I look forward to getting books that form some sort of series. When you get two or more that form a series in your head and you get to read them back to back, they make for an interesting argument in your mind. But that is not always possible. The next best thing is to get a series of unputdownable interesting books that one reads back to back. When I get these unputdownables, the reading progresses rapidly with the books rapidly flying off my table. I keep the to-read books on my table and the rest get pushed into the cupboards. And I also control myself and don’t buy books till I clear my backlog, else it will rapidly spin out of control with books filling up shelves but not filling minds. Hahaha. I liked that last bit of corn philosophy. Filling shelves without filling minds. I should put that up in the library that one day I will design. Hah!
The last few weeks I have got extremely lucky with my books. I first got the book ‘Born to run’ by Christopher McDougall followed by a book on the Taj Mahal, followed by ‘Employees first, Customers second’ by Vineet Nayyar followed by ‘Into Thin Air’ by Jon Krakauer. They were as disparate as they could get.
Born to Run (see link which also has an interesting video by the author) is about Ultra marathoners and an ancient tribe that loves to run really long distances. I loved it as according to me the marathon / ultra marathon is the greatest ever sport. In my pecking order it lies at the very top. While you compete with others you largely end up fighting with yourself. The ability to pound the ground every step, continuously for hours at a stretch is simply magical. The author also argues that perhaps we survived as a species largely thanks to our unique ability to run long, real long distances. It explains how humans probably survived by simply running down the animals. They would most certainly outrun in the short run, but if you understand them and are able to track them, then you can most certainly run them down by sheer determination and grit. The gazelle will simply run like hell till its body gets over heated and dies. Poop. That’s it. Of course there is a little more skill to it that the book describes in detail. It also talks about our running styles and how with the advent of padded shoes we have been susceptible to more and more running related injuries. And interspersed throughout the book are lovely descriptions of ultra marathon races. They keep you riveted to the book, waiting to see who wins. All in all an amazing book that has immediately moved to my top ten list.
It also makes a point that I completely agree with. It says that one of the most important things about an ultra marathoner is the mind and how ‘nice’ a person he is. The general sociable or amiability of a person is completely important in a long distance runner. This is a slightly less fleshed out point in the book but it makes enough references to keep my mind active to the concept. I think its worth having a look at in detail.
The next book was about the Taj. From when I remember I have always had a fascination for the Taj. I grew up thinking about it. When I first visited it I was a kid, I next visited it when I was 23. At 23 when I saw it I thought it was highly over rated. Over time I have come to think deeply about it. There has to be some mystery about it. What is it that makes the Taj, THE TAJ. Is it merely a makbara or does it have greater significance. Slowly I started understanding it a bit better. I started reading about it at every chance I got. Reading more and more gave me further insights and glimpses into the monument. I can safely say that today I understand it enough to know much more than the average guide who does not understand it nor it nuances. I understood the value of walking slowly from the front entrances and seeing the arches in line. Letting the Taj slowly emerge. Also one great insight to me is to slightly lower yourself and see the image from the pathways before the gate. Then you will realise the perfect form that architect is letting you see. It must emerge, slowly. There is a reason for it to have a gate that shields the monument from view. Else they would have just put it up without the surrounding walls. Why lower yourself. My theory is that over time we have rebuilt roads and pavement to a point higher than what was the original. If you lower yourself on the path towards the monument you will the perfect angle where all the gates come in a beautiful line of sight. But then that’s my theory. It worked for me. Another thing is to visualise the Taj with garden in front being full of fruit bearing trees a ala Eden. It would not look as naked as it is looking now. It was supposed to be full of fruit bearing trees that possibly even contributed to its upkeep. There are old paintings of the Taj that show it with trees in front. Imagine a beautiful white relief in contrast to the dense green eden. The Humayun tomb in Delhi also always held a strong fascination for me. The book also explains the taj in relation to eth tomb. I always suspected that you cannot fully appreciate the Taj without first appreciating the Humayun’s tomb. I was right there. I would like to again and again to Taj to understand it deeper and deeper. So many myths and so many explanations. It is a mystery that needs explanation and resolving.
Next in line was the book ‘Employees first, customer second’ by Vineet Nayyar. I have come to this conclusion since the lat six months that the key to happy customers is happy employees. Satisfied happy and motivated employees make for a great set of customers. Putting customers first takes the focus away from the enablers and is a recipe ripe for disaster. This book I picked up in crosswords and read it back to back, in two hours flat without leaving the shop. I simply placed it back on the shelf. No, I will not deny the author the royalty, but I promised my self that I will figure a way to buy not one but at least 200 books. And get him to speak to as many forums as possible. He has a very valid point of view. He is attempting to change the way we as companies think. I will do everything in power to ensure that the message is spread as far and wide as possible. Putting that one book down will ensure that I will remember to figure out a way to get my signed copy from the 200. How? Wait and watch. Things are already in motion. Vineet – if you are reading this. Trust me. I think I know what you are aiming for and I think I can deliver your objectives. Message will be received very very wide.
Then the next book was about the ill fated expedition on Mount Everest. Another very high endurance sport. A book that kept me awake at night and made me read like crazy. To give you an idea on how much I enjoyed this book – I woke up at 730 am when I was in Bangalore and I just picked it and continued reading it till I finished it at 830 am. I just wanted to complete it.
Now the book on hand is called ‘the human zoo’. I just started reading it. I have no clue how good it is but the opening two paras in the introduction is one of the most hard hitting ones I have ever read – I reproduce it here.
‘When the pressures of modern living become heavy, the harassed city dweller often refers to his teeming world as a concrete jungle. This is a colourful way of describing the pattern of life in a dense urban community, but it is also grossly inaccurate, as anyone who has studied a real jungle will confirm.
Under normal living conditions, in their natural habitants, wild animals do not mutilate themselves, masturbate, attack their offspring, develop stomach ulcers, become fetishists, suffer from obesity, form homosexual pair-bonds, or commit murder. Among human city dwellers, needless to say, all of these things occur. Does this, then, reveal a basic difference between the human species and other animals? At first glance it seems to do so. But this is deceptive. Other animals do behave in these ways under certain circumstances, namely when they are confined in the unnatural conditions of captivity. The zoo animal in a cage exhibits all these abnormalities that we know so well from our human companions. Clearly, then, the city is not a concrete jungle, it is a human zoo.’
Very rare that a book’s opening paragraphs slap you so hard. Very rare. I am dying to read the book to find out how hard the slaps turn out to be.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
leading to victory!
One more weekend and one more ‘training offsite’. I do tend to think that these traiing programs are highly over rated and boring. Though like any book, no matter how bad it is, it is never a complete waste. This time it was only for top management. So now we have senior shit with one person per room. So how do we up this further for the even more senior people. We have Suites for them.. Corporate India never ceases to amaze me. Cut to the activity.
The activities are always fun. Far better than the yappity yappity talking that happens in closed rooms. It is interesting to see the people trying hard to understand the games and trying to win them. They try so hard to win. One of the games we played required us to take an estimate of the score before we start the game. The other team had played it before we did and all we wanted to do was beat them. The people try and the way we stop listening is crazy. We try so hard. Competition pushes us to extremes. We stop thinking clearly and start pushing. We assume stuff that never was. We start distrusting. In another game, which required all the players to survive wasn’t actually a winning game. It was a survival game where if all survive all win. People did not understand that as well. They thought it’s an ‘us versus them’ and started by not trusting and by not sharing resources. I was in a team that was supposed to be mute and was stranded on an island surrounded by acid. The only way out was to get the acid proof tiles that the blind team had on another island. That required the lame team to direct the blind team to come to us with the tiles. So obviously the only thing we could do was wait till they come to us. Relax till then. I sat down to bide my time, relax till the tiles came. Post which I knew I had to scramble like hell. It was a bit amusing to see my team mates gesturing and clapping and tryuing to explain stuff to everyone. Getting all excited. When the tiles came I swung into action and was super fast enough to get the tiles to all the stranded players. In time to ensure all win. That’s all that there was to it. Simple stuff. no rocket science. I don’t know if the guys thought I was not a team man when I was relaxing and biding my time, when there was really nothing to be done by us. Relax and wait till the tile comes to us. Post which we run like hell.
I realised an important truth this offsite. Well it is a truth to me. The jaimitism is coined thus – winning and leadership are so over rated. We are so blinded by this thing about leading to victory that we fail to see the process. You don’t really have to win. Teaching Jispa I realised that its not about winning. It is about the process of play. Every time I try and drill it into Jispa – the Olympic credo – when a great sportsperson comes to write against your name, he writes not whether you won or lost but how you played your game. If your process is right and you have done your best, the result will be in your favour. You don’t have to win. Look at yourself, your own limitations and always use that as a pressure tool. Not winning. Sure in a competitive sport you have to out run and out perform to win. And I am not saying that one must be a wimp but if you focus your energies towards yourself and not the opposition then the game is won there itself. You fight hard, every point every game, but you aren’t really fighting him or her, you must be fighting yourself. The opposition is a useful benchmark, but it is not the end.
Similarly leadership. It is so bloody overrated. We understand it as rubbish inspiration and motivation. I think true leadership is exactly what it is not. It is listening to a lot of people. It is getting involved only at grave risk. It is by making yourself almost dispensable. Letting people do what they want to but only being the guide and using your experience to suggest. If you know it well enough then being an example always helps :).
But both of these are so tough to follow. You want to win, you want to lead. At least the kind of personality I am. Severely competitive and severely pushy. I can’t not try. And thanks to my pushing I end up being in a leadership role.
But also I realised that I have matured over the years. I come into my own with people who look upto me. In situations where more than one leader emerges I tend to be quite about the whole thing. Almost disinterested. I guess people feel that I have tuned off, but I haven’t. I only see the futility of multiple leadership. I know if I open my mouth I would be forceful and dominating. That would just upset everything a bit. It is not a battle I wish to fight at this level. And hence my silence.
It is similar when bosses refuse to listen. Too many hot heads will spoil whatever broth was being cooked.
So I try and conquer my urges to win and my urges to lead. Its not easy for me. funny nah. I get this realisation as a truth and I also do not follow it. But I am improving. Slowly slowly I am getting to see the benefits of being stable and level. The benefits of process and pain as opposed to the pain from ‘competing and leading’. I think that this has also come about thanks to me switching sports and taking up swimming. It is a meditative state of sorts. Me swimming against myself. My own technique being used by me to improve and push myself.
Or I am just getting old, hopefully wiser hehehe. .. whatever.
The activities are always fun. Far better than the yappity yappity talking that happens in closed rooms. It is interesting to see the people trying hard to understand the games and trying to win them. They try so hard to win. One of the games we played required us to take an estimate of the score before we start the game. The other team had played it before we did and all we wanted to do was beat them. The people try and the way we stop listening is crazy. We try so hard. Competition pushes us to extremes. We stop thinking clearly and start pushing. We assume stuff that never was. We start distrusting. In another game, which required all the players to survive wasn’t actually a winning game. It was a survival game where if all survive all win. People did not understand that as well. They thought it’s an ‘us versus them’ and started by not trusting and by not sharing resources. I was in a team that was supposed to be mute and was stranded on an island surrounded by acid. The only way out was to get the acid proof tiles that the blind team had on another island. That required the lame team to direct the blind team to come to us with the tiles. So obviously the only thing we could do was wait till they come to us. Relax till then. I sat down to bide my time, relax till the tiles came. Post which I knew I had to scramble like hell. It was a bit amusing to see my team mates gesturing and clapping and tryuing to explain stuff to everyone. Getting all excited. When the tiles came I swung into action and was super fast enough to get the tiles to all the stranded players. In time to ensure all win. That’s all that there was to it. Simple stuff. no rocket science. I don’t know if the guys thought I was not a team man when I was relaxing and biding my time, when there was really nothing to be done by us. Relax and wait till the tile comes to us. Post which we run like hell.
I realised an important truth this offsite. Well it is a truth to me. The jaimitism is coined thus – winning and leadership are so over rated. We are so blinded by this thing about leading to victory that we fail to see the process. You don’t really have to win. Teaching Jispa I realised that its not about winning. It is about the process of play. Every time I try and drill it into Jispa – the Olympic credo – when a great sportsperson comes to write against your name, he writes not whether you won or lost but how you played your game. If your process is right and you have done your best, the result will be in your favour. You don’t have to win. Look at yourself, your own limitations and always use that as a pressure tool. Not winning. Sure in a competitive sport you have to out run and out perform to win. And I am not saying that one must be a wimp but if you focus your energies towards yourself and not the opposition then the game is won there itself. You fight hard, every point every game, but you aren’t really fighting him or her, you must be fighting yourself. The opposition is a useful benchmark, but it is not the end.
Similarly leadership. It is so bloody overrated. We understand it as rubbish inspiration and motivation. I think true leadership is exactly what it is not. It is listening to a lot of people. It is getting involved only at grave risk. It is by making yourself almost dispensable. Letting people do what they want to but only being the guide and using your experience to suggest. If you know it well enough then being an example always helps :).
But both of these are so tough to follow. You want to win, you want to lead. At least the kind of personality I am. Severely competitive and severely pushy. I can’t not try. And thanks to my pushing I end up being in a leadership role.
But also I realised that I have matured over the years. I come into my own with people who look upto me. In situations where more than one leader emerges I tend to be quite about the whole thing. Almost disinterested. I guess people feel that I have tuned off, but I haven’t. I only see the futility of multiple leadership. I know if I open my mouth I would be forceful and dominating. That would just upset everything a bit. It is not a battle I wish to fight at this level. And hence my silence.
It is similar when bosses refuse to listen. Too many hot heads will spoil whatever broth was being cooked.
So I try and conquer my urges to win and my urges to lead. Its not easy for me. funny nah. I get this realisation as a truth and I also do not follow it. But I am improving. Slowly slowly I am getting to see the benefits of being stable and level. The benefits of process and pain as opposed to the pain from ‘competing and leading’. I think that this has also come about thanks to me switching sports and taking up swimming. It is a meditative state of sorts. Me swimming against myself. My own technique being used by me to improve and push myself.
Or I am just getting old, hopefully wiser hehehe. .. whatever.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
shut up and let go
Yesterday was the farewell party for one of my best ever juniors. She had joined us fresh after graduation and worked with us first for around 6 months. She left to attempt to an entrance test, only to join us back. This time she stayed for over three and a half years. He reported to my junior, but was working closely with me on a number of projects. We are a small team.
She also happened to be a dear friend of a dear student of mine. Over time her fantastic work culture along with a remarkably empathetic mind, she managed to win over many people in the organisation. I don’t anybody had anything negative to talk about her. For me somehow she became all the more special and I had a special corner for her. She was my special trainee and I loved to see her grow. Somehow some people come in your lives in such a way, that they impact you more then you really want to. While I might have taught her a lot, I too managed to learn quite a lot from her. Slowly over many talks I came around to trusting her. She would the only one who would know my computer passwords and I would lean on her for special requests. It was great relationship, almost filial.
So yesterday at her farewell, I was obviously emotional. She had put in her papers as she was getting married. And she also wanted to pursue some business. Leaving a career to get married is dumb but to do strike off on your own is a great thing. I have always been after her to get herself a spanking new management degree. When you are fantastic talent, you nee the polishing effect of an A grade education. That is something I have kept pushing her. I wasn’t sure if my company or any company would ever be able to recognise the value of a person without the polishing effect of an education. I have no clue what a management degree really adds considering the horrible standards. I have seen A listed fresh post grads struggling with simple concepts that talent such as hers grasp in an instant. So while she wasn’t doing any further studies at least striking out on her own seemed like an interesting bet.
