An awesome journey awaits for each of us and its each of our responsibilities to find it.
In search of Pizza
I recently watched a tamil movei –Kaaka Muttai. The story revolves around two slum children of Chennai whose desire is to taste a pizza. They collect money by selling charcoal & try to use the money to buy pizza. They are not let in because they were from the slum. So then they try to go look for ways to buy better clothes and eventually “obtain” better clothes. On their second attempt- they are denied entry again. The story continues with such twists until the last scene where the boys are greeted at the pizza spot with a red carpet . The owner also promises to give them pizzas whenever they come even if they don’t have money to give. However, the final scene shows the brothers saying to each other that the dosa which their grandmother gave them was better than the pizza they were eating.
Isn’t life much the same? When we focus very heavily on the goal, often when we get to the destination we are disappointed.
After all, life is about looking out of the window.
Unconscious Biases : Ashamed of or aware of?
I was checking my bags in at the airport. As the process was fairly slow – I started talking to the ground staff…One of those guys who helps to lift bags at luggage counters. I pulled his leg & he did likewise. Soon the boarding pass was ready, I bid goodbye to him and proceeded to my boarding gate.
Later, he was walking about inside the terminal and he spotted me. So we started talking again. He sat with me and told me about his life – his previous jobs, his current job, his education and a lot more. Soon, his managers were doing their rounds, he got scared and I asked him to get back to work. As he was about to leave, he asked me for my phone number and I got freaked out a bit. I didn’t oblige.
After he left though, I felt a bit disappointed by the experience. I realised that if it were an air hostess or a co-passenger, I would have given them my phone number.I was ashamed. I was unconsciously biased against that boy.
But on more thought, I realised that unconscious biases exist. They were built into me because of my background and upbringing. While I can’t undo all of that, I can be more aware of my actions and consciously correct for my biases. Perhaps then, unconscious biases are not something to be ashamed of but rather something we need to be aware of.
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My super-public habit tracker
June: Exercise 4 Blogging 3 Meditation 1
May: Exercise 4 Blogging 10 Meditation 6
The Why…
Consciously thinking of the “why” to any situation can go a long way. Here are two situations that happened yesterday that outlined it.
I had travelled to my cousin’s house to meet her 1 year old daughter. I had previously only met her on her first day on earth – doubt she remembers much from that day. The setting therefore is cousin, her husband, her daughter, her brother & me. The baby ran around for a bit, when I remembered I had to upload a few documents and I quickly logged in to complete it. The baby girl fell asleep by the time I was done. The purpose of the visit was clearly to spend time with the young one, but I just forgot about it due to the reminders a phone gave me.
Later in the evening, as I was about to leave I went around the house hugging goodbye. My aunt was in the kitchen and fairly sweaty. She was hesitant about the hug as she felt she was sweaty. This time I remembered my why and got my hug in.
There are plenty of things to do in the world. The tough part is not completing all these many things, the tough part is to remembering the why.
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My super-public habit tracker
June: Exercise 3 Blogging 2 Meditation 0
May: Exercise 4 Blogging 10 Meditation 6
Understanding Transformation @ Bridging The Gaps
I spent a weekend at the Bridge the Gap camp. The camp was about many things – ultimate frisbee, painting, dancing, gender equality and meeting people from across the country. Read more about it here in Shweta’s post. The camp was a lovely place to be, full of love and energy. There were plenty of activities and sufficient camaraderie to get you through the Ahmedabad heat.
Through the camp though, I had one question on my mind. All of these things seemed to be the means to a certain end. What was the end? The closest answer I heard was “transformation”, but that is a wide term. So I kept looking and perhaps the answer hit me a day after the camp.
Realising I was carrying a piece of the camp close to my heart
I was back to my normal life – working for a large firm, talking to people around the world and getting “stuff done”. In a conversation about sales, I caught myself saying salesmen and replaced it with salespeople. That was purely because of a conversation I had with Box (Assistant coach for u23 India Ultimate Frisbee team) at the camp. He told me that at camp he referred to people as players and sports drills had to be renamed from “3 man drill” to “3 player drill”. It was the simplest thing – I remember wondering why I didn’t think of that earlier.
Of course this realisation stuck with me, and did indeed transform me.
My notes from camp
At meals I spoke to the kids – I surprised the tamil talkers and had fun with my broken hindi with the others. During the practice sessions, I picked the organisers’ minds. Here are some of the other realisations kids had through the camp:
Don’t be afraid to ask for all the love you need, Don’t be shy to give all the love you can
A kid from Chennai told me that he liked it at camp because everyone was friendly. I dug deeper. I told him that it must be the case at home too. His rebuttal was diplomatic – smart kid! He contrasted home and explained the non judgemental nature of all the participants at camp. Among his examples and my observations were examples of some kids teaching the slow learners, games that never stopped because the number of participants kept increasing and all the communication that happened between people who perhaps knew 2-3 phrases in each others’ languages. Some understood that a non judgemental and loving world exists out there.
I can be someone else
I was told stories of how families don’t perceive some of these kids as very useful or keep reminding them that they are not very useful – too slow, too naughty, not as good as your sister. Confidence destroyed. But you know the beauty of self image? It is a self fulfilling prophecy. If people perceive you as good, you will be good in their presence. If people perceive you as bad, that you do exactly that. So the camp offered these kids distance from their normal life – perhaps 10 days away from home and at least six days of feeling useful. That feeling is powerful and hopefully makes them look for it when they return home.Some understood that they are better than what they were told they were.
