Is it the rest? Is it the exercise? Is it the nice heavy breakfast? Is it peace of mind? Is it getting rid of the below-par, irritating co-workers? Is it refusing to watch the news shows? Is it the conscious attempt to stop getting into a self-righteous mode? Is it the watering of plants every morning?

These last few days I have been relatively more productive – definitely more than what I was in the last year. Why?

The best wedding gift we got was ‘Out of My Comfort Zone’ – Steve Waugh’s autobiography from Ramanand. There are couple of things that have remained with me –

  • After his first child was born, Steve Waugh was more determined to do well on tours because he thought only then, the sacrifice of not being with the family was worthwhile.
  • He spent some time trying to figure out what he did when he played well and tried to build the same conditions every day so that his chances of success improved – this could be listening to the same song or keeping the same red rag with him (Ian C would probably include the green rag as well).

I try to think of the first one whenever I’m away from home but I’m never on any mission so doesn’t become important but the second one – try as I may, I’m not able to figure it out. It is not as if I hate hard work – I know I can, if I buy into some bigger goal (usually for the good of others rather than for me). I feel my biggest problem is to find motivation and one that will stick! A few days ago, Niranjan talked about The Flow and I feel I need something which is challenging enough to even get me started.

One big challenge when I am in the mood is to figure out what to do? I usually get very impatient, knowing that there are quite a few projects/tasks which are waiting for my Afridi-esque (now it can even be called Sehwag-esque) form and try to do multiple things simultaneously and very soon, the form dies on me. (Cue: Start reading The Art of Choosing by Sheena Iyengar)

I have decided not to wait for those flashes of inspiration – if I keep rotating the strike, I will get the bad ball and then make it count.

What I have noticed is that when I’m in the mood, I do a few things right – like writing in paragraphs instead of the ghastly bullet points. I don’t know if writing is a cause or an effect – even if it is an effect, I don’t want to let the flow get wasted. And yes, I will try to write more often, without it feeling like a chore. If you are reading this, brace yourself. Hopefully, I don’t start running an RGV-style factory.

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Testing embedding of Perisqope quizzes

I'm writing this while on vacation...taking time off while waiting for the cab to come in and take me to the Dharmashala cricket stadium. So the love for the game has not been lost yet but....(apologies for the rambling tone and some lack of structure to the whole post)

I have always maintained T-20 is a great format. In fact, Max Cricket (Crowe's invention) is better.
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In the next 3 days, we will start hearing about the laments of how a billion people can produce fewer than 10 Olympic medals. The outrage will last for a week; some companies/ people will (hopefully) donate some money to the Olympic Gold Quest and assume their responsibility is over. The media will move on (has it already moved on?) and we will revisit this in 2016; of course there will be the odd clamour when we will qualify in some sport, get walloped in others.
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While I couldn’t read the book, I did the next best thing – I checked out Sheena Iyengar’s TED talk on the art of choosing. I was surprised at how she drew such perceptive inferences from the experiments she had conducted. It would have been dull, drab data for her. How did she choose to ignore the dullness of the data and opt to, instead, get fascinated by the beauty of it? I was impressed.

The TED Talks present the same challenge that she talks about – information choice overload.
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Is it the rest? Is it the exercise? Is it the nice heavy breakfast? Is it peace of mind? Is it getting rid of the below-par, irritating co-workers? Is it refusing to watch the news shows? Is it the conscious attempt to stop getting into a self-righteous mode? Is it the watering of plants every morning?

These last few days I have been relatively more productive – definitely more than what I was in the last year.
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11:52 AM : I fall for the temptation. Let's check the score on cricinfo.com. But while the page is loading (cue for cricinfo - stop those interstitial ads, they are irritating), I have a bet myself - what will the score be? I say 30 for 2; the inner me says 30 for 3. I win - it is 39 for 2.

I have read a few articles by noted columnists, former cricketers, some backed with data, some with hunches, some sponsored by big corporate clients.
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I'm sure everyone who reads this blog knows about Ramanand and knows what a great guy he is. Still, I thought the increase in my fandom levels should be made public - JR has been hosting a daily question blog called Infinite Zounds.
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The next time someone tries to pitch Amway or Oriflame or any other Multi level marketing scheme to you, this is what your response should be :

This is great. I'll sign up with you. But you will have to do me a favour in return.

You must have heard that Watson, the computer built by IBM has defeated a team of Humans at Jeopardy. The age of Skynet (like how envisioned in Hollywood films like Terminator and Matrix) is not too far away.
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