Main Aur Meri Tanhaai....

Main Aur Meri Tanhaai....
Yash Chopra was literally in love with love, and taught the world how to love love in its various colours, shades and interpretations. The suddenness of his passing away suggests nature had not planted Yashji amidst mere mortals like us to go into a reverie – Jab Tak Hai Jaan, he had to create romance out of romance.

Wonder what Yash Chopra's soul will be doing right now up in the heavens, watching his just-left-behind human folks go about their business of life, with many of them carrying the idea of romance as one reserved for the illusory world of films, not applicable in the real world! Maybe, he is just plotting another script for his re-entry into Earth, grander and more extravagant.

For Yash Chopra, the illusory world was the real world, where he projected his romantic interpretations with such finesse and subtle depth that you found each one of his love triangles, though based on the two-plus-one formula, DIFFERENT. Over so many years, one man, obsessed with romance as an idea, came up with so many colours that it was astonishing that the concept of love could have so many shades. Whether it was Kabhi Kabhie, or Lamhe, or Silsila, or Chandni, or Darr, or Dil Tho Pagal Hai, the audience found a fresh context and a new dimension. He was literally in love with love, and taught the world how to love love in its various colours, shades and interpretations. His love triangles seemed same from the outside, but there was no sameness in the inside.

Even through films like Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge, which catapulted Shah Rukh Khan to superstardom, and Veer Zaara, the depths of love as an emotion were explored with great passion and predilection. No doubt, Yash Chopra was a very passionate human being, reflected even in his non-romantic films like Deewar, Trishul, and Kaala Patthar, where he got his characters to exude their roles with tremendous focus and intensity.

In many ways, Yashji's life was a focused one. He focused on romance, and always ensured that in the end, it was love that won, and not merely the film's characters. While Hindi films have always revolved around love as a predominant theme, cutting across generations of filmmakers, Yash Chopra was an absolute original. He brought alive the romantic feeling in dimensions as only he could.

It seems he was born to paint the emotion of love on the grand and illusory landscape of life, providing people with many moments of escape from their stale and humdrum existence. It is intriguing that the script of life snatched him away from us just after he said he wanted to retire from direction, perhaps also to reflect on his work and his interpretations, just as an artist would after having finished a project. The suddenness of his passing away suggests nature had not planted Yashji amidst mere mortals like us to go into a reverie – Jab Tak Hai Jaan, he had to create romance out of romance.

Yash Chopra's legacy lies not just in creating films of a genre of which he was the master architect, it also lies in bringing alive some extraordinary talents like Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan. Amongst the pantheon of Bollywood legends who have departed from this world, the vacuum left by Yashji can be filled only by Yashji, as God does not make such romantics with any imaginable frequency.

The heart says that Yashji has just taken a break. He did not exit this world because he was tired of love, he has simply gone on a cosmic holiday, perhaps to take fresh lessons on the idea of romance from the creator. The world awaits his return on another day, in another form, with a fresh wave of romantic interpretations. Till then, his films will provide us with succour, relief and entertainment.

Yash Chopra – born on September 27, 1932 – went on a cosmic holiday on October 21, 2012.

Amitabh's Birthday Today – Why Not Declare It As National Excellence Day?

Amitabh's Birthday Today – Why Not Declare It As National Excellence Day?
Take out the social relevance attached to his success, and just study Amitabh the person, and what we will get is a picture of excellence which cannot be learnt through books, but only through observing a true icon in action.

One man, one industry, one nation, one obsession – Amitabh Bachchan. As somebody who has grown up watching Bachchan perform some incredible roles with passion and panache, he continues to be a role model for the crafty exhibition of his excellence as well as for the excellence of his craft. It is incredible that the nation never tires of knowing the same things about him over and over again, be it through television, radio, newspapers, magazines, or the Internet.

There was a time in his career when many people wondered whether he would ever get himself out of the stereotype of the angry young man and perform more meaningful roles. Despite his iconic superstar status, his admirers too felt that the actor in him was yet to flower. Then came a downslide in his career before KBC resurrected him, and lo! the dawn of a new millennium also brought along with it an Amitabh who had resurrected his life and reinvented himself professionally, rising like a phoenix.

Ageing acted as a positive boost to the acting talent that lay hidden within him for so long, caught up in preserving the star, who fought illusory battles on reel for common people's real life problems. Amitabh was not just a star, he was the mechanism of relief for the Indian masses, who for long had to go through hard life battles, finding an irrational sense of succour in the lanky and unconventional looking `system fighter on screen` from Allahabad taking on the bad guys of the world, almost single handedly. On screen, when Amitabh punched the villain in his trademark style, the masses packed a punch emotionally as they let out another element of their stored-up frustration.

