Friday 30 August 2019

Until then...

Let days of togetherness

And all the beautiful moments
Once you shared

Serve as fond memories

From what you had.

And the pain and heartache

They gifted you

Be the learning lessons

From the journey

In your search ahead.

Let no amount of setbacks

Crush your dream of love

Love will come finding you,

The one you truly deserve,

If and only if

“YOU”

Believe in Love.

Until then

Just hang in there


"May ALL have"

Today I had a meeting with one of my recently acquired client. As we were discussing and working on our agenda she received an important phone call which she had to attend to.

Since the call was taking long, I started looking at the kind of books she read, and it was then that I saw a frame in one of the corner racks just behind the Ganesh Idol. On a deeper observation I realized that their were some words, she had got framed and kept there.

It was at some distance so I could not read clearly (or may be my eye sight is getting weak), so as soon as she finished her call, I asked her if I can see that frame closely. She turned her office chair around reached out to the frame and handed it to me.

I read the whole thing and found some greatly profound words. I could not stop myself from asking a copy of it. She gladly obliged. I asked her if they were her own words, to which she said NO, she got her copy from her boss for whom she used to work in the early days of her career. So I could not find who wrote these words :(

If any of you have any idea , kindly share with me in the comments section or on my social media account.

Sharing with you all the "GOLDEN" words, copy of which I acquired from my client and she from her boss.

It is only because someone cared to share it at some point of time  with somebody and the circle grew. Since my client cared to share with me this today, I am just continuing the tradition.

I take this great opportunity to share if further with you all. If you resonate the same feeling, then my humble request to you is this >>> please play your part and let the circle of sharing grow and  go on and on, forever and ever.

The copy I received was a black and white print, so I tried my bit to enhance it further by adding colors which came to my imagination with every sentence I read.

I love sharing, do you too ?

Happy Life !!!

Monday 26 August 2019

I always wanted to do this.... Did you too?

One of my favorite activity is to watch an eagle flying.

I am so blessed that I am staying in a house with a great view and a balcony to sit and or stand in :)

From here I everyday I adore the view of eagles flying high up in the sky and the mere vision makes me so blissful.

You might think what is so blissful about it?

Actually there is, but I am not sharing it now. That I have kept for my "My story" series which I am already writing and have already published 4 posts on the same on my blog-site. 

I always wanted to capture the sight of an eagle flying on my smartphone and its been more than four years now that I have been wanting that and guess what ? Today I got one. :)

As I stepped out in my balcony I saw one of the eagle flying at a very close range, taking circles. Luckily my smartphone was close by and I immediately grabbed it. I unlocked the phone, touched the camera icon and switched on to video mode. And VOILA !!!

This is what I managed to shoot. Please click the link below to the see the action of this magnificent bird and its swift and carefree flying.


I hope you enjoyed this post and the video.

Happy Day :)

Saturday 24 August 2019

I did not know this until now... Did you?

Source- Google Images
Learning something new is always such a fun :)

Today I learned  something new and found it very amusing .

[ I can add one more title to myself and it would be that of a "FOOL" :))) ]

Yes I love being foolish, why ?

[ I will share my reasons for that in my upcoming blog post series on famous Quotes.]

Yes very soon I will be starting this series on my blog-site, wherein I will write about my experiences and how the quotes seemed so appropriate.

For now, I wish to share what I discovered today.

I read other bloggers blogs and often write back to them if I find their email's on their site, if not then I drop comments on their blog posts. It's a great way of connecting with them and exchanging notes and learning's. I have met some amazing people this way and it is such a nice experience.

I read this beautiful post on parenting  and wanted to share it. So I clicked the 'twitter' button to share it on my twitter handle and 'facebook' button for sharing it on my facebook page.

I also saw "'re-blog" button so clicked that too :)

Until then I did not knew how re-blogging works, but soon I discovered the answer when I saw the 'like' notification on my "wordpress" account. As I opened it I found out that the like was for the re-blog I did, and that the post appeared on my blogging site.

Thus I learned that rather than sharing it individually of various social media sites, I can simply click re-blog button and the post will be automatically be posted not only on my blog-site but on all the social media sites as well to which I have connected my blog.

You all might have known this, but I just found it out today, so yes you may think of me as a fool, and may smile :)

Did you discover anything randomly, just the way I did ?

If yes please share your stories, I would love to read them.

Happy day :)

Tuesday 20 August 2019

Nature's Jewels- The Orchid flower

As you all know I have a love for photography too. Although not with a professional camera but every now and then when I see something pleasing which makes me happy and smile I capture them on my smart phone camera.

I love nature and have shared some snaps from nature in my earlier posts. If you have missed them below is the list and links for my earlier posts on nature photography:

Sun Soaked Leaf

Amazingly Beautiful Skyline

Rain 'N" Clouds

On A Rainy Day Along The Creek

Invisible Butterfly

Today I am sharing with you the pic of an orchid flower from the gardens of one of my family friends with whom I stayed for two days during my road trip. They live at Pallakad in Kerala, India.

