Change Something

I haven't written anything on the blog for a while. It's about time I put an update. Even if its insignificant and is of no consequence. The very act of writing is important to me.

So while I write this, I am tripping on music from MTV Unplugged Season 3. MTV Unplugged has to be one of the best music shows that I know of. The concept is very simple. As simple as they get. They get an artiste and ask that artist to re-imagine, re-create, re-sing some of their most popular songs. Right now, I am #CLT to Kabira by Arijit Singh. The next on the list is Yaaron by KK and Tum Ho by Farhan Akhtar.

And I am having a tough time deciding which one is the best. You must try them. Here, I made a playlist.



So the point of this post is two fold.

One is to write for the sake of writing.

Two, make public yet another hidden wish that I have harbored since I gained consciousness. If I could change something about myself, I would want to be able to sing well. No, I don't have aspirations to go sing on stages et al. I don't even know how that would feel like. I don't have a reference point. But I know that I want to be able to sing well.

Sing well enough to be able to open my throat and sing at any place without running the risk of dogs chasing me. Sing well enough to be able to not get ashamed about my voice when I am tripping on a song. Sing well enough to probably learn a guitar or something and play for myself when I am down and about.

But then, at my age, I am not sure if I can learn how to sing. I think I'd have to stay content with my singing experiments in the confined and cramped walls of the bathroom. Atleast there, I dont run the risk of getting pelted by stones et al!

Oh, one more thing. If you could change something about yourself, what would you change?

Untitled. 18 Jan 2014.

Crib Alert. This is a whiny piece of text. You may not want to read this. 

We are almost 20 days into 2014 and I am already hoping that it gets over fast. To me, it seems as if the world is out to get me. To drag me down. To create obstacles in my path.

I know that I am wrong and this is never the case. Almost.

But these many coincidences can't really happen at the same time. Mathematically, its impossible. A coin toss can't continue to fall on the same face all the time. There are so many things that are going in opposite direction (from as planned) that if I made a list, it can reach the moon.

I can actually make and submit a long list of things that are dragging me down.

But to what effect? To whom? How would it help? God up there would look at it and help me fix things? I am not sure about God. If He had to help He would've helped already. No? Been some years that I have been drifting around here.

But I'd rather not.

I want to fight this battle with time. The one we are losing with every passing second. The one we are lagging behind in every minute. The one that takes us closer to the end with every passing year.

There are two kind of things that affect me (or anyone else for that matter). Things that I can control. And things that I cant. I can work on the first set of things. And ignore the other.

So the fact that I have been lazy and busy, I can fix it. I can blame is on preoccupation with a freelance project that I've taken up. I can blame it on weather. I can blame it on things at home. I can blame it on my general boredom with life and all that. I can blame it on a lot of other things.

But the fact of the matter is that I am singlehandedly responsible for my laziness. No one else is. I need to stop wasting time. Our time is limited and I can not spend it in not doing things.

Further, this laziness is already affecting everything that I want to achieve in 2014. My health, the book, career, money, love et al. I don't know how its affecting my non-existent love life, but I want to believe that there is some karmic connection somewhere. Again, the affects are evident. In last twenty days, the story hasn't moved a lot, I haven't posted on my blog, I haven't written my ten ideas a day, I haven't met new people, I haven't stopped spending money on frivolous things, I haven't become any slimmer or wiser, I haven't even made any attempts whatsoever to lose weight, etc etc.

Apologies. I said I wont crib and I wont make a list. Let me leave this hanging here.

Coming to  things that I can't control that fuck my head, its again a very long list. It may not reach the moon but it would reach zero gravity for sure.

Sunanda Pushkar for starters. I heard about it and was shocked beyond words. She was in news just a day before and I cant explain the extreme step. I don't know what really prompted her to take her life but I sincerely believe that overly intrusive social media has had a role to play in her decision. If I could, I would really really try and stop those jokes and quips that the world made on her.

Even though I did not know her and I did not make any of the aforementioned jokes on her, as a participant on "social media", I feel responsible for her decision. I have been trying to write about her, to her for more than an hour but I haven't been able to. There are a very few occasions when words fail me, this is one of those. I just hope that these incidents are not repeated. I hope that all the funny people learn a lesson. For our five minutes of fame, we have abetted her in killing herself.

