"The Happyness Formula" book..

Every time I see a self-improvement book in the shelves...I fantasize about myself writing a book someday...

And...how about if we could come up with a formal and conclusive *Happiness Formula"..

Basically the idea would be to derive down a simple and precise formula which could *troubleshoot life* and (probably)...improve your happiness.
(now..this could go on back cover..and by using troubleshoot-your-life phrases..I would have already incepted in the readers mind: your life is pathetic and you need to read this book...etc etc..)

On page one I would like to put this top formula:

(F-1)
Happiness = Health + Money (wealth) + Social life (community) + Meaning (for some of you this would mean spirituality..but this is what not I mean).

Rest of the book would contain some nested formulas(with random permutations and combinations of above components).. that would further explain each component of happiness...
For instance...

(F-2)
Health = Sleep + Diet + Exercise

..down another level..

(F-3)
Sleep = Schedule + Technique

..until it starts getting practical...

(F-4)
Sleep Technique = Consistent bedtime and waking time + no reading or TV in bed + no booze or caffeine…

...and so on.

Going further, just to make *The Happiness Formula* extra useful...the highest priority would appear first (leftmost) in the formula.

For example, in the top Happiness Formula (F-1), health is a higher priority than money, which is a higher priority than social life...etc...

I realize you might not agree with my ranking of priorities..and point out all the exceptions...
For example..you might argue..if you have no money..you might not afford to be healthy. But the formula only shows priorities, not absolutes.

Obviously you always need money flowing in...but take it this way...the priority shows that you shouldn’t take a job with high pay that will significantly affect your health. It makes more sense to get healthy and then leverage your health to get the best job.
And, Healthy looking people land better jobs and are more highly paid. Their brains work better too...and they have more energy...

I have ranked money higher than social life (and meaning)..because once you have money..those other things are easier to get. For instance...you cannot have much of a social life...if you can’t afford to do anything. And..obviously..you can’t make money if your health is a mess...

I would further..go on with some rambling about more of further derived confused fundas ...like explaining how could something like “money” can be broken down into a formula so easily that virtually anyone can just follow it to get more...
(I believe: small, simple and precise is always appreciated)

I think it can be done...

(F-5)
Money = Income + Investments

We could further go ahead with a small and precise Investment plan..endorsed by some economists/financial planners..

(F-6)
Investments = Do these steps in the order shown:
1. Make a will
2. Pay off your credit cards and all other short term loans.
3. Get life insurance if you have dependents.
4. Buy a house if you want to live in a house.
5. Put six months worth of expenses in a money-market.
6. Take whatever money is left over and invest 70% in a stock index fund and 30% in a bond fund and never touch it until retirement.
7. If any of the above confuses you..or you have something special going on (nearing retirement, further studies, tax issues), hire a fee-based financial planner, not the usual insurance-cum-investment agents(they'll mess up your finances).

What stops me from converting this *The Happiness Formula* into a book is...it would hardly be about (say) 20 pages long. Its power is in its brevity, and brevity is not rewarded in our economy.(you know what I mean).
If the best book in the world was only 20 pages long, no one would buy it. They would stand on the shelves and read it cover to cover... :(

Maybe a wiki project would do just fine...
Related: Aim of Life

Who's next...?

This one is on a serious note. CNBC had an excellent talk this Sunday...and here's the pollution:

China's Shanghai stock market had a 9% plunge..and led to a global sell-off on 27th Feb, 2007.
And the question was..who' next?...

I strongly believe(now), it's India next..to me, the country(mostly) looks like it's on the road to a *genuine* economic and political crisis...
(me going pessimist?? NO!...hold on your arguments for a while please...)

Reasons being:

• we're as big as China. It's growing just about as fast...
• Our economy is in more danger of overheating...
• And...we now are more dependent on speculative hot money...
• We have already suffered a ~30% drop in May-June, 2006, so similar volatility cannot be ruled out.

To mention the obvious..any short-term blip in a major developing market such as ours *could* set off big ripples across the globe...

