MY ROLE IN MAKING SWAMI'S DREAM OF A GOLDEN AGE A REALITY

As the proverb goes, "To bring about a change, you must first be the change!" The difference between the present condition of the world and the Golden age is like the difference between the land and the sky. To bridge the gap, all the people will have to undergo mental, spiritual and moral transformation. First of all, I would myself undergo the transformation.

I will open up new centres or help in the existing places where "education is not sold but educare is served". I shall help others learn the human values and more importantly practice it and help them realise the meaning of "Fatherhood of God and Brotherhood of Man."

I shall try to make people realise that all the religions are actually different paths leading to the same God and by this try to bring about communal harmony.
At an individual and intra personal level, I will remove all my bad qualities and cultivate good qualities and try to spread the same to the people close to me.

After completing my education, I will either tackle over my father's business of sanitary ware and improve it or join some other company. If I take over the family businesses, I will expand it. I will make regular charities like feeding the poor, donating to orphanages, donating to NGOs etc. If I join a company, I will make my peers, superiors and subordinates realise how important ethical and moral behaviour is… If I have the authority, I will organize weekend camps for all employees and take them to old age homes, orphanages, leprosy clinics, etc. so that people realise the actual suffering of the people. My aim would be that everybody should know the value of service and the self satisfaction that it brings. They would also get to know the importance of right conduct, both in professional and personal life.

I shall give tips to people on how to live their lives in a practical way. Even small random acts of kindness which may seem insignificant to others can change a person's life. I will tell people that any type of kindness can work wonders, be it from making a person cross the road, to forgetting the differences with another person and forgiving.

Man should pray to God but at the same time keep rowing to the shore. Once the weaving starts, God will send the threads. God helps those who help themselves.

I will conclude with a Japanese proverb which is also a source of inspiration for me: HE WHO WANTS WHAT GOD WANTS OF HIM WILL LEAD A FREE, HAPPY, SATISFIED AND PROSPEROUS LIFE…

– Posted by Sumit Agrawal on behalf of Late Anirudh Rathi

A BRIEF HISTORY OF MYSELF

I was born on the 31st day of December in the year of 1990 (last day of the year) in Raipur (my mom’s place) at Tiwari Nursing Home. For the first 7 years of my life, I was the sole child of my parents & then came my brother.

My childhood was uneventful. I enjoyed many things that would still be a luxury for people today… my mother was very strict & I was beaten quite a few times, but she was the one to whom I went every time I needed solace. Father was strict in some aspects but would always be there whenever I needed something. Grandparents were loving a usual!

When I had grown up (till 7th grade), I started getting irritated for small things. Things grew worse as each year flew by. Grandfather used to tell me that I was very lucky to be born in such a good family (I used to think “Yeah, right!”). I used to have quite a few fights with my brother & mother which used to make me angry with everything…

Till 9th grade, I studied in Timpany Secondary School in Vizag & I shifted to NTS till 10th. My new school (NTS) gave me a lot of exposure to the “Big Bad World”. Then for 11th, father applied for me in the Sri Satya Sai Higher Secondary (2006) School which changed me a lot (for the good) into what I am today!

I started really thanking God for the family I got, friends & everything else! I came to know a lot about life (how to love it, what to live it for, etc.) & other things. I came to know some people here without whom I think my life would be missing something big. Then, in the year 2008, I got into Sri Satya Sai University for B. Com (Hons.) course in Bangalore campus.

