Bullets kill. US Army recently accepted it. And it is time you do too.

I am talking about the bullets which are shot through your screens and not guns. Bullets you use to present your point. To power your point.

For thousands of years, knowledge was transferred through stories, pictures and dance. When you get to interpret the information by yourself and then understand it, your mind obviously understands it better. Experience builds memories. Thus, performances, books, abstract images, indirect messages, mysteries, etc register in your minds better. Imagine reading a murder novel as a bulleted list. No fun guaranteed!

They  say, bullet points make information less complex. Sure. They are great for shopping lists. Not for real life. Things rarely follow a linear path in the real world. Bullet lists disregard the inter-connectivity of things. They are just a bunch of words between two dots.

You would always remember things that have a certain reference point, things that made you think, things that moved you, things that you could relate to. Mona Lisa cannot be explained in points. Simple phenomena like sleep or laughter cannot be explained in bullet points.

So, try telling stories. It gels well with the thousands of years of human practices. Don’t let points kill the point.

I love hairsalons. I think they are great employers. They treat all their employees equally. If you try asking for the best hair stylists, they will usually tell you that all of them are good.

But they are not as good with their customers. The customer usually gets assigned the one that’s free or the trainee, depending on your luck.

Most hair salons owe a lot to Henry Ford. Their service is just like an assembly line. You feel like you are on a conveyor belt and everyone gets to work on you a little, to get you out of the way as soon as possible. From getting you seated, shampooing your hair, tucking in the cape, judging your hair, spraying water (my favourite part), combing, cutting, blow-drying to showing the reflection of your brand new haircut, every single thing is handled by a specialised professional. And do not ignore the mandatory complement by the girl at the reception. She is a pro at it.

So how do you select such a team when you walk inside a salon for the first time. Are they the same for everyone or do they have such specialised team according to your hair type and requirement. I think it would be a great idea to do so. May be see a portfolio of their work too!

We all live in an imperfect world. But that’s not the whole truth.

We all live because it is an imperfect world. Imperfections give us something to do. And every being on this planet is here for a purpose. If the purpose goes missing, so do we.

Everyday, every single penny that we shell is in exchange for the perfection we buy. We buy food because without it we cannot survive. We buy music because without it the world is too silent, too boring or too noisy. Every new business that comes in the market, makes you realise of yet another imperfection you probably ignored or never realised. Most marketing and advertising campaigns are based around making you aware of those imperfections.

Nirvana is that stage where imperfections are the perfections. But that’s not easy for my grumbling tummy to attain.

But this was better than CGI. You really really, I mean, reaaaaaaaaallly need to bend backwards to take stock of the height of Burj Khalifa. And you try hard to concentrate on the point at which it ends. It’s a tough task, because it pierces the clouds and sky.

The structure doesn’t seem arrogant and yet isn’t very friendly. I think it would take us sometime to understand it, as we are not yet used to seeing such a shape in such a massive size. The semantics of the building suggest it is still rising and growing. Almost, jutting out of the ground, like a spring.

I hope this city keeps rising and growing too… wisely.

How to Predict What You’ll Like? Ask a Stranger – TIME.

Evita is not exactly a role model for today’s corporate woman. Atleast not to the public. Intentionally or unintentionally everywhere we see the use of the feminine sex-appeal at workplace. By women themselves, or their influence. Lady luck, some might call it, others just plainly refer to it as the feminine charm.

I landed up in an argument with a friend over this very thing. Work with people for their ability to perform in the task and not to use their gender and sexuality, I said. But now that I ponder over it, I see the boundaries of ethics slightly blurred. It is as if they seem to stretch and vanish, as and when required.

We wear a smart suit to an important meeting. Chop hair to look professional. Wear an expensive watch to impress. Spray designer perfume to seem rich. Display abundance through a mobile phone. Put a large man at the gate as the bouncer. All of them and more appeal to our senses at a certain level. They create a hope, an image, a promise that may not be true. It’s just we have learnt to equalise these things with an act or an emotion. It is the years of conditioning that we have undergone. And we have learnt to use these inputs to our benefit to get the output we desire.

If we are all allowed to make fake promises, then why sneer at the method and not the outcome?

Terrorists are given a free pass… allowed to surrender.
Criminals get to reform in jails. Early release if they behave well.
But we let the ‘filth’ of our society lie in one corner while we pretend it doesn’t exist. There is not exit strategy in place for them. There is no strategy to save them. To improve their lives.
There is not amnesty granted to them.
The society forgives the family of a terrorist but not of the prostitute.

What would the society rather have… prostitution or terrorism?

Thoughts after watching Dev D… A must watch!!!!!

Google Earth Goes Deep With Ocean Simulations – NYTimes.com.

Overused, abused and overhyped. The word we constantly use to identify ourselves, to describe ourselves… The word I. In the languages I am aware of, like English it is spoken quickly and is of single syllable. Whereas words referring to the second or third person is usually longer and takes more time to deliver.

Besides the overuse, there could be another reason behind this relationship. May be we are supposed to give less time to ourselves while talking about ourselves and give more stress and mental space when talking about others.

If it is so, in the languages where this relation is swapped i.e. first person reference is longer than the second or third person reference, does it reflect something different about the culture. Do people give more or less importance to themselves there? Are egoes bigger?

If one starts to speak those languages, would it alter his behaviour?

Can language, the result of culture, history and heritage, in turn affect the future cultures?

So we talk. We discuss. We debate. We show. We gesture. We cry. We hug. We email. We chat.

Each and all of them usually are polished and veiled cries to be understood and appreciated. Almost all the time, our communication is about getting people to understand what we mean and feel.

How many times a day do you initiate or even carry-on a conversation in which you communicate that you want to understand. Not to prove your empathy and power of understanding. But just doing it. The understanding itself being a reason in itself.

As some movie said.
All we are… are suckers for social acceptance.