some 5-6yrs back, I had started this quest to find the roots of "Indian Business History" .. could never complete it, since life took another direction, and I realised that
"business" may or may not be about "management" (still researching why all "management" schools started calling themselves "business" schools:)
as an HR professional, there is 93% Human Resource outside the corporate/business boundaries (which contributes to 60% of GDP... whichever way it is calculated), and so there are more professional "HR" skills required to make them more productive..
...and so, my plan to convert this 2-session presentation into an elective, went for a toss. I still do it for our induction program, though ... but also know that I will never go beyond this... so thought that it may be a good idea to let it loose... :0)
Those were the days - many, many years back (somewhere in late '70s) - when one was madly in love with life as it was unfolding, with someone in one's life (and who later departed to occupy some other universe)... and with life in general
...when I had scribbled these verses
...even though perhaps the "जीवन भर के नाते हैं सब...." doesnt hold in some ways/ anymore now (having said farewell) - and life moved on in its course...
बोलो प्रेयसि! किस पथ जाएँ सारे ही पथ भाते हैं अब...
लहरों पर हंसती प्रतिछवियां सागर में खोती सरिताएं आज सभी से शब्द चुरा कर अधरों पर अमृत बिखराए गीत चिरंतन गाते हैं हम....
कविता बन जाती स्मृतियाँ चाहे कितनी भी सूखी हों बीती ऋतु की मधुर कहानी पुस्तक-पृष्ठों पर मुरझाये सूखे फूल सुनाते हैं अब....
जीवन की भटकी पगडण्डी उल्हझ गयी तेरे केशों में हम चंचल, मोहित दो राही पलकों पर कुछ स्वप्न सजाये जीवन-दिशा बनाते हैं अब....
तुमने जो माँगा है, प्रेयसि! वो तो है अधिकार तुम्हारा बाहों में आ कर रो लें या, थक कर आँचल में सो जाएँ, जीवन भर के नाते हैं सब....
Those were the pangs of growing up back then... and trying to (not) commit my "terms of engagemnts" with the world around me, as I was growing up then....
...these verses were jotted down on Jan 27th, '74 (I was around 19yrs old then) by a person (the other "me"), who I hope to meet one day - once again...
...insha-allah
जब-जब राह मिली तब-तब, अपने पर बंधन सा पाया जब-जब भटका मैं तब-तब कुछ खालीपन सा घिर आया!..
प्रेम मिला, स्वीकार सका ना, दायित्वों से भाग उठा, प्रेम-रिक्त जीवन से लेकिन पल ही भर में उकताया!...
किसको खोजूं? क्यूँकर खोजूं? जीवन के आधार कहाँ हैं? प्रश्न बुने, कुछ पल फिर मन को - बहलाया... या, भटकाया?...
सत्य बना हर पल की सीमा, हर पग मंजिल का परिचायक सांस बनी जीवन का दर्शन, पर क्या खोया? पर क्या पाया?...
In a few moments,it will be another Teacher's Day...
(while teaching/preparing-for a course on "Cross Cultural Management" I realised that Japanese' term for "I/Me" actually means "between the people"... we carry thousands voices and lives as we live, grow and learn... The Web of Life, in Capra's terms)
...and so, this post is for all those (so many) from whom I learned and continue to learn:
...some who sit/sat through my classes...
...some whose classes I sat through (cursed them then, but value what I learned from them - now! - not necessarily what they taught!)..
...some who pass(ed) on the road below my balcony - and also those little ones of the XL community, who play in the basket-ball court beyond the road..
...some who I encountered in a brief ephemeral moment of this Brownian Motion, called Life - and inadvertantly, they left a thought, an image, an idea... to germinate, grow - take shape...
... some I grew up with, and they helped me to find my bearings in this topsy-turvy world - and also
...some friends and co-travellers, who took the other fork on the road, and went to inhabit another prophesy...
...some who support(ed) my life - the lady who cleans the road and the staircase, the 'bahadurs' in the campus, Rahila "Chachi", Nanki who would buy and cook for us then in late '70s ...
hmmm..well... the list can go on infinitely... but to add one more
...some whom I "met"/came to know about in this virtual world of blogs, Ryze, Orkut, Facebook, YouTube, etc...
One of those virtual encounters, back in 2007, was with Randy Pausch - never met this Carnegie Mellon Prof... who gave his "Last Lecture" knowing fully well that he will not last more than a few months (he expired on July 25, 2008)
...and yet in some ways, I "met" him (and learned much from him)... yes, this vibed with me since I had known another teacher/ friend/ co-traveller in my life, who too in her own way articulated The Point of it All before she took the other fork on the road...
So this post is to celebrate life of another of my teachers [...er - this is the original 76min video - not the Oprah Winfrey show kind, which too is availblle somewhere on YouTube - definitely not meant for the ADD junta :0)]
But if you can spare 76 / 34,164,000min of your on average life (65yrs), this is worth watching - and will be a tribute to a person
er...the fact that now I make my living by blabbering around with a GoG ("Gift of the Gab", for the novices) has nothing to do with these verses - मेरे मौन गीत - written almost 40years back (39 to be exact:)...
..but then that was another time, another era (though hopefully, not another person)
साँसों की सरगम पर ह्रदय की ताल पर मर्म के शब्दों को संजोया, पिरोया मैंने... बस यही हैं, मेरे मौन गीत!
जीवन के समतल पर समय की हलचल पर शून्य की शान्ति में तैरते-उतरते से भटकते रहे, मेरे मौन गीत!
प्रेम के आँचल पर जीवन के अस्थिर मेघ पर तेरे स्वर का सहारा खोजते-खोजते स्वयं खो गए, मेरे मौन गीत!...