The other thing that has left me numb in my head is the gross unfairness of the world that we live in. I dont want to write about the specific thing at a place that is in public domain but I am deeply moved by it. Its proof enough for me that God is merely a figment of our imagination. If He were around, I am sure He would not appreciate the unfairness. No no, I am not blaming God. I am merely saying that things around me are unfair and I need to start living with those.

Then these is this thing about shit happening at home. I can't control it. The fact that I am too poor to afford a house that I want to live in, in Mumbai, I am left at the mercy of landlords and brokers. More than anything else, these things drain me out of my energy. And what do I do to get this energy back? I try eating junk food. To get that temporary kick from carbs and sugar. What happens in the long run? I go down the spiral!

You see my point? No? Ok.

Anyway, enough of a rant. Gotta get going and get some words written on the Nidhi Kapoor Story. It's so close to the finish line.

Before I end this, I just hope that these 20 days are not an indication of the entire year to come and things improve as we go along. If they dont, I wont know what to do.

P.S.: Yet another reason why I blog. I don't write personal diary and this blog is hardly read by anyone (may be excluding prospective employers). Ranting things out of my system help me get back on the track. Imagine climbing on a really high, tall place and screaming on top of you lungs. So loud that your throat hurts. Despite being that loud, there is a good chance that no one hears you. But then do you scream for others to hear you? No. You dont. You scream because you want to throw shit out of your system.

This blog, this rant is my attempt at screaming like that. On top of my voice. Loud enough to clean my system. Clean the shit going on in my head. That.

Thank you very much. Why? I dont know.

Hello 2014.

Well well well.

2014 is here. And how.

Took me five days to realize that it's here. And all this when I have been waiting for 2014 for a long long time. 31 years to be precise. Someone of the pandit variety once predicted that I would get rich and famous when I am 31. He made this prediction when I was still young. And since I have waited this long, he better be right.

One of the things that I want to do in 2014, is to get regular with blogging. I mean more regular than the 100 odd times I post. The daily kinds. I may not have interesting things to talk about everyday on this blog but I will talk nonetheless. I want to be a writer and I am nowhere close to being a good one. The only way I'd improve is by writing a lot. For for every 1000 pieces I may write, just about one, or even less, may make the cut in the hyper-competitive and super-cluttered world that we live in.

Other thing would be reduce the amount of time I waste on doing frivolous things. For example, facebooking. I have realized that everyone else on facebook is richer, smarter, luckier and more successful than me. They also seem to know all the celebrities. Some are celebrities by themselves. I could compete. But I'd rather conceded and move out. So, in 2014, I would spend lot less time on FB. Except when I am talking about tnks. Its like a necessary evil that I'd have to live with.

Third thing that I am going to change is to start moving towards a simple and minimalistic life. I know I have this thing for collecting and hoarding things. I love physical greeting cards, collectibles, fridge magnets and other such things. I have saved a lot of these, hoping that someday I would have a home of my own and I would decorate it and fill it with memories. But then as I go along, I know I cant carry all these things with me. I know there is no point living if there are no emotions. I know I am confused. So in 2014, I would start thinking of all these things.

Fourth thing, I'd figure out a way to make money. I have a very large appetite for spending. I am a spendthrift personified. I may claim to love frugal life and all that, I just can not not spend money. I am loving the joblessness. I just need to find a way to foot my bills. Would you know of any rich old kings in need of eligible heirs?

Thats it I guess. Hope 2014 is good to me. Hope I can do these 4 things. Rest I think will follow. And wait. This list is different from this list. Dont ask me how. Thats for you to find out. As a reader. If someone's actually reading this. You've see Gravity? Sandra Bullock alone in space? That!

Thats it for the time being. Enough for the first post of 2014. More as and when I get time tomorrow.

Wish everyone a great 2014. Hope the year brings with it love, luck and happiness. Hope that pandit was correct.

2014. The year that will be.

John Trever. Via Log 24

Its that time of the year. When everyone gets into the rut of making resolutions for the coming new year. And since I am a mere mortal I have to give in to the temptation of making a list and adding more noise to already existing noise.

