I am missing both the topics I told him. But yes, I saved myself by missing another target – Writing a blog post very soon. I have set so many targets these days. Every night, I determine myself to start it from the next day. Today I added one more target to m list – Learn Photoshop as soon as possible. Photoshop seems quite strange to me. Well, I might need a friend who could teach me.

I hope I set small targets of myself, and I at least manage to achieve them. Hope to see you people again.

Best of luck to all guys who are taking JEE 2012. Wish you a lot of success.

I got many compliments for PS in my statuses. Jitesh once said how to copy my statuses, my PSes are original. Many friends say PS are most of the times better than my original status. Umar, Meetul, Nikhilesh and Ashwini are  main interrogators in this matter. My nephew once asked me personally, does this PS get you money? He gifted me first smile of that morning. There are numerous other comments as well.

Anyway, there was not any special logic behind the PS when I started using it. There are so many things that I want to share with my readers. They are not inter-related many times(e.g today my main status was related to Prithviraj Chauhan, and my PS was related to Zynga). So I gave a thought to use postscript(PS) in my status. The other idea that flashed my mind then was to use N.B.(nota bene) after my statuses.  But finally I couldn’t get comfortable with this idea and decided to ontinue with PS. In the beginning, many people didn’t notice it, but lately, my friends started to notice it. After some more time, my friends also noticed that my PS and also noticed that the 2 things in my status are not related to each other. Yes, I really have a lot of things to share. I share what I learn from life, I share what I learn from history. I share my choices, my dreams, my thoughts. Sometimes I have funny things to share, sometimes I have unique incidents. PS gives me a lot of space to share 2 totally different things. Now I face at least one comment on PS thing in second alternate status. I feel happy when I see PS used by my friends in their status(although they carry forward their main status into PS). But I feel said when they do not continue with this idea.  Ankit(Shukla) and Arbu have started to use PS frequently in their status. I hope this post makes them use PS in a better manner.

I was planning to write this post for more than an year. My 2 school friends, Akash and Priyanka always asked me why I use PS, and in reply I used to tell them – I’ll write a story on PS shortly. Later on they forgot their demand, but I remembered that the PS story is pending. When I told Jitesh about this post, this is what he had to say:-

Today I am free from the burden of this secret.  Many of you would not like my idea, but you got to accept that its unique. Ideas fail, but nothing is as powerful as an idea whose time has come. See you people again very soon with a new idea.

Almost 2 months ago, my friend asked me to attend some camp of his spiritual teacher. I declined his offer saying a quote I knew – If you can’t find peace within yourself, its pointless to search it elsewhere. I was actually searching peace in that period. I tried everything, from music to studying philosophy, from traveling to fasting. But I guess, now I have figured out the source of my peace. It might be a bit early to say, when I wrote first page of my new diary today, I felt peace.

Over the years, I started to feel, I am gaining slight impatience. And the main problem was, I could not resolve the increasing extent of harakiri of my patience. Finally I decided to keep a record of my targets, what I achieve and how much close I move towards the target. Man is not perfect. I know it will take me some time to analyze my problems. But I hope,  I will improve with time.

I always love to write with fountain pen. I bought one yesterday. It just writes what I want to write. Mudit Grover said in my status that pens are too old, we should try key-boards. Perhaps he doesn’t know the pleasure of over-writing, cutting and manipulating words. Yeah, sometimes you’ve to change harsh words into softer ones so that gen next doesn’t criticize you for being so rude. Well, it was just the first day. I hope my diary improves me, and makes me a better human being.

Hope to write here soon

This speech, from a widely regarded Commencement address Jobs gave to Stanford students in 2005, never gets old, no matter how many times you watch it.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last-minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960′s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

The story is as below: -

This is a true story of Mother’s Sacrifice during the Japan Earthquake.

After the Earthquake had subsided, when the rescuers reached the ruins of a young woman’s house, they saw her dead body through the cracks. But her pose was somehow strange that she knelt on her knees like a person was worshiping; her body was leaning forward, and her two hands were supporting by an object. The collapsed house had crashed her back and her head.

The story continues..

With so many difficulties, the leader of the rescuer team put his hand through a narrow gap on the wall to reach the woman’s body. He was hoping that this woman could be still alive. However, the cold and stiff body told him that she had passed away for sure.
He and the rest of the team left this house and were going to search the next collapsed building. For some reasons, the team leader was driven by a compelling force to go back to the ruin house of the dead woman. Again, he knelt down and used his had through the narrow cracks to search the little space under the dead body. Suddenly, he screamed with excitement,” A child! There is a child! “
The whole team worked together; carefully they removed the piles of ruined objects around the dead woman. There was a 3 months old little boy wrapped in a flowery blanket under his mother’s dead body. Obviously, the woman had made an ultimate sacrifice for saving her son. When her house was falling, she used her body to make a cover to protect her son. The little boy was still sleeping peacefully when the team leader picked him up.
The medical doctor came quickly to exam the little boy. After he opened the blanket, he saw a cell phone inside the blanket. There was a text message on the screen. It said,” If you can survive, you must remember that I love you.” This cell phone was passing around from one hand to another. Every body that read the message wept. ” If you can survive, you must remember that I love you.” Such is the mother’s love for her child!!

Still A normal Indian(say its me, or you, or its any face in crowd) tries to search some questions that have been left unanswered by the march parade in New Delhi on republic day, and something that is not conveyed by those flashy advertisements boasting development of India. That face is still trying to find why India is still counted among third world. That face is still searching an answer to the question: Why is India still a developing nation after almost 65 years of getting independence?

