Mystical Ingredient – Episode-10: Self-Expression

In the last 9 episodes, I have been exploring how few people emerge as leaders while all others remain as followers? This question was haunting me ever since I commenced my professional career. When I chose to become a consultant in my 50’s, I got the privilege of meeting and interacting with many CEO’s. I was closely observing the characteristics of these leaders with an aim to document my observations which will be of some benefit to growing youngsters and business leaders. In my previous episodes under the title of Mystical Ingredient, I had covered 9 characteristics of Leadership and in this episode I wish to add one more which is “Self-expression”.

SELF-EXPRESSION – Manifestation of Dharma of Life

The Lexicon has several synonyms for self-expression as “expressiveness”, “articulateness”, “eloquence” and so on. Let us examine what is self-expression and what relevance it has with the leadership and prosperity in life? My interpretation of self-expression is the ability of human beings to express them to make a difference in this planet. Each one of us has different degree of ability to make the World to know that we “exist”. Some of us are very articulate to express our ideas and some of us chose to be silent even when we have valuable ideas to contribute. Such of those who are very articulate are noticed and those who are silent gets ignored and taken for granted. I am not referring to aggressive behaviour to get your things done; it is the confidence with which we express to make a difference is what matters. Let’s look at the anecdote:

“Nandakumar grew up in a typical south Indian Brahmin family with religious beliefs and values. Like any youngsters growing up in such an environment, Kumar also displayed lack of confidence and hence self-expression as he believed he cannot make a difference in this planet. Your behaviour is the manifestation of what you believe and hence Kumar was seen as a meek looking youngster who was taken for granted. Whatever may be your character, the World will accept; it has accepted Hitler who could slaughter 10 million people and get away with it as well as Mahatma Gandhi who made a difference to this nation.

Like each one of us are branded based on our behaviours, Kumar was also branded as “meek” – timid and submissive. As Osho Rajnish used to say “Rose has born to be rose and Jasmine as jasmine – if rose tries to become jasmine, it will neither be rose nor jasmine”. Similarly Kumar has born to win as he has the right IQ and knowledge to manifest. Due to some unknown reasons he inherently believed that he cannot. Today Kumar is one of the most successful consultants and a star performer in SSA managing very big corporate accounts and making a difference in the field of process excellence

What made the difference in the case of Kumar? How his self-expression suddenly opened up?

Theory of Dharma:

In the creation every one of the element is intended to manifest a unique characteristics; the sun has to give warmth & light, the ice has to give chillness, the tiger has to be carnivore and cow has to be herbivore and so on. It is difficult to answer who made the cow as a vegetarian and tiger as a non-vegetarian? In philosophy it is called “Dharma”; dharma of water is to flow and dharma of fire is to burn. What is the significance of Dharma in self-expression? If you study the nature, particularly flora & fauna, we notice they exactly express the quality which is their “dharma”! They fire doesn’t feel shy to burn; the creeper doesn’t not feel shy of catching the wall and so on. The rose is proud to be a rose and snake as a snake. We notice self-expression is very evident in all creations in a natural manner without any hesitation. If that is the case why human beings have become so un-natural? We have forgotten to be the natural self due to the social conditioning.

In our childhood while we were laughing, we were told not to laugh! While we were serious, we were told why we are serious and so on! We are confused to be natural and slowly became artificial to please everyone around us. We want to “look good” rather than “feel good”. Over the period of time we lost our natural ability to express ourselves as we are. Self-expression hence is a natural process and does not require a B-school degree. All that is needed is “be natural as human”. Kumar chose to do this when it dawned on him.

Knowledge & self-expression:      

   

 One of the belief is “knowledge is needed for self-expression”. Many of us feel, if we open our mouth we may make ass out of ourselves as we have no adequate knowledge to impress people. If this is true, the Lion does not have knowledge but expresses it majestically! I am of the view that self-expression is a natural process and knowledge is more of an impediment rather than a virtue. If you carefully examine most of the leaders have limited knowledge in any one subject! They are generalist rather than experts in any single subject.

