WABI-SABI : The Japanese Philosophy for a perfectly Imperfect life

 

My son Akshaj used to scribble a lot on the walls with his color pencils which is not a surprise to any of us as they are children and its obvious they do all this stuff ,after all he is just 5 year old now.


However, interesting thing which I have learned from him is, one day I lost my patience and screamed at him ,'Akshaj , this is the last warning to you, just stop spoiling the walls.' His response blew my mind, 'Mamma, I am not scribbling, I am making family picture on this wall, see its you ,me and papa'. When I keenly observed its true I was able to see the drawing of three of us.

All my anger gone for a toss that very second looking at what he drew with his tiny hands that's when I realized the wall is looking more beautiful now with his doodles and squiggles like a puzzle to find a family picture instead of plain pale yellow color wall without any design on it.

I cuddled him, no words just love to my baby boy (this incident happened when he was just 3 year old).

Finding beauty in imperfection is an art and I have learned it.

Later I came to know about this beautiful concept name as 'Wabi Sabi' which means 'Embracing Imperfection and celebrating happy incidents'. This Japanese philosophy encourages us to focus on the blessings hiding in our daily lives, and celebrating the way things are rather than how they should be.

Have a great day with this new learning!

 

"Managing Virtual Teams"

 During this pandemic, all around the world almost all the IT companies and  non - IT companies announced work from home for some months or probably for an year.

But the question is, do we Project Managers have essential skills to manage virtual teams effectively?

I was going through few articles on this topic, interestingly , I found a well explained quote by Julie Wilson.

'Managing a virtual team requires managers to double down on the fundamentals of good management,  including establishing clear goals, running great meetings, communicating clearly, and leveraging team members' individual and collective strengths," says Julie Wilson, founder of the Institute for Future Learning and instructor at Harvard University.

Top three challenges Leaders and Project Managers(PM's) go through were  very well explained in a nut shell in one of the Harvard university education blog.

1. Communication
2. Trust
3. Productivity


Based on my own experience and interaction with friends ,I listed few challenges a  PM face while managing virtual teams but are not limited to are

1.  Giving assurance to the employees that they will be treated equally, irrespective of whether working at office or from home .

2. Communication skills are the key in managing virtual teams successfully.

3.  Ensuring the virtual employee's work is in  line with the teams work for the common goal- successful completion of a project.

3. Assigning and Monitoring employees work but not the time logs of employees online status as  working from home is different than working at office especially during this pandemic time as there are many challenges  to face  at home and the situation is same for all of us in the family -children's online classes, spouse work from home ,almost everyone has the same start timings in the morning.

4. Collaborative working and strategic team building can help instill trust in remote and onsite workers.

"Managing a virtual team can be challenging, but addressing those challenges head-on is worth the effort, " said Julie Wilson.

My son Akshaj and his number blocks!

Akshaj  makes 1 block from 6 alphabet frames with acute concentration, like these he makes as many as possible .Then he plays with them counting, adding, subtracting and what not ,he even fight with those number blocks.

When I asked him ,'Akshaj don't you get bored of these ?'

He simply says, ' I love numbers and I always want to play with them Mamma'.

This simple act of my son made me realize to love  the task in hand  which helps in getting rid of  mind wandering.

While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about!

Unsung Heroes and their inspirational stories!

Recently, I came to know about Uncle Moosa and his story thru one of my friend which inspired me and sure will motivate you guys to pursue your area of interests.

Uncle Moosa, a Keralite whose original name is  Sathyanarayan Mundayoor quit his government job in the Income Tax department in Mumbai in 1979 to pursue his dream of teaching children and joined in Vivekananda Kendria Vidyalaya school in Arunachal Pradesh , influenced many young children with his new ideas and inculcating in children the book reading habit in his unique styles and methods. He established 13 Bamboosa libraries in remote areas like Wakro, Chingkham ,Lathaw,Anjaw and his libraries has10,000 books which are volunteered by children who are regular to libraries.

Uncle Moosa was bestowed with Padma Shree Award, the fourth highest civilian honor this year for his contributions towards education in the northeast remote areas of Arunachal Pradesh.

Akshara Santa /Saint of Letters:

Harekala Hajjaba is an orange vendor from Harekala village in Mangaluru, Karnataka, popularly known as ‘Akshara Santa’ or ‘Saint of Letters’. He saved up money from selling oranges and started a primary school to educate the children in his village in Mangaluru

He got this motivation to begin a school came from his own inability to talk to a foreigner who asked the price of oranges in English. 

Hajjaba started a primary school in his village in 2000 with just 28 students. He then took out loans and used up his savings to buy land for that school. A few years after that he also started a high school for students aged 10 to 14 in the same village.

