happiness by building a remarkable life.

Sunday, October 28, 2012

The Now Habit, unschedule and a relief

I got a relief from the constant overwhelming urge that I should work hard all the time, have no fun and this is the way life is going to be. i tend to put off living with the solace that someday I will be happy. I no longer believe that.

I am reading the book "The Now Habit" by Neil Fiore, and summarizing that with a snapshot of a page here.

This is taken from the sixth chapter of the book. I am human, and not superman.

Note: Since we should work only for 30 minutes a day, here is link on how to learn faster and better. Trust me, if Cal Newport endorses it, it works.


Sunday, October 14, 2012

Why it is hard to do deliberate practice ?

After trying my hands on deliberate practice, deliberately for the first time in the context of learning a software I have found out the following things.

1. You should clearly, and I mean crystal, know what you want.
2. You have to take it one inch at a time (I couldn't help stealing the Al Pacino line here.)
3. It must be designed, or better, planned what you are going to do.
4. It is mentally demanding and therefore you should make yourself free from distractions.

It was not that fun, but I learned something anyway.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Water, water evreywhere...Not a drop to drink

How to find motivation, and the truth behind it in a world full of bookshelves..full of motivational books and a hoard of motivational speakers.

I used to like motivational books, once upon a time. I bought, downloaded and read a lot of them. I tried to follow them, and tried to find my passion so that I can align my career and studies with my passion, and be happy forever. Also, I wanted to be radical, such as leaving a menial job and then following my passion.

This process has been going on from class 11th, that's from 2004 and eight years has passed. I am not saying those books did not help me, but as a matter of fact most of the things were useless. After browsing hundreds of blogs, websites, videos and e-books... I found out a website called Study Hacks.

It changed my perspective and I really started to connect to it. it introduced to me the concept of deliberate practice, related to the 10000 hour rule popularized by Malcolm Gladwell.  It takes deliberate practice to achieve a truly wonderful life. 

I started reading books related to this... Talent is Overrated, The Talent code, Drive and Flow: The Psychology of Happiness. I felt like I have finally found the Holy Grail. 

Meanwhile, I am still working on improving my life. I am not yet successful. But, now I know what it takes to build a truly remarkable life and career. Applying these principles to our lives is not easy, and I have not yet learned, let alone mastered, the art of delibearate practice.

Someday I will. Or, let me put a deadline 'coz a goal without a deadline is still a dream. I will master the art of deliberate practice within the next 365 days. 

What I gained, however, is that I came out from the rut of stupid motivational books. I am not reading any motivational books or watching any videos which talks about passion as something you find out one day just out of nowhere. I am buying the theory of creating passion, the craftsman's manifesto and deliberate practice.

Lets put this into action. 365 Days to a better life. In the meantime, you can google "Study Hacks," "deliberate practice," and "Craftsman's Manifesto."

Life is tough, but I know about deliberate practice.


Sunday, October 7, 2012

Why we will never have immortal songs ?

There are old hindi movie songs that can still blow our mind. Kishore Kumar, Mehmood, Muhammad Rafi and Lata Mangeshkar have always been everyone's favourite. Some songs have been marked as immortal and rightly so, as they still have the capacity to blow our minds after decades of their release. 

Now, the new genre of songs.. I mean from the 90's are hardly recognized as immortal ones. I don't have enough data nor I am qualified enough to comment on the quality of songs to segregate which ones should be immortal or not.

But I have an observation, or may be a gut feeling to explain this. With the rise of internet and youtube, we can see the songs of contemporary movies along with the video from the time they start advertising. What happens is that all the songs are registered on our minds, not only by its melody and words but also as the picturization of it. It happens to me that when I listen to a song without looking at its video, I discover fragments of lyrics or music that is awesome which I have never cared for when watching it with the video.

A a large and mass effect, this phenomenon results in the fact that the popularization of songs are not limited only to the melody and words but also the picturization. Along with that, we have too many songs and too fast access to almost everything.

Therefore, may be we will never have immortal songs or if it is immortal, nay be it is released before the 90s.

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

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