Farewell to first 5 weeks of Unreasonability~

Now as I am sitting down to write this post, I think again to myself if it is possible enough to put everything that happened in the past 5 weeks of the Unreasonable Institute in this blog post? ~ Simply not, past month or the five weeks haven't been mere 30 days for us, but its been a lifetime... a whole process of overwhelming knowledge, information, education, learning's and sharing and laughing all together. In short the first five weeks of the Unreasonable Institute have been UNREASONABLE!!!

I remember the first day of the Institute... all the fellows arriving at the Unreasonable "Mansion", awed by the colors of diversity that surrounded us one by one as all of us from 18 countries celebrated a getting-together of the most unreasonable people around the world. It was a moment to behold. For myself it was a moment to acknowledge the fortunate blessings upon my life and to think again of where I come from and where am I... and the gratitude in my heart wasn't in limits, I was in a different world and that feeling is something which just cant be defined at all....

The Unreasonable Mansion was something that I liked with the first sight, with its beautifully structured glass windows to its porch facing the great pride of Boulder, the flat irons, the patio of the house and of course the volleyball court where I learned my first ever volley ball! However, though from all the best things I adored my room, that I share with Maria and Trina the lovely ladies who helped me get together the room in a traditional style representing Sindh and Balochistan! coming back to this room from a whole day sessions at the Institute I feel myself smiling at the fact that I am not far from my traditions.

The Launching ceremony of the Unreasonable Institute was one of the memorable ones, all of us went crazy working on the answer for the question we were asked to speak upon in 2 minutes. Who are you to define progress in our time? I had taken days to find out the exact meaning of this question until finally I had something like this: Who do you think you are?! to actually be defining the meaning of "progress" in America?!
I decided finally not to answer that question and just give an overview to people about what I am doing, I think I did right.

The first week was amazing, luck was on our side as Boulder Creek Festival was taking place in just those days and a lot of us headed down there and enjoy the soothing sound of the beautiful creek. Although among the best things was trying to win big stuffed toys by throwing rings around bottle heads, when I am saying "trying", I mean banging our heads on a wall, the rings were the size of bracelets which flew down the rack of bottles while we grasped our breath and our eyes glued to the movement of that sacred last piece while it swooshed in the air, taking dramatic strides, we gasping even more, not even moving our eyelids, pausing the whole crowd surrounding us, fists in the air and there! the ring would not go in the bottle and instead of a big YES we ended up exhaling HAA's of sadness while proud winners made a big deal of fluffing the stuffed toys in front of us... we went on trying something else. Ullas, Maria, Cesar and Fernando tried walking on strips, falling each second while on the same spot kids of four to six years were flying in the sky tied to strips... I am simply amazed to see all this.

Another of the best things about the Unreasonable Institute along with the amazing founders is the mentors. Evey day a great mentor would arrive at the Institute and apart from a mentor session, they facilitate workshops from organizational legal structure to financial models, from networking to building a strong team, and that not being enough we get to have office hours with them. I remember the first one I signed up for and kept thinking the whole time what are people supposed to talk to mentors in office hours except for the weather. Things eased up when I saw that the mentor itself was quite confused on how he is supposed to run the office hours. However, this have been a great help to all us fellows as it gives us the opportunity to engage in 1 on 1’s and build powerful relations with our mentors to learn as much as from them as possible.

In fact that’s greatest thing I have learned in the very beginning of the Unreasonable Institute is the power of 1 on 1's, how effective it is to develop a powerful relationship with one person at a time. I learned how each single person in this world holds a story within them, a unique experience from their life which to the second person is of course new and the fact that if this unique experience is shared with other, it becomes a rare knowledge which is only possible by building powerful relationships and networking with people, observing each one as a resource. I just cant believe how blessed we are to live close to people, people surrounding us at our home, at workplaces, at grocery stores even and each one of them is a rare, unique resource!

This reminds me of all the times us fellows spent together in the past month, learning from each other, laughing with and "on" each other, hence developing a powerful bond of a family, one of the best times I believe we all had together from dozens others is the courageous plan of water rafting/tubing. It was one of those days in Boulder, sunny, warm and clear with patches of white clouds floating in the sky making the horizon look like a basket of diamonds and hence our week long email exchange about the grand-day-to come had finally paid off. And when all the proud fellows with huge tubes in their hands made their way to the Boulder creek, it was a sight to behold...until, a few of us couldn’t help grasping for air or murmuring a not-so-silent EEK! seeing the crazy fast flowing water making its way in seconds to the end of each turn banging waves in every rock and tree... It was impossible for a human being to climb down in this water and come back with bones all joined together. Matt tried to experience it, but not far enough in the water he announced that his legs are frozen enough and Ben can rescue him.... and thus they all decided to have picnic in a nearby park where I spent my whole time chasing kids until the warriors made their way back to the Unreasonable Mansion with tubes still in their hands.


For some reason all this sense-of-family is scary in one sense too, The signs show its going to be a dangerous experience ending the Institute of Unresaonability.... even from my own experience I remember my visit to Nashville a few days ago, leaving Boulder for the first time for three days and counting each single second in Nashville till the time I came back and sighed with relief to see my big family. Talking to one of the founders I did mention that we perhaps would need mentors in the end days who are psychiatrists, as some of us might not be able to take the separation when its time to leave the Unreasonable Institute... Okkk lets not talk about that...