiguities, oddities – but they are loveable and are always there for each other. The show has humour as its essence, though some of the situations, dialogues and scenes , including live-in arrangements could be too much for the sensibilities of Indian audience. However, there’s no denying that longevity of the show, its freshness and connect with the viewers over a prolonged period is something that our content makers can well learn. Some of the points that I could arrive at towards this end are;

(1) actors enjoyed great bonhomie in as much as they negotiated uniform salaries with the producers

(2) all 6 got equal importance and there were no show stealers

(3) none of the characters had to be changed by resorting to plastic surgery or other such unbelievable things seen in domestic shows 

(4) script always ensured situational humour and never appeared stretched. There were no generational leaps. 

When the show ended, the six actors had become the highest paid TV stars, earning a grand sum of 1 Mio dollar per episode. Thanks to OTT, we now have access to all these iconic shows about which we had only heard.