Monday, March 26, 2007

Good morning

It has been a good morning. We finally matched the Unleash Talent INC internship. A guy called AJ will be joining us from May onwards. He's Nigerian fellow with a good entrepreneurial attitude and passion for leadership.

Those of you who were thinking of applying, don't worry. The TN has been cloned, so you can still apply: TN-In-LK-CN-2007-1271. Those of you who had no idea what this meant, don't worry. It's nothing important for you and no it's not a secret message to take over the world.

As some of you know, my boss co-owns another company called Wild Drift where I sometimes facilitate, too. Here's a piece of feedback that warmed my heart:

"This is one of the best experiences I’ve ever had in my life. The point is that I learned lessons that can never be learned from books and realized there is so much more for me to learn and unlearn. In my opinion your teaching techniques were very effective. It helped me understand some of the things you were trying to tell us. In conclusion, I’d like to thank you for one in a million experience and making me look at life in a totally different perspective. There wasn’t much excitement in my routine daily life [university, books, shopping for shoes etc.] Wish you all the best and hope you’ll get to conduct more and more projects like this in the future."

posted by Tomi Astikainen @ Monday, March 26, 2007 0 comments

Friday, March 23, 2007

Writing

What a wonderful thing writing is... especially fictional writing. One of the reasons why I rarely update my blog is that writing about my own life is too factual. Writing is about inspiring yourself with words, it's about going beyond the limitations of your imagination and finding out what lies in your subconscious. It's about creating characters that start living their own life in a story that you cannot really control completely, but it evolves.

For ten years I have tried to write a full-length novel, but the end result has been just a few pathetic notes, good starts, pages and pages of short stories and an odd poem. Now I think I have finally matured as a writer so much that I can finish what I have started. Why am I so confident that I will finish the book I've now started? Well, I have a plan of the storyline and interesting characters that are weirdly intertwined.

That's my advice to all those 16-year olds who are struggling with writing a book: make a mind map of a) the key characters, b) the support characters, c) a rough story line with the twists and turns, d) role and objectives for each individual part... and then just start writing. In the beginning of each part, you can outline the objectives and deliverables for each chapter. Believe me, this kind of approach helps a lot.

One good tip is not to write in order, i.e. write the parts that you like and later combine them in to a story. Skip chapters and write what you feel that needs to be written right now.

Collect ideas. As soon as you get an idea (in the shower, jogging, on your way to work... it doesn't matter) jot it down and have a place to collect them. That's the way to evolve with the text and add important nuances that keep the reader in a hook.

Then again, one key ingredient is still missing: inspiration! You need to be in a life situation where you can get inspired of small things around you. That's the key to writing colorful text. For me that situation has been living in a completely different country. You find your own way.

Take a break. Leave time for real life. It's easy to get caught up with the imaginary life. Don't let yourself slip into that. It's a mental hazard. Too many young creative minds became prisoners of their own mind when they took their art work too seriously. Relax. Go play basketball or feed your mice. Swim. And then write again.

Get feedback only at right times. Don't expose too much of the unfinished work of art, because you know it's not ready. You will write and re-write it many times. You will delete pages and remove extra characters. You will add new flavors where they are needed. Once you feel like you have a cohesive draft to present to some, let a few trusted people read it and collect feedback. Don't play defensive, but incorporate the feedback in your own creative way.

Finally, let's deal with the demon of time. How many times we find excuses not to write? How many times we think we will write a book once we grow old and wise and when we can retire to solitude somewhere in Lapland, Barbados or in the Alps? When you have a good story, you don't need to sleep 7-8 hours a night. It keeps you awake late in the evening and in the morning you don't want to sleep because you need to get your subconscious on paper.

Now Tomi, I hope you have checked this post at least once during your writing process. As in any good tragedy: It ain't over until the fat lady dies...

posted by Tomi Astikainen @ Friday, March 23, 2007 2 comments

Thursday, March 22, 2007

Exciting times

Usually people are excited of what is going to happen to them. I realized an odd thing about myself: I'm excited of what is going to happen to a community of people. As we welcomed two new trainees, Adelina from Bulgaria and Franky from Hong Kong, I was so happy. I thought it's great for them to be here and that this community is now much stronger and happier.

Of course I'm excited about the fact that I'm going to be in Vienna next week to see my girlfriend and after that meeting all friends and family back home. But at least as exciting for me is to think "Who are the next Unleash Talent INC employees who get a wonderful experience that possibly changes the course of their life?".

I love others happiness. It makes me happy. A wonderful thing indeed...

By the way, tomorrow we interview a Nigerian guy called AJ (Adeola) and simultaneously we are trying to figure out how to get Petsa here to learn with me before we can start things in Finland. He has not said final "yes" yet but he knows I don't take "no" for an answer. :) If you don't know who Petsa is, shame on you!

posted by Tomi Astikainen @ Thursday, March 22, 2007 0 comments

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

Finnish elections

Never before has elections been so important for me. I went voting today, without knowing a single candidate name or number. But I didn't go there so that someone would get my vote, or for any loftier reason like helping my country. No, I went there to meet other Finns... and I did!