Our Government of India awarded Padma Shri to Hajjaba for providing affordable education in 2020.

Beena Rao

Another unsung hero, Inspired by her father, Beena Rao is  changing the lives of thousands of slum children in Surat Gujarat with her simple initiative of introducing Prayas, a free coaching institute for slum children with the help of her husband.

She started with teaching 2-3 children herself. Now, she has a team of 34 volunteers who teach around thousands of students at eight different coaching centers across Surat, the capital of Gujarat.

Her TED talk on ‘How I changed slum children’s abusive slang to scientific jargon’ is an eye opening to all of us.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jGk_r8vtTg

Source of the stories: https://www.thebetterindia.com

There are many unsung heroes in India and abroad where they are dedicating their entire lives for the noble cause of contributing their knowledge/wisdom to the society.

 I understood from the lives of these extra ordinary people  that Dedication, Discipline and Patience are the three important tools on which one should work on to achieve any dream in life.

“The highest education is that which does not merely give us information but makes our life in harmony with all existence” –Rabindranath Tagore

Beauty of Oman !

As the country Oman is in complete lock down except for essential services due to COVID-19, staying at home all the time is quite a bit boring and frustrating but it's necessary to be at home to save ourselves as well as others from this Pandemic.

And so, to have a productive day I thought to collect the pictures of scenic views of Oman as a fun activity with my friends in what’s app group and make it as a photo collage. As soon as I posted this idea in my group, my friends accepted and showered with beautiful pictures covering plethora of places in Oman.

While I was working on the Collage, I remember my friends Shraddha and Abhishek who planned to visit Muscat this March’2020 but due to Corona virus and early lock-down in Mumbai, they couldn’t able to make it and eventually had to cancel their tickets. Then, an idea flashed in my mind, let me post the pics in my blog which gives a glimpse of Oman as a surprise for them as well as displaying me and my friends photographic skills. Ha ha…

Here is the brief look of beautiful Oman!

 

 Hope you guys love it!

Lot of thanks dear friends Ramya, Nayana, Subhasri, Lavanya, Anushya, Geetanjali,Sudha and Sowmya  for capturing the beauty of  Oman in these awesome photographs!

MINIMALISM

I started clearing out the clutter in my home to utilize my time in this (Corona virus Pandemic)   lock down period and I realized that there was lot of unwanted things stuffed inside the wardrobes like unwanted clothes, drawers etc like my son's toys which he no more plays with them as our children's choices keep changes as they grew. 

While I was clearing up the mess, I remembered the concept of 'Minimalism' explained by the famous bestselling author Joshua Becker (https://www.becomingminimalist.com) which I recently gone through and would like to share with you the philosophy of minimalist.

What is Minimalism?

“Simplicity, clarity, singleness: These are the attributes that give our lives power and vividness and joy as they are also the marks of great art.” —Richard Holloway

What is a minimalist lifestyle?

It means living with things you really need. It means removing anything that distracts us from living with intentionality and freedom.

I started realizing the importance of being minimalism is by my personal experience i.e by clearing out the clutter in home and by keeping and maintaining only essential things meeting our needs and reducing my screen time. Yet there are many other aspects of minimalism which I yet to explore and work on .However in short, living a simple life helps us think freely, clearly and open to the beauty.

UBUNTU

Hi Friends,

I have learned a new word 'UBUNTU' while doing web surfing and would like to share with you what I have explored early this morning.

When I get deeper and deeper in this to understand the meaning  of UBUNTU, I was thrilled to know  the beautiful concept of Humanity and came to know that many world leaders like Barrack Obama  and others acknowledged and follows the Ubuntu philosophy.

This is the word in South Africa. Ubuntu means ,'I am because because we are'. Nelson Mandela ,the President of  South Africa (1994 to 1999) introduced the Philosophy of South African 'UBUNTU' to the world.

" In Africa, there is a concept known as 'Ubuntu' -the profound sense that we are human only through the humanity of others; that if we are to accomplish anything in this world it will in equal measure be due to the work and achievement of others"  - Nelson Mandela.

I found a beautiful story in the web (source unknown) which instills positivity and togetherness in all of us which we need to teach our children to make them better human beings.

An Anthropologist proposed a game to children of an African Tribe.He put a basket of fruit near a tree and told the kids that the first one to reach the fruit would win them all. When he told them to run they all took each others hands and ran together, then sat together enjoying the fruits.When asked why they ran like that , as one could have taken all the fruits for oneself, they said " UBUNTU, how can one of us be happy if all the others are sad?". A simple concept with a powerful insight !

                                             "I AM BECAUSE WE ARE"