Here is my list. And if all goes well, by the end of 2014,

• I would have published at least one book. Most likely, it would be The Nidhi Kapoor Story.
• I would be 30" in diameter. I am far more than right now. 
• I would have saved enough to not work for someone else. Enough said. 
• I would have learnt to code. Atleast code WP plugins and themes.
• I would have learnt how to play guitar. At least the 25 most played songs on my playlist. 
• I would've done all the things that I have listed here. This is a private list, in case you were wondering. 

And everyday, I would do the following...

• Write 1500 words. Towards a book or towards this blog or towards yet another writing project. 
• Think of ten ideas. As recommended by James Altucher.
• Workout for 30 minutes. It could be a walk, a swim, a session of yoga (I attend Yoga Kuteer) or something on similar lines. 

And often I would...

• Meet strangers. I want to meet one new person a day but I know its tough to do so. I would try to meet at least one stranger a week. I'd call it #meetAStranger or something. 
• Create and put out a new project once a month at least. This could be a business, could be a text, could be a blog etc. I think I would work on all those ideas that I have saved on my parkedIdeas tag. 
• Read a book every week. I will use tips from this Farnam Street post to help me reach my goal. 

Thats all I want to do. In 2014.

Come to think of it, at my age, when I should be changing the world and making the dent et al, here I am, trying to write a book. Sigh. But then I guess I need to take small steps towards greatness. The endeavor to make the dent remains. Like Archimedes said, "Give me a lever long enough and I would move the Earth", I will move the Earth. If I dont get the lever, I would make one. But there is no doubt I would. 

That's it I guess. Wish everyone a very happy new 2014. May the new year be full of health, love, luck and happiness.

P.S.: To arrive at this list, I have taken inspiration and lifted ideas from the likes of Steve Pressfield, James Altucher, Chris Guillebeau, Farnam Street and others.

P.P.S.: Need to stop using all the extra "And"s.

2013. The year that was.

So 2013 is almost over. Its time to take a stock of what all I did in this year. In fact this is first in line of many posts that I would hope to write over the next week talking about 2013 and 2014.

In numbers

• 3 - number of countries I travelled to. Out of these three, one was a new country. Now that I dont have that awesome naukri, firang travel is increasingly going to be tough. 
• 4 - number of jobs that I have held after I finished my MBA. In almost 8 years. 
• 100 - the number of posts that I published on this blog in this year. Including this one. Apart from these 100, I have published almost 1138 posts over the last ten years. Yes, its been ten years since I started writing this blog. And a lot of good things have happened to me because of this blog. 
• 150 - number of likes on my book's FB page. If you haven't, here is an opportunity. I normally do not pimp these links but I am going all-in with the book and there is no stone that I would leave unturned. 
• 434.50 - in rupees, the lowest my bank balance reached before I was rescued from the sub-prime crisis. 
• 73 332 - words I wrote for The Nidhi Kapoor Story, my first book. The book is still not complete though. I had hoped I would be able to. 

In terms of milestones

• May - wrote the first chapter of my first book. I never planned to convert it into a book while I was woking on it but guess somethings are meant to happen. 
• Jul - took a sabbatical from full time employment to work on my book. And work on the business that I put money in. I am out of it now. 
• Nov - Roadtripped in US. Covered about 5000 miles in 12 days. Havent had the time to write my posts about this. I hope to do this soon. By January of 2014 I think.
• Dec - Finish first draft of tnks. I could not. 

Summary
The year, like the rest of my life, has been all over the place. In 2014, I hope to change all this and give things a little direction. The big big dream about making a dent is still alive. Would be alive for another three or so years, before I am forced to settle down. And if that happens, it would be very very unfortunate.

The other thing that I realized while writing this is that there isn't much to talk about for the year. I mean there is this attempt to seed and run a business, attempt to write a book but there is nothing to talk about when I look back at the year from a time in future. There have been attempts but there are no outcomes. I need to look towards outcomes, rather than attempts.

