Why I am infrequent here ?

I have been working as a social impact consultant from last 8 years and before that was a student of rural management. This parallel journey kept me occupied and took negative toll on 'Sparsh' blog. Due to nature of the work, I started reading blogs related to development studies, social sciences, economics, agriculture, public policy, rural management, and related field. Yet, I found lot of factual blog but very few personal blogs on topics above. So, I created a blog: Diary of Rural Manager! where I have a space to write exclusively on social impact sector, sustainability and rural management. Maybe it was time to admit that I was the writer I was waiting for.

It was cathartic to speak to the community and to feel that I was standing in dialogue with them fully as myself. In the process my ideas started to develop. I could finally articulate what I had only felt vaguely all along the journey. I had even written on the idea behind incubation of Diary of Rural Journey in 2013.

I traveled, lived, worked and enjoyed life as a rural manager in rural India (often referred in popular vocab: the field). I made an effort not to refer rural India with any connotations of exotic otherness. Rural India suggests hardship, bad roads and yet a rough terrain inside mine comfort zone, into the unknown. A journey on muddy road has always showed me to re-examine managerial education, renouncing the elite hook and turn into pragmatist. Actual or feared, exploration is my fuel for the writing.

Why Diary of Rural Manager! blog is important? The writing process of blog helps me to establish today’s insights and record them for posterity. Often, we find that truths established today are thoroughly debunked for at some future time, while some neglected truths are later uncovered and brought to the fore. Blogs, at their heart, have a lot of characteristics that are going away in changing times. Blog had stable URL and can be accessed without any app on any web browser. Blog is  not particularly tied to any platform like Facebook, Instagram or Google.

The difficulty of good blog is not to write, but to convey what one mean and want. Blogging is a game of rhythm but the process of writing usually goes into two distinct modes. In the first mode, its all about endurance and discipline. In the second mode, long periods of inactivity are mixed with brief bursts of power and inspiration. Deadlines for writinf, just don’t work out for me, due to inherent laziness. Blogging like Marginal Revolution , JabberWock, and Cinemascope is a work of a master craftsman who understands that talent and skill has to be paired with tactics and strategy to being success.

Like a startup, blog requires a lot of interaction with potential readers to reach and validate the early stages of the content quality and ease of reading posts and outreach. Otherwise just forcing a way into an idea lead towards a gossip ditch. Idea behind this blog now is to share insights so that more students can avail the benefits of professional counselling and choose the right career at the right time. An information asymmetry acts as an important early career lubricant, allowing the privileged to manoeuvre into more promising career tracks, resist exploitative employment and take risky opportunities – all of which increase their chances of long-term success.

Those who make a commitment to an idea ironically find a sense of freedom. People care about people — and a blog is not a newspaper that has to be published regularly. The neglect of Sparsh has given way to lethargic numbness on personal space. It’s important to nourish yourself; to keep emptying yourself out through words and then filling yourself again with observations and experiences. Easier to say in hindsight today but nothing starts as easy in beginning. Hopefully I shall resume blogging on Sparsh and keep on repeating the process.