Happiness - I am all ears!!!

With a shaky voice and her eyes filled with tears... She said... “I lost everything…I don’t care and It doesn’t matter anymore…I am old now” and she continued to clean the dishes and later made my bed. I was sitting at my work desk in Manchester, United States listening to this old lady from Albania who was once a carpet designer in her country. She classified herself among the upper middle class who lived in a small city called Fier along the coast of Albania.
She migrated to the US as a refugee in late 1996 after the outbreak of the civil war. She claimed that she lost all her wealth during that period and she along with her husband decided to migrate to the US as living in the her hometown had become too risky. I did not delve further because that would have only made her feel worse. Instead, I decided to show her some pictures of Albania that I had pulled out from Wikipedia and various other websites as we were speaking.
When I showed her the pictures, she exclaimed with joy! She quickly started talking about many historical sites and their importance. Some of the things she referred to were Ali pasha’s castle, the traditional folk music called the “Skrapar” and the Butrint [A UNESCO world heritage site]. She proudly acclaimed that she had been to many places in Albania as a kid and later travelled across the country with her husband.
While we were talking about various places, she also introduced me to the upcoming albanian pop star called “Anila mimani”. She started dancing when I played some songs from the youtube. Later, she quietly thanked me and left the place.

it was such an amazing feeling and a sense of completion that I derived out of this small incident. It was just an attempt from my side to make her happy and I knew I could not solve all her problems….but I am glad that I was all ears!!!!

* What makes you special?

IBM chose this powerful line to reinforce their brand equity. When I first saw this advertisement I was totally captured by the profound depth of this verse. This simple question opens many doors when you extend it to individuals and “individuality”. I am trying to nail down the single unique factor that makes me special in this world….

Just a random thought....

A recent article in the newspaper about a schoolgirl, who was subjected to brutal rape by a group of men, drove me towards writing this piece. When I read the article, several thoughts passed my mind and one of them were “why do people behave differently?” Why do a small proportion of us indulge in such barbaric acts? What drives them towards such instinctive provocation, which causes more damage than just physical abuse?
At the risk of digression, lets think about the statements we make to describe people’s behavior. Some of them I can think of are: He’s heartless! He’s a nice guy! He’s a liar! He’s a nerd! He’s an animal! He’s a sadist! He’s so cool! He understands! He is weird! The bottom-line here is that our expression of human behavior differs from one person to another. Why? The simple answer to this question may be attributed to the DNA of the person or the external environment, which determines his actions at that point in time.
However, I have tried answering this question differently; I believe Humans are driven by three factors:

1. Animal instinct – Animal instinct forms the core of a human’s behavior. The three characteristics that govern animal instinct are Fear, Sex and hunger.

2. Human Instinct – The next layer comprises of human instinct that is governed by logical reasoning, intuition, love (not sex)

3. Spiritual instinct - The spiritual instinct is very abstract, this layer is highly subjective and is governed by three factors again Belief, Persistence & patience

Every human being will have all the three instincts as part of his behavior.

Human behavior = function (AI, HI, SI)

Let me try building a simple mathematical model now assuming a linear function

Human Behavior = X * (AI) + Y * (HI) + Z * (SI)

Where X, Y, Z are integers and signifies external environment variables that takes different values at different times for different people.
AI – Animal Instinct
HI – Human Instinct
SI – Spiritual instinct

This model* according to me explains why people behave differently at different situations. A different value gets applied against AI, HI & SI and hence gets multiplied in the respective proportion that determines human behavior at that point.

* I have no data to back this model; it’s just a random thought expressed in mathematical form.

PS: I have used “He” throughout this article for my convenience. Please replace with “she” as appropriate

People do lots of things to impress others but, what matters is how they behave when they don't have to.

Walking on the path of life…

Walking on the path of life, I experienced an unusual scene
“Mr. success” and “Mr. failure” greeted me with a smile so pristine
“Mr. Success” shook my hand and gave a gentle bow
“Mr. Failure” shrugged and said, “Goodbye, it’s time for me to go”

I exclaimed and asked Mr. Success if, he could walk by me forever
He said it was difficult, as he had to move from one person to another
I bent over him and whispered in his ears, “ How do I escape failure”
He laughed and said: “ we are twins”; and I was surprised to hear

I was taken aback suddenly to see two identical men standing in front
They looked similar in every aspect and were looking no different
I wondered and asked myself “ how is success different from failure?”
One of them stepped forward to explain; I was eager to hear

He explained, “Success and failure lies in the eyes of the beholder”
Failure gives you agony and pain; but it also makes you bolder
It’s your attitude that decides whether you walk with me or my brother
We are just your state of mind; we can be replaced by one another

Discover the donkey within u….

