Category: Uncategorized

In 2018, my sister Rashmi underwent treatment for cancer at AIIMS Delhi. She went to the hospital twice a week, underwent chemotherapy and many more side effects of treatment.

During that time, I visited AIIMS 10 to 12 times within a month and the scenes were gruesome. A 5-year-old boy suffering from leukemia, a poor old woman sitting with her husband in pain, hundreds of depressed people due to their ongoing war with cancer.

On a particular Monday, I was with my sister for the weekly consultation. We reached the hospital by 1:00 pm and I took a token with serial number 57 from the counter. We waited for our turn for the OPD starting at 2:00 pm. Patients and their attendants started to gather outside the OPD. By 2:30 pm, there were close to 300 people in a small place and there wasn’t any space to move even an inch. The mic-announcement system at OPD had stopped working sometime back. So, the security guard would announce the name of the patient and if one could not go immediately then his or her turn got canceled for the day. The patient would be asked to come again and take a future date for consultation.2

For a disease like cancer, everyday counts. Missing an appointment is the same as asking for more trouble and putting one into more pain.

I had to wait for 3 hr and 15 min until the number 57 was announced. For that entire duration, I stood at only one place, keeping both my mind and ear alert. I couldn’t allow the chit-chatting of 300 people to break my concentration. But it was tough.

By the time we managed to come out of the hospital, it was almost 6:00 pm and we were really exhausted. And there were only 6-7 doctors who were attending to the patients in the OPD. Consider the stress on the doctors at the end of such sessions.

On many occasions, people usually visit AIIMS Delhi when they have exhausted all their options elsewhere. This hospital gives them the last hope. Consider the pressure on the doctors who know that if they don’t treat the patients well, then the patients have no where to go.

On the last day of the visit, I met the head of Cancer department to thank him for the tremendous effort being put by his team. He had a smile on his face. He mentioned that due to huge inflow of patients that far outweighs the current capacity, the hospital face huge stress; yet the doctors and medical staff try to make best possible effort.

Although it has been almost 3 years since that incident, that conversation is still fresh in my mind. During this grave time due to COVID-19 situation, the doctors and medical staffs continue to put effort to bring our loved ones out of danger. Doctors and medical staffs continue to put their own life at risk to save lives.

But when I see attack on doctors, I feel sad and helpless. I understand that there are some medical professionals who take advantage of current situation, but that doesn’t mean we should see everyone as the culprit.

Sharing this picture which is made of photos of doctors who lost their lives due to COVID-19. Small steps in our part may help us to save precious lives of doctors.

1. Wear double mask

2. Take vaccine (let’s take which ever vaccine is available immediately instead of thinking of Covishield vs Covaxin)

3. Say few kinds words to front line workers every time you meet them. They are under tremendous stress. Few nice words can make their day.

4. Follow Social Distancing

5. Have Patience. We need it the most at this time.

COVID-19 lockdown substantiated my belief that physical activity immensely helps physically as well as mentally.

I took inspiration from my uncle and started 100 day running challenge on 11th July 2020. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to continue the routine even for a week. 

But I managed to clock 214 consecutive days of workout until I thought of taking a break.  

During this period, I had to deal with illness, injury, anxiety, failure, and many ups & downs.

Biggest takeaway for me has been to train the mind that no matter what happens, keep moving. 

There is no substitute for hardwork and consistency. 

So, pick up yourself out of bed every single day and go for a run my friend. 

You will be amazed by the difference running can bring to your life. 

Consistency is the key to unlock your immense potential.

PC: Canva.com

I started writing in 2008. I wrote regularly (2-3 times in a week) for almost 6 months.

Thoughts are like waves in an ocean. They come and go. Writing gave me an access to capture those waves of thoughts in words.

At some point I started developing fear whether I would be able to write good stuff regularly. Which meant if the waves in the ocean would be big enough to inspire me to write. The fear got so stronger that I stopped writing completely.

Since then, 10 years passed with blink of an eye.

Now a days when I write, same fear comes back. But this time I found an answer for that fear. Whatever we do in our day today lives, that shapes our thoughts. Those help generating ideas and finally some of those ideas and experiences take shape in the form of writing.

To answer my fear that I may not be able to write good stuff consistently, my response goes like this.

“I wish to live my life with purpose and abundant energy. As long as I am able to do it, there would be no dearth of ideas to write.”

Every time I think of the above lines, fear vanishes instantly. But it comes back from time to time. Now I have taken my fear as a companion that intends to remind me of living life fully.

Thank you all the readers for reading, liking and sharing your comments about my writing.

That inspires me to work even harder.

Have a lovely weekend.

PC: Keith from Pexels

Few years back scientists warned that world is not ready to deal with next Pandemic. But very few people believed them. You can very well see COVID-19 situation as on today. We still don’t have a perfect answer for this virus even after more than a year.

Similarly, scientists have been warning us about Climate Change for last two decades. Yet, we are living our lives as if Climate Change is a hoax or it may not happen in our lifetime. We don’t have much time left before climate change will bring devastating and irreparable damage to the world.

Current Covid19 situation has shown that we must believe science and the scientists.

If you are an EHS Consultant, consider you have a very serious task in hand. It’s no longer only about what gradual changes (e.g. enable IT System) to do to improve customer’s existing EHS processes.

Some questions you need to ask:

• – Whether your customer’s business is ready to deal with impact of climate change?
• – Does customer’s long-term vision & strategy encompass sustainable development?

Management guru Peter Drucker, who once was asked, “What is the worst mistake you could make?”

His answer was, “To be prematurely right.”

Picture: youmatter.world