To the one lonelisome out there,

Who is alone, in the whole crowd,

Disconnected with SELF,

What bothers you now,

Is it the typical laborious life?

Or your choice of it,

Ever did you consider, my dear friend,

To break the shackles of the systemic poison dripped into you,

For years and years,

All those innovative years of childhood,

You have learnt and been taught,

Learnt to be a slave in a way,

Taught to live with the system,

Complain, to nobody than yourself,

Lose your confidence, and life in a way,

Have you never, felt the spiritual unhappiness,

Living without excitement everyday,

Doing the thing you dislike,

For the reason of making a living,

What are you doing my friend?

Killing your SELF, to make a living?

Or think again, is that just existence you fighting for?

When you are destined to LIVE life,

Enjoy it, every moment,

To reach the unexplored,

To taste the unknown,

Lead and make a mark of your own,

Show the world your uniqueness,

Did you ever try?

Tell me No,

Nobody is going to tell you,

Never will they, what to do,

As zombies, in the system,

They move,

Unable to break the shackles of the systemic maze,

They shall continue,

They are fed with the constant poison of definition,

Than the true potion of appreciation,

Those inhabitants of the world, are destined,

To be a denizen what they are,

To take pride in being mediocre,

To be what they wanna be,

Do you wish to be one among them? Or

Do you want to let you loose your divinity,

The spiritual happiness,

What you seek,

Is all around you giving you every opportunity,

Open your eyes, and

Grab it, cos nvr will it again,

Be as close as it is now,

Never will it again,

Knock on the doors uncared for,

The power within you,

Know it,

Connect to it, and capitalize on it,

That opportunity runs away with time,

Break free my friend,

Free from the limitations set by the world,

More importantly the words “ I can’t”,

Try, Be, Conquer, and Explore,

Live life than mere exist,

Make it worthwhile,

Dream on, Live on….. again and again…

- Praneet Dixit

PS: While the poet has left the choice of title to me, his choice is "STUFF" :)

I’ve got nothing against sales agents, really. I’ve had my share of chasing people in malls and streets, trying to get them to answer questionnaires for my marketing assignments. Since then, I’ve always tried to politely refuse the salespersons, whose livelihood depends on disturbing people’s lazy Sunday afternoons. But some approach you so persistently that you either give in just to escape the drivel or you simply lose it and get labeled as the ‘Un-cool Customer’.

And sometimes the experience is simply scary. I was at my bank recently to pick up a new debit card. Everything went fine at first… “Please have a seat sir. I’ll take a couple of minutes to get it”. I have nothing to do except stare at offers and deals jumping at me from every direction – posters, danglers, life-size cutouts… you name it. Finally Ms. Bank Clerk extends an envelope towards me with a “Here’s your card, sir”. I reach out for the envelope, but something’s not right. You know the familiar phenomenon called ‘giving’ where one person holds an object and then the other lets it go? Well it didn’t quite happen. Did I miss something?

I gave Ms. Clerk a puzzled look but she was just smiling naturally - just the way she does eight hours a day, six days a week. “Sir, have you considered our wide range of options for your investments?” Uh-oh… there it was. I just stood there like a deer startled by headlights. I live a block away from the bank and it was a Saturday; I was wearing a crumpled t-shirt I had slept in, with fading, worn-out shorts and a pair of dirty, unbuckled slippers to complete the effect. Why did she think any self-respecting bank would consider me a potential customer for their ‘wide range of options for my investments’?

In spite of my appearance I couldn’t tell her I wasn’t fit to make any investments at this point in my life. Nor could I publicly announce that I had already pissed away all my money in my shopping fantasies, even before my first paycheck hit my account. I also couldn’t run for my life - she just wasn’t letting the envelope go! So I stopped opening and closing my mouth like a goldfish and came up with the smartest reply I could think of: “Wha…??”

“You’ve got a lot of options to choose from: long-term, short-term, low-risk high-yield… blah blah blah… jargon jargon jargon… crap crap crap…” If you’re one of those people whose brains simply go blank as soon as they’re exposed to financial terminology, you know exactly what I’m going through. Anyway, a few unconscious hours later I tell her to stop and offer a brilliant excuse.

Me: “Well, you see… I’ve already made my plans for investments some place else” (Ha! Got you!)
Ms. Clerk: “Oh, I see. Which bank?”
Me: (Oops!) “Well… er… you see… my friend… works in this particular bank… er… so in that bank only… heh heh…”(I swear I mentally apologized to every single batch-mate of mine who got recruited into a bank.)
Ms. Clerk: “Why not this bank?”