Have you ever felt lazy parting with your bed on a Monday morning? Or on a Tuesday morning and on a Wednesday, Thursday and Friday morning? Have you ever stood in the balcony and thought about your life or any situation and wondered about, how things have changed around you and at the same time expressed your inability to control it? Have you ever sat late night for an exam preparation with an intention of burning midnight oil? But on the contrary, ended up happily sleeping beside the lamp and wasting the midnight oil. If the answer is yes, then you are entangled in the vicious circle called the “donkey factor”. There is a donkey within each one of us that raises its ugly head at the moments when we are expected to Achieve, Think, Perform, Motivate, Slog, change and Execute.
I have always wondered if I would have been in a better position if I had regularly studied everyday and had prioritized things in a better fashion. I even feel that sometimes I had shamelessly surrendered myself to the donkey factor and yielded to its ugly tricks that masked my thought process at the moments when I had to act.
There are a few symptoms that I have recorded to diagnose the donkey factor.

• Tendency to run away from a difficult situation hoping that somebody would solve it
• Procrastinating things and reassuring yourselves that you would act tomorrow and you can just relax today.
• Blaming it on others and not taking any ownership of the problems
• Starting off a project in full excitement but later losing the heat in between and taking things for granted
• Wrong assumptions; unnecessary arguments even after knowing that you are wrong.
• Resistance to change

So, how do we overcome the donkey factor? Can we kill the donkey once for all and become a perfect human being? According to me, it is very difficult to kill the donkey as it is inbuilt in our system and all we can do is to MANAGE IT by diverting its attention to something inconsequential and also by developing the habit of positive thinking and self-motivation. Doing too many things at a time also motivates the donkey. It starts jumping and kicking and doesn’t allow you to concentrate. It also builds laziness and a huge resistance to change.
Few things you could do to manage the donkey factor:

• Maintain good health by doing exercise regularly
• Feel confident and be frank in expressing opinions
• Believe in yourselves
• Develop the habit of positive thinking
• Constantly motivate yourself and others
• Make short term achievable goals than a big long term goal
• Smile as much as you can and be happy
• Prioritize and stand up during difficult situations
• TALK to people- that’s the mantra of success
• Seek advice- within limits
• Keep yourselves busy with extracurricular activities
• Listen to Music- a refresher
• Be open to change
• Make good friends

So much for the idiot box…

I still remember the days when we had to buy our first color Television way back in the late 1980’s. I had done enough research as a kid with the brochures of many companies and had diligently worked on the specs (though I could not understand much, I still managed to choose the largest number among the choices…like a 29-inch compared to 25-inch, a 200 watt compared to a 100 watt). I was mentally prepared to buy a “videocon bazooka” with 200 watts PMPO. Whereas, my father was looking at a cost effective television that probably had just a picture tube and with no extra features at all (not even a remote). I put all my convincing abilities to test, explaining my father about why we require a television with a remote and a good sound backup but, on the contrary, he used to counter my arguments with a simple statement that “ what more do we want for two channels DD 1 and DD 2”. At last we settled for a “Philips 21 inch” after many arguments and brainwashing. Finally I was a proud son of the owner of a color television (with a remote control). I fancied myself sitting in front of the TV and watching programs all day and I also remember inviting my friends (most of them did not have TV at home) to watch “Chitrahaar” on Friday evenings. I would sit with the remote all the time and test peoples reaction as I switched channels at the very moment when everybody were engrossed in a melodious song or at the moment when a comedian is expected to crack a joke in the next nanosecond… and… as I switched they would boo with frustration…. it was fun… my father had refused to subscribe for a cable connection because he feared that I would not study and waste time switching between channels…. not that I was a class topper otherwise… but u know what? I still managed to see a few cable channels. If u are wondering how, then as most of us know fixing a cable connection is easy for a teenager…all you need is a blade and a safety pin…yes. I pulled the nearest cable wire that ran across my terrace and then a “little prick did the trick”. My brother, who was my accomplice would position himself in the house and tune different bands to check the clarity of the cable channels. He would run out of the house every 2 minutes and look at the terrace and shout at the top of his voice “ I am not able to see anything” (most of the time he wouldn’t even care whether I listened to what he said) and then I would readjust the pin and shout back…the idiot box as we call now was not all that idiotic then. It was probably the only source of entertainment and it was also a status symbol to own one. A few programs that I remember which were my favourites on DD are Neem ka ped, Kaliganj ki bahu, Malgudi days, Bhyomkesh bakshi, Tar rum too (NCERT), Chitrahaar, Ramayan, Mahabharath, Gul Gulshan Gulfam, Dekh bhai dekh and many more….