Kumar accumulated knowledge in many areas and still felt it is not enough to express him in the universe till it dawned on him that there is no connection between how much you know and your ability to market yourself. This self expression can never be given by any one like enlightenment; it cannot be taught, but has to be caught as Sukabodananda used to say. Kumar caught it one fine morning!

Self-expression & self-esteem: 

  

There is a strong correlation found to exist between self-expression and self-esteem. What is self-esteem? It is the opinion we carry about ourselves; some of us feel that we are great and some feel it is a curse that we have born in this planet. It is the result of our opinion of our physical, intellectual and emotional personalities. At the physical level all human beings without any exception feel, we could have been created little more beautifully. At the intellectual level, we feel we don’t have adequate knowledge as much as others have. At the emotional level, we always feel we could have been more stable and so on. At the end we always have a perennial dissatisfaction about ourselves in one context or the other. This feeling of inadequacy leads to some sense of low self-esteem which manifest in our self-expression.

A careful examination will reveal leaders provide vision & strategy and no knowledge for execution. As the CEO Coach Marshall Goldsmith said “You are paid more for showing people “what is to be done” rather than “how to do it?” I have noticed successful leaders / people are the ones who feel complete unto themselves with high self-esteem. Kumar suddenly recognized he is complete unto himself and felt fulfilled of what he is! The day it had happened, he turned out to be a star performer as he had all the knowledge and wisdom and his own opinion was his impediment. At last he found himself.

How do we improve our self-expression?

In summary, self-expression is nothing but manifestation of all your abilities without any inhibitions that makes a difference to this World. It is your ability to put your signature in everything you do and feel good in your death bed that you made a difference at the end of your life. My prescriptions for improving your self-expression are:

• Believe you are a worthy human being irrespective of your physical, intellectual and emotional stature
• You are here in this planet for a specific purpose; recognize and act accordingly.
• Marketing yourself is your responsibility and no one will do it for you.
• Only by manifesting your expression, the universe will notice you.
• Whatever is your knowledge, it will still be fractional of what this universe knows! You can at the most a “Book in the Library and never be the library itself”
• Even you are a spoke in the wheel of this universe; still you can make a difference for its existence.
• Never hesitate to express yourself in as many forms as it is possible.
• Prosperity is the function of your value addition; if don’t express you cannot add value.
• Edison invented electric bulb since he wanted to “make a difference” and “not to make money” although he became one of the richest man – “When you make a difference, you make money by default!”

·     Lastly, if you don’t manifest yourself, you are wasting your life.

 Jai Gurudev 

 NC  

Mystical Ingredient – Episode – 9: People Paradigm

In this episode I wish to continue the various people paradigms which enable the leader to get the best out the people to achieve the organizational goals. In my previous episode-8, I dealt with 4 paradigms and here I am continuing the paradigm-5 onwards.

Paradigm – 5: Performance assessment

One of the most sensitive aspects of people management is assessing their performance and giving feedback. Let us appreciate what is performance before we venture on assessment. An Organization is a constellation of people with different roles & responsibilities assigned to achieve an end result which could be financial and non-financial. Normally the complex network of people is structured with departments with functional roles which in turn become a value chain to convert the customer requirements into a value added product or service.

You may like to look at a simile such as a cricket team which has independent roles and interfaces governed by rules of the game. In a similar manner, an organization is also a game with roles and rules. If the organization has to perform, all individuals have to perform. Hence performance is nothing but achieving the intended goals at the end of the year.

In order to assess the performance of an individual, we need to set the expectations in the form of job descriptions and deliverables at the beginning of the year. A loosely wired organization, vaguely defined JD and absence of KRA (Key result areas) setting in the beginning of the year are generally the root causes for the people dissatisfaction and poor performance. I am of the view that if the people are not performing, the leader is responsible.  I wish to borrow the “GEM” ideology from Swami Shukabodananda to explain the role of the managers in getting best performance from their people.