I’m really grateful to this place for making me what I am now & making me meet to some great people whom I love & respect a LOT! Hats off to them & God bless them all…

- Posted by Sumit Agrawal on behalf of Late Anirudh Rathi

Love Thy Self

Yesterday I happened to quiz the teenaged sister of a friend about the biggest cause of stress in her life. While bracing myself to hear something like studies, parental pressure or even boyfriend trouble, I was totally stumped when, without even batting an eyelid, she replied 'my weight'.
And before you pour your sympathies for the poor 'fat' teenager, let me tell you that she weighs a mere 50 kg. She went on to tell me that almost all her friends are perennially stressed about how they look and #8230;some are fat, some too thin, most loathe their acne-d faces, and all girls in her class think they are not 'endowed' enough and hate themselves for it.
Come to think of it, the 'I don't like my looks' menace is not restricted to teenagers alone. While we adults crib about the bigger tensions in life, somewhere in the deeper darker corner of our subconscious also lies the stress of not looking our best.
Wouldn't life be much calmer if for a change, we decided to love our bodies the way they are and make peace with our looks? This, of course, is not to undermine the importance of a healthy diet and exercise for our well-being. But why kill yourself stressing over the length and curvature of your nose when you may just have the friendliest personality.
Believe me, the sexiest pouts and the most curvaceous figures are no substitutes for a warm, friendly persona. And if you don't have the latter, you sure have a valid reason to stress and do something about it.
So the calmness trick for the week is very simple - quit self bashing, look at yourself in the mirror and for a change, appreciate the way you look. What's better, ask a close friends to point out five things they love about your appearance.
They might just surprise you by coming out with ten!.

Arrivederci

Have A Nice Day!!!

Donuts For You!!!

Disclaimer: They following experience is not mine. DUH!!! I came to know about it from from different places and then finally got the exact version as it is below by the person involved himself. This can also be regarded as a contradiction to the controversial news that usually is heard of Orkut, the social website these days.

Do you Orkut?" .
"No," was my answer two years back when I had joined Orkut on being invited by the same friend who asked me this question.
I had no idea of the influence it was about to have on my otherwise conventional life. With a sudden exposure to this whole new reality, rather virtual reality, it took me few days to understand the tit-bits of this insanely attractive and dangerously addictive world.
Networking sites were not really a new phenomenon to me, however a community so vibrant and spirited was indeed a jitter to the already established and popular ideas like instant messaging or mailing. Scraps, communities, friends and the famous "Bad bad server, no donuts for you".
the days passed like never before. The whole world of mine seemed entrapped behind that login page of Orkut.
I became one of the big advertisers of Orkut. Every upward tick of those figures boosted my virtual ego.
Posing in front of camera to produce that sensational image to be posted on my profile, or giving an arresting introduction of myself in 'about me', my brain was truly "orkutised". In no time I had a profile to be proud of.
Life was dreamy. Then I met this girl.
So many times in life you meet people, have a chat and then just forget. And meeting a pretty face over Orkut was such a common phenomenon, may be we could have ended with a future more common.
I had once scraped her a simple "Hi", obviously being appealed by her profile picture, to which she had replied with a similar gesture. We added each other and then vanished from existence.
But one day her eyes caught hold of a guy in her friend list whom she had almost never talked with. She scraped him asking how come he was in her friends list.
The guy incidentally is me, no donuts for guessing that. I replied her with a fresh and smart introduction of myself.
And then we never looked back .
in regret.
We never rushed in. We never pushed each other.
The relation just developed like forests grow without any conscious nurture. We just clicked and kept on clicking with each passing day and exchanged scraps.
Our brainwaves harmonised on their own. And what else could we depend on except those so called wavelengths.
We never had seen each other and we still had not heard each other. The relation just grew on those written words that flashed on screen.
The relation at first seemed a little improbable. First of all, we still have a negative sympathy towards our relationship that developed over digital media, be it telephone or Internet.
We trust our sense of sight more than anything else. Secondly, the distance.
She was almost 2000 kms away from me. Long distance relationships too have very less takers.
But love has an uncanny tendency of making things look easy. And they lived happily.
I first called her on her birthday. And it was the first time she heard me say those famous three words.
I was still in the last few months of my post graduation degree and had to take my parents into confidence. They reacted too cool to be true and my father announced his willingness to sponsor my journey.
After my exams in May 2006, came the D-Day. Going miles to meet my soulmate sounded fairytale and I was anxiously on cloud nine.
Then we met and sparks flew. I could see rainbows.
I could smell the first rain against the earth. It was a hit, more than any Shahrukh movie! Everything went well after that.
We are proud to belong to the small percentage who make online relations successful. 2005 to 2007, like Orkut our relationship has also matured and had many facelifts.
And today we are set to get married within few months. The dates are fixed, the venue is set.
We retired together from Orkut quite some time ago. Nowadays we get to see Orkut and other online networking sites on newspaper due to controversial reasons.
However, I believe it's the people who make this community and it's on them - how they treat and utilise it. "Bad, bad server.
No donuts for you".
Thanks Orkut for the sweetest donut.