It almost seemed like God had planted Amitabh in a particular space as part of a larger cosmic role to execute the task of helping people cope with their struggles in a manner which was at once creative as well as bizarre. So, it is perhaps incorrect to say that Amitabh did not want to break away from the mould, maybe, the masses themselves could not release their star from the image they had constructed about him. Seen this way, it is clear why the entire nation prayed hard to recall Amitabh from the jaws of death after the Coolie accident, for his death might have not only meant the loss of a loved one, but also of hope.

Ageing allowed Amitabh to experiment and further evolve as an actor, but it was not before a long personal-professional struggle that he could resurrect himself and endear himself all over again to the nation, obsessed with his voice, personality, dialogue delivery, and depth of conviction while portraying various characters on celluloid.

But while there is a strong social context to Bachchan's success, what is fundamentally true about his mega status is his mega professionalism. He has always been considered to be a director's actor, who would do his part without interfering with the script. Not just that, his discipline, quality consciousness and single minded devotion to his profession are areas of learning critical for a nation, where excellence is compromised regularly and in absurd ways. Take out the social relevance attached to his success, and just study Amitabh the person, and what we will get is a picture of excellence which cannot be learnt through books, but only through observing a true icon in action.

So, as the nation once again obsesses about its Shahenshah as he turns 70, is it time to ponder whether we should declare October 11^th as National Excellence Day?

Happy Birthday Mr Amitabh Bachchan – bas naam hi kaafi hai!

Gandhi – Why India's Youth Should Know Him Better

Gandhi – Why India's Youth Should Know Him BetterGandhiji too would have been proud of the four qualities in our youth

Today is one more October 2^nd – the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi – and one more time politicians will offer their respects at Rajghat, and channels are likely to air the film `Gandhi` and other movies on the Mahatma through the day. For a vast majority, today is not about remembering Gandhi or what he stood for, but simply enjoying a break from work and relaxing on a national holiday. Being a long weekend, many of them may have even planned an extended holiday outside their respective cities starting last Friday or Saturday, ending today.

No grudges about all this of course, but there is no doubt that with every passing year, Gandhi and his methods are getting more and more relevant. As the world finds itself engulfed by Earth threatening problems like global warming, leadership concerns, terrorism, economic divide, etc, Gandhi the thinker raises his head from time to time in various ways, if only to remind people that his physical body died decades ago, but he lives on, causing enormous `chemical locha` (made famous by Rajkumar Hirani's film `Lage Raho Munnabhai, released in 2006) in the minds of people even today.

Gandhi is not just an institution, he is India's consciousness and somewhere a conscience keeper of our culture and moral/ethical values. The youth of our country, typically the post economic liberalisation generation, must study Gandhi beyond their academic text books, simply because that will help them establish a sounder intellectual/spiritual basis for existence than merely money. It will also make them realise just how much Gandhi contributed for India's sake at huge personal cost so that his countrymen could lead a life of dignity and freedom.

India and its people may not have panned out as per Gandhiji's vision, but I feel in some ways he would have been proud of today's generation for their following qualities:
-- A go getter attitude: Gandhiji was a go getter. He withstood enormous suffering to achieve independence for India.
-- A vibrancy unseen in any other generation collectively before: Gandhiji never grew old. He was the very epitome of energy.
-- A sharing attitude: To my mind, this is India's best post-independence generation when it comes to sharing. Be it through thoughts on facebook or through daily communication, they are quite forthcoming in their attitude of sharing, and Gandhiji would have been proud of this.

-- An aversion to corruption: The youth came out in large numbers to support Anna Hazare in his fight against corruption, and Gandhiji would have been proud of this too. The youth also perhaps have a decent ability to imbibe Gandhigiri (again, thank you Lage Raho Munnabhai).

But if Gandhiji were alive today, he would have given the youth a huge thumbs down for their attitude towards money and sex. Gandhiji was the very symbol of discipline and self control. He would probably have done his bit to educate the youth on this.

The youth of our country should know Gandhi better, for there is so much to derive from what he stood for. Post liberalisation India, dominated by money-oriented discussions, presents a very simplistic view of life, whereas seen from Gandhiji's perspective, they will find many answers to the various complications a money-driven society throws up, and thereby discover a far higher level of intellectual/spiritual enrichment.

Why Many People Don't Want To Be Successful

Why Many People Don't Want To Be Successful
The process of success and success itself bring with them a relentless responsibility,
which not everyone can handle.

