in vacant or in pensive mood

The Instagram algorithm is fascinating. I came across a profound intellectual and philosophical piece of content not from any self-proclaimed Indian guru but an American stand-up comedian. This is Pete Holmes' bit. He draws a fascinating philosophic parallel between characters in a book and the author. He simply says that most people look for God in this universe - something that he has created - and that is akin to the character looking for the author in the book he/she has written, in which the character lives.  I'd add that each character is themself a version of the author. Every version of the author exists in each of the characters he writes about. They just can't see it from inside the book.  Why I said that the algorithm is fascinating is because I just finished rewatching Loki Season 2 and this bit immediately drew me back to the Finale of Season 2. For those who haven't watched the show - let me first give you announce 'spoiler alert' here. Loki, the g...

I started my career in advertising with Bru Coffee. I was the junior account executive on this account in at Ogilvy, Mumbai. Needless to say, this was a huge opportunity, the magnitude of which I understoon only a few years later. For context, I am from a Puducherry - a charming small town in South India. So naturally,  a move from here to Mumbai is a BIIIIG jump. But that was still smaller compared to my professional leap. I was handling a Unilever account - a client few within the agency get the privilege of working on. The cherry on this surprise cake? I was working at Ogilvy - the mecca of modern advertising. A culture shaper in the Indian advertising scene. I had entered this behemoth without prior advertising experience, working on a client many aspired to handle, in a city many struggled to get to. And all of this was handed to me on a platter - all I had to say was YES. All of this would have been much harder if not for the account I was working on. Bru Coffee is a Sout...

The 2026 T20 World Cup has introduced something new - four official phases to a 20-over match: Launch. Consolidate. Accelerate. Finish. As a strategist, I found interesting yet funny, I have 3 observations to make.  Firstly - I get it. What started 20 years ago needs something new, fresh to keep audiences glued. It needs better 'marketing'. It needs a je-ne-sais-quoi that could attract viewership. It needs new news. And the 4 phases are just that. A rebrand of sorts.  It's complete marketification of the game. Introducing boardroom lingo into homes and regular conversations.  It's definitely different from regular 50-over matches. Power-plays can't be called just power-play anymore. Everything needs to be shorter, more intense, more adrenaline-fuelled. If you notice the words - they are practically synonyms. Apart from consolidate phase - which in my personal opinion is an aberration - all words practically talk about speed. Consolidate sounds more a marketingstrate...

I had this strange sensation a couple of days ago while I was meditating in the Ashram at Pondicherry. I was, in my head, imploding myself to lifelessness and trying to feel a sense of oneness with the Higher force.  I have been doing this many times, along with the opposite experiment of expanding myself into a universal largeness to feel small and again, connect with a higher force/being. Now, although I have been doing both of these, I had a strange feeling this time because as I was trying to come back to consciousness and into myself - I had lost all sense of my body in my head. I actually felt that I was nothing. I couldn't feel my physical presence, my body, my arms, legs, the fact that I was sitting Japanese style, the ground - nothing.  The feeling was wonderful and immensely moving almost a spiritual epiphany of sorts. Although there definitely is some solid scientific reasoning of this sudden senselessness - what I was feeling then was nothing short of a momentary s...

I saw an Instagram post about time being interpreted differently in different languages. It was fascinating to know that in Mandarin, time is vertical concept when used in grammar (last month translated in Mandarin would roughly be Upper Month).  That small detail opened up a bigger idea: Time isn't perceived the same way across all cultures and from a linguistic point of view, cultures represent time as they experience it.  So for some, it is cyclical (as based on phases of sun, moon, seasons - almost agrarian). But also as a concept of time repeating itself from a philosophic sense too. For others, it is horizontal (past, present and future are in a spectrum). And for some cultures - time is vertical. Interestingly - there's a language for whom time as a concept is absolutely different. They view the past as forward (known) and the future as behind (unknown). They see things as materializing or materialized.  That's not all - if language has this kind of impact - where ...

I have played enough basketball and volleyball and rate myself 7/10 in both. I used to have a great jump/vertical and could almost touch the ring and easily cross the men's high net in volleyball too. But what I lacked in both were good coaches. Coaches who could correct my approach and jump. Since basketball interested me more, I learned a lot watching NBA. The best compliment I got in my college days was being called KOBE. I definitely had that MAMBA spirit (but more because I had a similar look that he had in his rookie years). Anyway, I had picked up a good jump shot for basketball and even had a decent ball release too.  But things weren't the same in volleyball. Although I could spike hard, my fundamentals were wrong and I never knew it. That is, until now - when I have become the volleyball coach for college students of my alma mater. As a coach now, I was observing the approach to a spike in volleyball more closely and observed that it is very different than a pull up j...