Boys and girls both have pressures
There was a session at the camp where each gender shared what society expects of them and what that implies on their respective lives. I didn’t attend the session, but later a girl from lucknow told me that she learnt how boys have pressure because of gender inequality too. She told me that understanding that guys have pressure to bring money back home forces them to actions they might have otherwise avoided. Am sure some of the guys learnt something similar too. That is powerful. After all, equality comes from learning and understanding the other opinion. Some learnt to understand people of other genders and backgrounds.
Understanding the woman
For many it was a safe environment to interact with both genders. For many it was the first time that girls and boys played together. The girls learnt more about their menstrual system and learnt that it was ok to talk about it. The guys understood how they can be supportive (not sure if buying chocolates was covered). Some guys had a daily goal of talking to a new girl each day. Some girls were confused by the women role models they saw around them – they wondered if it was ok for a girl to be so comfortable in a mixed environment. Many people at camp understood their gender and the other gender; they bridged the gap.
Good Job 🙂
Sangeeta used the phrase often and soon it became the camp’s catch phrase. The kids used it often. It is powerful to overpower a person with so many positive thoughts – after all confidence in one sphere transcends to all spheres of life. Everyone learnt to say “Good job”.
A Question from Liz: How would you describe the camp to others?
On the last day, Liz (an organiser) asked me how I would describe the camp to others. After much thought, here is my attempt.
The best days in life are those that you lose yourself in.You have so much fun, you enjoy everything around you – the place, the people and the activities.
At the end of the day you are tired, but you are so high on emotions that you can’t sleep anymore. You smile to yourself. Your mind wanders. It raises questions – Why did I deserve this? Why did I have fun? Will this feeling continue or is it just a passing moment? How can I sustain this feeling.
These are the best kinds of days. They make you grow. They make you learn. They make you yearn for more.
I believe the camp gave that to the kids.
The camp was the means. This was the end. Deep realisations on days that make you yearn for more.
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Vikram visited Bridging the Gaps camp at Ahmedabad. This is the 3rd time Help2Grow has been associated with this initiative. This post is also cross posted at Help2Grow’s blog
A little thoughtfulness goes a long way
I have house help, she comes in once a day and cleans the place in an hour. I can’t communicate with her very well – so I let her do her thing.
This morning I was reading a book on my bed when someone rang the bell. I ran out to the door and left the book face down at the page I was reading – no bookmarks. I forgot about the book and it was soon time for cleaning. My bed had been neatly laid out and the book kept to the side. The book though, while it was closed – also had another book in the middle. No bookmark, but another book to mark the page I should continue from.
Needless to say, i am very happy with my house help!
Hotha hai… C’est la vie
Two months in Pune and I’ve had to dig deep with my hindi skills. One of my favorite quotes has been “hotha hai” or it happens. I find its usage very close to “C’est la vie” or “such is life”.
These phrases are amazing resets for when things are not going your way. It becomes the immediate response when sh*t hits the fan and builds a “yes, and” mindset- a mindset that doesn’t question the rationale for the situations but one that explores the available options given the situation.
Stage Time is not Limelight
There are some who are shy of the stage, others not so much. The latter decide that for better visibility & more recognition they should take to the stage. Unfortunately, once you put yourself on the stage you will be judged closely. A bad judgement takes times to fight back from. If you do well, you can enjoy the limelight & the stardom. If you are not up to the mark – you merely enjoyed stage time & created no positive impression – often even created a negative impression.
Stage time is important and the means to achieving limelight.Fortunately though, there are many stages. Some stages are frequent & more forgiving. Choose your stages wisely.
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My super-public habit tracker
May: Exercise 1 Blogging 8 Meditation 4
Fighting to end fighting?
We fight, we all do. Countries call them war, you may call it a passion for change or a quarrel with your neighbour. It’s important to avoid them , but sometimes we have to fight.
It’s important though to remember why we fight. We need to fight to end fighting – in which case small punches don’t help. In fact they may even cause more harm.
So if you are annoyed by your friend/partner’s habit of pointing out when you leave the dishes out, it doesn’t end the fight when you start pointing out he/she does it too. While we think this is a dose of their medicine, it usually adds more fuel to the fire. So the fight doesn’t end. To end the fight, you may need to change the paradigm of argument or find another way to demonstrate the frustration.
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My super-public habit tracker
May: Exercise 1 Blogging 7 Meditation 3
Training & Management
I am reading “The Hard thing about Hard Things” by Ben Horowitz. I love the importance he provides to people. He says “Take care of the people, the products, and the profits – in that order”. In the book he pays a lot of importance to one-to-one meetings as well. I’ve always believed that an easy way to measure the importance a manager gives his people is by looking at the number of hours he/she spends on one-to-one meetings & grooming talent. Personally, I’ve had a huge difference in performance when managers spend more one-to-one time with me. Ben Horowitz goes a step further and says that CEOs (and managers) should design training courses about the company, its product and other decisions taken by the company. He argues that while McDonalds has a training course for its staff, how come more complex jobs in our organisations don’t have job specific training schedules?
This is his case for why training (conducted by the manager – as other trainers don’t know much about your company) is a high priority:
Training is, quite simply, one of the highest-leverage activities a manger can perform. Consider for a moment the possibility of your putting on a series of four lectures for members of your department. Let’s count on three hours preparation for each hour of course time—twelve hours of work in total. Say that you have ten students in your class. Next year they will work a total of about twenty thousand hours for your organization. If your training efforts result in a 1 percent improvement in you subordinates’ performance, you company will gain the equivalent of two hundred hours of work as the result of the expenditure of your twelve hours.
Wonderful perspective to keep in mind.
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My super-public habit tracker
May: Exercise 1 Blogging 6 Meditation 2
Learning Antenna 