Breaking the habit...

Ok.. sorry for that superbly cheesy LP reference, but yeah.. today was special.. I finally did something that I never liked doing.. and liked doing it!

What am I talking about?? "Coaching Classes" ofcourse...finally, on my own.. decided to go to one of those factories that I didn't like so much since... ever.

*School

Well.. till 9th class I never even felt that "it is a competitive world" I would always do what I wanted, read and write exams and top with ease.. then there was this thing in tenth where all teachers would always stress on the importance of getting really high marks. I never actually understood it.. however.. with more attention to "marks" than ever before I wrote the exams. I saw many of my friends go to tuition and other things after school, which I never could understand why they went to.

I am you know, that guy who reads and doesn't battify/byheart every friggin thing.. basically most of you reading this are also of type, so I guess you get me when I say this about tuitions and other things.

Other than that one time when we stayed in karnataka and "kannada" was compulsory (my 3rd class) we (me and bro) didnt go to tution for anything, not that I am against tuition.. I can understand that it helps many people because of the "better" teachers they have.

*Interim-Idiot (Intermediate)

You know.. that time after 10th, the 2yrs where practically ANY place can be called a "coaching center" where the main aim of a "college" is to hold one test after the other, making students feel like they're cattle not humans..I was ok with it for the first year, but then.. some kind of stupid thing happened to me.

Seeing all these people around me read like CRAZY, I started wondering if I really deserved getting good marks because I did far less hard work than others, yet was able to perform satisfactorily... its just that the environment was like that.

I know how stupid it sounds but that's how I used to think of it back then.. I thought that, if I would get better marks, there is someone else loosing an opportunity, and almost everyone around me was like this super hard working lifeless machine who have dedicated their life for this thing hence I felt that they deserved better rank than me ( :| )

So after this, I finally started realizing how everyone is competing for everything everywhere and that this is a competitive world.

*Coaching Classes

Rather than being a participant in the competition, I just slid away, the fire to "be the best" never burnt within me. You can say that was basically the most stupid part of my life. I just started hating all these factories with a passion because it was removing all kinds of fun from everyone, going to one was like shaking hands with satan. I always viewed school in my childhood as that lovely place where you learnt things.. but everything changed because of the poor "Teacher-child" relations, and lifeless lectures.

The best thing in intermediate were those classes when the really awesome lecturers taught, it was only about being there and learning things. Only two were really good, almost everyother class felt so dead that my brain learnt only because it was the min. required thing.

All these dead lectures and other things, confirmed my belief that "learning things on your own" is the best way to do it. I've learnt oh so many things since I was young and those are the things I remember even now.. down to the most trivial details. One is his own best tutor I must say.

*Engg Coll.

Well after coming to engg, I must say I've been having the time of life, because I've been doing what I wanted, learning what I wanted, and doing it the way I wanted! The detached attachment with the lecturers and subjects is such a good thing, I can keep having the best of both worlds. The fact that almost all the subjects are computer things, adds to the learning experience..

However, there is another thing , sometimes the thing you really wanted to learn turns out to be one of the subjects of your engg. course.. so because of this, I found myself NOT learning it on my own.. also because of the sub-par to poor lecturers teaching those subjects to me.. those thing totally died :( That's one of the saddest things I felt.

*Why go to them now?

Well, what happened later is specific to me, don't know if all others can relate to this, but the thing is that, the place that use as my "learning tool" had turned into one of my biggest vices.. yeah.. you know..

Using my computer paired with teh internetz as the source for total timewaste by reading each and every article in 10 blogs everyday, commuting in forums, stalking on twitter, among other things, really effected my life.. infact, it CHANGED it totally..

All I did was now look here and there, and waste time, I would plan on doing something but only rarely did I get anything done, because the system idle process was just one click away (browser)

So basically, there HAS to be a way to limit this.. ofcourse, there is "self control" which I have been rigorously applying since the past few weeks, which btw have been my recent BEST, but no matter what, the best way seemed to be the one where I would stay away from the computer..

The thing is that, I am planning on writing GRE soon, and there is no way I'll be able to dedicate myself COMPLETELY, if I plan on reading it on my own on the computer .. I've been controlling myself while reading oracle, but even then.. I feel that there must be a better way.

