Why the Happy Ending seems like an Unending Journey!!

Happy ending is the last and universal goal in general. We have been making all kinds of efforts to learn, grow and develop to arrive to state of happiness since time immemorial. And all these efforts and strides are to lead the life in a fashion of happily ever after, which is all fine, because this is the purpose of this life, a continuous betterment of essential life experience of humans. However, When we examine deeply, we find that the living has become very comfortable and well advanced ,credited to all the technological evolutions of last couple of centuries, but the essential life experience has been worsening only, and that is being substantiated by plethora of alarming trends and statistics globally.

So, what has been going wrong for all these years? Why after being so much trained by myriads of sources do we always meet to disappointment when it comes to the quality of life experience? Why do we keep on postponing our happiness? How do we reach to destination of ultimate joy?

Let's try to figure out the answer of all these questions through a systematic inquiry. Inquiry in itself is not just about analyzing and assimilating the available and handed over facts, but it does mean to question the status quo by digging deeply and not to accept at all till answer comes. Inquisitiveness is the tool towards blossoming of an individual..!!

So, let’s begin the journey by revisiting the life cycle since childhood. We all cherish our childhood for its innocence, blissed out joy, unconditional love, a deep sense of freedom, profound inquisitiveness, fastest speed of experiential and effortless learning, an honest relationship with everything and everybody and so on. But unfortunately, all these manifestations of really valuable proposition of life, is curbed when we grow from childhood. We curb a very organic and beautiful manifestation of life and start giving the methods, tricks and dogged dogmas to arrive to those real values of life as joy, love, freedom, understanding and success through other way around. How sad this whole process is, first we curb the effortless outflow the same traits, for that we aspire throughout our life and then start cribbing about our fate and luck when we don’t arrive to destination of these real values of life.

We have been just fooling ourselves by teaching  that by doing something in a certain fashion; somehow we’d arrive to the happy ending. Like they say, that get a degree first and after that life will be all good and happy, and we get ourselves enrolled in a course to feel that happiness, and what we later realize “that happiness” is all missing what we would had thought of three/four years back. Then after the self created disappointment, we again give a boost to ourselves that after getting a well paid job that happiness will come to me. And again, we feel cheated and screwed up by life when that J.O.B seems like Juice of Blood, which is being sucked out of me by my boss or company. So happiness is still missing, then we start searching that happiness in weekends parties and mindless shopping because advertisers and marketers are continuously telling that after having all these merchandises and products, you would feel a great value within your life, and story goes on in similar fashion, that emptiness still haunts us. And then, suddenly somebody would advise that get married now, your better half would definitely fulfill this emptiness, life will arrive to happy ending and what we realize after the "marriage of this kind", I don’t need to have any say on that.:)

 That vicious cycle is still there, that vacuum is still sucking us, marriage couldn’t fill that void, so we give a new booster to ourselves that after having our off springs and their giggles in our home that void will definitely be filled…and life again slaps us tightly by saying that, these foods of thought will never fill that void. These thoughts are not new, it has been practicing by generations, they have been suffering with the same stupidity and void, still due to default setting and conditioning of the mind, they have been transferring the same rubbish and suffering to coming generations unintentionally and unknowingly.

So, now we are in a position to figure out that, why this chase of happy ending seems unending and how come have we all been falling on the same track of similar kind of role plays which script has already been written. Role plays is all fine, but that should be played in complete awareness. And that awareness springs out innately from the source itself. Life is all about a complete immersion in the moment. This complete immersion facilitates a real connection with all these real values like love, joy, freedom, happiness and so on which is present by default within us. We need not do something to access them. We just need to be available for them. And this fact is well proven by the behavioral traits of a small untrained child. Its responses are spontaneous, effortless and with a full force of life. A child either cries or burst into laughter, both happens with the same intensity. Whatever we learn in childhood is very profound, very fast and has indelible imprints in our mind and this is all because of that complete immersion in life.

