Did You Write This Letter?

O! Dear,

I have been wanting to connect with you for ages now, and didn't want to rush you a mail or flash on you a phone call but sit down and talk leisurely; it never happened all this while, for such is the pace of life!

I sometimes wonder in whose hands the reign of my life is! Who is accelerating it? Or, what is, rather?

I dont' know about you, but there are moments when I fall into silence as I come back from work, and perhaps would remain silent for hours without me knowing. A withdrawn state of being, with lot of conversation going on in mind and yet the voice suppressed between the chest ! The politics at work, the pressure of things to do and the desire to deliver more, the deadlines, the relationship, the battles, the failures, the dejection, the surprises, the celebrations, the cocktail of experiences we go through on a day is such that the exhaustion silences us as the day pulls down its curtain in disguise of a restful night !

That's when, my dear, with a punctuation of a sigh, the temptation to wrap those thoughts in these words become stronger. At times it gets birth as a little verses, and at times it becomes a letter; at times it simply flutters its wings and fly away to an unknown garden of dreams, and at times it simply become vapour and exist just as a steam of thought on the warm walls of my heart !

I am writing all these today for no reasons! I feel so exhausted - one of those days when you feel so heavy inside but do not know why you feel so and can't point a finger at any reasons...; you are a victim who had to read me as a result.

It keeps me wonder, what is it that I am chasing with such an exhaustive energy! What is it that I am aiming to gain with such a loss of the 'present'! The credentials, the laurels, a shining profile - just to be framed in a box of obituary in the end ?

Love

Shahir

October 16, 2011

Additions That Don't Add Up

4 + 5 = 9. Period.

Whether it is written in bold, or in gold, whether it is styled in Italic, it can only be 9. If what you want to make is 10, it's no point shifting around the 5 and 4 as you well know; what is required is to pause, reflect and add that '1' that will make up the 10.

Sometimes it is an application of science. Some other times, it's abandoning science and embracing common sense.

It's often that 'one' thing that is needed to add to what we do that is missing which stops us short of achieving what we are capable of achieving. I see people doing the same thing over and over again, tumbling down and getting up, tumbling down again and getting up, chasing the unseen, yet not pausing to reflect what else should I be doing that if I do can give me a better result, or get me closer.

There are sometimes a misinterpretation about being 'persistent.' Is it about doing it again and again till you get the result? Or is it about doing it again, plus or minus what didn't work in how it was done before ? 'Doing it again' is what I see mostly happening individually, and even in management situations. A very simple example will be the CVs I receive from applicants for various positions - the forwarded message of re-forwarded messages that leaves lines and symbols from previous messages. The belief is, 'I must have applied to at least 23 different hotels and I am sure I will get one of them.' If only they spend one minute to sit down and perhaps reflect, why after the 10th application I am not receiving an answer, and then alter what need to be altered, perhaps the result would have been different. In a hotel scenario, people coming with pre-opening experience is another example. I did this in the first hotel opening, and whether it was successful or not, the same template is pushed to apply in the n'th opening too ! Application of mind takes a back seat, often !

It is also about asking some bitter questions for which answers might not sit well with the desires in mind. What we insist as 'should be done' should perhaps question for why should it be done and what would happen if it is not done. What we consider as a 'must' should be questioned as 'for who that is a must' and what alternatives are available.

What I have also learned in my own life is that it is also about accepting what comes disguised as failure which in fact may just be a change of track that will lead to the right destination. I partnered a business sometime back, and went through adverse situations that forced me to close the consultancy - a period where I was almost pushed to the edge of being insane with the sound of shattered dreams and the face of an uncertain future looming large at me every time I close my eyes. It was then when I struggled with shame from the thought of being labelled as a failure, but when the decision to 'fail' was made, it was a relief that offered me energy to think afresh and look for avenues that would suit the puzzles that will make the big picture. And today when I look back, I realize that in the heat of tears were hidden the elements that strengthened my resolve and character. That acceptance of 'failure' was the '1' I needed to add to make it 10, and no matter what I did with the 5 and 4, wherever I positioned them, however I decorated them, would not have given me the result.

There needed a pause - perhaps an uncomfortable pause at that.

There needed a reflection - perhaps hearing unwanted commandments from the subconscious blue-print.

Because when you want enough, and when every cells and limbs are crushed to the ground enough to crave for success, and success alone as a recipe for survival, you will look for it, and there is no way that you can't have the support from the universe. Life is at times a magnified copy of an Olympic stadium. When you and I are behind that starting line, with all our focus on the goal we want to achieve, the sixty thousand audience in the stadium will join their hands together to sit in silence for that moment, offering us in solidarity the space and means to focus. The moment we start our race, they will join us with roaring applause as we cruise towards the finishing goal. My boss, a university professor, an HR Practitioner in US are all my examples of how universe will conspire towards achieving our goals as Paolo Coelho rightly wrote in The Alchemist.

To 5 and 4, what is the '1' that you need to add, to make it 10?

Shahir

06 October 2011.

Whoever You Are!

They all had something similar to say, that, they tried many avenues, faced several rejections, went through periods of dejection, faced faces of indifference and at times mockery, and it was a long long road before they reached the stage where a throne and a crown awaited to celebrate their success.

They all had several stories of failures etched into their lives that remains as a stain on their pillows that witnessed their sleepless nights and heard the sobs of an aching heart, before carving out a singular story of success! It had emotions that pulled them from both sides, days that had no beginning and never ended, and nights that they dreaded for the eerie silence it offered and expanded the size of world around them!

Nothing that was worthy to celebrate was achieved ever without the agony that you experience today, one that makes you feel dejected, one that makes you feel as worthless. It is beyond that bend where the valley of flowers and lakes are; it's after that what you term as misery that you are ripened enough to be called a fruit. The shell that's restricting your growth has to be cracked, and it is through that crack that you emerge to fly. Crack - perhaps is destructive. It's but the death of leaves that become the fertilizer for the growth of its tree. Knife wouldn't sharpen on a soap-rock; it needs hard surface to be sharp; such is life too. In smoothness of ordeals ones character doesn't harden. It's in its toughness the strengthening of character takes place.

No one walked up to that stage without causing callous on their feet from walking long distance without safeguards; there were hardships; climbed up the hill in joy and tumbled down to the valleys in tears. These are the few from the past whose life is a resemblance of yours that is good enough to offer hope for a future that you doubt!

It is never time to quit. It's time to defeat that voice that demands you to quit, for in that voice lies the sound of mantra that generates the energy to march forward, now.

Whoever you are.

Shahir

October 01, 2011