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Category: time

FortyTwo – part 2 of 2

So what answer did Elon Musk find? In the whimsical universe of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” by Douglas Adams, one finds not just humor and absurdity but also unexpected pearls of wisdom, especially when it comes to spirituality.

It’s a tale where the Earth is revealed to be a supercomputer designed to calculate the “Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything,”. And what is the final answer? Simply the number “42.”

This comically simple answer raises profound questions about the nature of spirituality. The search for meaning, for many, is a lifelong journey.

So much so that Elon himself believes that it’s not about the answer, but about finding the right question. What question about the complex creation we are part of will even come close to having an answer like 42?

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Secret ingredient

Now I’m no cook. I know next to nothing about the kitchen. A few dishes to survive? Sure, I can whip something up so that I won’t starve. But serve my cooking to others? Wouldn’t do it to my worst enemy even! With that simple disclaimer out of the way, an interesting book is “Masala Lab” by Krish Ashok. And within it lies a tale that resonates with every culinary enthusiast. Readers are gracefully led into a traditional kitchen, where generations-old recipes are passed down with love and care.

As the author meticulously lists the ingredients for a crispy multi-lentil pancake – adai as it is known in South India and specifically in Tamil Nadu – a profound revelation emerges. The grandmother, a character brimming with wisdom, introduces a secret ingredient that transcends the tangible: Patience.

Through this narrative, Ashok captures the essence of cooking as an art, where patience isn’t just a virtue but a vital ingredient. In our modern world, where instant gratification is often sought, this story is a poignant reminder of the timeless values that form the foundation of great cooking, whether in the kitchen, or as a recipe for one’s own success!

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Presi for a day

It’s very cute, these little childhood essays we used to get. “What would you do if you were PM or President for a day?”

And everyone would write all sorts of things – trying to resolve every problem one ever encountered in their lives.

“Ah, if only I had the power to change the world…”

The reality isn’t that the answer is difficult, but perhaps that the question itself is wrong. In today’s world of hyperinstant gratification, even the PM’s role has been reduced to results demanded in 24 hours!

As many greats have said, nothing worth having in life comes easy (aka quickly). It would be best to focus on becoming better versions of ourselves each and every day, leading to an unimaginably profound longer term impact.

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Rolex flex

Everyone knows the value of a Rolex. Sometimes the price is so high that it’s shocking. But why is this the case? And do we have some lessons for how value is created? For me, for sure! Here’s what was in a recent half page Rolex ad in the paper:

WHAT MAKES A ROLEX A ROLEX?
It's not the wheels and cogs. It's not the steel we shape nor the gold we forge. It's not the sum of every single part that we design, craft, polish and assemble with countless skills and constant care. It's the time it takes. The numerous days and months that are necessary until we can print this single word on each individual dial leaving our workshops: "Superlative." It's the mark of our autonomy, responsibility and integrity. This is all we make, but we make it all. So that, in time, you can make it your own. 

As we well know, all good things, take time. So no need to worry if success isn’t imminent, as long as the effort is going in!

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Butterfly effect

In ancient China, there was a philosopher-mystic named Chuang Tzu. He once woke up in the middle of the night very alarmed. His disciples rushed to his bedside and asked him what happened.

Chuang Tzu said he dreamt he was a butterfly, blissfully fluttering in nature’s embrace, flitting from one flower to the next.

Upon awakening, he was now pondering: Was he a man who dreamed of being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming of being a man? Was he in a dream then? Or was he in a dream now?

Do we know for sure? Perhaps we will never know.

That’s why our Gurus, our ancients and our scriptures ask us to focus on the one true changeless Consciousness. Chuang Tzu’s tale also reminds us to appreciate the beauty of change and find harmony amidst uncertainty.

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Titaning the noose

Some people love to live on the precipice of danger. The thrill of adrenaline. I’ve never understood it.

Why would one stuff oneself into a small tube and go down the depths of the ocean to see a sunken ship? There must be some good reason that my tiny brain is unable to process.

And it’s not like the ride was free. It was a cool quarter of a million dollars per head. Phew! It’s like a 1000x magnified version of paying crazy ticket prices to go see a horror movie – as if the horrors of daily life aren’t enough!

Many people routinely do this – climbing mountain peaks that are overly crowded, or parkour on top of skyscrapers with no safety harnesses, or surf in shark infested waters. Why voluntarily increase the probability of throwing away one’s life?

As our scriptures tell us, this human birth is incredibly rare. Why do we want to throw it away? But as my Guru points out, if we are not on the spiritual path and constantly focused on the Lord, then we are anyway throwing our lives away!

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Don’t look up…

…because there’s a comet about to obliterate the earth.