Till yesterday evening. I heard that she was thinking about a one year post grad in marketing. I went livid at the party. I blew it big time. When everyone’s turn came to talk something about her, I went on to a long lecture on why she would be making a mistake and started castigating her in public. I would have gone on till suddenly her one time boss, tapped me on my shoulder. I knew that was a signal to stop. I crossed the line. Her boss knew I was getting all emotional. I soon stopped and closed my two bit speech with some postivity.
This lady who stopped her also worked with me for some time and is now a dear friend. She told me to let go. Let her make mistakes, it’s her life. She reminded me of what I once said about Jispa “you always said you will not interfere what Jispa does after she is 18 nah? Now why are you behaving like this with her?” oops. The penny dropped. I was being an ass. A complete ass. I know the lady has potential. Real potential. She is easily amongst the best I have worked with. A fast learner, superb execution and lovely ability to not ruffle feathers. Sure she should get the best, but then she also knows that. She is working within her constraints. She is best aware of her situation. What is my role? My role is to be there on demand. To point what I see wrong. To advice where necessary, to prod where urgent. Just step back and out. They have the right to their own mistakes and their own decisions. You may argue your case but you can’t push it down their throats. Finally, I know too little. I do not know the whole picture. I am blinded with my selfish desire to her succeed. Highly selfish. She may not see it that way. She might have to live her life with others. Taking others along with her.
I got a small dose of what it might feel to see your daughter grow up and do what she wants to. A small dose of what it might feel to be the father of the bride giving her hand away. What it might feel to see her take a decision that may not be in line with what you see as her potential. Sigh………….
Thank you, both the girls. Thank you. I grew up a bit.
Here they are. I am flanked by both these girls. On my right is the one who chastised me and on my left is the one I tried to chastise. And in case you didnt get it, in between is me.
She also happened to be a dear friend of a dear student of mine. Over time her fantastic work culture along with a remarkably empathetic mind, she managed to win over many people in the organisation. I don’t anybody had anything negative to talk about her. For me somehow she became all the more special and I had a special corner for her. She was my special trainee and I loved to see her grow. Somehow some people come in your lives in such a way, that they impact you more then you really want to. While I might have taught her a lot, I too managed to learn quite a lot from her. Slowly over many talks I came around to trusting her. She would the only one who would know my computer passwords and I would lean on her for special requests. It was great relationship, almost filial.
So yesterday at her farewell, I was obviously emotional. She had put in her papers as she was getting married. And she also wanted to pursue some business. Leaving a career to get married is dumb but to do strike off on your own is a great thing. I have always been after her to get herself a spanking new management degree. When you are fantastic talent, you nee the polishing effect of an A grade education. That is something I have kept pushing her. I wasn’t sure if my company or any company would ever be able to recognise the value of a person without the polishing effect of an education. I have no clue what a management degree really adds considering the horrible standards. I have seen A listed fresh post grads struggling with simple concepts that talent such as hers grasp in an instant. So while she wasn’t doing any further studies at least striking out on her own seemed like an interesting bet.
Till yesterday evening. I heard that she was thinking about a one year post grad in marketing. I went livid at the party. I blew it big time. When everyone’s turn came to talk something about her, I went on to a long lecture on why she would be making a mistake and started castigating her in public. I would have gone on till suddenly her one time boss, tapped me on my shoulder. I knew that was a signal to stop. I crossed the line. Her boss knew I was getting all emotional. I soon stopped and closed my two bit speech with some postivity.
This lady who stopped her also worked with me for some time and is now a dear friend. She told me to let go. Let her make mistakes, it’s her life. She reminded me of what I once said about Jispa “you always said you will not interfere what Jispa does after she is 18 nah? Now why are you behaving like this with her?” oops. The penny dropped. I was being an ass. A complete ass. I know the lady has potential. Real potential. She is easily amongst the best I have worked with. A fast learner, superb execution and lovely ability to not ruffle feathers. Sure she should get the best, but then she also knows that. She is working within her constraints. She is best aware of her situation. What is my role? My role is to be there on demand. To point what I see wrong. To advice where necessary, to prod where urgent. Just step back and out. They have the right to their own mistakes and their own decisions. You may argue your case but you can’t push it down their throats. Finally, I know too little. I do not know the whole picture. I am blinded with my selfish desire to her succeed. Highly selfish. She may not see it that way. She might have to live her life with others. Taking others along with her.
I got a small dose of what it might feel to see your daughter grow up and do what she wants to. A small dose of what it might feel to be the father of the bride giving her hand away. What it might feel to see her take a decision that may not be in line with what you see as her potential. Sigh………….
Thank you, both the girls. Thank you. I grew up a bit.
Here they are. I am flanked by both these girls. On my right is the one who chastised me and on my left is the one I tried to chastise. And in case you didnt get it, in between is me.
Monday, September 13, 2010
What kind of a guy?
Now what kind of guy would want to see a movie, in which the hero can fly during fights (nearly), beat baddies without getting a scratch, mouth dialogues before and after, dance in the middle of the fight routine as the cell phone in the baddie’s pocket rings. Smashes the same baddies and then asks him to forward the ring tone, is confused if he is a tough guy or a real softie. He is a self proclaimed Robin Hood but you don’t really see him give away the loot to the needy. And of course he is so in love with a dialogue that he repeats it twice in the movie. One to the baddie and one to you for effect. It goes something like ‘after I am done with you, you will have so many holes in your body that you will get confused from where to breathe and from where to let out gas’. He is the same guy who tries to get his girl by calling her to the police station (incidentally, he is a cop) by detaining her father on cooked up charges and announces a reward for someone who makes her smile. The dad is also in the race for eth reward. The dad finally kisses the groom to be and voila – they are in love. No… not the dad and the groom to be, the groom to be and the girl in question.
In extreme anger toward the climax the hero’s shirt tears out as his muscles bulge in anger and he beats the baddie shirtless. And yes, before I forget, there is also a social message in the film. For all those who thought that diesel fumes kill, (spoiler alert – but hell it doesn’t really matter as you have suspended belief itself) the hero in true greenpeace style kills the villain by getting him to choke on diesel fumes. Warning – tractor smoking is injurious to health. And lest you think that the idea was serendipitous, you are given a clear rationale for the same. The movie also a plot line, yes exactly one line. More like one long line with no commas or full stops or any other punctuation save for the exclamation marks which come through after every dialogue or incredulous scene. And those too come in pairs or triplets. The whole movie plays to the gallery much like a under age cricketer who plays a cover drive and stays in the position for a second longer, waiting for the shutter bugs to capture his poise. Wah! Clap clap. The mandatory item number also has lyrics that the item girl, who is incidentally one of the producers, mouths as – I will be a zandu balm for you. I think her name on the producers list was a clear disclaimer for the movie.
Oh what kind of guy would want to watch that kind of film? Which by the reviews and the people around the theatre suggest as the next big thing in Hindi movie cinema. Oh the movie – Dabangg. More like the Da Bang, alluding to the big noise from one of the holes the hero blew in you. The confusing holes? Remember his dialogue… ok ok.. that was a sad joke.
But as I had asked earlier – what kind of guy would see that film? Well the same guy who would write this post in the morning eating yesterday’s over ordered take out pizza, reheated in the micro wave. The thus marinated pizza tastes just like the movie.. real crap for you but you seem to be enjoying it.
OK. I ADMIT. I ENJOYED THE FILM. THERE. YOU SATISFIED NOW. It was horrible cinema, but it was funny. I couldn’t believe it. This is the stuff that people love to watch. I was smirking in my elitist attitude that I am watching what people like to watch. I am actually laughing not at the dialogue but at the people who like this dialogue and find it great. Am I kidding myself? Probably deep down I actually like the movie. I might be enjoying all the sets (ostensibly Indian hinterland), the drama, the fight sequences, the dialogues, the revenge, and the brothers, whatever. Probably I secretly wanted a Salman Khan hairstyle a la Tere Naam. Possibly.
In extreme anger toward the climax the hero’s shirt tears out as his muscles bulge in anger and he beats the baddie shirtless. And yes, before I forget, there is also a social message in the film. For all those who thought that diesel fumes kill, (spoiler alert – but hell it doesn’t really matter as you have suspended belief itself) the hero in true greenpeace style kills the villain by getting him to choke on diesel fumes. Warning – tractor smoking is injurious to health. And lest you think that the idea was serendipitous, you are given a clear rationale for the same. The movie also a plot line, yes exactly one line. More like one long line with no commas or full stops or any other punctuation save for the exclamation marks which come through after every dialogue or incredulous scene. And those too come in pairs or triplets. The whole movie plays to the gallery much like a under age cricketer who plays a cover drive and stays in the position for a second longer, waiting for the shutter bugs to capture his poise. Wah! Clap clap. The mandatory item number also has lyrics that the item girl, who is incidentally one of the producers, mouths as – I will be a zandu balm for you. I think her name on the producers list was a clear disclaimer for the movie.
Oh what kind of guy would want to watch that kind of film? Which by the reviews and the people around the theatre suggest as the next big thing in Hindi movie cinema. Oh the movie – Dabangg. More like the Da Bang, alluding to the big noise from one of the holes the hero blew in you. The confusing holes? Remember his dialogue… ok ok.. that was a sad joke.
But as I had asked earlier – what kind of guy would see that film? Well the same guy who would write this post in the morning eating yesterday’s over ordered take out pizza, reheated in the micro wave. The thus marinated pizza tastes just like the movie.. real crap for you but you seem to be enjoying it.
OK. I ADMIT. I ENJOYED THE FILM. THERE. YOU SATISFIED NOW. It was horrible cinema, but it was funny. I couldn’t believe it. This is the stuff that people love to watch. I was smirking in my elitist attitude that I am watching what people like to watch. I am actually laughing not at the dialogue but at the people who like this dialogue and find it great. Am I kidding myself? Probably deep down I actually like the movie. I might be enjoying all the sets (ostensibly Indian hinterland), the drama, the fight sequences, the dialogues, the revenge, and the brothers, whatever. Probably I secretly wanted a Salman Khan hairstyle a la Tere Naam. Possibly.
But one thing is for sure, for the screen character to be memorable the reel life would need to meet the real life persona. This gyan is from a book I once read called – the Making of a superstar – Amitabh Bachhan. It is quite an interesting read. One of the points is that your off screen image must be in sync with your on screen image. Salman seems to have got it right. Brain dead, beef image who does a lot of shit and gets into a lot of trouble but you love him… not because he is so handsome and has a beef chunk body; that is incidental, but it really because his heart is of gold. Like the movie as well, you know he is generous.. Why... not because he is actively doing anything about it, but just because he says so. And if you do not believe it, I will bash your skull in.
But the movie is a hit. It is a perfect eid release which ties in with his biggest and loyal fan base. But the hall had people from all walks of life, but it did seem to have a stronger male group crowd coming in. The other movies seem to have gotten cold feet with no one taking on the movie giving it a free run.
But I am not surprised. If news channels we have look like general entertainment channels, then the entertainment channels will have to look even more “enterainmenty”. How low can you go?
No actually you can go lower. The Times of India gave it four stars. The DNA also has some similar lofty praise. And unabashedly claims that you shouldn’t ask fro story or anything else. Ya. Who ever said that a free press is a conscience of democracy? Or any other lofty goal.
I like what Lee Kwan Yew said of free press. He believed that the free press was purely at the mercy of the one rich man who owned it. It was never free and will never be. I did not realise it then, but the more I think about it....
Monday, September 06, 2010
its not just a room, is it?
Back to work after a little tired weekend. We were off for an office offsite to Lonavala. This was a complete bonding offsite which required us to come and do some team activity. This always happens over the weekend. So we left on Friday evening for a three hour drive. We were put up at a resort that was high up on the hill. So at a point the big bus cannot go any further and one needs to get into a SUV or a smaller bus. The end location ended up being quite cool. It is quiet a scenic resort and there is nothing all around except other green hills. Lonavala is being developed like crazy with scores of Mumbai dwellers buying holiday homes in the hill station. The concept of buying a holiday home has really caught on in the last few years. Let’s see how it pans out and whether Lonavala will actually be a buzzing place (defeating the holiday home purpose) or be a desolate ghost town with unkempt and inhabited properties.
The resort we stayed was over multiple levels and okay rooms. More like a good three star property. It was pretty pricey and given the cheap guy I am, this might be the property I might only go free of cost. I wouldn’t pay 10 k per night (inclusive of meals) for something like this. Jasmine and I have learnt the fun of staying in cheap but nice, warm and comfy places. You might not get the great view out of your window when you get up but it might have lots of walks, a bench from where you get the view, or be close to the action in the city. No point paying for a travel and staying in a resort all day cooped up – enjoying the view!
I have been to many company offsites. They tend to be fun if you know the group you are travelling with. It’s most boring when you have joined in fresh and are supposed to let your hair down. After 6 years in the same firm I was pretty cool with the gang. As usual, the suff was all about pulling legs, going through with the activity, ending in a drunken disco party with all sorts of songs being played and all night card parties. Nothing too exciting but nothing so really boring. The only thing is that you end up missing your family. Nice place, nice hotel, good view but no family.
Hmmm. In offsites you normally get to share a room with some colleague of yours. There will always be two to a room. And normally you can’t decide who you would be sharing the room with. That is preordained by the human resources or whoever is organising the offsite. It is up to their great achieved wisdom, that no one can really decipher, who on earth will be sharing with whom. I don’t really blame them either. They have this task and I don’t really fault them, whichever logic they use. I would assume that rarely would lots be taken. It’s normally placed according to some hidden agenda. If it is cross functional bonding then it does make sense to mix the functions in the rooming lists. I personally believed that it would be pretty cool to mix seniority. The junior gets valuable interaction time with the senior and the senior gets a hands on update from a junior’s perspective. So many times such simple stuff is missing in offices.
But this bonding thing always had a catch. The senior guys get rooms all to themselves. Exclusive. I always found that funny. Rather brhaminical. Why would the senior get the room as single occupancy and the juniors need to bond with another? I hated the concept and I kind of might have been jealous of the guys. In any case I never recommended nor endorsed it. For me, my great example was once when we were in Goa and my room for the night wasn’t fixed. My big boss was put up at a five star venue where the event was happening. He asked me to spend the night with him in the room. That would have saved the company some money for sure. I think it was a nice gesture. Not too many CEOs I have seen do this. An exclusive room is something to treasure and relish like other privelges like cabins, office décor, the type of dustbin (true), the laptop or car or whatever. To top it, not is the room exclusive, it is also normally an upgraded room. Better showers, possibly a bath tub, a sitting area perhaps, or even a gallery. Anything to separate from the pelebs underneath.
So this time around when we arrived I rushed in to the reception on whom would I be sharing the room with a bad drunk who snores at night could be disaster to your sleeping plans. As I made it through the crowd which was doing the same, checking the rooming list and calling out to their partners, I asked for my room number and partner. Voila – sir, this is your room. Ya, with whom am I sharing. Whoops. Single occupancy. Hah! I am a senior ass now. Ok. Let’s got to the room. I enter the room to find a sitting area, an executive table, a dining table, a balcony and a separate bedroom. Oh shit. I immediately asked the guy “are all rooms like this?’ he replied in affirmative. I checked with my neighbours. Nopes I was the lucky one. They had rooms that were tiny and their bathrooms did not have a bath tub. Though I kind of wondered what’s the point of having a bath tub, especially when there was no stopper on it. This was embarrassing. I was getting a dose of stuff that I resented other getting.
As some pelebs came in for some or the other reason, they would remark on the room size and I would be even more apologetic. If having single occupancy was not enough embarrassment.
But these things are not going to change in a hurry. I don’t think it will ever change. Organisations will always reward seniority in visible ways. They need not be practical or economical. They will always remain so.
When I am travelling I prefer people having their own rooms. It’s often enough for you to give and get personal space. But on an offsite where binding is an important deliverable, I see no point.