Going forward, in 2014, I need to have years that I can write boast about in my biography, if I get to write one! Hope 2014 is a stepping stone. If you are the kinds to believe in God, do pray for me. Guess only thing that can help me, is divine intervention!

Thats it for my yearly report. More posts on 2014 coming soon.

P.S.: I made similar lists in 2008, 2009, 2011.

Reading vs Hearing

Posted originally on The Nidhi Kapoor Story blog.

Yesterday I was dinnering with a friend and talking about The Nidhi Kapoor Story. While we were at it, he told me something very insightful about the way I write. He said, "my sentence structure is very conversational."

I did not understand this at first. When I prodded him more, he said that he meant that when he reads things that I write, he does not have to make any special efforts to comprehend what he is reading (aka what I've written). Its like someone talking to him. Its like a regular, everyday conversation that two people are engaged in. There is back and forth of ideas, thoughts. The words, the sentences, the meaning is plain jane and is commonplace. He said he could consume it while sleeping and yet comprehend it.

So, next, I asked him, "What is the other kind?"

He said, the one where you use flowery language and you write with the intent of using words to exaggerate the meaning, club them with other interesting words to create poetry. Poetry not as poems but poetry as expression. Where, while reading, you need to focus on what is written. Where, when you do comprehend what is written, you are filled with pleasure. Pleased at the ingenuity of the writer. For example, Jack Kerouac's brilliant timeless piece, "the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars."

When was the last time you heard someone use "burn, burn, burn like fabulous roman candles" in a day to day conversation? Unless you were talking to a drunk man. Or unless you were sitting across a poet high on something. Or unless it was a philosopher. Such people, like Jack, they think in rhymes. They ponder over deeper meaning of words. And they have a mastery over human emotions. And then equipped with all this, they coin new words and twist the rules of grammar, rules of language to create masterpieces. It must be such a pleasing sight to see such masters in action.

Truth be told, I would love to create poetry like that. I believe that its my reason, my purpose. To create poetry I mean. But I am not equipped to do it right now. In some time may be. I shall wait. Hopefully you guys wait as well.

And, second truth be told, I could get offended at the entire commonplace and plain jane remark but I choose to take it as a compliment. The Nidhi Kapoor Story is an important milestone in my writing career and I plan to, want to, evolve as a writer with every such milestone.

Anyway before I get into a rant, to summarize, writing is a battle between prowess with words to create poetry vs intent of narrating the story as if you're talking out loud. I am definitely the later kinds. What about you? What is your forte? Writing poems? Talking / Thinking out loud?

The happiness formula

tnks' FB cover

I have spoken about happiness multiple times in past. Its the single most important things that I chase. I know there are multiple schools of thought. Some say its fleeting, some say its a process, some says its the outcome. I dont know all of that. I am not evolved enough to be able to talk about all that.

But I do know something that made me happy today. And I hope that somehow, I can continue doing it over and over again. And its pretty simple to be honest.

All I need to do is to wake up early, take a shower, head to the nearest coffee shop (preferably Starbucks), plug in my favorite music. And write. Write till I am dead with exhaustion. And then eat a lot and then sleep. Yes, I am that simple. All the gibberish talk about starting up, getting rich, changing the world, making a dent etc sound so small when I am in the zone and writing. And not just writing but debating about each work, thinking on the fly, creating, molding, killing my characters. Its a lot of fun.

Just need to make this into a routine, over the next few months.

Nidhi Kapoor BSODed

Posted originally on The Nidhi Kapoor Blog. This is a slightly modified version. 

Unlike most writers, I write on a Windows based laptop. And I initially used tools like Omniwriter, Scrivener etc to get things written.

But then, as I went along, despite all the rich features that these writing tools offer, I craved for simplicity and flow. And thus, once I reached beyond 50,000 words, I moved my files back to good old Microsoft Word. All was hunky dory, things were great, till the blue monster showed his face. I am talking about Blue Screen Of Death aka BSOD.

The dreaded BSOD

Just when I was writing the climax scene of the story, the computer crashed. And along with it, it took the entire word document. And no, I could not recover it. The word document got corrupted and I tried retrieving it but despite all efforts and all software, only thing I got was a 200 page word document full of gibberish. It was as if my work of the last five months was reduced to the infinite monkeys punching on the keyboard at random.

