Puddle of musings

[sthithaprajn-ish]

"I know in my mind, I will touch the sky. So I take a leap of faith and hope to fly." -Brodha V

[sthithaprajn-ish]

You are the average of 5 people you hang out with.

[sthithaprajn-ish]

Multiligual post trial

ಉದಯವಾಗಲಿ ನಮ್ಮ ಚೆಲುವ ಕನ್ನಡ ನಾಡು

वन्दे मातरम

[sthithaprajn-ish]

If modernity has a motto, it is 'shit happens'

Yuval Noah Harari in his book Homo Deus

[sthithaprajn-ish]

Smoke-free generation

While the champions of climate change on the west are busy legalizing cannabis in their provinces, New Zealand is aiming to create a smoke-free future by phasing out the sale of tobacco and putting an end to the everyday cigarettes. Good going, Kiwis!

[sthithaprajn-ish]

Being average

I’m a student in grad school and the metrics for success used in the post are based on the academic definitions of success- scoring good marks in exams, having a good opinion from the teachers, achieving good ranks in common tests, having a good research performance, etc.

The past- I have been an average (maybe above average :)) person all my life. In my school days, I was probably better than 80% of my peers. I scored well in exams, got decent ranks in common tests, and was considered to be a good student by my teachers throughout my 12 years of schooling. I had a decent GPA in my undergrad and probably ranked in the top 10% in the class. However, I was never extraordinary at anything in my life. If you were to ask my teachers, they would probably say ‘He was a good student’ (yes, they remember me as I was a good student :)). All-in-all, I was average-good.

The present- I’m currently a grad student at a decent university and have a decent academic performance. Nothing stellar, but average. My research performance too isn’t something to be wow-ed at. If you were to ask my supervisor, he would probably say ‘He is a good student’. Not great, but good. There have been grad students who were better than me, there are grad students who are better than me- they put in more hours, they are more motivated, and consequently, better than me. Again, I am an average student.

The future- The reason why I’m writing this post is to add some clarity to my self-evaluation, so I could better prepared for tomorrow. I have high ambitions, which I believe would take a long time to achieve. But this is what I feel to be good at- being good for a long time. In my opinion, this power along with the high aspirations would take one higher day by day. I might still be average tomorrow, but I would be better than today. Twenty years from today, I would be much better than today. I might not be the best, but that’s okay, I can still continue to be good while still keeping high ambitions.

I know this is written from an academic perspective, but I believe this would hold true for every other field out there. Be good, be patient, be ambitious as this is success.

[sthithaprajn-ish]

If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.

African proverb 

[sthithaprajn-ish]

The Happy birthday dilemma

I have somewhere around 700 friends on Facebook and on an average I receive 2-3 birthday notifications everyday. The first couple of months of using Facebook when my friend-list was significantly smaller, I could convey my wishes to everyone on their birthday without fail. But now with 2-3 birthdays everyday, it feels more like an obligation than a genuine wish. So I decided to convey my wishes to only those friends who are close to my heart, in which case my wishes actually mean something. This is where I’m having trouble. I’m having a hard time filtering my friends. The filtering which seemed rather binary is actually a fuzzy one. The difficulty in filtering and the fact that some of my friends are not on Facebook, which for the sake of equality (in birthday wishes) requires extra effort from my side in remembering their birthdays, have made my life complicated than what is already is. So I have decided not to wish anyone on their birthday, and for the reciprocity, I have removed my birthday from Facebook, so that my friends do not have the obligation to wish me on my stupid birthday. I have been following this rule for almost a year now and I have one less thing to think about. However, yesterday, I broke this rule for the first time to wish a friend who I hadn’t spoken in a while. I needed a reason to start a conversation and so I wished them on their birthday. This helped not only reinforce a little of what was once a strong friendship but also made me feel sociable. It had been a while since I felt such a feeling (credits to the Covid-19 virus). I feel I need to take back this rule, which I now feel to be sort of anti-social. So, I’m planning to settle on a middle ground where I hope to wish a subset of Facebook friends who I would like to befriend again. I know I had difficulties filtering friends earlier, but the whole work-from-home situation, which has been since over an year now, has made me desperate. I want to be amidst people again, I’ll settle for virtual group now.