“GEM stands for Goal setting, Empowerment and Measurement. The first step in GEM is Goal setting. Every human being is keen to make a difference in this planet and feels happy when he/she creates something new. The statistics shows that the people satisfaction levels and hence attrition is low in companies which has a lofty vision and engagement of the people. If the Leader has no vision the whole organization starts rotting and people have no sense of direction. The Organization goals are then deployed as individual goals till we reach the lowest level in the rung of the ladder for which techniques like Policy Deployment are helpful.

Having set the goals, the leader is expected to ensure the Empowerment part of the GEM. What is empowerment? I wish to use Juran’s Self-control to explain empowerment.  Dr JM. Juran defines Empowerment through three things which are important for any people to deliver what is expected from them:

•  He/she knows what the result/outcome they are supposed to deliver and when.
•  They should know how to operate through the process and identify when things go wrong.
•  They should have the authority and knowledge to set things right or stop producing defective output.

Don’t you think that the Leader cannot blame people if he has failed to empower them through training, hand-holding, providing facility and authority?

The third aspect of GEM is Measure of performance - MOP and providing feedback. For vast majority of the processes, we have no measure of performance and we judge people subjectively without any data which leads to dissatisfaction. Driving an organization without MOP is like driving a motor car without a fuel indicator. Hence for effective performance management, the Leader has to apply GEM principles.

Paradigm-6: Potential Assessment

It is very difficult to describe what is potential and how to identify although HR experts have devised several theories and models. Referring the Thesaurus of potential, you find synonyms such as likely, probable, promising, doable, feasible, on the cards and viable. My understanding of potential is the “Hidden abilities of a human being yet to be manifested – it is a seed which has the potential to germinate and bear fruits”. Having attempted to define Potential let us look at the context of People Paradigm important to Leaders for the development of the organization.

Unlike performance which is a short term need of an organization, identifying the potential is the need for building institutions. It is paradoxical if I say “All performers may or may not have potential; and all potential people may or may not perform”. This statement clearly brings forth the distinction between Performance and Potential. In other words performance is what a person achieves in the present and potential is his/her ability to discharge higher responsibilities. ”Performance is a being and potential is becoming”. The following anecdote from Matshushita the founder of National brand will clarify (as stated by him from his book “Not for bread alone” written by him when he was 91 years old)

“Someone asked me how Matshushita Electric Company became a multi-national. After studying only up to second grade, I was working for Osaka Electric Company as an operator. Right from childhood I was curious to create something new and I sketched a concept of a new switch and proudly showed it to my supervisor requesting him to develop this as a product by Osaka Electric Company. He curtly answered me that I was not hired for designing their products. I felt why not I start my own company and had the audacity to commence an electric company with a missionary zeal to improve the quality of human life through electric appliances. Ever since I commenced my company, every year I found at least 3 people emerging as potential CEOs. In order to retain them I made them as entrepreneurs asking them to commence our overseas operation and that is how Matshushita Electric Company became the multi-national”

What a great Leader with no B-school education was able to identify the potential of people and build institutions. Many organizations today don’t have a process to identify and develop the hidden potential of people. There are few Indian corporate which has examples for potential identification as their CEOs are home grown:

Mr. KK.Nohria CMD of Crompton Greaves, Mr SM.Trehan MD of Crompton Greaves, Mr AM.Naik CMD of L&T are all the examples of leadership to identify and mentor the potential of people. They have all joined as trainee and grown up to the highest rung in the organizational ladder. Can you imagine they have superseded over 11,000 people and retained their position?

In summary:

• All human beings have the potential of different degree waiting to blossom.
• Nature wants variety and hence it will create new possibilities
• Swami Vivekananda was hidden in Narendra, Mahatma was hiding in Mohandas Garamchand Gandhi and so on
• Looking for performance only is a myopic view of a leader; searching for potential is the characteristics of a Level-5 leader.
• Performance focus helps organizations to survive; potential focus builds multi-nationals.
• You don’t know what giant is hiding in you! Don’t be satisfied with what you are as what you could be may be a great possibility.

The people paradigm will continue.

