Few years back I was interviewing a candidate for an open position in my company that time. Surprisingly, all his answers to my questions were starting with a ‘because’! Q. Why are you planning to leave your previous organization? A. Because… (quite reasonable) Q. What are your strengths and weaknesses? A. Because… (hmm… interesting!) Q. How many years of experience do you have? A. Because… (are you kidding me?) It freaked me out! I rejected him because of his poor communication skills. But after a few years, I suddenly remembered the interview and got curious about the possible reasons why that guy was starting every answer with a ‘because’. And the only possible explanation I could think of was, there was a ‘why’ question constantly getting played in his head. He was assuming that I would ask him ‘why’ over his simple and straightforward answers, so he was just trying to be proactive about answering both the questions in one go. I realize now that sometimes these ‘why’ questions help us avoiding distractions from the navigation to our own destinations. A few days back, when I was extremely provoked to buy an attractive and expensive shoe, the question suddenly popped up in my mind, “Why do I need another shoe?” And it worked! The ‘because’ was not that strong and convincing to myself. The shoe was successful to mask my other financial priorities that time. I was able to walk away from that shoe eventually. I will be thankful to the guy I interviewed for the rest of my life. He taught me the strength of ‘because’.
0 Comments
A wise friend of mine once taught me that knowledge is nothing but actionable information. In other words, if an information helps us to act better, it is a knowledge. But I also feel that things keep moving back and forth between the information bucket and the knowledge bucket. A few years back I tried this experiment with some of my friends who are software engineers. I gave them some basic calculus problems that they were really good at when they were in high schools. They all failed to solve those problems. This is because we have moved the information on how to solve calculus problems from our knowledge bucket to our information bucket. And that is because this information doesn’t help us acting better in our daily life any more. However, it used to. When our purpose of life was to secure high marks in the examinations, we gathered related information to act better. If I had given the same problems to my friends who are mathematics teachers, I am sure they would have solved those pretty quickly. And the reason is, this information still help them act better in their work and that’s why they have kept it in their knowledge bucket. Sometimes we love to keep things in our information bucket that did not and will not help us act better, ever. More we are able to get rid of those information, more we will be able to focus on our actions. And, at the end of the day, it is all our actions that matter. Very recently I listened to a speech by Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of “Eat, Pray, Love”. She was addressing an audience who don’t have a passion. She started her speech with saying there are two types of people in the world – the Jackhammers and the Hummingbirds. Jackhammers are obsessive about their passion. They keep hammering until their dreams come true. Hummingbirds are little different. They don’t have a passion. They keep flying from one branch to another, one tree to another trying different things. They pollenate the world with various new ideas. It is their curiosity that moves them from branch to branch, from tree to tree. If you don’t have a passion, just follow your curiosity to try new things, just like the hummingbird. Carry just one idea at a time from one place to another, one group to another, one person to another. Your curiosity will lead to your passion. It is called memory. I visit my own museum every day. Everyone visits their own personal museums every day, consciously or unconsciously. When I visit, I see my first bicycle that my maternal uncle bought me when I was in first grade. I see our first cassette player that my father brought one day along with a couple of my favorite cassettes. I see the foldable iron bed which I slept in and shared my dreams with when I was in junior secondary school. I see the broken radio (which was broken by me, by the way) that I used to listen before sleeping every night when I was in college. I see so many other things that bring back happy memories. Yes, happy memories. I try to keep only those items in my personal museum that has some association with happiness. Well, to be honest, most of the items. I realized many years back that it is us who have the ability to choose the items for our own museums, not our friends and family, not our jobs, even not our situations and circumstances. I have a friend who chose only her broken and lost items for her museum. One of my other friends has kept various price tags of his gadgets in his museum. I even know one who just has only one item in his museum. That’s right, just one single item. I wish I could help them picking up some good stuff for their museums. My grandmother had a passion for knitting. I can’t count how many sweaters and scarfs and socks she knit for me and my brother when we were growing up. Every time she remembered what colors and patterns we like. I wish I had preserved each and every pieces she made for me with love and passion. Just like everyone else, I received millions of presents and gifts in my lifetime from my friends, relatives, colleagues and sometimes even strangers. But when I look back, I see that it’s the handmade gifts that I remember the most. The reason is, handmade gifts touch our souls. And they do so because their primary ingredients are the creator’s passion and their love for the recipient. A few weeks back a wise man gave me a gift. It was a small envelope with my name on it. When I opened it, I found an inspiring poem that he wrote me. That touched my heart and my soul. If I ever have my personal museum, I will keep it there as one of the most valuable items. One of our good friends presented an oil painting that she painted for our living room. I am going to keep that too in my personal museum. It’s been more than ten years my grandmother passed away. But I still feel a connection with her whenever I think of her passion for life and her love and care for us, with which she knit all the sweaters. An amateurish handmade card or showpiece, a letter with a few heartfelt sentences, flowers grown in one’s own garden, a drawing that says “I love you” – that’s all it takes to touch another soul. I saw this Super Soul Original short a few months ago and immediately fell in love with it! It is helping me to discover what really makes me happy since then. I am starting this blog series to inspire myself. Inspire to do things that I love to do, inspire to take risks to have a better life and inspire to empathize.
But why a blog? Why not a diary? Because it is easy for me to type than write (what a shame!), easy to maintain the posts and it is free! And, most importantly, there is a tiny little possibility that it might inspire one more, just one more person in this world. I searched various dictionaries for the meaning of the word 'passion'. Here are some of them: "A strong feeling of enthusiasm or excitement for something or about doing something" (Merriam-Webster) "A strong and barely controllable emotion" (Oxford) "A powerful emotion or its expression, esp. the emotion of love, anger, or hate" (Cambridge) "A powerful emotion such as love or anger" (Macmillan) But I look at passion in life it in a little different way. Few months back I read the book "Art of Happiness" written by Dalai Lama. The following two quotes are stuck in my mind since then: 1. "The purpose of our lives is to be happy". 2. "Happiness is not something ready made, it comes from your own actions". And, combining the two quotes, I was able to create my own definition of passion - "Our actions that help us find our purpose of lives". I wish to share stories about passion and inspiration in this series, however small and insignificant those might seem. If you have an inspiring story of a family member, friend, neighbor or even a stranger, I can help you to share it with the world. I am sure that will touch at least one more soul. |
AuthorAbhimanyu Gupta lives in Chesterfield, Missouri with his wife Nilanjana & son Anusurya. His profession is software testing and his passion are music and books. He can be reached via Email, LinkedIn or Facebook. Archives
January 2017
Previous posts
All
|