But I kind of realised that after spending over 12 years working your butt off, an exclusive room on an offsite is a small perk that tells you… in a smallish way… that you have begun arriving. Now why would I need a dam room to tell me that. That’s the job of my boss.
The resort we stayed was over multiple levels and okay rooms. More like a good three star property. It was pretty pricey and given the cheap guy I am, this might be the property I might only go free of cost. I wouldn’t pay 10 k per night (inclusive of meals) for something like this. Jasmine and I have learnt the fun of staying in cheap but nice, warm and comfy places. You might not get the great view out of your window when you get up but it might have lots of walks, a bench from where you get the view, or be close to the action in the city. No point paying for a travel and staying in a resort all day cooped up – enjoying the view!
I have been to many company offsites. They tend to be fun if you know the group you are travelling with. It’s most boring when you have joined in fresh and are supposed to let your hair down. After 6 years in the same firm I was pretty cool with the gang. As usual, the suff was all about pulling legs, going through with the activity, ending in a drunken disco party with all sorts of songs being played and all night card parties. Nothing too exciting but nothing so really boring. The only thing is that you end up missing your family. Nice place, nice hotel, good view but no family.
Hmmm. In offsites you normally get to share a room with some colleague of yours. There will always be two to a room. And normally you can’t decide who you would be sharing the room with. That is preordained by the human resources or whoever is organising the offsite. It is up to their great achieved wisdom, that no one can really decipher, who on earth will be sharing with whom. I don’t really blame them either. They have this task and I don’t really fault them, whichever logic they use. I would assume that rarely would lots be taken. It’s normally placed according to some hidden agenda. If it is cross functional bonding then it does make sense to mix the functions in the rooming lists. I personally believed that it would be pretty cool to mix seniority. The junior gets valuable interaction time with the senior and the senior gets a hands on update from a junior’s perspective. So many times such simple stuff is missing in offices.
But this bonding thing always had a catch. The senior guys get rooms all to themselves. Exclusive. I always found that funny. Rather brhaminical. Why would the senior get the room as single occupancy and the juniors need to bond with another? I hated the concept and I kind of might have been jealous of the guys. In any case I never recommended nor endorsed it. For me, my great example was once when we were in Goa and my room for the night wasn’t fixed. My big boss was put up at a five star venue where the event was happening. He asked me to spend the night with him in the room. That would have saved the company some money for sure. I think it was a nice gesture. Not too many CEOs I have seen do this. An exclusive room is something to treasure and relish like other privelges like cabins, office décor, the type of dustbin (true), the laptop or car or whatever. To top it, not is the room exclusive, it is also normally an upgraded room. Better showers, possibly a bath tub, a sitting area perhaps, or even a gallery. Anything to separate from the pelebs underneath.
So this time around when we arrived I rushed in to the reception on whom would I be sharing the room with a bad drunk who snores at night could be disaster to your sleeping plans. As I made it through the crowd which was doing the same, checking the rooming list and calling out to their partners, I asked for my room number and partner. Voila – sir, this is your room. Ya, with whom am I sharing. Whoops. Single occupancy. Hah! I am a senior ass now. Ok. Let’s got to the room. I enter the room to find a sitting area, an executive table, a dining table, a balcony and a separate bedroom. Oh shit. I immediately asked the guy “are all rooms like this?’ he replied in affirmative. I checked with my neighbours. Nopes I was the lucky one. They had rooms that were tiny and their bathrooms did not have a bath tub. Though I kind of wondered what’s the point of having a bath tub, especially when there was no stopper on it. This was embarrassing. I was getting a dose of stuff that I resented other getting.
As some pelebs came in for some or the other reason, they would remark on the room size and I would be even more apologetic. If having single occupancy was not enough embarrassment.
But these things are not going to change in a hurry. I don’t think it will ever change. Organisations will always reward seniority in visible ways. They need not be practical or economical. They will always remain so.
When I am travelling I prefer people having their own rooms. It’s often enough for you to give and get personal space. But on an offsite where binding is an important deliverable, I see no point.
But I kind of realised that after spending over 12 years working your butt off, an exclusive room on an offsite is a small perk that tells you… in a smallish way… that you have begun arriving. Now why would I need a dam room to tell me that. That’s the job of my boss.
Friday, September 03, 2010
the sitting train
No one in office reads anything. It’s quite a sad state of affairs. I can’t even seem to find people who read enough fiction. I have been a non fiction reader. I have nothing against people who read fiction. I personally somehow find it a waste of time. When there are brilliant books that make for a lovely read and are non fiction, I haven’t had the desire or urge to read fiction. Though some of eth fiction that I have read I have quite enjoyed. The da Vinci code and the White Tiger spring to mind immediately. I have also made my thoughts very clear in the past on stuff like robin sharma. Those self help corn ball you are good at heart shit is something I cannot bear.
But then again – I really don’t have anything against people who read that as well. The problem is that people don’t read anything. I guess TV has ensured that you must be entertained sitting on your couch. You only breathe and keep awake. Awake not alert, simple open eyes will do the trick. The TV is loud enough visually and otherwise to keep you sufficiently titillated.
Reading is a great thing that is getting missed. When I see book stores I take heart that people seem to be finding / discovering their love for books. Especially the young ones. They seem to have a wide range of books at their disposal at they seem to be enjoying it quite a bit. When we were kids, I spent a part of my earlier childhood in Dubai. We were quite lucky to be there. At least in some supermarkets there would be a book section, mainly comics, where we would gather and lie down and start reading. These were supermarkets run by Malayali businessmen. They were not meant for a reading experience. So we would pick the comics from the shelves and sit on the cold floor and read. Till one Malayali store keeper would come and shoo us all away. Only to find us come back. Much like the pigeons feasting on open grain. How long can you keep shooing us off.
The greatest thing India ever had; was the Amar Chitra Katha comics. We used to devour them, the tales of valour, intelligence, stupidity and freedom. I guess a many of them were flawed, wrong and as one book suggested – racist. But they still allowed for a lovely and vivid reading experience. The first chance I got I bought the entire set that is in print and kept it at home. I am almost spoiling Jispa by doing this. We would get them one book at a time and sometimes one set at a time. Between us and other kids we would get them all read.
Sigh… reading. I guess that why talks by authors who have written books are so popular. Yesterday I had the chance to attend an Al Ries and Laura Ries seminar. Al Ries and Jack Trout are probably the demi gods of marketing. They first wrote the book Positioning and have then proceeded to write many books since then, together and individually. Good smart guys. But the seminar is meant for those who haven’t read their books. It is meant for the TV generation. They talk about what they have written. It is almost the same thing as reading their books and seeing them convert it into a ppt. Pretty boring. Laura especially is a n extremely boring speaker. She does not even change her tone while talking. Somehow the older Mr Ries is far better and somehow more compelling to listen to.
In the good old days when I did my management, these books were not easy to get. I had taken one copy from my library and photocopied it and then bound it into a book. It is nice to get to now see these seminars. For me personally I recommended the same as it would interesting to go with the team. No matter how boring, there is always something one can relearn from good minds. And I did and I have something that I can action out right away.
But the question that came across my mind is this – at 15 grand a person it is quite expensive. My company agreed to pay for me and my two team members to go and attend the same. But if I had put up a bill for 15 grand, saying I read these books instead, I am not so sure if the company would have agreed.
When I worked in consulting with Dharen Chadha, the rule was that per month you get two thousand rupees as a personal development allowance. This was to be claimed against bills for books, movies, music etc. the thought being that as a brand strategist you would get your reference point / creative spark form any source. You could even learn dance or gardening with that money. It was a small allowance like that that to my mind changed my life. It made me look at books that cost 600 or 700 and buy them. Once the heroin struck it never left me since then. I remember when I finally resigned from consulting, my wife and me decided to keep that allowance going as a budget.
For companies the easy decisions are the ones that look like seminars and group therapy sessions. Something as simple as buying books for reading wherein you might learn and implement much more is not allowed as a reimbursable but a seminar or an offsite or a training program that is boring, not accountable and ridiculous might find greater favour. What to do. Such is the way of corporate life. I don’t think the CEO might feel good thinking that so many of his employees read so much but might feel better that so many of his employees went to a training program. And hopefully they got a certificate at the end of it all. A shiney new certified employee as opposed to a reminiscent germ of a thought in an employee brain.
But then again – I really don’t have anything against people who read that as well. The problem is that people don’t read anything. I guess TV has ensured that you must be entertained sitting on your couch. You only breathe and keep awake. Awake not alert, simple open eyes will do the trick. The TV is loud enough visually and otherwise to keep you sufficiently titillated.
Reading is a great thing that is getting missed. When I see book stores I take heart that people seem to be finding / discovering their love for books. Especially the young ones. They seem to have a wide range of books at their disposal at they seem to be enjoying it quite a bit. When we were kids, I spent a part of my earlier childhood in Dubai. We were quite lucky to be there. At least in some supermarkets there would be a book section, mainly comics, where we would gather and lie down and start reading. These were supermarkets run by Malayali businessmen. They were not meant for a reading experience. So we would pick the comics from the shelves and sit on the cold floor and read. Till one Malayali store keeper would come and shoo us all away. Only to find us come back. Much like the pigeons feasting on open grain. How long can you keep shooing us off.
The greatest thing India ever had; was the Amar Chitra Katha comics. We used to devour them, the tales of valour, intelligence, stupidity and freedom. I guess a many of them were flawed, wrong and as one book suggested – racist. But they still allowed for a lovely and vivid reading experience. The first chance I got I bought the entire set that is in print and kept it at home. I am almost spoiling Jispa by doing this. We would get them one book at a time and sometimes one set at a time. Between us and other kids we would get them all read.
Sigh… reading. I guess that why talks by authors who have written books are so popular. Yesterday I had the chance to attend an Al Ries and Laura Ries seminar. Al Ries and Jack Trout are probably the demi gods of marketing. They first wrote the book Positioning and have then proceeded to write many books since then, together and individually. Good smart guys. But the seminar is meant for those who haven’t read their books. It is meant for the TV generation. They talk about what they have written. It is almost the same thing as reading their books and seeing them convert it into a ppt. Pretty boring. Laura especially is a n extremely boring speaker. She does not even change her tone while talking. Somehow the older Mr Ries is far better and somehow more compelling to listen to.
In the good old days when I did my management, these books were not easy to get. I had taken one copy from my library and photocopied it and then bound it into a book. It is nice to get to now see these seminars. For me personally I recommended the same as it would interesting to go with the team. No matter how boring, there is always something one can relearn from good minds. And I did and I have something that I can action out right away.
But the question that came across my mind is this – at 15 grand a person it is quite expensive. My company agreed to pay for me and my two team members to go and attend the same. But if I had put up a bill for 15 grand, saying I read these books instead, I am not so sure if the company would have agreed.
When I worked in consulting with Dharen Chadha, the rule was that per month you get two thousand rupees as a personal development allowance. This was to be claimed against bills for books, movies, music etc. the thought being that as a brand strategist you would get your reference point / creative spark form any source. You could even learn dance or gardening with that money. It was a small allowance like that that to my mind changed my life. It made me look at books that cost 600 or 700 and buy them. Once the heroin struck it never left me since then. I remember when I finally resigned from consulting, my wife and me decided to keep that allowance going as a budget.
For companies the easy decisions are the ones that look like seminars and group therapy sessions. Something as simple as buying books for reading wherein you might learn and implement much more is not allowed as a reimbursable but a seminar or an offsite or a training program that is boring, not accountable and ridiculous might find greater favour. What to do. Such is the way of corporate life. I don’t think the CEO might feel good thinking that so many of his employees read so much but might feel better that so many of his employees went to a training program. And hopefully they got a certificate at the end of it all. A shiney new certified employee as opposed to a reminiscent germ of a thought in an employee brain.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Before you learn to win you must learn to lose
It is so important to lose right. You might get more learnings out of losing than possibly out of winning. At least that has always been the case for me. And if the stakes aren’t that high, I dare say, it is fun losing.
As a kid we sued to play a lot of games. Cricket, badminton, volley ball, basketball etc. Cricket in the narrow lanes of Mumbai was a speciality. Cricket is a stupid sport in the sense, that a lot is required of an umpire. You can’t really play until you have an umpire. So we would divide ourselves into two teams and start the game. The batting team would need to nominate an umpire. This by design resulted in huge conflict of interest. It was a zero sum game for the umpire. His team wanted him to give decisions in their favour while the other team at the least requested for a neutral approach. In so many cases there will be split judgements involved. Things like caught behind and run outs were especially contentious. There was no way it would end fair. To add to the conflict of interest, it was in the umpire’s interest to get his won guys out as well, if he wanted batting. Then came the issues of no balls, catches which are taken close to ground, the scores and the number of balls left/ delivered in the over. The really contentious ones like leg before wicket, which is completely reliant on the umpires judgement were simply banned from street cricket. For the street bullies this mode of getting out was simply thrown out.
The decisions would come under greater scrutiny when an important batsman would be batting. The opposite team will bay for blood and appeal like crazy, and the umpire will have severe stress not to give out. While when you play domestic matches, matches that are played within your own team, the decisions tend to be fairer. But in case you have a match with some opposite team, the fight levels can climb. And if a ball or something like that is at stake, then fights last for really long and tempers flare.
The cricket rules are also so numerous that sometimes different interpretations seem equally logical. Street football is so much better. There are no real rules except goal posts, the goalie D and handball. Everything else is permitted and no one heard of anything called off side.
Since we are a cricket playing city, fights were de rigueur. And in tournaments they were intense. I was naturally competitive and I had an acute sense of fairness. I would not tolerate injustice, especially if it was done to us. So argument on scores, run out and the lot was something I was routinely involved in. but there were some kids who were known for arguments. They could never be given out unless all their stumps were shattered. Run outs did not exist for them. They were generally the trouble makers and they usually resulted in the game being abandoned. It was crazy. I was midpoint between them and the centre. In other words I was an ass.
My brother, as is with everything that is me, was sitting on the other opposite fence happily looking at the ensuing tamasha. More then once he pulled me aside from the group when I was arguing, ‘why are you fighting? Is there a trophy? Is this a major tournament? does you life depend on this?’. I don’t know when, but certainly not immediately, the penny dropped.
I don’t argue too much with any official. I really don’t care too much about wining matches. It’s the fun thing. I like to play with people who don’t argue too much. Otherwise its just spoils the whole point of the game. Even today when we adults come together and play anything, be it a board game or anything… I rather have fun trying to decipher the various permutations and combinations rather than try and win every game. Sure I like to win but its more fun playing the combinations. I really don’t understand adults trying their best to win at a board game. Trying and scheming and fighting. It’s good for them. It’s good for me as well. It makes the game fun to watch, but then at some point it irritates. Some of them are so childish. They just don’t get the point. Now they are adults so they cannot openly fight but you can see the fight inside of them. Some can’t even accept graciously. And when I win, they assume that I am playing tough. I am just playing fun. I am trying to understand the game. If I get an interesting play I don’t keep it to myself, I try and decipher it for the others. I like to discuss it. This would only help reinforce their belief that I am a real fighter. Oh god.
I used to be like that. I used to love to win. I have changed so much over the ensuing years. The aggression is still there, it’s just better channelled elsewhere.
I keep trying to explain to Jispa that winning is not everything. Yes, when we play we want to win, we try to win, but the aim is not to win. It is to play properly. Get your technique right. Get your teamwork going. Learn from every game. Winning is a by product of stuff that we do. On Jispa party on Saturday we had devised a treasure hunt. It sounds like a great idea but we got mixed up. I thought that the adults would play with the kids. I thought the adults would make the kids understand the game and solve the treasure clues together. We even built in the use of a compass and gave the clues directional bearings. It was fun. But the poor kids just ran around. I don’t think the adults knew how to handle a compass, let alone make the kids understand. So while the adults loved it, the kids probably got a bit tired and bored. And when I wanted the adults to play some games with the kids after the treasure hunt, the adults were too tired while the kids loved it.
