Make do (5 things - Week 96)

This conversation might be too less for your comfort and mine. I’m supposed to be on a bus heading back home in another three hours and I’m yet to finish my packing. And like most of my packing adventures, this had begun over 48 hours ago, and still in the end, I see myself short of my target. I don’t know how it happens, but I’m sure you would have felt the same too. If not you, I’ve thirty four other people over here going through the same.

This week has also been taxing. Even though the end of the program might bring joy in that manner, the eventual conclusion of the program has left many of us in tears quite literally. Even though we have had multiple ice breaking sessions in the previous three weeks, it was only now that we were getting to know each other better. As soon as it came to that, we have to leave each other, and be on our way to the different corners of the country, not knowing when or where we are going to meet again.

Such is always the twist of fate. Change in inevitable. But also unavoidable is the need to adapt to the change. After thoroughly exerting ourselves here for the past three weeks, we are now on our way to get back to our original life. We have been warned of the dangers ahead of us, and also been given advice and techniques on how to handle ourselves, if we find ourselves in such danger.

So, considering my emotional state and my pressing need to get back to packing, please accept this list of five recommended books for reading that I’ve received over the past three weeks as the 5 things for this week. Please excuse the jumbled nature of the list.

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1. 7 habits of highly effective people

The author Stephen R. Covey presents a holistic, integrated, principle-centered approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, service, and human dignity principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.Covey shows how to build the healthy relationships that are key to an effective life. This classic is well worth reading for its perspective and practical advice.

2. One minute manager

The one minute manager is a concise, easily read story that reveals three very practical secrets: One Minute Goals, One Minute Praisings, and One Minute Reprimands.The book also presents several studies in medicine and the behavioral sciences that clearly explain why these apparently simple methods work so well with so many people. By the book's end you will know how to apply them to your own situation and enjoy the benefits.That's why The one minute manager has continued to appear on business bestseller lists for more than two decades, and has become an international sensation

3. 20 crimes that shook India

Souvik Bhadra and Pingal Khan’s Red Handed – 20 Criminal Cases That Shook India, cannot be called a thriller since the twenty cases analysed in the slim paperback volume are well-known to most Indians. However, what makes it a worthwhile read is the analysis and comments that intersperse the well-known facts.

 4. The Shiva Trilogy

The mythological – historical – adventure – fiction series is all but immortalized as one of the trend changers amongst Indian books and Indian publishing as a whole. The series is creative, out-of-the-box and very much Indian.Amish Tripathi, the author of the Shiva trilogy, namely The Immortals of Meluha, The Secret of the Nagas and The Oath of the Vayuputras  needs to be applauded for three things One a brave attempt at mythology with descriptions of epic proportions,ahem!figuratively speaking.Second, characterizations and research- He is completely in sync with what and how the readers would want their heroes and antiheroes to be and has amplified the heroic in each of the characters, including even the mundane ones. Thirdly – His farsightedness as far as the calculations of the far reaching effects and impact of the book. 

5. A Hitchiker’s guide to the Galaxy

Seconds before the Earth is demolished to make way for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is plucked off the planet by his friend Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy who, for the last fifteen years, has been posing as an out-of-work actor.Together this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide ("A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have") and a galaxy-full of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox--the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he bought over the year

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So, that's all for this week then.

Have a great weekend!!

'til next week.