The elections were held at Trans Asia hotel. As I entered the election room there were two women sitting behind the table, one Sinhalese and one white. I wasn't sure if the white woman was Finnish so I timidly said "Hello". The Sinhalese woman answered in English, but the white woman said "huomenta" (good morning). I dropped my bag on the floor, lifted my hands in the air and shrieked "Jes, suomalainen!" (Yes, a Finn!). They laughed.

I was so glad to just sit there and talk with them in my own mother tongue. I was already about to leave to work but they urged me to wait for a while (I was their first "customer"). Then a few Finns from the Red Cross came and gave their votes. I joined them and went to the poolside restaurant to have a lunch. There I met a middle-aged woman who was talking all the time. She turned out to be one of those people who love to organize things and get people together. Now I'm invited to Finn's party on Friday to Galle Face Hotel. Excellent! She also insisted that I pop by at their place in Ceylon Towers, since they have sauna and a pool at the top of the building (and yes, it is right on the shore overlooking Indian Ocean). I'll see if I have time to go tomorrow. I'd really love to go to sauna! Finally, she said that as F1 races start, all the Finns get together to blame/cheer Kimi Raikkonen. Sounds like fun, though I'm not that big a Formula 1 fan anymore.

Oh yeah, I did also vote, though it was not the point of this posting. There is something called "election secrecy" (vaalisalaisuus), that I've never really understood. You're not supposed to reveal who you voted for. I do it every time. I like discussing things like that (and some people just got very angry at me). As I mentioned in the beginning, I didn't know any of the 100+ candidates, so I just started browsing. I realized there are even parties I had never heard about before. After some glancing and shallow analysis I decided to give my vote to a guy called Sami Suomalainen (Sami Finn). It was not because of his name, though that also felt like a nice coincidence, considering how "patriotic" I feel at the moment. He's a Green Party candidate who's a Master of Business Administration and an entrepreneur. Sounded like my kind of guy. :)

Umm... did I mention that on 30 March I'm flying out to Vienna to spend 1,5 weeks with Paula in Czech Republic. From there I go for another 1,5 weeks to Finland, in order to see my friends and family. Yep, now it's official! I can't wait.

posted by Tomi Astikainen @ Wednesday, March 07, 2007 7 comments

Monday, March 05, 2007

Soul-searching sun

It’s been nearly two years when I last time reflected on my personal values. Lately, I’ve feel that something in my value system is not right, not up-to-date. People might think that values are something that stays the same throughout one’s life. I agree. But it’s the priority order of values that might change as we go through the storms and blissful moments of our lives. I believe this is what has created the confusion, now that I’ve been going through as shaking experience as Sri Lanka can be.

Previously, in fact as long as I’ve been aware of what values are, I was wondering why most of the people had family as one of their key values and I didn’t. Of course my stormy family history with parents’ divorce and all the repercussions of that had its effect but deep inside I’ve always loved them. Also my sister’s and brother’s families are part of mine. Still, I thought family as a value will never be important for me. Now, however, I’ve not only come into terms with my parents, but learned to love them again, even more than I used to as I was a kid.

However, there’s one more development coming into this equation. I used to be a person who just couldn’t live alone. I thought I value love and affection just for the sake of it. I thought it’s the feeling of being loved by someone that truly matters to me. And it is. But yet again, my time far away from my love has proved that it’s not the physical presence and proximity that I so deeply value. Paula has become part of my family, and I’ve proven to myself that there’s more to it than sheer longing for proximity or affection. Soon we will have our own family, that is part of the bigger family around us and that, my friend, is something truly important for me.

Without further a due, here are my top five values revised and re-prioritized:

  1. Close Friendships
  2. Family
  3. Positive legacy
  4. Growing wisdom
  5. Enjoying the moment

My definition of a friend is “someone who is ready to take a bullet for you and for whom you would do the same thing without hesitation”. I cherish the presence of my most important friends and want to be an integral part of their life, as they are mine.

Family I already explained in depth before. In conclusion: In my family we enjoy mutual, unbiased, and truthful love and take care of each other no matter what happens.

Positive legacy means that during and after my time at the face of the earth, I want people, communities and world to develop in a positive way because of what I started.

Growing wisdom translates to building on my strengths, knowledge and passion in order to constantly search for further development and life wisdom.

Enjoying the moment means that I want to have a freedom to choose how I spend my time in order to live life to the fullest every day.

Finally, for those who are really interested about values and their unsettledness, here is my previous list of values from 2005:

  1. Close Friendships
  2. Making a difference
  3. Love & affection
  4. Enjoying the moment
  5. Personal growth.
To sum it up: The key value is still close friendships. Family has stepped into the picture and “eradicated” love and affection like mentioned before. Making a difference has translated to positive legacy as the means of fulfilling my life vision have become clearer. Personal growth has crystalized into “growing wisdom” and enjoying the moment has stayed the same.

posted by Tomi Astikainen @ Monday, March 05, 2007 1 comments