So, in order to end this seemingly unending journey, there is only one way-out. If the seed of my varied actions and role plays is rooted within our valued proposition of life like happiness, joy, love, freedom, peace; then I need not worry about the offshoots of those actions. Life is not a means to get an end. The moment we would start the efforts to shorten this gap of means and end, life automatically would start manifesting itself beautifully. Means and end must be embedded within each other implicitly, and then miracles are inevitable just like an accomplished singer or dancer, for whom, she and her performance are not separable, she and her craft are just embedded implicitly in complete harmony with the moment and then we are bound to say..Impeccable Performance!!

Image Credits: www.letthelittlechildren.com www.chezalpresents.com

Leadership is a Living Process; not a Position !!

There are 235,000,000 hits on the Google search term on definition of leadership. This is simply because the basic term or definition leadership implies a whole range of possible meanings and theories; consequently, they say that Leadership is not a Noun, It’s a Verb. So, in this article I am not going to discuss and deliberate over the different leadership styles and types of leaders but to investigate the leadership as a process and figure out the paradigm shifts in this journey.

#Whether a Leader is Born or Made?

This question comes every time in the scene whenever we discuss about leadership. Let’s try and figure out the answer. For a long time the Hollywood sponsored model of leadership has created for us the glamourous image of a leader as a hero on a horseback. We have confused leadership qualities with with height, weight and cover boy appearance. Leadership has nothing to do with the looks, it's not an object that one acquires or what can be thrust upon a person from outside. It is a set of subjective principles like awareness, vision, creativity, dynamism, courage, adaptability, decisiveness and so on and all these qualities emanates from within the self. So, leaders are born when people start sensing these subjective resources within themselves. So, by this viewpoint, everyone has the potential to be a leader as everyone has a Self, provided one could evolve upto the Self-Awareness to realize the abundance what he has been provided by default. Self-awareness is the key to all leadership qualities. Leader like Mandela is revered and recognized world-wide for the sake of his own self. His whole life stands for a cause-freedom, which is the innate value of every human being and therefore he became a symbol and brand of freedom which encompasses the aspirations of whole world looking for freedom.

#Self-Identification leads to the Greater-Identification

Leaders search very deep for their self- identity. A great identity conspires great possibilities in life which facilitates profound action choices. A search for our true identity is a kind of talent search within us by digging deep. There are latent talents that sleep within us as seed of possibilities which is having the blueprints to create a whole forest. When we discover these seeds, they grow and bloom. Imagine, Sir Isaac Newton who was asked by his mother to run the family farm saying that his identity was of a farmer! And if he would have identified himself with this provided borrowed identity then world would have lost one of its greatest revolutionary scientists who have changed the course of the human history. So, leaders are autonomous beings and they live in self-referral world. They like to assume responsibility for their own lives. The Greek philosopher Aristotle said, “Whether your talents and need of the world cross, there lies your vocation.” When our identity merges with the needs of the real world ,great thing happens.

#Integration from Compliance to Commitment

Compliance is the old paradigm of leadership. The industrial civilization taught us how to bind people through compliance. Compliance is a form of white-collar slavery. Compliance breeds fear, resistance and bureaucracy. A culture of compliance destroys creativity and disintegrates an organization.

 In today’s information and services dominated economy, the best talent always seeks those organizations which could reflect and resonates with their inner values and could provide a sense of fulfillment while discharging his duties. Bigger salaries and perks are not going to motivate them anymore and which is very evident from the alarming statistics of disengaged workforce worldwide. 

So, #21^st century’s leadership is bound to provide greater meaning and purpose to their people  that could inculcate a self sustained commitment toward their duties. Passion is the threshold of commitment. But don’t mistake passion as a momentary fling at something that fascinates our imagination. It is not like a matchstick that flares up and snuffs out in a moment. Passion is that spark which ignites possibilities of fire within. Passion is a sustained commitment to realize oneself.

