A List of Top 10 Books That Touched My Life

A friend recently asked me what the purpose of my book shelf was, or rather my books sitting on it was........is it like an art piece, do you ever reread, is it to prove something, a decor for the room, what?

In the process of answering him, I figured something deeper. While a lot of the books are for the pure joy of it.....for good story, for good literature, for good writing....... there are some which are far dearer. They are ones which have touched my life in a deeper sense...... that clearly influenced perspective shifts, world view and some maybe even my very way of being. The ones which fall in that list:

1. New Earth - Eckhart Tolle
2. If You Love Someone - Hari Mohan Paruvu
3. Jonathan Livingston Seagull - Richard Bach
4. The Celestine Prophecy - James Redfield
5. A Short History of Almost Everything - Bill Bryson
6. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
7. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
8. Razors Edge - Somerset Maugham
9. Silence - Thich That Hanh
10. Fountain Head - Ayn Rand
11. My Experiments with Truth - Gandhi
12. Autobiography of a Yogi - Paramahamsa Yogananda
13. The Prophet - Kahlil Gibran
14. Being and Nothingness - John Paul Sartre
15. Eat Pray Love - Elizabeth Gilbert
16. The Zahir - Paulo Coelho
17. Many Lives Many Masters - Brian Weiss
18. Illusions - Richard Bach

And am I glad they came into life when they did.......

The T Rex Story

The T Rex was a large part of life post Jurassic Park. No, not as much me.... but because it completely caught the fancy of Dhruva, who was then three years old...and it became his singular obsession for years to come

The Meteroid Crater at the Yucatan plane of the Gulf of Mexico

I recall this incident a month or so after watching the movie; we're sitting down for breakfast and the coffee cup shook. Dhruva went cold and frigid....he's focusing on the window and asking....do you think a T Rex could be four storeys high? ( we lived on the fourth floor). He thought it was a Rex's walk that shook the cup......

That started a crazy level of fascination.  He could identify and name atleast a hundred different dinosaurs, with their physical characteristics, habitats, food habits et al. The whole family got together to bring him dinosaur books and toys from everywhere...I still have a bag full of them. Even our favorite two hundred piece jigsaw puzzle was a dinosaur scene... a fondly remembered Sunday activity that we did for months on end. (hoping I still have that one too). 

Well that's context for why I read and write about this piece of evolution, a review of 'Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs: The Astounding Interconnectedness of the Universe', by Lisa Randall, a Harvard particle physicist and cosmologist, by Maria Popova.

"She talks of the intellectually thrilling exploration of how the universe evolved, what made our very existence possible, and how dark matter illuminates our planet’s relationship to its cosmic environment across past, present, and future.

Randall weaves together a number of different disciplines — cosmology, particle physics, evolutionary biology, environmental science, geology, and even social science — to tell a larger story of the universe, our galaxy, and the Solar System. In one of several perceptive social analogies, she likens dark matter — which comprises 85% of matter in the universe, interacts with gravity, but, unlike the ordinary matter we can see and touch, doesn’t interact with light — so is part of the invisible but instrumental factions of human society:

She tells an expansive and exhilarating story of how the universe as we know it came to exist, and invites us to transcend the limits of our temporal imagination. How humbling to consider that a tiny twitch caused by an invisible force in the far reaches of the cosmos millions of years ago hurled at our unremarkable piece of rock, a meteoroid three times the width of Manhattan, which produced the most massive and destructive earthquake of all time, decimating three quarters of all living creatures on Earth.

Had the dinosaurs not died, large mammals may never have come to dominate the planet and humanity wouldn’t be here to contemplate the complexities of the cosmos. 

One of the most scintillating parts of the book illustrates this aspect of science in action. Beginning in 1973, a geochemist proposed that a meteoroid impact caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, only to be dismissed by the scientific community.

The notion remained radical until a geologist named Walter Alvarez embarked upon an investigative adventure that ended as one of the greatest breakthroughs in planetary science. 

They detected an unusually high concentration of iridium — a rare metal put to such mundane uses as fountain pen nibs — in the clay deposit separating two differently colored limestone layers. Because Earth is intrinsically low in iridium, they suspected that an extraterrestrial impactor was responsible for this perplexing quantity. After a team of nuclear chemists confirmed the anomaly, Walter and Luis Alvarez proposed that a giant meteoroid had hit the Earth and unleashed a downpour of rare metals, including iridium.

But rather than the end of the story, this was merely the beginning, sparking a worldwide scientific scavenger hunt for the actual site of the impact. Since craters are typically twenty times the size of the impactor and Alvarez estimated that the meteoroid was about ten kilometers in diameter, scientists set out to find a crater nearly 125 miles wide.