The only time I remember being grilled with dead-end questions like this from a sweetly-smiling woman was when I was taken to my school principal’s office for some mischief which I prefer not to remember right now. I do remember I tried hard even then, to suppress instinctive questions like “Why the hell do YOU care?” Fearing for my new debit card’s safety, I came up with the brainwave of the day. “Hehehe… the thing is, we are a group of friends who collectively decided to invest in the same friend’s bank as a personal favor…”

What a story! They say the brain has two halves. One half of mine was gloriously cheering me on, and the other was screaming to make me stop, unable to bear the torture of belonging to such a numbskull nitwit. Ms. Clerk simply stared back at me with a blank expression. I’m sure she would’ve believed me if I had said I breed dinosaurs for a living, instead of going on and on about my Group Investment Plan crap. And then it all happened in a fraction of a second.

She got distracted by her phone ringing. I snatched the envelope and fled, leaving a slipper behind. Laugh all you want, but I’m sure she must’ve chased me atleast for a short distance.

And today when I tried to upload this post, I discovered my net connection was down. I called up the helpline, went through the complete set of recorded instructions, waited for a decade to get a response (meanwhile listening to an annoying voice excitedly screaming offers and schemes into my ear) and then finally got through to an agent and explained the problem with my internet. He comes up with his well-trained question, “Sir, do you have Net-Expert installed on your computer?” I thought for 10 seconds before feebly muttering a ‘No’.

“Well, sir. You see, we have this great software which is absolutely perfect for your needs…”

The above post was featured on the erstwhile uber-popular blog of Ishu's :D Couldn't come up with a suitably good (new) post for a cameo on Athena's page, so decided to go with my favorite one. Keep encouraging yourselves and others to write in here. Kudos to Athena for a novel effort. Chao! ~ http://theishu.wordpress.com

I am surprised at the way internet/social media has revolutioned the way we communicate. Most of us are on Facebook, and as much as we hated the new format, it has brought about a shift in the way we connect with people. If you thought Facebook was to 'get in touch' with your friends, it isnt any more. It is about status msgs, updating links, being parts of groups, supporting causes etc.

Social media tools includes Facebook, Twitter, Youttube, blogs etc. These days, more and more organisations are using these tools to create an awareness about their products innovatively and to create a formidable online presence. I am using this too.

I have seen an increase in the number of hits to this blog though many havent been leaving behind comments.

My story - in short :
I use Facebook to increase visibility for my blogs. As soon as I update my blog, it shows up on my Facebook profile. As and when a writer posts on this blog, I update my status msgs and trust me, it has been helping me. The number of visitors being reffered from Facebook has increased.

Are you using Facebook/ Orkut/ Twitter to your advantage? To get more people involved, I want to know how the internet or social media has changed the way you connect with people.
Tell me your story.
( I am yet to register on Twitter though!)

"Change" is the term that everyone adores. Though sometimes we want things to be the same as what has been the case, there is an element called 'betterment' that adds/increases productivity to/in the system through an improvement over what it has been, that lets each of us to chant for change. Change is constant but leads us to receive two results, worsening or betterment.

What is your present situation now? Worst? Worse?? Better??? the best:-? It depends as is the case with any other. You can not rate it without referring to any other situation. You are in worst situation now, when compared to the recent good olden days. You might be better now when you see it with a feel good factor. Or You might have also felt that you are in the best situation over all what you have faced and you might wish things be the same. It is comparative. You always have a reference point when you rate something.

When you think beyond this, with no reference frames, you will always find something that at some point of time, you feel like it would have been better to what it was if your decision was something else to what you actually chose.

'Need' has something to do with change. When you 'need' something you want something to be changed. Your need might be either instantaneous or eventual and long-lasting.

If you are conscious of your need in a social point of view, we are needed to choose between two things.
1) Soothing our need temporarily or to see the results immediately that may not produce a permanent solution(In our case, especially).
2) Planting the seed and wait for the SYSTEM that will, at some point of time, give us solutions that lasts for long.

And, This is one of the few most important chances that one get to make a decision out of.

By no chance, Have I decided to miss the voting this time. I am 25 now, where in a number of election processes have already been passed, and, I have not yet involved in the elections through voting. This time, I strongly wanted to be a part of the process and I got my voter ID, and :), unless I don't find my name in the voters list at the polling booth, I would be sure voting this time.

Agenda is not the only thing to look for. We should also look forward to see a political party that plays a political opposition to be matured, problem conscious and solution oriented, and, a political party that governs us to be more matured to receive criticism and with a problem solving approach.

