A Radical change

 Hello Readers

 I hope this blog finds you well.

 Transformation literally means going beyond your form.

Wayne Dyer

 This blog is quite unique for me as I have taken the longest time to add many things before, I could publish it.

 It started nine years ago when I was fresh out of college and started a job in one of the world's most powerful investment banking firms.

 That is when I started blogging as well.

 So, since I entered the world of business away from college, I have been learning many things, especially looking at things in between things!

 Looking at things in between them?

 Yes, when we look at a gadget, software, or a utility, we can just look at it on the top, use it and move on or try to think about it.

 The transformation from a new bee to an experienced employee is a metamorphosis.

 You become an all-new person altogether.

 The eye-openers

 When you join a workplace, your body tries to adjust to a whole new world physically and mentally.

 You understand the realities of life; what do they mean when they say to meet a deadline, a sign-off, and a closure!

 After seeing the above deadlines, you will feel your college professors were kind to you.

 Each day you travel to the workspace, you get a revelation of all the other things you could have done and chosen as a career and start the comparison process.

 You will start defining or judging your job as good or bad!

 You speak to your friends and understand how it is working at their end and feel happy atleast they are enjoying it!

 Your family now looks at you in a new way with respect and a sense of pride, which you had not  experienced before.

 The first thrills and happiness of buying your loved ones from your paycheck.

 Bidding goodbye to your first job and then stepping into the next one, building your corporate career.

 That first promotion and appreciation which you will never forget!

 The most important one respecting businesses and leaders who have built them and understanding how each penny is earned.

 Phase one of transformation is now complete!

 One day when I was traveling to work, I saw a small boy trying to sell unusually long pens; somehow, it motivated me to buy one,

I started using that pen; surprisingly, it wrote for a long time.

 Being a freethinker all the time, I started thinking of this whole incident as a business model. This company manufactures pens but can't find the right channel to promote them; their sellers are poor and downtrodden, so that is an example of cost-cutting, or they could not afford facilities for marketing and sales to stack this product; in a stationary market or distribute it!

 When I was in college, I never thought that clear because I was inside a curtain of just bookish knowledge, and no practical experience is what I figure.

 After spending quite some time in the industry, I feel each business is a temple of ideas, motivation, a group that is determined to achieve its goals, a symbol of synergy, and a few brilliant minds who had a vision and sketched on a drawing board and built corporations and created intelligent products and services and generated employment.

 As it is said in one of my favorite books, "Rich dad poor dad,” “If you're the kind of person who has no guts, you just give up every time life pushes you."

 I think that is the root of what a business means.

 So, we can choose to be transformed from a novice to a pro and finally think about starting something on our own; that is the moment you can call yourself an entrepreneur.

Believe me, you have skills; you just must start believing that and put them to action.

 I dedicate this one to all the great entrepreneurs worldwide for their grits and daredevils.

 Their determination to build something and stand away from the crowd, their patience, and the pain they took to make their dream and protect it.

Thanks a lot for your time, have a great week ahead.

 Helios.

Eyes wide open

Hello Readers

 I hope you all are doing well.

 My soul is not asleep, it is awake, wide awake. It neither sleeps nor dreams, but watches, its eyes wide-open far-off things, and listens at shores of the great silence. 

 -Trou Aikman

This piece was lying in my drafts for almost a year now though I would finally write about it today.

It is one of the simplest things to understand, and it is very accurate and happens in our lives often.

From the time you jump out of your bed, many personal and public incidents happen in a day in your life.

 Some may be your routine, and many more pleasant and some unpleasant ones.

Of late, I am not labeling incidents as good, bad, and ugly; what I feel is the truth, and we must learn to face it.

Conversations are an essential part of our day. We reach one step closer to our goals.

Each successful conversation is a good thing; it opens new opportunities, learns new things, or even builds new relationships.

Courtesy Google images

Sometimes, we fail to see the larger picture of a conversation and jump to conclusions, and eventually end up in fights and arguments that can be avoided.

Even you can win the toughest of conversations with people. You forgo your ego and biases in exchange be open-minded; half of your issues are resolved.

I see many tussles go on due to miscommunication picking wrong lines in a conversation, and sometimes pushing the pencil on others because it was a bad day.

We need to keep our eyes wide open all the time and smile; please realize we have one life, let us make most of it and do some good to this world and pass it on to the next generation.

