Deliberate Practice

"Deliberate Practice" and not just practice leads to improvement. It is a beautiful concept I learnt aeons ago... Deliberate practice is purposeful and systematic, requires focused attention with the specific goal of improving an aspect of performance… Has a feedback loop to know how you doing and try again..

Regular practice is mindless repetition and not necessary leading to Improvement. 

Concept is great but to really do is a real challenge. 

In Defense of my Stubbornness

My friends, family, my bosses all call me stubborn.. The say it in different ways but it means the same - Stubborn! Sensitive as I am to criticism it does feel a little bad, and I wonder am I, is it bad? Can I do better... The cycle of questions to figure out if I am on the right track or not begins.. 

Sensitive I am but I am also a Narcissist :) This come to my rescue and I am here to defend my stubbornness, I now know that it is the best quality to have :)

In general I am stubborn to my viewpoint, this is the context I am called stubborn. In the context, the opposite of stubborn will be capricious, fickle minded and I am glad I am not the one. I do have views on topics and my views I form after some thought so I like to stick to my own comprehension and worldview. 

This stickiness I consider a strength which helps me stick to my decisions and own up, this helps me to put effort to execute to what I have decided, I stick my neck out to what I believe in, that's the stubbornness I have. What's the fun in living life and decisions of others, I like to learn on my own terms. Will I change my views, yes but with a lot of difficulty I need to have my worldview changed, I am trying to listen and observe better but change is albeit slow. I am at a position where I can decide so I like stubborn as I have accountability of my decisions, so unless convinced otherwise I like to stick to my views. I don't mind others to live as per their own conviction, I will not force my views on their life. 

To all those who are not stubborn I will say when it comes to your decisions be stubborn, don't let others rule you. You will feel in control and own up your destiny. If Gandhi was not stubborn to Britishers we would have not got Independence, if Mandela was not stubborn apartheid would have remained in Africa, if Mother Teresa was not stubborn she would have never stayed in India reducing the suffering. Stubbornness in some sense is also linked to perseverance and all leaders are stubborn... don't call me a Narcissist now please, I will defend that even better :). Be stubborn........

P.S. - Just wondering how these labels affect us, most do not appreciate the context and can out you down.. Stubbornness and Narcissism can be our shield with doses of self awareness and introspection.

I am happy with comfort zones

I am tired of listening to people that I need to challenge myself and move out of comfort zone.. Go challenge learn a new skill, play a guitar, or go start networking or partying, I am an introvert become an extrovert, go take a holiday alone and discover new places, make a new set of friends, change role as you are doing well in the role means you have learnt everything possible, find a girl for yourself you getting comfortable with self.. blah blah blah.. 

The amount of advise I on this from family and friends is unthinkable, the only silver lining is I am not alone.. Almost everyone gets it and there is enough written by experts that how comfort zone means I am a big loser :(. In fact I am better off as I don't indulge in self flagellation, this friend I was speaking to on the topic feels guilty as she is acting in accordance with comfort zone...

My argument is what's wrong with comfort zone? We chase happiness that's the meaning of life and the comfort zone by name itself means happiness, so why challenge and stress yourself and become uncomfortable? The only place I can agree is if this zone is inhibiting you to achieve what you wish to, like becoming a Head HR, go ahead and challenge as the goal is more important to you than the zone. But in general why keep moving out of the comfort zone. Please don't move my cheese, I like the predictability of it being here daily. I know the argument is that I will be less prepared to face challenge when environment changes, if it does I am ready to slog then. Adding stress and anxiety for fear of future and what may happen well I don't care. To those who believe in moving the zone time and again I will suggest be less fearful of future and the environment, it can change and go against you but at that time be ready to fight it, accept that reality. But for now don't be paranoid and just be happy and enjoy the comfort zone..

The only challenge which I like to take head on is my fears, as that's my goal to be fearless. This value is close to me as for a religious person is GOD. I am changing roles and I debated why am I moving out of my comfort zone, I am extremely happy with my role, the team I am working with. It is not the redundancy and growth as HR professional I am worried about then why? I have rationalized it now that it may help me practice new skills which I could not in the earlier years as I had a few fears, the fear is now gone and the new experience will give me to hone a few skills. Now I am looking forward to it......