I just love the chance to play with the kids. I don’t understand how you can let go of the chance to play with them. I am here, getting them all together devising the games and trying to get them to have fun. All you have to do is show up and show some enthusiasm. I don’t know. Adults like to talk. We get together and talk. Yappity yapp yapp. Use your body, worst case… use your brains. Yapitty yapp yapp… yuck.
Coming back to winning. Jispa was in a team that came in first. There was one clue that all the teams struggled on. We had to give the answer out. For some that clue came in second, for some it came in fifth and so on. At one point all of them were stuck on that clue. So we helped them with the answer. Some poor teams spent an hour before we gave the answer and some poor teams spent about 30 minutes before gave them the answer. As a leveller, I docked the 30 min team 15 minutes as a fairness measure. So as Jispa came in I said you penalty is 15 minutes. Some understood and some just did not. The desire to win supersedes all. Jispa refused to understand. She was almost getting upset. Later after the party I explained to her “kid, its your party. Number one – try not to win in your own party; number two – when a great sportsperson comes to write against your name. He writes not whether you won or lost but how you played your game. Play hard by al means. But please don’t play with winning as your only motivation. Laugh when you win and laugh a lot more when someone else wins. Help others. Learn from other at all points. Concentrate on the technique and game. Winning is not everything.” I also warned her that if I ever see her behaving in an unsportsmanlike manner I will get her off that sport. Respect the game.
Jasmine then remembered a video she saw on facebook. It was of Derek Redmond. Favoured to do well in the 1992 Olympics, while running the 400 meters he tore his hamstring. He fell, cried in pain but got up to hobble and complete the race. His dad also ran on the track to help him complete. Some videos on youtube talk about the relationship and the fact that his dad came in. I see no merit in that. if my daughter also were to fall on the track, my instinct would also be to help her. Nothing unusual about it. But when I saw the video tears dropped. The pain and the agony and yet to hold on to it to finish what you came to start. We showed that to Jispa. It matter not whether you win or lose, but how you played your game. He came to win for sure, but more importantly he came in to compete and for that he had to finish the race.
I like the way Steve Waugh never ever asked for a runner. He did not believe that if you are injured then you need a runner for you. I too hate the concept in cricket. I will bat and hit the ball all over while some one will run for me. Bull. Complete bull. I don’t ever remember asking for a runner ever. I don’t want to ask for one as well. Anil Kumble got hit on his mouth while playing in West Indies. He came on to bowl all strapped up. Sure he did. He is a champion bowler. That’s his job. But people miss that he also came to bat. He is not a batsman. That was not his job; there was no glory in that for him, nothing to embellish his record there.
Here is the Derek video.
See this one. Listen what he says himself. At first he thought he was shot or something. After a few seconds he realised he was in the Olympic semi finals, so he just had to get up and run.
As a kid we sued to play a lot of games. Cricket, badminton, volley ball, basketball etc. Cricket in the narrow lanes of Mumbai was a speciality. Cricket is a stupid sport in the sense, that a lot is required of an umpire. You can’t really play until you have an umpire. So we would divide ourselves into two teams and start the game. The batting team would need to nominate an umpire. This by design resulted in huge conflict of interest. It was a zero sum game for the umpire. His team wanted him to give decisions in their favour while the other team at the least requested for a neutral approach. In so many cases there will be split judgements involved. Things like caught behind and run outs were especially contentious. There was no way it would end fair. To add to the conflict of interest, it was in the umpire’s interest to get his won guys out as well, if he wanted batting. Then came the issues of no balls, catches which are taken close to ground, the scores and the number of balls left/ delivered in the over. The really contentious ones like leg before wicket, which is completely reliant on the umpires judgement were simply banned from street cricket. For the street bullies this mode of getting out was simply thrown out.
The decisions would come under greater scrutiny when an important batsman would be batting. The opposite team will bay for blood and appeal like crazy, and the umpire will have severe stress not to give out. While when you play domestic matches, matches that are played within your own team, the decisions tend to be fairer. But in case you have a match with some opposite team, the fight levels can climb. And if a ball or something like that is at stake, then fights last for really long and tempers flare.
The cricket rules are also so numerous that sometimes different interpretations seem equally logical. Street football is so much better. There are no real rules except goal posts, the goalie D and handball. Everything else is permitted and no one heard of anything called off side.
Since we are a cricket playing city, fights were de rigueur. And in tournaments they were intense. I was naturally competitive and I had an acute sense of fairness. I would not tolerate injustice, especially if it was done to us. So argument on scores, run out and the lot was something I was routinely involved in. but there were some kids who were known for arguments. They could never be given out unless all their stumps were shattered. Run outs did not exist for them. They were generally the trouble makers and they usually resulted in the game being abandoned. It was crazy. I was midpoint between them and the centre. In other words I was an ass.
My brother, as is with everything that is me, was sitting on the other opposite fence happily looking at the ensuing tamasha. More then once he pulled me aside from the group when I was arguing, ‘why are you fighting? Is there a trophy? Is this a major tournament? does you life depend on this?’. I don’t know when, but certainly not immediately, the penny dropped.
I don’t argue too much with any official. I really don’t care too much about wining matches. It’s the fun thing. I like to play with people who don’t argue too much. Otherwise its just spoils the whole point of the game. Even today when we adults come together and play anything, be it a board game or anything… I rather have fun trying to decipher the various permutations and combinations rather than try and win every game. Sure I like to win but its more fun playing the combinations. I really don’t understand adults trying their best to win at a board game. Trying and scheming and fighting. It’s good for them. It’s good for me as well. It makes the game fun to watch, but then at some point it irritates. Some of them are so childish. They just don’t get the point. Now they are adults so they cannot openly fight but you can see the fight inside of them. Some can’t even accept graciously. And when I win, they assume that I am playing tough. I am just playing fun. I am trying to understand the game. If I get an interesting play I don’t keep it to myself, I try and decipher it for the others. I like to discuss it. This would only help reinforce their belief that I am a real fighter. Oh god.
I used to be like that. I used to love to win. I have changed so much over the ensuing years. The aggression is still there, it’s just better channelled elsewhere.
I keep trying to explain to Jispa that winning is not everything. Yes, when we play we want to win, we try to win, but the aim is not to win. It is to play properly. Get your technique right. Get your teamwork going. Learn from every game. Winning is a by product of stuff that we do. On Jispa party on Saturday we had devised a treasure hunt. It sounds like a great idea but we got mixed up. I thought that the adults would play with the kids. I thought the adults would make the kids understand the game and solve the treasure clues together. We even built in the use of a compass and gave the clues directional bearings. It was fun. But the poor kids just ran around. I don’t think the adults knew how to handle a compass, let alone make the kids understand. So while the adults loved it, the kids probably got a bit tired and bored. And when I wanted the adults to play some games with the kids after the treasure hunt, the adults were too tired while the kids loved it.
I just love the chance to play with the kids. I don’t understand how you can let go of the chance to play with them. I am here, getting them all together devising the games and trying to get them to have fun. All you have to do is show up and show some enthusiasm. I don’t know. Adults like to talk. We get together and talk. Yappity yapp yapp. Use your body, worst case… use your brains. Yapitty yapp yapp… yuck.
Coming back to winning. Jispa was in a team that came in first. There was one clue that all the teams struggled on. We had to give the answer out. For some that clue came in second, for some it came in fifth and so on. At one point all of them were stuck on that clue. So we helped them with the answer. Some poor teams spent an hour before we gave the answer and some poor teams spent about 30 minutes before gave them the answer. As a leveller, I docked the 30 min team 15 minutes as a fairness measure. So as Jispa came in I said you penalty is 15 minutes. Some understood and some just did not. The desire to win supersedes all. Jispa refused to understand. She was almost getting upset. Later after the party I explained to her “kid, its your party. Number one – try not to win in your own party; number two – when a great sportsperson comes to write against your name. He writes not whether you won or lost but how you played your game. Play hard by al means. But please don’t play with winning as your only motivation. Laugh when you win and laugh a lot more when someone else wins. Help others. Learn from other at all points. Concentrate on the technique and game. Winning is not everything.” I also warned her that if I ever see her behaving in an unsportsmanlike manner I will get her off that sport. Respect the game.
Jasmine then remembered a video she saw on facebook. It was of Derek Redmond. Favoured to do well in the 1992 Olympics, while running the 400 meters he tore his hamstring. He fell, cried in pain but got up to hobble and complete the race. His dad also ran on the track to help him complete. Some videos on youtube talk about the relationship and the fact that his dad came in. I see no merit in that. if my daughter also were to fall on the track, my instinct would also be to help her. Nothing unusual about it. But when I saw the video tears dropped. The pain and the agony and yet to hold on to it to finish what you came to start. We showed that to Jispa. It matter not whether you win or lose, but how you played your game. He came to win for sure, but more importantly he came in to compete and for that he had to finish the race.
I like the way Steve Waugh never ever asked for a runner. He did not believe that if you are injured then you need a runner for you. I too hate the concept in cricket. I will bat and hit the ball all over while some one will run for me. Bull. Complete bull. I don’t ever remember asking for a runner ever. I don’t want to ask for one as well. Anil Kumble got hit on his mouth while playing in West Indies. He came on to bowl all strapped up. Sure he did. He is a champion bowler. That’s his job. But people miss that he also came to bat. He is not a batsman. That was not his job; there was no glory in that for him, nothing to embellish his record there.
Here is the Derek video.
See this one. Listen what he says himself. At first he thought he was shot or something. After a few seconds he realised he was in the Olympic semi finals, so he just had to get up and run.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Dominant love?
Devdutt wrote a good piece titled ‘Right to kill my child’. It correctly questions the demands we make on our children and more importantly exposes our true motivations. He wrote the article as “the newspapers are filled with reports of parents wanting to kill their children”.
The key point he makes is “Love is to allow children to grow up, be independent, take their decisions and be responsible for the consequences. Power is about control, dependence, domination, and the demand for obedience and subservience.”
It’s a very pertinent point that he makes. Over the last week I happened to be agony uncle for a few people. One lady wanted to marry someone her choice but not same religion and the other wanted to stay abroad and work but had to come back to get married on parental pressure. Makes me think of the stuff I too might have done under parental pressure.
But more importantly or selfishly, makes me think of the times I might have been motivated by power and not love. I try and let Jispa talk to me straight. Some times I think I let her talk too straight, and I might be actually spoiling her. Like my mom always thinks that I am teaching Jispa to argue. But I don’t see harm in having conversation. I do not want domination and subservience or any other unspellable word. I like the relationship to be healthy and equal.
The other day somebody was at home and Jispa walked away in some cranky voice. I imitated her. She came back and gave me a knock on my head. What on earth. That was hard. “but why are you imitating me? I don’t like it.” Ok. Point taken. “but you also hit me hard. That’s not fair. It’s not right. I am papa” “ok sorry” “ok sorry”. Kiss and make up. That I wonder how much liberty should I give hr. I don’t mind it as I realize that in the end I have the final upper control. If things go out of hand I can immediately scream and shout and get ii back. At that time also, it’s about respect.
I really try to ensure that at all points, it is never about dominance. It shouldn’t be about that, but parenting is something that you do without too much thinking. You hope you hone it over a period of time. And when you have only one child, thats all the chance you can get.
We keep telling Jispa how lucky she is. What a great school she has and stuff like that. Recently she has started telling us how lucky we are. We don’t have to go to school and we don’t have to wake up and stuff like that. Its just a general tit for tat. One dialogue was – you are lucky you don’t have to do math. Hey, do you not like math. “I do, but it’s the subtraction that’s boring. I like addition.”. “Hey, subtraction is addition – just reverse” “How”. ‘How do you minus 7 from 12. You take seven and the go like, eight, nine, ten, eleven, and twelve. You just added 5 to 7 to get 12.” “but I hate borrowing” “arey that’s simple. Hello uncle, please give me one. I have less. So if seven uncle gives one, how many are left?”
That was some fun in the morning. But the banter continued. She went like, you are so lucky mummy, you don’t get to…” Jasmine went back like “you are so lucky that you don’t have to cook and then someone makes a face, you don’t have to wash dishes, you don’t……” I let the final one in “Jispa you are so lucky to get papa and mama like us. We could never scold our parents the way you can” “I don’t scold you” “sure you do. The way sometimes you get angry at me I would have never done like that to my dad. Ask mom if she could ever talk to her dad the way you sometime scold me or get angry at me?” She then asked “you couldn’t scold your dad because he was always building?” My dad was a civil engineer, you see. “No, I just couldn’t scold dad as that was not the done thing to do. It was just different”. Awww. I love papa and mama… awwww…. Banter ended. Poor thing should have hit back saying that we were lucky to have someone like her. That would have also been another irrefutable one.
On a completely different note - This is how I taught jispa and her friend to handle a heavy bag while at the bus stop.
The key point he makes is “Love is to allow children to grow up, be independent, take their decisions and be responsible for the consequences. Power is about control, dependence, domination, and the demand for obedience and subservience.”
It’s a very pertinent point that he makes. Over the last week I happened to be agony uncle for a few people. One lady wanted to marry someone her choice but not same religion and the other wanted to stay abroad and work but had to come back to get married on parental pressure. Makes me think of the stuff I too might have done under parental pressure.
But more importantly or selfishly, makes me think of the times I might have been motivated by power and not love. I try and let Jispa talk to me straight. Some times I think I let her talk too straight, and I might be actually spoiling her. Like my mom always thinks that I am teaching Jispa to argue. But I don’t see harm in having conversation. I do not want domination and subservience or any other unspellable word. I like the relationship to be healthy and equal.
The other day somebody was at home and Jispa walked away in some cranky voice. I imitated her. She came back and gave me a knock on my head. What on earth. That was hard. “but why are you imitating me? I don’t like it.” Ok. Point taken. “but you also hit me hard. That’s not fair. It’s not right. I am papa” “ok sorry” “ok sorry”. Kiss and make up. That I wonder how much liberty should I give hr. I don’t mind it as I realize that in the end I have the final upper control. If things go out of hand I can immediately scream and shout and get ii back. At that time also, it’s about respect.
I really try to ensure that at all points, it is never about dominance. It shouldn’t be about that, but parenting is something that you do without too much thinking. You hope you hone it over a period of time. And when you have only one child, thats all the chance you can get.
We keep telling Jispa how lucky she is. What a great school she has and stuff like that. Recently she has started telling us how lucky we are. We don’t have to go to school and we don’t have to wake up and stuff like that. Its just a general tit for tat. One dialogue was – you are lucky you don’t have to do math. Hey, do you not like math. “I do, but it’s the subtraction that’s boring. I like addition.”. “Hey, subtraction is addition – just reverse” “How”. ‘How do you minus 7 from 12. You take seven and the go like, eight, nine, ten, eleven, and twelve. You just added 5 to 7 to get 12.” “but I hate borrowing” “arey that’s simple. Hello uncle, please give me one. I have less. So if seven uncle gives one, how many are left?”
That was some fun in the morning. But the banter continued. She went like, you are so lucky mummy, you don’t get to…” Jasmine went back like “you are so lucky that you don’t have to cook and then someone makes a face, you don’t have to wash dishes, you don’t……” I let the final one in “Jispa you are so lucky to get papa and mama like us. We could never scold our parents the way you can” “I don’t scold you” “sure you do. The way sometimes you get angry at me I would have never done like that to my dad. Ask mom if she could ever talk to her dad the way you sometime scold me or get angry at me?” She then asked “you couldn’t scold your dad because he was always building?” My dad was a civil engineer, you see. “No, I just couldn’t scold dad as that was not the done thing to do. It was just different”. Awww. I love papa and mama… awwww…. Banter ended. Poor thing should have hit back saying that we were lucky to have someone like her. That would have also been another irrefutable one.
