What is Happiness?

For a truly happy person, even if he loses everything suddenly, he should be happy. Even if he is in the company of abhorrent, he must be smiling from within. Ideally, there should not be any concept of good, bad or ugly for him. Everything should be indifferent and nothing else for a person of such demeanor.

How can we develop that kind of mindset?

1. By removing all the ought, must and should from his dictionary.

2. By removing the concept of time. Time induces fear. If we do not finish something before this deadline then this would happen. If we reach late to the office then the Boss will rebuke. 

The basic idea of true happiness has to be "living in the present" and "having no desire".

Now, what is the meaning of "Having no desire"?

Having no desire means being detached from everything around you. 

Being detached means if you get or if you do not get your desired result, maintain equanimity. 

For example, even if I do not get food for 10 days or lose everything I possess in the next moment, I shall not be frustrated, irritated or angered. 

Does this mean there should not be any rules in the way we live? Won't we slip into an animalistic life if we fail to adhere to certain rules and regulations. But isn't discipline, rules, happiness and living in the present are the antagonistic concept? Isn't the definition of happiness contains should/ought/must in itself? Aren't we motivated to act out of our desire and if no desire what would motivate us to act? Even if we act without desire, what will determine our direction of actions? And if we go with the flow, aren't we vulnerable to fall in the trap of negativity, indiscipline, and unhappiness? Can we really achieve zero? Can we really achieve thoughtlessness? or is it all useless? 

Rules are peculiar. If you take an excuse for breaking them once, you develop this as a habit.

Loose talks, discussing individual or material being in the ecosystem is the cheapest way to waste your time. Rather discuss ideas. Work on them. Make them a reality.

Your past experiences are your biggest teacher. Your mistakes are the view of the future. Identify them and draw lessons from them.

There is always a new beginning and a new start. If you are not able to achieve a desirable goal, keep trying. In pursuit of certain objectives, If you give up, or withdraw then contentment but diffidence.

If fight and win over the challenge.

Clearly I am clueless.

Resurge

After more than 100 days and nearly 3-4 failed attempts, here I am again, geared up to compile my thoughts on this blog. So without much ado, first thing first, let me list down some of the interesting events of the last 100 days of my life:

1.  The experience of working with younger kids was very interesting. It pushed my limits of what is possible and what not? There were times when I was totally lost but then I managed the situation by putting some effort. It was the most fruitful novel experience of the last 100 days where my decision to not give up helped me to emerge out with grace. But I must thank Master Prashanth for helping me overcome this challenge. More specifically, three things helped me. First was I dealt with him with patience and love rather than anger and ego. The second was the identification of my role and persistence in solving the problem. The third was my own karma which came to help me in difficult times. 

2. There was a religious family event Siddhachakra Vidhan. The Fun in Siddacharkra Vidhan was fantastic. It was a family gathering where all family members assembled for religious purposes. I remember playing the role in Somasati play where I turned an emotional scene into laughter. There was lot of dance and pooja. However, during most of the prayers/offerings/rituals, I was confused about the relevance of Dravya Pooja. I could not fathom its significance.  

3. In the office, I was fortunate to be part of some new upcoming IT projects in the Income Tax Directorate. These are the projects with cutting edge industry architecture which can change the face of the Indian Taxation and Financial system. At the same time, I picked up the issues at Office and gladly raised my voice against wrongdoings. I had immense learning in how to handle vendors but I think that requires a separate post.

4. During this time, Article 370 was revoked and a lot of prime time News hours and headlines were devoted to this.  A lot of discussion on WhatsApp and other social media was devoted to this which consumed my time as well. 3 years back, I had predicted about article 370 and Kashmir issue in my old blogs. I am glad that some of it came true. Kashmir issue is not yet resolved but at least the wheel have rolled further which is better than being stuck in one place.

5. I Settled down in Kaushambi in government flat and picked up with my new sports which I am finding somewhat challenging yet entertaining. There is some change from JNU/NII. The greenery and serenity is missing but overall it is fun and ok. Ultimately, my destiny ensures I do not stay in one place for more than 12 months.

6. The biggest blessing for me was my attendance in the Yama Samlekhna of "Parampoojya Guruvar 108 Shri Vidya Nand Ji Maharaj". This was one of the most rewarding and memorable moment of my life. My experience with other saints also prompted me to think about "What should be an Uttam Sadhu Vritti"?

7. Staying with Ayush and Ni2 was fun. "Bahut maja aaya". 

8. On the national front, the Indian economy tanked to a new low. Unemployment reached great heights. Maharashtra's political crisis showed the real face of Indian politics and Godi media continued to harm our nation.

While life was becoming routine, there were numerous things that happened which distanced me from my core. Among all the activities, four are most critical for connecting with my core self namely Meditation, Reading books, Writing blogs and Running. I failed on all four counts miserably.

In a way it was depressing. I made multiple efforts to become consistent and become more regular but all of them resulted in vain. Every time I tried to stand up, I lay flat on the floor. But there is always a new beginning. Possibly that was the learning. So here I am writing this blog and eagerly awaiting the start of my next Vipassana course in mid-December. 