Despite the enormity of the target, the odds of finding it were slim — if the meteoroid had hit the ocean, which covers three quarters of Earth’s surface, the crater would be both unreachable and smoothed over by sixty-six million years of tides; had it hit the land, erosion, sedimentation, and tectonic shifts may have still covered its traces completely.

And yet, in a remarkable example of what Randall calls the “human ingenuity and stubbornness” driving the scientific endeavor, scientists did uncover it, aided by an eclectic global cast of oil industry workers, international geologists, three crucial beads of glass, and one inquisitive reporter who connected all the dots.

In 1991, NASA announced the discovery of the crater in the Yucatan plane of the Gulf of Mexico. But it wasn’t until March of 2010 — exactly thirty years after Walter Alvarez had first put forth his theory — that a collective of forty one elite international scientists reviewed all the evidence that the

meteoroid killed the dinosaurs and deemed it conclusive.

Circumstantial evidence.....Conjecture...Research.....Proof....Knowledge. Fascinating Journey, huh?

How I Raised Teenagers Who Tell Me Everything - Even When It's Hard

An article in mbg (mindbodygreen) which really resonated with me. 

My teenage daughter was seeing a movie one night with a group of friends. When I called her to coordinate her Uber ride home, she didn't answer. Finally, two hours later, she answered her phone and told me she was on her way home. Something felt off.

I let her know how worried I had been not to hear back from her. The next morning she came into my bedroom and said, “Mom, I wasn't really at the movies last night. I was at a kickback.” For those parents who haven't heard, it's basically a casual party with a bunch of teenagers "kickin’ back." Original, huh?

We live in a mostly peaceful, fairly suburban wedge of a pretty large and sometimes very tough city. I knew that raising my kids in a diverse setting meant they’d encounter situations that required skill to maneuver. I needed to make sure they could make good decisions on their own.

So, starting when my children were in preschool, we’ve been playing a game in which I would describe a situation, then ask whether it was a health or safety issue.

Can you eat a pile of candy for dinner? No, sorry, this is a health issue.

Can you cross the street without holding my hand? Sometimes, depending on how busy the street is.

Any issue that fell outside the bounds of health or safety was one they were entitled to decide for themselves.

Can you go to school with your hair in knots and unbrushed? Sure, if your fashion sense is to look horrible, so be it!

These are my parenting parameters — these rules determine when I step in and when I lean back. So when my daughter told me that she had lied about the kickback, I went back to that rubric of health and safety. I calmly explained to her, “Sweetie, if I don't know where you are, I can't keep you safe. And that can create a dangerous situation.”

I ran a few scenarios by her: What would've happened if the party had gotten rough? Or if you started to feel sick? Because of the lie, you might’ve felt hesitant to call me and ask for help. This is a safety issue.

I did not shame or interrogate her — I also told her that while I consider her “very smart and capable,” life can deliver curveballs, and I want to help her catch them. She agreed to always tell me exactly where she was going, including the address, in the future.

I told a friend of mine, who is also the mother of a teenager, what went down. She asked me repeatedly why I didn't punish my daughter for lying. The thought hadn't occurred to me. My focus was on keeping the lines of communication open.

Subconsciously I must’ve felt that harsh discipline would give her reason to shut me out and lie again to get back at me; I wanted her to learn to make her own decisions and always come to me when those decisions were difficult.

Teenagers need to individuate from their parents and test out their own theories, rules, and values. But how do we make a space for individuation while keeping them safe?

According to Advocates for Youth: “A major study showed that adolescents who reported feeling connected to parents and their family were more likely than other teens to delay initiating sexual intercourse. Teens who said their families were warm and caring also reported less marijuana use and less emotional distress than their peers. … When parents and youth have good communication, along with appropriate firmness, studies have shown youth report less depression and anxiety and more self-reliance and self-esteem.”

If we want our kids to talk to us about all their challenges — including sex, drugs, and situations in which they might feel preyed upon — and we want to impart our wisdom to open ears, we must work on making communication a two-way street.

1. Allow your children to have separate thoughts and values.

Our children are separate people and might have different values. This can be incredibly challenging to deal with. For instance, a transgender teen in our community tried for months to win the approval of her father, who repeatedly stated that her sexuality went against his religion.

It wasn't until she attempted suicide that he saw the damage his rigidity was creating. Make an effort to see your teenager as a separate individual — and allow them to express their individuality — you don’t own your child.

2. Be curious.

The greatest gift you can give a teenager is curiosity about who they are. When my kids were in kindergarten I started a game. I’d say, “Vanilla ice cream or chocolate ice cream?” “A vacation by the beach or in the mountains?” “Getting angry with me or getting angry with your dad?” I learned so much about them through this seemingly pointless banter. If you show curiosity about the little things, it’ll open a portal into more open communication and connection.