Think macro, leave the micro dejections, frowns, and disappointments.

Connect with your friends, have a great time, make your life simple and a happy one!

Thanks for your time. Have a nice day!

Helios.

oxytocin

Hello readers

 

Hope all of you are safe.

 

Let go of the thoughts that doesn’t make you strong.

-Anonymous 

My previous blog was about emotions and the support we get from people during times of distress.

 

This one might be a continuation of it and a kind of closure for the discussion. Let's get started.

 

Emotional pillows are people help us lean on them, then we ended up with another question: who do they rely on? 

 

I got good answers from my dear readers for this question. So yeah, the most common answer is that they have someone to lean on. It's an endless chain. 

 

I like biology a lot; oxytocin is both a biological word and an emotional one. 

 

Oxytocin is a hormone and a neurotransmitter that is involved in childbirth and breastfeeding. It is also associated with empathy, trust, and relationship-building. 

 

I have heard many speakers talk about oxytocin that boosts emotional intelligence morale and brings people out of depression.

 

The simple reason why it is used is called a mother hormone.

 

The same hormone makes a child calm when their mother touches the child, increasing oxytocin in the child's body.

 

Do we know that when we touch dogs, they feel we are their parents, and likewise, our brain calms down, and oxytocin gets released in your body, so you get that connection with the dog?

 

Well, that's the biological part.

 

 Compare this to how it feels. It's much different than just explaining it with all the biological terms.

 

Oxytocin as an expression

 

You meet many people in life, most of them just passed by some stay with you and some move on.

 

But do we realise all those who left you, who are staying with you, helped you calm you down at some point in your association with them?

 

Are you wondering how?

 

Even simple acts of kindness like getting you a cup of coffee while you were working, waiting for you to join, and then walking together, helping you when you forgot your wallet are just a few examples.

 

When you say good things to people, congratulate them, appreciate them, and are kind to them when you try to help them, with a small pinch of gratitude, you become a caregiver to them.

 

So, in a short period, we have on this earth how many offices can pledge that you just be kind to the people who live around you don't hurt them if we can't be kind.

 

During these times of uncertainty, what we more need is few good words and a smile.

 

Oxytocin matters in life. Though it is a complex biochemical, I see the human angle in this!

 

Thanks for your time.

 

Helios

Pearl of Friendship

Hello readers

 Hope everyone is doing well.

A friend is someone who understands your past, believes in your future, and accepts you just the way you are.

-Unknown

 There are moments in your life which you would always recollect, and you rejoice in them

It was triumphant to you.

 Maybe that was the day you got your driving license or graduated, or maybe your first job.

 There is this word called “companion” or companionship which is dear to all of us.

 Why do we feel so? For the simple reason that we are called humans, the human gene in us longs for sociability and cordial relationships.

 So, there is a string in the mind which needs support to strum, sometimes because it is worn out due to the emotional wear and tear in our day-to-day.

 There are experts in tightening that string, and the tool they use is simple; they give the buff of happiness and the empathy required at that time.

 They give you a buddy boost, which was required. We call them friends.

 The Webster dictionary defines a friend as: person who has a strong liking for and trust in another person.

 Simple and beautiful as it sounds, a person who genuinely likes your quality, presence and appreciates.They shares your happiness and pain,  see happiness in your happiness.

 The beauty of friendship is, it is just that person being there for you and you being there for him.

 There is this word called expectation which sometimes blocks friendships. But I see it is a litmus which proves the vigor of that comity.

 People say, "meet my friend"!  but I feel the word "friend" is taken lightly these days and like so many sayings go you should seriously choose whom you want to consider as one, yes.  I am serious.

 I have learned one thing clearly in life: there are two kinds of people whom you meet in life; the first kind are just passers-by; definitely, you enjoy their company, then we move on, you might learn somethings from them or teach them and there it ends.

 Then they are this second kind, whom you want to stick upon, and they too wish to stay with you and accept you as you are; these are the people who will stand by you come what may.

 In fact, one of my friends asked me when I wrote my last blog, why don’t you write something even my daughter could connect!?

 I thank him for asking me that, we all need good friends in life, and the bonds should start building when we are young, and those bonds last forever.

 Of course, there are no timelines to meet good people and become pals.

