Win-Win

Winning is good, when I win I feel happy. I celebrate. Losing will disappoint me. I will console myself that winning is not always possible. I then become philosophical – participation or attempt is more important, it is not win or loss - the learning experience is what matters!

What about a win-win proposition? No losers what so ever. Most ideal scenario, but like any other ideal scenario this one also does not happen naturally quite often. We have to really work hard towards it.

I see this cow every day. She is frustrated. Ticks and many other small insects camp on her back and bite her so much. It itches her, irritates her. What options she has? She cannot scratch her back by herself. Her master is only interested in her producing calves periodically and getting sufficient milk. The all-important person who made her master’s dreams true is the very bull himself standing behind her. Cruel fellow, after all he is a bull. He is not interested in helping her to scratch her back, he is rather waiting for the next immediate opportunity - to climb on her back!

Then the saviour arrives for the cow. None other than a crow. I have never seen any human being admiring a crow- only the legendary cartoonist R K Laxman, was fond of observing crows and making beautiful sketches of them in different postures.  Nobody welcomes crows.

But the cow welcomes the crow. He happily sits on her back and relishing those ticks. Crow is happy, he is having a feast. Cow is happy too, there is some relief in her unbearable itching. Yes, a win-win situation for both of them. No losers one might think. But, what about those dirty ticks – absolute losers!

Once I had an opportunity to get into a win-win situation. Like many, I also decided to renovate my house in a small way which would eventually become big. The part-time contractor did a superb job in doing all the necessary work. He did one more favor to me. Any scrap piece, be it of metal, or wood or glass he would say “Sir this will be of some use. Do not throw it away. Will be useful in the future” and started dumping them in one corner of my open terrace. Once he got his money and vanished, I started going up every day to my open terrace. It looked to me like a mini-scrap yard. I was struggling to find a way to use them.

I made up my mind. I had to clear the stuff from there. But days have gone when I could lift heavy things like those. These days I am more used to working on much heavier stuff using a feather touch keyboard. Getting a person to get this type of work done was not that easy.

Then I thought the saviour just arrived for me. One Ganesan, came in front of my gate. He was also planning to renovate his house a few blocks away. He wanted to see and learn the modifications I carried out. After showing him the heroic things I got done, I did not forget to take him to my open scrap-yard. There was a purpose behind it. “I don’t need these materials, it would definitely be useful to you, you may take all of them”. I told him and I meant it, they may be useless for a person like me who was tired of getting the changes done. He was not tired yet! I thought it was a good opportunity for a win-win situation for both of us, he gets free material and I can start calling my open terrace by that name again. Ganesan went off saying “I am still in planning stage, not sure I would need them, may be. I will let you know”.

Days went by. While more and more dust started accumulating on those scarp materials, neither did I find any use for them, nor was Ganesan in sight. As I was passing by the nearby “Sathya old newspaper mart” I saw Sathya buying other scrap things in addition to old newspaper. Sathya was kind enough to help me. He came home and had a look at the material. He was ready to clear the stuff, in return he could give me only a small amount of money per Kg basis. I was more than happy. He was also happy, he would make a decent profit from the deal. He did a good job of clearing the entire terrace area, handed over me the paltry amount. Yes, it was true, it was a win-win situation for both of us, no losers. But a few days later the lone loser appeared in front of my gate, of course bringing an army of his men along with him. Who else? - Ganesan with a broad grin on his face “Sorry to bother you. I came to take those materials”! He had finished his planning, obviously  his plan was elaborate and time-consuming!

So while we think that we had a win-win situation, there could be people who may consider themselves as losers. We can ignore tick-like parasites, they deserve to be perished. We can ignore Ganesan, after all it was his fault and impact was not much on him. But whom we need to really watch out is people who get jealous of our win, who may consider us as a threat to them, who may consider our win as an opportunity lost for them. They will do anything possible to unsettle us. They may try to dampen our spirits. They may even encroach!

Look or Stare

I saw this boy the other day. In the park. 

Jumping up and down and trying to run, taking rounds – clockwise and otherwise, purely at random. Extremely happy and with full of energy, he was all over the park. While his parents were walking somewhere else in the park, strictly following the ground rules laid down in BOLD letters by the authorities, and also constantly looking at the google-watch-like gadget fitted on their hands, checking how good they were performing that day.