3. Get a life of your own.

Are you hyper-focusing on your teenager to avoid your own life? Helicopter parenting is an epidemic these days. The revered psychoanalyst Carl Jung observed, “Nothing is a bigger burden on children than the unlived life of the parent.” If you want your kids to talk to you and confide in you, the first step is to make sure you’ve got your own life together.

Jung also said, “Children are educated by what the grown-up is and not by his talk.” Are you modeling a fulfilled person? Or are you attempting to live out unfulfilled dreams through your kids? Kids will stop sharing their lives if they sense your motives are tainted.

4. Deal with your own history and trauma.

I have a friend whose teenage daughter initiated a conversation with her about potentially having sex for the first time. During the talk my friend started crying and saying she was “worried and fearful” for her daughter. My friend was molested when she was 15 and, without intending to, was projecting her trauma onto her daughter.

This girl has since stopped talking to her mother about sex. When my bewildered friend told me this, I encouraged her to spend some time in therapy so that she could separate her painful experience from her daughter’s very healthy natural explorations into becoming a sexual being.

Separate your history from the present-day experiences of your child. If you can’t talk about difficult experiences, how do you expect your children to?

5. Learn to listen actively.

Are you listening as much as you are talking? Do you use “I” statements (“I want to make sure you are safe” versus “You are screwing up your life!”)? If a conversation with your teen tends to evolve into a heated debate, step back and ask yourself whether you are disagreeing with your child’s feelings or actions rather than intently listening with the desire to understand him or her better.

It’s impossible to be a perfect parent, but if your intention is to guide rather than control, if you’ve examined your own motives and life, and if you really listen — you have a much stronger chance to have open, honest communication with your children.

The SmartPhone Fixation

These can't help but make you smile......and maybe even wonder how far away we ourselves are from there.

                       

The one with the archangels in heaven is my favorite :)

Bajirao Mastani

A movie of epic proportions. Everything about it....... the opulence, the costumes, the battles, the heroism,  the conspiracies, and above all else..... the love.

                        

It's a historical romance based on the real life story of Bajirao, the Maratha Peshwa, and Mastani, the Bundelkhand princess, of half Muslim and half Rajput origin, set in the 1700s. It's a love story that gets to you, searing through you in it's intensity. A love that's wanting to.... and willing 'to be' despite anything that might come in it's way.....like a force unto itself...and it has its own beautiful energy.

The frames just take you over from the moment the movie starts, with the dramatic sequence of Bajirao being crowned Peshwa, and you meet this larger than life character. One who has the focus, the awareness, the intelligence and strength of character to be what he chooses, be it a superb warrior, shrewd strategist, honest husband or a man in love. Everything at a hundred percent kinds.  

When the Peshwa and Mastani first meet, or rather part after they first meet, she says “Tujhe yaad kar liya hai ayat ki tarah, ab zikr hoga tera ibadat ki tarah.” and that's how it plays out.  ( Ayat, is verses from the quran and Ibadat is the penance...I think). That's when he gives her his dagger, and I guess is the defining moment of acknowledgment.

Once back in Pune, Bajirao seems quite happy to be back in his feifdom and with his wife. But Mastani decides otherwise.........she's like 'Mastani, apni taqdeer kudh banaati hai', and she goes after what she wants....the Peshwa. 

The resistance is strong....the mother, brother and the other religious strongholds in his palace....... yet, they prevail. The mother is a stoic and powerful character, played to brilliance by the inimitable Tanvi Azmi, relentless in her belief that Mastani can never be given a space in the Shaniwar Wada home

Priyanka as Kashi, the first wife, is graceful in emoting the hurt, the betrayal, the longing, but to her credit rising above it all to enable what's right for her husbands happiness, and the subtlety with which she brings it out is beautiful. 

While she might still have even accepted Mastani, it's a not to be, as the combined forces of the rest of family and the custodians of religion have a vice like grip on the system, taken to completion by Kashi's son Nanaji.

Deepika is sparkling and intense, not just in how she looks and emotes, but in the panache with which she carries through even the sword fights. Very convincing. And if I haven't said anything about Ranveers' acting..it's because it didn't seem like acting, he just lived the role...it's like ang ang me peshwa hi tha.

It's a powerful movie, and I'd say a thanks to Sanjay Leela Bhansali and team....especially for how he celebrates love beyond structure, system and other opposing forces.

Strong recommendation to watch....the larger the screen the better.

I later had a tryst with Mastani Mahal, the palace built by BajiRao for Mastani...or rather what remains of it.

