Husain Journal

Ever felt that you have an irritating traffic of tasks jostling in your mind to get checked off? Emails, assignments, medical, home errands and your to-do list can go on. A mere thought of these tasks is overwhelming. You try to do it all, but you feel that your hands are tied. You feel confused, clueless, and even frustrated. You think deeply about getting it all done, but soon your mind spins up clever excuses to keep you off it. And? The next moment you find yourself putting your feet up and having your favourite drink or watching television or scrolling on the social media. Because confess it to yourself – you know how to distract yourself. You know how to get yourself busy with something easy and dumb so that you can keep your mind far from grappling with the tough. But the revulsion of this escapism? Even though you’re busy in such mindless, low-quality activities, the burden of pending tasks continues to silently scream on you in the background. Has it ever ha...

For quite some time, and especially after my mother whispered goodbye to this fleeting world, I’m having difficulty waking up fresh and energetic. Yes, you might say that waking up with that cloggy feeling in mornings is pretty general, but if due to them your normal work is skidding off the rails? The alarm bells begin to ring, bang, pound. And if you snooze, you lose. You have to wake up. Well, first joining a gym and racking my bones to the point of cracking appeared clever. I reasoned that this way I’ll fall asleep as I threw myself on the bed. Good idea? But this required a heck lot of time and effort. Going to and from gym, managing office and personal work – all this appeared a little beyond the time and energy at my disposal. (Additionally, I hate sad and crappy music played in these places. Isn’t it true that all that we expose ourselves to – knowingly or unknowingly – has a bearing on our thinking?) Second I thought of purchasing some physical exercising ma...

Ever found yourself avoiding projects that entail risks of failure and mind-racking work? Yeah, I’m talking of work that you put up to be reviewed and judged. Not the work that you tinker around with to fill up your time with a ‘productive’ activity – which is for the sheer sake of practice. Not the work that you know you would shove away so that it gets lost in the dark gulf of obscurity. Here I rather am talking of work that stands the hair-raising risk of rejection, failure, condemnation. Work in which you squeeze out your heart and soul and blood. Not 100% sure if you thirst for risk and are prepared to be slapped with rejection even after putting out your best – but I confess here that yes, I try several crutch activities to avoid work that entail risk and toil. This is the reason why before publishing on my blog, I feel hesitant – because I fully know that my work would be up there to come under people’s scrutiny. I instead prefer to read something which melts away...

If presently you can’t drum up the courage to say no to others, then admit it – the scathing truth is that you don’t give your work a priority. You likely think that you can do your work any time afterwards, and this is the reason why the requests of others – which are timebound unlike yours appear more urgent to you. (That what’s delayed is delayed, sometimes forever.) So? Top import for you to pursue a few tasks and have a strict work regimen because then it would get easier for you to say no to others. So go ahead now and write down what’s to be done and tell yourself that you have to check off this particular task before such and such date, and you’ll likely get the required guts to say no to others’ requests. Gripping? Then put it to practice – now . If you’re following your work regimen and are unable to fulfil others’ low-important requests, don’t care about them. Those who have so thin regards for your aims and tasks shouldn’t be there to suck your energy ...

It was 1850s when folks found themselves hooked by the irresistible news that a massive quantity of gold is buried in the deserted state of California in America. A crazy stampede of folks scampered towards the promised land in the hope of getting back carrying a potful of glittering gold so that they can quench their acute desire of instantly getting rich. But there're a multitude of dark stories covered beneath this gold-dazzling screen. And the truth, harsh as a swishing cane, is this: Though a handful of folks did get super rich, the little-cared about truth is that there were countless who lost there everything in this crazy pursuit. Pre-embarking on their chase, these ambitious gold seekers turned off the nobs of their income streams – selling even their lands and belongings in the hope that they'll walk back with gold sacks on their backs. But tragically, some of these folks couldn't even return to the warm embrace of their eagerly waiting families....

Plunging right away in the matter without any introduction… 1. I must meditate I have for a long time heard about the deep fruitfulness of meditation. But it’s a shame that till this date I haven’t put this into my daily practice. In a school in the U.S., children with cognitive challenges are able to perform miraculously at their studies because their teacher makes them meditate for 10 minutes every morning. He places a toy on their bellies and tells them to see how it rises and falls as they breathe in and out. This practice of only 10 minutes a day helps them remain clear throughout the entire day, and due to this daily ritual they super perform at their studies. When I uncovered this mind-quickening story, I thought that if children with mental challenges can perform so well due to their 10-minute meditation of every morning, then it’s very likely that my performance at work too is going to touch astounding heights. 2. I must keep a calendar. I have read about ...

If I hadn’t made these 7 common and little-known mistakes in my younger years, this time my success would have been tenfold. 1. I settled with the easy or with the less important. And due to this, I couldn’t burnish my skills. It’s said that one grows when one does something a little over his head – when he stretches himself a little more. For example, when I was at college, I didn’t read actively (marking/underlining the important and making my own notes). I just rushed through the books if I got time from reading newspapers and emails, and obviously it wasn’t the best thing. If I had read actively, and cared less about newspapers and emails, my progress would have been tenfold. 2. I shed a considerable amount of attention on ridiculous stuff. For example, I fussed over what x person would have thought about me. I devoted a lot of time thinking about what folks think about me, though it would have been hugely fruitful for me to utilise the same attention on my core ...

So? You’re terribly busy running on the hectic treadmill of life. And you hardly get a chance of slowing down to feel the heart-moving beauty – these blessings that are all around you. But the amazing truth is that if we feel thankful for our daily blessings, that we take for granted, we’ll feel as if heavens have opened up their breasts to shower joy on us. We might get so energetic that we’ll turn back all the negative forces no matter however powerful they're to grab success. So, I’m going to list a few blessings which you have, but never feel grateful about. Shedding these blessings attention would kill your worries, scale up your strength, multiply your optimism, and eventually bring you near the success your heart hungers for. 1. There’re many people on ventilators, neither able to speak nor allowed to eat or drink anything. They helplessly see their relatives, but they know that nothing is going to be of any help. They’re waiting for their death, in a deep w...

Admit it. You terribly crave to get successful. And to keep yourself motivated and on track, sometimes you tell yourself that you deserve it. While this thought could be a powerful motivator – the only problem? Many times it fails to provoke you to leap up and do the hard labour which you require to grab it. And sometimes you also feel you possess the capability of getting that successful, of putting forth that level of labour, of doing all what it takes to get on the top. Yet… You ruefully catch yourself lagging behind, making a cover of those sheets of weak, even non-existent excuses. Is there anything more daring that could provoke us to cross our limits? That could defy our fears and drag us by our necks in open? More than all these things, the thought that can inspire and provoke us to work hard – as we should be working – can be another realisation. What if we shift the focus from ‘us’ to ‘them’? Yes, what if we feel that our success matters more to peopl...

You or I or anybody can get as successful as he dreams to by doing a simple thing. And, that simple thing is meditation, or being fully present in the moment . Many people think that meditation is the practice of sitting quietly in a secluded corner, paying attention to your breathing and mentally scanning all the parts of your body. It means that you shut off yourself from all external stimuli and internal triggers so to cancel out all the bustle of this ever-speeding world. While this is true, many folks also are of the view that you can’t meditate while you’re Fixed in traffic Engaged in any mentally demanding tasks Having food or coffee However, pause and reflect… Isn’t meditation another name for being fully present in the moment – of pouring the purest of your attention on whatever you’re doing at that specific moment? If you’re having a juice, pay attention to its taste, colour, texture. How it touches your lips, how it slides down your throat, what se...