 Andy Grove, the former CEO and Chairman of Intel, once said:

"No matter where you work, you are not an employee. You are in business with one employer-- Yourself….Nobody owes you a career-- You own it as a sole proprietor. And the key to survival is to learn to add more value every day."

Leaders recognize that the only commitment that a human being can make is a commitment to one’s own potential. We all are in this one business: to actualize our potential. Whether we are working for an organization or a community or a family, the only commitment we can make is to ourselves. This actualization of potential is a #living process like blooming of a flower from a bud, and so is the #Leadership.

                                             

                            Let’s Liberate the Potential Lies within Us!!

How to Get the Right Candidate on Board

Getting the right candidate on board is indispensable for any organisation or company. The basic intent and purpose of any organisation should be the well being of the people in general, because at the end of the day, we need to deal with the people only, either as a workforce for a company where the people facilitate all the processes of the organisation or the end consumer who utilizes the end products and services.

Leading and managing the workforce becomes comparatively easier if we have the suitable candidates from the outset. If you are entitled to pick and choose your people, then this 3-step method will help you out to select the right person for the job. These steps are- Estimation, Identification and Inspiration

• Estimate what “RIGHT” is: Analyse what you want this person to do and create a specific job description accordingly. What level and kind of skill sets and knowledge is required? For instance, does this person need to be “familiar with” or “expert with” MS Office tools? What personal attributes will they need to be successful and satisfied? If the team is working in an ever-changing environment, you will need a different type of person who should be pliable enough to adjust with. What type of person will fit in with your style of management and leadership? Will he require less supervision or more instruction? If you like to delegate and empower the workforce, then someone who needs constant comprehensive instructions will definitely be unhappy in your company. What kind of person will fit in with the other team members? This is really precarious, because sometimes someone who is similar is best, and at other times someone who complements the colleagues is the best.

• Identify the Right Person through Weighing Your Options: Now you have to find some potential recruits,so that you can utilize the answers you concocted in segment 1 above to draft an advertisement that helps people to know if they are qualified and trained enough and whether the job is the type they would be interested in. Once you have some prominent candidates to interview, you can again use the answers from segment 1 to help you discover and evaluate the responses. Those real time responses provide a clear picture of the candidate’s competence to do the job what you need them to do.

• Inspire That Person to Join Your Team: To survive in the volatile economic times of 21^st century, it has become imperative for the organizational leadership to inculcate a greater sense of meaning, purpose and value within their workforce. Once you have found the person you think is right, you have to sell and personify them the opportunity in your organisation. Up until now you have been focussing on your needs, but now you need to focus on their needs. As a manager and leader you need to ensure a certain balance in all your decisions to address the need of the task, the individual and the team as well. When you know what motivates a person, you can give them things that foster self motivation.

So,choose the right person for the job, he will be a happy person while discharging his duties,which in turn will make you a happy manager and leader!!

Six Building Blocks of Personality Development

Personality word comes from “persona” which means mask, in literal sense. Mask is just like a peel of a fruit and peel does not hold any significance of its own. The glow what peel reflects is because of the fruit which is embedded with this. We can’t keep the peel shining and glowing by sprinkling the water if the fruit is rotten. So, likewise personality is not like wearing a certain kind of mask all the time. Mask is only relevant as long as we are playing a certain role. After completion of that role we need to unmask ourselves, otherwise we start feeling bored. And this is the main reason of the epidemic which is known as "boredom", particularly in the privileged class across the world.

So, if personality is not a reflection of the individual essence, then it is just like a peel which is not embedded with the fruit anymore. Now, let’s try to understand development of the personality with the analogy of the tree. The first building block is the belief system; it’s like the root of a tree. Belief system is like programming of computer software over which the functioning of the hardware system depends upon. There are multiple factors like environmental influences, level of exposure, familial background and so on which helps out in shaping a certain belief system. The next step is the thought process which fundamentally depends upon the belief system, every thought what we come up with, crops out of the belief system and these two building blocks resides in the root which is not visible.