Work Rules ! Insights from Inside Google - Laszlo Bock

Laszlo joined Google in 2006, when Google was a 6000 employee company. It's now grown to 60,000, with 70 offices, spread across 40 countries. Fortune named Google the 'best company to work for' an unprecedented five times. This also in numerous other countries, as diverse as Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Ireland and yes, In India too. 

Google is the most sought after place to work on the planet, according to Linkedin, and receives more than 2 million applications every year. And hiring is a few thousand, making Google twenty five times more selective than Harvard, Yale or Princeton.

They (Laszlo) must be doing something darn right. 

Laszlo says: "Leaders always speak of putting people first, and then treated them like replaceable gears. I have worked in an environment where our sole purpose was to change the world, and another where it was all about profits, and it just didn't make sense to me, no matter where I turned, people weren't treated better in their jobs. You spend more time working than doing anything else in life. It's not right that the experience at work, even at some of the best employers, should be so demotivating and dehumanizing.

This book is about this journey,  sometimes exhausting, sometimes frustrating, but always surging forward to create an environment of purpose, freedom and creativity,  and what can be done to put people first and transform how you live and lead."

The reason I picked up this book is to help a friend create an HR framework for his company, and I started by picking out specific chapters. But as I read, I found myself reading it like a novel, like whole........it's deeply insightful, and can be used, if not in whole, definitely in parts to impact cultures of companies, of whatever size.

Laszlo Bock has done far more than codify Google's recipe for its high-freedom, high-performance workplace, he has created the essential guide for unleashing talent in the digital age. Intelligent, playful, and practical, WORK RULES! is for all leaders who want to inspire brilliance and bring out the best of humanity in their workforce. LIZ WISEMAN author of Multipliers and Rookie Smarts

A couple of quotes from the book which seemed like inspiration to Laszlo and which kind of set context:

CEO of Wegman, Danny Wegman "leading with your heart can make a successful business.Our employees are empowered around this vision to give their best and let no customer leave unhappy"

Chief People Officer Ishan Dantanarayana, of Brandix, a cloth manufacturing company in Srilanka "our goal is inspiring a large female workforce by telling them... come as you are and harness your full potential'" and these efforts have made it the second largest exporter in the country, and recipient of several awards.

High Freedom approach is the future. Command oriented, low freedom management is common because its profitable; it requires less effort and most managers are terrified of the alternative.

Talent will flow to high freedom companies.

Here are the Work Rules in bullets: ( each is a chapter in the book)

1. For becoming a founder
• Choose to think of yourself as a founder
• Now act like one
2. For Building a Great Culture
• Think of your work as a calling, with a mission that matters
• Give people slightly more trust, freedom, and authority than you are comfortable giving them. If you're not nervous, you haven't given them enough
3. For Hiring
• Given limited resources, invest your HR money first in recruiting
• Hire only the best by taking your time, hiring only people who are better than you in some meaningful way, and not letting managers make hiring decisions for their own teams
4. For Selecting New Employees
• Set a high bar for quality
• Assess candidates objectively
• Give candidates a reason to join
5. For Mass Empowerment
• Eliminate status symbols
• Make decisions based on data, not based on managers opinion
• Find ways for people to shape their work and the company
6. For Performance Management
• Set Goals correctly
• Gather peer feedback
• Split rewards conversations from development conversations
7. For Managing your two tails
• Help those in need
• Put your best people under a microscope
• Use surveys and checklists to find the truth and nudge people to improve
• Set a personal example by sharing and acting on your own feedback
8. For Building a Learning Institution
• Engage in deliberate practice: Break lessons down into small, digestible pieces with clear feedback and do them again and again
• Have your best people teach
• Invest only in courses that you can prove change people's behavior
9. For Paying Unfairly
• Swallow hard and pay unfairly. Have wide variations in pay that reflect the power law distribution of performance
• Celebrate accomplishment, not compensation
• Make it easy to spread the love
• Reward thoughtful failure
10. For Efficiency, Community, and Innovation
• Make life easier for employees
• Find ways to say Yes
• The bad stuff in life happens rarely....be there for your people when it does
11. For nudging towards Health, Wealth and Happiness
• Recognize the difference between what is and what ought to be
• Run lots of small experiments
• Nudge, don't shove
12. For Screwing Up
• Admit your mistake. Be transparent about it
• Take counsel from all directions
• Fix whatever broke
• Find the moral in the mistake, and teach it

It's a long list, and I guess we each will take what we can, but listen deeper and you'll truly find the manage with your heart ringing true all through...in alignment for the individual and the company.