10 Steps to Greatness ..Forever.. Guaranteed..

I read an article in the Harvard Business Review on how I can become more effective at work.. then I read another article in Psychology today as how I can become smarter with life and be more happy. Then Stanford leadership had an article on becoming an effective leader, oh then how can I forget there were some beautiful quotes on Pinterest I cant take my mind off those, such wonderful wisdom to live life.. and well wonderful TED talks by Boyd Varty on Ubuntu and Stephen Cave on Death... and there are so many pending wisdom on my Gmail Account, Twitter, etc

Am I not really smart and great! The truth is all is bullshit as I have stuffed myself with a lot of thoughts of right philosophies to get everything in life yet everything is elusive.. This is just information and noble thoughts and more noble thoughts but the issue is of practicing the nobility.. 

All this has done till now is made me feel small.. showed me a big vacuum.. there is so much to do.... unfortunately I enjoy the theories and I keep reading... I enjoy because I can show off these theories on my Tweets and with others by talking about it with everyone I meet.. wonderful jargons.. It does feel great!

Enough of theories of greatness... This is the circle which now I wish to break and my resolution to self is to live a few top ones, challenge to experience it.. Ubuntu as taught by Boyd Varty, Focus as taught by Daniel Goleman... Fearlessness as taught by Vipassana will be the guiding factor.. That's my resolution.. It is formidable but life cannot be lived in the theories stored and catalouged in the mind... Life has to be lived.....

Water Water Everywhere but not a Drop to Drink

I have read, understood, made notes of all the wisdom in books but the same damn wisdom I am not able to live!

In one of the Vipassana lectures Goenka ji explains there are 3 types of wisdom and with varying impact on life. In order of hierarchy of impact these are:

1. Shrutpragya or Wisdom acquired through reading or listening wise thoughts 
2. Chintan-Pragya or Wisdom acquired through thinking and analyzing whatever was heard or read
3. Bhavanamayi Pragya or Wisdom acquired through experience

That's where the struggle is reading all the great thinkers in Twitter and using intellect to like a certain level of knowledge that is easy but to imbibe these in life, making this part of experience is what is a real struggle.

With all the knowledge dissemination through internet we have a generation of wisely informed people but with huge gap in practiced wisdom...

What we need to do is pick the thought which you relate to and exhibit courage to experience it, making it a part of life!

Damn the habits, fear & procrastination...

We are all the same

The more people I meet, the more I read, I realize we all are same.. the same emotions, the same fears, the same love, the same wants, it is just that the expression of this differs.. the underlying code is the same.. the answers to it differ based on what we conclude of our life struggles .. 

All go through the ups and downs, through their good days and bad days, through moments of elation and moments of sadness, moments of success and moments of failure. All want the same outcome happiness through - being in love with self, feeling secure.

I am saying being in love with self and not necessarily loved by others as I think that is an outcome of being in love with self in the right manner. Narcissist creates a delusion of self love and does not need others and outcome is achieved, most others self love is dependent on if others love, this is how most people are.. Without narcissism if you can come to a state where you feel, you are complete by yourself that is also possible. 

Secure is important as you need to be in the state for a longer duration, not just being there in here and now and worry about future..security brings permanence...

We are all the same and if we collaborate, trust each other, these outcomes can be achieved in a simple manner. Society, its norms like family, festivals, marriage, community are based on these principles..

Wisdom Decoded

Wisdom of living is about achieving a balance, balance tailored to your own unique reality, reality rooted in the 4 dimensions of - emotional (includes relations), physical (including material), intellectual & spiritual. 

Why balance? There are always opposing forces of desire and what you are capable of. You may desire a mansion but you may not be capable of generating that much of capital, you err in balance and you end up moving into dark areas of making money through fraudulent means. This is intra dimension balance. There is another inter dimension where you need to get it right.. You want the mansion and you single mindedly focus on getting the required capital ignoring other dimensions  - emotional,  spiritual; you make a mess out of it and when you have the mansion you have a lot of fear and you are standing alone... 

These 4 dimensions make life, achieving a balance and moving ahead in each is all it requires.

Mind Conflicts

I keep running after the elusive perfect day without any conflicts. But never can have. There are different conflicts which trouble. There is a common pattern in all humans, the underlying theme is of desire vs morality. One major one which I have observed is as follows.

Oh yes you love the woman and want to make love with her right now, gently and truly but then the thoughts of monogamy or your spouse or she has a boyfriend, am I being led by selfish senses and not anything else... Enemy mind says "Control" the other mind says "Let go and love"... and life goes on.. there are more conflicts this is one.