Good things do happen. Just that they fail to get a word of mention. If you have any such experience or know of it then please do share it with us.

Arrivederci

Have A Nice Day!!!

The Interview.

I was sitting there on one of the 4 chairs placed at equal paces. My legs were shaky as though I'd fall off as soon as I stand, butterflies were having a field day in my stomach, my mouth was dry no matter how much water I drank and was feeling as though I needed to use the restroom even though I actually did not need to. Then finally I was called and I managed to force myself to go till the Interview room. And as soon as I entered, I was greeted by the interviewers but suddenly my cell started ringing and and everything was haywire since.

"Pheww... That was close", I thought after waking up. So it was a dream after all and the time was, Oh God already 6:30.... never woke up after 5:30am for the previous 2 days. But then I never felt more sleepy so I slept again and lazily got up by 7, went out to eat something and thought I will study for a while. But then my laziness got the better out of me. So again I wasted some time and then finally had bath and got dressed up by around 8 and my father started preparing me for some possible questions in the interview. By 9 I thought I would go through the text book but instead I took some time out and just focused my thoughts and thought how to present my body language. My batch's interview started by 10 so I was supposed to report by around 9:30.

I left for the university by 9:30 and met my other classmates and we started discussing. We all were supposed to go one by one roll number wise and there was one common waiting hall for each batch that was going on (10 guys in each batch) and the next four boys who were going to be interviewed after the boy being interviewed were supposed to sit on some four chairs and not supposed to talk. I was 2nd from last in my batch so I had to wait a lot to sit in one of those chairs. Each chair was at a distance of about 6 feet from each other with the last one ending up near the boardroom where the interview was going on. Slowly-slowly I reached till the last chair and instead of being nervous, I was excited. I wanted to go in and get done with it soon. Then finally I was called and asked what did I learn in NCC. That took me by surprise so I said some words like "discipline, military etc". Then I was asked a question from accounts by the controller of examinations and I gave exactly the opposite answer. Then he asked me if I was sure and gave me the hint that it was wrong. So then I gave the correct answer. Then came the Vice-Chancellor's turn to ask and he was know to ask economic questions (he is from the IAS). And I answered them really confidently that he himself doubted that if his question was correct and that just boosted up my confidence to new heights. So realising me as a tough candidate to tackle with he told me that I could go and then did not fling any more questions. Mine was one of the shortest interviews and I was not even told that my entrance test marks unlike my peers who were told that they did not do so well. Guess I must've done well. I was off the hook soon and today i was really happy when I got the news that I was selected for the course.

May be it was my luck or the way I showed my body language, but my interview was a hit. I was scared of interviews but after giving 2, I am really confident about them.

The 1st mistake most of the people do is that they smile too soon. Don't smile as soon as you see them but wait for a second or 2, soak in their persona and then let a big , warm, reponsive smile flood over your face and overflow into your eyes. That looks more genuine while the immediate smile looks like artificial. The next thing is to maintain eye contact. Especially when you are answering someone's question, look at that person in the eye and answer confidently even if you are not too sure about the answer. But don't look at the same person for long as it may become intimidating. Your posture is important too. How you walk into the room, how you sit on the chair and how you stand up again. Don't move much as it is a sign of nervousness. Usually many interviewers are present in a interview but only a few ask the questions while the others are busy observing you. Dress formally and decently. Wear clothes which suits you and the institution which is conducting the interview. Don't fold your arms or legs as it sends out very negative signals. Keep them by your side. And never have a blank face. If you have an idea but don't know the exact answer then start your answer with "I think or I believe". If you don't have even an idea then ask for a change in the question. After answering each question give a short smile to the questioner. Know about the background and history of the Institution for which you are being interviewed. And if you are feeling nervous, then take in long breaths and drink small amounts of water with intervals cos you don't want to start searching for the toilets!