As the tag line reads, It's 'Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead'

Her - The Movie

Hard to classify if this is an unusual soulful love story or hardcore scientific fiction ........let's just say, both.

It's an extraordinary and intense love story between human and a highly advanced, artificially intelligent, operating system.  In fact when I put the picture here, I kept having this feeling that something is missing, because Samantha ( the OS) is a strong presence and such a pleasing personality, that you don't want to miss her out........but then, she's only a voice.

         

The scepticism is not just ours, Theo starts with scepticism too, but somehow Spike Jonze, the director seems to have rational answers to all the subtle and sublime facets of the relationship. It's set in a not too distant, but surely fantastic world. After all, we already have Siri on the iphone.

Theodore ( Joaquin Phoenix), a sensitive guy who writes touching personal letters for others for a living, is damaged and hurt over the breakdown of his marriage, and yet when he meets his wife for the divorce the inadvertent emotional lacerations continue. And all this makes him this sad and mopey guy.

He then has a device with a new operating system, that is built with an ability to not just think and compute, but to also feel.......and what's more, it's a self learning system that grows on emotions as well, an entity in it's own right.

The Operating system christens itself Samantha ( Scarlett Johansson's voice...sweet, warm, sensual and playful......brilliantly done).

The shift in his personality is so beautifully brought out, where he goes from this mopey, boring guy back to a smart and fun loving guy. When Dhruva first told me to watch the movie, I was like...'how, dhruva...what about touch, feel, see and stuff?' and he's like...'watch ma, you'll realize those are not as integral to a relationship as we think they are'. And here, it almost seems so.

It has it's super quirky moments, like when Samantha, starts to process all of Theo's work, and being a computer has the ability to handle huge loads at great speed...and she tells Theo..'"I can understand how the limited perspective can look to the non-artificial mind". And at one point Theo realizes that Samantha is simultaneously talking to 11500 humans and is in love with 641, and she's telling him how he should not be upset, as it in no way impacts his relationship with her, her heart can feel as much too.

There's an underlying, kind of offbeat wisdom on human relationships under all that technology and sci fi that's genuinely engaging and provocative.

If you can stretch the mind and thought, a definitely worthy watch.

Kahlil Gibran - On Love

When Love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you, yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you, believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams

For even as love crowns you, so shall he crucify you
Even as he is for your growth,
so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height,
And caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the Sun,
So shall he descend to your roots
And shake them in their clinging to the earth

All these things shall love do unto you that
you may know the secrets of your heart
And in that knowledge become a fragment
of Life's heart

But if in your fear you would seek
Only love's peace and love's pleasure
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness
and pass out of love's threshing floor
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh,
but not all of your laughter,
And weep
But not all of your tears.
Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed,
For love is sufficient unto love.

The Mentalist

Nicolai Friedrich - The World's Best Mentalist

Up until we booked for this show, I didn't even know what a 'Mentalist' was. For those, like me, who don't know....A mentalist is an artist who uses mental prowess as his art.                 

                            

The show was simply mindblowing.... intriguing........ fascinating.... bewildering.... at times even creepy

Why?

Because Nicolai uses powers beyond what one has seen. He started with magic...sleight of hand kinds, which in itself was good magic.

And then he moves onto mind reading, and that's so amazing to see, because you see his effort, you can see his process. Like one instance, where he asks this woman to go on an imaginary rendezvous with him, and he asks her to imagine the city, any city in the world. Wear a pretty dress of any chosen colour, and then visualize a number as it appear in a reflection of water with rose petals.

He's then watching her intently, and he starts to draw or write from her mind. And he reads them all.

Then there are some amazing card tricks....one in which he involves everyone from the audience too (each of us gets four cards as we enter), and it's mind boggling to say the least. I still get the creeps thinking of that one. It's so seemingly impossible. Defies all rationality.

Then there's making tables fly which seems like mass hypnosis, then there's finding the one right piece of a jigsaw out of thousand pieces, based on sheer intuition..... lots of very unusual and 'a normal'..as in non normal, kind of stuff.

I fortunately got to talk to him a couple of minutes after the event.......and to being asked what power he uses, he said.......I use everything....magic, hypnosis, illusion, telekinesis, energy. 

He says....we have so many preconceived notions we look through. All our perceptions thus come from an expectation. You need to break through that.

Very interesting indeed. And he's so very charming too :)

The Amphitheatre at UB City which hosted the event

         

On a side note....the Christmas tree at the UB city was very different....minimalist  and classy, so here's a couple of pictures

From up close

And it's stuff like this that enable perspective shifts...make you wonder at life.... and man, that bit more. I mean the mentalist...not the Christmas tree :)

Thanks Swaroop.....wouldn't have done it had it not been for you......was a simply amazing experience.

