Pride goes before a fall

Pride goes before a fall…..

Life is the greatest teacher…

Blessings of our elders are inevitable in all walks of our life.

Life is a cycle of events, whether it is season, or experience.

I like to get wet in the rain, so that no one would see me crying, I like to get apprised, as I can know my strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats!!

Why do we garnish our own traits while tarnish that of others?

It was nice to see granddaughter coming to see her grandma, at least before joining her college this time.

Was it a realization? If yes well and good.

Still cannot forget the day, when having told that her grandma is sending someone, there was no one at home!!!

Would they have done this if it was whom they want!! What do they have their mobiles for? Just to demand and ask for things??

It needs a fall, to remind us that there is someone above us.

When the results are good, it’s because we are brilliant, when the results are bad, it’s because papers or the task was difficult!!

Events like the reality shows are also an eye-opener.

Indeed, whatever has to go wrong will go wrong, and nobody can stop an idea whose time has come!!!

Grass is always greener on the other side.

Don’t boast. Take time to appreciate and for Thanks giving.

It is all part of future shocks, that we have started depreciating the value of relations!!

It was again Potta Ammavan, who is and was there in the hour of need.

You can fool some people for some time, but not all the people all the time.

It is so good and indeed a blessing to have elderly people at home, you have got so many visitors, and get to know so many people.

Gods blessings are needed in every walk of our life, and when he tests us, we should not give up. Lijohns marriage took place amidst so much of hurdles:
Rain, due to which, house construction delayed, father hospitalized, leg figure swollen and having sugar, business of milking cow had to be stopped, thief, and the day before brother in laws brother expired, yet the wedding happened well.

What you want to do, do it now. You cannot keep it for tomorrow; there is no better time than now! This is the right time. As ammuma said, if you don’t have borrow and give, this time will never come again.

You should never dream of winning a lottery, unless you buy one, and passing an examination, unless you write one, and getting promotions, unless you come out of your comfort zone.

Anubahvikum…That work keep echoing my ears…It is not only sisters, so long as there is life in any individual, he goes through anubhavam, or experiences….Life is indeed the greatest teacher, and each day is a new learning….there are many lessons, learned from life of our own, and of others!!

Dimensions of Culture

It is said that one who has learnt the language but is ignorant of the culture is a fluent fool. Let us try to know the dimensions of culture:

Individualism Vs Collectivism:

Most individualistic society is USA according to a 1980 study. It is the function of ones reasoning mind. It makes an individual independent, strong, reliable, and confident.

In the orient, there are life long family relationships based on inter-dependence and loyalty. That is collectivism. There is always a safety net.

Whatever, ultimately, you have to face the consequence.

Particularisam Vs. Universalism

Particularisam means an individual behaves as per circumstances and people.

Universalism means there is equality, say like in naxal countries.

High Power Distance Vs. Low Power Distance

Filipino culture ranks extremely high in power distance. There is clear cut distinctions in hierarchy and status. This is seen in Asian families too.

In the USA all are considered equal, so hierarchy is either not acknowledged or is positively de-emphasized. (Classic example-using first names to address people) Hierarchy do exist but it is considered inappropriate to accentuate this fact.

Fatalism Vs. Activism

In Fatalism, individual is a small speck. There is fate or destiny, controlling him. So we Indians forget quarrels, calamities.

In Activism the locus of control is largely internal. There are no limits on what I can do or become, so long as I set my mind to it and make the necessary efforts. People here are generally focused. Americans being so can nevery forget 9/11.

Polychronic Vs. Monochronic
In a polychronic society like India, people follow the IST meaning: Indian Stretchable Time. They don’t realize that the most important thing in life is Time. Those who be on time to places become fools. They have to keep waiting. So much of man hours is lost. But they are good at multitasking too.

In a monochromic culture, time is given and people are the variable. The needs of people are adjusted to suit the demands of time. So there is no concept of being late. Time is quantifiable and there is a limited amount of it at any given time. They belive in completing one task at a time, and only then taking the next.

