Laziness, thy name is Baldev!
Oxford medical dictionary defines laziness as: “quality of being unwilling to work or use energy”. I believe the definition needs to be modified.
My personal definition of laziness is “attempting to get maximum output out of minimum input.” That has been the guiding principle of my entire life. I have always felt that “laziness” can and does lead to
innovation.
Here is an example of that.
It was December 31, 2018. It was my desire to send a new year wish to some of our classmates who I was in regular touch with over the years. These included Vibha, Naresh Sardana, Neera, Kapil, Rajinder
Kahlon, Sukhi in India and Narinder Batra, Manu, Navkiran, Maninder Arora and Dhan Raj Agarwal overseas (my apologies if I forgot any names). True to my laziness and considering that it was too much
work to send wishes to everyone individually, I put the names together in a single WhatsApp group and sent the wishes. The responses were encouraging.
Little did I realize then that the foundation of a bigger group of our classmates had been laid!
Most of the year 2019, the group stayed quiet until Diwali greetings were exchanged, and Manu sent pictures to the group of Diwali decorations at our alma mater in the Anatomy and Physiology
departments and the principal’s office.
Fast forward to the eve of 2020, similar wishes were exchanged again.
February 25, 2020, was a usual busy day in the office. My wife Rita and I were still trying to get over Jet Lag after our annual India visit. Neera texted me to add Jyotsna, her friend and classmate since
elementary school to the group. That day was the turning point for the group. I did add Jyotsna to the group right away and that same day something monumental happened. Jyotsna suggested that we
contact other classmates, and she would call them to participate. She started the project and within a week we touched the half century mark. Another week passed and we were 80 plus in the group.
As the saying goes “You build it, and they will come…”.
Yes, they came in droves!
Everyone helped by providing contact information of the ones they knew. It was a busy couple of weeks for me – adding so many of us to the group. But it sure was worth it!
Navkiran then advised me to add another Admin (Jyotsna) in India to share the workload and I did exactly that. Jyotsna has won the admiration of all for her calls on everyone’s birthdays and marriage
anniversaries. Monitors Balwinder and Sanjiv Sood have helped in their own unique ways.
Three and a half years later, we still count ninety members and another ten to fifteen who are not in the group for various reasons but still in touch on an individual basis.
Like any big and diverse group of individuals sharing a common platform, true to our individual personalities, there are some who are very active and others who post occasionally and still others who
hibernate for prolonged periods of time.
But we all love to be in touch with each other and have mini get togethers in India and abroad.
The precious pearls that were scattered all over the world after 1978 are now together forming a beautiful necklace of pearls!
So, let’s think again.
Laziness can be a virtue after all!
-Baldev
