Is anybody there?

Lights out Alice!

It has been a while since I came here to pen my thoughts. No, the veracity and the velocity of my thoughts have not decreased although, the quality has definitely taken a hit. No, I would not use being busy as an excuse because it is just that, an excuse. I wile away enough time throughout any given day to be able to spare quarter of an hour to center myself and pen down my thoughts.

Yes, the fact that I know that my thoughts are not unique and whatever I may be going through is something that is not massively different from what any other person goes through saps some of the motivation. Deep down, we all want to contribute meaningfully to the world, but the reality is that only some of us get that privilege and it has to be earned, either by going navigating through difficult circumstance or being observant enough to understand nuances in every situation. I am neither. 

Coming to the brass tacks, where am I right now? I was sort of grounded in February, with the only trip coming over the weekend in Hyderabad, personal in nature, to meet with Satya and brainstorm about EVs. The month of March is crazy with the amount of travel- 4th -7th Kochi, 10-14th - Jaipur, 14-16th Indore, 17-19th Bhubaneshwar, 26-28th Kochi, 28-30th - Chennai. For all this travel, I don't seem to be enthused by it at all. Mostly because there is a lot of turmoil on my professional front with boundless uncertainty as to what my role is. My department is filled with people who are trying to cross each other and micro manage and hence the environment is not great to work in. I don't want to be pushy, for fear of repercussions, but it is leaving me doing nothing meaningful, which is detrimental to my career. It is a sub-optimal situation that I am still trying to navigate through since there is no clear answer as to what is the right solution.

On people front, I need to improve my ability to interact with people in my first meeting. I generally have seen that I am pretty shy, to the point of looking rude, in the first few meetings. Inadvertently, I am generally gathering data on what the other person is like, their behavioural traits, what they like and what they dislike so I can curate the right personality to appeal to them. I know it sounds very shallow and superficial, but to be fair, I think most humans do this sub-consciously. I am just slower and more aware of my actions, although I am in no way trying to absolve myself or justifying this behaviour. This is definitely an area I need to work and improve upon.