The New Moon

It is midnight and I am sitting in my balcony, where a gentle breeze is caressing my hair and the night has fallen in the lap of silence. While I look at the buildings near and far, the yellow lights, the shadows of surroundings and the stillness of the moment, my eyes catch gaze of something in the night Sky. The Big White New Moon gleaming with Sun rays. So exquisitely white that even its craters could not tarnish its purity.

A deep sigh of relief passes through me. All the thoughts of day at work, disturbances in life, an unknown tomorrow, just vanished when I saw the brightness of this beautiful natural satellite of ours. All commotion settled, tranquility prevailed and I did not know why I smiled. I am at Peace, WOW!!! But why? What did the Moon do? I could feel warmth in its appearance, proximity in its distance, a deep connection in its non-human existence. I think the very reason is this universe, the fact that we both are a part of this magnificent system, connects us with energy, so powerful, that it negates the need of words for a conversation. Right now, I can feel this energy in my eyes, which are stuck at the Moon, making it aware of its beauty, intimating it that “you have another admirer”, and thanking it for restoring my sanity & patience, for being so eloquent and for Being There, Being VISIBLE.  Meanwhile, my mind tries to capture the Moon’s light, its aura, as much as it can, so that it can treat me with the visuals, in my most tiresome times. I haven’t felt so serene in a long time. The last time was when I was in front of the Himalayas.

This just reinforces my belief in the ingenious of the creator of this universe, who would have made numerous ways in which the parts of this system could connect with each other, irrespective of living or non-living, but I guess we have  long forgotten this system, the NATURE, the originals….But this is what is true. Whenever you are disturbed, you just need to look at something that is not man-made and you will find peace and calmness. Even five minutes with the Naturals will give you so much peace that you would feel there is no need for liquor to get a high, to forget your worries. Try it next time…

My 15 minute trance with the Moon is interrupted by something and I realize that I need to sleep now or else I will miss the rise of yet another splendid creation “THE SUN”. So I am off to sleep now. Good Night!!!

Strength of Mind

In the cacophony of life, each character, when translated into an adjective, becomes a relative term. Talk about “Strength”, especially of mind, and you will know there resides different levels of it in each individual’s life. We think of having strong minds because each day we find resolve or at least try to find one for our numerous problems. Our situations and dilemmas seem so big that overcoming them, no matter how trivial they are, makes us feel proud and we proclaim of being driven by a strong mind that helped us face the situation and overcome it. TRUE - only till our vision and perspective is limited to our own life. Get out of your life, look around; and you will learn there exists a different definition of strength that can make you re-think your problems and abilities to tackle them. We feel strong enough after tackling trivial issues at work, sustaining relationships, earning a comfortable living and many other mundane things.

This is what happened the other day, when I was doing my routine work in office, cribbing about morning tea, contemplating my career, cursing my fate for making me a part of a miser company, my failure to buy a home and everything else? I took pride in the fact that I had a strong mind because, in spite of a not having all the above I could control my emotions and thoughts and do my work, thoroughly. I had to send an email to a client about a project and while thinking all this, I pressed the send button. POP - “out-of-office reply”. Taking a sigh of frustration, I was just about to close the message when my eyes read the message “I am still undergoing Breast Cancer treatment and may take time in responding to your email”. I read the message at least thrice and it shook me. Shocked and stunned, I just thought I was never going to receive a reply, just then came her email on the project scope and the way forward. This really got me thinking, how could a person struggling with death each day lead such a normal life? It is not possible. I can not work in slightest fever and cough and she is working with a cancer. How is it possible for her to carry on a normal life along with the chemotherapy? While my mind rattled off these questions, answers started pouring in too. Strength, is to live life fully amidst the imbroglio, to smile even when in pain, to walk against the wind, to hold no grudges, to forgive, to not succumb to situations but harness possessions and fight back. That’s STRENGTH redefined for me.

The Quality Conscious - Not for us

Quality – our Mission

Quality is core to the success of our company. We want to provide quality services to our clients. We are committed to quality; whether for our clients or for our employees. These are some of the mission statements made by the upcoming corporate firms in India. But, but, but when it comes to quality of work life for employees, the word Quality starts fading from the ruthless ears of the top management. Quality work-life, almost becomes an oxymoron. Its bitter, because it’s true, that each of us is appraised on the basis of the perfection with which we work in office, but when it comes to the services an organization ought to provide us, laxity conquers.

QUALITY – What is it? The cafeteria food which is worse than the food in a hostel Mess or the free of cost transport (one of the highlights used to lure potential candidates) which includes travel in rickety buses and rude drivers with rash driving skills as their forte, or the bus route which is deliberately planned to make an hour journey into two? And don’t even try talking to the management about it, because this is too small a matter for them to handle. Try going to the middle-management and you will hear only one thing - its imposed from the top. Where will you go? Your manager? Forget it. He would just say that these things are too petty for you to consider. Just concentrate on the quality of work you deliver and how the quality can be improved, you know our client has become more finicky on quality these days….blah blah blah….here baby.take the QUALITY CAPSULE yet again.

Corporate Hypocrisy

Here goes my first post about something that has annoyed me the most in my career, CORPORATE HYPOCRISY.

I could and would never be able to understand how people change their philosophies, ideologies, thoughts and eventually themselves to become what they hate the most. I have come across people who would initially disgrace the “Boss”the most, but later would love to go on dates with him. Such was the case with two colleagues of mine at my previous firm. They would always hate the "Boss"; take oaths to be good managers, rattle-off verses of wisdom. And then I see them hanging out with the same boss, who at some point in time was suppose to be nasty and cruel. The next appraisal cycle comes, and bingo, they get promoted and become the same nasty cruel boss. Change is the only constant, I know, but I guess there is a fine line between change and hypocrisy. The latter being applicable to people who change their thoughts for their convenience. The day, I joined the corporate world; I got to learn that hypocrisy is the name of the game. You are not allowed to be honest. In every town-hall, you would hear the newly promoted managers say: "I have learnt a lot in this company”. I wonder what learning meant for them. Was it about learning how to fake, how to be nasty to subordinates and slaves to bosses, how to make a normal deadline a challenging one so that subordinates can stretch and the managers get the appraisal? If that is what learning is meant to be, then I am glad I never took my lessons!!