One that is 9 kilometers wide, and is easily a mass extinction event.

Nobody will survive.

The calculations are perfect.

Top scientists have accorded a 100% chance of this happening. Yes, you read that right, 100%, not 99, not 99.9, but 100%!

Okay okay, I admit, if this seems like it is taken straight out of a Hollywood movie, then that it because it almost is. The name of the movie is, you guessed it, “Don’t look up”, and it is supremely entertaining.

And you know why? Because it is so realistic! The world is literally about to end, but all anyone cares about are themselves, their properties, their money, their own goals and ambitions, their power and influence, and on and on. Is this only on-screen, or does it remind you of off-screen behavior as well??! ????

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N.O.W = No Other Way

Now is all we have, No Other Way
To live our lives, to make each day
A moment to embrace and hold dear
To focus on the present, never fear

The past is gone, the future yet to be
But now is all we have, don’t we see?
So let go of regrets, of what-ifs and might-have-beens
And embrace the present, for it’s all that’s ever been

Everything that’s happened, everything that will
Were nows, in their own time, until
They slipped away, into the past
Leaving us with now, this moment that will last

So let’s make the most of now, and all it can bring
Embrace the present, and let the past take wing
For now is all we have, no other way
To live and love and be, each and every day

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Living in the…

We know that we need to live in the now. That’s what all great people say. The present is a gift, and that’s why it’s called the present, yada yada.

So there was a question this weekend at the satsang by a newbie. A very valid question, that could put all the oldies to shame. Just because one has spent 30-40-50 years in the satsang means nothing, no different from giving the same exam year after after for decades and flunking each time.

The question was this. We are told to live in the present. But we often find great learnings from mistakes we made in the past. If we have to live in the present only, then how to learn from past mistakes?

The answer given by the speaker was mind blowing. He said that it’s great to learn from the past, but not okay to regret the past. What’s the difference? The former is a conscious activity, while the latter is unconscious. The former propels us toward action, the latter prevents it. Likewise for the future. There’s no harm planning for it. But getting anxious about the future? Not allowed bye bye.

Interestingly, both learning and planning, while associated with the past and future respectively, actually happen in the now only!

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Transitionary

Supple to firm to infirm.

Baby to youth to old.

Each one of us goes through this.

No exceptions.

Everything is short lived.

And still in this short time, we run after only short lived things.

Is this sensible?

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“Leave your work behind in office”

We’ve all heard this as advice at some point, or even felt it personally. When work gets to us, when stress and anxiety from the workplace increase, we wish the option would exist to keep our personal and office lives completely separate.

The brilliant folks over at Apple TV created a mind-boggling TV show called Severance with exactly this premise. What if you could truly leave your work behind… at work?!

A couple of considerations on how it would play out practically, as portrayed wonderfully in the show:

1. We would literally have no recollection of work outside it, and ditto for home. Once the clock strikes 6 pm and you’re out of office, you won’t know what happens in office at all. Is this good?

2. Maybe not. Because your work self only knows work, it’ll mean one never gets out of work at all. Each day begins with you walking into the office (but from where, you’d never know, because that is a separate life), and each day ends with you walking out, without knowing where to. As far as your life is concerned, work and home have truly been separated.

Of course the show is much more nuanced than just this. But it is a sure starting point for anyone who thinks that the splitting of work and life brings immediate benefit. It does not!

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Advertising

Here’s an advertisement in the newspaper that I came across recently. I honestly had no clue what it was talking about until I turned the page to see the picture of the actual product. Can you guess?

Snowflake hallmark since 1969. Manufacture calibre. 70-hour weekend proof power reserve. Silicon hair spring. COSC certification and Master certification from METAS.

I seriously had no clue! But that’s also how our scriptures are. The same line would with be pregnant with meaning when my Guru reads it, whereas when I read it, I can probably not make out anything more than a few words strung together ?

Okay in case you were wondering, this ad was for some premium wrist watch collection.

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Why prepping in advance is key – part 1 of 2

We are often told to read our scriptures, heed the advice of the wise, and attend satsangs regularly. After a while, we come to realize that most of the content is the same – seemingly repetitive and boring.

But you know what? In the repetition is where the magic happens!

Consider the stock markets for example. Everyone knows you need to buy low and sell high. It’s the easiest thing to do, right? Wrong. It’s the hardest thing to do, as any experienced investor will tell you, because when the market falls, your portfolio falls with it, and it paralyses one from taking action, even if that is the best time to buy more! Have a look at this often quoted statement in the market:

During these moments, confidence and clarity evaporates and is replaced by pessimism and doubt.

