“Aqua Thermal Treatment of Ceramics under a constrained environment.” Do you know what that means? It’s washing dishes! Dr.Prateep Philip, IPS, retired but “refired”, does not do a Shashi Tharoor on his readers by necessitating a dictionary. What you need is actually a simple thinking cap. The 3333 quotable quotes spread over 33 chapters, on pretty much every aspect of life, are quite something.
Title: Fillipisms
3333 Maxims To Maximize Your Life
Publisher: ATC Publishers
Price: Rs.599
As a public speaker, ‘Fillipisms’ is an integral part of my toolkit (although that’s a dangerous word today!) A friend for close 25 years, I have always considered the author to be a wordsmith, worthy of being nicknamed ‘Quote Marshall’! The title itself is a clever play on his surname, replete with his signature personal touch and a one-word blurb of the work inside, with the USP – to give your life a fillip.
A Queen’s Award winning police officer and a deeply spiritual man, Prateep draws his inspiration from the Holy Bible. And the 1330 couplets in the ‘Thirukural’ gave him an idea to compile this treasure trove of punchlines. The work can vie with international bestsellers like ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’ and ‘You Can Win’. Splashed on the cover is an encomium from renowned author Brian Tracy himself, who swears that “this book will jolt you out of inertia.”
Reading is believing. Here are some samples:
“Genius is 1% intuition and 99% tuition.”
“Don’t run the race of life in such a way to end up on the podium of odium.”
“Keep your ears to the ground or else you will have your nose on the ground.” (perhaps, gleaned from his stints as a senior intelligence officer?!)
“Slow & steady wins the ‘raise.’
“You have a choice to be a nerd or to join the herd.”
“Each of us has a choice to be either a mess or a message.”
“Pause is the secret of poise.”
The template monotony of government communication may have bottled up the creative juices of this former Director General of Police. Imagine fillipisms on file notings!
Knowing Prateep and his insatiable appetite for creative expression, he is not the sort to rest on his laurels. Fillipisms are still a work in progress, judging by the quotidian fresh dose he shares on the social media. A new edition seems just on the anvil.
Post retirement, Prateep has a big list of books in the pipeline. Meanwhile, he is setting podiums ablaze as a motivational speaker. No prizes for guessing what his own reference book would be!
(Sanjay Pinto is an Advocate practising at the Madras High Court, Arbitrator, Columnist, Author & Former Resident Editor – NDTV 24×7)
