Reaching There

"Surreal but nice" that's what Hugh Grant's character managed to blurt out, mesmerized by the beauty of Julia Roberts (in the movie Notting Hill ). And this was the exact thought that was running in my mind as I was rising from a depth of over 35 feet under water in the Arabian Sea near Goa, India. I had just finished my first dive (rather second dive of my first dive) with grouper fish, tailor fish - and many more - knelt at the bottom of the ocean floor and touched a ship wreck that sunk more than sixty years ago! It was a surreal experience that has left me with a feeling of self-satisfaction as well as endless curiosity. The two feelings very rarely take a house together in my mind. Probably the last time they shacked up together was when I got an admit for my Master's from State University of New York . The feeling of gliding underwater among the fishes, water pressure trying to burst your ears drums, flying over huge boulders of rocks under sea; like an un...

The best way to start anew is to start simple yet big! Simplicity is attractive in any form; whether it is the simplest form of an idea, design or even a human being. It carries with it the power to affect thousands when complexity restricts itself just to a handful. There are numerous examples around us where a simple idea became a big time hit! Whether it was Apple's iPod, Google's home page or Indian " jugaads ". Ideas like Mahatma Gandhi's non-violent movement, Nelson Mandela's efforts on reconciliation (forgiveness) or more recently Juan Mann's free hugs campaign were simple yet powerful enough to carry their effect through the human biases. The inherent infectious nature of these real simple ideas leaves us happily vulnerable to unknown outcomes that always follow them. As I welcomed 2011 into my life I was asked by someone whether I had any new year resolutions. A confession here, I am not a resolution kinda guy. But that set aside I thought why ...

Recently I read " Why the Best Solutions Are Always Temporary Ones "  by Peter Bregman   on Harvard Business Review . The article did brought up some interesting points. These points I must add are worth sharing with you. The article's central theme is (and I quote) because nothing is perfect, and nothing lasts forever. So we're better off seeing every solution as temporary, every tool as potentially valuable and probably fleeting (unquote). This belief aligns with two areas I love to read about these days:  acting  and  spiritualism.  Let's take acting first. In one of my older posts I wrote about actress Hilary Swank talking about  forgiving ourselves when things don't seem to work . In these moments we tend to exert ourselves to make things work which is most of the times counterproductive. These are the moments which destroy our psychological and emotional construct. Actress Julia Roberts talks about not burying ourselves within heaps of self...

I know, it's a very catchy title for my post. Julia Roberts and Elizabeth Gilbert are probably two of the most famous names from the field of arts. These two artists have risen to pinnacle of probably the two most toughest forms of human creativity; acting and writing.  These two forms of art require large amounts of inspiration as well as perspiration from the person trying to pursue it. And interestingly the unemployment rate is highest in these fields. However there is a certain attraction that draws thousands of people to delve into their lives and bring out something new through acting and/or writing. (A trivia; Julia Roberts is starring in the lead role for a movie based on Elizabeth Gilbert's memoir called " Eat, Pray, Love "). Although there are lot of things to learn from these artists but they do form an epitome of a characteristic that has shaped their magnificent careers. Julia Roberts If you think of Julia Roberts you would probably think about the...