In the last 17 years of my life as a Motivational Speaker and Corporate Trainer, I have received many a request from bright young people (who are joining professional institutes e.g. IIMs, other B-Schools, Law Schools, Engineering Colleges, Colleges , even a new job etc) to help them by sharing a few lessons about the best ways to conduct ‘self’ in a new institution / at a new place. So, if you are going to a new place in some time, this blogpost about the best, right things to do in college might be just what you need. A few tips on what to do in your ‘new ghosla’ 🙂
(Image courtesy: Google)
My work gets me to work at some of the finest campus names in India. Top B-Schools, Engineering Colleges, Law Schools etc. Thousands of students — I get to connect with every year. They share with me & I get to closely ‘inner view’ them- their lives, their issues, their career graphs etc. Through this blog post- I wish to SHARE the same with you. Whatever I share with you – You’ll find it valid right through the next 2/3 years and even beyond.
May you ‘Rise & Shine’ one hundred percent at the new place: My Dil-Say wish for you & a few recommendations further:-
1) Accept your B-School / Engineering College / College
Yes it could have been better. But now that you could not — ACCEPT IT. Try to make the best out of ‘what you have been given by destiny’. Do not CRIB that you were meant for bigger and better B-Schools / Engineering Colleges etc.
‘Jo cheez Toot nahin Sakti- usko pighlao mat’… Accept it.
2) Value each and every hour at the College.
One of the biggest mistakes you could make is – waste your time. Your aim should be to come like a polished diamond than no one can recognize. Not a degraded and lowly version of yourself!
Trust me these 4 years at your Engineering College / 2 years at a B-School will never happen again. This is possibly your very best chance to change yourself for doing ‘bigger & better things’/ prepare yourself for a ‘fantastic life ahead’. Find the best things to do in college and DO THEM.
I will want you to do this small exercise. Meet and spend time with some 10 seniors of yours. See what they do and ‘how did they spend their last few years’ in the campus. Ask yourself then- ‘Do you wish to be like them’.
If I were to do my Graduation / Post Graduation again- ‘I will want to come out as a more firm personality by doing at least a few newer things very well. I will spend at least one hour in the gymnasium than in front of the laptop / playing computer games etc. I will prefer ‘having read’ some 100+ books on mystery / fiction than spending the entire months seeking love out of ‘ONE’ girl (who would eventually get married to someone else. Even if she gets married to you — trust me- it would not make a difference).
I will prefer learning newer hobbies and mastering a few of them than whiling away my time in indecision and in day dreaming. I will prefer passing out as a ‘PERSONALITY’ even if it is a maverick one than passing out as a normal ‘Bhed-Chaal’. I will prefer ‘not picking hobbies/ decisions out of making an impression but out of my real passion. I will prefer making a thousand mistakes and feeling foolish than passing out as a vanilla ice cream.
(Image courtesy: Google)
3) Haule- Haule
Do not start on a very high energy (showing your hyper excitement about being a part of a new place). Usually people who start with a very high energy — fall/ droop down with a more high energy within a few months.
Jo zyaada uchalte hain, wahi fislate hain… So, start on a balanced energy.
It is OK ; if you have made it to a good place ; but so have others out there. Do not portray this image that —‘I am the real cool guy / girl out here or ‘MAIN HOON DON‘. Go slow. Slow is better than fast e.g. Do not exhaust promenading all your new clothes within the first few days only :).
I know you have moved out of your home. The new found independence is really liberating especially when it comes to aspects which you have always wanted to but never explored. Do it; but do it slowly. Water looks good when it falls as pleasant rain and the same water becomes a hell when you stand under a powerful fountain. It hurts. So! Go slow; especially in the beginning.
4) Aek Chup; Hazaar Sukh
Reduce your talk time to 1/3 rd (although your new environment will induce it to triple it, and you are very vulnerable). ‘A professional smile’; is the code to many a thing / people / situations which you will not like. No one actually is interested in your stories. No one remembers the details of what you’ll say. They will remember only – ‘How did you make them feel’?
Work on making people ‘FEEL’ through your matured, friendly and genuine gestures and talks. The deepest of all ‘Human needs / hungers’ is the ‘want / desire to be LISTENED TO’… Be a warm Listener?? Doing this can win you many a situation and people. The best ability that one could work towards having in the modern & new setup is:- ‘The ability to FEEL & LOOK RELAXED’…
And while you are at it, try these 20 ways of sitting in silence that can transform your life.
5) No point being a Sodium / Potassium
Reduce your reactions to people & situations to 1/10th. (This statement doesn’t mean that you become lesser assertive. I mean a smarter, calmer assertiveness). One looks cool & feels cathartic when one reacts to / in daily life situations. Super MARD feeling types :). Try a different code: ‘Don’t react but smile’. 99.99% of the people I meet/train; I find them either ‘Reacting’ or ‘Over reacting’. The other .01% end up making a style statement by ‘NOT’. One reason for Sachin doing well – I see is his habit to not to react to people / controversies. He saves his energy. I see a lesson!!!
