Date palindrome

Today's date is a palindrome in DD/MM/YYYY format. 

 

5/10/2015

 

....reads same in both directions.

No ZERO days!

The single best productivity tip I ever received: No ZERO days. 

A "zero" day is when you don't do anything towards your target/plan/goal.

Take a vow to yourself: From today, from this moment onwards, you will live in a NON-ZERO system.

Feeling too tired to study? Read just one page of chapter. Don't have time to exercise? Do just one pushup.  But DO it.

Success doesn't come in a single day;  it's a result of long string of CONSISTENT NON ZERO days. 

Fibonacci series

I was leafing through a small textbook about Fibonacci sequence (1,1,2,3,5,8,13, 21, 34, 55… ) and its many practical applications. For example, you can quickly do an approximate conversion between miles and kilometres. 

Each number in kilometres is approximately equal its preceding number in Miles. Ex: 5 kms approximately equals 3 miles, 8 kms = 5 miles, 13 kms = 8 miles and so on. 

And by the way, Fibonacci series was originally discovered in India, possibly by Pingala or Virahanka.

The HenryMan List - Patrick McLean

Do the right thing. Always, everywhere, without exceptions. Know that rules aren't always the right thing. Throwing a punch and being polite may seem contradictory. They are not. There are occasions when throwing a punch is polite and standing inactive is the rudest thing you can do. 

For more such crisp advice, read: Patrick McLean @ 

http://www.theseanachai.com/2009/02/19/the-henryman-list/

Dictionary of numbers

Just found a wonderful extension for Google Chrome: Dictionary of numbers.

It searches the text in your web browser for numbers and provides context to help you understand the numbers better.

For example, if a web page contains “318 million people”, it says

 

318 million people [≈ the population of the United States]

http://www.dictionaryofnumbers.com/

Microsoft Converter

Since last couple of days, I have got quite addicted to an app called Microsoft Converter. It has 20 categories (area, speed, energy, currency, time, etc.) and each category has 10 units within which you can do conversions. 

Thanks to this app, now when am gently cruising at 60 kmph, I know am travelling at 0.05 Mach (speed of sound) or, that distance from home to office (2km) is equal to 1.34x10^-8 AU (distance between Sun and Earth).

G. I. S. T - Vol I

The single best productivity tip I ever received: No ZERO days. 

A "zero" day is when you don't do anything towards your target/plan/goal. 

Adopt the NON-ZERO system. 

Feeling too tired to study? Read just one page of chapter. Don't have time to exercise? Do just one push-up. But DO it.

Success doesn't happen in a single day; it's a result of long string of consistent non-zero days.

If someone repeats instructions or a story/incident to you, instead of "Yeah, you told me this before " say, "Yes, I remember that."

This indicates that you cared enough to listen and remember the first time they told you.

When apologizing, replace the words "but" or "however" with a full stop/pause. For example, "I'm sorry but I'm trying to do my best" can be better phrased as "I'm sorry… I'm trying to do my best."

Words like "But" or "However" negate the first part of sentence and make your apology seem insincere.

Anger is a secondary, yet powerful emotion that often masks the primary feelings. Kids get hungry, then throw tantrums. Adults feel cheated, disappointed or humiliated.. And so they get infuriated. Senior citizens face negligence or helplessness, leading to their annoyance. 

Fighting this rage on its own is futile unless you resolve the underlying cause. 

When experiencing anger, either within you or those around you, leave it alone. Instead, probe for the emotion just preceding it and deal with it.

Apologize once. Say 'thank you' once. 

Forgive someone for their misdeed just once. Do something for free for somebody only once.

The more we repeat these actions, the less sincere we become, and the less effective they become. 

Do it once; Do it by heart.

When we take control of our life and start organizing it in a major way, we expect things to get better. But, there is an initial phase where some of our routines and relationships will in fact stop working as smoothly as they used to.

This is because…. Those habits and those relationships required you to be messed up, to their advantage.

Learning from the Enterprise

While writing the article “Agile at Home”, which put forward the idea of using Agile methodology in our family life, I realized that there was in fact much more to the corporate system that we could borrow and customize to enhance our personal productivity. This article is an attempt to explore some ideas in this direction.

Quarterly planning

We often make plans, small as well as grand plans, which fade into oblivion due to the lack of proper planning. Either we set too stringent deadlines that are practically impossible to meet, or on the other extreme, we do not set any time constraints at all, thus ensuring we never get the task done.

I feel that a quarter of the year (3-month period) is the perfect time-slice: It gives some breathing space to complete or at least make a good progress on any activity; and at the same time, it is short enough to bring some urgency in the execution.

Corporate Policies

Every organization has a set of policies in place. They are carefully documented, and shared with all the employees. Every new joiner is made aware of what constitutes ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ as per the enterprise.

Of course, every family has their own set of values and rules; the only difference is that almost always they are of bespoken kind. I am not suggesting that every family should write down their code of ethics; but it would definitely help everyone to share a common set of philosophy. This could be conveyed via discussions at dinner table or in any other way that makes sense.

Emergency Procedures

This, in my opinion, is one of the most important points.

What to do in case something goes wrong: Whether to act on impulse, or to follow some guidance?

I strongly feel that every family member should be educated on what things can possibly can wrong, and what should be the proper response.

Of course, nature and destiny can strike us in ways we can never imagine. But it never hurts to be prepared for the known, and let our mind free to take on the unknown.

Know Thy Numbers

All organizations, big, small and medium-sized, focus on numbers: the bottom line, the top line, the margins, the revenues. At home, I feel, we could just as possibly pay some attention to numbers, albeit of a slightly different nature. More often than not, the family members at best have a fuzzy idea of finances, and it would help if – at least – the earning members clearly know where they stand in terms of income and expenditure.

Apart from money, there is another type of numbers that matter to us, or, should matter. The BMI, the creatinine level, HDL, LDL... And so on. These numbers become more and more important with senior folks in the family and it is imperative that we not only keep a good track of their status.

Annual budget

This is a bit tricky. All corporates (and governments, of course) have an annual budget. All the expected income and expected expenses are laid out and tallied. Some provision is also made for unexpected spending. This sets the financial tone for the whole year and acts as a guidance for low or high spending in any area.

I haven’t tried this yet; but with some discipline and careful planning, I see no reason why every household can’t have an annual budget of their own. This could be an inclusive-affair, with all the senior members of the family pitching in and working together to create an annual budget that meets everyone’s requirements.

There’s much more to learn from the enterprise, of course. Each of these points should have their own blog-posts; but I hope this at least got you started thinking.