Perspective Of Life

One day, the father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the express purpose of showing him how poor people live.

They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.

On their return from their trip, the father asked his son, "How was the trip?"

"It was great, Dad."

"Did you see how poor people live?" the father asked.

"Oh yeah," said the son.

"So, tell me, what you learned from the trip?" asked the father.

The son answered:

"I saw that we have one dog and they had four.

We have a pool that reaches to the middle of our garden and they have a creek that has no end.

We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night.

Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.

We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight.

We have servants who serve us, but they serve others.

We buy our food, but they grow theirs.

We have walls around our property to protect us; they have friends to protect them."

The boy's father was speechless.

Then his son added, "Thanks Dad for showing me how poor we are."

Isn't perspective a wonderful thing? Makes you wonder what would happen if we all gave thanks for everything we have, instead of worrying about what we don't have.

So, appreciate every single thing you have.

Dare to feel...

True Courage is the strength to show all kinds of feelings. Daily we come across many quarrels, discussions or accidents where we feel we should express our feelings or emotions or sometimes our help, still we fail to do that. I find many of us developed a fear of expressing oneself. Even at workplace, people feel insecure to ask doubts or to show his opinion where a crowd is gathered. Does my opinion have a meaning? Will other consider me a stupid? Such fear leaves that person thinking about his opinion or doubt for the rest of discussion. These circumstances become more critical when such person involved in a strange atmosphere.

Before a week, I went to play cricket. While returning, my group stopped at a tea stall to have tea. As we took our seats, an old woman started shouting on a young man. We were just trying to understand the situation, they started a quarrel and the noise was irritating. The quarrel was about some money that young man had borrowed. None of the spectators tried to stop them. Suddenly one of my group members who even didn’t know “Gujarati”, in which the altercation was going on, stood and asked that old woman to take money from him and he also convinced the young guy that he should not shout on elders especially on such an old lady. That young man felt guilty and apologized, he also promised to return money as soon as possible. My whole group was shocked watching my friend’s daring to express what he felt. Even language didn’t stop him from expressing himself.

I have observed the same thing in case of accidents. Though helping is a noble act, we stay in dilemma whether to involve in that matter or not. I have seen many of my friends who like to stay away from an accident place. When you go out for a walk and suddenly you see a person fallen of his bike, you will first stop, think to help and before you answer yourself, other people around will be gathered and help the victim. Once you convince yourself that situation is ok, you will continue with your business. We all may have such experience, but don’t consider you didn’t ask for help as others were gathered. It is also the same fear that prevents us from showing our gentle feeling. A strong person in such situation still goes close to the victim, asks him how that happened and shows sympathy. Even he tries to lighten up the mood by producing some humors.

A well conditioned athlete falls into tear after victory or a participant in beauty pageant once declared winner shows her great surprise and happiness. In such occasions, we can see how much that person is strong not only physically but also emotionally. We should not hide our feelings out of fear and that decides our true strength. Once you eliminate such fears, you won’t stop expressing any kind of feelings whether you may be standing in a crowd. As emotions flow, self-confidence is raised and hence our inner strength.

"India Vs India" - India Poised Anthem

There are two Indias in this country.

One India is straining at the leash, eager to spring forth and live up to all the adjectives that the world has been recently showering upon us.
The other India is the leash.

One India says give me a chance and I'll prove myself.
The other India says prove yourself first and maybe then you'll have a chance.

One India lives in the optimism of our hearts.
The other India lurks in the skepticism of our minds.

One India wants. The other India hopes.
One India leads. The other India follows.

These conversions are on the rise. With each passing day more and more people from the other India have been coming over to this side. And quietly, while the world is not looking, a pulsating, dynamic new India is emerging.

An India whose faith in success is far greater than its fear of failure. An India that no longer boycotts foreign-made goods but buys out the companies that make them instead.

History, they say, is a bad motorist. It rarely ever signals its intentions when it's taking a turn.
This is that rarely-ever moment. History is turning a page.

For over half a century, our nation has sprung, stumbled, run, fallen, rolled over, got up and dusted herself and cantered, sometimes lurched on. But today, in our 60th year as a free nation, the ride has brought us to the edge of time's great precipice.

And one India - a tiny little voice at the back of the head - is looking down at the bottom of the ravine and hesitating.

The other India is looking up at the sky and saying it's time to fly.

Source : India Poised

Download Video : http://www.indiapoised.com/video2.htm

A Blessings In Disguise

This is a success story of my cricket team. My company participates in an inter-corporate cricket tournament every year. We had a great history of “not winning” a single game in the cup from last two years. But this year, lady-luck changed partner. We prepared a cricket team the same way we do each year. Most of players were the same but this time we participated with a hope to win at least one match.

Our first match was with a poor opponent. With great surprise of all, we scored highest runs in the first inning. We crushed opponent’s all hopes to win by setting an unachievable target. But when we came to bowl, we were too relaxed that opponent chased the highest target made ever in this tournament. We were shocked; we could not convince ourselves that we continued the history by losing highest total targeted match. We hardly spoke to each other and we left the ground. I could not find a single word to describe the situation when I came home back; but only disappointments.