Buzzer Management

Another one from Seth

I started the quiz team at my high school. Alas, I didn't do so well at the tryouts, so I ended up as the coach, but we still made it to the finals.

It took me thirty years to figure out the secret of getting in ahead of the others who also knew the answer (because the right answer is no good if someone else gets the buzz):

You need to press the buzzer before you know the answer.

As soon as you realize that you probably will be able to identify the answer by the time you're asked, buzz. Between the time you buzz and the time you're supposed to speak, the answer will come to you. And if it doesn't, the penalty for being wrong is small compared to the opportunity to get it right.

This feels wrong in so many ways. It feels reckless, careless and selfish. Of course we're supposed to wait until we're sure before we buzz. But the waiting leads to a pattern of not buzzing.

No musician is sure her album is going to be a hit. No entrepreneur is certain that every hire is going to be a good one. No parent can know that every decision they make is going to be correct. 

What separates this approach from mere recklessness is the experience of discovering (in the right situation) that buzzing makes your work better, that buzzing helps you dig deeper, that buzzing inspires you.

The habit is simple: buzz first, buzz when you're confident that you've got a shot. Buzz, buzz, buzz. If it gets out of hand, we'll let you know.

The act of buzzing leads to leaping, and leaping leads to great work. Not the other way around.

Checklists at the Docs

This is a small little habit that I'd developed, way back when I used to go see the doc for monthly checkups during pregnancy. Through the month, I'd jot down all the questions that came to mind, and carry the list to the doc each visit for answers.

That's a habit that just continued through the years......right through to now.

Might seem like a silly thing to do, but it's after all about our own bodies, of which we know so little ...........and there's always questions we have, but are either hesitant or forget, to ask.

And today when I read this, I realized it's something folks could actually make into practice.

Bringing Emotional Intelligence To Medical Care

A study of patients in physicians' waiting rooms found that each had an average of four or more questions in mind to ask the physician they were about to see. But when the patients left the physicians ' office, an average of only one or two of those questions had been answered. This finding speaks to one of the many ways patients' emotional needs are unmet by today's medicine. Unanswered questions feed uncertainty and fear. And they lead patients to balk at going along with treatment regimes that they don't fully understand.

And any treatment done under uncertainty has that less a degree of effectiveness.

Also, I find that when we ask the doctors, they are (mostly) more than happy to explain, with drawings and all. They just need to know you want to know.

It's like a small little cheat code for more efficient treatment....worth the try?

Love and Merit

Excerpts from a NY Times article, Love and Merit,  by David Brooks

There are two great defining features of child-rearing today. First, children are now praised to an unprecedented degree.  They are given food, shelter and applause. 

The second defining feature is that children are honed to an unprecedented degree. The meritocracy is more competitive than ever before. Parents are more anxious about their kids getting into good colleges and onto good career paths and spend much more time investing in their children’s skills and résumés and driving them to practices and rehearsals.

These two great trends — greater praise and greater honing — combine in intense ways. Children are bathed in love, but it is often directional love. Parents shower their kids with affection, but it is meritocratic affection. It is intermingled with the desire to help their children achieve worldly success.

Very frequently it is manipulative. Parents unconsciously shape their smiles and frowns to steer their children toward behavior they think will lead to achievement. 

This sort of love is merit based. It is not simply: I love you. It is, I love you when you stay on my balance beam. I shower you with praise and care when you’re on my beam.

The wolf of conditional love is lurking in these homes. The parents don’t perceive this; they feel they love their children in all circumstances. But the children often perceive things differently.

Children in such families come to feel that childhood is a performance. They come to feel that love is not something that they deserve because of who they intrinsically are but is something they have to earn.

The shadowy presence of conditional love produces a fear, the fear that there is no utterly safe love; there is no completely secure place where young people can be utterly honest and themselves.

On the one hand, many of the parents in these families are extremely close to their children. They communicate constantly. But the whole situation is fraught. These parents unconsciously regard their children as an arts project.

This conditional love is like an acid that dissolves children’s internal criteria to make their own decisions about their own colleges, majors and careers. At key decision-points, they unconsciously imagine how their parents will react and guide their lives by these imagined reactions.  

Studies suggest that children who receive conditional love often do better in the short run. They can be model students. But they suffer in the long run. They come to resent their parents. They are so influenced by fear that they become risk averse. They feel driven by internalized pressures more than by real freedom of choice. 

Parents two generations ago were much more likely to say that they expected their children to be more obedient than parents today. But this desire for obedience hasn’t gone away; it’s just gone underground. Parents are less likely to demand obedience with explicit rules and lectures. But they are more likely to use love as a tool to exercise control.