Hence, now we need to understand that whatever we think of anything is our own creation. We are the creator of our thoughts; nobody else is responsible for that. How we respond to an external stimuli is our own choice and that is being governed by the conditioned programming or the belief system. Let’s imagine a situation; the result of the final year of a graduate program is being displayed. The student, who has topped the chart, is obviously very happy and for him the whole ambience and atmosphere is very pleasant. But, the student who got failed, for him same ambience and atmosphere may seem very boring and obnoxious. So, it’s not the weather which is changing, it’s the two different minds who is perceiving the same weather differently as per their respective state of mind.

The next block is of the feelings. Feelings are nothing but the intense thought pattern. The kind of feelings we have most of the time, that shapes our attitude towards life. So, feelings and attitude constructs the trunk of the tree. These two factors are the supporting block of the tree of the personality. Then, the last two blocks are action and habit. The kind of attitude we have developed over the years that reflect in our each and every action. When our multitude of actions get repeated, that becomes our habit and when all our habits got accumulated that becomes our personality. Actions and habits are analogous to the branches and leaves of a tree. And the outliner of the tree loaded with the fruits and flowers tell about the personality of the tree. And this personality has a very rigid and concretised form and we start getting identified with this.

ROOT-Belief System & Thought Process

TRUNK-Feelings & Attitude

BRANCHES-Actions & Habits

OUTLINER-PERSONALITY

Therefore, these six building blocks, namely Belief System, Thought Process, Feelings, Attitude, Actions, and Habits are the foundation stone of the personality building. Whether this personality belongs to a person or an organisation, these six crucial blocks will always be there. And once I came to the realisation and understanding of these building blocks, I’ll no more be a personality. I’ll be spontaneous, unpredictable, and absolutely effortless in all my efforts. I’ll be driver of my personality, and will not be driven by my personality.

So, the next time when I am unhappy with my responses or actions, which is being performed by me without my consent, even for the years; but that response is bound to happen bypassing my faculty of mind and intellect. Then, I need to work upon my conditioned programming which is responsible for that response. If I am not happy with the outcome of my life, and still giving the same input with the similar software, expecting that the some magic will happen, and output will be transformed, so that is not going to happen. For a changed output, input and software must be changed. Likewise, if I want to keep the branches and flowers of a plant fresh and live, I need to provide the water and nutrients into the root, and not on a particular branch or flower.

And who will tell me that the time has come to revamp the software, nobody, but my own life experiences will tell me. If I am not happy with my actions, feelings and life experiences then, these factors are enough indicators that my programming has become obsolete and irrelevant. Time has come to rewire the fundamental programming with the pragmatic and dynamic intelligence and not with the handed over dogged dogmas and beliefs.

LESS Personality, MORE Presence; MORE Personality, LESS Presence !!

It’s Simple!! Let’s Make It Easy Too!!

Recently I came across an interesting discovery while I was conducting a workshop over People & Life Skills with final year engineering students of a Delhi based Engineering College. I started the session by asking their current life experience in general, just in order to understand how and in which mode I should pitch in the session. There was an underlying theme in all the responses and that was “Seemingly it’s simple but practically it’s not easy”. In their words there is a huge gap and disparity between the current life experiences and what they had dreamt of four years back.

But, interesting part of this discovery is, that whatever they had confessed about their personal life experiences, is not very peculiar. More or less, a major part of humanity on this planet can identify this adage, “It’s simple but not easy”. Whether this is the student or a professional, both of them feel themselves as a victim of the borrowed and projected realities of life.

So let’s decode the factors which make the whole process uneasy even after being simple!!

