go doggy go

Epiphany: a sudden realisation of a meaning of a larger thing or something like that. I love that word and of course I love the feeling you get when you get an epiphany. Well actually sometimes you love it and sometimes when the meaning is not so what you want it to be, the epiphany will probably hurt. As one smart lady told me – an epiphany and a catharsis go hand in hand. Blah blah blah ...
A few days ago I suddenly got one. I could see far more clearly. I suddenly felt lighter. I was smiling throughout the evening. And while sleeping I slept peacefully. Sigh. There is great joy in sleeping without stress. Normally there is stress of work, relationships, money, what ever... something that keeps your mind ticking over. It’s never be that great and I am lucky enough for it but the small ticking also affects. I was so much at rest I thought nothing. I read and then I slept. I don’t even remember any dreams or anything. Sometimes when the mind ticks too much, I have a mid sleep break where I wake up and get into a half sleep zone. There thinking and dreaming merge and while the body is at rest the mind probably is at not. It does affect sleep.
Anyways, just before I slept I had a bb conversation with Dikshi. Who’s she. She is one the prettiest girls who ever worked on my team. Pretty in ever conventional term of the word. When I first interviewed her, I did not really notice she was pretty. But I did notice her eyes. Let me describe her – fair, young, long hair (golden brown), and hazel colour eyes. Funnily enough I only remember those lovely eyes. But she came as a whiff of fresh air. I was interviewing many people for the position of a trainee and I was completely irritated by it all. I had formulated simple questions. What is the formula to calculate the area of a circle? The radius or what is the Pythagoras theorem? And my fav – NaOH + HCl =? Why these questions for a trainee you might ask? Well what else to ask them? Their knowledge on their subjects was pretty much useless to me. How do I know if they retain anything they learn? And this is stuff that they would learn only about 5 years back. So I ask them stuff that is necessary to pass your tenth standard exams. If you know that then I guess you are a decent bloke that retains stuff in your head and not necessarily a guy who mugs stuff.
So Dikshi answered these questions well. She knew the answers, she also seemed pretty smart and she was on. That’s the story here though. The story is that after she joined in, her boss put in her papers and the person she was replacing was going away fast. Soon it would be only she and me managing the entire marketing for that division. A year back there were three experienced people managing the business along with me and now there would only one inexperienced person. The marketing for this was so process oriented with data coming in from various sources and the emphasis on accuracy was extremely high. The stress was crazy. I took Dikshi aside and told her – dude – it’s you and me versus the world. I had only her to rely upon. There were other businesses also that I had to take care of. And she was the one and only small girl, just out of college, into her first job and thrown into the deep end of the ocean...and she performed, admirably performed. I so respect her for that. A few months later when my transfer orders came she told me ‘jaimit sir, you told me, it’s you and me versus the world, now you only are leaving me and going?’. Man I felt so bad that day. Sorry Dikshi, but thank you at the same time. You are awesome.
Most of the time it doesn’t take heroics to be a hero. All you need is doggedness. She did a boring job but she did it with a focus that did not waver. She just hung on and got it done. So many young and not so young turks dot get this. To be a hero most of the time you don’t need extraordinary talents. Surely they help, but what you really need is single mindedness. Most of the times a single word, a single command, well executed can create enough magic for a life time.
Soon after I left, Dikhshi left the firm. She wanted to pursue her studies in fashion management. Poor thing, I respect her even more. She hung, I feel only for me. A fashion manager was doing a boring man’s job. Simple irritating execution of fact sheets. To my mind that is ashining example of what people can do with focus. Got in and did the job well, no matter how bad.
I had a friend in post grad college, Venugopal Acharya. He was a gold medallist in economics and then he did his MBA with me, but in finance. He was one guy I respected tremendously. He has been lost to the hare rama hare krishna movement. But I traced him and caught up with him, many years ago. He was telling me about some of the politics he faced at his firm, Times Guarantee. There as a management trainee he was victimised and then relegated to the stores and library section or something in the times of India building. He was not sad about it at all. He said he hung on and started organising the library. He classified the stuff, put them in order, and started keeping a process. Soon enough, things turned and he got noticed for doing a great job in a place that seemed like Kaalapani. That is also one story I always recount.
Simple focus and doggedness.

