outing

It was one of those yearly team outings, where the entire organization heads for a retreat. The management talks about the roadmap, growth plans over lots of alcohol and food. For Vishal, the senior analyst, it was a special occasion. He wanted to propose to Rajni for marriage. They both have been at the firm for over three years.

While Rajani hails from Bihar, Vishal is a local boy from Ghaziabad. Although working together for all these years, talking, working side by side, none dared to express themselves. Other office mates would make fun of Vishal that he needs a robot to express his feelings to Rajni. Some of them wondered if it was Vishal’s appearance that was making him feel inferior. Vishal is in his late 30’s, pot-bellied and 4.7 ft in height, and wrinkles on his face. Rajani is a wheatish, tall, and charming lady with an athletic built. Many confused her as Punjabi because of her eating habits and appearance. There was over a 10+ year age difference between them. Most of Vishal’s friends told him not to worry as age is just a number.

Rajani liked Vishal for who he was as a person, sober, helpful, and super intelligent. He was the go-to person for most of his confidants for advice and help. But Vishal knew it was his age, failures, and learning through the process giving him an edge over the rest. You start finding patterns from your actions and guide others.

Post breakfast after a late-night party, most were sitting lazily near the pool and watching other guests swimming. It was then Vishal expressed his feelings to Rajani. Everyone around cheered for them both. Rajani threw an unexpected challenge, call it syambar, with only Vihal participating. She challenged him to win her over 30 mins swimming challenge. It was a shock for everyone as no one knew if either of them could swim. Poor Vishal happily agreed to the challenge. He had no other option: as everything is fair in love and there are no challenges.

The challenge would begin at 9 am. Vishal had 2 hours to watch the youtube video and get coaching from some of his friends. It was like a penguin in water huffing and puffing, some observed. Others celebrated jubilantly for his courage. He was out there to win over his love. Nobody knew if Rajani knew swimming because it was only Vishal in the pool doing pre-challenge practice.

At nine, the race started. Over 50 people were cheering for them both. Many anticipated that Rajani will, close the chapter of Vishal today by defeating him. After all, they were hardly a match together. But the reality was something else; she was conceding the race to Vishal. Was she testing his courage? She was just in the waters while Vishal was competing fiercely and was ahead of hers. Everyone was hooting, shouting and some of them were dancing.

At 3ed lap, Vishal seemed uneasy but determined to finish 30 minutes swim and win the race and heart of Rajani. But God had some other plans; the next minute, he went unconscious and, his body was floating on water. The ambulance came and took him to the hospital with Rajani accompanying him. She was speechless, numb, and crying while holding Vishal’s hand. He died in Rajni’s arm with a smile on his face, on his way to the hospital. The autopsy report mentioned many other reasons like diabetes and over-stress leading to the severe stroke and causing his death.

Its’ been over 4 years since Vishal’s death. Rajani is in a mental hospital in Ranchi. She has not spoken a word all this while.

Pressure

The positives and negatives of the Internet are known to us all. This generation is under pressure to show and share. Social media is the go-to destination for all announcements and achievements.

In the 90’s most of us mostly lived reading comics, watching MTV, and fighting over batting in the cricket field.

I feel the amount of pressure this generation is going through is enormous. Last evening I met my neighbor’s friend, a 17 years old kid, crying. On inquiry, I got to know about the breakup and, Instagram was the tool for the announcement.

I am not sure how society, parents will be able to take care of them. I feel scared to be growing up with smartphones and Instagram around me. I think parents have to do a lot for their kids growing in this era.

kal

Ji lo kuch pal he sai, khud ki marzi se, aazaad, beparwaah. Itna kuch karna baaki hai abhi, itne bhi kya zindgi bachi hai abhi? Kal ke liye khud me kitna aaz? Kal ko kisi ne dekha hai kya bhala?

Kal ke liye hum aise armaan saza lete hai, ki aaz me jina he bhool zate hai. Kyun nahi je sakte hum apni zindgi ko aaz mae, abhi ke liye? Aisa bhi kya hone wala hai kal?

Kitne aaye, kitne mil gaye mitti me, kuch ne jiya zindgi ko zindadili se, aaz me. Kitno ne ache kal ke moh me aaz ji li bebasi, mayusi aur dard me.

Zindgi hai tumhari, sochna hai tumhe, zina aaz abhi ke liye hai ya mar zana hai kabhi na aane wale kal ke liye.

responsible

A broken team blames individuals for failures but garners appreciation together. As a leader, what is right? Finding a scapegoat to offload failures or creating a culture where everyone is radically honest with ownership and acceptance: be it success or failure. In the end, the belief: we are all in it together, whatever keeps the rocketship sailing. Something we should aspire to.

A founder is not just a captain of the ship but the person responsible for bad decisions. Knowing what not to do to fail takes us towards being a success.

