Season 5: From January 2019 onwards
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - October 2019
|
Madhusudhanan Kalaichelvan
An aborted academic program in the US. A failed, debt-laden business. A sense of cluelessness. And the pain of being constantly judged and misunderstood by others. These were what led Madhu to his Bliss. His qualification as an architect helped certainly. “But it was the search, the seeking spirit in me that opened the door,” he says. One day, when he was in the “throes of confusion and darkness”, he asked himself what made him “deliriously happy”. “History + Architecture + Teaching” was the answer he got. He spontaneously embraced this clarity and employed his training and creativity to be who he is today – a professor and heritage expert; he “loses himself” telling stories of people, places, events and monuments from time immemorial! Karthik Anantharaman – Actor Karthik believes he followed his Bliss to be an actor only because of his innate ability to flow with Life! Admittedly, he had no dreams and no ‘serious ambitions’; and he was ‘pretty okay’ being an SAP executive at a Gurgaon firm. But an impromptu decision to enrol for a theatre workshop in mid-2008 changed his Life! Forever. In July 2012, several plays and a Malayalam film later, he landed in Chennai - with no job and no contacts! Yet, in the last 7 years, he has done plays with Theatre Nisha, written scripts and dialogues, been a production controller for ‘Harmony with A R Rahman’ and done a lead role in an independent film, ‘Revelations’ – all this, simply, “for the love of what gives him the greatest joy – just being”! |
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - August 2019
|
Suresh Kumaraswamy
Suresh had one more decade to go for his retirement as a senior management member in a software MNC. But his quest to seek ‘an identity beyond his business card’ led him to the very first Edition of The Bliss CatchersTM on January 22, 2015. The following month, Suresh quit his job as he felt his quest had a validation. He then enrolled for his Master’s in Sanskrit – a language he deeply related to and always wanted to learn – at Vivekananda College. He’s since completed his MA and MPhil in Sanskrit (in 2018). Suresh is our homegrown #BlissCatcher – he was inspired to follow his bliss by this Program! Srivatsan Sankaran Imagine being born hearing impaired. Imagine, after graduating as an engineer, landing a well-paying job at a top IT company. And then imagine quitting that job at 23 (in 2014) to follow your bliss – photography, because you are ‘madly obsessed’ with it! And then imagine setting up two exciting ventures – Madras Photo Bloggers and Travel Tales, traveling to 300+ destinations, covering 30+ festivals in India, conducting several photo tours and walks and writing 30 travelogues! Imagine living Life the way you want to live it! That’s Srivatsan Sankaran for you – he’s gutsy, he’s adventurous, he’s a #BlissCatcher! 
|
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - July 2019
|
Karthikeyan Pitchaimallian
Karthik grew up doing art and stayed connected with it for the first decade of his working Life. Yet it was in 2011 that he discovered that art was his bliss. That year, to get his mind off a crisis-ridden business venture, he went on treks in the Western Ghats. And each time he saw a herd of elephants there he felt an “indescribable emotional call” arise in him. He used this “divine” inspiration to create art. And that’s how, over the past 8+ years, all his work – paintings, sculptures and jewelry – has “flowed from a sacred place”, from deep within him. “I realize I have a karmic connection with elephants. My love for them makes me come alive as an artist,” says Karthik. Sudarsan Yennamalli Born into a family of artists, Sudarsan believes his raison d’etre is art. Even so, because he was intensely curious about ‘how a computer thinks’, he flirted with the IT sector for about a decade. And just when he was rising up the corporate ladder, he quit the space. He says: “I felt incomplete – my work had ceased to offer me amazement and inner joy!” So, he came back home – to art! Over the last 20 years, Sudarsan has poured his heart into creating over 2000 paintings, he has held two shows, and has immersed himself in photography and music! Does he not yearn for the comfort and security of a monthly pay check? “I am ready to starve than die unhappy. My art is my Happiness,” he quips! |
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - April 2019
|
Aarthi Sivaramakrishnan
Although she was good at painting, Aarthi stopped doing art when she left school. Post her Engineering and MBA from XLRI, she was living the corporate Life as a HR professional! But getting caught in a school of jellyfish, while taking diving lessons in the Andamans in 2012, changed her perspective to Life forever. As the painful sting of the jellyfish immobilized her, Aarthi first thought she was going to die! Then she also thought of her art and of what “could have been”. So, over the next few years, she simply allowed herself to be “drawn silently by the strange pull of what she loves doing” – she quit her job and set up her boutique art studio, The Colour Company! She now leads workshops and creates artworks on order. “My art defines me, it is who I am,” she says. Gnaneswar Ch When he was 13, Gnaneswar was moved to tears because someone killed a snake that had sneaked into a shoe-rack in their home in Vizag. This incident encouraged the young lad to embrace the idea of conservation instead of going to Medical school. Serendipitously, he was pointed in the direction of studying Wildlife Biology in Ooty. After completing this undergrad program in 2018, Gnaneswar has been working at the Madras Crocodile Bank. He hopes to soon specialize in the area of wildlife crime control. At 21, he’s our youngest #BlissCatcher ever, but he has great conviction nevertheless: “I am not in a hurry to become someone. I will be content with investing my lifetime in partnering in conservation efforts.” |
