I am deprived (Intellectually)!

Three days back I sent a text to two of my friends, "I am intellectually starving".  One of them told me that I should blog. I haven’t done for a month. (And the other one is still in slumber mode!)  I feel a nagging feeling of emptiness in my mind. 

Seven years ago, after few months of my arrival in Kuching, I felt the same. It’s a feeling of suffocation. Suffocation of the mind. Nothing much was of any help; no books, no friends (then), until I met Vasu. A person of high intellect and we belong to the same community: teaching. I breathed. 

Then onwards, once in a while I used to feel the emptiness and suffocation. In a way emptiness and suffocation are extremes. But I felt them at the same time.  I took a long time in getting along with my colleagues and most of them are busy in their own way. Of course, I do talk to one or two of them once in a while. Coincidentally, I became the advisor for my debate club. Though it is a students' club, the club has seen many intellectual students. Perhaps they also wanted a place like that! Birds of the same feather flocked together.  Some of my colleagues are surprised with the way our club is. 

However, exams, holidays and other personal commitments occupy them every once in a while. Now the club is on a break. And STAR Movies, HBO and Cinemax also seem to be working against me. I don’t find any mind blowing movie in the cinemas recently. Well, I was disappointed by Inception. (Another blog on that later)

I was also busy or rather distracted by few other things.  Much of my time was occupied in resolving few important issues at hand leaving no space or energy in the mind to fill up with intellectual thoughts. Hardly any discourse took place!

The only other source where I find my refuge is books: the best reliable companions. Trust me, they never forsake you unless you get a book which is not of your taste. But still, I couldn’t find some books that I have been looking for few months. Borders and MPH disappointed me. When I went to KL last week, due to time constraint, I couldn’t go to Curve (it’s not what you think ;), it’s a book store in KL or to Kinokonia.

Two evenings back, I called my Professor in India and was speaking to him for a while. He is trying to deconstruct Mani Mekalai. He is a professor in Post Modernism, Structuralism and Deconstructivism  and many more.  In learning, he is one of my important sources of inspiration. Talking to him helped me to some extent.

The last mind blowing book that I read was “The unnamed”. Now I am onto another novel, "The Museum of Innocence".  It’s by Nobel Prize Winner Orhan Pamuk. Though it is skill fully written and interestingly enough it is not so much intellectually engaging.  I will be done with the book in few days. 

And what next?

Wait and See...

The most undesired place to wait and see is an ICU. You will understand if you had ever been there waiting at the doorsteps of ICU, for Doctors and nurses to smile at you. Sometimes you feel utterly helpless. And it is not just you, doctors too. You will be stuck not knowing your next move of your life.  Helpless in every sense of its word. I experienced it few times, at a stretch for two to three weeks. It was, indeed, an ordeal by itself.

We wait to see many things to happen in life. Contrary to the feeling it creates, anxiety it brings, uncertainty it holds, it is pretty much has become very common to hear wait and see nowadays. It is a game in political and historical contexts. UN waited too long to interfere Sri Lanka and it interfered after the assassination of Prabhakaran. Last year during a debate competition at University Sabah Malaysia, a team in the Grand Finals debated that the Govt will wait and see for the situation and will not do anything for time being. It was about Kyoto Protocol. And God knows the definition of 'time being'.  A sword hanging over your head. Anything can happen at any time.  Indefinite uncertainty. 

In our personal lives, wait and see approach is psychological. It is more of letting the circumstances to control the issues. It is okay to let it happen once in a while.  (These days, almost everything is OK!) To me, it reflects the indecisiveness of an individual. Indecisiveness in terms of 1) unable to explore and arrive at better options and 2) fear of the failure (not getting the desired results). When you wait to see anything more than the affordable time, the gravity of the matter gets worse or loses its importance. And there is nothing much to wait to see. 


Same goes in business settings. I read somewhere,"you can not work with someone who is slower than you or faster than you" In any case, you won't keep up the pace. It is not a sin to work with some one who is ahead of you. At least, you can consider the person as a motivating factor, if you want.  


Most of the times, managers would love to wait and see at crucial decision making stages. To me, it is a sin. Fear of taking responsibility of their actions. Being accountable to what we do, takes courage. And, courage is one of the desired qualities of a leader.  Play the game and take the risk.  At least you are taking some effort. And you are not loosing anything, if at all any, it is only your job and not your life! 

Having said that, it is also unavoidable at certain circumstances that we may have no choice but to only wait and see. And it is not watchful waiting or nor the kind of 'I am going to watch the world die' as a lyric goes.

In waiting you develop a virtue: Patience.  But being patient for too long is inability. I prefer immediate actions if not instant ones. 


However,  Life seems to be too long to wait, like waiting for Godot.