Uncertinity Vs. Certinity

Uncertainty avoidance is related to anxiety and not just to risk. It leads to a reduction of ambiguity and hence a need for structure.

High Context Vs. Low Context

In high context we need to look the background. You need to look at the undercurrent for survival. It is harder to understand and penetrate. In countries like Japan and France it is highly followed. In families it is so especially between husband and wife.
Eg. Admit mistake and earn respect: In some organizations you may be chucked out.

When everything is explicitly stated it is low context.

East Vs. West

Once upon a time, India was a self-sufficient, self reliant and happy country. Though after coming into India ruling us and living behind, they have left their culture, which we try to imitate and there is confusion. We are on the middle path. Lessons we can learn from the west are:
Freedom from Prejudice: Only open book can absorb ideas.
Discipline: Most important thing in life is time. One needs to respect that.
Professionalism: How to be impartial in relationship. Accept mistakes, let the other man save his face.
Egoism: Only when an individual is happy, he can help the group, to make a collective right decision. It is worthless to make sacrifices when one is not happy.
Self Confidence: Be a go getter.
Appreciation: We should not be critical, but lean to say good.
Planning foresights:
These qualities need to be imbibed.

It is hurting to see that the new generation, instead of looking at this, feels that family relations are a burden or are wrong. It is especially because the individual is not happy.

Accountant Vs. Marketing:

Accountants would like to economize, make optimum use of their resources. If you try to economize, you will not be able to market.
Marketing people would like to spent more and get more. Getting more makes them happy, and they try to influence those around them. (at times with a heavy price)

This was to highlight the different departments in an organization. Though there are differences, both understand the perception and live together.

Roles, superstitions and rituals, Values-The determinants of behavior, also play a great part. Eg. The father as authority figure.

Remember Ethnocentrism: Ethnic+Centre: The tendency to evaluate a foreigner/outside behavior by the standard of ones own culture.
 We take our culture for granted.
 We see our behavior as correct and others as wrong.
 Infuses prejudice, contempt, stereotype, and conflict.

At any cost you will learn but at what cost and with how much pain is important.

All cultures are not readily compatible. Don’t focus on differences, focus on similarity and you can get alone with anyone.

Courtesy:
• Ms. Pushpa Kurups charismatic personality, and valuable training
• Ms. Narayanis thoughts on lessons we can learn from the west.
• Mr. Sajeev and Ms. Tharas gift: The fountain head, and the other books.
• Life experiences.

The Fountainhead

In ‘The Fountainhead’ Ayn Rand depicts mans character to be the product of his premises, through various characters, which are distinct classes of humanity:–

Howard Roark a college drop out from, the Architectural School of the Stanton Institute of Technology, self made architect, self sufficient, self confident, self centered ‘monster- because he is utterly innocent about it. His integrity is as unyielding as granite. He is in conflict with the world in every possible way-and at complete peace with himself and is himself at every cost. He knows it, and therefore is never hurt, nor suffers, and has no painful surprises. He has accepted what he is to accept from the world and is concerned with only what he does, which cannot be influenced by anything and anyone on the outside. He neither joins the society nor fights them, but lives on his own but do not mind destroying what he believes to be a destruction of creativity. A hymn glorifying a man’s ‘I’. Who dynamited and destroyed, Cortlandt, as it was he who designed it, and others tried to change it. He did not recognize anyones right to one minute of his life, energy or achievement. After a desperate battle waged he is fortunate enough in finding victory, after facing all odds, hardships and obstacles and of the fanatic denunciation unleashed by an enraged society against a great creator. A man who is as he should be as per Ayn Rand. ‘Are you happy Mr. Superman?’

Parallel to him is his senior in the college and the topper, Peter Keating, a second hander, in whose house Roark lived during the three years of his architectural education. He is a ruthless, unprincipled egotist, who did anything for his ‘brilliant career’, removed Tim Davis, Claude Stengel and Lucius Heyer, from his way, send for the competation drawing made by Howard Roark as his. He was a luckier, selfless man, who having no self also did not have any ethics. His aim in life was Greatness-in other people’s eyes fame, admiration, envy. His philosophy was to always be what people want you to be, then you can get them where you want them. Others were his motive power and his prime concern. Concerned, not truly, but only as mirrors for his own vanity. He borrowed from others in order to make an impression on others. That’s actual selflessness. It’s his ego he’s betrayed and given up. But everybody calls him selfish.