I felt irritated many times over many small issues. Even I became loquacious and loud in conversations. The pleasantness, calm and equanimity were missing which concerned me at times. My employees asked me to take care of my business. He pleaded that my job will feed only one stomach but my business will feed 20's of them. My friends giving me unsolicited advice about not to waste my life. And my tendency to look at my palm worsened which in a way indicates that I worry about my future. 

So these were the past 100 days of my life. My failure/disinclination to document my thoughts was my biggest mistake. Every day there were so many unique mention-worthy incidents, startup ideas, political-economic comments on which I wished to write. However, I have no clue why was there so much disinclination for documenting these thoughts.

One prime reason was lack of time. Another was a lack of personal space. And third was lack of silence within. Anyway, there is always a new beginning. and It always feels good to stand up after falling flat. So here I am raising the toast to my new beginning and hoping to draw strength from this experience. 

Importance of discipline

Q. Why should I live a disciplined life?

1. Fitness
2. Managing multiple activities and multiple interest
3. Physical training leading to mental training and vice versa
4. To breed positive thinking
5. Productive lifestyle-->positive thinking--> Resilient attitude
6. The risk of not living a disciplined life are very high
7. My ambitious attitude require me to live in disciplined manner
8. Health and wealth perspective
9. Basic attribute of a leader like life style
10. You will not find a single person who is happy or content or leader in his walk of life without living a disciplined life
11. It gives confidence and belief of ability to push my limits.
12. It makes you less fearful.

Q. What kind of life I wish for myself?

1. Active reading, writing and speaking
2. My expertise in one domain
3. Wish to work on high profile projects
4. Meditation
5. Excel in whatever I do
6. A sense of achievement and fulfillment in life
7. Helping every single person who approaches me in someway or other
8. Making this world a better place to live
9. Bring smile on face of people

Q. What is the importance of work achievement in my life?

1. For most of your adult life and retired phase, your work is your identity
2. Whenever you meet anyone, first thing they ask is What do you do? So whether you like it or not, we are defined by what we do, how do we contribute towards our community.

Q. How to maintain discipline in life?

1. Remind its importance to yourself everyday.
2. Meditate: meditation brings continuity in life. It gives free time, me time when one can sit and draw lessons from life, contemplate and reflect. Thus it helps in reminding us.
3. Keep cheat days.
4. Make friends who motivate you for the same.
5. Feel the leader within you.
6. Visualise the kind of body, mind and life you will develop with and without discipline.
7. Minimise the regrets. Realise that how deep would be the regret if you fail to follow it.
8. Most importantly:
9. Fix your sleep time and wakeup time.
10. Make sure good never become enemy of the best.
11. Keep trying everyday.
12. Make schedule. 
13. It's ok to miss everyday but it is not ok to not draw the lesson from the failure.

Q. Why is it important to be a leader in life?

1. To live as per call of your soul and mind and heart.
2. To enlighten the path of others.
3. To be involved and engrossed with yourself. 
4. To help people who are not as fortunate as you are.
5. And finally the noblest oblige and self actualization.
6. Important thing is here leader does not mean a politician or person with mass appeal. Leadership here means doing the best where ever possible.

Q. Why is it important to set your life as example for others?

1. It is not important.
2. Be an example for yourself first.

Q. Why is it important to have a reflex of positivity and how is this related to discipline and schedule?

1. See the happiness, calmness, love, affection and fearlessness in the behaviour of positive people.
2. Always jolly, loving, trusting others around him. It takes away a lot of tension.
3. Once you start living a disciplined life, it means you can control your mind a bit. So this control can help in shooing away your negative thoughts.
4. For an ecosystem like India, negative thoughts and negativity is natural to occur. You mind generally gets conditioned to think negative. In such a situation, you discipline and spirituality help you in staying positive.

Q. Why is it important to develop a work attitude in life?

1. An empty mind is devil's den. Therefore, keeping oneself busy with small goals, targets and activities is very important.

Q. How to develop a attitude of work orientation?

1. Set small goals 
2. Make schedule
3. Follow meticulously
4. Achieve goals
5. Analyse, draw learnings, assess success and failures
6. Celebrate the process
7. You will develop liking for the same.

Q. Why is it important to maintain a dairy of pending and achieved task?

1. It helps you in tracking your task progress and accordingly regulate your time.

Q. Why is it important to write daily journal and maintain a list of assignments?

1. It helps in going back in time and revisit past experiences more clearly.
2. It enhances your articulation.
3. It captures your state of mind at that very moment.

Q. Why sports are necessary?

1. Physical activity releases endorphins which are key to happiness.
2. Sports give an element of entertainment.
3. It helps you overcome your OCD behaviours.
4. Sports is like meditation at times. You energy, thoughts remained focussed.

Q. Why dwelling deep within your soul is important?

That's the ultimate reality, source of all the good.

Expecting anything from anyone around you is foolish. Every action has some or other interest. Except mother's love, everything seems conditional.