Yes, you read it right. There are many people in this world who do not want to be successful. Now, this is not the same as not having the desire to be successful. Everybody in this world desires to be successful, but not everyone chooses to be successful. Desire and want are two different aspects, just as my favourite theory that comfort and success are not equal to each other. The interpretation of words has a major impact on how we shape our understanding, and thereby our destiny.

The reason somebody can have the desire for success but not the want is that success comes with a price, and it creates expectations. Successful people face a perennial problem which the unsuccessful ones don't have to, and that is, they have to sustain and expand that success. It is not an easy paradigm to deal with. Both the process of becoming successful in something and then working towards sustaining plus raising the bar demand a price which is both undefined and unquantifiable. Many people early in their journey realise this and block their due in life – in many instances unconsciously -- because they lack the emotional and mental bandwidth to continuously pay the price. Somewhere along the line, they just hope that success will one fine day arrive at their doorstep, and they will not even have to pay the price. They just hope that success will arrive automatically. But then unfortunately it doesn't work that way.

A key difference of course lies in the fact that the process of success and success itself bring with them a certain responsibility which not everyone can handle. Besides, it is a relentless responsibility. Once you get to something in life which is deemed as success, the responsibility to live up to it can be overwhelming for many. That is why many people, after having attained a certain level of success, come crashing down. Only those who are able to take responsibility for their situation, plus are ready to continuously reinvent themselves can rise again, and keep rising. They are the ones who believe that you are only as good or bad as your last performance – success is just that, what you achieved yesterday. Today is a new day, and it calls for a fresh effort, with no guarantees of yesterday's conditions remaining the same.

In many ways, the right question is not what needs to be done to be successful? Rather, the right question should be, what should not be done which will block our success? Here are a few pointers:

1. Don't hope for success, rather, work for success.
2. Don't shy away from the price of success, rather, be ready to pay it continuously.
3. Don't give up because it is painful, rather, persist and become pain-resistant, for only pain produces performance.
4. Don't blame it on bad luck if you don't make it, rather, create your own luck by persisting till you make it, and keep persisting to grow even more.
5. Don't have a bad attitude, rather, work rigorously on building the right attitude
6. Don't think it is too late, rather, it is never too early or too late to start.
7. Don't expect people to support you in your journey, rather, expect more brickbats than bouquets for your courage to pursue your dreams, even from those who matter a lot to you in your life.
8. Don't be in your comfort zone, rather, get out of it and take calculated risks. Not taking any risk is the greatest risk of all.
9. Don't just have desire, rather, have BURNING DESIRE. It is not good enough to just have desire. What separates the extraordinary from the ordinary is the extra word: Burning.
10. Don't be deluded that success is just about attitude, rather, it is a recognition which is given to us by others. Attitude is in the inside, but success is in the outside, for it is relative.

The tenth point is a very important one. We can't declare ourselves to be successful. That is done by others. The world decides whether we are successful or not. This means there is a waiting game which every success aspiring person has to go through, and naturally, he or she has to compete for that recognition in the marketplace. This calls for huge amounts of patience and persistence, with no guarantees of that recognition coming our way in our lifetime. That's why the success path requires a lot of courage. For many people, their life ends with a gap between effort and recognition. But, somewhere you have to believe life evens it out in its own unique way.

Similar to the topic of this piece, the other important questions could be: Why leaders fail? Why salespeople fail? Why relationships fail? I am reading this amazing book by Marshall Goldsmith titled, `What got You Here Won't Get You There`, and he quotes the great Peter Drucker as having said: “We spend a lot of time teaching leaders what to do. We don't spend enough time teaching leaders what to stop. Half the leaders I have met don't need to learn what to do. They need to learn what to stop.” -- (Chapter: The Twenty Habits).

Needless to say, the inspiration to write this piece has come from Marshall Goldsmith's book. Come to think of it, if habit formation be considered as a key component of success, how critical is it to stop our bad habits than simply create healthy ones? For healthy ones to take shape, the unhealthy ones have to be weeded out; otherwise, how do you make space for the healthy ones? Sometimes, an overdose of positivity without a realistic self assessment works as a roadblock to success. An ability to look in the mirror and acknowledge one's life's realities is an extremely commendable quality.

But how does one really define success? There is really only one definition: Success is a journey, not a destination – of which failure is an integral part. If you can't take failures in your stride and learn from them, you cannot deserve success. The beauty of success lies in the journey, a never ending journey, rather than in achieving a so called destination. Those who stop are not missing out on the real or imagined fruits, they are simply missing out on the romance of the journey. If you stay on the journey, you are successful.