The most prominent factor is that we are still living in the hangover of past of poverty consciousness where all focus was to get a job and earn a living. If a small plant which is rooted in ground can earn its food without moving a single inch,an earthworm can earn its food being millionth part of human's size and intelligence then being the most intelligent species on this planet, at least we are sufficient enough to survive. The only need is to be available for what is already provided by this cosmos. The basic purpose of the education should be broadening and enlarging the horizon of human’s perception through experiential learning and not to just imposing with ready-made answers and information. Ready-made answers and information is necessary to operate a system but not sufficient to channelize the inherently unique potential of humans. And therefore this gap of reality and virtual reality is imperative.

If our perception of life and its peripherals is only limited to sense perceptions then we are bound to experience a constant intriguing emptiness within ourselves. All our sense organs take us to the world outside. Through our senses we are constantly channel surfing this world. Throughout the course of our lives, every bit of our attention is parceled out through our multi-sensory channels. They ensure that our lives are fully outbound. In the absence of a corresponding inbound attention we are fully depleted.

And if there inbound attention is present, then that would let us realize that sense perception has its own limitations. Like we humans can only hear a limited frequency range from 20Hz to 20000 Hz and see only visible range of light i.e. VIBGYOR and rest of the frequency’s band is beyond our experiential perception. So, logically it’s pretty obvious that if we had mistaken to our sense perceptions as the bottom line then suffering is inevitable. Sense perceptions have only survival relevance; it has nothing to do with existential relevance.

Being born as humans we are not here just to survive, but to realize our potential at fullest. So innately we are constantly seeking to be unbounded in all our means and efforts, but by creating the boundaries all the time. Boundaries are always designed by the experience of the past, but life is always instantaneously and constantly changing. So how can we apply a static and irrelevant rule of past for a dynamic and live phenomenon of life.  This dichotomy we had been practising for millenniums and this is the root cause of all suffering. Cosmos is ready to provide whatever it has, but we are not intelligent enough to receive that. Even being equipped with all the necessary hardware to realize the power of cosmic software, we are behaving like a handicapped just because our sheer stupidity of considering our sense perceptions as the bottom line of knowing and understanding.

We are full of instances and examples of our human race that had been able to exercise and attuned with the cosmic software. They were just available to that what was/is/will already available with open eyes and ears, not the conditioned one. Right from all the scientists, philosophers of early ages to modern days’ successful entrepreneurs, all of them belong to this. We have couple of  instances where the leading literary or scientific figures of the world were not able to get the systematic and smooth "formal education". But, what they have put down has become the curriculum for us to get our masters and doctorate.

They were not some special beings, they were just light beings. That lightness enables us to see the life as the life is, otherwise we are constantly loaded up with the concepts of life. Most of the prominent corporations of the present day, from Microsoft to Facebook and many more like this have been established by someone who has not even completed his formal education. These all successful entrepreneurs are nothing but the alive being in real sense . That aliveness makes them to see the opportunity to contribute to humanity when rest of the lot busy being cynical and complaining all the time.

                                      So It's Simple & Easy Both..Cheers to Life !!

MOTS: An Impediment to LEADERSHIP EXCELLENCE

MOTS  is a pejorative acronym which is used in corporate circle and business world for leadership failure. It stands for More Of The Same (MOTS). But this phenomenon is not just restricted with the world of commerce but do exist in our common social context as well. MOTS happens when we touch things on daily basis but do not feel them. MOTS happens when we talk a ton but communicate very little. Or, when we look again and again but fail to see. MOTS also happens when we live in the same house with our near and dear ones and still we are not courageous enough to have an honest interaction with them.  MOTS occurs also when we write elaborate letters & memos, but fail to get our message across.

So, what’s holding us back??

All these above mentioned instances are just “MORE” manifestation of the “SAME” phenomenon, and that phenomenon is SUPERFICIALITY. We are bound to perform a superficial behavior in our all kinds of interaction as long as we are being governed by readymade concepts of Life and all the expressions of life through which human beings actualize their potential. These expressions can find a millions of ways like science ,literature, engineering, business, commerce, art, technology and many more, whatever we could think of.