On a completely different note - This is how I taught jispa and her friend to handle a heavy bag while at the bus stop.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
I want to move it move it
I have written before on how I always wanted to study physics. But I ended up with commerce and accountancy. I cannot read even one book on accountancy but I keep reading books on physics. Or any science book with simple English. It makes me jump with joy to see simple mechanisms work and the ingenuity of the manufacturers. I specially love mechanics. One of the first thing I remember dismantling was my mom’s powder case. You have to wind the thing from bottom and it would produce the most beautiful tune from inside. I opened it to get to the mechanism. It has no battery and the sound so beautiful. The simplicity of mechanism had me enthralled for hours. It was basically a rotating drum with pins on it. The drum is connected to a metal comb which gets picked at when a pin of the drum passes through it. I don’t know if this makes sense to you but this diagram should help. It is truly beautiful. I might have been in fourth standard at the time.
I also loved the little carpentry that I could do around the house along with dad. Primarily consisting of banging nails and screws in the house.
Oh the choices we make and where we end up instead. Not that I regret it. I guess I might have gone crazy after taking engineering as well. I might have ended up as a engineer MBA as opposed to a commerce MBA. No great difference. In fact I might have been worse off and would have been confused seeing balance sheets. For what I am doing, I am better off.
One of the other wonders was always how on earth does a sewing machine work? While you do it with one needle and a thread with the hand, in a machine you require two threads, one from top and the other from bottom. As a kid I remember pestering mom, as to why you require two threads. I don’t think mom had too much of a scientific answer to give me. Or too much of any answer to a scientific question. I always wondered. When I saw my wife with the machine I would sit and stare, all fascinated. How does the bottom thread get through the cloth on top? Is there a needle at the bottom also? Why do you require two? How does the thread pierce through and get through the bottom to come back on top? Dam it.
While I could easily break and destroy the old powder music box, I would dare not attempt to open the sewing machine. Not as a child and definitely not even after I bought it for my wife. No way. Jasmine too had no clue how this worked.
The mystery got resolved thanks to a link my wife sent me. Here is the magical mechanism. Explained. I can stare at this gif forever as well. My god. I love the mechanism. The sheer simplicity of it fills my heart with joy. Everything beautiful must be simple. I am really feeling so nice just looking at it.
On the link there is also the Constant Velocity Joint and the “Maltese Cross mechanism, which turns smooth circular motion into segmented second-hand motion for clocks”.
Constant-velocity joints (aka homokinetic or CV joints) allow a rotating shaft to transmit power through a variable angle, at constant rotational speed, without an appreciable increase in friction or play. They are mainly used in front wheel drive and all wheel drive cars. Rear wheel drive cars with independent rear suspension typically use CV joints at the ends of the rear axle halfshafts, and increasingly use them on the propshafts.
It seems they replaced the Universal Joints in some places. The universal joints were simple but could get notchy and needed regular maintenance. It so looks like something that belonged to my dad's premier padmini car.
Pretty cool nah? I remember unlike others I could spend hours at a science exhibition or be at ease in an industrial museum. Like normal museums, even industrial museums must have an audio guide that should explain the beautiful mechanism to lay people. If you have an interesting guide then kids would love going to see things move and engines start. “NOW what would happen if I move this lever?” crank crank sputter sputter.. “Voila the ball has turned onto the opposite side, clever nah!” clap clap clap. And now we proceed onto the cantilever double axle shaft… (don’t look it up – I made that name up from all the mechanical words that sprang to mind).
But just imagine the possibilities of museums. We spend on making them and not on explaining them.
Like this blogger who went to a maritime museum and shot this. I loved the photo she clicked. Only if she knew what it did or I knew what it did and why it is in a museum?
Monday, August 23, 2010
the selfish giant
This post was written on Saturday but posted later. Why is this important? Because this blog has a time value attached to it. Time is the fourth dimension, but is relative. What is all this shit? Well, I have been reading some stuff on quantum physics and I find it completely disconcerting. The journey as it seeks to find the theory of everything. This stuff does not make any sense. But it makes so much when you read it. It is so fascinating but at the same time so bloody mind boggling. Sometimes I wish I had taken physics major. That the stuff I was always good at and I naturally loved. Nowadays it makes for great fun to read this complex stuff and be entertained. It is only possible if you don’t want to remember it all and give an exam. Because otherwise it would be so insurmountable. I even read stuff about us living in mutliverse as opposed to a universe. Whoa!
But the point of the time value of this blog is important as I sit down today and reminiscence on the feeling that got built up over the last year as we hurtled towards yesterday. In the good old days I felt excited and I wanted yesterday to come everyday. I even counted the days to yesterday. Till I was in third standard yesterday was always in my school vacations. We used to live the gulf, where the school shut for the oppressive summers and I could not have my day in the sun in front of peers. Yesterday was an important point in my every day year. So when we first came to Mumbai I was so excited that I would get to celebrate yesterday with peers. I started counting the days I would take to get yesterday. Waiting and counting. If I am not mistaken I even counted up to 45 days. Oh that day. I wore a safari suit in the fourth standard. What was it blue or was it grey. But I was so proud. I must have never been so proud to distribute orange hard boiled confectionary. It used to cost 10 paise for one at retail price at around 6 paise per sweet at wholesale rate. Man I was so thrilled. The first time I had a chance to celebrate my birthday in school and having 60, not just 30 as per gulf school norms. Yeah yeah. It was day in the sun. No wonder I was so excited.
All these years I continued to be excited till something struck last year. It was my own version of the mid life crisis. I started hating birthdays. Not that the thought of growing older hurt. But au contraire I loved getting old. But I started hating getting birthday greetings from people. Why? I don’t know if people really care when they wish and I stopped liking any wishes and I started suspecting them of being mere formality. I also stopped wishing too many people on their birthdays as well in the hope that they would in turn stop greeting me as well. I even got rid of my birthday notification from the social networking sites.
Day before yesterday I sent a mail to HR. they have this practice of sending emails announcing everyone’s birthday. What a complete waste and pain. So I wrote them a mail asking them to please desist on my day. Just. Just spare me. As I get older I have gotten more anti social. In fact I merely got grumpier. Just like the old troll in fairytales. On Thursday being my grumpy old troll mood, I refused to listen to my team request for a luncheon on Friday. In fact once my meeting got cancelled for the morning I put in a request for the day off. I am not even coming to office. The second half we planned to run off to Igatpuri at my sisters bunglow with her family and my brother’s as well.
I make an effort not to remember my birthday. My dream one day is to forget it completely. That will be the day according to me. so I woke up in the morning not remembering its my birthday till I received an sms wishing me. as I came out of the shower my wife and kid sang the birthday song. I like that. I know people who really care, when they wish, it doe fell kind of good. My things with birthdays is the rest of the world not those who care.
I spent the rest of the morning helping my wife clean the house as we were to leave for three days. Roaming around in a pair of jeans, I was trying to get my pedagogy right for the lecture I was scheduled for next Sunday.
Suddenly the bell rang. As jasmine opened the door, I saw my good peon form office – Vinod with a cake in a bag. Oh god. They sent me cake from office. I looked at Vinod. Since I was topless I looked at him and aksed, ‘ are there others around? are they hiding?” he nodded and pointed in the direction. I ran in to wear a t shirt and then came out to discover them hiding near the stair case. SURPRISE!!! My team along with two others who are no longer a part of my team was present. Ok. I really love them. They all came in from office to catch me on my birthday. They had got a chocolate mousse cake which I proceeded to cut and then they took turns splashing it on my face.. Soon enough one spark resulted in a cake fight. All of us including my wife had cake n our face. All with brown melting mousse dripping down on the face.
It was pretty good fun.
Moral of the story – I was a grumpy old troll with a bad attitude problem. Sure enough you get shitty people and people who don’t care but at the same time you get good guys with a lot of love to share. In my effort to alienate those I do not care about or thopse who do not care for me I end up alienating those who do and those that matter. I almost threw the baby out with the bath water. I am reminded of the story of the selfish giant who did not let any one in his garden and winter permanently set in. It only got a bit of spring when one small kid who refused to get intimated by the giant and came and sat on one of the trees. The giant then saw light.
My team refused to get intimated by my ‘trollness’. They said screw you. And they came home and showed me what I might have missed.
Dates are irrelevant to the rational mind. They have no significance. What is the point of celebrating Independence Day. Work hard and be honest if you really care. Don’t sit and celebrate the day by watching old emotional movies on the telly. What is the point of it? Pure symbolism. What shit?
But at he same time, isn’t it a day to somehow remember that we struggled. So many fought so that they and more importantly those to come would be free.
My birthday has no real significance to me and to the rational mind it means naught. But we are all a bunch of people guided by irrationality. I liked it that the team came. I liked celebrating with them. It mattered to me that they felt welcome to come home and the fact that they bothered. It said something to me. it also proved my belief that I might be a troll at times but I am a likeable troll or at the least approachable. Having cake on my face was the ultimate gesture of acceptability.
In the physics book that I was reading I read about the Solvay conference held in Brussels devoted to Quantum Physics. 17 of the 23 delegates were or would become Nobel laureates. Marie Curie was even a double laureate. Einstein was one delegate. It was here Einstein declared in reference to Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle that “God does not play dice”, and to which Niels Bohr replied “Albert, stop telling God what to do”
Wow. Imagine the group where one like Einstein can be told something like that in no uncertain terms. There is respect for the brain but there is also a healthy irreverence. Groups where people aren’t afraid to speak their mind are the groups that I would love to belong to. That is the group that I prefer. A respect but a certain irreverence. A case of opposites reconciling. And to think of it – I almost missed it thanks to my … my…. I don’t know what. Shit. I was lucky. I hope I don’t forget this lesson. In all likelyhood I am going to make this mistake again. It’s going to be difficult. The silver lining for me is that here I made the mistake but my team refused to let me suffer for it. At least I was considered open enough, whose plea for solitude was ignored.
As I grow older I will have many more of these pangs in opposite directions. The greatest fun will always be if in some magical way opposites reconcile.
But the point of the time value of this blog is important as I sit down today and reminiscence on the feeling that got built up over the last year as we hurtled towards yesterday. In the good old days I felt excited and I wanted yesterday to come everyday. I even counted the days to yesterday. Till I was in third standard yesterday was always in my school vacations. We used to live the gulf, where the school shut for the oppressive summers and I could not have my day in the sun in front of peers. Yesterday was an important point in my every day year. So when we first came to Mumbai I was so excited that I would get to celebrate yesterday with peers. I started counting the days I would take to get yesterday. Waiting and counting. If I am not mistaken I even counted up to 45 days. Oh that day. I wore a safari suit in the fourth standard. What was it blue or was it grey. But I was so proud. I must have never been so proud to distribute orange hard boiled confectionary. It used to cost 10 paise for one at retail price at around 6 paise per sweet at wholesale rate. Man I was so thrilled. The first time I had a chance to celebrate my birthday in school and having 60, not just 30 as per gulf school norms. Yeah yeah. It was day in the sun. No wonder I was so excited.
All these years I continued to be excited till something struck last year. It was my own version of the mid life crisis. I started hating birthdays. Not that the thought of growing older hurt. But au contraire I loved getting old. But I started hating getting birthday greetings from people. Why? I don’t know if people really care when they wish and I stopped liking any wishes and I started suspecting them of being mere formality. I also stopped wishing too many people on their birthdays as well in the hope that they would in turn stop greeting me as well. I even got rid of my birthday notification from the social networking sites.
Day before yesterday I sent a mail to HR. they have this practice of sending emails announcing everyone’s birthday. What a complete waste and pain. So I wrote them a mail asking them to please desist on my day. Just. Just spare me. As I get older I have gotten more anti social. In fact I merely got grumpier. Just like the old troll in fairytales. On Thursday being my grumpy old troll mood, I refused to listen to my team request for a luncheon on Friday. In fact once my meeting got cancelled for the morning I put in a request for the day off. I am not even coming to office. The second half we planned to run off to Igatpuri at my sisters bunglow with her family and my brother’s as well.
I make an effort not to remember my birthday. My dream one day is to forget it completely. That will be the day according to me. so I woke up in the morning not remembering its my birthday till I received an sms wishing me. as I came out of the shower my wife and kid sang the birthday song. I like that. I know people who really care, when they wish, it doe fell kind of good. My things with birthdays is the rest of the world not those who care.
I spent the rest of the morning helping my wife clean the house as we were to leave for three days. Roaming around in a pair of jeans, I was trying to get my pedagogy right for the lecture I was scheduled for next Sunday.
Suddenly the bell rang. As jasmine opened the door, I saw my good peon form office – Vinod with a cake in a bag. Oh god. They sent me cake from office. I looked at Vinod. Since I was topless I looked at him and aksed, ‘ are there others around? are they hiding?” he nodded and pointed in the direction. I ran in to wear a t shirt and then came out to discover them hiding near the stair case. SURPRISE!!! My team along with two others who are no longer a part of my team was present. Ok. I really love them. They all came in from office to catch me on my birthday. They had got a chocolate mousse cake which I proceeded to cut and then they took turns splashing it on my face.. Soon enough one spark resulted in a cake fight. All of us including my wife had cake n our face. All with brown melting mousse dripping down on the face.
It was pretty good fun.
Moral of the story – I was a grumpy old troll with a bad attitude problem. Sure enough you get shitty people and people who don’t care but at the same time you get good guys with a lot of love to share. In my effort to alienate those I do not care about or thopse who do not care for me I end up alienating those who do and those that matter. I almost threw the baby out with the bath water. I am reminded of the story of the selfish giant who did not let any one in his garden and winter permanently set in. It only got a bit of spring when one small kid who refused to get intimated by the giant and came and sat on one of the trees. The giant then saw light.
My team refused to get intimated by my ‘trollness’. They said screw you. And they came home and showed me what I might have missed.
Dates are irrelevant to the rational mind. They have no significance. What is the point of celebrating Independence Day. Work hard and be honest if you really care. Don’t sit and celebrate the day by watching old emotional movies on the telly. What is the point of it? Pure symbolism. What shit?
But at he same time, isn’t it a day to somehow remember that we struggled. So many fought so that they and more importantly those to come would be free.
My birthday has no real significance to me and to the rational mind it means naught. But we are all a bunch of people guided by irrationality. I liked it that the team came. I liked celebrating with them. It mattered to me that they felt welcome to come home and the fact that they bothered. It said something to me. it also proved my belief that I might be a troll at times but I am a likeable troll or at the least approachable. Having cake on my face was the ultimate gesture of acceptability.
In the physics book that I was reading I read about the Solvay conference held in Brussels devoted to Quantum Physics. 17 of the 23 delegates were or would become Nobel laureates. Marie Curie was even a double laureate. Einstein was one delegate. It was here Einstein declared in reference to Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle that “God does not play dice”, and to which Niels Bohr replied “Albert, stop telling God what to do”
Wow. Imagine the group where one like Einstein can be told something like that in no uncertain terms. There is respect for the brain but there is also a healthy irreverence. Groups where people aren’t afraid to speak their mind are the groups that I would love to belong to. That is the group that I prefer. A respect but a certain irreverence. A case of opposites reconciling. And to think of it – I almost missed it thanks to my … my…. I don’t know what. Shit. I was lucky. I hope I don’t forget this lesson. In all likelyhood I am going to make this mistake again. It’s going to be difficult. The silver lining for me is that here I made the mistake but my team refused to let me suffer for it. At least I was considered open enough, whose plea for solitude was ignored.
