The Year called 2018: A Throwback

Throwback

It is always nice to look back at the year that has just passed by. When I look at 2018, this is what it threw back at me,

January 2018

I think I know you… Karunya, Do I?, gets published as a paperback edition.

However accomplished an author becomes with time, his first book remains closest to him forever. My first book My School “My Father”: everyday parenting would always be special for me. It was because it was a work which was converted out of my raw feelings about the parents-children relationship and not because it is now an Amazon Number one best-selling book on parenting.

With all the accolades I received for my first book in the year 2016 and 2017, I forayed into fiction and wrote my first romantic-thriller novel, I think I know you…Karunya, Do I? in 2017. But the day I received the first paperback copy of my second love, I had an unexplainable spur of joy, something that you can only have when you hold it in your hands, hug it to your heart and feel the shape, size and smell of your paperback book.

The paperback got published by My Books Publication, one of the most promising publishers in Delhi. It was a moment of pride, happiness and achievement.

I think I know you… Karunya, Do I? Gets launched at the world famous, New Delhi World Book Fair in January 2018 as a paperback edition by My Books Publication.

What followed suit after it got printed was that my publisher, My Books Publication unveiled its cover page and the paperback book at the world famed, New Delhi World Book Fair 2018. I had an ounce of sadness looming over me, because I knew I would not be present at the launch. It was because it was an overnight decision by my publisher, the late. Mr. MoolChand Chauhan. He decided to squeeze in a slot for my book launch at the last moment along with other seven books, the slots for which had been decided weeks back.

Right there stepped in my partner for life beyond life, Ratika S. Panicker, who pitched in at my place and unveiled the paperback edition of my second book and first fiction novel, I think I know you…Karunya, Do I?

Being a professional corporate trainer that I am, whose calendar gets blocked by the fifteenth of the last month of the quarter, was training his participants in some other city miles away. I got to see the footage of the Facebook live, later in the evening that which I watched with pride sitting in the comfort of my hotel.

When my wife, was pitching in for me and speaking about my journey as an author and the struggles I had faced in my life, I not for a moment felt that I could have expressed that in any better way. Click to Watch the launch of I think I know you Karunya, Do I? at the New Delhi World Book Fair 2018

Attended the famous ZEE Literature festival 2018 with my publishers, MoolChand Chauhan and Mr. Shahid Khan.

If that was not enough, I got an opportunity to attend my first ever Literature festival, the mecca of all literature festivals in the country, the ZEE Jaipur Literature festival along with my publishers late MoolChand Chauhan and Mr. Shahid Khan, as delegates.

It was a lifetime experience watching the who’s who of the literature world, right from the famous baadshah of crime writing Mr. Surender Mohan Pathak to Shashi Tharoor, Chetan Bhagat, Ashwin Sanghi, Amish Tripathi, and many more.

At the literature festival I got an opportunity to meet many new authors and authors published by my publisher. It was also an event where the first Amazon’s Pen to Publish Contest 2018’s final results was to be announced. The winner was to receive a contract for a paperback edition with Westland publications, a reward of Rs. 10, 00,000 and mentoring by one of the five panel judges. That’s where I happened to meet the winners J. Alchem and Sudha Nair, much before they went on stage.

Later in the day, my publishers and I along with other published authors of My Books Publication enjoyed our stay in ways more than one. We happened to visit a Book Cafe by the name Step out Cafe where we went live on Face book and shared our experience at the Zee Jaipur Literature festival, our feedback, the shortfalls and the strengths of such literature festivals. We had Shaveta Dham, another author who has penned down a beautiful book called Emotions in my basket. Accompanying her was her family that included her lovely supportive husband and a powerhouse of talent, her daughter.

February 2018

Attended a book reading event at Dehradun organized by Creative Colours and powered by My Books Publications.

For all the time management tricks I apply to plan my quarterly calendar right to the last hour, this invitation by Creative Colours at the last moment was something I had to squeeze out of my personal family time. Sunday is one day that I completely avoid meeting or socializing with professional relationships, because that’s one day I reserve for all my personal relationships. But when insisted by the publisher I agreed to participate in this book reading event organized by Creative Colours at Dehradun, in an open-mic session.

I recited an excerpt, the opening chapter of my book; I think I know you…Karunya, Do I? It was altogether a different experience in itself. Witnessing young talents display their talent of poetry, comedy and prose was an absolute treat.

I was also invited there as a judge but trust me it was difficult for me to judgr and choose the best out of such an amazing pool of talent.

