L a l a w r i t e s

  Often, we are engrossed in a debate where emotions take over the rationality of the usage of words. You forget that silence at times is the best antidote to increased conflict. Today in the office my boss was questioning the drafting skills of a junior who committed an avoidable error on the draft. The English language, apart from Hindi, is the main medium of correspondence in central ministries. You need to be well versed in either of these to be able to conduct the official work. All juniors are supposed to put up drafts in the language of the correspondence. But the junior was adamant in defending himself on why it was not his fault that the mistake happened. Boss further questioned each of his reasoning. He kept on giving witless responses. Finally, he ended up embarrassing himself. What I learned from another story heard from P.B. today was that it is better to own up to your mistake than to defend it. He is true to his word as he practices it in real life too. I have ...

  I had a call from William, a schoolmate, and dear friend, now settled in the U.S. Will has a cute and chubby daughter named Mehreen, aged around 2 years. She was recently in India with her mother. They stayed here for 3 months and this was Mehreen’s first visit to India. They had a busy schedule as they met relatives and friends and had to travel to different places. The mode of travel was a car. In the U.S. there are strict laws for traveling with a child. The Car needs to have a child seat properly secured if you are to travel with a child. India is a little behind on this front and it is not yet a strict rule to provision for a secure child seat in the car. Mehreen would have traveled in a car in the U.S. as a toddler and been seated in the child’s seat fastened on the rear seat of the car. In India, she had no such compulsion and could sit, stand and move inside the car. Of course, that is not safe but many cars in India do not have a feature to affix the child seat. So, ...

  We are too occupied with our present lives and fail to plan for our future, 5 years, 10 years, or even more, down the line. The hectic lives that we live make us forget if there is a life ahead that needs attention today. The future from a viewpoint of wealth, relations, health, and happiness. To live in the present and do something on a daily basis for your future life is an art. Now the point is how do we want our future life to be? And how do we get ourselves ready for our future life? The question to ask first is what type of life do you want in the future? Do you want a stressful or stress-free life? Do you want to be able to move freely or be ridden with health issues? Do you want to have a stable financial position or do you want to live a life with debt? Of course, no one would want to choose a life that hinders joy in their life. Everyone would want certainty, stability, and freedom to live a happy life. But how can we secure all these goals? You can secure your fu...

  Have you ever wondered how Romeo and Juliet could fall so much in love? Same for Heer and Ranjha, Sassi and Punnu, and other folklore of love. These stories of unbridled love ending in tragedies instead of the divine union have common undercurrents. Their romances were not acceptable to society, particularly their families. Now think of a situation where these guys didn’t have any resistance or interference from their parents or society. Do you think their love would have kindled to the limits of madness? They would have probably got married and then daily life issues that every married couple faces would have been theirs too. It would not even have been a story worth mentioning. Recent experiments show that increased parental interferences and pressures lead to couples acknowledging the greater number of negative traits in their partner apart from becoming more critical but with a caveat, they actually fell more in love. When they are forced to ignore each other, it makes th...

  Scarcity: Have it before it is gone I am currently reading “Influence” by Robert Cialdini. Today the key idea learned was how the scarcity principle influences decision-making. Have you ever noticed how the hotel booking websites display messages of the Last room left, the Last few rooms, and 1 room booked just now? Also, infomercials flash messages of "Limited Time Deals" with a timer running to push customers to buy immediately lest the product of their dreams disappears from the shelves. In the U.S., on the launch of a new model of iPhone, queues of buyers form a night before the stores launch the phone. The die-hard fans of the iPhone fall prey to the scarcity principle cleverly deployed by Apple by offering just a handful of units. People want to lay their hands on the new phone as if their lives depend on it. They are ready to do unimaginable things just to trade a closer spot in the queue. The artificial scarcity works wonder for the brand as its sales skyrocke...

  Obsessions of Fair Skin and my tryst with It Have you seen channels like Naaptol or Home Shop 18? These are the channels selling products with an aggressive pitch centered on cheap and quality products. Over the years these channels have evolved in putting up better content and selling better products but there is still a sea of useless products being pushed down the throats of gullible customers. I remember seeing these long infomercials for the first time on TV around 20 years back. It was the time when I was in school and seeing these ads I believed whatever they presented on TV. I vividly remember the most popular infomercial/commercial of a product named “Roop Amrit” - Roop ka Amrit, literally translated as a Nector for Beauty. What it claimed to do was to make you at least 4 tones fairer. It was hypnotizing to see the ad as everything about the ad was crafted artfully. The voiceover was a deep-pitched speech that hooked you to the screen accentuated by the visuals tha...