So rather focus on your soul, connect with it. Roam in that world. It helps in soothing the mind, rejuvenate you from within, helps you overcome negativity and allows you to love unconditionally. It helps you understand the course of your destiny, gives you clarity of thoughts, and  calms your mind. It increases our acceptance of events in life. It makes us indifferent but at the same time more positive, loving, joyful and chilled out. In all it helps us in understanding the true nature of things around. It is Brahmacharya.

Improving public service in India

How to improve the operations at the public places like hospitals, Railways and other places.

1. The responsibility to improve the operations lie not on center, state or Panchayat. Instead, this is contingent on institutional leadership. Therefore, institutional chiefs need to work on devising steps for the behavioral dimension of it's customers and employees.

2. Technology: We need to deploy technological means to make this process convenient for the people. Beginning with online appointment for the hospitals, the technological solution must deploy full suit of technology for making life convenient for end users. To this end, it is necessary that we restrict the visitors accompanying the patient/traveller, barcode the people/documents, increase the number of staff members, increase the size of the public place, providing basic amenities to public as well as employees, put more signboards and self guided facility, more patient counters or rail announcement system, a working solution for the appointment systems at institutional as well as operation level etc.

3. Administration: The task of administration should be left to administrators who have received general training in dealing with these aspects rather than putting specialists on this job. The areas of hospital management, railway station management, crowd control techniques etc should be given proper attention.

4. We need to plan for things 15 years ahead of our time. It requires critical evaluation of current state of affair and huge investment for bringing futuristic solutions for solving current day problems.

5. The time management can be improved by employing artificial intelligence, data mining and other solutions. In addition, we should deploy Internet of Things, and Blockchain kind of things to make things work. For example, a patient could be informed about his real time of appointment with doctor as soon as he is over with registration. Similarly, IOT solutions could be deployed in tracking the movement of patients and their documents.

It is a painful sight at public places to see wastage of human, economic and social resources in a huge manner. We need to make the entire process of experiencing public services hassle free, predictive and transparent. New India should not have any place for any mismanagement of resources.

Random blabber

Recently I happen to work alongside few younger mates and it proved to be a worthy experience. One of the noticeable thing about working with them was their methodical approach and focus on the conceptual understanding. So strong was their emphasis on the procedures and methods that it struck me like a hammer. As if it brought me out of my sleep or mediocrity or falling standards. I realised the importance of focussed effort, methods and procedures and reignited my believe of delivering the best.

Most importantly, all of this came as Deja Vu. These learnings were not new, it is just that lethargy and lack of novelty in my thought had shadowed them. That is why I believe it is important to keep the company of right kind of people in life.

Another observation was negativity in my thoughts. Off late, the negativity in my thoughts has spiked. Mainly it is triggered by confusion about what I wish from life and my tendency of singing the same song repetitively. Another trigger and manifestation of this negativity is lack of exercising and inability to follow a disciplined life. And indirectly, it emerged from my misplaced expectation from the ecosystem in which I live.

The only way to overcome this would be to meditate, to sit and work tight, as per a predefined plan. Self control and self absorb is the key to peace, happiness and optimism.

Another thought which struck me was spreading happiness. I thought that I should ensure that whoever comes in my contact, should walk out more happier.

Last 10 days were happening except for last few days. The JATF Udaipur visit was a unique experience but much novel was the experience of viral fever. First time in life I got infected with a fever which increased my temperature on 10 different occasions in short span of 5 days despite taking the medications. It was only 2 days back, I could recover fully and since then I have been wanting my time.

And so now you understand the motivation behind this blog. Hope to write more impersonal things unlike this note. Till then good bye.

A letter from July

One more happening month of my life is over. Many notable things happened in this duration. Some of the significant one are following:
1. Economics class at JATF was highlight of the month. Initially I was little worried and afraid about the classes but once it started rolling, there was no looking back. It was like a rollar coaster ride for me. I am still awaiting the feedback for the same.
2. I shifted to government flat. It is good place to be in. Lot of amenities around but I am yet to get my routine back on schedule.
3. My data mining course has started. There is lot of fear and confusion whether I'll be able to cope with it or not. I need to play extra hard to really fulfill this goal. This is one of the challenging task on which I have set my foot and I really need blessings of everyone around to finish the course.

Many little things also happened like
1. My bicycle ride to Singhu border
2. My rain walk from Ambience mall
3. My participation in faceless e-assessment project and budget proposals framework.

All in all, life is busy and happening as usual. I wish to find more courage and vitality to write about day to day learning and read and exercise more regularly. These three remains the flip points of my journey this month.

Random thoughts

Never keep a problem lingering or pending

Play it on front foot

Remember the kind of frustration you deal with in daily life is much bigger than a unicorn CEO.

Noblest oblidge: If you have a gift from God, if you are blessed with a talent, it is your duty to give it back to the society.

Everyday is a new beginning.

Always begin the day with a smile and blessings of trees, animals, sun, Moon and every other resource around you.

Douse the anger within you and world will become a better place to live.

Give others benefit of doubt. Trust people. Respect every emotion of every individual. We are all the same.