Reading out loud the story of Karunya and Aasma before a seventy odd crowd was no less splendid for me. I tried and made an effort to match to the mesmeric environment the other poets, stand-up comedy artists and the authors had created. I think I did a pretty fair job.

Click this link to watch the recorded video of the book reading event.

March 2018

The World Image Solutions along with Horizon interviewed me through New Orleans Talk Network, live from New Orleans, USA.

It was again a moment of extreme pride, because on March 21, 2018 7 PM CDT/ 8PM EDT and 06:30 AM IST, Meet The World Image Solutions along with Horizons interviewed me live from New Orleans, through NOTN, New Orleans Talk Network. The hostess, Rhonda M. Lawson, interviewed the two of us stretching from Indiana in US to India, in the same interview show and telecasted the show Live on Facebook, You Tube and Periscope.

The other author on show was Jim Peters, author of Black Swan Planet, a science fiction author from Indiana, in the US. It was again an experience of a life time, being on a first ever online Live interview and its only Rhonda, Jim, I and the sound recording artist who knows what went behind the scene, trying to put all our efforts for the show to go live.

On the day of interview ten minutes before the interview, there were multiple audio-video glitches, which we together sorted out well on time and the interview began. Click this link to watch my interview with Rhonda Lawson.

April 2018

Attended the MS Talks event in Delhi with the publisher, My Books Publication.

Invited as one of the guests at a public speaking event organized by MS Talks India, was another feather in my cap. I got to witness six wonderful speakers coming from six different realms of life, right from a retired Brigadier from the Indian Army, to an International Motivational Speaker to a travel blogger and a female motorist. It was again one splendid event where each of the speakers enthralled us with their real life incidents and stories. The audience was awe-struck listening to their inspiring stories, and the pool of fifty like minded people including the audience learned, enjoyed and went back home a lot more inspired.

May 2018

Invited as a Motivational Speaker at the MS Talks platform, where I shared my story of how I changed my life using the power of mind.

The next was an invitation that came my way from the founder of MS Talks India, a dynamic and extremely inspiring Sikh Mr. Supreet Arora, fondly called Author Sherry. He is not only a maverick public speaker but also an equally talented author with his first book, Unleash the Hidden Potential doing amazing sales on Amazon.

Along with the other five speakers, I shared my story of how I changed my life by training my mind by using the power of my subconscious mind. It was one amazing reflection of the part of my entire life story I have had so far. Watch me sharing my story of how I changed my life by training my mind at MS Talks India, May 2018.

The video went viral and continues to be a video with maximum number of views uploaded by MS Talks India’s You Tube Channel.

Announcement of the Hindi edition of My School “My Father” is made. The month of publishing the Hindi edition was decided as November first week.

After my first book, My School “My Father” had become a best-selling book on Amazon and then an Amazon number one best-selling book, I had been receiving thousands of e-mails and social media requests by my readers to come out with its Hindi edition also.

The book when first published in 2016 was an English edition only. I therefore made an announcement to come out with its Hindi edition in November 2018.

Read about the extremely talented Hindi poet and author, Mr. Ashutosh Gupta who co-translated with me my first book, My School “My Father” into Hindi.

Invited as a keynote motivational speaker and judge to an Inter-School debate competition at Lotus Valley International School, Noida along with Mrs. Sutapa Basu, the author of the famous book Padmavati, as the other judge.

This was one eventful month in 2018. I received an invitation from the number one International school, Lotus Valley International School, Noida to judge an Inter-School debate contest – Battle of Words. Read the coverage of this event on the School’s website.

As I delivered a motivational key-note on the most important aspects to keep in mind while debating on any topic, I stressed on the importance of voice modulation, rate of speech, gestures, postures and knowing your content. I went on adding that in the end as the results get announced what would matter will not be about who wins or loses but who out of their individual classes were good enough to get selected to represent their school and what they learned from this exposure.

The co-judge at the event was Ms. Sutapa Basu, the author of the famous book Padmavati and the recent Genghis Khan.

Amazon best-selling book My School “My Father” achieves its best ever milestone of getting crowned as the Amazon Number One Best-Selling book.

May was turning out to be the best month of 2018 for me. My first book achieved a milestone which every book out of the millions available on Amazon longs to achieve. It was crowned as the number one best-selling book on Amazon.

For an author with just two books published, milestones like this propel the writer in him to produce his best works, and that’s what it did to me. I was on cloud-nine but took a resolution right in the middle of the year to dedicatedly put myself to a routine of regular writing. I started with fifteen minutes every day and today as I am writing this blog post, I write at least for three hours every day, with not a moment of so called writer’s block.