These tips are really useful if you want to get through an interview successfully. Have some clarifications or suggestions then do paste them in your comments. All the Best.

Arrivederci

Have A Nice Day!!!

Be yourself.

Far too talented was he... my classmate, friend and guide...

"Could I reach upto him?... no way!",

That was what my mind had to say,

But in him saw my heart an ideal,

I wanted his talent, was he ready to deal?

I tried to imitate him, his every word, his every action,

Perfection?... I knew no satisfaction,

For the harder I tried, the harder I fell,

Oh, God! my childish inspiration led me to hell...

I aspired to be someone- someone I could never be,

Finally I decided to be ME- my very own self.

Unique!- Yes I would be a Somebody.

Even if it meant being a Nobody.

I'd be myself...

Arrivederci.

Have A Nice Day!!!

IPL... The scoop and controversies

There was a lot of hype over the IPL before it started. The player auctions were on the main pages of all the newspapers, Most of the teams were coming up with their team songs to generate the publicity, cheerleaders being flown in from the States etc. Even though it got off to a great start, it was not short of a few hassles. After so many of the players were missing out of action, and many more doing things which are making them miss out all and action and of course the cheerleader controversy.
Sachin has not yet played a single match because of a supposedly groin injury. Now that must have hurt. I think that's the reason why he was not able to appreciate the cheerleaders. Even if he is not able to play for his team, at least he can join the cheerleaders.Even George Bush was a cheerleader at school. I ain't kidding. May be because they didn't take him in the team so he became one of them.
Regarding the cheerleaders, are the supposed to build up the excitement or get the crowd excited??!! Just think how they will be responding to theirs parents back home, "Hey mom.We are enjoying here so much. We are the cynosure of all the eyes as soon as we start giving those high kicks and those routine steps. We never got this kind of attention back home. But a fat guy in some kind of ethnic wear doesn't want us do perform. He wants us out. May be we are too hot for him to handle. The crowds all ga-ga over us. They keep asking us for photographs and handshakes and they keeping making all sorts of signs at us. We are really enjoying the attention. Cya later."
And then there is Bhajji. He seems to have become a michi bhajji now. With the slapping and reunion incident, looks like hes trying to make the IPL into an Ekta Kapoor soap. Even Symonds had to hear more than a mouthful from Bhajji during India's recent tour to Australia. But the allrounder did not smack him. A few days in Symonds wing will surely afford him the art of keeping calm. And now that he is anyway going to sit in the stands, he can also join the cheerleaders and give Sachin company there. Both of them failed to get their team a win; we can hope that the dancing will change their team's fortunes. If Bhajji does join the cheerleaders then looks like we will have to call him leerleader. One thing we know for sure is that Sreesanth's face value must be a lot because the slap cost Bhajji 3 crores rupees i.e. 3 followed by se7en zeros. OMG!!....... Shree must also be having a lot of water in his eyes that he overflowed like the Brahmaputra does during the monsoons. Was it because Preity Zinta hugged Yuvraj and not him??
SRK's publicity seems to have paid off. His team, the Kolkata Knight Riders are now probably the most popular and successful team. But then even Ganguly Dada was in trouble with Warne which cost him his match fee.
Vijay Mallaya's team dint have much luck with the cricket or the foreign cheerleaders. But he's become the IPL's Beerleader................
And finally we can hope to see the Rawalpindi Express to set the pitch on fire as he will be making a come back after his ban has been suspended which is being taken into consideration.
That's it for now. Do tell me what you think about it by posting your comments.

Arrivederci

Have A Nice Day !!!