But parental love is supposed to be oblivious to achievement. It’s meant to be an unconditional support — a gift that cannot be bought and cannot be earned. It sits outside the logic of the meritocracy, the closest humans come to grace.

Walk - A Movie Review

A movie, (a true story), of how a seemingly impossible and crazy dream is made true.

Philippe is fascinated with tight rope walking right since he watches the act in a circus at age four. It becomes his passion and his obsession and he grows to be a high wire artist. He is then looking for that perfect act....the artists coup as he calls it, when he sees a picture of the twin towers during a dentists appointment, yet under construction, and his mind is made up.

To walk a tight rope, without harness, between the twin towers.

In reality, this seemingly impossible stunt was done by Philippe Petit, a Frenchman, on Aug 7, 1974.

The photography or rather the cinematography brings out just how breathtakingly....insanely.... difficult and dangerous the whole walk is. I had difficulty sitting in one place and watching it on my laptop, and can just about imagine how it must have been on large screen and in 3D. I understand men went and threw up in the rest room.

Joseph Gordon Levitt, who plays Philippe is adorable and convincing...... with this boyish charm and hackneyed french accent, you can't help but feel with him. 

While before I watched the movie, the question in mind is 'why?...why would anyone want to do anything so crazy and meaningless?', within two minutes of the movie beginning, the question disappears and you're all set to go along with Philippe on his journey to his dream.

What does come through and stay beyond the passion and the belief, is the physical and mental precision of the process, the thoroughness and attention to detail which marks an extreme achievement.

A critical part was played by Ben Kingsley as Papa Rudy, a french daredevil, who is mentor to Philippe. He says, 'Stop, you're doing too much..no, you're still doing too much...do it from the heart, not out there'.....and Philippe understands that months later. The Aha moments. That was a defining relationship for sure. That it's such a beautiful and enriching relationship is really brought out when the real moment of glory, of achievement is shown not in NY with Philippe, but in Paris with Papa Rudy.

There's only moments where the stress gets the better of him, and his inner conflict, his tumultuous relationship with his wife and friends is left unexplored. (apparently, the earlier made, award winning, documentary by Marsh called Man on the Wire dealt with the complexities of his personality in more depth.)

And it's Robert Zemeckis' genius I guess that makes us experience, not just the lead up to the actual Walk, but the very Walk itself. You experience it physically through every step Philippe takes, the metallic creaking of the rivets, the rustle of the wind in his hair, the stress when it wobbles...and then the inside of his mind...the fear, the doubt, the audaciousness, the defiance and the glory.

This is the moment....the moment when all else fades away...just him and his dream 

Watch it to see how its a single , simple, horizontal line between an unbridgeable gap, across the void as he keeps saying, a void between where you are and where you want to be and how it gets bridged.

Also what clearly comes through is how once you're in the flow, the effort seems to fall away...it's then like music and poetry....a oneness that's almost spiritual in its intensity and beauty.

My First Tarot Reading

Tarot reading sure is a more esoteric practice than many others. It straight brings to mind a woman with loose hair, flowing robes, a crystal ball, dimly lit room..... foretelling impending doom.

It's really nothing like that.  There's nothing so mysterious or psychic about it. In fact Tarot reading doesn't even claim to predict or foretell ones future.

It is in essence a mechanism that enables you to connect to yourself, connect to the energy within the individual......and to the energy of the universe around the individual.

   

It's more of an incisive tool to self awareness. It's one way of enabling a delving into deeper layers of consciousness and then to how one connects to the possibilities and energies that surround you.

I've been learning and practicing for a few months now. Last week a friend happened to see the cards on the shelf, and asked if I would do a reading for her. 

I was game to try, though I told her I was yet learning and not a pro at it. She was interested, so I did a reading.....my very first. And was I was thrilled, when at the end of it she was like, 'that was really nice, and I could so connect to the cards....... and what you said sure gave perspective and pushed thought'. Fun, huh? 

Repurpose, Reinvent.....Don't Retire

Retirement seems to suggest a binary perspective....Work...... or No Work.

It's like...I've worked all my life, and now I deserve the break. I had a responsibility...I needed to earn...I've done that for long years, so now it's time to indulge.

So what does this 'Break' mean? What does this 'Indulge' mean? They're pretty much myths.

Most folks find themselves at a loose end post retirement. There's an anxiety that's part of that transition, that seems to only grow with the years.........and the concern is not as much financial......... it's more about productivity, or closer home.........'relevance'. I start to wonder about my own Relevance. Especially today when sixty is nowhere near old age. It's only about how healthy you are. Age is a number. Don't let society delude you on that.