As I grow older I will have many more of these pangs in opposite directions. The greatest fun will always be if in some magical way opposites reconcile.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
now I am there, now I am not
It’s tough being a dad. At least being an involved dad. One of my guiding principals in being a dad is to remembering what I went through as a kid and ensuring that the same shit does not hit my daughter while I attempt to replicate what I really like. Jispa so far has grown to be a sweet kid who understands issues and is able to not throw tantrums to get her way done. She is remarkably well behaved while shopping or for anything.
Her birthday is coming up and I don’t understand the parties where you end up spending near about a lakh rupees. That seems to be par for the course. I find it obnoxious. Why do you need a party organiser when you have me? What is my creativity and jasmine’s superb organising skills going to come of use? This year we want to have a treasure hunt. We have a large – really huge garden behind our house. I think it is sometimes touted as Mumbai’s largest public garden and it’s also decently maintained. The builder maintains it as he still wants to sell projects that are coming up. So the game and clues have all been dreamt of. Now to have a really fun party. The kids are also so bored of the standard party games played by the standard party organisers. Jispa is happy with these parties and does not insist on getting fancier parties as compared to her friends and neither do we have such ambitions.
Its amazing how our moods are linked into hers and having a close nuclear family one person’s mood impacts the others immensely. Yesterday Jispa was upset at some issue she had with her friends. There are times when you can control issues and then there are times when you can’t. It is up to you to take that call. And it is a difficult call to take.
As a dad I want to protect her where possible and also at the same time I want her to be ready to face life’s realities where possible. She needs to grow up and be happy at the same time. Can the two coexist? Some part of growing up is necessarily not happy. I have had some experiences as a kid, that were not too happy. In school, as I have earlier blogged about, we came in from Dubai to India when I was in fourth standard and it was pretty traumatic. But more than that I started noticing something at about the same time. There some group leaders emerging within the class. These were characters who would dictate what to do and be natural leaders of their groups. And eth groups had the second type of people. Kids who would follow the leader. So the leader decided the games to be played and the group followed and pandered to every whim and fancy of the leader. I remember seeing it upfront and early enough. And I also remember not fitting in either segment. I was no natural leader - in school at young ages – these were normally the really bratty extra shrewd ones. And I was definitely no mind less follower. The result in primary and to an extent secondary school is a bit of solitude. It’s not as poetic as it sounds. It means you typically float from group to group every break figuring some game to play. A little bit of a loner.
I have seen Jispa’s style and her friends. There are some natural born pains. The mean types, the over dressed types, the I know it all types, I am so pretty types, it’s my way or highway types. Jispa is the amenable type but not a mindless girlie types. She has a sharp mind that can see the pettiness in a game and get happily bored. Even more so when the game becomes too girly She is also not a natural bon bitch. No I don’t think I am seeing it with parenting eyes. I genuinely see some girls behave like an A grade bitch. The way they manipulate others or their parents. Jips is not a manipulator.
I don’t know how it will pan out for her. I sure knew how it panned out for me. I had very few friends and I really never did belong to a large group in school. In college somehow a group emerged, but I was never really really close to any one group and also hung around with different groups. I learnt in the end not to get too fussed. I learnt today not to be bothered too much with others plans and people. I was in the end happier alone. It’s the same thing with meetings as well. Everyone is involved in meetings and it really gets to my nerves. The bullshit quotient gets too high for my liking and I simply tune off.
I am sure Jispa will face this or many similar issues. Or even issues of another kind. Some I will know of and some I won’t have a clue. She might be too proud to tell me. or she might not want to tell me for whatever other reason… I might sweat too much. So many of these I would simply not be able to solve. And she grows older she will have to solve them her self. I can at best be a sounding board. I have to understand this. I have to think through this. It is difficult to see your child unhappy and say – its ok, she’ll grow up. There will be much heartbreak for her to handle. What is going to be my role? Yesterday with her friends she was upset; I stayed away from the cause. I limited my role to cheering her up. I told her that her happy me was having a fight with her sad me. She can’t let the sad me win for now. Let the happy me be there and show happiness. We take the sad me and trap in a pocket. In the evening when the sad me has had some time to think, remove her from your pocket and ask her what the issue actually was. She should then see if the sad me was really right in being sad and to have a heart to heart chat with her. Till then if you are sad or if you let things affect you, there will always be people happy that you have things affecting you. Let the happy me win for now. Sad me is not a bad thing, just give it some time to think.
I guess that should be the rule going forward. More and more so. I would cease to really know what the exact issue is or the problem is. That is something she would have to deal with herself. I can only give larger picture ‘gyan’. It’s not easy but its ok. That way I guess I can help where required and stay off on specifics. Real learning is nothing but application.
Everyone grows. The more I protect the later she grows. It is affine balance and it is disturbing in the short run. Even as I write this I am not totally at ease not knowing the exact nature of any problem. I don’t like saying that I don’t want to know. I want to know. I want to see. I want to be involved. But I also know I shouldn’t. I can only be there if required. Hopefully my blog will be around well afterwards.
Her birthday is coming up and I don’t understand the parties where you end up spending near about a lakh rupees. That seems to be par for the course. I find it obnoxious. Why do you need a party organiser when you have me? What is my creativity and jasmine’s superb organising skills going to come of use? This year we want to have a treasure hunt. We have a large – really huge garden behind our house. I think it is sometimes touted as Mumbai’s largest public garden and it’s also decently maintained. The builder maintains it as he still wants to sell projects that are coming up. So the game and clues have all been dreamt of. Now to have a really fun party. The kids are also so bored of the standard party games played by the standard party organisers. Jispa is happy with these parties and does not insist on getting fancier parties as compared to her friends and neither do we have such ambitions.
Its amazing how our moods are linked into hers and having a close nuclear family one person’s mood impacts the others immensely. Yesterday Jispa was upset at some issue she had with her friends. There are times when you can control issues and then there are times when you can’t. It is up to you to take that call. And it is a difficult call to take.
As a dad I want to protect her where possible and also at the same time I want her to be ready to face life’s realities where possible. She needs to grow up and be happy at the same time. Can the two coexist? Some part of growing up is necessarily not happy. I have had some experiences as a kid, that were not too happy. In school, as I have earlier blogged about, we came in from Dubai to India when I was in fourth standard and it was pretty traumatic. But more than that I started noticing something at about the same time. There some group leaders emerging within the class. These were characters who would dictate what to do and be natural leaders of their groups. And eth groups had the second type of people. Kids who would follow the leader. So the leader decided the games to be played and the group followed and pandered to every whim and fancy of the leader. I remember seeing it upfront and early enough. And I also remember not fitting in either segment. I was no natural leader - in school at young ages – these were normally the really bratty extra shrewd ones. And I was definitely no mind less follower. The result in primary and to an extent secondary school is a bit of solitude. It’s not as poetic as it sounds. It means you typically float from group to group every break figuring some game to play. A little bit of a loner.
I have seen Jispa’s style and her friends. There are some natural born pains. The mean types, the over dressed types, the I know it all types, I am so pretty types, it’s my way or highway types. Jispa is the amenable type but not a mindless girlie types. She has a sharp mind that can see the pettiness in a game and get happily bored. Even more so when the game becomes too girly She is also not a natural bon bitch. No I don’t think I am seeing it with parenting eyes. I genuinely see some girls behave like an A grade bitch. The way they manipulate others or their parents. Jips is not a manipulator.
I don’t know how it will pan out for her. I sure knew how it panned out for me. I had very few friends and I really never did belong to a large group in school. In college somehow a group emerged, but I was never really really close to any one group and also hung around with different groups. I learnt in the end not to get too fussed. I learnt today not to be bothered too much with others plans and people. I was in the end happier alone. It’s the same thing with meetings as well. Everyone is involved in meetings and it really gets to my nerves. The bullshit quotient gets too high for my liking and I simply tune off.
I am sure Jispa will face this or many similar issues. Or even issues of another kind. Some I will know of and some I won’t have a clue. She might be too proud to tell me. or she might not want to tell me for whatever other reason… I might sweat too much. So many of these I would simply not be able to solve. And she grows older she will have to solve them her self. I can at best be a sounding board. I have to understand this. I have to think through this. It is difficult to see your child unhappy and say – its ok, she’ll grow up. There will be much heartbreak for her to handle. What is going to be my role? Yesterday with her friends she was upset; I stayed away from the cause. I limited my role to cheering her up. I told her that her happy me was having a fight with her sad me. She can’t let the sad me win for now. Let the happy me be there and show happiness. We take the sad me and trap in a pocket. In the evening when the sad me has had some time to think, remove her from your pocket and ask her what the issue actually was. She should then see if the sad me was really right in being sad and to have a heart to heart chat with her. Till then if you are sad or if you let things affect you, there will always be people happy that you have things affecting you. Let the happy me win for now. Sad me is not a bad thing, just give it some time to think.
I guess that should be the rule going forward. More and more so. I would cease to really know what the exact issue is or the problem is. That is something she would have to deal with herself. I can only give larger picture ‘gyan’. It’s not easy but its ok. That way I guess I can help where required and stay off on specifics. Real learning is nothing but application.
Everyone grows. The more I protect the later she grows. It is affine balance and it is disturbing in the short run. Even as I write this I am not totally at ease not knowing the exact nature of any problem. I don’t like saying that I don’t want to know. I want to know. I want to see. I want to be involved. But I also know I shouldn’t. I can only be there if required. Hopefully my blog will be around well afterwards.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
its in the schedule
There are so many demands on daily life, it is important for a schedule to be in place. otherwise I guess its just impossible the demands of conflicting priorities. Once in place also the schedule makes for certain rigidity that my anti establishment tendencies find pretty irritating. Right now I am at 35 managing to find a balance between the two. But my daughter at 8 is another thing altogether.
She wants to do a lot and she clearly enjoys it tremendously. But it drives jasmine up the wall. Till now the pressure of school work was minimum but slowly as the pressure cranks up the walls seem to be bulging.
Jispa has her reviews happening. A lot of school work faces two kind of responses. Jasmine who wants it to be given due importance and me… who couldn’t really care less. I prefer sweating over the creative and fun stuff. The elocution competition, the sports day, the taekwondo kicks, creative writing etc. but math and Hindi are still there in the curriculum when I last checked and we still count those marks for promotion. So I guess that’s a given. So every time Jasmine will be stressing out on the math and Hindi and I will be like – let it be, let it be. And when it comes to the other stuff, I am in complete command with Jasmine only overseeing.
I also realise that jasmine is right. So it makes for an interesting balance. Otherwise both of us would have gone completely bonkers and taken Jispa along with.
So right now in the middle of all her activity we are struggling to find time for practice for her. How so we squeeze in time for her school practice as the reviews have started and how do we find time for her guitar practice, without which it’s pretty much impossible to learn the instrument.
I was trying to understand the schedule. I have learnt that it only works if it is a part of the schedule that is followed everyday. Jispa is also a dreamer. Someone who thinks of interesting things all the time. The imagination will always be in hyper mode. I get my best ideas in the shower or when I eating or doing something of a routine. It’s not a get over with it attitude but the brain starts functioning overtime and its gets lost in its thoughts. Jispa does that and bang…. There goes the schedule. The morning is a special pain. So I did the next bets thing. Disciplining my self to wake up on time. If I don’t wake up on time, I can’t wake her on time and then we are constantly rushing.
If the waking time is crunched and the shower hits the face fast enough rest of eth morning is much better. Jispa will get at least 30 minutes to practice everyday and I can use that time to also read. The key is to get all ready by 7 am. It happened today but I am not overtly bullish on it happening everyday. She got her practice time for a good 30 minutes. Here is a pic of her practising the guitar today morning.
Today while reading in the morning I came across what John Wheeler said – “Everything important, at the bottom, is essentially simple.” This was not a philosophy book but a physics book and this was in the chapter that was talking about quantum physics. But I couldn’t agree more. Most of the smartest people I met have said the same thing. If it is too complex it cannot be right. My best marketing teachers have always said that. Last week I saw a play on the life of mathematician Ramanujan. They also said something to the effect that – a mathematical equation has to be beautiful. Beauty lies in simplicity not complexity.
Most of all that we see or face – the answers lie in simple steps or terms. Can we have that one lens (Thank you Dharen for this example) through we which we can see everything and make sense of the complex games at play. Can we understand it so well that we can explain it to our mother (thank you prof Navalkar for this example). But essentially we only know it well if we can explain it well enough that a child could possible understand it.
I love it when Jispa asks me questions. It gives me great pleasure in explaining stuff to her. Yesterday she was talking about how stickers stick but don’t stick on the paper it comes in. interesting question. In trying to help her understand it I think I too cleared my mind on it. She then gets encouraged to ask more and more. What fun. I love this bit of parenting as well.
This too is only possible if I fit the schedule. Most of our father daughter interaction happens in the morning when I get to drop her to the bus stop. It get as high as the history of Indo Pak relations to something that is as sublime as sailing paper boats on the roadside streams near the bust stop. The latter is of particular interest to us and we hope for a decent stream everyday.
She wants to do a lot and she clearly enjoys it tremendously. But it drives jasmine up the wall. Till now the pressure of school work was minimum but slowly as the pressure cranks up the walls seem to be bulging.
Jispa has her reviews happening. A lot of school work faces two kind of responses. Jasmine who wants it to be given due importance and me… who couldn’t really care less. I prefer sweating over the creative and fun stuff. The elocution competition, the sports day, the taekwondo kicks, creative writing etc. but math and Hindi are still there in the curriculum when I last checked and we still count those marks for promotion. So I guess that’s a given. So every time Jasmine will be stressing out on the math and Hindi and I will be like – let it be, let it be. And when it comes to the other stuff, I am in complete command with Jasmine only overseeing.
I also realise that jasmine is right. So it makes for an interesting balance. Otherwise both of us would have gone completely bonkers and taken Jispa along with.
So right now in the middle of all her activity we are struggling to find time for practice for her. How so we squeeze in time for her school practice as the reviews have started and how do we find time for her guitar practice, without which it’s pretty much impossible to learn the instrument.
I was trying to understand the schedule. I have learnt that it only works if it is a part of the schedule that is followed everyday. Jispa is also a dreamer. Someone who thinks of interesting things all the time. The imagination will always be in hyper mode. I get my best ideas in the shower or when I eating or doing something of a routine. It’s not a get over with it attitude but the brain starts functioning overtime and its gets lost in its thoughts. Jispa does that and bang…. There goes the schedule. The morning is a special pain. So I did the next bets thing. Disciplining my self to wake up on time. If I don’t wake up on time, I can’t wake her on time and then we are constantly rushing.
If the waking time is crunched and the shower hits the face fast enough rest of eth morning is much better. Jispa will get at least 30 minutes to practice everyday and I can use that time to also read. The key is to get all ready by 7 am. It happened today but I am not overtly bullish on it happening everyday. She got her practice time for a good 30 minutes. Here is a pic of her practising the guitar today morning.
Today while reading in the morning I came across what John Wheeler said – “Everything important, at the bottom, is essentially simple.” This was not a philosophy book but a physics book and this was in the chapter that was talking about quantum physics. But I couldn’t agree more. Most of the smartest people I met have said the same thing. If it is too complex it cannot be right. My best marketing teachers have always said that. Last week I saw a play on the life of mathematician Ramanujan. They also said something to the effect that – a mathematical equation has to be beautiful. Beauty lies in simplicity not complexity.
Most of all that we see or face – the answers lie in simple steps or terms. Can we have that one lens (Thank you Dharen for this example) through we which we can see everything and make sense of the complex games at play. Can we understand it so well that we can explain it to our mother (thank you prof Navalkar for this example). But essentially we only know it well if we can explain it well enough that a child could possible understand it.