Before I end, a strong recommendation. The best book I have read on success is `Think And Grow Rich`, by the great Napoleon Hill. It is an ultimate treatise on success. Don't miss laying your hands on it and reading it.

Mr & Mrs Iyer, `by` Miss Iyer

Here's presenting what our daughter Diksha might be thinking of us

I am just about 14 years old, and do understand the importance of protocol. So let me start with my Mom.

She I think is cute and simple, but married to a crazy........you know whom. Right from my younger days (I mean childhood days, I am young now!), she has encouraged and piloted me to various activities outside of school, be it skating, dancing, or, ah......well I suppose these two primarily. And like every other Mom, been after my life to complete my homework and studies on time. Eureka! I have discovered all Moms act alike.

What are the things I like about her? Well.....she is very caring, loves her family – I mean not just me and Dad, but her mother, brother, cousins. She is very artistic, wow! she actually draws amazingly well. And she cooks yummy.

And what is that I don't like about her? The same things actually that Moms take a lot of pride in – telling their children what is good and what is bad, why I should not keep things wherever I want, why I should take care of my hair and health, and how I don't fully appreciate what my parents do for me, etc, etc, etc – instructions, instructions, instructions. It is in these moments that I miss a sibling; at least the instructions can be shared. Actually, she is right, but why should I understand anyway? I am too young, you see!

And here's about my Dad. He's a cool dude actually, but somehow can't fathom why he thinks he is some kind of a person always in demand. He behaves as if he is getting younger every year. But can't he see I am growing older? There is just one word to describe him – crazy. These days, he is on cloud nine, because I stood second in an essay competition in school – no, no, it's not pride in his daughter's talent and all that. That's because the title of the essay was, Father – My Role Model. But I gave him the breaking news anyway, that I did not choose the topic, it was given to us. Guess his expression?

But he has this amazing capacity to keep himself and all of us excited. My Mom is so unlike him, and that's why I think they complete each other. He sings Bollywood songs as if he is the successor to all the legendary Hindi film singers. He is embarrassingly loud in his conversations sometimes – actually most of the times – my Mom rightly reminds him that our house is not a training room and the mobile is not a microphone. He often stares at the mirror as if he is the only true master creation of God. Actually, I carry the same habit and attitude.

Interesting characters I have inherited as Mom and Dad. My Mom is a typical housewife, concerned with the way the house is, whereas my Dad is concerned with the way the world is. I don't mind that as longs he gets enough money home for my regular Mc D burgers, movies, and outings. My father is an intellectual – at least he thinks he is one – and regularly stacks his library with new books, which I can't relate to, not at this stage of my life at least. Life right now is too cool to be serious; it's LoL (lots of laughter).

Well, what about me? What kind of person am I? That Dad will anyway cover someday in his blog! So keep reading.

PS: Before I sign off, I love my Mom and Dad, and they love me too.

VVS: Where The Bat Was A Brush, And The Cricket Field A Canvas

Laxman was not just one of his kind, he was the only ONE

VVS Laxman got it all wrong. He thought the cricket field was a large canvas, the bat a brush and the ball a solidified form of paint. Instead of dogged defence, he presented a light touch, instead of hitting the ball hard, he caressed it, as if not to cause pain, and instead of placing the delivery in the area of its arrival, like an artist does with a paint brush, he simply changed direction and placed the ball where it could find greater relevance to the divine cause of expression.

Laxman was more of an artist, and less of a batsman. He simply expanded the vision of being a painter to a dimension which required a vast space like a cricket field. The artist in him needed a much larger canvas to pour out the genius within. Fans like me did not watch Laxman bat just to see him score runs or bail India out of one more tight situation. We watched him bat because in the pretext of a willow in hand, with his artistic strokes, he provided perspectives about life which only a person with artistry in his soul could. He maneuvered the cricket field as an artist maneuvers through various creative ideas.

Just as you thought the delivery was now going to be inevitably delivered to the cover fence with a copybook swirl of the bat, with the left foot in tandem, the TV camera suddenly shifted towards the midwicket fence, focusing on a hapless and bewildered fielder fetching the ball. Just as an artist gets an instant inspiration to change the direction of his brush, Laxman often suddenly used to bring the wrist into play and dismiss the delivery to another corner of the large canvas called the cricket field. This aspect of his game was so unique that it can never ever be replicated on the cricket field. New batsmen taking his place in the middle order can replace the name in the batting order, but cannot replicate his talent, for he was not just one of his kind, he was the only ONE.

