This and That aka Daily Musings

This lock down gave everyone an opportunity to introspect. Those who still have some semblance of normalcy (i.e. having some regular income) in their lives took the opportunity to get their health in shape, acquire new certifications or look for new avenues to keep busy. Work from home is not 'one size fits all' kind of a solution. Being chained to your laptops is taking a heavy toll on the mental health of many professionals. I was very queasy in April and May when work had come to a standstill. Our future suddenly appeared very bleak. Along with us we had a staff of 7 who depended on their livelihood on us. There was a lot to think about. Sometime in June I chanced upon Naval Ravikant's tweetstorm about Meditation. This is what saved me from a lot of anguish. I had a completely wrong conception of Meditation. I used to think that to meditate would mean emptying your mind of all thought. This is perhaps impossible for most people. If one were to peek inside our mind, one w...

Angel investor Naval Ravikant had quoted Gautam Buddha in the Farnam Street podcast that "Happiness is a choice."  This is perhaps one of the greatest philosophical sentences. The Buddha says,  Happiness is a choice, not a result. Nothing will make you happy until you choose to be happy. No person will make you happy unless you decide to be happy. Your happiness will not come to you. It can only come from you. What is happiness after all? Is it being content? But content with what? Success? Money? Does happiness mean you have a smile plastered on your face throughout the day? Does a person keep joking or making light of situations just to be under the illusion of being happy?  These are complex questions with no ready answers. It is very easy to feel unhappy as there are plenty of triggers throughout the day. You wake up late, you miss your exercise, the toast gets burnt, you miss your train, your boss is unhappy about your performance, you are unhappy with your performa...

Amazon Prime's 'Tales From the Loop' is a gripping, visually compelling drama. I had seen its promotional video when it was released a few months ago but what prompted me to watch it was Twinkle Khanna's tweet about it being 'sublime'. The period depicted is indeterminate and there is tremendous attention to detail in terms of attire, visual appeal, furniture and fixtures, vehicles etc. Jonathan Pryce plays the head of the Loop and is in top form (we saw him earlier as the High Sparrow in Game of Thrones). He is ably supported by a bevy of hugely talented actors across various age groups. It is important that the episodes are watched in serial order as the story is somewhat linear. The presentation is unconventional as in spite of the story being linear, each episode has a different arc. The director has been able to stitch together all the angles and arcs in the finale. Various themes are handled in this drama. Pretty deep subjects are tackled with minimum dia...

Guru Pournima was celebrated in India on 5th July. People acknowledge the role of their gurus in life and pay obeisance according to tradition. We were very intimately associated with Guru Pournima because of Gayatri's dance class. Every year visiting the class adorned in her finest traditional attire was a ritual which was followed by us for the past twelve odd years. This year we made an exception as our daughter is no longer actively pursuing Bharatanatyam because of other priorities.  The function is very elaborately organised and is a visual feast. Most of the students visit and pay their respects come rain or shine.  Kaustubh Kirtane sends me a Guru Pournima message every year. I find this particularly odd as I do not deserve the epithet of 'guru'. Whatever KK has achieved, he has done it by the dint of labour. He found himself in a bit of a soup recently after ILF&S imploded. But he found a suitable alternative employment. KK now sees himself in a different role ...

Health, Wealth and the magic of compounding Kedar's comment about doctors managing our 'health' and CAs managing our 'wealth' was intriguing. Somehow it stuck in my mind and after some deliberation I realised that the concept of compounding, which is thought to be associated with financial matters, is applicable in almost all walks of life. Any physical activity, wealth creation, relationships, happiness, learning – all would benefit from the wonder known as compounding. Consider savings. The earlier you start, bigger is the corpus when it is time to retire. Think of studying. The more you study in a systematic manner, the more erudite you get. Consuming healthy food over a period of time helps one in managing lifestyle ailments like diabetes, cholesterol and blood pressure (or even avoiding them). Quality time spent on nurturing relationships helps us in not getting isolated or lonely. Especially in these social media crazed times, man has never been so lonely and ...

Gayatri has participated in a creative story writing online contest on Internshala.com. Internshala had kept an online training programme which participants had to complete before they could submit their stories. Gayatri found the course too mundane and basic but she had no choice but to complete it. But I guess, she got a bit tired of waiting endlessly for the boring e-lectures to end. To add to her plight she was also doing the himtrek (Delhi) internship till the 20th and is also actively involved in the DIFS (Department of Interreligious Faith Studies – I am not sure if I have got the acronym right!). To put a long story short, Gayatri was finding it difficult to write a story based on the four prompts provided by internshala. She chose one prompt in which they have shown a young girl, alone, probably facing a lake, maybe forlorn. Gayatri had the outline of the story ready but was unable to put it in words. She was dejected because of this and was on the verge of discontinuing her e...

Himanshu Joshi has been after me for a couple of days regarding the renewal of Office 365. We have merely 5 licenses and the total order value would be in the vicinity of Rs. 25,500. Not exactly a scintillating order size. But today no business is doing well and people are now employing desperate measures to grab whatever orders they can get. Yesterday Himanshu called me and offered me a credit period of 1 month. I would still not budge as there is no clarity about where our business is headed. A little while ago, someone from Microsoft (allegedly) called me to check on the renewal status. I told him that we would be deferring the renewal by a few months. Upon hearing this I got to hear the usual crap about the imminent hike in prices and how it would be wise to lock the price before 30th June. I dilly dallied. He then out right offered me a credit period of 2 months! This is unheard of. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Microsoft or for that matter no major software company...