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I was away from office for 2 weeks (not away from work though) and joined back yesterday.

And it’s unbelievable what coming back to office does to me. I feel like a performing artist who has placed on the stage or the studio, where I belong. Amongst people that I belong to. Shopping art that I am proud of.

And it wasn’t the easiest day. As a matter of fact – it was one of the most difficult days I have had in a really long while. Difficult decisions, difficult conversations, and some really difficult moments in solitude.

That’s the key to understanding stress. As Simon sinek says, if you go through this experience when you actually wish to do something else – that causes stress. Not hard work. Not difficult moments. Not tough conversations.

Instead, working for something or at something where you don’t belong.

Beware of what your job is doing to you. More people worry about what they eat in the morning than where they go in the morning. Consider whether your job is building you or destroying you.

https://twitter.com/Kpaxs

We are all an outcome of a genetic lottery.

Done nothing to be born into a certain condition.

Some of us were born into loving families. Some of us into war ridden zones.

Some of us were fed good food and taken care of. Some of us were born on the streets left to fend for ourselves.

Some of us went to great schools. For some of us education wasn’t an option.

And because of this lottery – we sat on opportunities and privileges that we tend to take for granted.

So we drive an air conditioned car and get mad when the bicycle comes in front of us.

We walk into an interview and judge the person dressed shabbily.

We speak in English and laugh at those who don’t know how to pronounce cafe.

If only all of us stopped before doing so, to realize that success isn’t always about working hard and the hustle. And failure isn’t always being lazy and not ambitious.

It might make us a lot more humble. And a lot more inclusive.

Just because I am not poor, doesn’t mean there is no poverty!

When we meet people we are constantly looking at them not for who they are, rather the person we think they should be.

Constantly judging people for not adhering to the idea in our head of who they should be, how they should act, speak, behave, react.

Constantly comparing them to what we think they should be.

Not seeing them for who they truly are.

And as time progresses, our habits begin to define us.

This judgment based approach becomes a habit.

And then next thing we know….

We start to judge our own selves.

We start to reject ourselves because we are not what we think we do be, instead of realizing who we are.

If someone talks to you about someone else behind their backs, they will talk about you too behind your back.

If someone judges people for who they ought to be, they will judge themselves too for who they should be.

To judge others is to judge one self.

I won against my tennis coach yesterday.

22-20

21-18

(We play games of 21 points)

In the 43 points that I won, only 7 were winners.

Points that I won on my caliber. On the basis on my shots, the power of them, the placement of them.

The rest were won because of unforced errors from the coach, the wind, close calls that he left.

I won, because he lost.

There are victories that we score because we won.

There are victories that we score because others lost.

Knowing the difference, is the key to winning more.

This notion that we can be anything we want. We can be whatever we wish to be.

It’s not true.

We suck at a lot of things.

And we are all probably good at at a few things.

And really really good at possibly none until now.

And only if we hold on to those things that we are good at – and not stress upon what we are not good at

Do we have a chance to win

Our only chance to win

Am reading the fascinating biography of Einstein – written by the impeccable Walter Isaacson.

It’s a rather long read. And as I neared the years of Einstein when he left Germany for the US – my eyes quickly glanced to the chapter length.

The bottom left suggested the chapter was 20 mins.

Wow – that’s a lot chapter – the longest one thus far, I found telling myself.

And right then, it struck me.

These were 2 years of someone’s life.

And that someone happens to be Albert Einstein.

And here I was expressing (possibly) frustration that the chapter was 20 minutes long.

2 years of a life boiled down to 20 mins.

And even that seems long.

This is what will happen to all of us.

Our lives will eventually be reduced to a few minutes, a few pages, a few memories, a few incidents.

And while one can feel bad about this fact, the takeaway (yet again) for me was – most things that happen to us in real time don’t matter.

Most of our reactions are misdirected, unnecessary and avoidable.

Most of our emotions are temporary.

Most of our life will not be remembered by our own selves, forget others.

And yet we spend an inordinate amount of time fretting over our situations, our circumstances, how the world is unfair, how we should have behaved, how someone should have spoken to us, how we failed to do something.

In the end all of us will boil down to our own 20 minutes.

And now think –

What will those 20 mins be?

What would you like them to be?

And what will soon seem trivial?

A week back on Sunday, I posted a survey on instagram, at 5am.

Do you get up early everyday?

Within 3 hours I had an overwhelming majority – 83% saying yes!

At 9am I could have safely concluded that majority of my network on instagram wakes up early.

And then it happened.

The late risers started to wake up.

And they, just as everyone else, checked their phones first.

By 11am, the survey was 48% yes and 52% no.

Here is the best part though – I still don’t know the exact result.

What is “early” for you may not be for me.

So what did people have in mind when they said I don’t wake up early or that I do.

We will never find out.

What’s obvious though – is that through the day, I have enough occasions to convince myself of a conclusion.

A conclusion backed by primary data.

That’s how most of us end up behaving in real life.

We seek conclusions that validate our beliefs. We seek people that agree to our views. We crave for data that endorses our point of view.

And then we go “aha! I knew it!”

The destroyer of an echo chamber isn’t an alternate point of view. It’s you yourself.