June 2018

A new YouTube Channel Ajit Panicker- a Master Glocal Storyteller gets launched.

A lot of people in my journey called life so far have christened me as a Jack of all trades, the idiom that I have always loved finishing for them, ‘and master of none.’

Exploring new things in my life has been my second nature. I have been so adventurous with my life, so much that people had started feeling that this boy is restlessly impatient and unstable.

Who would tell all these uselessly good for nothing people who are available around you and me only to pass their ever ready comments?  I not only wanted to see this beautiful world through its various forms of creation and learn, but it was also one of the ways to immune myself from the burnout, that comes when doing one single thing for a very long time. Today I am an author, an International Master Life skills trainer, a behavioural science expert, a planner, a content design specialist, a master facilitator, a motivational speaker, a training project manager, a voice over actor, a narration artist, a storyteller and the biggest of them, a passionately curious learner for life.

After becoming an author, to avoid the mental ‘writer’s’ block that most of the authors of our generation face, I started diverting my mind into my other areas of interest and hobbies. One among them was telling stories. So in June 2018, I launched my second You Tube Channel ‘Ajit Panicker- the Master Glocal Storyteller’ to recite stories from Indian Mythology in Hindi and English.

An attempt that began as a rejuvenating exercise is slowly turning into a craze for all who have begun listening to it. I receive raving reviews and feedback from across the world for the audio-video stories narrated by me on this channel.

Subscribe to this new channel Ajit Panicker ~ the Master Glocal Storyteller.

You can also subscribe to my first official YouTube Channel which is all about my work as an author, motivational speaker and life coach.

September 2018

A new series called Ajit Panicker’s L.S.D, a collection of unconfessed stories of love, lust and treachery gets announced.

I have been working on two fiction books, The Writing Alchemist and The Boy, from past one year, but the kind of research both of these books required, I was not able to come out with any new book in 2018, although the Hindi edition of My School “My Father” got published later in November.

This was not fair to my ever increasing base of readers. So that I could buy time from them and to enliven my dream of writing a hybrid genre I decided to write my first series in romance-thriller-crime-suspense category. That’s how the series Ajit Panicker’s L.S.D was born in my mind. It is a series as a collection of ten unconfessed stories of love, lust and treachery. It is currently in the editing stage, and the first free to read story should get published on 15^th January 2019, followed by one story every month for the next nine months of 2019. The rest of the nine stories would be available for a buy on Amazon.

You would just hate, not to love this mind-boggling strange human relationship series full of love, romance, crime, suspense, deceit, extra marital and murders

October 2018

An initiative to provide #101TipstolearnEnglish gets launched on Facebook Page.

Being a life skills trainer, I conduct training workshops for different set of audiences. One among them is a type that has major language problem with English. As we all know the colonial rule by the Britishers to this date continues to strongly overwhelm with its extensive importance of the English language in the lives of Indians. In the so-called modern developing India, we still feel and accord an overbearing importance to this global language.

But because we all know, that in the India we live today, so that we can grow faster and to avail many such better opportunities that are only available to a group of people who have good command on this language, we have to master this language. Let’s not overlook its importance just because we are proud nationalists. It is just another language and it always good to have command over one more language than the national language.

With the intent to help all such people who don’t have resources and the facilities to avail the various ‘Learn fluent English’ institutes, I started this initiative on my Facebook page, #101TipstoLearnEnglish. To find all the tips I have shared so far use the hash tag #101TipstoLearnEnglish on Facebook.

With the intent to help all such people who don’t have resources and the facilities to avail the various ‘Learn fluent English’ institutes, I started this initiative on my Facebook page, #101TipstoLearnEnglish. To find all the tips I have shared so far use the hash tag #101TipstoLearnEnglish on Facebook.

Cover Page of the first independent story of L.S.D- That Sinful Day.

For Ajit Panicker’s L.S.D, the series that was announced in September, I managed to get my designer create a beautiful cover page for its first story for an online reveal. The cover page for the first story, That Sinful Day, that would be available for free to read by 15^th January 2019, was revealed.

Announcement of Chat over Chai with Ajit Panicker.

This is something that was announced, though at a very early stage. It is a chat show that I intend to start anytime towards the end of 2019. The announcement was made that it would be a chat show where we would interview people from the various walks of life who are being evangelist to the society in general. Anyone who is trying to make an attempt to do anything substantially good for the people in the society would be eligible to get invited as the guest of the talk show.

The chat show would be “Chat over Chai with Ajit Panicker”. The latest development on this is that the founder-Curator of The Vent Machine, Ms. Surabhi Pandey has agreed to be part of this project.