Orchids
Orchid Flower
Isn't it a lovely and beautiful sight? Something that brings smile on your face :)

The Green stem is the slender body and the arms adorns the white flower signifying purity, and the buds represent a new life in progression. The subtle pink shade giving the impression that having known that I was admiring its beauty the flower seemed blushing, aware of the fact that there before her is someone who admires beauty. 

Yes or no?

If not let this pic and post be your reason to smile and acknowledge yourself for being the beautiful person you all are.

Beauty is all around us be it in stars, or in skies, flowers or birds, oceans and waterfall, people and their souls. Just put on the lens and look for the miracles unraveling itself everywhere.

Happy Day :)

Sunday 18 August 2019

Don't loose yourself, while pleasing others

Relationships are meant to help us grow and enjoy the company of the person with whom we are. The one where the involved person's are in a happy space and look forward to spend good time together. Isn't it?

And here I am not referring to any one particular sort of a relationship, I am talking about all kinds of them, that as a couple, or  friends, with siblings, and parents, your clients, colleagues etc...

Well it does not always happen that way, right?

Generally I am a happy go lucky person and believe in having meaningful and long term relationships and associations, yet their were instances where I had to turn harsh to the extent of being rude and let go of the person I once liked and was fond of.

Why I am writing about this ?

Well because often I see people doing more harm to themselves, trying to be nice and pleasing when they are suffering and in immense pain inside.

And why so ? So that they are looked upon as being a good person who care.

It makes no sense to be in such a relationship which is only doing more harm to you then good.

Source- Google Images
 I remember cutting myself loose of some people whom I had known for some time and even several years, one to the extent of almost 35 years of my life.

The person in question was someone I had known all my life and although she never did or intended to do any harm to me, but her pessimism and negativity was taking toll on my emotional well being.

I always patiently listened to her problems whenever she discussed it with me, and gave her solutions as to how she can do certain things in order to overcome them. I constantly tried to motivate and inspire her by citing examples of other people in similar or worst situations, but then came a time when all she wanted to see and talk about was negativity.

Finally one day I told her on her face, your negative approach towards life is not going to help you, but you comparing our situations ( I was also going through some tough times myself then) and blaming destiny and all is affecting me and I do not want to be party to this any more. If you can not stop doing that I will have no option but to tell this that "Please do not call me ever again"

It was that day and till this day,  I never heard from her nor did I called or asked about her to the people known to us.

Source- Google Images
Yes, it is not good to break any relation but if it becomes a threat to our sanity and leads you to depression and becomes an emotional burden then its always better to drop the baggage and walk off.

I never thought ill of the people with whom I cut off and I will never ever do that, its just that now I will never go back to them and its better this way.

If you have something similar to share please write to me I would love to read your stories.


Friday 16 August 2019

Of Skies and My Eyes

Source- Google Images













As I was looking out on to the skies

I saw these two clouds running by

One chasing the other as if to hold thy

What I saw next was a vision, that got me all smile

They fused in unison as if longing of desire

Both becoming one as they moved by

And they flew together clearing the sky

The skies were all shining its radiance so bright

And the Moon came out shimmering in full glory

As if to testify the great union of clouds

That just happened in the sky

The great spectacle to which witness were my eyes

Wednesday 14 August 2019

Invisble Butterfly

Those of you who read my blogs regularly already know about my trip to Uttarakhand.

I had shared my experience of White water river rafting in my earlier blog post. If you have missed it, read  it by clicking here >>> "River Rafting @Rishikesh"

While on this trip when we went to Mussorie, we friends decided to take a walk from Library bazar in Mussourie to Park House, Sir George Everest's House. Although the place is in ruins now, but the walk there and the scenic view from their was worth the efforts.

What made this walk much worthy was this pic as can be seen below:

IMG_20190516_1504592
Transparent Butterfly


It was my friends nephew who noticed it first and then brought to our attention. As you can see the wings of the butterfly is almost transparent, which can be  mistaken for invisibility. 

The butterflies are very swift and fly away at the slightest movement. I wanted to capture her presence and so with absolute still movements and lightness of feather I managed to take out my smart phone from my jeans back pocket and manged to click some pics of this divine beauty. Isn't she Pretty and Cute ?

One of the pleasure of walking is , you never know when you will come across such amazing natures treasures

Have you seen something like this before? Why not share with us all ?

Thank you for dropping by

Happy Day :)

Wednesday 7 August 2019

Awareness Drive: "MY LEFT IS MY RIGHT"

Today I had to go to CSMT (Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus) for some work of one of my NRI client. Usually I try to avoid coming to this side of town, especially by car, for following reasons :
  1. Car parking is a big issue
  2. Ongoing Metro project work
  3. Travel time by car from my place takes lot of time
  4. And in this season (monsoon) driving pleasure goes for a toss because of the potholes on roads all over :(
So today I decided to take the local train instead.

