Gerald D'Cunha

  “The only unique contribution that we will ever make in this world will be born out of our creativity.” Brene Brown   A famous motivational guru had made this statement: ‘Winners don’t do different things; they do things differently.’ Interestingly, the best-selling author and motivational guru had the sharpest and the quickest business-acumen to copyright this line. So, it’s ‘registered’ under the relevant Intellectual Property Act… Now, you and I can’t claim it as ours… It is his – the great guru’s! Sometimes, I find it so silly when someone claims, that a line like the one mentioned – which is a universal and age-old truth – as his/her property. Yes, I agree and marvel at his/her business acumen… to make a fortune out of common wisdom… Is that creativity? I think, it is. And, if it is, so be it. Many of us have come across this dialogue between a honeybee and a concerned creature: Once, a concerned creature asks a honeybee: “My friend, you take so mu...

I f I look back and ask, “Have all my decisions, during my 59-year-long life, so far, been only the ‘right’ decisions… Haven’t there been bad ones… some big ‘mistakes’ in the conventional view point?” Why only my life, no one’s life can function within the ‘perfect frame’… All decisions cannot be ‘only right’. There have got to be ‘wrong ones’, too… the flawed, the so-called mistakes. Sometimes, what a wrong decision can teach us, nothing else can. It’s the innate trust in our gut, that, there is something sublime concealed even in a bad decision – in a mistake – yes, this innate trust coming from our gut can, often, work miracles in our lives… The art of converting a mistake into a miracle, therefore, is a spiritual art of successful living… It’s also the art of peaceful living… For, in the holistic sense, all decisions are good decisions… all flaws form the flawless! E arly this morning, my good friend, Dr. Deepak, sent me a video about one of the mammoth mi...

M y friend, Austin Coutinho, literally survives on the oxygen called ‘Cricket’. Is he a player? Yes, he was, once. Is he a coach? Yes, he was and he still is. Is he a mentor? He has always been, and will always be one. Is he a consultant? Yes, he is… and, too good in it. What else? Here it is: He is a gifted cartoonist! And, rightly, has been spending hours and hours to give life to every cricket hero through his adorable caricatures… Every morning – perhaps when all of us are still asleep – he wakes up with a new idea in his mind… Sometimes, the subject of his creative work could be a Soccer star – a Messi or a Ronaldo… sometimes, it could be Usain Bolt or  Michael Jordan… or our own Sindhu, Sakshi or Dipa. Like me, there are several admirers of Austin… and we all look forward to see his fresh offering of the day… When we see it, our hearts smile! “How does he do it?” I have wondered almost every day, “He is a genius!” Once, earlier, when I had blogged...

Pic.: Aparna Khanolkar Sheth “Genius is initiative on fire.” Holbrook Jackson I have just come out of my class. My twelfth-standard students were to write a test on a particular chapter today. Before the class, I told them, that I would be giving them a simple problem to solve. In fact, there was one point, which was slightly tough. I, even, gave a helpline before the test, by helping them how to deal with it. .. The test began. They had to complete in twenty minutes... But, even after fifteen minutes grace-time, they were still struggling to complete it! I don’t make a big deal about this test-business in my teaching profession. But, I do make a big deal about my students’ attitude, commitment, focus, hard-work, goals, persistence and passion... So, even after the goof-up, today, I  wasn't  telling them, that they needed to score well in their future tests and the final-exams... I was telling them this: “My dear students, t...

Pic.: Vincent D'Souza I f Face book is, now, just ten-year old, its founder, Mark Elliot Zuckerberg, is just 29! Well, he became a billionaire at the age of 23… and, now, his personal wealth is estimated to be close to 28-billion Us-dollars! Not bad for one who was not born into any wealthy family or surrounded by any powerful men and women to pull strings for him! He and some of his friends were merely a bunch of Harvard campus-kids… And, what started as some fun-activity to connect the campus kids has, today, become what it is… the Behemoth called ‘Face book’! The guy like me - and the guy in the remotest village of not only my country but also of any country - knows the power and potential of the idea that had come to Mark from    thin air! I am simply inspired, simply overawed by such a phenomenon. Always! “Thoughts are things!” This was how I had first learnt about such a phenomenon from Napoleon Hill’s class...

Pic.: Mehul Bhuva “Love, Romance and Sex – these are our natural, positive emotions… Maintain their sanctity. When you blend these three emotions, a mighty force is born. Through marriage and intimacy,  you give a physical outlet to this force. However, if you learn to transmute this force into the work you do, You will see miracles… the birth of a genius.” L ove is the most beautiful of all human emotions. And romantic love is, in deed, romantic! If God Himself couldn’t see Adam feeling lonely in the lovely Eden Garden, and if He had desired man to be happy and fulfilled in the love and company of a woman – which had prompted Him to create Eve - then, romantic love has to be divine. It is blessed by God Himself! Intimate love, is intended to be very, very sacred… It is intended to be respected, honored, celebrated and cherished. It comes with great responsibility. If romantic love has to en...

We are sane people, not idiots. Will any one of us get the moving plane return back to the airport, get down from it... and, then, run away to meet a long-lost friend? Or, will any one of us, drop everything aside, and jump into your car - minus your pants - for the same cause? What about this: will you agree to spend years in your engineering college, come out with distinction - only to be a dummy of some rich-guy's worthless son? We know such things happen only in our Bollywood films. Not in real life. Still, think of it - we all loved the '3 Idiots'! Hey, it seems, it is Bollywood's highest grosser of all-time! Idiots are not straight people... They do odd things, at odd times... and, above all, in their odd ways. On the screen, in the darkness, we loved the idiots... we kept our hands on our 'dil' - and, 'siti bhajake' - sang with them - AL IZ WELL. We laughed, we cried... we loved these characters when they peed on their dean's name plate. Yes, ...

Passion is contagious. On Saturday night, I went with my wife and son to watch "This Is It." I had been a huge fan of Michael Jackson - the star, the performer and the enigmatic genius. But, I had never been fond of his songs. Except for the famous 'We are the World', I have registered nothing in my mind! Well, this admission may reveal my ignorance. I may sound stupid, even. But, honestly, I admired the man - the larger-than-life persona -- but, not his songs, his music. And, that is it! But, let me tell you, the two-hour-long film left me breathless. In fact, it is not a film; just a documentary - compiled from the footage of the rehearsals Michael did with his musicians, dancers, technicians and production and direction team. Mind you, it was the 'practice session', the rehearsal... not the actual show. If I was left breathless, and crying, watching this footage-show, what would have been my experience watching the real one! The man was, in deed, a genius!...