Love

Jai Gurudev

NC    

Mystical Ingredient – Episode- 8 – People Paradigm

In this series “Mystical Ingredient for a successful Leadership”, we have discussed many leadership qualities any common man can develop to emerge as a CEO of any corporate. This series is nothing but portrayal of all the mistakes I did in my corporate career combined with my observations of the qualities of many successful leaders in my consulting career & the few CEO coaching I do these days.

One of the greatest ingredients for successful leadership is “How one relates with the people around them?” which is the result of their paradigm about the people. This is the main topic of discussion in this article. I request my patrons to read this article not only with a perspective of developing their leadership skills but also with an aim to improve their relationship with their loved ones or any people with whom they interact. I am of the view that our behaviours in our adulthood are the result of our childhood conditioning. This is the findings of many gurus of human psychology such as William James, Sigmund Freud and many others. Here is an anecdote from my personal life to illustrate what I am referring. 

“I grew up in a large family of 11 observing my father as a tyrant whose territory the people dare not to tread in. He was a terror to many people as that is the personality he possessed and got away with it successfully throughout his life. Unfortunately, for any male child the father is the first person through whom he understands the world and unconsciously role model them. Among the many good qualities which have become the foot print of my dad, by default I unconsciously took the aggressive behaviour as a feature in me. This aggressive behaviour did not work well with my loved ones and became an impediment for my growth in my professional career till the mentor arrived and corrected on time.”   

This anecdote gives you an idea how our paradigms shape up our ability to deal with people and decide our destiny. Please remember, as we grow in our corporate ladder we need the enrolment and support of people to deliver results as we have less “doers” role as we climb up. I wish to present few paradigms about people which I consider of paramount importance for getting best out of people. Paradigms are the attitude one can choose with respect to any aspect of life; it is the philosophy of choice that we make and all our behaviours will manifest from this philosophy.  I shall provide few anecdotes wherever appropriate by referring great leaders I had come across.

Paradigm-1: “Law of Universe”

This universe is designed as a “Spontaneous Organization” which does not require a “Manager to run”. Looks complex to start with? Our understanding is for successfully running anything we need to supervise and manage. If you look at anything in nature, be it the rain forest, day & night, seasons, planetary motions, formation & destruction of nebulae and so on, everything happens without any external controls. As we believe that everything needs to be controlled, we have created an entity called “GOD” and safely put the responsibility on Him. Please don’t take me wrong that I am atheist. In reality we find that the whole universe is designed as a self sustaining mechanism and it is impossible for someone to oversee and give decisions for tsunamis or earthquakes or seasons to happen. They are all governed by few laws and they are self-sustained in nature.

The message from this paradigm is “Everything in this universe are interlinked and interdependent” for existence. Thinking that one is superior than the other is foolishness as the spoke is as important in a bicycle as the hub and rim. It is important to develop a paradigm that the leader needs everyone to do their bit to make a successful outcome. In fact the Leader are the “Non-Doers” and “Doers” at the same time as he makes things happen without doing anything himself. As the leader is dependent on the people resource, respecting this law of universe makes them humble.

Paradigm-2: “People are creation of Good”

As Ishikawa in his book “Total Quality Control” has written that there are two paradigms about people as it is stemming from the religious beliefs. The western philosophy believes that “Human are creation of evil” and the eastern philosophy believes “People are Devine in human form” – two diametrically opposite paradigms. How this has got anything to do with our ability to manage people?

Most of the western management principles are stemming from the philosophy that “Human is a creation of evil” as it states that if you leave people alone without supervision they will involve in destructive activities. This paradigm is evident in the organizational structures and systems that were developed from the western countries which has “maker-checker” and inspection based. The Ford production system of the earliest automobile manufacturing believed in “Thinkers & Doers” – few intelligent people to think and create a process and rest of the dumb people to produce.

On the other hand, the Toyota Production system coming from the philosophy that “Human is a creation of good” and once they are aligned well with the vision of the company they don’t need any supervision. The concept of supervision based structure is very rare in a Japanese company. Most successful leaders have a very positive feeling about people working for them.