Ellsworth Toohey, contrast to Roark, who did not believe in individualism, but that all are equal and interchangeable, glorified all forms of collectivism, who said to Peter, that kindness was the first commandment. We need to learn to love everything, the humblest, the least, the meanest, and then the meanest in you will be loved. According to him there are two things we must get rid of early in life, a feeling of personal superiority and an exaggerated reverence for the sexual act. He seldom let a boy pursue the career he had choosen. He told them, that it would be wiser to choose a profession about which we can be calm, sane and matter-of fact. And if you hate it, it makes for down-to-earthness. He belived in principles and that there are two procedures in life, you can pull out each single weed as it comes up or prepare the soil in such a manner-by spreading such a chemical- that it will be impossible for weeds to grow. Guess he was busy doing the second, with a mask of the social worker. Who destroyed architecture, literature, theater, press. He spend time creating all form of silly organizations. He made friends who clung to him. He once said to kill by laughter. Laughter is an instrument of human joy, but which can be used as a weapon of destruction, by turning it into a sneer. He was Catherines uncle. When there was an end to the Banner, many newspapers bid for his service. He selected the Courier. He went into ‘intellectualism’ in a big way. A subconscious revenge for his obvious physical inferiority, a means to power his body could never give him. Also he had a cunning perception that only mental control over others is true control. Concerned about others, with an overwhelming desire to dominate them.

Gail Wynand, the greatest publisher, born without a silver spoon in his mouth. A self made man, who had acquired all the wealth, and power in the world. But he ruled only as long as he said what the mob wanted him to say, and all were fair weathering when he said what he wanted. Of whom Henry Cameron, who loved his work for which he fought and lost, who was the only person with whom Howard Roark wanted to work, and did work, had warned when on his death bed. With whom Austen Heller, who had given Roark, his first break in creativity had asked Roark to keep a boundary, to which Roark had said: but nobody has ever given the proper statement of where they must be drawn. With his banner was Alvah Scarret, who had never hated anything and so was incapable of love. When Toohey was to be taken back to Banner, he put an end to it. Mike the electrician, and Steven Mallory, who was the sculptor of the controversial statue of Dominique for the temple, were the few well wishers of Roark. But Gail Wynand ended up giving Roark the biggest and greatest break, in his career, though had lost even his wife for Roark.

Dominique Francon, the exquisitely beautiful women who loved Roark passionately, but married first Peter Keating, and then Gail Wynand, and in the end return to Roark. Hers was the character, I could not digest, may be it is typical of the western culture, and unacceptable to traditional orients! To her everything was a string leading to every other.

Catherine Halsey, whom Peter had jilted for Dominique. Who then takes up work, and believes herself to be temperamentally unsuited to domesticity which is too selfish and too narrow. Who learns to believe in looking at things objectively, and being rational.

Mrs. Keating, full of dreams for her son. A true, normal mother – for whom there is only one perfect child. ‘Motherhood in a changing world’. Can they ever broaden their own emotional view and raise their selfish love for their children, to a higher plane?

About material and non material things:

There are various perceptions given of two great professions Architecture and Journalism.

Money: There is nothing evil in a desire to make money. But money is only a means to some end. If a man wants it for a personal purpose-to invest in his industry, to create, to study, to travel, to enjoy luxury- he’s completely moral. But the men who place money first go beyond that. Personal luxury is a limited endeavor. What they want is ostentation: to show, to stun, to entertain, and to impress others. They’re second-handers.

Man: A man thinks and works alone. The man who attempts to live for others is a dependent. A man cannot rob, exploit or rule-alone. Robbery, exploitation and ruling presuppose victims. They imply dependence. They are the province of the second hander. No one is responsible, no one can be held accountable, and such is the nature of all collective action. The only good which men can do to one another and the only statement of their proper relationship is-Hands off!!! Our idea of mankind is general. All we know of it is the people we meet in our lifetime. Of them, one can feel some respect for people when they suffer. They have a certain dignity. But they are different when they are enjoying themselves. Whatever, we need people in our life.