I won... sheesh

Last Saturday was Jispa’s annual sports meet. This is a good time for most of us peleb to catch u[p on what celeb look like in real life. The high points of getting your child to a school which even the celebs prefer. What a pain. Here you will have all the normal mothers going gaga over the celebs and wanting to photograph them and be photographed with them. I am sure it’s quite a pain for the celeb. But as some other mini celeb (friend) told me, these stars would become even more insecure if no one approached them! Haha. The life of a goldfish perhaps!
Honestly I find pretty juvenile when the mothers approach these fellas for the photograph. I am happy and content to beat them in the fathers race. Speaking of which, I continued my winning streak at this race as well. it was pretty boring. There seems to be no real competition in my peer set. A tennis sport celeb (one of the celebrated doubles players) who obviously is pretty fit and fast has a kid ina lower age standard and hence does not compete with me. It would have been mighty fun to race against him. My race I dominated, lead from the start and had no real competition. This time I walked away with a bored and under achieved feeling as well. Last year I had worked on my technique, I had high foot lift, I ran on toes, I ran fast all through etc etc. This time I felt my technique was all wrong. I was lazy in the run to the event. This clearly showed me the power of simple preparations, trial runs, muscle memory and visualisations. One has to keep visualising how to play, how to run, what to do in a situation for one to be better at it. I won but it did not seem to fit all together. Somehow the legs did not know what really to do like last year. This time also ego got to me. Half way into the run I could see there was no real competition. I slowed down considerably towards the end of the run. Too many thoughts crossed my mind. Should I just walk across the finish line to show off, should I relax, should I .... what on earth was happening. EGO the main enemy of sport, the chance to show off in front of an audience. And all this in a mere 75 meter race? Dam shit. I took 10.25 seconds. Drat. If not for ego I should have done in max to max 9 seconds. Now that’s a good race. Pumping hard, the toes barely touching, hard push!
Jispa asked me how my race was. I told her I won but I was all wrong. No fun in winning without real technique. Next year I am determined to do better. Determined to run right. I play to wear the right stuff, tracks instead of jeans and better shirt than the loose flowing full sleeves t shirt I wore in sheer arrogance. It does not matter that I won, I am still hurting at the arrogance that I showed. Dam. This something I have always maintained. Sport is internal, you play for yourself, against yourself with you as your main competitor. Who cares about anyone else. That’s what makes swimming so interesting for me. I swim against myself every day. Even when I play cricket or squash. Who cares what the opponent is. It’s you playing yourself. After teaching Jispa all this about competition and me being stoic during her swimming competition the same day later, I made the same bloody error. Gallery! I think it comes close to ‘pride’ but I think deserves a mention by itself as the eight sin ‘show’.
Talking about encouraging your kids, after the sports day Jispa attended a swimming meet. There you always get whacko mothers shouting to their wards ‘PULL,PULL, PULL, KICK, KICK’. What the hell. They are standing at eth edge of the pool and shouting themselves hoarse. You even get father doing the same. Inside the pool is your champion going to hear you. Should your champion hear you or be in a zone all by himself. He is supposed to focus on his technique, the strokes and blank out everything. A huge quiet and calm. Whenever I have done well in cricket or any other sport. There is a huge quiet that descends over me. I can feel nothing, hear nothing, know nothing. I have been in that zone a few times. It does not matter what anyone is shouting. In fact if someone is being specific to you it irritates else lots of other noise just adds to the ‘silence’.
The last few times I ran I was oblivious to competition, to the crowd, I could only feel the ground being pushed under, I could only feel that I was all alone. I couldn’t think of anything except the finish line. Wow. And compare that to this time when I practically wrote a story in the ten seconds it took me to finish the race. Sheesh.
The zone is not something that comes automatically. You have to work on it. Think it through. Be prepared for it. Work on it and then in the middle it arrives. The muscles know what to do, the body knows where to move. Everything falls into place. Then you play as if an angel is inside of you. All falling into place. Effortlessly.
Hmm. Jispa goes to play squash on Saturday and Sunday. I use it to run the treadmills at the gymkhana. Let me see if I can work into that zone there itself. I think it’s possible. Coming to think of it, this Sunday, I had it at the treadmill for a few minutes, I was running beautifully. But somehow I look around and feel someone is looking at me. That’s when it breaks. I must pretty egocentric that I visualise people looking at me. I have to be above all this. Sport will probably help me. Keep me and my inflated head in check. Keep it down, simple and straight. Easier said than done.
I am sometimes afraid that even my humility might be a show. An act that is designed to make me look humble in front of people. Do I have genuine humility? Even at times. Can I help someone purely to help someone without any expectation of anyone looking at me, thinking about me or having an expectation of nice feelings? Be completely above it all. Is that possible? I believe it so. Difficult but not unachievable.