When I started blogging the idea was that I shall join the great fraternity of avid writers who have huge following are read and published far and wide. The real experience is quite humbling though.
Its time now to come to the basics. I started blogging because I am not as good with writing and as witty and as fast as I would like myself to be. There is a story here to tell. But before that the problem set: I still feel that the thoughts that pass the mind are not as exactly and vividly converted into written words as I would like them to be. There is some hidden bottleneck that not only reduces the speed but the clarity also.
As the brief problem set is defined so here is the story. While I was a student , my professor of economics gave a trick to improve the ability to transfer thoughts on paper as clearly as they appear in mind. For that he proposed a "Chilla" (a fourty day intense and repititive activity and meditation by definition). The Chilla was to write two pages daily for fourty days, irrespective of the topic and accuracy both. He suggested that there would be no requiement of getting corrections also. Most of my class fellows never believed and so never tried it either. But those who did , spoke highly of the Chilla.
Thus started my blogging where I would become "world famous" though in my own world. As you know everybody lives in his own world so if I am famouss in my world which might consist of my friends , my neighbour's dog and my ever erretic driver or may be the secretive neighbours and their many veiled daughters. Sorry but describing my whole world might not be the wise option or my foolish intention in any case. The point I wanted to make was I have become world famous through my blogs.

Participation a word used very heavily these days and specially so in the realm of development work. I just saw this in a new light today when I was attending a workshop on some development subject in Islamabad. There was a consultant from a donor agency who was lecturing as to what could be the best way forward in a certain sector. I just tried to put myself in his shoes to see how i can manage with little or only superficial knowledge about a country or its people. And still advise them with a lot of confidence and get a lot of money.

The use of participation came as a great rescue as it allows to make all kinds of blunders of not understanding the context and yet sail through the process of looking smart and wise and able to advise. you keep on gleaning all the information regarding the situatioon, culture or the reality on ground (which is not a bad thing in any case) and cover up your follies in the garb of learning process. But the idea is turned upside down when it comes to participation for others. In that case it boils down to a meaningless exercise of getting the inputs and then paying no heed to them. The devcisions can be made without regard to any input. Worst of all in this participatory process the down trodden or the exploited ones do not get any knowledge or they never get to share the real understanding of the masters. This makes the whole process a mokery and a one sided thing only.

Participation a word  used very heavily these days and specially so in the realm of development work. I just saw this in a new light today when I was attending a workshop on some development subject in Islamabad. There was a consultant from a donor agency who was lecturing as to what could be the best way forward in a certain sector. I just tried to put myself in his shoes to see how i can manage with little or only superficial knowledge about a country or its people. And still advise them with a lot of confidence and get a lot of money.   The use of participation came as a great rescue as it allows to make all kinds of blunders of not understanding the context and yet sail through the process of looking smart and wise and able to advise. you keep on gleaning all the information regarding the situatioon, culture or the reality on ground (which is not a bad thing in any case) and cover up your follies in the garb of learning process. But the idea is turned upside down when it comes to participation for others. In that case it boils down to a meaningless exercise of getting the inputs and then paying no heed to them. The devcisions can be made without regard to any input. Worst of all in this participatory process the down trodden or the exploited ones do not get any knowledge or they never get to share the real understanding of the masters. This makes the whole process a mokery and a one sided thing only. KASHIF MATEEN ANSARI

It was on the joys of reading now, there will be a few words on the reflections on the past. I feel most nostalgic about my stay at the Lawrence college. Primarily that I spent my childhood there but also that it gave me the opportunity to learn and reflect. I used to sit on the side of a stream of fresh water that still sparkles like flowing pearls in my memory. There I used to study my books and spend time looking at the nature. That was also the time when I used to think a lot and those thoughts were about anything and everything. Though some of them were emanating from what i was reading and many from what i was experiencing as life unfolded in front of a boy away from his home.

A few pictures from Lawrence College are attached with this post.

A few words from Rumi

O wandering sufi

If you want to find The greatest treasure

Don't look outside,

look inside, and seek That.

RUMI

Each moment contains a hundred messages from God:

To every cry of "Oh God"

He answers a hundred time " I am here."

RUMI

the joys of living a life with some leisure time are tremendous. I was not used to a life that gave any time for idle time neither any time for thinking or reflecting. Now that I have a different life style I enjoy the time I have in reading books, discussing topics with my friends and reflecting. what I discuss with my friends range from the topics like politics to strategy and in particular a strategic approach to thinking about the future of my country.

We also discuss piano and sometimes music of other kind like opera. Although I will discuss these topics later but i will try and post the links of some beautiful pieces of music by Mozart and Beethoven. Previously I was as far from Piano and Opera as anybody could be but one of my friends introduced me to it and now I feel that I am totally given to this form of music.

Back to the joys of idle time and reflection. In the past few months I have read more books than I read in a few years immediately preceding. The joy of knowing more and understanding a few things from a different perspective is immense. It is not only a lot of pleasure related to discovery but it is rewarding in the sense that you can apply a lot of what you learn.

The topics that have interested me in these few months are Sufism and I have read and still reading Rumi. It is a treat to read his Masnevi. On this I will write later in some other post.

Other topics are new ways of thinking and taking perspective as you will find if you have read Malcom Gladwell or Nicholas Naseem Talib. On this also later in some other post.

I am reading the wonderful book by Malcom Gladwell, Tipping point.

I think it is wonderful and I am amazed at the narrative. Though before this one I have read the "outliers " and that was a wonderful piece of work. Its astonishing how he has come up with the idea of incidental convergence combined with a talent that is good enough and the requirement of putting in enough number of hours , that all is required for exceptional performance or success.