This exactly summarizes why we need to prepare in advance, read the scriptures in advance, practise in advance, attend satsangs in advance, build our key relationships – you guessed it – in advance. Because mental and physical strength is built during practise, not on the battlefield.

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Can we think of the Lord all the time?

A close friend couple (husband + wife) had taken a 1 year sabbatical. This was what they recounted to me.

They planned their sabbatical about 10 months in advance. And they were both working right till the start of the sabbatical.

Initially, they said, it felt so far off, and they would hardly think of it.

But towards the end, as time kept moving forward, and as the time-to-sabbatical reduced from months to just weeks and days and hours, they said that they kept thinking of the sabbatical ever increasingly, even during their office work, which they were anyway doing, and doing well.

We certainly seem to have the capacity to process multiple things at once in our minds. So can we think of the Lord a lot of the time, while also going about our other daily duties? We sure can!

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Ageless

If you are middle aged and have many years of experience, would you work for a teenager? Probably not, right? Huge career risk perhaps, and their lack of experience means you may not learn much. Besides, working for someone that much younger than you could be a bit weird.

That thinking is passé now.

No I’m not saying this frivolously.

I recently discovered that one of the hyperlocal apps that I use is a billion dollar company run by two teenagers!

Of course no one can see the future and how risky it can be. But surely in this day and age, age is no bar. Execution of an idea (perseverance, patience) trumps everything else. Good advice for spirituality as well.

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Beyond home and work – part 5 of 8

Continued from yesterday:

So here is something for each one of us to think about deeply.

Everything we each have succeeded in today, can we really say with 100% confidence that it is all solely because of us? The marks we got in school? Yes we studied of course, but teachers helped, parents helped, someone wrote a question paper, someone wrote a book, someone invented or discovered something that could be written about in the first place – and on and on!

Same for the bonuses and promotions we got at work, somebody trained us, someone recognized us, someone provided us with a job to be, someone invented a computer decades ago, without which much of our work wouldn’t even get done!

It’s not that we should not get credit for our actions, but think about it, and we’ve really just been taking-taking-taking from day 1.

Continued tomorrow…

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Beyond home and work – part 4 of 8

Continued from yesterday:

One-and-a-half hours later, there was still no respite, and people started getting angry and stressed. Some were shouting, others were fighting, some started live-tweeting their frustration, babies were crying – it was just total and complete chaos.

And it was immediately evident, that even outside of home and work, stress and anger can cause the entire day to become unproductive.

Because yes this got sorted and people checked-in and all. But even after the flight was over and we landed at the destination, there were some people arguing with each other about having cut in front of them into the line in the morning and how they have no manners and such!

Continued tomorrow…

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Beyond home and work – part 2 of 8

Continued from yesterday:

For many of us, the question will be, “Really? Is there even anything outside of work and home?” “With weekdays and weekends both just flying past in a complete blur?”

But there still are things that frequently upset us – like:

  • struggling with our workout schedules,
  • not being able to take vacations, or even worse
  • taking vacations but mentally still being unable to relax;
  • or we may have doubts on what the right decision to make is, given a certain set of circumstances;
  • or there may be an inability to maintain true friendships – we may be online all the time on social media, and yet feel extremely lonely and disconnected,

and on and on and on….

Continued tomorrow…

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Peda

Peda is a sweet popular in India. There’s also PEDA. That’s not a sweet, but can surely make your life sweet. How?

Most of us struggle with time management. There’s just never enough time. But that’s probably because of how we look at time.

We start with our task list and then start assigning times it will take to complete each. Total them up and realize it would take days and weeks to complete, leading to frustration.

Enter PEDA. (Okay okay, too dramatic I know, but hear me out). It’s just an acronym I put together for the following:

  1. Procrastinate (everything you don’t need to do right away)
  2. Eliminate (whatever you don’t ever need to do)
  3. Delegate (to others who are better at the work or have more time)
  4. Automate (if it is repetitive and can be coded)

There you have it. Follow PEDA, and you’ll find time is actually plenty.

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Successhun – part 2 of 2

There’s an amazing scene in Succession. Correction, there are several amazing scenes in this 8.9 IMDB rated show.

One in particular stood out for me. No spoilers don’t worry.

The kids (grown up of course) are all standing around papa Logan, the big man, the head honcho.

Everyone is looking for their own pound of flesh, trying to score brownies points, and put everyone else down while at it.

One narcissistic chap tries to sell himself golden, “Dad, remember how I did this and that and succeeded and cracked the deal last week and blahblueblee.”

To which the big kahuna replies curtly as only he can, “I don’t do ancient history.”

Finito. Trap wide shut. Nobody gives a damn about the past. It’s over. We shouldn’t either. The future, is in the present. That’s all that matters.

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