The fact of the matter is that the Human dynamism can’t be manipulated or treated like a machine. It can’t be programmed like a computer which is designed to provide a predefined output. We are designed to give outcome, which is a conscious affair, not for the monotonous output. Human beings are CREATED as The Most Sophisticated Creature on this planet, not CONSTRUCTED- that is why we love to create our own reality by default. In short, freedom is the innate nature of human beings which continuously fuels up to know the unknown, to see the unseen and whenever that will be tried to be curbed , an inherent opposition is obvious. We are the ones who are applying both the accelerator and brake at same time which will result only in the loss of fuel, loss of energy, loss of power, wear and tear of tyres and engine. And the same phenomenon holds good with us as well.

Motion is a mechanical phenomenon but misconstrued as Action most of the times. It  is another form of inertia and so there is a perfunctory student who waits to end those 50 minutes of his lecture session or the burnt out executive who  is waiting for weekends to come to unwind himself. Both of them has become the victim of acute motion sickness. If the action does not have the synchronization with our being, we are bound to sleepwalk through just the motion of our being.

Motion is all about speed and Action is just a rhythm which is nothing but a complete involvement with everything, irrespectively. True leaders do not care so much about speed; they are just attentive to rhythm. A marathon runner does not run at the same speed throughout the race. A leading runner attunes to a natural rhythm that facilitates him to actualize his entire capacity to run. The ancients had come to the experiential conclusion that all the rhythms of this world were integral to this one cosmic rhythm which encompasses the source of all intelligence.

Leaders recognize rhythm to be a law of life. We live our days in a natural rhythm of rest and activity. Corporations move in the rhythm of conquest and consolidation, acquisitions and mergers of market share. There is rise and fall in prices and values. The only way to evolve in life is to be ready to embrace both the so called highs and lows that come through life with same level of acceptance. Leaders are neither blinded by speed nor trapped by the mental or social model of success.

Success is nothing but the courage to take on the journey what you have faith in. Being an organization/entity/company, we need not waste our energy and resources in estimating the future of the industry. We should not view future as a predestined fate, but as an infinite series of opportunities and possibilities. What is indispensable to succeed in the middle of this ambivalence is “Contemporary Intelligence”. In order to deal with the Contemporary Issues, we need to develop contemporary intelligence. Contemporary Intelligence is the only real Intelligence which facilitates adaptability and teaches constant preparedness. Contemporary Intelligence is always there within all of us, we just need to allow that to surface.  It acknowledges the fact that the nothing succeeds quite as planned model and this fact is being manifested in the practices of all leading corporations across the globe.

This amazing story tells how Contemporary Intelligence operates in real world:

Two colleagues of a multinational company, one Korean and another American, were getting prepared to jog close to woods. The American saw that the Korean was in great haste to tie his shoe laces. Being baffled by the Korean’s bustle, he wondered, why are you so much in rush? Without saying a word, the Korean pointed out to a bush behind them. There the American was horrified to see a tiger advancing towards them. In a frenzied voice the American asked, “What’s the use of tying your shoelaces now? You can’t run faster than tiger! Korean replied, “I just need to run faster than you.” Then, without wasting a moment, he began to run.

JUST LIVE THE LIFE WITH THE OPEN EYES

NOT THE CONCEPTS OF LIFE WITH THE COLOURED GLASSES

Attention Deficiency Syndrome: Pandemic of 21st Century

This is not just the age of information and communication technology but also an era of attention deficiency. We are just busy in fixing the outside world with the help of technological evolutions and gadgets but “The Most Sophisticated Gadget” The Human Being has been completely vandalized in this process. All the gadgets and technological evolutions are the byproduct of “THE GADGET” but now “THE GADGET” has become the victim of its own creation like Frankenstein’s monster.

All these technological evolutions have provided us things to make our living comfortable, which is all fine but our essential LIFE EXPERIENCE is worsening only and that is also being substantiated by a myriad of alarming social trends like increasing rates of suicide, violence of all kinds ,depression and so on, all across the globe.

