GIVE TO GAIN

 

Give to gain

It's that simple.

But when you give never expect that those who have been given are going to give you back. They'll never.

However you will gain from unexpected locations.

If your needs are met you don't have to bear any grudge  towards those who have been recipients of your munificence.

Now comes the question. 

What are you willing to give?

Not a curated social media post or a token gesture, but real giving - the kind that creates opportunity, visibility. advocacy and forward momentum.

It is common knowledge this is a world seeped in gender disparity as well as gender inequality.

Gender equality in practice  means redistribution in access, information, influence and power. It is the very thing people champion in keynote addresses and guard against in closed door meetings.

Redistribution requires someone, somewhere, to loosen their grip.

'Give to Gain' rests on a simple principle. 

When women thrive, everyone benefits. Not metaphorically. Not eventually. But at once.

Leaders shape culture by what they reward and what they refuse to ignore. Silence amplifies injustice.

Today, leaders cannot afford that silence.

When men champion equality visibly, equality shifts from rhetoric to reality. 

Equality is not a power swap. It is the sharing of power. And sharing, as anyone who has ever split a dessert knows, can mean accepting that your share of the pie may be smaller.

If we want parity in leadership, we ought to begin it at home. Who serves, who speaks and whose ambitions are encouraged to expand rather than shrink, matter much.

When domestic labour is shared and ambition is encouraged equally for sons and daughters, we reset expectations. We often call women Griha Lakshmi. But we overload them with invisible work.

True respect means redistributing responsibility. Homes that treat daughters as future leaders and not future liabilities build confidence in everyone.

For, women and men, giving means creating real access to opportunities, leadership roles, fair payouts and the confidence to speak freely.

It also means flexibility, recognition and space to grow without judgement.

Empowerment becomes visible only when it is visible in everyday life.

If treaded with the truest vision, Give to Gain is the gateway for mankind to reach out to the stars.

Lynn Lobo

The Future is She

Circulated with 

Trivandrum Times

Times of India

8 March 2026

GENDER IS NEVER A HANDICAP

 Geetanjali Vikram Kirloskar

She did not inherit leadership. It was built brick by brick. It happened as she joined her husband, Vikram Kirloskar. They built the business, together. Her early days were in advertisement and television. She stepped into leadership when she lost Vikram. The grief was irreparable. But she gathered herself. She said, "You don't know how strong you are until you are hit by a storm. You either collapse. Or you emerge stronger. I chose to emerge stronger."

She went on transforming grief into  resolve. Though Vikram was not there, it was a shared legacy she had carried forward.

She insists that women, instead of getting preoccupied with the gender divide, must focus on adding value. Women in leadership have to speak better. They don't have to speak louder. But they have to create a measurable impact.

She perceives, women can be creative and compassionate. But they can also be firm. They can apply at once emotional intelligence and rational thinking. They know how to compartmentalize and move ahead. Depending on what the moment and the role demand, they can be strategic and decisive. They straddle contradicting dimensions,  empathy and assertiveness and intution and logic with ease. The balance they strike makes their presence invaluable.

No wonder, excellence alone stands out. There is little space for mediocrity.

Gender is never a handicap.

Kavya Christopher 

in Trivandrum Times

Sunday Times of India

8 March 2026

TRAIN LIKE A ROOKIE

 

Jasprit Bumrah knows he is the most complete pacer going around. He also knows that to maintain that, he has to train like a rookie every day.

Two evenings before a crucial match, he opted to bowl in an empty net, with two boots on either side of the batting crease. He kept hurling yorkers for a good 45 minutes. It was a drill he had started in December 2025.

Mohammed Siraj went up to him. He asked Bumrah, "Why do you need to practice bowling yorkers? You can get up from sleep in the middle of the night and land those yorkers."

Bumrah smiled nailed another perfect yorker that displaced one of the boots, and said,"It's very important."

At 32, after multiple injuries and several match winning performances across formats for over a decade, Bumrah still puts himself through drills that a 16 year old would do at academy level. It just speaks of his constant hunger to be the best and remain at the top.

Times of India 

7 March 2026

............................

Switch over.

There is no magic. You need to be at it like Bumrah, who trains like a rookie.

MORPHING IN THE SCIENTIFIC AND SPIRITUAL CONTEXTS

 Adam Grant writes in THINK AGAIN

"We celebrate great entrepreneurs and leaders for being strong-minded and clear-sighted. They are supposed to be paragons of conviction, at once, decisive and certain. Yet evidence reveals that when business executives compete in tournaments to price products, the best strategists are actually slow and unsure. Like careful scientists, they take their time so they have the flexibility to change their minds.