Then I saw this gentleman staring at this boy. He did not remove his eyes on him for a long period of time, turning around and looking him again. That made me realise two things. One – the boy is wearing a pair of highly sophisticated spectacles with a unique design - either they arrived from the US or the boy himself had arrived from US wearing those glasses. Two – the staring gentleman is none other than the person I keep seeing  in the nearby shop Kumar opticals , sitting at the counter looking eagerly for half-blind people to enter his shop! Obviously he had a reason to look at this boy closely.

“We do not see things as they are, we see them as we are” – Anais Nin.

If you are a TV news reader and more inclined to Roman culture, you will not be able to appreciate the Chinese way of thinking, you may end up in seeing and pronouncing the Chinese Premier's name as "Eleven Jinping" ( instead of Xi Jinping ) and you might lose your job.

If I have something to buy in mind, my attention will go towards things that are similar on the road. I have been thinking of giving a break to the front gate of my house, before it breaks by itself as its expiry date had crossed several years ago! So what do I do? When I venture out for a morning walk, I stop and start looking at each and every gate in front of the houses on the way. That action of mine is good enough to take me into custody for questioning by that cop, who has been following me getting initially suspicious by my rather clumsy morning dress – my looking and parsing each gate will just reconfirm his reading that I am planning to break into one of the weaker but richer houses that night!

One day I suddenly had a desire to buy a new pair of Jeans. To me Jeans is one of the biggest inventions of this century, which will help in optimising resources apart from covering the nakedness! One unstated advantage of the jeans, which not a single marketing agency dared to announce till date publicly, is that “Wash once, wear for ever”. In my opinion our government should pass a resolution immediately that dress code in all offices should mandatorily be jeans. Especially in urban areas where water of any use is at premium, and jeans is everywhere! 

To select Jeans of my liking, before going to a multi-brand cloth shop and try myself, I have a better option to start with. Watch closely all the Jeans-clad people on the road. I would find real fat people went easily into their Jeans, which will demonstrate the “stretch-ability” of it. If I am more particular and daring, I can go very near to those shabby ones and take a deep breath - to see how much it smells, to know whether the fabric is new in the market, deodorant-capable or not.

Looking or observing a person in front of you is an art. You should observe everything in as much detail as possible without the other party realising it. And remember, there is a thin line between looking and staring. If you fix your eyes at one place extended by a few more seconds, the look gets subtly translated into a stare even without your knowledge.  And also remember, there is a fine print in our rule books, which says any type of stare can be considered as an attempt to sexually harass somebody! 

So beware and never allow your look extend into a stare unnecessarily. If the other party decides to go to a police station once to register your “expected” behaviour, rest assured - you have to go to the same police station many more times to convince them that it was natural and purely unexpected.

Stories are powerful

I can distract you for a moment for sure.

You might be seriously thinking as what all goodies Chinese Prime Minister will offer to us when he is in our country soon. You might be wondering when our Ex-PM will open up to tell his side of stories, if any. Or you might be evaluating the pros and cons of Kerala state following Gujarat model as directed by supreme court, as far as total prohibition is concerned. Even if you are fully engrossed in these thoughts, all I have to say is “Hey listen to this story” and your eyes and ears will eagerly look forward to my story.

"Those who tell the stories rule society”- Plato. Stories are that powerful.

We had an old mousi ( aunt), distant relative of my father. She stayed with us for a good amount of time to look after us, when we were little kids. She knew the technique to contain us and make us quiet. She would tell us stories from Ramayana. Our favourite was story of Soorpanaka, the devilish sister of Ravana. Mousi would enact well to describe Soorpanaka having  huge belly, crooked eyes and a dirty heart – including oversized left and the right side of it - to show the severity of devilishness Soorpanaka possessed.  We used to concentrate fully till Laskshmana cut her nose and ears for trying to cheat him and his brother Lord Rama. This story alone was good enough to keep us quiet for an hour and also to drive the point that evil would get punished severely. We never got tired of hearing such stories again and again.