I love it when Jispa asks me questions. It gives me great pleasure in explaining stuff to her. Yesterday she was talking about how stickers stick but don’t stick on the paper it comes in. interesting question. In trying to help her understand it I think I too cleared my mind on it. She then gets encouraged to ask more and more. What fun. I love this bit of parenting as well.
This too is only possible if I fit the schedule. Most of our father daughter interaction happens in the morning when I get to drop her to the bus stop. It get as high as the history of Indo Pak relations to something that is as sublime as sailing paper boats on the roadside streams near the bust stop. The latter is of particular interest to us and we hope for a decent stream everyday.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Can I proudly say that I am .... humble?
Normally forwards on the email are really boring stuff. Either they tell you a joke you have heard or haven’t found funny, or they give you sentimental bull shit that you must forward to a billion or so people or else face bad luck. Very rarely does some one send you some insight that you have not known of or care for.
Yesterday I received one rare forward. This was in the form of an essay “How Will You Measure Your Life?” by Clayton M. Christensen, Harvard Business School. He wrote a lot of interesting stuff. A lot which I knew about or agreed to. But one thing he wrote struck me harder as it seemed to give a solution to something that has been vexing me.
I have met some seriously humble people and some seriously arrogant behaviour. Humility is a virtue that is taught in school in moral science class. It is a virtue to have. But it is taught or rather it is understood wrongly. Till now also I never really understood humility. I think my natural instinct is arrogant and self assuming. I have a mighty high view of my self. I have tried always in the past to some how keep this in check. Self deprecating behaviour was one strong way to do it, as I saw it. tel your self that you aren’t that good. That there are many better and you are just not able to see it. There so many higher goals and standards for you to achieve. That I thought tried keeping my arrogance instep.
But something was somehow still amiss. Something did not connect. Was I still arrogant but only slightly more balanced about it. Yes I am good but there are ways to get better. Would this help me treat other people better or would my arrogance finally play out. Would I unknowingly upset people by my huge self confidence and inability to see counter points of view? Suppose I get the point soon enough, do I insult people by telling them that I got it and they could carry on. Was hunching my shoulders and sitting in a submissive pose just an act that went against my grain and really helped no one. What is humility and how to achieve it? Honestly I can ask all this in hindsight. Till now I think self deprecating behaviour was helping go …. No where. While I genuinely manage to control my thoughts and made me achieve to higher standards by believing that everything can and must improve, I don’t think it did anything for my humility quotient (or lack of thereof).
The answer is in what the author writes
“humility was defined not by self-deprecating behavior or attitudes but by the esteem with which you regard others. Good behavior flows naturally from that kind of humility. For example, you would never steal from someone, because you respect that person too much. You’d never lie to someone, either.”
That is humility. It is not seen by how we treat ourselves; its essence is in how we regard others. Not treat others but genuinely REGARD others. We can treat other people nicely but then think we are such nice people that we are able to treat other people well. It would flow from our own high version of our self. But if we genuinely regard others well it would not occur to us to treat others better. We would naturally treat them well.
I see light. If I were to think through and analyse the people I have met, the humble ones are the ones who regard others. They are so beautiful that they genuinely love other people and they have no self concept when they interact with others. The genuine intent comes through so strongly that it is easy for people to love them and regard them in return. They don’t ask for it and don’t want it, but are always there. Prem and Rajesh were two such souls that have shown me such light.
I have always wondered – how I am seen as humble with some and arrogant with others. I am the same guy, why would this happen? Till now I have thought that those whom I work with closely have been able to see the real me and the others just need to dig deeper. I had made significant progress with my self deprecating attitude, but at some time it hit the wall. What is wrong?
The answer is elsewhere. Do I have genuine regard for others whom I don’t work closely with? The problem is not with others, it is with me. The day I realise that I have made a great step forward.
There. Today I took a significant step forward.
Now I will look at the email forwards with a little more ‘regard’
PS: Hey – a-ha moment…. I think I do better with my students as I have genuine regard for them. I love their abilities and try my best to work with them. That’s why I tend to work better wit them. Yes. It is not about me. I have always maintained that the students love to learn, it is only that we as teachers have failed to teach. I have maintained that if we respect them and ‘regard’ them well they will automatically love and respect you. Yes. Shit … the stuff is so dam true.
It has also worked where I have tried to tell myself with every subordinate – this one is good and not let me think that anyone is bad. That’s helps me work with them and improved my relationship with them. It has failed as well but the successes have been more than failures. Hmmm….
Can you see me now? I have a halo behind my head. It is a little light and is fast disappearing, but its there somewhere… look closely.
One more interesting thing he wrote: The lesson I learned from this is that it’s easier to hold to your principles 100% of the time than it is to hold to them 98% of the time. If you give in to “just this once,” based on a marginal cost analysis, as some of my former classmates have done, you’ll regret where you end up. You’ve got to define for yourself what you stand for and draw the line in a safe place.
Yesterday I received one rare forward. This was in the form of an essay “How Will You Measure Your Life?” by Clayton M. Christensen, Harvard Business School. He wrote a lot of interesting stuff. A lot which I knew about or agreed to. But one thing he wrote struck me harder as it seemed to give a solution to something that has been vexing me.
I have met some seriously humble people and some seriously arrogant behaviour. Humility is a virtue that is taught in school in moral science class. It is a virtue to have. But it is taught or rather it is understood wrongly. Till now also I never really understood humility. I think my natural instinct is arrogant and self assuming. I have a mighty high view of my self. I have tried always in the past to some how keep this in check. Self deprecating behaviour was one strong way to do it, as I saw it. tel your self that you aren’t that good. That there are many better and you are just not able to see it. There so many higher goals and standards for you to achieve. That I thought tried keeping my arrogance instep.
But something was somehow still amiss. Something did not connect. Was I still arrogant but only slightly more balanced about it. Yes I am good but there are ways to get better. Would this help me treat other people better or would my arrogance finally play out. Would I unknowingly upset people by my huge self confidence and inability to see counter points of view? Suppose I get the point soon enough, do I insult people by telling them that I got it and they could carry on. Was hunching my shoulders and sitting in a submissive pose just an act that went against my grain and really helped no one. What is humility and how to achieve it? Honestly I can ask all this in hindsight. Till now I think self deprecating behaviour was helping go …. No where. While I genuinely manage to control my thoughts and made me achieve to higher standards by believing that everything can and must improve, I don’t think it did anything for my humility quotient (or lack of thereof).
The answer is in what the author writes
“humility was defined not by self-deprecating behavior or attitudes but by the esteem with which you regard others. Good behavior flows naturally from that kind of humility. For example, you would never steal from someone, because you respect that person too much. You’d never lie to someone, either.”
That is humility. It is not seen by how we treat ourselves; its essence is in how we regard others. Not treat others but genuinely REGARD others. We can treat other people nicely but then think we are such nice people that we are able to treat other people well. It would flow from our own high version of our self. But if we genuinely regard others well it would not occur to us to treat others better. We would naturally treat them well.
I see light. If I were to think through and analyse the people I have met, the humble ones are the ones who regard others. They are so beautiful that they genuinely love other people and they have no self concept when they interact with others. The genuine intent comes through so strongly that it is easy for people to love them and regard them in return. They don’t ask for it and don’t want it, but are always there. Prem and Rajesh were two such souls that have shown me such light.
I have always wondered – how I am seen as humble with some and arrogant with others. I am the same guy, why would this happen? Till now I have thought that those whom I work with closely have been able to see the real me and the others just need to dig deeper. I had made significant progress with my self deprecating attitude, but at some time it hit the wall. What is wrong?
The answer is elsewhere. Do I have genuine regard for others whom I don’t work closely with? The problem is not with others, it is with me. The day I realise that I have made a great step forward.
There. Today I took a significant step forward.
Now I will look at the email forwards with a little more ‘regard’
PS: Hey – a-ha moment…. I think I do better with my students as I have genuine regard for them. I love their abilities and try my best to work with them. That’s why I tend to work better wit them. Yes. It is not about me. I have always maintained that the students love to learn, it is only that we as teachers have failed to teach. I have maintained that if we respect them and ‘regard’ them well they will automatically love and respect you. Yes. Shit … the stuff is so dam true.
It has also worked where I have tried to tell myself with every subordinate – this one is good and not let me think that anyone is bad. That’s helps me work with them and improved my relationship with them. It has failed as well but the successes have been more than failures. Hmmm….
Can you see me now? I have a halo behind my head. It is a little light and is fast disappearing, but its there somewhere… look closely.
One more interesting thing he wrote: The lesson I learned from this is that it’s easier to hold to your principles 100% of the time than it is to hold to them 98% of the time. If you give in to “just this once,” based on a marginal cost analysis, as some of my former classmates have done, you’ll regret where you end up. You’ve got to define for yourself what you stand for and draw the line in a safe place.
Monday, August 09, 2010
its just a game, is it?
I was reading one blog on my reader. It is called Ulterior Motives and is authored by Art Markman. In this particular post he talks about the effect of violent video games. (link) The long and short of it is “These results suggest that video games can actually create a curriculum for teaching aggressive and risky behaviours. Unfortunately, they do not provide a good outlet for anger and aggression. Instead, they reinforce anger and aggression and allow players to transfer that behaviour to the real world.”
One would assume that this is nothing new. We all knew this. Violent Video games promote violent behaviour. Ditto with movies. But slowly over a period of time we have let the violence increase in the content we consume. So Sholay which was extremely violent when it released 35 years ago would be pretty average by today’s standards. I don’t assume most would even think about the violence. Possibly we are now blind to it. It is a matter of every day routine.
While growing up us boys faced a huge shortage of steamy pics to ogle at. No internet to get your fix. Here the Mid Day mate which was a daily picture of a scantily clad woman in a mainstream afternoon daily was the best we could get. Any one who had the Mid Day would be obliged to share the third page for our voyeuristic pleasures. I don’t think it really matter today with a surfeit of it in various forms of digital media.
There is a joke doing the rounds on SMS – it talks about how romantic mushy movies spoil women expectations and then adds that porn does the same to men.
I would assume that media does impact human minds. The stuff we see does leave us with impressions that we carry forward. I would only assume that games would create greater impression than a movie. For one the time spent might be larger and two – you take on the role play that rewards excessive behaviour. Whatever the reason, I might argue that it is ill advised to leave too many unattended games at your kids door step.
The problem here is accentuated by the fact that parents might see these as merely games. My son is just playing video games. How bad is that?
One kid’s party we went to was celebrating his birthday. He might have been around 7 years old. A sharp kid with a keen eye. It seems he loves playing games. All sorts of games, board games, video games, outdoor games. He picks them fast and beats some of the elder players. His dad got him a PS2 for his birthday. Very cool. I don’t approve but I guess its ok.
There that’s him with his gift and you can see the PS2 to his right on the back.
While just flipping around his presents I chanced upon the games his dad bought along with. His enthusiastic dad just bought the device and asked the vendor to give the popular games. I am not sure if he specifed the age of eth recipient, but I am quite sure it wouldn’t have made a difference to the vendor. The top most on the pile was….
There. There were a few more like these ion the pile. Can you see the rating that is there on the CD cover. Would you give a movie with that rating to the child? nopes but a game. What wrong with just a game? I nudged his dad saying the game is meant for elders. His dad said, “arey my son is good at games. He plays the games meant for elder kids very well. He goes to other friend’s house and beats them at the games. He is good.” Err… what do I say? “This is not that kind of elder games. This is really elder games. The kind that has not so harmless content in it”. I did not know how to explain the stuff but Grand theft auto is not exactly a paragon of virtue role play. I don’t even think it has a grey side. It’s the cool other side – period.
I am not sure if the penny dropped but I dropped the topic and carried on. It was not his fault. He wasn’t too aware. He merely thought they were games. How easily is this misunderstood or glossed over.
One would assume that this is nothing new. We all knew this. Violent Video games promote violent behaviour. Ditto with movies. But slowly over a period of time we have let the violence increase in the content we consume. So Sholay which was extremely violent when it released 35 years ago would be pretty average by today’s standards. I don’t assume most would even think about the violence. Possibly we are now blind to it. It is a matter of every day routine.
While growing up us boys faced a huge shortage of steamy pics to ogle at. No internet to get your fix. Here the Mid Day mate which was a daily picture of a scantily clad woman in a mainstream afternoon daily was the best we could get. Any one who had the Mid Day would be obliged to share the third page for our voyeuristic pleasures. I don’t think it really matter today with a surfeit of it in various forms of digital media.
There is a joke doing the rounds on SMS – it talks about how romantic mushy movies spoil women expectations and then adds that porn does the same to men.
I would assume that media does impact human minds. The stuff we see does leave us with impressions that we carry forward. I would only assume that games would create greater impression than a movie. For one the time spent might be larger and two – you take on the role play that rewards excessive behaviour. Whatever the reason, I might argue that it is ill advised to leave too many unattended games at your kids door step.
The problem here is accentuated by the fact that parents might see these as merely games. My son is just playing video games. How bad is that?
One kid’s party we went to was celebrating his birthday. He might have been around 7 years old. A sharp kid with a keen eye. It seems he loves playing games. All sorts of games, board games, video games, outdoor games. He picks them fast and beats some of the elder players. His dad got him a PS2 for his birthday. Very cool. I don’t approve but I guess its ok.
There that’s him with his gift and you can see the PS2 to his right on the back.
While just flipping around his presents I chanced upon the games his dad bought along with. His enthusiastic dad just bought the device and asked the vendor to give the popular games. I am not sure if he specifed the age of eth recipient, but I am quite sure it wouldn’t have made a difference to the vendor. The top most on the pile was….
There. There were a few more like these ion the pile. Can you see the rating that is there on the CD cover. Would you give a movie with that rating to the child? nopes but a game. What wrong with just a game? I nudged his dad saying the game is meant for elders. His dad said, “arey my son is good at games. He plays the games meant for elder kids very well. He goes to other friend’s house and beats them at the games. He is good.” Err… what do I say? “This is not that kind of elder games. This is really elder games. The kind that has not so harmless content in it”. I did not know how to explain the stuff but Grand theft auto is not exactly a paragon of virtue role play. I don’t even think it has a grey side. It’s the cool other side – period.
I am not sure if the penny dropped but I dropped the topic and carried on. It was not his fault. He wasn’t too aware. He merely thought they were games. How easily is this misunderstood or glossed over.
Sunday, August 08, 2010
teewee
Yesterday we had some time to kill at a friend’s place. In fact a lot of time to kill. Our friend put me in front of a TV to try and make me feel comfortable. Since my TV viewing is pretty much zero thanks to the absence of the idiot box in our home, I assumed and I am sure she would have assumed as well that I might be happy to get what in scare supply in my routine life.
Sitting cozy with two remotes, one for the TV and one for the set top box (STB) I was set for a couple of hours of pure time pass. Hmmm. Lets see. The STB was there to make my life great. The programs neatly categorized. The schedule all there to select. You even know which movie is going on at the time. ya ya…. This is all old news. I know. It seems the lead company alone has put in over a million STB’s in the market. I have fiddled with this a few times in the past to know my way around. Though I keep pressing the wrong buttons from time to time and get to some vague place from which I attempt recovery. The common mistake being surfing channels from the TV remote and pressing the channel change instead of eth volume. There are also a plethora of complex errors that I make. These I will continue to make as these are highly random in nature and are uncomprehensible. In other words I have no idea how I made the errors and hence I have no idea how I will learn enough from them not to repeatthem. That’s the fun part.
Great – something interesting on the science channels. Ok. Same old stuff. Lets try the geographic channels, then the history channels. Oh bloody bore. Movies? Anything interesting on? Hmmm. The English ones? Nopes… pretty boring – cant make out types. Hindi ones? What shit? This one is South Indian dubbed into hindi one. Ok this another I remember – Shahenshah. A movie from my school days. Real crappy. My god.