Just as you don't have to be a professional scientist to reason like one, being a professional scientist doesn't guarantee that someone will use the tools of their training. Scientists morph into preachers when they present their pet theories as gospel. They treat thoughtful critiques as sacrilege. They veer into political terrain when they allow their views to be swayed by popularity rather than accuracy. They enter prosecutor mode when they're hell-bent on debunking and discrediting rather than discovering. After upending physics with his theory of relativity, Einstein opposed the quantum revolution: "To punish me for my contempt of authority, Fate has made me an authority myself.'

Sometimes even great scientists need to think more like scientists."
...................

There is true similarity in what is stated  here on the trajectories of many Indian churches. Ascribing  whole credit to Adam Grant, for his brilliance,  his ideas are borrowed to cobble together  disapproval over derailment of values  in the erring churches.

Though trained well in the scriptures, the preachers present their pet theories as gospel overriding what is really in the gospel. They treat thoughtful critiques as sacrilege. They veer into political terrain when they aliow their views to be swayed by popularity as well as selfishness or selfcentredness rather than what the gospel presents or advocates. They enter the prosecutor mode when they are hell-bent on debunking and discrediting those who hold on to what the gospel really means. 

Believe it or not, many churches in India - not all of them - are in a mess today.

Faith has morphed into politics and money power. Faith is listless. Faith is cosmetic these days. Wealth, gained through means fair and foul, holds supremacy. 

A tectonic shift in the equation alone could banish or eradicate the rut and retrieve those churches on the cusp from absolute disaster and perpetual ruin.

CMC VELLORE THE NO NONSENSE REFUGE

Jeevan C George loved playing badminton. One day while playing the game spiritedly he had accidentally sprained the ankle.  He found it difficult to tread along. He went for treatment. It was stabilised. But he was advised to stop the foray into badminton and to go for surgery to correct  the disability.

He is young. He found the pull back in life harrowing. Though he consulted several specialists, the line of treatment suggested was similar. 

I asked him to visit CMC Vellore if all the avenues were exhausted. Why I suggested CMC was because they are  mostly the no nonsense kind.

My cousin's son after visiting several hospitals and going through three or four streams of treatment, admissions and coughing out a sizeable sum had finally consulted CMC at my prodding. 

The first question they asked after putting him through a series of tests was, 'why did you let your son consume so much medicine.'

Finally they advised him to go for an inhaler and no other medicine was prescribed.

The boy was having a difficult time with a persistent cough that had refused to depart.

He had to quit several jobs due to the severity of the ailment.

After CMC his cough left him. 

An engineering graduate, he is now employed abroad. He leads a perfectly healthy life.

THE BEST LEARNING

 

"The best learning happens out in the middle"

Zubin Bharucha, cricket coach. He has worked with  Sanju Samson, Kerala Cricketer since Sanju was 17.

If we apply what the coach  said to our own lives it is one hundred percent true.

We learn best when we do any job, when we are on our own job and when we immerse ourselves into the vexing issues that dawn upon us while on the job.

Indeed, the best learning happens out in the middle.

You will be on your own. You have no escape. You have to go deep into it single handedly and come out with solutions to ensure your own survival.

 

HE DREW THE CROSS WITH HIS HANDS

Sanju Samson drew the cross with his hands expressing  gratitude to the almighty after India's victory in the T 20 Cricket match against West Indies

It was similar to Jemima Rodriguez praising Jesus for strengthening her to play the vital role  in the Semifinal

A reception had been held in honour of the Women's Cricket team for winning the championship.

The best player in the finals had a tattoo of  Lord Hanuman. 

She was asked  how Lord Hanuman had helped her in the pursuit towards victory.

She replied Lord Hanuman was the force behind her stupendous success

All said and done, Hinduism is the most tolerant religion in the world. In all these 5000 years they have not initiated any pogrom. 

Partition of India was not their idea. It was sowed by the British. And the unsuspecting people had  walked into it.

If the majority were intolerant, no one other than them would have been here.

The respect they offer Christians, the Christians at times do not exhibit towards  fellow Christians.

Who is intolerant? Introspect.

Of course there are Graham Steins and a host of others. 

But that does not stain the tolerant multitude.

Please think why Jesus was here. He came to save sinners. Not Christians.

It is not fair to think that  those who are not baptised are all sinners.

Are the baptised free from SIN?

Please read Keys of the Kingdom by AJCronin.  

Now for Samson. He was never kept out. He was given opportunities to perform.

He relentlessly prayed. 

He believed. 

The God he trusted, led him on.

He peformed.