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - March 2019
|
Sudalai Rajkumar
In the world of Big Data, on a platform called Kaggle, Sudalai Rajkumar is a Grandmaster; he ranks in the Kaggle Top 100, one of only four people from India! They even call him the SRK of Data Science! Although he graduated in Mechanical Engineering, his love for “crunching numbers and predicting patterns” has driven his career. As a child, barely in 3rd grade, he used to stay back after school and ask his Math teacher for more problems to solve! At 30, SRK, who is the father of twin boys, is still obsessed with solving Math-based problems – this time, he goes after data-driven ones that confront the world! He says: “I don’t know why, but the patterns in numbers excite me...I am more a data lover than a scientist!!!” Vinay Babu After investing 28 years in operational leadership roles in the banking sector, and after a Life-altering cycle rally from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, Vinay decided not to postpone his happiness anymore. “Making furniture is my happiness, teaching people how to make furniture gives me joy,” he exclaims. So, he decided to take the plunge and set up his signature carpentry studio – Maney’s – in January 2017. Thinking back, he realizes that his bliss, carpentry, had “found him” as a 11-year-old, when he had observed carpenters at work at his family’s new home in Porur in 1982. “There was a strange pull then. And when I felt it again, I just followed it. To me, now, every day is a celebration,” he exults. |
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - February 2019
|
Sunil Gargyan
Sunil believes he was born for music. Although he started off playfully – yet masterfully – singing movie songs as a child, his family and his guru, the legendary P.S.Narayanaswamy, honed Sunil’s talent in classical music. By 2012, when he was still finishing school, he had entered the sabha circuit; and over the years, he’s been consistently winning several accolades and awards! While he did graduate in Commerce (because he liked the subject), Sunil is clear he doesn’t want to keep a regular job just to earn a living. He says: “Music is what feeds my soul. It gives my Life a spiritual anchor. I lose myself in it.” Vedanth Bharadwaj After 12 years of training in classical music, when Vedanth joined Rishi Valley School in his late teens, his music journey took a new turn. His room-mate there, Ananth Menon, introduced him to rock and other genres and taught him to play the guitar. This “awakening” experience, and his guru Ramamoorthy Rao’s inspirational coaching in Hindustani music, led to Vedanth’s decision not to pursue a corporate career despite holding Master’s degrees in psychology and management! Instead he followed his bliss, set up a music studio and “explored music that appealed to him”. Over the last 15 years, Vedanth has come to be identified only with his guitar, through his love for Kabir and for the passion with which he inducts children from less-privileged backgrounds into music. “My raison d’etre is music,” he declares emphatically. |
The Bliss Catchers™ - Season 5 - January 2019
|
Anjali Venkat
As a child, Anjali loved painting in water colors. Around when she was 10, she remembers being drawn to a stained glass church window. And that’s how she began ‘dreaming in glass’! Growing up, she would endlessly look through a kaleidoscope or burn thin glass bangles over a candle flame! Although she graduated in Economics, glass always ‘stayed connected’ with her. Over the last 30 years, Anjali has taught herself to be the celebrated artist that she is today. She creates precious art from what the world sees as waste – discarded glass objects. She says: “Glass doesn’t follow what you want it to do. But I work and re-work till I kill myself, till I get it right. I find great joy in the process.” Dushyanth Gunasekhar At 23, Dushy gave up his idea of wanting to be a Forensic Auditor. He had a ‘better’ idea – why not set up a platform for the youth to creatively express themselves? And so, Crea-Shakthi was born. Seven years on, Crea-Shakthi is not just a youth platform, it is an agile, thriving, profitable, creative content Firm. It produces and hosts 200 shows a year, it trains children in theatre across 37 schools, it is a full-fledged theatre repertory, it has just launched a publishing arm and, important, it has proven the naysayers wrong! Dushy says he loves his role of ‘creative curator and entrepreneur’ because it lets him be who he truly is: “Crea-Shakthi has helped me marry two of my deepest desires – being in business and being in theatre!” |
