Perspectives and perceptions

My friend recently shared a t-shirt design which she thought was very apt for me. Given my penchant for behaving almost as though I have an OCD about orderliness, the line reads, "I have CDO, It's like OCD but with the letters in the right order like they're supposed to be" Funny. And a bit true. I do obsess over stuff like straight lines, and clean desks, and bedsheets tucked in perfectly and eye pencils facing in the right direction and bottles in the shelf being arranged according to size, and books being arranged according to category and then height, clothes being arranged according to type and then maybe by color... and so on. Sometimes it's tiring to keep up. Most times it helps to be like this. I always have something to do! There's always something more to clean, something more to arrange and something to change. :) But apart from all the funny reasons, the real thing is this... Sorting out the mess in my physical surroundings, sorts out the m...

Take charge of your own things, no one else will do it for you. I suffered from lack of proactiveness on my part, and I'm going to literally have to pay for it. Rs. 1,000/- for not having submitted my CET form in time, a literal way to show that you got to take charge. Well, life, I'm now listening!

Since childhood, I've heard my mother say this to me very often, Don't ask me questions, Do it because I say so! It was my father who always told me, Keep asking questions till you're satisfied with the answer. Obviously referring to being satisfied as in being satisfied that your curiousity is justified. This being the base, I set off on my journey... Somewhere I lost track and then now have taken up that path again. Intelligence is not only about giving the right answers, it's about asking the right questions too. We tend to overlook this aspect almost completely, until realisation dawns upon us. Why don't people ask questions then? Does it mean that they're not curious about anything? Does it reflect their attitudes towards things? Does it indicate their insecurity? Does it show their inability to handle the responses? All this and more... I think to begin asking questions, the primary base is that, you don't accept what's in front of you without thin...

Stepping into a new place, be it an institution, a workplace, or just another group of people, we all are very receptive about the perceptions that we create in the minds of people. Most often, the perceptions that people have about us are based on what they feel when they’re around us. Through my school life, I never noticed anything awkward or different about people’s perception towards me. In college, things were different. I still remember the moments when I walked into a class, and introduced myself to everyone, and then slowly got around to knowing people and then becoming close friends with a group of them. After the initial months had passed, when we embarked on a casual conversation about what we all had thought of each other at first, I was surprised to hear, that everyone had perceived that I had lots of “attitude.” Back then, having “attitude” was misconstrued by me as being “bad”. I’m sure many still make that mistake. Let’s define what we mean by attitude ...