 A very learned man once said, “when you have already accepted a person as your close friend, stop having your ego fights with them for things like starting conversations, who should be the ice -breaker! if you do not hear anything from their end just dial the phone or go meet them!”.

 Further, he says, once you are sure they will be part of your life till your end, support them, respect them, and enjoy the purity of the friendship.

 That is the pearl of your friendship.

 Ending my blog with a humble thank you to all my friends who stood by me and for me and made me smile when I tried hard to cry.

 This one is dedicated to all my dear friends!

 Thanks for your time, good evening.

 Helios.

Carte Blanche- A Story Of Freedom

 Hello Readers

 

How are you today? Hope you are just keeping yourself cheerful and dandy!

 

The sanctity of law can be maintained only so long as it is the expression of the will of the people.

- Shaheed Bhagat Singh

 

What can we do and what we cannot, is defined by a simple word “freedom”.

 

The word  free is existent since the beginning of time.

 

It has been there even before we came into the picture, I wouldn’t say the world doesn’t have rules, it does, and those rules are defined by force, nature and I consider nature as a mother and the whole world and the things in it as her children.

 

It is a cycle; actually, there is no mercy in the way the world works, life and death are considered the same by nature, one sunrise other is twilight.

 

Humans divided themselves as fruitarians and non-vegetarians, that is only when civilization came to existence, and when we learnt to cultivate plants and could make sense of what is edible.

 

Okay! Turning the wheel of time a little bit forward, we are all civilized, and the dark ages and the benighted ages are over!

 

The world is now moved towards the industrial revolution, and with the help of mighty vessels and steamers, people started exploring the world and finding new sea-routes and trading beyond borders.

 

By now, some have realized where I am getting to, if some of you guessed if it is remotely related to colonization and our freedom struggle, Bravo! You are right.

 

The typical way forward from this point is to talk about the various invasions on India from the various western, Turkish and many more Kings and cantonments and finally, the Brits settling here for almost most of of their lives, putting India into deep poverty, slavery and turmoil and finally the mutiny which got us freedom.

 

But I would like to talk about something other than the usual, in the light of the freedom and Independence Day, which we just celebrated for the 73rd time yesterday.

 

Freedom- Simple, isn’t it? What are the first thoughts you get when you listen to this word freedom?

 

Clapping your hands in bliss and running in a cornfield? Or a pigeon flying high up in the sky?

 

Well, they are depictions or perceptions or the thoughts which are injected to us by watching so many movies!

 

When I think about freedom, I don’t get such fancy thoughts or images atleast now, I look at what it has costed to experience this freedom today?

 

The sacrifices are what revolves around my head! Followed by the mindset.

 

The mindset of the people who decided to fight against what kept us handcuffed, enslaved, and bootlegged.

 

Have we realized their level of maturity, their organization skills, planning, management and the heroism fluxed with emotions for their motherland?

 

I would say all the freedom fighters, I do not want to mention names because if one selected a diplomatic way to get us freedom, another picked up a howitzer.

 

But finally, they had one thing in common, a country which could spread its wings and fly the way it wanted.

 

India removed its shackles and became free from the colonists in 1947.

 

Just one day after our Independence Day, let us respect the essence of freedom and realize what has it taken to reach here.

 

Courtesy Google images

 

If today you can do whatever you want, there is people’s effort, pain, blood, and sacrifice behind it.

 

The Idea of free India is just brilliant, but the effort it has taken to reach till here is a herculean effort, we all need to work and move in the directions these elders thought us to, for they are the only ones whom I consider as elders!

 

Let us all always keep that in mind and respect those selfless, heroic souls.

 

Finally, let us not satisfy ourselves and enter a comfortable space. 

 

There is still a lot to be done and take our country to new heights, lets us all be only partially satisfied so that we keep on improving our motherland.

 

Wishing you all freedom and happiness.

 

Thanks a lot for your time, have a great day ahead.

Helios

Maverick in traffic!

Hello Readers

How are you today?

Work hard, work harder, work with efficiency, work in cooperative spirit

Work with a team spirit to make your country great, self-supporting and strong.

-Sir M Visvesvaraya

The greatest civil engineer ever lived in India.

They say a plan is first blotted in mind and then on a sheet of paper and then they bring it to life.

