Nothing-ness of It All

Imagine a trading floor buzzing with activity – some are on the phone taking cues from a big screen highlighting figures in green and red, the rest are glued in to their terminals and keying in orders furiously. It’s a typical day on Wall Street. “Not only do you put long hours, but the hours that you work for are also quite intense,” says Nitya Sharma, Cofounder & Chief Executive Officer, Simpl – a fintech start-up. He was earlier a bond trader with Goldman Sachs in New York.

It was during one of those rush hours that Sharma felt the need for having a calm mind which can distill the huge flow of real-time information that came to him on a daily basis. “For me, meditation is about controlling my thoughts. In a job where scorecards were written every day and millions were involved, it was necessary for me not to get caught up in the storm. Meditation helped me maintain a calm demeanour to do my job efficiently.”

Initially, Sharma learned by reading and watching videos. It was when he moved to India that he visited the Vipassana centre in Nashik for a 10- day course. “You can’t even carry a pen and notebook with you. It is only you and your thoughts for the entire 10 days.” For Sharma, the major takeaway was how dispensable we all were. “I am a CEO and I am responsible for running my business smoothly, but when I came back nothing had stopped. It’s like nobody noticed my absence. We intellectually know these things, but actually feeling it was quite different.” Meditation has now become an integral part of Sharma's morning rituals. –