Estimate your hunger. If you can’t, read on…

I went to a restaurant with my friend one day. As soon as we saw the menu card, we felt like hogging all of the dishes there! Without giving it a second thought, we ordered 4 dishes we felt like drooling over. The moment the first dish went in, I was no more “extremely hungry”. The second one almost filled my tummy. I loved the third one, so finished my share in the same momentum. Then! I looked at the fourth one and felt, “What was I thinking when I ordered this? But never mind, my friend is here to finish it”. But oh, my friend was equally full! We kept pushing the dish towards each other forcing the other one to complete!  Somehow we managed to complete half of it and that’s it! It felt like my stomach is gonna burst if I take in one more spoon. The rest of it went a waste.

Happens with you? This was me, about 2 years ago. Until one day, when I heard that a staggering ‘one billion people’ in this world sleep hungry every single night! There must have been days you’ve not had food and tried sleeping. Could you sleep? Not easy, right? Imagine the plight of those unfortunate kids who might have never tasted a candy! They never know how “Oh, I’m full” feels like.

When you order an extra dish at a restaurant that you can’t finish, it’s not the 100 odd bucks that you are wasting, it’s the resource! It’s the resource someone somewhere in the world is dying for. You can afford to waste 100 bucks, but not the food that’s keeping you alive. Most of us empty our plates at home, almost all the time. Why doesn’t this happen at restaurants? We fail to estimate our hunger may be, or we are too lazy to wait for the dishes to be prepared & served, so we order all at once. Or sometimes, it just doesn’t occur to us that we are ordering more food than we need.

Let’s try and keep this in mind next time we go to a restaurant - “Take all you want, eat all you take!” To mark a beginning to this, support this brilliant initiative – “Empty Plate Campaign” by 36meals, happening this weekend - March 23^rd and 24^th. You don’t have to move out of your house, it doesn’t take hours. All it takes is a photo of your empty plate after your meal and uploading that on 36meals Facebook Page or Twitter. Here’s the FB Event Page to join.

Of course that’s not the last day we follow it, but that’s the beginning for many people. Those of you who never waste a morsel of your meal, take lead and inspire the people around you. “All empty plates look good. It’s the plate with food left over that looks ugly”. So go ahead and post your photos!

Thank you.

This is where I belong

Change is something every living being resists, but when it’s a desired change, there’s nothing more you could ask for. We all need a break from our daily routine once in a while, a change in our way of life once in a while, a change in the environment once in a while, new clothes to wear once a while, fresh air once in a while, new friends once in a while….very importantly “once in a while”.

Away from my home and office, I travelled a few miles assuming that it would be another formality I’d be completing. As the day went by, I realized everything was so peaceful around me. Bright light inside the building & lot of space comforted me like never before. Clear thoughts on mind and positive vibes all around. I was already feeling sad that I would have to leave soon. For a moment I thought, I should extend my stay and relax for a few more days. The very thought brought deep joy & a broad smile on my face.

But wait, this is not where I belong. The night’s silence sure gives peace for a few days but it wouldn’t be long before I’d start finding the place lonely. The garden outside looks great, but very soon I’d find the rats & insects troubling. The fresh air is bliss, but somehow dust is what I’m used to! I belong to the city life; buildings are what I’d like to see, more than trees. I love talking to machines & gadgets more than real people. A walk on the road alone is peaceful but I need to see the vehicles too. This is how I am. This is how I prefer living. This is where I belong. Change is welcome for sure but I cannot be taken away from where I belong.

It's 'Now' or 'Now'

A couple of months ago, just when everything seemed to be going great, I gave a visit to my grandpa's place. My grandpa, who was all healthy for his age, was on bed when I saw him; he had stopped responding all of a sudden. He was trying really hard to breathe. We put all our efforts to make him respond for half an hour. His condition only got worse. For the first time in my life, I saw someone close to me being taken in an ambulance not knowing that he wouldn't return back alive.

Few months ago, I heard from a friend that her mom is in critical condition in the hospital. She had cancer, which was diagnosed only in the last stage. No medication would work. She passed away within a week.

A couple of weeks ago, my aunt slipped and fell down; she ended up having multiple fractures. It will take her months to start walking normally again, for something that happened in a split second!

Could she have done anything about it? Could my grandpa do anything about his life? Could my friend save her mother's life in any way? Can any of us avoid something like this happening to our near ones or us?? The answer is an obvious 'no'. That made me think for a moment - We get all stressed and all worked up trying to control our lives 3 - 4 yrs from now! Is the very next moment in our control? 