Announcement of Ignite Your Passion, a signature program to be launched as a free seminar made.

With the ten signature programs that I have designed in my stint as a master trainer facilitator and designer, I added one more program to it, this month. Announcement of the eleventh signature program by Ajit Panicker, “Ignite Your passion- Succeed with undying fire inside your belly” was made.

Launch of MS Talks Online Workshop for writing skill development. First session of How to write a best-selling book? – Introduction to the stages of writing a best-selling book.

In collaboration with MS Talks India and after rounds of discussions with Mr. Supreet Arora, the founder of MS Talks India, we launched a skill workshop online on the art of writing a book. The announcement of thirteen sessions under this series names “How to write a best-selling book?” was announced.

Then one after another on every alternate Mondays starting October end moving into November, I conducted four  different sessions under this series. It was a free workshop on a specially made whatsapp group with about 191 members. It was usually conducted at 8 pm on alternate Sundays in October and November for duration of 30-60 minutes.

Session I: Introduction to the stages of writing a best-selling book

Session II: How to identify my objective of writing a book?

Session III: How to identify my target audience ‘my readers’?

Session IV: How to make the ideation stage of writing a book fruitful?

November 2018

Announcement of Collaboration with The Vent Machine

An announcement of a fervent collaboration with The Vent Machine was made to bring out before the world, stories of those heroes and sheroes who have been through different types of extremes in life and have come out as winners.

Read about the Fervent Collaboration with The Vent Machine

MSMF Hindi edition gets published.

Finally my third book My School “My Father” gets published, though a translated work. It is a work of co-translation that I have done along with a renowned Hindi poet and author Mr. Ashutosh Gupta. You can buy My School “My Father” – Hindi edition using this link

December 2018

Accomplished reading 46/50 books at the Goodreads Reading Challenge.

For the last three years starting 2015 I have participating in the Goodreads Reading Challenge every year with about 18/50 books read in 2015, 22/50 books read in 2016, 34/50 books read in 2017 . I came closest to the reading challenge this year by finishing 46/50 books.

One who motivates me to read exactly 50 books every year is Bill Gates, who has a habit of reading at least 50 books every year. 

Went Live to launch Life Stories by Ajit

Life Stories by Ajit, a series of real life stories was announced to get published on The Vent Machine, the famous Singapore blog. This #LifeStoriesByAjit series is about real people with real life struggles and the way they overcame those extremes, and are now leading a mainstream life. They today inspire people around them through their story. Read about the unveiling of the Life Stories by Ajit.

The first story of Mohit Chauhan got published on 25^th December 2018. The story has been receiving raving reviews and feedback ever since that day. I went live on 21^st December 2018 at 8 PM to discuss the reasons, the idea and the inspiration behind this initiative and why I decided to collaborate with The Vent Machine. 

Watch the Unveiling of the Life Stories by Ajit, the launch and the Q&A session that followed.

An exclusive interview with The Vent Machine

A day before the first story of Life Stories by Ajit went live on The Vent Machine, the founder of TVM, interviewed me on her blog. This interview briefly talks about my real story, struggles, aspirations and vision of what I wish to see the world as. Read my exclusive interview by Ms. Surabhi Pandey, on her blog The Vent Machine.

First story of #LifeStoriesByAjit gets published on The Vent Machine: Story of Mohit Chauhan.

On 25^th December 2018, the first story of Life Stories by Ajit gets published on The Vent Machine.

This story is not that of the great Prithvi Raj Chauhan. He has not won battles for the country but his battle with his own life and his ‘ThisAbility’ oops disability is no less than Prithvi Raj Chauhan. He is Mohit Chauhan, a man who struggles, fights for his own survival every day with no less valour. Read his story on #LifeStoriesByAjit powered by The Vent Machine.

Invited as a Motivational Speaker and judge at the Public Speaking Contest organized by RevUp Life Skills Unit.

The penultimate day before the year ended was an invitation to be a judge and a motivational key note speaker at a public speaking contest organized by one of the revolutionary start-ups, brain child of Nancy Juneja, RevUp Life Skills unit. It is a platform to groom young children to become great orators and public speakers.

My key note address was on how reading and writing as a habit can change your life forever. I shared a story and with it I tried making my point of how one can master reading, writing and public speaking skills as a child. With the parents of the children from five years to sixteen years enthusiastically participating in the event, it was one awesome event to end the year with. \”

That was one of the best ever throwback.

Thank you for staying till the end of this blog post to read and witness my throwback of the year 2018.