Paradigm-3: “Forming Opinions & Judgement”

I am the believer of Freudian theory that People manifest behaviour driven by their values. In a heterogeneous culture in India we have multi-various and diversified values. One of the negative characteristics of the leader is developing quick opinion and judgement about people. It is extremely difficult to remain in an unbiased manner without the influence of language, religion, caste and creed of our subordinates attracting and creating a comfort levels for us. There are many leaders who had succumbed to this weakness and created a poor image for themselves.

This characteristic of a leader divides people and starts developing different layers in the organization. I am of the view that every human being has equal opportunity to be a successful contributor if he/she is mentored and developed. If someone is not performing the leader must examine what way his/her leadership is the cause for the poor performance. Passing early judgement without examine the leadership style is a sin that is to be eliminated for creating a good climate.

Paradigm-4: “Hiring Heart & Head”

I grew up in Chennai in TVS culture as my formative career was spent with them for 17 years. Mr TS.Krishna, the chairman of Lucas-TVS in early 70’s is known for his Leadership who always believed that “TVS hires the heart and not the head of the people”. What does this really mean? It will become evident from his daily routines. As a chairman he need not have to clock in at 7.15 am when the company starts, but always he was found standing & greeting people in the main gate from 6.45am onwards. He knew all 3000 people’s name and their family history. This includes who is not well and what their off-springs are studying and so on. 

His daily routine also includes eating breakfast in the canteen along with all workmen and walking through the shop floor every day and enquiring the well being of the workmen. TVS always believed that if their employee’s heart is happy then they will do their best to the organization. This gives focus for the leaders to give importance to the emotions of their people instead of believing that their head is only hired. It is coming from the paradigm that if we have genuine interest of the well being of the people they will form as an asset to our organization. I wish to share the following to reinforce my point:

“Shekhar Mane has joined our organization (SSA) as accounts assistant few years back. as an unassuming and soft spoken youngster. We employed him more as a account keeping person looking at his deceptive profile. Now over the last few years he has developed his stature to control our finance function significantly contributing to our performance. His growth in stature is a result of his efforts combined with our keenness to bring the giant sleeping in him. He is enjoying his career with our team as we respect the head and the heart together"

I am not concluding this episode as many more people paradigm is due to be shared with you.

This episode will continue next week.

Jai Gurudev

NC

  

Mystical Ingredient – Episode 7 – Resource Myopia

What is “Resource Myopia”?

Before I plunge into the next magical ingredient “Resource Myopia” that makes the leaders, let me explain what is it all about which will help my readers to appreciate this episode. Psychology has identified 11 mental blocks that prevent human beings to become a “Possibility Thinkers” and one of them is “Resource Myopia”. 

Let me explain in detail before we could explore how to overcome it: The Oxford dictionary meaning of the word “Resource” is:

• “A supply of an available asset to be used when needed.
• A strategy for dealing with difficulties; the ability to find such strategies.

The word “Myopia” has the following connotation:

“Short sightedness”

 – Right under your nose but not seen!

From the above explanations you may appreciate that “Resource myopia” is a short sightedness of available assets that can be used to achieve whatever you want. The moment if we are asked to accomplish something, we all respond “I don’t know how to do it” – we come from the paradigm that if we don’t know how, we cannot achieve what we want? If I say you can accomplish whatever you want even if you don’t know how to do it, you may give a dirty look at me! Let’s look at the anecdote below:

If you don’t know how to make “Tandoori chicken” and if I ask you to make it, you have two options – one is telling me you don’t know and another is surfing the 2000 plus websites to figure out how to make a good Tandoori chiken and use the best recipe! In the first option you are resource myopic and in the second option you are not.

John F Kennedy in mid 50’s announced his vision for America as “We must land the man in the moon and bring him back alive before the end of the decade” When he proclaimed this he or the NASA did not have any clue how to reach a place which is 3,50,000 miles away crossing the empty space and land & take-off without a run way. No single man on earth can come with a design of a lunar system that will make JFK’s dream a reality. “The land of possibility” made it by overcoming the resource myopia. The obvious response of a common man is to write a thesis how and why it is not possible! Only people without “Resource Myopia” can make this.