Someone who's in 12th is worried about getting a job 4 yrs later. Someone who has a 5yr old kid is worried how she'll fare in her 10th grade. Someone who's getting married is worried if she'll be happy in her new house (No, that's not me) Someone having a daughter is worried every moment if she's coming back home safe. Someone at job is worried about promotion two yrs later and this and that and the list goes on. Planning, anticipating and working towards it are justified; just "worrying", getting tensed and stressed out aren't!

While you are spending those few moments in worries, you're losing your precious present which was "future" few moments ago. I don't even know if this article is gonna reach my blog, so is there a point in me worrying how people are gonna take it? Instead, I can give my complete focus to what I'm writing and how I'm writing this very moment and be sure that I've given my best, enjoying the whole process of penning down my thoughts!

All I wanna say is, the next time your mind tends to worry, ask yourself if that's gonna help your present or future in any possible way, unless your favorite pastime is to worry and get worked up! Since the answer is 'no', give a smile and say "I'm gonna live this moment and not the next moment which I'm not even sure if it's gonna be mine!"

Relax and have a happy weekend :)

The Beginning

I recall some of the times during my 4 years of college life when a lot of people told me – “This is the phase of life you can enjoy the most! Once you get into corporate life, you’ll not have the time to meet your friends and have fun. Each of your friends will take his/her own career path” and so on. These statements never sounded true to me in those years, and touch wood, not even to this date!

The challenge is to meet up old friends regularly and find a common topic to talk about. So we end up talking about movies, T20, politics or recall old college memories. But how often do you get to meet? Initially, once in a month, then once in 2 months, then once in 6 months and then probably years later! “What else could one possibly do?” you may ask.

While I decided to be a part of this wonderful start-up IU with the best of my friends and work together for a lifetime, not everyone gets a chance. How about working for a cause with your friends part-time? Recall the projects you did with your friends during college. Or if you are still an under-graduate student, wouldn’t you want these friends of yours to stay connected for a lifetime? There is a door open to this possibility! That is Social Entrepreneurship!

You could be a student, you could be an employee, you could be a home maker, you could be a businessman or you could be a retired individual but Social Entrepreneurship still has a place in your Life along with everything else you already do. It can bring back the enthusiasm in your life combined with the satisfaction of serving the society.

Make a new beginning in your life with ATTH – the first ever of its kind – Social Entrepreneurship Forum Live in Bangalore on November 4^th. Innovation, Inspiration, Live examples, Right Contacts, Right Platform, Right Time and more and more is Atth! Yes, I’m a part of it and enjoying every bit. Grab this opportunity, as you never know when the next one could be!

Log on to www.atth.org for complete details.

Seeds of Retrospection

Flashback! Rewind and fast forward every two weeks of your life fortnightly, take the juice from there and you’re sure to have the best fruit punch in no time to share with the world. So what’s the juice I have taken from my last 2 weeks?

Feed the side of your brain that’s starving!

A year ago I would go around telling everyone “I’m not creative! Give me an idea and I can work as hard as it takes to implement. But I cannot generate ideas!” I laugh at this statement of mine today (Proof that I could create something out of the world: www.iuquotes.com design). They say creative people use the right side of their brain. I tried to tap that hemisphere of mine for a long time, but all my attempts went futile. What can I tap out of the side of my brain which I’m not feeding at all? What you SOW is what you reap.

S – See

O – Observe

W – Watch

You might say they’re all the same. I’ll elaborate here.

See every element around you like you’ve never seen it before. See more of it, and see it more often than you think is necessary.

Observe what makes it so beautiful, so eye-catching or so enticing. If it doesn’t appeal to your eye, observe why it didn’t. Think what could have been better.

Watch out for what you can create from there. Nothing gets created out of nowhere. There’s an inspiration every creative person draws from a lot of things around him.

So go ahead and start sowing. In some time you’ll have enough and more ideas than you can ever implement.

Feedback on this small write up of mine is most welcome!

Shruti Balasa

Chief Web Designer, IU Web Solutions.

(eMail me @iu.shrutibalasa@gmail.com to get your website LIVE!)

Organize your Workspace to Organize your Work.

Have a PC or a laptop? You download a document or transfer a photo to your system, and where do you first place it? “Ah for now, let me put it on my desktop, I’ll move it later!” And it remains on the desktop till the number of icons on the desktop makes you go crazy! Then you make a folder ‘Desktop files’ or if you are like me ‘Others’. And then comes a crucial time when you need ‘that very file’ and “Oh God! Where did it go? I have 5 – 6 folders by name Desktop Files!” I’m sure you can empathize with the above situation. So what do you do?