While going I found everything usual (as those accustomed to Mumbai life knows), but while returning after completing my work to CSMT station I noticed something.

Between Mumbai mains and Mumbai Mail/ Express platforms corridor there was a gathering of crowd. I normally do not pay much heed, but then I heard some voice coming from a loudspeaker.
The voice quality was not very good, as from those high quality speakers which we are used to listen to now, so I paid some attention.

As I approached the commotion, I saw five uniformed men (with placards around their neck) and two Police personnel on either side of them  standing in a row. The one in the center was speaking through the mic.

IMG_20190807_1642447
Spreading Awareness over Public Address system at busy CSMT Station- Mumbai
I was surprised by what I heard. These group of men were asking people to walk the right (proper) way.

"KEEP LEFT" is the signage we all have seen at Railway station FOB (Foot Over Bridge), isn't it?

So what made them do this I wondered. One answer which came to me was that not every body is literate so they might not be able to read the signage.

But then what about those who can read? Are they following the instructions on signage?

Probably not, may be that is why these gentleman have to come out and say it loud right in the middle of the crowded station where most of  the people passing through this place can hear and at-least then walk on the proper side of the walk-way.

IMG_20190807_2016314_2
The giveaway they were distributing
I felt very bad for what they were doing. Not because they were spreading awareness, but because of the bitter fact that we as citizens have become so careless and irresponsible that even the basic social etiquette such as this is something which needs to be reminded to us.

Mission Swatch Bharat was something our honorable Prime Minister Narendra Modiji had started and fruits of which can be seen now. Though there is still way to go but at least people have become aware and are contributing in keeping their surroundings clean.

This  seems to be the new mission for Central Railways (Mumbai Division) who with support of Railway Police Force (RPF) has been assigned this task of spreading the 'walking awareness'

Are other Railways (North, West, South, East etc) also have been commissioned for this kind of awareness drive?

We often blame government for not doing this and not doing that, but then are we as citizens acting responsibly?

If yes, then what was the  need for 'Swatch Bharat Mission' , "Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao", "Ghar Ghar Toilet", "Save Water, Save Trees", and several such other missions and initiatives ?

Any thoughts???

Sunday 4 August 2019

Happy Friendship Day

FriendshipNeverDies
Source - Google Images

We are all busy with so much in life that seldom do we find time to unwind or connect with our friends.

My close friends are from my college and school days. Few I made in the course of time while working. Most of them are married and are working 6 days a week. And since we all stay at different locations within the same city, so coming together makes it all the more difficult.

But then these are also the kind of friends who have seen me and been with me for most part of my life, so even if we rarely talk or might meet only occasionally it does not make much of a difference.
What remains important is that when we connect, we start from where we left and the time lapse just vanishes.

Today on this special day, I  called most of them to wish them "Happy Friendship Day" either over phone or text message and email :)

Did you wish 'Happy Friendship Day"?

Saturday 3 August 2019

Book Review: "Missing, Presumed Dead" by Kiran Manral

BookReview_1
Book Review by Nilesh Sharma

As much as I love reading books, there are some books which leave an impression and even when the read is over the mind still stays glued to it, and the characters within the story.

Kiran Manral's book "Missing, Presumed Dead" is one such book, which left me thinking for a long time. It's a Mystery thriller, categorized as "Fiction" series and is published by "Amaryllis" (An imprint of Manjul Publishing House Pvt. Ltd)

To begin with, the 'Cover page' of the book itself is quite interesting. A female face revealing only the lips and nose overshadowed by the valley and trees. It gives the hint that the story is about a female who probably lives in fear and isolation.

The book is written in two parts :
"Book 1" reveals the story of "Aisha" the mentally disturbed mother and a wife who has suicidal tendencies.
"Book 2" gives way to  her husband "Prithvi" who is an academician working on a private project for a US based organization who has opted to stay in small Himalayan town away from city hustle bustle.

Aisha and Prithvi were in love who gets married and have two kids, elder daughter "Maya" and a younger son "Aryan"

The trouble starts in their marriage more after the birth of Aryan and this makes the plot of this Novel.

The distance between them grows to an extent that their relationship has come to a stage where Aisha wants to flee with her children to some far off place where she could not be found. Prithvi too is sick of Aisha and wants to get rid of her.

"Heer" Aisha's half sister (her father's illegitimate daughter) whom she had never seen before, arrives one day all of a sudden at her house, which is located far from town in isolation.
It was raining and the weather too bad, but Aisha needs to go to town to collect her package. Road leading to town is closed and she can go no further unless she march on foot.