I have nothing against getting compared to monkeys but what about all those promises I've made to all the friends? to myself? the promise I made to readers of tnks? What about my dreams of becoming a full-time writer? There were a million questions and I hit the panic button. And hit it again and again, so hard that I almost broke it.

But somehow, while I was shitting bricks, I remembered that I still have the story saved as a Scrivener project. I fired it up and voila, I had a large chunk of story there. I had shifted to Word about two weeks back and hence apart from whatever I did in last two weeks, the entire story was there.

If I could be honest, since I started writing the book, the last two weeks were when I made real progress, real breakthrough in the story. I made it lot more deeper, lot more interesting, lot more complex. I added layers and introduced more characters. I even killed an important character and un-killed someone who I had killed in the second chapter. Sadly, I cant recover any of what I wrote in last few days but the bright side is that I was not back to zero. Just that two weeks of my life went down the drain.

Thankfully, the story, the plot and the twists are still fresh in my head. With little extra effort, I am sure I can recreate all of it. Despite the setbacks, I remain committed to my deadline of finishing the first draft by end of the year. And I promise I will.

I dont know who to blame about the fiasco. The old laptop, or the operating system, or all the applications installed on my computer, or all the multiple windows that I keep open, or myself for being so callous about something as important as #tnks.

So lessons learnt?

• A. Always always always take backup. Three times. And buy insurance. Just that you need to understand the pricing. 
• B. Keep calm and carry on. I shouldn’t have panicked. Things always tend to workout in the end. 

Someone buy me this notepad! 

Thats it!

And while I work towards writing longer and harder to finish the book in time, do help me spread word by sharing / liking the fb page. I am also looking for someone to help me with design around the book. If you know someone who can help me, do let me know.

And finally, please let me know if you would want to read and review the first draft of The Nidhi Kapoor Story. 

I. Yoga.

Image Credits: Anonymous. Found here.

Ladies, gentlemen, friends, fellow countrymen and other minions of the world,

With one simple stroke, a sheer brilliant one at that, I have done the impossible. I have dislodged Nidhi Kapoors, Arvind Kejriwals, Sections 377, Tarun Tejpals and other such news hogs of the world from their usual position on the top of my mind. And replaced all those with one word. Fitness. And replaced all the thoughts with one thought only. I need to get fit. And replaced all my frivolous actions with one. Chase of personal excellence. Ok scratch that personal excellence bit.

In short, I have now joined a fancy Yoga training regime. And I have been doing it for a week. And I am loving it.

The regime includes alternate day visits to a yoga studio about 25 KMs from where I live, at 7 in the morning. At the studio, I have a personal instructor that spends anywhere between 20 minutes and one hour with me and works on my breathing, poses and peace. All of this, in attempt to make me healthy, peaceful, effective and better.

And if I could make an confession, even though its just been a week, it has been amongst the best experiences that I have had in a long long time. Its been so good that I am wondering why din't I do this sooner. Actually, for the sooner bit, I have no one but myself to blame. I thought yoga was yet another Indian thing that the new media and collective conscious of the modern, evolved, educated world has made popular (other things include naturopathy, homeopathy, social media, Arvind Kejriwal etc). But like they say, if something has to happen, it will happen. I was nudged pushed into this amazing world of yoga and I have been enjoying it immensely.

It did not come easy to be honest. My sis had to pester me forever to go join the classes. sgMS had to consistently ignore my existence and my attempts to woo her back. A cute stranger with beautiful hair and smile had to remind me that I am fat and ugly, when I made a pass at her. My folks had to get angry and inform me of my limited and fast-dwindling supply of money. Nidhi Kapoor had to remind me that I have made no progress, no breakthrough in the story, even though I am so close to the deadline. My body had to remind me that I am not young anymore. In short, everything that I care for, except that stranger with long hair, was gaping at me and questioning my choices in life.

I did not see a way out and initially joined these classes to shut all these people up. You know how it is when you think you know better than anyone else and you do something just to stop all the noises in your head?