                                      So, now let’s figure out what went wrong!!

We all have our unique place in this cosmos by default because the DNA structure of every single human being on this face of earth is unique. So it’s pretty evident that everybody has been rewarded with a separate unique path of his own to lead his life-journey, but because of sheer stupidity, we lose the sight and fall in the same line of meaningless race as a SHEEPLE.

In order to find our own space we have to learn to stay centered. That subtle connection with the centre is the source of all encompassing energy. It is just like a center of a cyclone which is very quiet and it is this “Quiet Center” from which cyclone attains it’s horrendous power. It seems pertinent to mention a few lines written by a Latin American Poet. It goes like:

Still Still

The forest knows where you are

You must let it find you!!

The sages and yogis of ancient India did exactly that. They did not roam around the world in the quest of truth. They looked for it in the stillness of their own beings and figured it out! In the 21^st century very few of us live in forests. However, we have to deal with the jungle of information overload. If we have lost ourselves in the wilderness of information, the only way out is to find our centre in the calm depths of a reflective mind. It is like searching a misplaced key by quieting our mind rather than rushing around the room.

We must make peace with this jungle to find ourselves in it. The fragmented world of information is held together in the wholeness of our attention. This attention knows the relevance of information. This attention puts the information in its proper context and perspective. This attention brings us home to ourselves.

Every Information/external stimuli absorbs our attention and excess of information therefore, results in complete loss of attention! Unless of course we put in a conscious effort and care within ourselves to create greater attention capacity within us.

The draught of attention everywhere - from the living room to showrooms. In the world of trade and commerce, brands germinate and terminate in a short span of attention. Either we take examples of consumer durables, FMCG or music and film industry.The script is same whether it is boardroom, living room or bedroom. One out of every two marriages in western world fails for lack of attention on the part of spouses. A troubled professional is channel surfing for hours on his living room television or surfing the net, not in particular, for that matter. So the trend is being manifested in all our relationships.

But the most disappointing & disturbing of all these attention lapses is that we have messed up ourselves so much that we can’t have an appointment with ourselves even for moment! And even if we get some odd seconds free, we become restless and start searching some gadget or somebody to which we could outsource our anxiety and frustration. It’s just like that our body and soul live like two decent neighbors in adjacent flats in a luxurious apartment but they never get to meet.

We take time off to service our car, upgrade the upholstery décor of our drawing and living room and so on but, there is no time to refresh our relationship to ourselves. This is nothing less than suicide. We have capitulated the vitality of our lives to drab economic equations: while making a living we have completely botched up the life.

So, what is stopping us from realizing to the greater profound and unique capacities we are born with??

As per my gut response, it is ego. This ego only prospers with the fodder of continuous attention. We want a bigger car and bigger house not to accommodate our body but to massage our ego. If we start examining our responses and reactions to the external stimuli in a course of a day, we would come up with the conclusion that most of the responses are governed by ego, not by self. Ego is nothing but an accumulation of all the labels and identities what we have acquired from the outside. These acquired identities do not have any existential relevance, they do have the social relevance but up to an extent, beyond that they start suffocating us. And the brunt of this suffocation is being felt by us very evidently in our current socio-economic, socio-cultural scenario cutting across all the boundaries and geographies.

                          Some practice points to DATE YOURSELF!

1.      To start with, set aside few minutes for active and productive reflection. Explore what mistakes you committed or what you could have said or done better.
2.      Another way to connect with ourselves is to start witnessing some of the activities what we perform on regular basis in the course of the day. This practice helps us in realizing the power of ourselves as observer.
3.       One of the ways to have a self appointment is to dis-identify with those labels that we identify wrongly with our self. We can say to ourselves

       I have a degree or qualification but I am not my degree. I have a job but I am not my job.

                THESE ALL BELONG TO ME BUT THEY ARE NOT WHAT I AM.