"Daljeet" who is in the town for work sees Aisha and offers help by driving her to town in his SUV.
The weather makes it impossible for Aisha to return home, and she stays with Daljeet in his summer home which is a closely guarded mansion.

Daljeet is a divorcee and Aisha a vulnerable woman, two broken hearts reach out to each other. A perfect setting for two strangers who will never see each other again, leads to series of steaming sex.
But little did Aisha knew what she was getting into, until the day she found herself confined to a dark and isolated out house.

Heer in Aisha's absence takes charge of the house, and kids and most importantly Prithvi.
From the time Prithvi lay her eyes on Heer he wanted her. Aisha's absence made it all the more easier for him.

A local shepherd finds Aisha's wallet lying on the road where the bridge was broken, with a suicide note in it and hands it over to the Police. Inspector SD Pant calls Prithvi enquiring about Aisha.
The story takes a new turn, now that Aisha is declared "Missing, Presumed Dead" by the police.
There is an ancestral Kothi and other properties which belonged to Aisha. Prithvi wanted to sell it earlier but Aisha was against the idea.

The plot gets so intriguing that as I kept reading further and as new facts revealed themselves I kept wondering, and tried fitting the pieces together ( in my mind) as in jigsaw puzzle and kept asking myself, what next? The characters and their behavior is very unpredictable, and kept me hooked to the book. I finished book in one go with little breaks.

Only when you will read the book will you unfold the mystery which will keep you spell bound in a way you won't even imagine...What was Heer's motive, why did she come all of a sudden to Aisha's house? Why Prithvi kept his family out of town? What happened to Aisha? Was she really dead or managed to put her plan into action? Why was Daljeet in town, and was it just a coincidence or a well laid plan to bump into Aisha? 

Kiran Manral's book will keep you hooked till the last page, the suspense keeps building as you progress reading to find out more. Well defined characters, with intricate details of their surroundings and locations and a gripping story, is what you will come across.

The writing is elegant (with some heavy words) and I enjoyed reading this riveting book thoroughly (all 260 pages of it)

My rating for the book is good 4/5 and I strongly recommend that you read this book.

Order your copy now at Amazon and do share your reading experience. 

P.S: This book review was part of "Blogchatter" 'Book Review Program' 

Thursday 1 August 2019

From My Diary - Choices I made ~ #4

In this series I am sharing the choices I made as far as my professional life goes.

Why I took up my 1st job at the age of 17 is answered in my earlier post  "From My Diary - Choices I made ~ #1 and then why I moved on to my 2nd one and why I left that can be read here >>. "From My Diary - Choices I made ~ #2 

My journey onto becoming Self-employed could be read here "From My Diary - The Choices I made ~ #3"

Yes, I did stop working as an LIC agent but that did not mean I left all my clients. I just up-scaled my scope of work.

How??? please continue reading to find out.

As I already mentioned in my earlier post I constantly learned and upgraded myself, so as I progressed on my journey as an agent, I realized that I now have gained enough knowledge of the financial products that I was offering that it's time to become a Fee based adviser rather than selling.

By this time (2007) I have had a client base of over 900 plus. Moving onto fee based advisory meant letting go some :(

But then I knew this was necessary if I want to take up Fee based advisory model. The choice was made so the next step was to meet all the existing clients and convey to them what I wished to do and how it will help them, should they continue with me as their adviser.

Most of the clients refused to continue since they could not digest the idea of paying fees for financial advisory service. I merrily let them go with a promise that even if I won't advise them going forward but then since they already were my client for whatever product they bought from me earlier, I will continue to offer servicing for them.

Now was the time to devise strategy for my new role as a Fee based adviser.  I worked out a strategy based on my working experience in financial service sector and the kind of income I was looking to generate.

It came down to having 96 clients max in my portfolio and that's it, I will be good :)

Since some of my existing clients accepted me in my new role, it was not difficult to gather more, as they offered references and thus the work was getting better for me.

Just the way I did annual review for my clients, I did my annual review and realized that managing 96 clients will be difficult so I reworked on my strategy and brought down my target number of clients to 72.

It was 2009 and I was doing pretty okay, I had already had about 55 clients  and the way  things were going in another two years or so I would have had another seventeen clients, and that was my target.
But life had something else in store to offer me, and things changed, this time it was something which I had never imagined or ever dreamed of.

What happened, that change the course of my life? What did I do? What choices I made then? To find out, stay tuned for my next blog-post of the series "From My Diary - The Choices I Made"

Have you read my earlier posts on this series? Is there something you wish to share with me or want to ask? I will answer to your email that is for sure, write to me at "nilesharma@gmail.com"

Thank you so much for dropping by and reading my post.

Stay Happy :)

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Yesss, this is my moment of glory. My first 50 followers here on this blogging platform. Never scored that much ever in cricket :) Thr...