In the long term, however, I think India still remains the most attractive of all global stock markets:

• Our population is younger than China..
• Our education system is expanding and improving..
• Our companies are now more focused on creating wealth for shareholders...ha!

All this makes me more inquisitive...

• Do the long-term rewards outweigh the short-term risks?
• Should I (as investor)..buy in now...determined to weather any storm that may come?
• -> or instead, should I simply wait for the rain to fall and the clouds to clear?...and how long?

Myself..not being a finance expert..but I'll have my take :)

Short-term risks:

• Asset prices are high...so high that they show all the signs of a classic asset bubble. Property values have soared...value of prime office space in metros are up by double digits (>50%) the last year...these high asset prices depend on a flood of easily withdrawn overseas hot money...and India being very dependent on global cash flows...makes it all the more vulnerable
• Bank lending is out of control...RBI trying hard to control it but in vain till now.
• Inflation is out of control. Nationally, inflation recently hit a two-year high of 6.7% and is running even higher specially in rural areas where two-thirds of India resides.

• RBI recently raised its benchmark interest rate to 7.5% at the end of January...without noticeably slowing neither inflation..nor..the lending boom.
• FM has *intelligently* undercut the central bank's efforts...urging banks not to pass on interest rate increase to lenders...kudos!!

Short-term prognosis:

• A big domestic credit crunch ahead...caused when lenders stop lending...and..borrowers can't get the cash they need to run their businesses.
• Causing India to fall far short of all current forecasts of annual growth...foreign investors start withdrawing money from BSE...resulting in yet another *major* correction...
• Consider Congress Party government losing power. After stumbling with politically motivated attempts to reduce food and fuel prices in rural areas...the new government bites the bullet...and raises interest rates, and cuts down bank lending enough to slow inflation...and eventually the economy slows down. On the other hand, this might lead to return of overseas cash back in also.

It won't play out exactly like that, of course :)
It's difficult to predict...how deep any credit crunch might be or how much RBI might have to slow down the economy to reduce inflation to its..so called..5-5.5% comfort zone...

Subduing inflation in India would require big increases in supply...
Indian companies..now operating at full capacity...and with improvements in infrastructure that reduce the costs of moving food and fuel...this seems achieveable.

But, I don't know...
---->how long the Congress government will be able to *cling* to power...
---->how other global markets would react to a big drop in Indian stocks...
---->when all of this *would* happen... :)

The core of the problem (per the talks..):
"The imbalance between urban-areas-quickly-growing-wealthy (in Indian terms..) and rural-areas-left-behind in the boom."

All this mess took a while to create...and it will take a while to correct. Crises could be seen within that 18-24 month window...

Long-term rewards:

• There's no going back to the highly-regulated-economy of the past...open-up is the theme.. Even the Congress Party..(clearly not a friend of open economy)..wasn't able to resist the momentum. And with Indian companies increasingly making big bucks from the global economy, there's no reason to put the genie back in the bottle. That means future growth should be pretty decent..(7-10% ?).
• We have enough numbers (population) to make a decent consumer economy/market. So, even if we are still poorer than China, growth in consumption should be able to take off the overall economy...
• Government realizes the need to catch up...education is getting the attention..and money too. Recent budget has shown the same.
• Thanks to the recent population explosion..half of our population in below 25 years of age...This means that we have the required time to fix our problems before the needs of a huge old aged (60 and older) begin to dip into national savings.....younger economy grow faster..
• Our companies have a culture of creating value for shareholders. It's subjective..but it's important. Many companies here...and some of the biggest...have family driven culture. I think that culture takes much better care of shareholders!..than that of corporate China..where companies are often run to enrich local officials, managers and elites.
• Companies traditionally have shown above-average profitability...inspite of being short of cash flows...so coping up with cash shouldn't be much of a problem.

All in all...India should remain the most attractive stock market in the world in the long term...