Some time ago I had to manage a 5 year old!  I volunteered to him that I would tell him a story, so that I could bring him to my side of the story. I started off with “monkey and the cap seller”. “I have heard this many times, tell me some other story” was his reaction. Next I tried “Thirsty crow”, the same story repeated. Finally I ran out of all those fables I had studied in my childhood days but could create little enthusiasm in him with those stale ones. Becoming  Lakshmana, for that matter  Soorpanaka, was not an option for me, I don’t look anyway closer to them, more over I thought he would not be able to relate well those old stories! Then I thought of switching to new-gen stories. Harry Potter came to mind, the only one I knew. I had managed to watch the first movie in that series and I could tell him about the magic using the broom! But I decided not to venture into using a “broom”, that too for an unintended purpose. Pictures of those victims in our capital who tried to misuse the broom to find a magical solution, but failed miserably suddenly came to my mind. I may fall flat!  So I had to pay a price for not knowing suitable modern era stories to narrate to him - I ended up in playing whatever games he was interested in, which was not that bad though as I had imagined!

Like story-telling, story-making is equally important. Studies have found that at any given point of time, human brain is capable of receiving more than 11 million bits of pieces of information. But practically one can be aware of only around 40 of them. Rest of the information is processed unconsciously and stored as stories in our brains. So, when you suddenly wake up from a dream that you were on top of Mount Everest, don’t think your brain is acting crazy. It is the result of your brain storing unconsciously the event narrated in your 7^th class by history teacher about the achievement of Sir Edmund Hillary by conquering that peak – while you were willfully busy nagging your friend in the front bench!

Each one of us surely has some mission, big or small, to accomplish in our lives. Gandhiji had a mission to free India through a non-violent movement. Martin Luther King Jr had a mission to abolish racial inequality. These great people had beautiful stories to tell to back their missions. If you also have a mission of that scale and impact, it’s well and good. If not, you will still have a small-scale mission like becoming an expert in some area or working towards certain social welfare initiative. 

To pursue your mission passionately, you need to build good stories around it. You have to refine and reinforce those stories by narrating to a few of your friends if not to yourself.  

At the end of the day, once your mission is accomplished  your stories can become so inspirational, somebody may listen to you and write your biography. Or who knows, you would become so good in story-telling, you may end up in writing your autobiography. At the least, when a young fellow approaches you, you need not break your head to find a good story then, you can tell your own story in a much more convincing manner.

Start framing your stories, today! Make your mission possible.

Dilemma

I had a dilemma today. Is it not common for all of us to get into some dilemma some time or other? 

Once, our people-development manager decided to have a personality development workshop for us. He was in dilemma in deciding the venue for the event. Past experience of having the same in our work location did not yield good results. Lots of people who thought their personality was fully developed dropped out. Many distractions during the workshop, in terms emails, phone calls and customer escalations made it difficult for the program to achieve the desirable results. 

So that time he decided to have the workshop in a remote location – Agra! No drop outs, one of the seven wonders in the world is beautiful right? But we had a different problem. How to keep attentive in the workshop, while thoughts of seeing TaJ Mahal kept coming into our minds so frequently?  That dilemma remained in us till the last day the workshop was somehow got completed ahead of time and we all set off to see the Taj.

On the way back after seeing Taj, the dilemma did not end for my friend Patnaik. “How can I go back home “, he was a bit worried. He did not have choice to stay back in Agra either, as his family might think that he had found a Mumtaz and he was already on the drawing board to build another Taj Mahal! What was his problem if he went back home? “You good for nothing fellow, came empty handed. Don’t you think it is mandatory to get the famous Agra “Petta” while returning from there”? His relatives and friends would give him gaali ( scolding ) if he did not get Petta. ( Petta is a complicated sweet made of white pumpkin and sugar, as far as my knowledge in sweets goes! ). But then what is wrong in buying a few of those sweets? “All because of you, I had to be hospitalised due to severe stomach upset after eating those pettas” gaali was sure in this case as well, may be after a few days with no lack of intensity though they were totally exhausted!

Whenever I get some free money I have a dilemma. To spend it or save it for the future. If I read any normal newspaper, I will be convinced that life is not that too long. Then I would tend to discount the future -  I will not be willing to give up any immediate luxury for the sake of that hazy future which I am not sure of. iPhone 6 will be my immediate purchase with some good amount of additional loan!