Then there is reference to the Gallant Gallstone, wherein it is said that there is no such thing as free will. We can’t help what we are or what we do. Its not our fault. Nobody’s to blame for anything. It’s all in your background and….and your glands. If you’re good, that’s no achievement of yours-you were lucky in your glands. If you’re rotten, nobody should punish you-you were unlucky, that’s all. – We all agree to this, but when it comes to practice, there are variances.

In the intellectual discussion there was Mitchell Layton who said, that people would be much happier in all regulated society that had a definite pattern and a unified form-like a folk dance. What makes people unhappy is not too little choice, but too much. Jessica Pratt, for whom education is all that we need, we would have a better world.

Altruism-the sacrifice of self to others, live for others. . If physical slavery is repulsive, more repulsive is the slavery of spirit. The man who enslaves himself voluntarily in the name of love is the basest of creatures. He degrades the dignity of man and he degrades the conception of love. Which is the essence of altruism.

Creator: Is the man who disagrees, who swims against the current, stands alone, the egotist. His concern is the conquest of nature, lives for his work, and basic need is independence. Men have been thought that highest virtue is to give, relive others from suffering. But one cannot give that which has not been created. Creation comes before destruction. We should not shrug at an act of achievement.

Egotism is the sacrifice of others to self, and

‘ From this simplest necessity to the highest religious abstraction, from the wheel to the skyscraper, everything we are and everything we have comes from a single attribute of man-the function of his reasoning mind’.

Neither politics nor ethics nor philosophy is an end in itself, neither in life nor in literature. Only Man is an end in himself.

‘Whatever their future, at the dawn of their lives, men seek a noble vision of mans nature and of life’s potential.’

And this book has given an answer to most of my doubts and questions: And the answer is ‘mans ego is the fountainhead of human progress’ Thanks for it....

A lovely birthday present!!!

Play amidst work:

All work and no play make Jack a dull boy,
All play and no work make Jack a mere toy.

To balance both, thanks to our S&C Committee at office, time and again, every month, there are various events organized.

Last week, the foreign instructor at KPMG was spell bound to hear sudden commotion, we had our colleagues hunting treasure, all around the office, we could see them, going all around, HR, Managers Cabins, sending mail to S&C, solving puzzles, and finally smelling out the treasure. There were many groups, and finally the treasure was hunted from the locker by Hunters headed by Sreeram and party. That was the Treasure Hunt event of the month.

In April, there was sports day, which was supposed to be held in the month of March, but postponed due to the sad demise of Binu Paulose.
No wonder with such motivation mail from their Leader Yashin Edison, Squad rants were the winning team. ‘In the midst of marriage, exams and fatigue, when the going gets tough, the tough gets going. These were the valiant squadrons who have offered their blood, sweat, toil and tears. Sunday, the whole team came alive. We will not give walk over, we will not bow down and we will not step back…. …..Live for nothing or die for something,’ participated in all events. Their team not only played for themselves but members of their team like Ajeesh, played for other teams too.
Indeed true leadership is revealed in:
Building and maintaining team.
Achieving tasks.
Subordinate Development.
Thereby influencing oneself , others, group, society and also being influenced by others. That indeed is Leadership skills.
True sportsmanship does not lie in winning or loosing but taking part. There were few participants, many could not turn up and indeed inspiring was Mohammed Bilal from Simcore, playing cricket, football, and running 1500 meters, giving commentary, all on the same day.
There were members from S&C committee on Saturday and Sunday, the whole day at Thevara Sacred Hearts College Ground.

Before that was Quest 2008, which brought into light many quizzers in OPI. Here again the winner was Sreerams Team.

Cheers to our S&C Committee!!! We are waiting and watching more actions that follow!!! Good experience after a break of seven years!!! Missed the earlier events!!!