Do we know what we want to achieve in life?

Do we really know what we want to really achieve in life? Probably No? and to me that's the beauty of life. Discovering ourselves, our passion and learning new things about ourselves is what probably makes life more interesting than setting the target and running after that.

As kids we were often asked this question. The answers differed as we grew in age from bus driver to postman to fireman to air hostess to PT Usha to settle in US and what not. It all depended on what fascinated us at that point. I really hope that today's youth wants to join ISRO after our greatest success story of MOM. Even now when into a career, we still keep changing the stuff that we do. Reasons could be boredom, compulsion, finding something more interesting or pure lethargy or anything else that I could think of.

I myself have so many ideas about what I want to do. Hundreds of those ranging from be a writer, be a musician, get into an arty crafty thing, be a teacher, be a technologist, an enterprise architect, an Agilist, a great speaker and many more things professionally, and be a great mother, daughter, wife, friend, colleague, mentor, a person with integrity, humility, courage, social worker and so on personally.

I just see the list changing all the time. I had never thought that I may participate in marathon, even if it's a very short distance like 6 km, or learn Quilling in turn helping my daughter win greeting card/bookmark competition. But I found those interesting and ended up doing that in my life! Not sure what new things I may stumble across, find interesting and put efforts to achieve those.

I read that the new generation may have as many as 17 different distinct careers in their life. I find it extremely interesting phenomenon when people change their careers completely. A friend from my engineering college got into TV serials completely, and we hear so many stories of people leaving their plush jobs for the sake of contributing back to society.

It's also interesting to see people finding new things in their profession and achieving excellence there. Even at this age Amitabh Bachchan is able to find challenging work and deliver awesome performances. I am in the awe of Dr. V who after retirement founded the Arvind Eye Clinic, the McDonalds of Eye Care. I guess these guys found their passion or purpose of their life and have jumped into it. In general what we want to achieve could lie anywhere in between "Giving my two cents" to "Making a dent in the Universe".

On a lighter note, I wonder what is it that Sachin Tendulkar would want to do now that he has accomplished so much and retiring at such young age!

Here's a wish that the journey of finding what we want to achieve and then achieving it in itself becomes thoroughly enjoyable at every point in life for each one of us, and we get opportunity to reinvent ourselves all the time, or at least sometimes! Amen!

Rambo Circus and thoughts related to HR

We visited the Rambo circus on Sunday. Advertised as fully air conditioned Italian tent, and with online booking on bookmyshow :) Brought back many memories. 

When I was a child, there was a small ground behind our house and in holidays a circus would often come there. It would be around 400-500 m far from our buildings and we would clearly hear the roaring of tigers n lions at night. A lion getting free, claiming 2 floors of our building and entering my house was often my nightmare during those days! But the lions were not so lucky!!

Nowadays they are luckier and they no longer have to listen in to the ring masters' orders. We can only see elephants, dogs, horses and sometimes birds in the circus now. All other animals are banned I believe. Not sure when luck would shine on these animals :)

My kids loved the acrobats and stunts that the artistes performed. It looked like a combination of "India's Got Talent" and Khataron ke Khiladi to them. Just on 31st night, they had seen a Chinese street artist performing stunts with a huge ring and now they could see it live! Most of the stunts evoked 'OMG, I won't be able to even try this!' in my mind, and I would label the stunts as never try this, or may be you can try while standing on mattress at home for the kids. Not that they would listen, but a feeble attempt as a parent nevertheless! 

I loved the stunts performed by 2 Latin American artistes. It was jaw dropping to see them walk and jump on the outer ring of the moving rings. See the photo below.

I kept wondering about what would motivate the individuals performing these stunts in sticking to this career.   What would make people join this profession and move to different continents to work. I have seen artistes from Africa and Latin America performing here in India so often. Many others may be really in need for work and joining this. But my sense is that the rush they must be feeling inside of them and the applause they would get after performing the stunts might be their poison. It must be a great satisfaction in itself. That might be driving them to practice well, go out perform and call the circus their home.

We all know that circus is a dying form of entertainment. The costs of running the show are huge. Keeping animals like elephants, feeding them is a huge task in itself.

But most importantly, the main assets of this profession are the artistes, and talented skilled ones. To produce or find them, convincing them to work for a dying profession would be even more difficult. They might even be facing issues like poaching, and when everyone has a special skill that's giving them a job, I am sure people won't be ready to create a backup as well. Age would also impact their performance as they would not be as swift.

It would be very interesting to see how these people issues are handled in these shows, and see if we can apply any in our teams. Hope I make time sometime to do that in my life  :)

Rocking Rangoli from South of India

My love for drawing rangolis dates back to my childhood, when I along with my friends spent hours to draw the colourful rangoli designs during Diwali vacations. It was a traditional art passed on by my grandmother and my mother, and I cherished it with passion. Over years I learnt a new form called Sanskar Bharti which was to draw ever expanding and large Rangoli designs. My practice however dwindled to only a few instances during important festivals as I got busier in life.

One of the times I really enjoyed making Rangoli designs was during the annual decorations in my office. It is such a joy. I learnt to make really big designs, put shades into the colours all right there. Making it along with colleagues surely made it more enjoyable.