There is another fact..these 3years in college, have completely changed my perception of the world. I still understand that its a "competitive place" but after going through all what I have gone due to my ... *ahem* confusions of an immature mind then being the awesome environment that is college life..I.. you know, grew a brain and stopped caring about such things..

You could say.. the thing about "equivalent exchange" from FMA really REALLY helped me understand everything better..( another proof that, there is someone out there in the world who has experienced something similar and written/created something to show you the consequences, also, anime/manga has the answer for everything in life :P )

All I see now is 1)set a goal and 2)achieve it. Try your best and SCREW others and how they perform! Its like you know , back to being the mindset that I was in school, I never actually thought that someone would be "sad because he didnt get better rank because I got one better than him" and nonsense like that :P and neither did I keep a lot of burden on my shoulders.

So basically, now my goal is to just write that GRE exam, and do what I can do.. and the best thing is that the exam is also my kind.. THERE is no frigging RANK,seats and all that nonsense.

*The first experience

So yeah.. after Phani talking me into it (in a common sense way :P ) today I went to the class.. and I must say, it felt good, the thing that I have a "schedule" and I need to do things at a given time, really gives the complete feeling.. and the lack of time after returning, makes me want to keep work first and news later, making things more effecient, its not like I am wasting time, and its not like I am totally shileding off one part of life :D

So yes... thats what happens, you can basically see my tansition from a person with different views, its not called being "hypocrite" its called "growing up" and understanding things :P I have not written anything in a way that it'd give you, the reader, any direct info on what to do, but showed you what I've gone through, which might inderectly help you.

Its how I tread on the...

Path to Reeteshification.

..Once you dig in..

First of all, watch this video




This is a video I watched around 6-7 years back, on TV. Back then I found the song funny because i used to translate what he was saying

"Once you dig in, you find it coming out the other side"

as something related to what happens when you "dig in" your nose :P because well, let me put it this way, I saw people who dig their nose, "very frequently" when I was young and after hearing this song I used to think of "It (the finger) coming out the other side" and used to laugh (on the inside)

And it also made me understand why one would actually pick their nose.. because.

"Once you dig in, you find yourself having a good time"

So yeah, that's what I basically thought after hearing the song... when I was a kid.

For some reason the song was brought back in my head and because of that.. I started singing it again.. (in my mind, of course ) but this time when I said part that again.. it was like this..

"Once you dig in, you find it coming out the other side"

hey, wait.. that's the same thing right? So whats the bid deal? Well, lets just say that a certain word has a certain homonym that one would have learnt after "growing up".. you know the thing that implies

"Once you dig in, you find yourself having a good time"

Very peculiar to see how perception of things change as time passes by! You see and hear things different after "growing up" thats for sure :P Well, just to be sure I was not singing a mis-heard lyrics, I went you youtube and saw the video.. and this time.. I heard it as..

"Once you dig in, you find it coming on the other side"

*ahem* OK.. so now I was totally confused and didn't understand if it was the old me or the new me that mis-heard it.. So I type "Dig in Lenny kravitz lyrics" in my address bar (FF) and came here.

This is the starting lyrics..

It's time to face it,
Come on in and
Join the party,
Life has been waiting
For you to care,
Don't try to fake it
Jump on in and,
Get it started
There's so much lovin',
For you to share
There is nowhere to run,
There is no way to hide
Don't let it beat you,
Say "Nice to meet you"
And "Bye"

Once you dig in
You'll find it coming
Out the other side
And once you dig in
You'll find
You'll have yourself
A good time

Let me phrase it...

"Don't try to fake it" "Jump on in and get it started"

Ok.. now I was totally convinced that he was singing about something else..something that I thought it was talking about when I recently heard it, especially NOT about picking nose! Something ,you know.. for which "Life has been waiting"

The whole lyrics can be translated as to something that is telling a "first timer" to "do it"... with respect...by saying "Nice to meet you" and "bye"

This really makes me think, what the singers actually think when they write these songs.. and what the fans think of it.. I mean look at the youtube comments

"'So rockin' inspirational for me'...thanks Lenny :)"

I have nothing to say to this because.. well, maybe he meant something else and my brain is thinking in a very unintended manner and spoiling the whole "inspirational" song.. I mean, the video at least, is not this bad, so I guess its just me.. or is it?

All I can say is that something are just good to "listen" but once you start hearing to the lyrics and dig in to it... heads will be rolling!