If I read economic times daily then my dilemma would be where to invest that money. They always advise “don’t keep all your eggs in one basket”. My problem is not the number of eggs, but number of baskets. I have only a few eggs– my challenge is in which basket to put those little eggs. To watch the basket closely till I impatiently exit once I made a small profit. Now you know where I get this free money to start my dilemma all over again!

So what was my dilemma today? In fact it was whether to write about “dilemma” itself or not! 

Whenever I start writing something I do believe in giving some good message at the end of the day. In this case I was not getting any! 

Then I thought as how I normally handle similar situations, much more complex than this one. Especially when past experiences did not give me any indication as which way I should go, especially when I didn’t have anybody around to discuss. I use to listen to my mind and do what it says. 

I did exactly the same today!

At times one can be negative !

Today the good news for me is that I found another topic to talk about. Bad news for you is that the topic is “negativity”!

Negative things affect us more than positive ones. I was too upset yesterday. I was mourning over the 6 rupees balance which I forgot to collect from the bus conductor which he normally writes on the back of the ticket for me to forget at the end the of the journey, which I promptly did!. Because of that I just could not sustain my little appreciation for the good efforts of the rather unusual careful driver in that state transport bus which made my journey tension free.

Studies have revealed that 2/3^rd of English words describe negative aspects. That tells us the story. So if you find so many negative words in this blog post then don’t blame it on me, the culprit is the English language!

We tend to look for negative items in a newspaper. Those things attract us more. The other day I saw the headlines in the newspaper “7 tips to become happier in life”. Though I knew a couple of tips of my own, number seven was a tall order for me. As I was about to look at tip #3 to tip #7,   some other headline caught my attention.  It read “Wife brutally murders husband”, I had no hesitation to read that first, I just forgot all about the enhanced happiness and those tips for it. Not that my wife is that cruel, for that matter she cannot kill even a cockroach fully!! Though there was nothing beneficial for me to learn about that murder, my undivided attention went towards reading and absorbing that news, just because it was a negative one.

I read about a professor in Psychology who used to show his students a black dot, drawn sufficiently large on a piece of white paper, first day in his class. Then he would ask the students what they saw. All focus would be on that black dot, everybody trying to interpret in his/her own way. One may be thinking of amavasi day (new moon day) when all bad things could happen. A well-read person would be reminded of that “black spot” which would be handed over to the captain of a ship, a summon given as a warning for impending and disciplinary action. (Black Spot is a pure fiction created by R L Stevenson in his novel Treasure Island. How does it matter whether it is fiction or reality as far as negativity is concerned! ). Then the professor would say “Why are you people focussing too much on the black dot, there is enough white space below that where you can write a poem or draw picture, if you suddenly become artistic. Or you can even write a short love letter, if the mood becomes romantic! ).

One might take good care while arranging a function, say a wedding.  Excellent program management, planning to minute details so that the function goes on well and the invitees are well taken care of. Almost all who had gathered will be pouring congratulatory words on the host, for making the function a grand success. The host will feel extremely happy. Then this is enough to feel terribly bad for the host to hear from an odd old person like this “Why these people should invite so many people with no planning? to make me wait for the lunch behind somebody and witness him relishing his lunch”. That one statement can wipe out a major part of the good things the host had heard so far.

After talking negatively for this long time, is it not my duty to tell something positive about negativity? I can positively say negativity cannot be fully avoided. Then the option in front of us is to look at the positive effects of being negative. And at times it helps us to do a reality check and do course correction if required.

For instance this morning I set off with a positive frame of mind, for my morning walk. I was about to cross the road at KFC traffic junction. Less traffic, I was on the Zebra crossing for a change, the signal for pedestrian turned green.  I was all set to cross the road, I saw a mini-bus approaching the signal from the right. If I had continued to be a positive person, I would not have thought of anything bad, I would have attempted to cross the road. Instead, those ugly thoughts came to my mind. ”What if the driver ignores the stop signal? What if the bus does not have efficient braking mechanism” ? “How would I look like if the bus knocks me down?”. These negative thoughts made me stand-still and watch the mini-bus zooming past at very high speed, luckily without taking me along with it for some good distance - "live or dead"!.

So, one may be negative at times and it could be for an advantage, but never allow it to over-shadow the positivity.