Impromptu Tête-à-tête

I was sipping my green tea in a nearby café, and this guy caught my attention – he had a laptop in front of him, scrolling and shuffling between a personality-development book and a notebook in which he was capturing some key points. With intermittent puffs from an electronic cigarette along with the effervescent coffee, he looked intensely pensive. As he courteously checked with me that whether I mind the smoke emanating, I was quick to respond saying it’s not so pungent, it’s digital… and that’s how we got talking to each other. Reading the personality-improvement material on laptop/ books isn’t a bad idea at all. However if one is doing it in the night with such an impervious concentration – you tend to become a little inquisitive and start politely enquiring about such a surreal physiological and psychological need. It kind of intrigued me. I started asking questions about why, what led to, what’s the end goal.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about the purpose of what we keep on doing in our day-to-day lives. What are we working towards? Is there any end to our official work? Are we deriving enough pleasure out of it? Is it monotonous!?

He responded with the similar revelations about himself. Working in an Analytics company in the US from last eight years with two years of visa still left, he decided to come back to his home country. It was a unilateral yet conscious decision. Nonetheless, his level of satisfaction seems to have surged because of such a move. He was on a sabbatical wanting to discover what he actually wants to do. Optimise himself. We need a course correction if we’re not happy with what we’re doing – not acting is not growing… status quo is a sickness. We may need to take rough, uneven alleyways to keep our focus intact on the bigger picture. Our aspirations and dreams. These are not the easy decisions to take, but it’s better to pursue the inner calling than living under the façade of superficial accomplishment.

Serving a company with his sales ability resulted in dollars for the company but no life, learning and satisfaction for him. He wanted to improve in life, intellectually and personally. What was stopping him – perpetual and superficial infatuation with what he was doing, and he didn’t want to do it anymore. For transient monetary considerations, we tend to take a less risky path but that turns out to be the most costly move. We completely become oblivious of the time we devote to such awry activities, and not being able to contribute to the self-conceived purpose of our life. While money may come and go – when time passes by, it doesn’t come back and that’s a sure and certain reality.

He believed that we, more often than not, put on the blinkers when we are on a specific track, chasing the goals assigned to us, and detach our self from other areas of knowledge and personal growth. Such an approach takes a toll on our overall growth. Growth cannot be limited to a specific profile, place and an area of operation. It’s important to grow in all the spheres of life. Personal development is equally important – be it behavioural, psychological and physiological. We will have to actively spend time with our own self re-checking, introspecting whether we are pursuing a right path or not; or is it just helping someone else meet his/ her goals and take the company (we work for) where it aspires to reach. We all so madly chase that one person’s dream with sweat and blood ignoring the importance, if discovered, of our own. If the interests are aligned, road-map charted, then it does not matter, but if it’s not, then it should bother us. It’s imperative to identify your interests to reach your full potential and productivity in an optimised manner.

Working towards accomplishing our aspirations should be our topmost priority. Money follows. We shouldn’t shadow money to make a career rather discover our interests/ passion make a career out of it… and make money shadow us. Such approach will relax us mentally. We will have to become more thoughtful in our approach that will help us develop new ideas and innovations in our chosen field.

It started as an impromptu tête-à-tête and developed into a meaningful exchange of thoughts and ideas. Quintessence remains the same – focus on the passion-driven vision, create your own path if required, and be consistent traversing through the thick and thin you may have to confront. You’ll end up achieving the ephemeral and eternal contentment.

Thank You

Yasir Reshi

Welcome 2018 – Salubrious Hope!

As we look back at the year gone by, I can say it left with a great deal of lessons, learnings and experiences. Thanks to Almighty Allah. 

You always have that list of activities, not necessarily on a piece of paper, to accomplish. At the risk of sounding a little disdainful about the year past, there are more to-do activities to be ticked than the minimally ticked ones. 

I feel the level of effort and emotion that goes into the planning, envisioning the desired future is much more than the energy that’s put to action for execution. Given the experiences of the past year, I see a huge potential to grow/ improve both personally and professionally. 