In terms of doing it, I do it with all seriousness that you expect from a 31 year, balding, single, almost poor man. The one that starts with pumping a mini fortune, buying ALL the equipment that you may potentially need in the next ten years that you'd do it seriously. And the one that ends next day, at all that equipment getting stowed in crevices and shelves in your house that you never knew existed. You know, I have all the paraphernalia. An expensive yoga mat, a set of clothes made by a brand that only makes and sells yoga merchandise, expensive music bought from iTunes that helps me in meditating, an acupressure chappal that is more expensive that a Nike and a routine that has made me start questioning my erstwhile choices in life. 

But now that I am doing it, I dont see myself not doing it ever. Ever. I just need to figure out if yoga can help me fix my bald head!

Warm Regards,
Saurabh "Nouveau Riche" Garg

Oh, one more thing. You may want to give it a shot. Trust me its awesome! And watch out for more posts on yoga in the next few days.

What to expect from #tnks?

Originally posted on the Nidhi Kapoor blog.

Dear Reader of The Nidhi Kapoor Story,

In my opinion, a book is like any other product. Or a service. You pay a certain amount of money to buy / avail it and you put in a certain amount of time using / consuming it. And in return, you expect a certain amount of satisfaction. Money and time are tangible, I can measure them. Satisfaction is not. I cant measure it.

So before you commit either of the two, I thought I would make you aware of a few things about The Nidhi Kapoor Story (#tkns). This could also act as a sort of a disclaimer. Disclaimer in terms of what to expect from the story.

The story is very important to me
#tnks is one of the most important projects of my life. For a lot of reasons. For starters, this is the first time when I've taken a sabbatical and I know what I want to do with. This is the first time I am trying to write a full length fictional book. This is the first time I am going all-in with a project. This is the first time when I am actually trying to work towards a long held dream.

The promise
I made the promise that it would be worth your time to read the story. And I would do everything to fulfill the promise. I hope you would like what you read. If you do, please let me know. Nothing works better than feedback from people who've liked what you've written.

However if you do not like it, its even more important that you write to me and let me know that you did not like it. The best way to reach me is on email. For a faster response, please ping me on twitter.

As good as I am 

#tnks is as good as I am. Not more. Not less. I am putting my best foot forward with it. I am putting in 6 very important months of my life on this project. And this is a very visible project. I do no want to fail at it. Someone once said, "I am scared of failure". So am I. I will do whatever it takes to not fail with this story. I even made a tiny post-it note and stuck on my wall.

But all said and done, the story would be as good as I am. It will be bound by my imagination.

English as a language
I am not a native English speaker and I am not good with complex constructs of the language. Please expect a lot of mistakes in grammar, sentence formation, tenses, verbs etc. I am trying hard to improve on these things but I think I have hit my limit. I may not be able to come upto the standards of literary geniuses and The Grammar Nazis.

So, while reading it, if you find that I have massacred the language, please excuse me.

Original Story
The Nidhi Kapoor Story is an original piece of work. I hate the very concept of plagiarism.

Years back I used to maintain a fan-site for Lucky Ali and one fine morning I see pieces from the text I wrote appear on front page of Delhi Times without any attribution or credit. I couldn't take on the might of TOI and I couldn't do anything about it. For them, it was one of the million pieces of texts that they print on their paper. For me, it was my life. I put everything I had into that website. And I felt cheated. I felt dejected. I felt as if I have been robbed of everything I had. Its an extreme reaction and that blog meant that much to me. It taught me how it feels to be on the receiving end.

Thanks to that incident, I have never even thought of copying from someone else. And I am proud to say that the Nidhi Kapoor Story is my original work. The story, characters, plots, locations, everything else is inspired from real life people and real life incidents. However, if it does looks similar to something else, I assure you that it is purely coincidental. Please do let me know if you find similarities.

I guess that's about it for the time being. Hope these things help you make an informed decision about #tnks. In case you choose to read it, I would love to know what you thought about the story. And if you dont, I would love to know why you dint. Please do write in.

And, like always, thank you for reading this.

Regards,
Saurabh Garg

P.S.: This may not be important for anyone else, but for me, its very very important. Because I would be custodian for your investment. Its my moral responsibility to ensure that your time and money is spent well.