Yesterday during the celebrations, I enjoyed every moment of making the Rangoli. We did two different forms of it. The theme was South of India. First was a traditional Onam flower rangoli that depicted a Kathakali dancer's face. It looked so awesome with all colourful bright flowers bringing it alive, and the fragrant rose petals brought a magic to it. Pure awesomeness. The design was inspired by the image below:

Another one that I always wanted to try was the traditional Kolam rangoli that the South Indians draw using rice flour. The designs looked complex, and always mesmerized me. I wanted to learn and try it out, and yesterday was a perfect chance :) I tried this one using a white chalk on a brown chart paper, and it turned out to be pretty neat. I think the trick here was to know how to draw those parallel 4 lines such that those intersect with each other forming 5 squares. But I really loved the experience. It was inspired by this design I found on the Internet.

Looking forward to trying out more complex designs from the South of India in this year :)

Soar beyond fears - Why walk when you can fly

Came across this lovely story today, something really inspirational for the new year, and could not help re-posting it here...

SOAR BEYOND FEARS

Once there was a king who received a gift of two magnificent falcons from Arabia. They were peregrine falcons, the most beautiful birds he had ever seen. He gave the precious birds to his head falconer to be trained.

Months passed and one day the head falconer informed the king that though one of the falcons was flying majestically, soaring high in the sky, the other bird had not moved from its branch since the day it had arrived.

The king summoned healers and sorcerers from all the land to tend to the falcon, but no one could make the bird fly. He presented the task to the member of his court, but the next day, the king saw through the palace window that the bird had still not moved from its perch. Having tried everything else, the king thought to himself, "May be I need someone more familiar with the countryside to understand the nature of this problem." So he cried out to his court, "Go and get a farmer."

In the morning, the king was thrilled to see the falcon soaring high above the palace gardens. He said to his court, "Bring me the doer of this miracle."

The court quickly located the farmer, who came and stood before the king. The king asked him, "How did you make the falcon fly?"

With his head bowed, the farmer said to the king, " It was very easy, your highness. I simply cut the branch where the bird was sitting."

We are all made to fly -- to realize our incredible potential as human beings. But instead of doing that, we sit on our branches, clinging to the things that are familiar to us. The possibilities are endless, but for most of us, they remain undiscovered. We conform to the familiar, the comfortable, the mundane. So for the most part, our lives are mediocre instead of exciting, thrilling and fulfilling.

So let us learn to destroy the branch of fear we cling to and free ourselves to the glory of flight.

-- From the Book "Why walk when you can fly"

Of VIPs and 93 friends

A couple of small talks thanks to my kiddo...

Whenever we cross the toll bridge on the expressway, we would read the signs on the lanes, one of those would read VIP. My son asked me what it means and I said Very Important People. He asked me whether we are VIPs, I said why not ! Since then he wants my hubby to get our car in that lane.
The other day he asked me how do they decide who is a VIP and who is not. I said, in my opinion people whom we care for, or without whom our work gets stuck is a VIP for us, everyone including my family, my colleagues, my domestic help and my favorite people who make a difference in my life is a VIP for me. I just wished the toll bridge people also think so, and treat people equal !

The other day my son was talking to one of our family friends, and they asked him about his friends. He started telling them his friends' names, and suddenly said, "My mother has 93 friends!". I was overhearing and was bowled over by this. I asked him later what is this 93 number, and he said he had seen it on my facebook profile the other day. Wow ! 93 friends ! He was proud that his mother has so many friends, and thinks he has not yet reached that number of his friends. For him the friends are yet all face to face and real friends, and not virtual ones like me though :)

It's Diwali Time folks ! Happy Diwali

Diwali is just around the corner, its actually nearer than that :) and it really really excites me. Have lots of plans this time, as its a 3 day holiday. So lots of rangoli, crackers, sweets, cooking, lighting, new dresses, diya, lanterns. It all really fills so many colours in life. Kids are also excited and spending a lot of time in making diwali greetings for their cousins / friends, and trying their hands at rangoli too.

India is really big on festivals, and Diwali is undoubtedly the Queen. People splurge on things that they would not otherwise, irrespective of how much they earn. It gives a zing to the routine boring life.
I have been finding out and telling stories about why we celebrate diwali to kids. So all stories of Narakasura, Laxmi's birthday, Bali-Vaman, Bhaubeej, Ram returning home from Lanka, Pandav returning from their exile, and what not. So many reasons to celebrate, isnt it?

I love the light and colours of diwali, and the enthusiasm that's filled in the air. Mumbai looks fascinating with the lights specially during Diwali. It hides all the dark side of it, and illuminates the hope of this dream city. I wish everyone a wonderful diwali, and pray that it fills everyone's life with joy that lasts forever, every diwali only adding to it every year. Enjoy !

Engineering practices !!

I would be speaking on one of my favourite topics "Engineering Practices" at Agile Tour 2010 in Pune India this Saturday i.e. 23rd Oct 2010. This is the first time Agile Tour conference is happening in India !
Am really excited to think about the event, and specially my presentation. Looking forward to hear new ideas, new thoughts to feed my mind.

The agenda looks exciting, They have 3 tracks, one technical, one process, and one on organizational change management.

So inviting all you folks in Pune and in Mumbai, who are passionate about Agile, to participate in this event, and wish me luck!