1. Get organized from Day 1. (Don’t get disheartened if you’ve already been disorganized. It’s still not too late. :) )
2. Trust me, doesn’t take too much time to keep your system neat and organized (I agree my room is not clean enough, but my laptop definitely is)

Let me first introduce you to the culprits who make you lose files – or rather keep them so safe that you yourself can’t find! Meet them here

• Downloads – You quickly download something and put it on your desktop, or you open it directly from downloads folder and it remains there forever.
  How to avoid this? If you’re using Firefox browser, the default setting is to save the downloaded files to ‘downloads’ folder. Change it to “Always ask me where to save files (Firefox menu -> ‘Options’ -> ‘Options’ -> ‘General’ tab is where you’ll find this setting)
  For Chrome – Chrome Menu -> ‘Options’ -> ‘Under the hood’ -> ‘Downloads’ -> ‘Ask where to save each file before downloading’ and so on for other browsers. Now when it asks you each time you download, kindly do not choose desktop, create a folder if need be and dump it there. A stich in time saves nine remember?
  Not to forget to rename the file to something that makes sense to you while saving it. If you’re downloading too many softwares, you’d usually install them right away and forget what they were named or where you saved them. Maintain a ‘Softwares’ folder and remember to download every single software into this folder and rename them. Trust me, your friend or colleague might ask you for the same software and they’d be impressed at your speed of finding them :)
• Files transferred from a pen drive or external hard disk – General tendency yet again is to put it on the desktop. Be cautious. Choose a relevant folder or create one. You’ll love yourself for it another day!
• Word documents, Spreadsheets, Presentations or any newly created file – Here, apart from choosing the right folder, it’s equally important to name the file correctly instead of naming it ‘New’, ‘Sample’ or leave it ‘Untitled’.
• Photos and videos – B drive, C drive, D drive, E and F also may be, will contain at least one photo, or worse even, contain a folder ‘Photos’ each. Best way to solve this is to keep each drive for a different purpose. One entirely for college/office or anything related to college/office (Yes, even if they are your photos with college-mates) Another folder – completely personal – which has nothing to do with college or office.

This should do, for a start. One tip to conclude – The best way to compel yourself to keep your desktop clean is to put a desktop wallpaper (Stretch) so beautiful that you wouldn’t like to dirty it with icons and icons all over. I suggest a photo of someone you admire…. Could be yourself as well! So here’s me, wishing you luck! Do let me know in your comments if this helped. If you can catch hold of few more culprits, do pour in your thoughts. :)

Inspiration Unlimited

It's been long friends I wanted to share with you all, about our Venture and platform Inspiration Unlimited. Just covering this write up about the same.

Inspiration Unlimited is a vision, founded as an answer to the present scenario in the world. The need for training is higher than ever in every manner. Values have to be restored. This time the felicitous process is hammering. The values need to be hammered into masses & potentials incarcerated inside need to be brought out. The masses stand in need of training in some or the other form, right from school level to the level of CEOs.

As is rightly said, Any & every form of success has its root in training and then success stems from execution. IU believes in passing the right training in every arena of life, from personal development, to mental abilities, to staff training, to self motivation, to leadership, to sales training, to art of relationships, to training for teachers, to better parenting & lots more.

IU is backed up by the founder's profound experience of dealing with people from different occupation, places, age groups & different intellect levels. People eulogize his training & the kind of change it brings about in the participants. He has a spark in his speech that can bring a dead man alive. He has a practical approach & is not a speaker or trainer who has emerged from mere reading of a few books, as you find many such individuals in the market today.

Our vision is to empower masses to follow their heart & experience life of full potential. We envision to help everyone live, not just exist. We also believe in seeing a better world with human race in greater levels of harmony by converting peer pressure into peer pleasure.

We have forayed into hand-made greetings under the banner of Aaslesha. All details are available on the following web links.

To avoid confusions and so that you are able to reach us right here are some links on web:

www.iuindia.com
www.facebook.com/iuindia
www.twitter.com/iuworldwide
www.youtube.com/iuindiaonline

Our magazine links:
www.twitter.com/iuemagofficial

Our Social Initiatives (each one would be covered in other blogs):
www.facebook.com/iuy2c
www.facebook.com/iunewspaperbag

To join us as a speaker or marketing executives from your city, district, state or country. Mail us at iuworldwide@gmail.com and we shall take things further!

Thank you. Hope it helps all those who wanted to know more about about IU.