Random Thoughts

I don't have anything against IASs but also nothing in favor of them as well. I do acknowledge that the post of an IAS is considered extremely successful and the greatest thing by many but certainly not by me. In this article, I'll try to point out the fundamental flaws of choosing to prepare for the IAS exam in the most unbiased way possible. For an apt comparison, I will take a developer or researcher in a company like Google, Apple, or Microsoft. Let's break down the details of why choosing to prepare for the IAS exam is not a good idea. Skillsets: The skillset one gains while preparing for IAS is almost useless in the practical world and personal life. The gained skillset is largely useless as it can't be used to land any other job in other sectors or countries. The work assigned to an IAS office is of two types: administrative or handling the problems of poor people. I do get that one might feel good helping poor people but in no way does that means that one is ope...

I believe that everyone has heard the phrase that the only constant in life is change. Given the complexity of our lives, falling in love or desiring things is inevitable. Depending upon our age we keep falling for one thing or the other. Maybe from a toy in our childhood to a cycle in our early teenage. The idea of love is so fundamental to humans that it is built in our biological self to keep desiring one thing or the other, it is the guiding factor that gives us a sense of purpose. There are two types of things we try to get in our lives, firstly, things for sustenance, and secondly things that give us enjoyment, things that we attach our personalities to. Sustenance is inevitable and it remains the same no matter where we live, or when we lived (which century). But the other things are totally determined by the environment we grew up in, the ideas that got stuck in our minds. Love and desire are one of the most important factors that differentiate us from every other organism on t...

The greatest skill anyone of us can possess is the skill to have mental strength. There is nothing bigger or better than having an insane amount of mental prowess. All my life I've been an underweight guy but I have never shied away from any physical tasks. I was as active or energetic on any trek/trip as my other friends who were in far better physical shape than I ever was. I do acknowledge that a healthy body leads to a healthy mind but having a strong mindset is something that can easily turn the tides in your favor. I've spent a crazy amount of time building my mental strength from a logical and moral standpoint. I have spent countless hours reading and listening to the amazing feats of great men. We don't even realize but piece by piece we start picking things from their personalities and start making them part of our lives. I truly believe that the world we are living in right now is majorly unsuitable to make us appreciate personal growth and motivation to be morall...

Let me start by saying that almost none of us know what we are doing and why are we doing it, but still some appear sorted while others are befuddled. I don't know about you but I did everything I wanted and still always ended up in the place where I never wanted to be. Wait wait,,,, before you attribute this to sadness, let me tell you that even though life didn't pan out exactly the way I imagined it, but nonetheless, I'm satiated with what I have. I don't know how happy I could have been if everything would happen according to the plan, I guess I would never know. So many choices, crises, happy-sad moments all of us face on a regular basis, but in retrospect, everything looks fine and that's why I call it the easy complex life. Life might look very tough and challenging in moments but everything smoothes out in the longer run. No matter how many tough decisions and challenges we face, everything looks simpler while glimpsing and wondering about the past. So many ...

As I grow older and wiser, I find myself in disdain for a lot of talks I hear around myself. Earlier, I enjoyed even the most meaningless and utter bullshit conversations but now as soon as I hear something that is boring or not adding value to my thoughts, I tend to overanalyze it. Back in college, I could talk and talk for hours without getting exhausted but now I get tired very easily if the talk is not interesting. A voice inside my head or a demon starts poking in my mind whenever I hear things that are not adding value or not pure bakchodi. This inside voice is real, whenever Socrates was about to do something wrong a demon in his mind used to stop him and that's how he decided what is right and wrong all his life. It's not that I don't like bakchodi anymore, it's just that after enjoying it for a few hours I need some alone time to reflect upon what I talked about and did in those hours full of bakchodi. As I've started observing people a little more closely,...

Cycling, considered to be one of the most boring sport by many and especially in countries like India where cycles are looked down upon by most people. I have always been a fan of cycling but never did I watched it as a sport. I always loved taking rides on my bicycle, whenever I felt sad, agitated, or depressed, cycling always helped me in clearing my mind. I don't know why Indians society looks at the cycle as a poor men's mode of transport. If you go to any place on a bicycle, all the eyes on the road will be at you as if you are an inconsequential person. A car driver will try to dominate a biker and a biker will try to dominate a person on a cycle. The bigger your vehicle is more you will try to dominate and this is especially true on Indian roads. Back in college, I expressed my love for cycling and said that if I get a job near my house, I will try to go via bicycle, that person laughed at me and said, dude, these things are only good for saying, no one actually does it....

Everyone knows that life is precious, but there is one thing more precious than life: freedom. If freedom hadn't been the most important human desire, people wouldn't have fought for independence from tyrants and dictators. Humans are biologically programmed to live in a hierarchical structure, but that doesn't mean they can't be free. Freedom exists in different forms: physical freedom, freedom of thought, relations, or something else. When I think about freedom, the only name that comes to mind is Bhagat Singh. Just think for a moment: this guy who had everything in his life, a good education, a loving family, and a ton of wealth, decides to go on a path of martyrdom, but why? He was as free as anyone could have been in that period, but still, this burning desire didn't let him sleep. There was no benefit or reward to be enjoyed at the end of his path of being a freedom fighter; he had no hope of reward in the next life, too, because he was an atheist, so he decid...