Try not to be a leader sticking your face on all the PR, news announcements. But be there to act, own responsibility during fuck ups.

recover

I have not been keeping well for the past few days. It is a common cold, as a result of rain walking last week. On one side, the screen time has reduced; on another, I have been able to spend many hours reading hard copy.

I feel like it’s a nature’s reset. I have not been sick in the past many years. A few friends are asking me to take precautions, visit a physician. Whatever happens, I am sure of recovering in the coming week.

I see it more like a recovery rather than falling sick.

us

Working in an organization where I, Me, and You come before Us can be painful for everyone. In a way, everyone has a sword and is fighting battle among each other. Instead of working together, we are all fighting to prove ourselves corrected.

An organization is about working together and solving pain points for stakeholders. With in-fighting and divide, an organization is a dysfunctional system in itself.

The responsibility of building an organization is not only with the HR head but the founders, leaders. It is a full-time role like fundraising, marketing, and sales. With the modern era of build, fast-break things come with their own curse.

culture

What is culture for any organization? I am asking it because, with my limited knowledge, it distinguishes between a winner and a loser. Most importantly, it’s learned by doing and, leaders need to lead it. It is an ever-evolving process.

With growth-driven entrepreneurship, hiring gets uttermost importance next to fundraising. The team has become a commodity or merely a resource. We need to ship new features for fundraising. Let’s hire a dozen resources for the same. In these environments only incentive that works is money. Some of us fall for the quick bucks and work without asking anything like a robot following instructions.

Some of us do care about the team, company, and its culture. We like to have our career growth defined along with the organization. Most importantly, we want to be part of the rocketship as co-creator. Monitory benefits come after it on the priority of picking or sticking to a job.

In a broken, corrupt organization, a leader says something and does another thing. Or the company is run by their yes men or family. What culture will it have?

In most cases: with rapid growth, culture takes a back seat. The company becomes mediocre from maverick. Guarding an organisation’s culture with scale is a true mantra and, only a handful have aced it.

flood

Mansoon meant flooded mohalla [society] with lots and lots of water. We would store food for a month in advance, some of our neighbors would shift in our house because water had gone to their houses. My hometown in north Bihar will transform into an island with no connection with the rest of Indian. It would last for 60-90 days every year. Rivers like Koshi, Bagmati, and Ganga would be overflooded apart from many seasonal rivers like Lakahndei, Boodhi Gandak.

Some elders make temporary boats joining banana trunks. There were a handful of houses and many empty lands. All those get converted to mini lakes. No cricket for the next 4-5 months. My school will announce a holiday with no opening date.

At one time, we saw corpses of animals, humans floating in the water. Our neighbors told us that a dam in Nepal got over flooded and got collapsed. It created havoc, killing many apart from making millions other homeless. Every year flood has taken away more life and done the worst destruction imagined.

The colorful sharbat mug made of glass will become mine for keeping fish catch. There were a few colorful fishes that we would catch with our hands. We would feed the fish some boiled rice.

Fast forward now, highways and dams have gotten constructed. Floods inside the city are a thing of the past. We stay connected throughout the year from the rest of the country.

Darr

Darr darr ke ze liya aye zindgi humne tumhe. Har Waqt ziye darr ki parchai mae. Aisa kya hua hame zo zindgi parchai se bann gaye dar ke kale kambal odhe.

Hum khud ke hua karte the kabhi, mast the, madmast the apni chaal aur dhun mae.

Kya hua zindgi ko hamare, kaise laga ye grahan jo hamne darr darr ke zina suru kar diya?

Ek he to Zindgi hai, darree bhala hum kyun kisi se? Ye darr darr ke bhi kya zina hua bhala? Hum insaan hai ji, bakreed ki qurabani wale bher thore he?

Apni Zindgi ko ko zisne jina suru kar diya, samjho darr se duuur ho gaya wo.

Kaise Zina hai tumhe ye Zindgi? Darr darr ke, ya bekhauu: mann bana lo, aur zindgi ko zina suru karo.

Aakhir kuch waqt ki he to hai ye zindgi, darr darr ke bhi kya zina bhala?

actions

Our actions define who we are. It is the path for our destiny.

It is easy to complain about all the bad things encircled around us in life. It is easy to complain about how bad our work is. It is easy to complain about how complicated or misaligned we are in a relationship.

In short, complaining is easy. Once in a while, The truth is, we will get drunk, smoke for a few hours, and feel lost. Once in senses, again same life: hating cribbing about everything and blaming others.

What about taking life in your own hand and working ass off and changing the course of life: breaking away from the relationship or switching the job?

Isn’t our life too short to waste on cribbing instead of dying trying? Why are we wasting money on therapy sessions or expecting friends to listen to daily cribbings?