Every nation has problems, and it is a truth that a nation cannot run away its problems. If its citizens work hard enough to eradicate problems, it develops. Else those problem root themselves deep into the mentality of citizens, and degrade a nation like termite. Similar is the case with India.

Corruption has become one of its largest problems. Some days ago,  I came across a news that was showing the amount of black money deposited in foreign banks. Its amount was somewhere near 28 followed by 23 zeroes !! Had this amount been used to develop India, it could have a lot more educational institutions, and hospitals. Leave corruption on larger scale, smallest step in the hierarchy of system is corrupted. And on this stands a giant infrastructure. Basically corruption has affected every Indian to some scale. Even if those 28 x 10²³ rupees flow into India, we need clean minds to utilise them for the welfare of India. Some miracle save my India. And the miracle is nothing other than a huge initiative of Indians to improve the system.

Anyway, let me discuss just second of so many problems because I feel republic day is a right time to discuss it.

It has been 62 years since India became a republic. Or I must say, India declared itself a secular state. But a true Indian finds its pathetic to see politics dividing Indians into Scheduled Castes(SC)/Scheduled Tribes(ST), Other Backward Castes(OBC), Minorities and etc etc. When we’re growing up, we are taught that all Indians are equal, but when we are able to adjudge things rightly, we come to know that all Indians are not actually equal. On one hand we’re taught that boys-girls are equal, but as per some reliefs given by reservation, they are not. Some sections of society are given “extra” privileges than the others. Those “extra” privileges do not come to them by the virtue of their economic condition, but by the virtue of the caste/religion/gender they’re born in. Its painful to see some real talent in India never gets a chance because some non-deserving candidates get to their place through those extra privileges given to them. India doesn’t develop because non-deserving people fail to give optimized performance designed for that post.

India is struggling to cope-up with the problem of brain drain. Its chief cause is nothing other than reservation. Because good minds do not get a chance in India, so they simply choose to work for other countries. And those countries make most of those magnificent minds, and they develop.  Our politicians feel India still needs reservation, and they keep India in hunt to become developed.

As per our system, girls need reservation because they’re weaker. Or to say the other way around, boys do not need reservation because they’re stronger. Not limiting this to gender, our politicians extend it to all religions, castes and sections of society. They silently play Divide and Rule among all of us, giving false assurances that India is rising. But these problems now lie in our minds. We have to take a start. We must realize India is our own country, and if we work for its development, it is going to benefit us back.

We need to revisit and rediscover our Indian-ness that has survived many ups and down in several millenniums. We have to clean our minds to make India corruption free,  and we have to treat all countrymen as Indians and show that we do not need reservation anymore. We have to start !! We must do it for India !!

Happy Republic Day to my motherland.

Almost a decade back, dootdarhan telecasted a serial name “Main Dilli Hoon”. It had initial lines as :-

Main Dilli hoon, main Dilli hoon
Main dharti par panahe dhoondhte insaan ki manzil hoon..
Main Dilli hoon.

Delhi, no doubt, is the fewest cities that accepts anyone without any discrimination. I spent my childhood here..My teenage here, and the golden time after teenage. It gave me everything including friends, education and knowledge of worldly behavior. I’m proud to say I lived in Delhi. Delhi is in my DNA.

I’ll miss Delhi. I’ll mis you

I’m really short of words while writing this, but honestly, I want to write a lot. Many people ask what gives peace in life. Some people follow spiritual leaders, some people make money, while some go into serenity. But actually you need someone who can actually pacify your soul.

Its great to have a friend who can rejoice with you when you’re high, cry for you, and can console you when you’re sad. Yeah, they never let you do bad deeds..alone.

Here’s a funny incident. Two friends(Delhites who’re addicted of using dustbins to keep city clean) walking with each having a cold drink glass in hand. When the glasses are empty, they search for dust-bin nearby. They land up in finding no dust bin around. One of them asks a roadside vendor:- Bhaiya, ye dust bin kahan hai? Ise kahan fenkna hai?

Vendor points to footpath and says:- yahi fenk do.

And whammm, both burst out together. This becomes a memorable incidence whenever they pass that place anytime again.

Add another incident to it. The two friends sitting in Domino’s eating cheese burst pizza. As a matter of fact, one of them is a die hard cheese fan(let that be me ). Some last bites of pizza are left, and my friend asks for 2 pieces of cheese and I say:- Chal na, main nahi de raha. And in a flash, I collect all pieces of cheese and eat them giving my friend a thumbs down, and I get a lovely pat on my back. My friend says – Tu paneer ka itna laalchi hai.

A lot of such incidents. And the two friends help each other in taking decisions. One of them helps in making the life of other friend regret free, and vice versa. Sad moments bring them closer.

They cheer when they see each other. They shout together. And all of a sudden one of them departs. Not for a long tenure though. The other friend becomes silent. The shouting turns into numbness. Sadness turn into tears. Both of them sit with each other for as long as possible to delay the separation as much as possible. One of them has no courage to board the bus before the other one does. But finally, they both have to depart. They separate for a short time with an everlasting promise in their hearts – We’ll be partying again. I won’t let you go !!

Good byes are not forever,
Good byes are not the end,
They simply mean I’ll m miss you,
until we met again..

As long as we’re true friends, distance can never separate us. I will really miss you..

I will return my friend…Sometimes distance creates everlasting bonds. You rock my world..

God bless you

]]> http://www.supriya.im/past.php/feed 5