So let's see what differentiates the few.....the ones who on the other hand seem to grow in wisdom and stature as they go through their retirement.

I listed out about hundred folks to help think through this......and for those that made the cut ( the rare few), what one sees is this ability to switch off from what was, and find interesting things to do in the present.

Repurpose......Reinvent oneself......there's enough and more interesting things to do. Just know yours.

Also, throw out all the usual conditioning which comes with the thinking.

Work and Earning have gone so closely together, that at all points work....productivity...is gauged in relationship to how much it can earn you. And if it's not fetching you enough, then it's not worth it.

Let's move out of that frame. Money is needed for specifics and if those specifics are already taken care of, get money out of the way. That's one of the most liberating feelings ever.

It's no longer about the company or organization needing you ( it never was) , it's about what you as an individual want....let's accept that. 

What's more....this doesn't have to be a retirement stage occurrence....it would be good to take a raincheck every few years in life. Stepback to ask....Is this where I want to be? Is this what I want to be doing? Is this who I want to live with? Is this where I want to live?  Cliched as it sounds....it's about the now. 

Everyone around you will call you a fool....but then........it's about you, not them. It's your life. 

Be where you are...because, you want to be where you are. You choose.

Manganiyar Classroom

This was one of the most amazing show's I've ever seen. Sufi folk music in a play format, by children from the unbelievably talented performing muslim community, the Manganiyar Tribe from a village near Jaisalmer, Rajasthan. 

Sangeet humare khoon me behta hai (It runs in our blood) they said.......and it's just so visible. The children are maybe from seven to fourteen in age,  and the singing, the zeal, the rhythm, the beat..... like Diksha said, watching the little ones even when they weren't singing....they were still moving to rhythm...like they can't stay away from it.

And there's no recording, background music, amplification, nothing....it's their show all the way, and it keeps you riveted and mesmerized. 

The theme is basic.....children in a classroom...a normal typical teacher with a stick and the kids refuse to study. One teacher who understands them decides to connect with them through music, and he unleashes an energy that's seen through the overpowering music. It's again what we call the flow..they make it seem so effortless and beautiful.

While it's mostly singing, there are also little boys who play the drums and two very traditional instruments, the morchang and khartaal, both Rajasthani folk instruments. Actually, I didn't get why it's called Sufi...( to me sufi is distinctly urdu for one)..it's in the local marwari dialect, and distinctly folk. End of program, no one moved from their seats..... until the director stands and says...that's it guys. 

Roysten Abel, the theater director and playwright, known for his production  'Manganiyar Seduction' says '"It began when the non-profit trust, Bhoomija, from Bangalore approached me for a piece. I took this as an opportunity to work with the Manganiyar children. I felt that these children were so brilliant; when they come out of the wombs of their mothers, they come out singing. The women play the dhol and sing and the child is in between the dhol and the mother, so he grows up in a cocoon of music. What’s unfortunate is that most of them leave their music and take up other jobs, and become carpenters or drivers. Most Manganiyars cannot pursue their vocation'

This is RangaShankara, the auditorium that hosted the show. It's built by Arundhati Naag ( better known for her character as Vidya Balan's mother in Paa), to motivate and encourage art in Bangalore, and it's doing a wonderful job. 

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This is the cafe at the theatre, and if ever you visit....you get great akki roti here

And if you see 'Manganiyar Classroom' in your city, I'd think it would be nuts to miss it :)

Understanding The Doublings

Yet Another From Seth 

If you seek to please 90% of your potential customers, all you need to do is the usual thing.

To please half the remaining potential market, you're going to need to work at least twice as hard.

And to please the next half, twice as hard again. It's Zeno's paradox, an endless road to getting to the end.

So, a letter with a stamp gets you on time deliverability 90% of the time. Priority mail gets you the next 5%, and if you want to be sure of reaching just about everyone in a trackable, reliable way, you're going to have to step up and pay for a courier service. (And note the expensive part... you often don't know which people need to be couriered, so you have to pay to do it for everyone).

The rules apply to more than fulfillment. They apply to bedside manner, to customer service, to effort and originality in the kitchen as well.

Health care works the same way. 90% of the patients will respond to a treatment, but the next 5% will cost twice as much, and on and on...

The very end of the curve, the .5%, might be unpleasable, uncurable, unreachable without insane effort. Which is why organizations that please everyone are so extraordinarily rare.

One approach, which some organizations use, is to redefine your usual systems so you are able to please most people without your team going through a Herculean sprint every day, and then (this is a key element as well), eagerly and regularly apologizing and giving refunds to the one in 150 where it just can't be done.

Perfect is nice, but you can't afford it. None of us can.