I am not here to campaign for any political party but I want you to plant the seed.

I have been trying for quite sometime now to make a re-entry to blogging and when Mrunal came up with this new blog idea, I decided it was time. Being my first guest post, I will stick to the one subject I love the most – Cricket.

Cricket versus T20

Along with over-arm bowling, Kerry Packer and the third umpire, T20 will undoubtedly go down in history as one of the few things that changed the game forever. Like all those changes, the impact of T20 was not immediate – Two years and an Indian win in the inaugural World cup was what it took to capture India’s, and thus, the cricketing world’s, imagination. Smartly, Lalit Modi & Co stepped in. A few cash-rich corporates, some of the world’s best players, a borrowed concept and a booming economy (on second thoughts, just a growing economy) took care of the rest. No one even remembers poor Subash Chandra now.

Well, with IPL2 ready to rock South African audiences and Indian televisions, I thought about why IPL1 didn’t fascinate me as much as it should have. Surely, if not for all the glitz and glamour, atleast the big names and the cricket on display should have had me. First and foremost, I guess it was the city-based teams’ concept. I really didn’t feel that passionate about supporting my city, or any city for that matter. And when Mathew Hayden, Joginder Sharma and Andy Morkel turn out for Chennai SuperKings, whatever little you felt is also gone. On the other hand, when Team India is playing, it’s a totally different ball game. The ecstasy that an Indian win brings is truly unmatched and so is the disappointment at a narrow loss.

The second thing that doesn’t work for me is the whole T20 concept itself. Sure, it gets over in three hours and fits television audiences perfectly but for a serious cricket fan, the cricket on view is not as pleasing as Test or one-day cricket. I remember seeing the inaugural T20 WC and truth be told, I fell for it. What nail-biting excitement it provided and of course, India kept winning. Two years on, the format has not evolved as much as it should have with the result that we keep seeing batsmen trying to hit every ball for a six. Swing and seam are gone; Flight and loop have been forgotten and it’s all about getting the Yorker length.

There is no doubt that T20 has given an exciting twist to the gentleman’s game. As Richie Benaud famously remarked “Test cricket is what parents take their kids to and T20 is what kids bring their parents to” (or some such thing). It has got a whole new generation of people hooked onto cricket. It has got more money into the game and for a cash-strapped ICC, it’s a huge opportunity. But let this opportunity not lead us to the demise of the game. Let it not turn cricket into some fast-paced action thriller where power and purpose take control over skill and strategy. The Dhonis and Gambhirs of today were brought up on Sachin’s Sharjah-like innings. Let Yuvaraj’s six sixes in an over not be the role model for tomorrow’s cricketing princes. Let T20 be what it is - the fun-filled, relaxed form of the game.

It’s a tribute to the game that Test cricket is still considered the pinnacle by its players and fans. And it’s a tribute to its administrators that they have maintained the balance between all the three formats. Undoubtedly, the big challenge will be to sustain the same in the coming years. Let’s maintain IPL as what it is – a cleverly packaged entertainment show with cricket as its anchor. Let it stay as the format where Buchnan tries out his multi-captaincy theories and Modi his time-out commercials. But let’s not take it beyond that.

I usually come across ppl who tell me that they are too shy to write. Some of them have resigned themselves to the fact that they can never write well, though they still nudge the hope of writing what they think and feel - an urge to shout out to the world whats bothering your mind - it could be a story, a concept, a movie review, a book review, a gadget review, a daily update, a stock market view or a general observation about life.

I am willing to help all you souls through my blog. You will get to publish your articles on my blog. If you are unsure, I will help you develop the story line or help you with proof reading and editing. If you choose to not identify yourself, you could give yourself a nickname, and be rest assured that I wont divulge the information.

Why would you use this option? This helps you to remain anonymous if you wish; you can still be lazy about creating your own blog; you can enlist my help in editing/proof reading/concept stage; you get to share your story with the world; you dont have to register like you do everywhere else to access the content; and last but not least, it gives you the confidence to start a blog of your own.

Whats in it for me? I am interested in your stories and I wanted a place where I can read all the stories at a stretch instead of wading through a lot of blogs in search of something good - this esp goes out to those who dont update the blogs regularly! I love to hear your stories and I love to tell mine... what better place to start this than my blog!

Reach me at mrunalini@gmail.com, if you are game. Time to vent out you frustration, among others.

PS1: I might consider sketching out some writers agreements just so that we dont disagree on these little things in the future - depending on the response I get.

PS2: Please feel free to forward this link to all those who might be interested in this

PS3: I am considering publishing all of these on a new blog altogether