NASA developed all systems required to make JFK dream a reality with the available assets in this planet. Where it all came from?

1. Possibility Thinking – my previous episode
2. Overcoming Resource Myopia – short sightedness of available resources.

Accomplishing without knowing is the secret of successful Leadership. In other words not knowing is an asset than a liability. It is paradoxical to know:

“Who don’t know how to do it have a dream and the mass who knows how to do it have no dreams!” Kennedy had a dream but did not know how to do it; the scientist of NASA knew how to do it but had no dream!” In other words the leader is paid for dreaming and inspiring the team to achieve his/her dream.

Vast majority of us feel shy of saying that “we don’t know” – please remember “not knowing is an asset and not a liability as the Leaders don’t know how to do it, but know how to get their things done through the abundant resources available in this universe”. In fact knowing who can do it for you is more valuable than knowing to do it yourself – after all how many things you can know yourself?

The Curiosity for Novelty:

One of the characteristics of this universe or nature is to conceal its secrets and reveal to those who search. The word Research means searching something that already exits - that is why it is re-search! As a child we had a tremendous curiosity to know everything we came across. As we have grown, somewhere down the line we lost our curiosity to know new things. The novelty is lost as we started thinking that “we know all that we need to know”. Alas what a foolishness to conclude that we have unravelled all the secrets of life! Avvaiyar, one of the legendary Tamil poet lived several hundred years ago said “what we have learned is like a speck of a sand in the beach and what we don’t know is the rest of the sand in this universe” .

Swami Vivekananda once was browsing through books in a Library in the US. The Librarian believed to have sarcastically commented to him “you seem to have read all the books in the library today”. Vivekananda answered him “Yes, you may like to test that by asking questions in any books in the Library”. The Librarian was shocked to see Vivekananda answering any questions from any books. He finally touched his feet and asked him how it is possible? Vivekananda replied “some people read word by word, some read sentence by sentence, some read paragraph by paragraph, some read page by page and I read ‘book by book’

It may appear that Swami Vivekananda was arrogant while he answered the librarian. It is not the audacity of this great man to think that he has absorbed all that is there in the library. The same Vivekananda said “If you show me a speck of sand and ask what it is? I may say it is sand! If you ask me further what is sand? I may say silica. If you ask me what is silica and if I happened to be a physicist I may explain the atomic structure, but if you ask me why the atoms are that way, I may not be able answer beyond! Even a speck of sand is un-explainable beyond a point how can we explain the sun, star and nebulae?” This is the question Swami Vivekananda asks to prove the point the secrets of nature is un-fathomable.

It means that don’t try to know everything and it is not a sin not knowing. For example “the cockroach is not designed to know nuclear physics but designed to withstand the nuclear exposure which none of the rest of creations could do” This only means you have your own strengths and weaknesses and your success depends on how you use your weaknesses as strength.

What is the main Point?

If you cannot find an answer for vast majority of things in this universe, does that mean we cannot achieve what we want? Most of the Leaders who have accomplished great results are the ones who have limited knowledge in the area where they have accomplished! The question that comes in your mind now is:

How can I accomplish without knowing much about the subject where I am working now?

If Boeing has put 2 million components and systems together in an aircraft to stay in the sky, does that mean the CEO Mc Nerney is a superman who knew everything about the aircraft design and manufacture? Is it humanly possible to know everything needs to be known by a single human being? The answer is no as the nature has not planned this universe that way. The sum total of the universal knowledge is available as a reservoir for you to access and you will only if you have no “resource myopia”

Entrepreneurship:

98% of the Indian industries are MSME’s (Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises), founded by entrepreneurs who knew how to do thing? For example, if I know how to make sheet metal components, I start a sheet metal making industry. These industries still remain MSME’s for decades with a stunted growth for the simple reason they were founded by someone who knew “How to do things”. If you look at the balance 2% of the corporate are founded by people who had no clues about what they were making. For example, T.V.Sundaram Iyengar who created a great institution TVS Group in the south was from a pious Brahmin family – TVS is a symbol of quality today silently making this country proud as the first company to get the coveted Japanese Deming award.