In terms of pure cricketing contribution, Laxman gave Indian cricket and India self belief. His 281 at Kolkata's Eden Gardens in the 2001 series against Australia was not just an extraordinary or unbelievable innings, it was an example of poetical destruction. Pace or spin met with a treatment which sunk the opposition into a `despair of admiration`. It was an example of grabbing the opportunity to etch his name amongst the immortals of the game. It is not that the innings manufactured Laxman, he manufactured the innings.

Whatever Laxman did or did not after that innings is purely a matter of academic discussion. In that innings he had scripted the future of Indian cricket. He started the journey of India years later being anointed as the world's No.1 test playing nation. To my mind, his innings in Kolkata and his mammoth partnership with Rahul Dravid (is it any coincidence that the two shared many great partnerships!) in that test is one of the great events in post-independence history of India. Though purely a great sporting event, it had ramifications for the entire nation's psyche, as India draws so much of its joys and sorrows from the happenings on the cricket field.

Laxman's retirement from the cricketing canvas marks the end of artistry in a game which is based so much on technique and temperament. Laxman battled hard all through his career to balance his inner urge for creativity as well as the situation he found the team in when he went into bat. But in the past few months, the artistry seemed to be deserting him; perhaps, the bat refused to be treated as a brush any more. Maybe, the bat could not reinvent itself any further. Maybe, Laxman finally had to accept that cricket is a game between bat and ball, the cricket field is not a canvas, and that he now needs to paint his future on a different pitch of life.

Artists change their canvas often, and maybe VVS, after sixteen long years, has done just that!    

I Have Turned `3` Today

I Have Turned `3` Today
For the record 43, but life begins at 40!

I write this in the morning hours of the day and this birthday is already coming through as a special one. We had a spot celebration at Barista past midnight with my wife's cousins, followed by a decent number of SMSes and phone calls this morning. And of course the facebook messages are already swelling up. I thank God from the bottom of my heart for all the lovely people I am blessed with in my life.

No doubt, life in the last three years since I decided to start out on my own has been tough, but fascinating to the core. It has opened up a whole new set of opportunities and brought me in contact with an incredible number of wonderful people. And the most important thing is I have never felt more young.

The reason for this is that somewhere along the journey of life I realised that life in a substantial and clear way begins only at 40. It was in my fortieth year (June 2009 to be precise) that I decided to quit my well paying job with a respected profile and attempt to recreate myself. The premise of my first book `The 20 20 20 20 Formula For Success` (co-authored with my friend Samuel Talari) was that a life of great purpose takes shape once you turn 40, as it takes that many years for many people to understand life from its depths and shape their role on this planet. In the first forty years, in slots of 20 years each, life shows us both its comfortable and uncomfortable sides. By the time we turn 40, a greater sense of perspective and maturity sets in, thereby placing us on the path of a deeper purpose.

Nature has gifted us with automatic physical growth. We play no role in how our face and physical structure evolves. Therefore, our primary responsibility is to acknowledge the power of being born as a human being and make it count. God has given us a mind and intellect, and he expects us to utilise them effectively to evolve as better life managers. When we touch 40, we reasonably outgrow viewing life from a predominantly physical perspective and start looking at it from a larger sense of consciousness. The true turning point of life is when we start seeing life with a purpose driven perspective, and not just from a paradigm of going through the motions.

Looked at in this way, age appears to be just a number. Age actually presents an opportunity to reinvent yourself and is definitely not a roadblock to your success. I tell people above 40 not to feel disheartened if they have not achieved anything substantial thus far, for `we are born` at 40 and they must count their age from thereon. If you look around, you will find that many people have achieved great things after turning 40. So, rather than feeling a kind of midlife crisis, this is the age when our youthful energies should manifest with renewed vigour and take us to heights like never before. For those who are under 40, I tell them, life has not even started, and many more enriching experiences are in store.

It is far better to succeed a little late in life and stay that way till the end than acquire success early and see it slipping away. In today's world we see too many people succeed too early and then struggle to hold on to it. This does not mean that people below forty should not strive for or achieve success earlier than many, but it helps to understand that success once attained also has to be sustained. Therefore, with early success also comes the responsibility to sustain it. And in any case, success is a continuous journey and not a destination.

All in all, life has so much to offer. All we need to do is keep our mind young always and allow the process of life to shower its unlimited abundance on us. Rather than feeling that every birthday is a step closer to death, create the feeling that every birthday is a more mature step towards fulfilling our life purpose. That way, you will acquire a bounce in your steps that will elevate you to a different level in life – each day, each year.

I have just turned 3 today. What's your age?