Stats: The average return on equity for Indian companies(BSE): 21%.
Average return on equity for the U.S ($INX): 18.7%
-> Middle class population(2005): 200-300 million (approx.)
-> India's Per capita GDP(2005): $3,460
-> China's per capita(2005): $6,660 (We are still poorer than China...)
----> Only 10% of Indians have life insurance.
----> Only 2% have credit cards.
----> Only 15% Indians have refrigerators.

State of affairs...

"A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude. To make them love it is the task assigned,in present-day totalitarian states, to ministries of propaganda,newspaper editors and schoolteachers."

-- Aldous Huxley (1894-1963)
Author Source: Forward to 'Brave New World', 1932

Self Brain Examination...

Just a parody of... you know what!

Brain irregularities have been found rare among women, probably because brains are rare to that subgroup.
Nonethless...if you'r a woman..and unfortunate enough to have a brain...then it is strongly recommended to conduct a self-examination for brain irregularities once every month...

Rub your fingers gently all over your head to check for any lumps. Some lumps are quite benign and can just be ignored..e.g...the nose.

Remember that..some lumps can actually prove beneficial..the nose being a good example.
No..not just because of some healthy nose'y reasons.
Nose can be also used to emit a snort at unexpected moments...to stun the enemy at a distance...or to divert his attention. Some women have (in fact)..mastered the art till the point that they can paralyze an unwary prey at long distance over a mobile phone.

Women in love are considered a high-risk group.
They are susceptible to large emotional swings...and they cause general upheaval among all concerned. Usually these symptoms can be detected as a lump in the throat.. not in the throat of the afflicted woman...but that of the beloved victim...

Women who are in their shopping period should conduct the examination only after atleast a week has elapsed. This is because their bodies are flooded with *loot-o-throne* hormones...which make their brains naturally lumpy during this period.
Women afflicted with credit-card-syndrome should allow 2 extra days to elapse to let the additional hormones subside.


Studies have found two responsible hormones : *loot-o-throne* and *plunder-o-gen*.
These two are countered by a third hormone called *sense-i-mone*.
Female body strives to maintain a very delicate balance of these opposing forces...at all times..
Please be aware that this fine balance can easily be disturbed by triggers like a TV commercial...or...vicinity of a shopping mall.


In case an irregularity is detected...there is no cause for alarm...as the cure is simple: *brain removal*.
Studies have also proved that most daily activities can be performed without it. Some researchers even argue for female brain being a subsidiary organ.
Evidently...some women with severed brains have even gone on to become successful supermodels..TV anchors and bollywood heroines.
It is even suspected that brain removal might be the reason for their success...

laws of Attraction...

A girl..in class..thinking:

"Am I so attractive?..why is everyone trying to impress me?..this never happened in my college days..”

She was just wondering why was she getting so much attention from boys around...

Economics teacher's loud voice interrupted her...

"Prices of goods are decided by forces of demand and supply...when demand for goods is significantly more than supply of goods then prices of goods increase... even though there is no change in the intrinsic value of goods..."

She got the answer.

Edit(6-March-07):
A friend is in college again..and finds oneself in similar situation..so..may be this theory is already validated...

Blogger Fido...

Consider me typing a new blog post, cellphone rings..a friend's call:

Friend: "hey dude..wass..up?...what are you doing..?"

"Writing a blog..expect one of those yet-another-crap-things there in a few moments.." I said.

"Why are you wasting time doing *this* crap?"

"okay...tell me, what should I do?"..suddenly I was inquisitive.

"Study for CAT, GMAT or something...and crack it", he said.

"Then..?"

"You'll get admission...in..may be IIM..(including me, he too had doubts on this)", he continued.

"Then..?"

"You will get placed in a top company with...astronomical salary", he added with an enticing tone..

"What will happen next?"..me going all the more inquisitive..

"Then one day you will become CEO of a big company...then like all modern (read moroon) CEOs you'll want to communicate informally with your customers..employees." he explained...(pretending to be intelligent)

"Then what will I do?"...I asked curiously.

"You will write a blog to communicate with all stakeholders *informally*", he explained..igniting my mind about the word "informally" he used...

"Dude..that's what I'm already doing...writing a blog!"

(remember one of those sprite TV ad?)