We envisage a destination, select a path and choose a course of action. However, there isn’t much we do to walk on the preferred path. Probably, it’s a lack of courage/ initiative to pursue the envisaged dream, or maybe it’s the fear of losing the monotonous, mediocre (day-to-day) rigmarole. Unless and until we are passionate, actionable enough, about realizing what we set out to, we cannot break the choking status quo. Growth can only be ensured by combatively cruising through the monotonous state to secure the unseen, imagined and dreamt-of objective. In many instances, we may not be having a well-defined path, but holding onto the status-quo obstructs the possibility of a marvellous future. 

Our explicit intentions should get translated into meaningful actions. We may have to take some bold decisions to move away from the status quo. Simply, if we don’t find it worthy to do what we’re doing, we should move away from it… it has to be beyond monetary compromises. For the sake of inconsequential, we give our hundred percent, completely oblivious and ignorant of our real potential and its suitable channelization to accomplish our self-visualised purpose of existence. It’s imperative to grow in the right direction at a right pace and with the support of right people. Let’s not keep our career hostage to the menial monetary considerations; the need of the hour is to classify the priorities, decide a course of action and start chasing till actualised. It’s undoubtedly easier said than done. Nonetheless, not doing anything would be a pessimistic posture replete with long-term repercussions. 

It’s bizarre. While I am writing this note, queerly the word ‘complacency’ comes to my mind. It’s is a sham. Even if we are confident, we can’t guarantee the favourable outcome. If we are complacent – It’s a mirage, an optical illusion, and it definitely warrants course correction. Plans do not necessarily go according to our wishful thinking; there’s a significant effort required to make our plans’ succeed. Self-conceived path, believed to be smooth and straight, may not always lead to a desired destination. It’s often a misleading mirage; a delusion. At the same time, strenuously trying is of paramount significance, though never guarantees the expected outcome - it only makes us comfortable and helps avoid regretting. We should learn to respect the decisions people take… these decisions might be having repercussions on our future, but they’re entitled to make choices basis their comfort, convenience and satisfaction. 

On the eve of New Year, let’s learn to accept the imprints of our engraved destiny. We will have to love the abstruse gift of the destiny rather than what we choose to love. Choice is a privilege not reserved for all. In the quest of love, I believe the first step is to respect the people who love you the most, shower affection on you, care for you; it’s pivotal to acknowledge their manifestation of greatness and generosity towards you, a favour. We should never fail to reciprocate, with love and emotion, not necessarily with the tangibility of the materialistic world. 

Understanding and accepting the ephemerality of our surroundings viz. people, things, situations (good/ bad) remains at the very centre of our happiness. If we are finding any of the aforesaid in our favour, it’s temporary, and if we are stuck in a quagmire of troubles - understand that it’s soon going to go away. Nothing stays forever – people, things, seasons, failures, success… all have an expiry date. Maybe the emotion and sentiment we own: Love, stays forever. It’s a person, not the profession; it’s affection, not the social sanction; it’s with whom your madness comes out, not always the civility; it’s the sense of unending passion, not an induced emotion. It resides in the heart, not fades away like a memory. It fills you up completely, leaving no further urge of wanting more. It’s divine, its love. Let’s cherish the expression of love and affection, spread and celebrate. 

In the conclusion, I wouldn’t hesitate to suggest that it’s always better to be fierce (not hurting people), fearless (not abrasive) and kind (not submissive). You’re the reason of your own happiness, you’re the cause of your own happiness, try to end the dependency on others. Don’t vest too much power in others, it belongs to you. Let’s try to be bold enough to achieve our conceived vision. 

I wish that the Year 2018 be the harbinger of good health, happiness, success and the peace of mind. I hope we are bestowed with the courage to celebrate what we achieve, able to achieve, and are always grateful to the Creator, and the creation we come across on the alley of our rightful means/ ways to attain the desired ends. 

Wishing you a great year ahead. 

Thank You

Yasir Reshi