In fact, India is known to be the center of architectural marvel and the Aw aspiring temples, church and Sufi architecture and other learning centers.

The I.T( Information Technology) capital of the country "Bengaluru" buzzing with young minds trying to solve the analytical assignments challenged to them inside the glass doors of their workplace.

Well, it is rightly quoted by many that, "Bengaluru is the silicon valley of India".

That looks very good on papers, but that is the ground reality of the commuters!

What are the perils and pitfalls of the industry, the ripples created on the infrastructure of this once beautiful city?

Usually a motivational blogger and what they call the optimistic types  I choose to be realistic and grim about this one.

Starting in the 1980s, Karnataka emerged as the information technology capital of the country. A total of 1973 companies in Karnataka are involved in Information Technology related business, including big firms like Infosys and Wipro who have their headquarters in Bangalore. The origin of the growth of the software industry in Karnataka seems to have been the entry of Texas Instruments which was the first multinational to set up base in Sona Tower, Millers Road, Bangalore in 1985.

Texas Instruments was searching for a location to set up their overseas development center in India in the early 1980s. They first looked at the states of Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, but when both states refused permission, Karnataka was approached with the condition that land allotted must be near an airport.

The then chief minister of Karnataka Gundu Rao agreed to their terms and granted land near the H.A.L. Airport in Bangalore. Texas Instruments currently has a large facility in Bagmane Tech Park in Bangalore near the airport.

There were many factors conducive to the development of the software industry in Karnataka state.

One factor is the presence of large numbers of top-grade science and engineering institutions like IISc, NITK, B.M.S. College of Engineering, B.V.B., Malnad College of Engineering MSRIT, N.I.E., SJCE, RVCE, PESIT, SDMCET and around 200 engineering colleges.

 The software industry requires large numbers of skilled engineers which are regularly churned out of the engineering colleges in Karnataka.

 The presence of Public sector undertakings like B.E.L., H.A.L., BHEL, I.T.I. And BEML gave ready access to manpower as well as trial opportunities of the newly developed software. There were many advanced laboratories like N.A.L. and ISRO in and around Bangalore which provided necessary basic knowledge required for software development.

The successive state governments have been proactive in providing essential facilities for the growth of the industry. The salubrious climate of Bangalore also helps in the growth of the software industry there. ( numbers and names Wikipedia)

When we come to the post-2006 era, when large companies like Infosys, H.C.L.- Tech Wipro, Satyam had passed the sigmoid it was sure that the Bengaluru will become the future I.T. hub of India.

The effects

There have been both positive and negative effects of the boom. Well for any onlooker it is evident that the per capita income of the state has risen, the software engineers earn the salaries at the beginning of the career what their parents earned during the time of their superannuation.

The downside

There has been a decline of quality engineers passing out of colleges, they are just manufactured engineers who are designed to clear corporate interviews. The Government too has made getting a government job like sour grapes which can't be reached.

Even though the earning capacity of an individual increased substantially, they do not know what to with the remuneration so technically there is a trend towards financial illiteracy.

The apocalypse effect!

Now the once garden city has become a concrete city with just huge megalithic apartments all around us! Definitely, jobs draw population, and that population brings its own needs, and that has to be catered.

But there is a point when the land cannot take much of human interventions which have led to catastrophes in the recent past examples, flooding of roads, the low laying areas being submerged during rains.

We, the citizens, don't speak much and try to be more and more supportive of solving the civic problems by ourselves. Still, if the public works department is in a state of apathy, with the unplanned development of infrastructure, I think we are in a state of emergency.

Recently I read an article where Bengaluru one of the well-planned cities in Asia has the worst traffic management in the world surpassing even New Delhi.

My reaction was not surprising, but it was disappointment and shallow, imagine you are trying to build sub-urban trains, metro rails. As a result, you block roads, but are we living in a superman era where everything can work as a click?

I took this picture last week! to show the poor utilities given  to workmen, in this case they were mixing water using paper cups! To complete a footpath construction!

Why is there is no planning, and what an everyday commuter can witness is just apathy on the road and feel depressed about it.

We all as the daily users of the roads and infrastructure who generate economy for this country should definitely start questioning the authorities about their plans and deadlines! And question their logic and timing of destroying roads and trees!

Let me know your thoughts on this all-important one.

Thanks a lot for your time.

Helios.