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“My own people leave me lonely at the times when I actually require them the most” is the single most frequent grief that I have heard people sharing…

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Yes! It hurts, and in a way that no other wound can ever do. You feel as if the whole life-energy has got squeezed out of you. The pain lasts long, sometimes for weeks, months and even years. And even when it subsides, it leaves you a very different person – a mere shadow of the person you used to be.

But what people don’t realize is that those moments have a far greater significance. In fact, that loneliness is required; because it creates an opportunity for you to ask to yourself those ‘uncomfortable yet fundamental questions about life’ that you would never ask otherwise.

It helps you realize that in the process of creating a web of relationships around you, you lost touch with the person who matters the most – You. It helps you repair the most important relationship you often keep neglecting – that with your own self.

In those moments, you witness that, without you, after initial hiccups, people’s lives continue to go on unaffected. Thus it helps you question your choice of maintaining these variable associations at the cost of losing touch with the ‘constants’ of your life.

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So, first, cry your heart out… and then utilize that loneliness to review, restructure and revive ‘your life’!

“You cannot create what you don’t get attached to…and you cannot enjoy what you get too attached to”…has been my advice to people for long, in both personal and professional domain.

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Yes! Most people maximize or minimize. As a result, around us, we get to see either of the two types…

The minimizers! They live on the surface. For them, everything is a task. Be it in relationships or at work, they maintain objectivity. They don’t relate to things, they simply get connected to them. They go through the motion, without immersing themselves in the act or the purpose. They simply plug-in and plug-out! But alas! They seldom create anything…they pass through life ‘mostly successfully’, but without fulfillment or significance.

And then there are maximizers! They get deeply involved. They don’t just participate, they lose themselves in the act. They can’t ‘eject’, and thus keep going through the highs and lows. They are often heartbroken, exhausted or weighed down by their own expectations. They attach their self-worth to what they relate to, and so it keeps dwindling. But alas! They neither experience the joy of the journey nor enjoy the feel of the destination.

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Well! The keyword is ‘Optimum’.

Optimizers…the ones who get attached, but never too attached…the ones who get detached, but never too detached! 🙂

“Sadly, the ones who hold the spotlight for others cannot come under it!’”

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She is a Mom’s girl, and in her life, her Dad is nowhere near the pedestal. And in any case, it is difficult to tell someone ‘about to enter teens’ to like or dislike something on its merit. That age goes more by ‘apparent’ than by ‘profound’…

Last time when I was at their house, I again heard her eulogizing her mother’s role in a contextual conversation, while her dad sat there smiling all the while. Later, as I stood in the balcony, she came and stood beside me. When she asked what I was thinking, I said what I wanted to tell her for a long time…

I said “You know something. While your mother is around you more often, tends to your every need and comes across as the one who loves you more; he has made huge contributions to your life – though silently and less explicitly. It is not just about playing the stereotyped ‘earning’ role; he has transformed almost everything about himself – his schedules, priorities, desires, and even his nature. He has done everything he can to maintain many complex intrapersonal and interpersonal threads to give to you two the ecosystem that you live in. In fact, he has even rationalized his expectations from your mother so that the bond between you two can remain unaffected”.

I paused and then continued…“You know girl…root doesn’t bear fruit, but it is the reason for it! It’s just that some entities are more interested in creation rather than credit.”

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Decades ago, during World War II, Winston Churchill had said that the real war-heroes are not just the army men, but also the coal-miners who provide army men with the most essential of resources. He had famously said that “They choose to stay in the pits and dig continuously with their faces in the coal, so that someone can go there and work in the defense of liberty”…

Well! This post is not about mother vs. father, or even about Churchill. It is about the fact that there are coal-miners in the life of each of us…

…Let’s learn to appreciate the role they play! 🙂

It is strange but “most people don’t attain ‘outer tangible success’ because of ‘inner intangible failures’”.

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A lot of people who know me professionally often ask why my approach towards my work is so sensitivity–driven. Well! Let me explain it…

Over the years, I have found that what stops people from achieving what they aspire for is seldom a piece of knowledge absent or a part of skill undeveloped…it is mostly a part of their emotional selves that is stuck.

And a major part of my work is to help people repair the damaged portion of their selves. That’s why whenever I help people even for the most academic or professional pursuits, my starting point always is ‘Who they are, and how they became who they are’, as that is what decides the fate of their journey to ‘What they want to become‘.

And I don’t fool myself into believing that I am a psychologist or a psychiatrist. I am not equipped to solve mental problems; I can only help resolve personality issues. And that too, not for enlightening them, but for helping them with what they aspire for. Yes! I can at best be a catalyst, as changing one’s mind is only and entirely in one’s own hands.

And in this pursuit, I play various roles – that of a friend, elder, assistant, mentor or even tormentor. I work as anything that works. And still, it doesn’t always work because at times the wall is too thick and my toolbox too limited. In fact there are many people much closer who I could never or won’t ever be able to help for better.

And then there are peculiar cases when a person’s strength actually comes from his flaws only. In such cases, often it is better to not interfere with what is working well for someone. Yes! We humans are unbelievably complicated and each one of us is absolutely unique. So there is no ‘one size fits all’ approach.

For instance, people with equally challenging past could turn out very different – Strong ones come out unscathed, sensible ones suffer but then take things in stride, and then there are the ones born with ‘artistic sensitivity’ who soak in so much that it gets hopelessly embedded into their sense of self.

Whatever the type, they all have something inside that limits what they do outside. And interestingly, every time I help someone, I stumble upon a part of my own emotional self stuck somewhere…

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Hmmm! Let’s see! Who knows, I may be yet another ‘overly self-involved vain’ doing all this eventually for his own sake. Or else, why would I write such a long post explaining something that nobody had asked me to. 🙂