6) High Energy
The new place will require you to bring out ‘higher energy levels’ in the right directions in your life to fulfill ‘to dos’ of every kind around. Energetic people are more successful.
Just do a couple of things:-
– An early morning bath (jo bhi ho jaaye subaha hi nahanaa hai)
– 25 mins of stretching & brisk running (NOT AFTER A GIRL)
How to get rid of bad habits: The Practical Way
It will be a hopeless way of passing time if you just wake up just 20 mins before your class and then the eternal struggle to choose between eating breakfast and releasing dinner. There will be a 1000 things to do in College. But you choose the ones that make you better and prepare you for the life ahead.
6) “Kya Kahengay LOG” — Sabse Bada Rog
Do not talk about people, discuss them or comment upon them…Else; it will take 3-4 months only for everything to go haywire. Give everyone the impression that you like them (TU MUJHE QUBOOL, MAIN TUJHE QUBOOL); even if the other person is the biggest idiot existing; according to you. Within the first month; ‘PEOPLE GROUPS’ will begin to get formed in the institute. These groups will disintegrate at a higher speed than the one at which they got formed. So, what are the lessons —1) ‘Do not share your intimate stuff with people around initially 2) Do not bitch about people to others. No critic has ever changed the world.
When the same very people you shared stuff with become friends with others / part of other groups — you will feel like an IDIOT. Whenever you begin to feel; that you are becoming a part of a particular group —‘ khisak lo’ … People who have fewer ‘people issues’ are likely to succeed more…Look around you & you shall understand the point. If you are not adaptive enough – you are bound to have people issues. Work consciously & regularly on your personality to ‘Accept & Adapt’. ‘A man of wisdom lives in the world, achieves/enjoys the world; but is never of the world’. If you want love, be lovable. Not pitiful, sarcastic, cruel, indifferent, needy, desperate, aloof, etc.
Further, at the new place – you are likely to spend much energy on impressing people and in getting impressed. Trust me — the entire acts of doing this will be hopelessly pointless. A mind is a terrible thing to waste especially on people; who wouldn’t even matter after a few years.
(Image courtesy: Google)
7) Laser Sharp Focus
Make Dossiers (files) on all subjects. They will come handy after 10 years. Do a Business Newspaper for at least 1 hour everyday. Learn Finance – the machinery on which the world operates. Start realizing & working towards your sector (of choice) early. Starts connecting all dots aka actions towards that and snowball all your efforts till date. During corporate trainings; I meet a lot of smart youngsters (MBAs from top B-Schools in India/ Abroad); who come and confess secretly- ‘Akash! I worked so hard to be here; but now I realize- this is just not what I wanted’. I feel sad about this and the age old principle of career choosing gets re-affirmed in my mind- ‘Wo kaam hee kyun karna jisko shayad karne kee zaroorat hee nahin hai’. Most youth thinks that getting through a good Engineering college / B-School etc. is the passport to a great career. It is – when you make the right choices 1) before joining, 2) during studying and 3) after you pass out from these places.
Strongly recommend you to read the blog post: ‘Six Pack Ideas for a SIXY Career’.
8 ) P.S. :-‘ I Love You’
‘Gases react more in rarefied atmosphere’ and ‘ we react more in girl-ified/ boy-ified atmosphere); I mean — relationships will JUST HAPPEN THERE. You will fall in love more easily and more frequently. (& everytime it will feel like PEHLA PEHLA PYAAR HAI). Reasons :-
1) The atmosphere of a good institute is fiercely competitive and this results in people wishing to have someone at the end of the day to share self &
2) A simple reason that — ‘I WANT SOMEONE AT THAT POSITION of a Boyfriend / Girlfriend’.
I receive frenetic emails from students (usually girls) saying that —‘It took me so much to reach here; but I am bored within 3 months’. IRONY naa !! Understand that it happens with everything in life. We are humans. It would then happen in relationships too. Other girls are too much dying without their Boyfriends in their hometowns.
(YAADEIN YAAD AATI HAIN 🙂 )
Relationships in rarefied atmosphere are too short lived to be taken seriously and as a result jeopardizing all the above ‘Focus & Career’ points. Let not your ‘FOCUS’ about Career & Life get upstaged by ‘Relationship issues’. That will be a full blooded tragedy.
More than 75% of the MBAs from top B-Schools that I have interacted with are the most KHAJAL( hopelessly useless) beings ever… It is the life’s total accounting – & not merely financial accounting or relationship accounting or any other accounting that counts. Do not be ONLY worried about Placements.
‘Apni Aukaat Badhao — Company waale apne aap Dulhaniya Le jaayegay’.
REMEMBER :- TOTAL ACCOUNTING…
It is a new place and you have worked hard to be here. ENJOY it fully. Make mistakes but do not repeat them.
‘Pankhon ko hawaa jaraa si lagne do ….
Uljhay nahin to kaisey suljhogay ; bikharey nahin to kaisey Nikharogay ….Udney do !!
My sincerest best wishes… Rise & Shine !
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