Sports channels then. India just won the test – are the highlights on? Yah yah… I am in for luck. The schedule shows that the highlights are on. Flip to the channel. Errr… Indian derby? WTF. Who watches Indian derby? Where are the highlights? I am surely at the right channel. The schedule also confirms. Drat. Ok some other cricket happening. The T20 matches in Australia. That’s cool. Lets watch, it might be fun. Oh shit a disastrous run chase and a hopelessly one sided match, but have we, Kieron Pollard. The highly explosive west Indian is in the team. Now that’s fun. He smashes some unbelievable shots with one landing on the roof. This is getting better. Bam, he is caught in the deep. Match almost over. Anything else?
Change change change change change… flip flip flip flip…. This seems like some distant memory. Yes. I remember this. Evening time. a remote in hand, complete boredom, going the whole range of channels and getting nothing to see. The last time this happened to me was four years ago… at my mom’s house. Nothing’s changed. The only difference is that now I know exactly what the name of the program is before getting bored. Yes. Some things have changed I guess.
I pull the trigger and get out of the room to see the kids and my wife enjoying playing I spy in those amazing books. So much more fun. I should have pressed the dam red button much earlier.
For the last few weeks I have been thinking about the TV and the STB in the house. Is it really bad not to have it at home. Are we being luddites? Yesterday I found my answer. A resounding doubtless no. the shit is not worth having or listening to. Get out of the house, get a book, talk around. Anything anything except have a TV infront of you. Throw the bloody thing out of the window. See it crash, break into a billion pieces. Enjoy the spectacle.
That is a bit radical. But seriously get the cable off from the TV. I have been seriously thinking of getting a TV or a projector home. But never cable. When we have the time we could watch a movie, or catch some documentary or some decent serials. Basically remove the constantly on boredom to some specific entertainment. But it is a big step for now. We are content without it. It will come in some day. I am not going to be tyrannical about it. But for now it can’t. For one – we have no space for it :) . hopefully when we have more space, or more money … a theatre room would be awesome.
For some reason I am reminded of a Bruce Springsteen song. Its an old one. Can you guess which one I am referring to..
Here are the lyrics
57 CHANNELS (AND NOTHIN' ON)©
I bought a bourgeois house in the Hollywood hills
With a truckload of hundred thousand dollar bills
Man came by to hook up my cable TV
We settled in for the night my baby and me
We switched 'round and 'round 'til half-past dawn
There was fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Well now home entertainment was my baby's wish
So I hopped into town for a satellite dish
I tied it to the top of my Japanese car
I came home and I pointed it out into the stars
A message came back from the great beyond
There's fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Well we might'a made some friends with some billionaires
We might'a got all nice and friendly if we'd made it upstairs
All I got was a note that said "Bye-bye John
Our love's fifty-seven channels and nothin' on"
(Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on)
So I bought a .44 magnum, it was solid steel cast
And in the blessed name of Elvis well I just let it blast
'Til my TV lay in pieces there at my feet
And they busted me for disturbin' the almighty peace
Judge said "What you got in your defense son?"
"Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on"
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
I can see by your eyes friend you're just about gone
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and...
The boss got it right. But I guess throwing it out of the window would come a close second to the buying a .44 magnum and letting it blast. Actually it depends. The slow motion of the TV falling from height (at least ten floors recommended) might remain with you longer the sound and recoil of the .44 magnum. Haha. I can see by your eyes, friend that you’re just about gone…
Sitting cozy with two remotes, one for the TV and one for the set top box (STB) I was set for a couple of hours of pure time pass. Hmmm. Lets see. The STB was there to make my life great. The programs neatly categorized. The schedule all there to select. You even know which movie is going on at the time. ya ya…. This is all old news. I know. It seems the lead company alone has put in over a million STB’s in the market. I have fiddled with this a few times in the past to know my way around. Though I keep pressing the wrong buttons from time to time and get to some vague place from which I attempt recovery. The common mistake being surfing channels from the TV remote and pressing the channel change instead of eth volume. There are also a plethora of complex errors that I make. These I will continue to make as these are highly random in nature and are uncomprehensible. In other words I have no idea how I made the errors and hence I have no idea how I will learn enough from them not to repeatthem. That’s the fun part.
Great – something interesting on the science channels. Ok. Same old stuff. Lets try the geographic channels, then the history channels. Oh bloody bore. Movies? Anything interesting on? Hmmm. The English ones? Nopes… pretty boring – cant make out types. Hindi ones? What shit? This one is South Indian dubbed into hindi one. Ok this another I remember – Shahenshah. A movie from my school days. Real crappy. My god.
Sports channels then. India just won the test – are the highlights on? Yah yah… I am in for luck. The schedule shows that the highlights are on. Flip to the channel. Errr… Indian derby? WTF. Who watches Indian derby? Where are the highlights? I am surely at the right channel. The schedule also confirms. Drat. Ok some other cricket happening. The T20 matches in Australia. That’s cool. Lets watch, it might be fun. Oh shit a disastrous run chase and a hopelessly one sided match, but have we, Kieron Pollard. The highly explosive west Indian is in the team. Now that’s fun. He smashes some unbelievable shots with one landing on the roof. This is getting better. Bam, he is caught in the deep. Match almost over. Anything else?
Change change change change change… flip flip flip flip…. This seems like some distant memory. Yes. I remember this. Evening time. a remote in hand, complete boredom, going the whole range of channels and getting nothing to see. The last time this happened to me was four years ago… at my mom’s house. Nothing’s changed. The only difference is that now I know exactly what the name of the program is before getting bored. Yes. Some things have changed I guess.
I pull the trigger and get out of the room to see the kids and my wife enjoying playing I spy in those amazing books. So much more fun. I should have pressed the dam red button much earlier.
For the last few weeks I have been thinking about the TV and the STB in the house. Is it really bad not to have it at home. Are we being luddites? Yesterday I found my answer. A resounding doubtless no. the shit is not worth having or listening to. Get out of the house, get a book, talk around. Anything anything except have a TV infront of you. Throw the bloody thing out of the window. See it crash, break into a billion pieces. Enjoy the spectacle.
That is a bit radical. But seriously get the cable off from the TV. I have been seriously thinking of getting a TV or a projector home. But never cable. When we have the time we could watch a movie, or catch some documentary or some decent serials. Basically remove the constantly on boredom to some specific entertainment. But it is a big step for now. We are content without it. It will come in some day. I am not going to be tyrannical about it. But for now it can’t. For one – we have no space for it :) . hopefully when we have more space, or more money … a theatre room would be awesome.
For some reason I am reminded of a Bruce Springsteen song. Its an old one. Can you guess which one I am referring to..
Here are the lyrics
57 CHANNELS (AND NOTHIN' ON)©
I bought a bourgeois house in the Hollywood hills
With a truckload of hundred thousand dollar bills
Man came by to hook up my cable TV
We settled in for the night my baby and me
We switched 'round and 'round 'til half-past dawn
There was fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Well now home entertainment was my baby's wish
So I hopped into town for a satellite dish
I tied it to the top of my Japanese car
I came home and I pointed it out into the stars
A message came back from the great beyond
There's fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Well we might'a made some friends with some billionaires
We might'a got all nice and friendly if we'd made it upstairs
All I got was a note that said "Bye-bye John
Our love's fifty-seven channels and nothin' on"
(Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on)
So I bought a .44 magnum, it was solid steel cast
And in the blessed name of Elvis well I just let it blast
'Til my TV lay in pieces there at my feet
And they busted me for disturbin' the almighty peace
Judge said "What you got in your defense son?"
"Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on"
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
I can see by your eyes friend you're just about gone
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on
Fifty-seven channels and...
The boss got it right. But I guess throwing it out of the window would come a close second to the buying a .44 magnum and letting it blast. Actually it depends. The slow motion of the TV falling from height (at least ten floors recommended) might remain with you longer the sound and recoil of the .44 magnum. Haha. I can see by your eyes, friend that you’re just about gone…
Thursday, August 05, 2010
life... choice... sigh
Some body asked me today about the choices we make. The ones that we make in haste and hope things turn out well or should we actually take time to think through all the choices we have. Should life be process driven.
It’s funny when someone asks me thus. I am reminded of the book I have ‘if you meet Buddha on the road kill him’. That book was once recommended to me by a blog reader, on one of the comments he left. It was an interesting enough title. I began reading it and never did finish it. The reason I couldn’t finish it was that it was very good and I always thought I should be a better frame of mind while reading it. Basically it talks about not looking outside but inward. The Buddha is in all of us. Also the book talks about how you can never give advice but you must relate your experiences in similar circumstances and let the pilgrim get his own answers.
This has been a driving force in my life in many ways. Possibly that is the reason that I don’t really like listening to too many advice givers, they don’t know me. At best they can relate their experiences and their thoughts. Then it is up to me to act and me to carry the cross of my own actions or like Napoleon, crown yourself.
Many years ago when I was engaged to Jasmine, her uncle in America had asked if I wanted to go there and make my life. He would support me to the end. I almost jumped at the chance. My mom was not too enthused. I think the reasons would be more like you can’t take the favours of your in-laws. It’s against society norms and people won’t respect you. I did not bother about that logic. My dad told me one thing that struck me hard. He said, in your life you have taken all your decisions. All that you are today are thanks to you and your abilities. You decided your specialisation stream, your own college, your MBA, your job, your summer assignment your wife everything. He said that he had no hand in any decisions that I took. In many ways I was on my way to be my own self made man. At this juncture why would I want to then take on anyone’s obligation? Things might not be as rosy there and the opportunity might not be that exciting. I think he was warning me of the perils of running just on someone’s word leaving what I had in front of me – my self.
Somewhere the penny dropped. I realised that and I kept it that. Another piece of advice my brother’s friend once gave me ‘its better to do it and know for yourself than not to and regret not trying, many years later’. That too has stuck with me for long. This was said roughly 17 years ago.
The common thread I take from here is that you are the master of your own destiny and in the end if you manage that then you have no one to blame but yourself and narcissistically, no one to thank but yourself. Right now too I just went through a rough phase mentally as thanks to some circumstances I was forced to rethink what kind of behaviour and attitude I must have. I have more than enough share of senior resources telling me what I need to do. In order to combat my normal self arrogance that I know best , I have conditioned my self to think at the first instance that what someone is saying is right and keep that as an hypothesis before proving it wrong or right (in degrees). But finally, the decision is mine and mine alone.
I have many stupid decisions in my life and some really bloody smart ones. But all that is hindsight and subjective. The bad ones might have saved me and the good ones might have been the ones that have stopped me from achieving more. The point being you never know. All I know that my supposed intelligence keeps improving all the time. And the calls I take keep getting better at the logic behind them – mind you I said that the logic behind the call improves; there is no evidence of the call actually improving. Who knows what the best solution is? Sometimes you see the mistake and you say yes – you improve, sometimes you don’t see it. the dangerous ones are the ones you get right and the logic fits correctly. You give yourself a pat on the back and congratulate your logic. Then you use it again, and again and again… your greatest strength becomes your weakness. You use it once too often and the world comes crashing on you. You have been exposed as a one trick pony.
There … now should you change or should you not. That is the question that I am facing. How much should I change? Things that I got right have got me here and the one instance it was used against me. This is getting a little complicated.
Virender Shewag was out in the last test playing the cut shot. One journalist asked him if that was his weakness. That he got out a few times playing it. To which the brilliant uncluttered mind of the batsman answered that the journalist also failed to see the number of runs that he has scored from there. He said that that had been his most productive shot from his arsenal. Should he cut it out?
Hahah. This is so not easy to answer. I guess the answer lies in learning from experiences. You keep at it, trying to think through the choices you made and analyse them. Slowly you might get better at them… not at making choice but making the logic behind the choices.
So can I attempt to sum total the entire post in one line – hmmm…. Let me think…..I think I got it…
life is a box of chocolates. You never know what you gonna get….
Thank you Forest.
But tell me one thing – aren’t the chocolates now coming in colour coded wrappers?
It’s funny when someone asks me thus. I am reminded of the book I have ‘if you meet Buddha on the road kill him’. That book was once recommended to me by a blog reader, on one of the comments he left. It was an interesting enough title. I began reading it and never did finish it. The reason I couldn’t finish it was that it was very good and I always thought I should be a better frame of mind while reading it. Basically it talks about not looking outside but inward. The Buddha is in all of us. Also the book talks about how you can never give advice but you must relate your experiences in similar circumstances and let the pilgrim get his own answers.
This has been a driving force in my life in many ways. Possibly that is the reason that I don’t really like listening to too many advice givers, they don’t know me. At best they can relate their experiences and their thoughts. Then it is up to me to act and me to carry the cross of my own actions or like Napoleon, crown yourself.
Many years ago when I was engaged to Jasmine, her uncle in America had asked if I wanted to go there and make my life. He would support me to the end. I almost jumped at the chance. My mom was not too enthused. I think the reasons would be more like you can’t take the favours of your in-laws. It’s against society norms and people won’t respect you. I did not bother about that logic. My dad told me one thing that struck me hard. He said, in your life you have taken all your decisions. All that you are today are thanks to you and your abilities. You decided your specialisation stream, your own college, your MBA, your job, your summer assignment your wife everything. He said that he had no hand in any decisions that I took. In many ways I was on my way to be my own self made man. At this juncture why would I want to then take on anyone’s obligation? Things might not be as rosy there and the opportunity might not be that exciting. I think he was warning me of the perils of running just on someone’s word leaving what I had in front of me – my self.
Somewhere the penny dropped. I realised that and I kept it that. Another piece of advice my brother’s friend once gave me ‘its better to do it and know for yourself than not to and regret not trying, many years later’. That too has stuck with me for long. This was said roughly 17 years ago.
The common thread I take from here is that you are the master of your own destiny and in the end if you manage that then you have no one to blame but yourself and narcissistically, no one to thank but yourself. Right now too I just went through a rough phase mentally as thanks to some circumstances I was forced to rethink what kind of behaviour and attitude I must have. I have more than enough share of senior resources telling me what I need to do. In order to combat my normal self arrogance that I know best , I have conditioned my self to think at the first instance that what someone is saying is right and keep that as an hypothesis before proving it wrong or right (in degrees). But finally, the decision is mine and mine alone.
I have many stupid decisions in my life and some really bloody smart ones. But all that is hindsight and subjective. The bad ones might have saved me and the good ones might have been the ones that have stopped me from achieving more. The point being you never know. All I know that my supposed intelligence keeps improving all the time. And the calls I take keep getting better at the logic behind them – mind you I said that the logic behind the call improves; there is no evidence of the call actually improving. Who knows what the best solution is? Sometimes you see the mistake and you say yes – you improve, sometimes you don’t see it. the dangerous ones are the ones you get right and the logic fits correctly. You give yourself a pat on the back and congratulate your logic. Then you use it again, and again and again… your greatest strength becomes your weakness. You use it once too often and the world comes crashing on you. You have been exposed as a one trick pony.
There … now should you change or should you not. That is the question that I am facing. How much should I change? Things that I got right have got me here and the one instance it was used against me. This is getting a little complicated.
Virender Shewag was out in the last test playing the cut shot. One journalist asked him if that was his weakness. That he got out a few times playing it. To which the brilliant uncluttered mind of the batsman answered that the journalist also failed to see the number of runs that he has scored from there. He said that that had been his most productive shot from his arsenal. Should he cut it out?
Hahah. This is so not easy to answer. I guess the answer lies in learning from experiences. You keep at it, trying to think through the choices you made and analyse them. Slowly you might get better at them… not at making choice but making the logic behind the choices.
So can I attempt to sum total the entire post in one line – hmmm…. Let me think…..I think I got it…
life is a box of chocolates. You never know what you gonna get….
Thank you Forest.
But tell me one thing – aren’t the chocolates now coming in colour coded wrappers?
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