The next match was a knock-out match; do or die situation for our team. We had two weeks in between. We came to company, and decided to practice daily. “Sometimes wining is everything” was true for us now. With a new start, we worked hard on practice. I found everyone was doing his best on the ground. We were waiting for the next play, our turn to show what we were and what we could.

With the end of two weeks, our wait came to an end and we were again standing on the same ground where people saw us losing all the way. Adding to our fortune, the opponent was a three time champion team. But this time we did not want to give away a single chance to our opponent. As per our plan, we won the toss and opted to bowl first. The reason behind our decision was also unorthodox. The day was a chilled cold day and we arrived on ground an hour earlier; so we had enough warm up practice; and our opponent being so confident had not have any warm up exercise even. So we thought to get some early wickets. With the start of innings, their wickets fell like castle of cards falls. With the lowest score on the ground we sent the entire team to pavilion. And we won the game with little extra effort in batting, And Yah! We did it. But we did not relax this time, now our target was not a single match but tournament itself. We kept ourselves on the same track we followed for second match; and we won the whole series.

With the ball, which was hit for winning run, in my hand I was looking at my team, thinking what made this day so enjoyable; our victory of the day or this stage achieved after our first defeat. This tournament left me with many memorable events and a great moral of life "how weak or strong you are if you get relaxed once reaching close to success, it will be snatched from your hands as you are not the only one waiting for it. You have to be consistent until you climb the peak of success and still have to work hard to be there.”

Killing Me Softly...

IT being a booming industry has not only provided lots of job opportunities but also affected mindset of people, their living standards, their hobbies and most adversely their attitude towards society and corporate life. I have seen people walking out from one job and joining other so frequently, even sometimes they themselves don’t how many companies or cities they changed. I never understand how they can settle so easily and so fast to new places. They created such a disputed mindset that no work place can satisfy them for a long period, resulting into another change. IT market has become a bidding place where a person bids for himself, day to day forgetting what loyalty means.

Despite of committing to work, such people do not honor their work, and start creating a vicious circle among them, leading into disappointments of people who really work. I saw a great leg pulling competition taking place among people of different hierarchy in IT industry. No one appreciates other person’s thought or work. Though internet bring people close by communication means, but increased distance by emotions. You even might not know where your close colleague lives or who are in his/her family.

I dreamed to be an IT professional when I was kid. But today being an IT engineer, I never felt the qualities of a good engineer. Sitting on a rolling chair for the whole day, surfing internet, I don’t utilize any of my skills. Every time I saw snaps of bridges, great buildings, I ask myself how this could be so perfect. They are not powered by Copy-Paste principle of software engineering (Reusability in technical sense). Thank God!! I am a software engineer where mistakes are allowed and I can correct it in later stage.

On the horns of a di'lemma

"Money rules the world" being belief of new age youth, young person has extreme desire to be rich in small period of time. Persons who are not left with great legacy need to be at that stage by their own. They stop studying as soon as possible, and start working for good MNCs. I have seen many boys and girls leaving their study incomplete and join some call centers saying we want to be self reliant.

But there are few people who has to forcefully join work, ending their study after graduation. They want to study more but their desires are bound due to financial or social positions. Once they stand on their feet well, their desire of studying starts playing in mind again leaving that person in a great dilemma whether to work or study or do both. Such a person can't leave his job as his income makes him capable to stand in this material world. As soon he decides to join study with continuing job, he is demoralized by his colleagues and even from his family. "Part time MBA has no value", "If you join study, you would stuck here for a long time", "People leave part time course due to burdens, you will too run away in few months" are some responses that person will get from his close friends even.

But the fact is that no one can understand your thoughts better than you. If you decide to study with work, don't ask others, instead ask yourself how will you utilize your study. Does your study has any importance or not merely depends on yourself. No study in the world makes you wise and no study or college guarantees your future. It is in your hand to show that your study was not worthless and prove all critics wrongs. After all, the greatest joy of doing something is when somebody says it is impossible.

Welcome

Hello Everyone…

This is my first attempt to express myself by means of internet. But before I start, I want to share my past experiences of writing skills, with you.

Writing thoughts was like a nightmare for me during my teenage. When I needed to write an essay for examination, I got into great trouble. I found neither a word nor a thought to put on the paper. I hardly wrote an essay of one full page. Even in paraphrasing, I used to skip 2 lines and write the third one in my answer. And most amusing experience was titling a paragraph. I used to skim through the paragraph and find most difficult word to understand and choose it as title.

Still I miss those days. Now you may think how do I become so brave to start a blog? I will give all credits to my friend Sandy for inspiring me to write inspiring thoughts. He is a great writer and my best friend; he also run a blog whose link can be found from “Blogs I Read” list. Thank you Sandy….

Now, about choosing starting date of my blog, I really liked 1^st April “The April Fool Day”. Don’t know whether I will be a fool doing this or not ;)

Mostly I will put my struggle in life on blog; it will be like autobiography. I plan to put short moral stories even. And I will put articles regarding my experience with human community whether it would be a moment of fun or condemning immorality.

So that’s all. Please give your suggestions to improve my blog and myself too.