Beyond the obvious...

Vacation time is good time. It’s easy to opine that although vacations are fun, but are totally unproductive. I sometimes feel otherwise.  Although for the most part of a day, I laze around. But it is in these periods of lazing around, our sub-conscious does miracles. Chances are, the longer our brains are unoccupied, the deeper we can dive into our sub-conscious and churn out thoughts, interests, plans or epiphanies, so to say. I still remember that BBT episode where I formally encountered this idea; Sheldon Cooper, stuck with a particularly complex research problem, tries to take up menial jobs, so that some part of his brain (In my dictionary it is  sub-conscious, although there is some other scientific name for it) can concentrate on the problem in the background. He finally succeeds, working as a waiter in the restaurant. Then again, there is an episode where he resolves to make his day-to-day decisions by throw of a dice, so that, the major part of his brain can focus on his research in the background. Such realizations can be phenomenal and occur in the fraction of a second – like that moment when Mr. Nash stumbled upon his million dollar idea of best group strategy in a competitive environment in ‘A Beautiful mind’. 

It sure feels funny to be quoting movies and TV series here rather than more authentic sources, but I believe a good amount of research goes into these and at-least the scientific material presented can be trusted.

Let’s recognize the power of sub-conscious and try to consciously use it.

Cheers,

Pradeep.

Success of Satyamev Jayate - Is it unfortunate ?

“Satyamev Jayate” doesn’t need much of an introduction. A show in which the legend, Aamir Khan, takes up pervasive social issues, one at a time – discusses them, analyzes them and tries to provide solutions for the same.

If numbers are to be believed, 84 million watched the the first episode of the show with a TRP of 4.27, the highest ever. “Satyamev Jayate” was the top search in India on Google Trends. Within three weeks, it has around 1 million fans on facebook. The show has instigated huge waves of discussions on various social networking sites. In short, the response generated for the show is unprecedented.

It’s feels good to know that we, as a society, are embracing these blows to the age-old traditions with open arms. It gives us a sense of confidence in the inherent goodness of our people. It strengthens our hopes of our nation becoming a super-power in future. 

But, amongst all these success stories, amongst all the satisfaction and hope, lies a disappointment in my heart. The disappointment is our sensitivity to the star power. Do we really need an Aamir Khan to teach us that we ought to say no to dowry, or that female feticide is not just a legal but an ethical crime as well.  It’s not that these issues have not been raised in India before, in-fact, the issue of dowry and female feticide are one of the most widely spoken about social ills. I have been watching the TV serial “Crime Patrol” on Sony TV – their core message being that every crime is preceded by clues and indications, which should be given proper consideration. They very recently broadcasted episode on female feticide, before Satyamev Jayate turned up. But as it turns out, it was no big deal. But suddenly aamir takes it up and whoa !, there’s been a miracle. The content was same, just form was changed.

To sum  it up, it is indeed unfortunate how we, as a society, are enthralled by the mighty, even on the trivial topics like dowry. But, at the same time, if an Aamir Khan is what is required to deliver results, then so be it.

Revival

A blog entry after almost 6 years. Let’s see how far I go this time. Last time, in 2006, it was just two posts within a month and then nothing for 6 yearsJ. Well, I feel I have gained the discipline and sincerity over the years to pursue my interests, it kind of comes default with age…but who knows, my intuition has proved wrong earlier. 

Ok, let me start by penning down the reason, I think, I am taking up blogging for. We constantly evolve over time- our perceptions, our thoughts, our needs, our wants, our likes, our dislikes, our relations, our priorities and our surroundings change over time. A lot of our thoughts are shaped up by the information and knowledge we have, and since, as we grow, this information set changes, so does our thoughts and other softer aspects. 

In life, love is essential. But to love anyone/anything other than our-self, we first have to love our-self and before that, we must know our-self. In-fact in my opinion, if we make as set of possible objectives for human’s life, “knowing self” would figure quite prominently in it. To know self, it’s important to understand what defines a person. From the top of my head, candidates can be our looks, our relationships, our achievements, our interests, our education our thoughts and our feelings. To the best of my understanding, our feelings are what define us, as they inculcate the impact of all others. But, feelings are much more abstract and difficult to capture. Also, a lot of activities, thoughts and events can converge to the same feeling. For example, you can happy because of promotion at work or by watching a good movie or by helping someone in need. Thoughts, which are a lower level of abstraction than feelings, have the capability to provide this distinction. So, a person’s thoughts are instrumental in knowing/understanding him. Keeping this in mind, my objective of blogging is devote time to understand/analyze my thoughts, create memory pegs for my thoughts and time-and-again, reflect on how my particular evolution-path has been.

Cheers,

Pradeep.

Some Comments on Commentators....

I was just going through the news paper where the column of achievements in Doha (2 gold in Tennis) reminded me of the stupid commentary i heard in the three finals.The finals were of Women Singles, Men's doubles and Mixed doubles.I saw all the three matches live and one thing i must say that the hindi commentators were ultra nonsense.Actually the commentators used to switch at regular time intervals and one could easily make out the intellectual differences between the hindi and english commentators.Their(hindi) two favorate sentences... "Dabao banaye rakhna hoga" and like "unhe chahiye ki woh acche khel ka pradarshan karen" arrree who the hell doesnt know that you have to play good to win..It was clear that the hindi commentators were not able to provide the insights , they just said the things which are pretty obvious, like telling the scores and stuff.

But, there is one thing to wonder...This insensible commentary ... is it because the commentators themselves are stupid or they think the people listening to the hindi commentary are stupid .The reason can be any but... if its the later one i would like to tell that its not so....

Cheers.

Student out of form...??

Can a student be out of form as do cricketers and other sportsmen.I have a great friend rakesh(name changed ofcourse..).I know he is highly talented. But he doesnt have excellent records to prove his intelligence(those are quite good thou..). He always tells me that he doesnt have good marks since he doesnt care and i know that its true. But lately he appeared for CAT and didnt do well even there...which he was quite confident of. He was very depressed after that...According to him...he didnt know what went wrong... He definatly didn do his best...I tried to comfort him by making him think over the other options... He has a nice job offer and can go for it after graduation ...And more importantly if he goes for an MBA with a work-ex, it would count much more...But actually he knew all this stuff better than me, the real problem was his not performing gud in the exam... which made him rethink of his capabilities....which he was really confident of...i tried to solace him by giving the example of cricket and other sports where sometimes a sportsman is not able to deliver his best only because he is out of form...He didnt agree to this..and even i am not convinced with this arguement.

" You dont do well in an exam....REASON:- That was not your day" sounds pretty weired to me atleast... But i was just wondering if this could apply to competetive exams like CAT and stuff...where more than the preparations your concentration and you know, speed and intellgence pays....these things may vary day to day rite.

But just being talented is not enuff you have to prove it to the world(thats what my friend says and i agree)...and if you go out of form in those rare chances to prove yourself .... its not good... i mean its just not the way it should be...but the thing which puzzles me still is .. is the out of form concept valid in competetive exams...??