One of the big problems of reading too much or understanding
a lot is arrogance. I have blogged about this in the past. I face arrogance. That
is also possibly the reason I don’t read too much fiction as well. What on
earth will that give me? I guess I underestimate the fun of reading for the
sake of listening to a story. A story need not have deep meaning, it seeks to
merely entertain and hopefully mesmerize the reader into a world of fantasy and
imagination. Imagination lets us be unbounded by reality and hence the ability
to experience what we physically can’t. I would not underestimate its power in
doing good to the world and to the person. I am possibly a bundle of
contradictions into myself.
But over the years I have learnt to be a little less
arrogant or to put it right – I have learnt to overcome / hide my
arrogance. It’s a difficult thing to
do. To put it aside and constantly say I
don’t know. Or there are things I don’t know. Or to constantly look for ways to
prove yourself wrong. Arrogance can be defeated. It is possible. The right way
is to constantly challenge everything. Nothing is real and nothing is the whole
truth. In marketing I learnt there is the truth and then there is the truth. Dharen
once explained to me that while doing research on hair oil, there is science that
says that oil doesn’t permeate the scalp and possibly does nothing to the brain,
but there is also the truth when the consumer says that when my mother puts oil
in my hair and then I sit to study I can retain more.
To my mind that is the reality. What consumers feel or
experience is something that can’t be challenged. They experience the impossible.
That doesn’t make him deranged and to be dismissed. That makes it an
interesting point of view. There are so many things the consumer says but also
the truth is the things he doesn’t say. All this put together is the whole nebulous
truth - if there ever was a paradox.
Over a period of time I have constantly tried to challenge
what I know and what I feel. Its dam irritating and I understand the value or the
pain of being a devil’s advocate. Society depends on progress and progress
means taking a stand. And the sticking to it and going forward. You never know
everything is an interesting concept but it can’t stop you from taking the
steps forward.
Why all this philosophy all of a sudden? Just recently I came
across this term “beginners mind”. It is a term from the zen philosophy - Shoshin (初心)
And I quote from the Wikipedia -
Shoshin is a concept in
Zen Buddhism meaning "beginner's mind". It refers to having an
attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions when studying a
subject, even when studying at an advanced level, just as a beginner in that
subject would. The term is especially used in the study of Zen Buddhism and
Japanese martial arts.
The phrase is also
used in the title of the book Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind by the Zen teacher
Shunryu Suzuki, who says the following about the correct approach to Zen
practice: In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, in the expert's
mind there are few.
Saadat A. Khan
suggests that "Beginner's mind embodies the highest emotional qualities
such as enthusiasm, creativity, zeal, and optimism. If the reader reflects
briefly on the opposites of these qualities, it is clear to see that quality of
life requires living with beginner's mind. With beginner's mind, there is
boundlessness, limitlessness, an infinite wealth."
That’s right. The beginners mind. A child like curiosity to
question everything and the ability to start afresh every time. It is extremely
irritating but to constantly question everything is the greatest requirement to
learn and to innovate. I try and get that in Jispa but it can get also pretty
irritating. And a school with the focus on teaching 30 kids and going forward
to a set syllabus is not conducive atmosphere for Shosin.
Yesterday Jispa asked me that ‘you said you could help me in
History and geography. Right?”. “Yup. Ask”. “So, teacher was explaining large
scale maps and small scale maps. I asked teacher this question and she
explained something but I did not understand – if 1:100 is a small scale map
and 1:10 is a large scale map, what are the maps in between called?”. This question
is seemingly easy but at eth core of it it’s a tough one. For one there are no
middle scale maps and the question is not of terms but to understand that sizes
are relative and the terms are actually irrelevant. It took some amount of
patience on Jasmine and my side and I could hear the irritation in our tones
when at eth end of a large explanation Jispa
simply says – ‘I did not understand’.
All this Shosin posin is easier said than done.