                                                                                     Dhirubhai Ambani

The founders of great institutions are the ones who had no knowledge in the subject matter on which they founded their organizations. Dhirubhai Ambani did not know how to make synthetic fibre or crack petroleum but created the largest wealth for himself, the common man of this country and made his off-springs as one of the top 5 wealthiest people in this planet within his own generation. Dhirubhai had the dream and knew who can make it a reality for him. He did not have the “Resource Myopia” which we have all plagued with.

                                                                                     Benjamin Franklin

What is the main lesson?

1. The universe by design is to conceal all its secrets and reveal for those who are willing to   
     “Search” – Electric bulb for Edison, electricity to Benjamin and so on.


2. “Curiosity is the mother of invention” and not as the famous adage says “Necessity is the  
     mother of invention”. Never ever lose the child like “curiosity” in life and retain your Novelty till  
     the last breath.


3. One cannot know everything in this universe as that is not the plan of the nature.  Not knowing 
     something is not a sin. Don’t feel inadequate or shy when you don’t know something.


4. What you don’t know; it is known to someone and they can fix it for you. You will find the right 
    resource if you don’t have “resource myopia”. For example whom do you approach when you 
    are not well? Obviously the doctor – why? You are sure he can fix it for you.


5. The whole universe is flooded with resources and will be visible only when you are free from 
     resource myopia.


6. All that you need is the “Dream” and free from “Resource myopia” – the rest of it will be a 
     history how you made it as JFK landed the man in the lunar surface.


7.  A Leader has a dream, finds the right resource, inspires them to share his/her vision and 
      achieves something great for humanity.


8.   Next time if you feel you don’t know how? – Recognize it is an asset and not a liability as the 
       rest of the universe is waiting to convert your dream to a reality.        

Jai Gurudev

NC   

Stature – Mystical Ingredient – Episode 6- Possibility Thinking

What is possibility thinking?

Possibility thinking believes that you are the integral part of this universe which continuously creates variety of species, flora & fauna, stars, nebulae and so on. One philosophy is “you are created and brought here without your consent and as a helpless creature governed by karma”; the other school of thought is “you are the creator itself as you came from the same intelligence that brought this universe to its existence”. If you believe the former philosophy, you are swayed by the wind like a boat without sails. If you believe in the latter, you take charge of your life like a captain of your soul. The possibility thinkers are the ones who believe that they are the creator of their destiny and feel there is no boundary for future as there is no boundary for this universe which even science is yet to find.

Why we are what we are?

Psychology says that our personality is a function of what happened in our formative years in childhood from 10 months to 3 years. The legend in modern psychology Sigmund Freud says that our “Script” of life is written during these crucial formative years. The following anecdote will clarify the point.

I happened to facilitate a Personality Development session long time back in which Suresh (name disguised for confidentiality) shared his life’s ambition as “To Show to the World that he is somebody and he will achieve this by owning a Mercedes someday”. Upon digging deep into his childhood, he narrated an incident as follows:

“My dad suddenly died when I was 2 years old leaving me and my mother without any means for livelihood. My mother without any means to survive, carried me in her hip and knocked the doors of her brother’s home at midnight – the only asylum she was left with. My uncle was shocked to see us standing helplessly and drove us away mercilessly saying that he had no means of supporting us! That was the day I decided to prove my worth to this World”

This incident in Suresh's life created an operating system in his sub-conscious mind which was running all his life “to prove himself” thereafter – which Sigmund Freud calls it as script. It is also a fact that vast majority of us are living life like Suresh as we have no means of knowing our scripts. If “Script” is the programme or operating system that runs our life like computer helplessly responding the way in which the program was written, all human beings would be robots and would not have produced great leaders.

What is the main point?

The subject matter for me in this episode is to explore “Are we the product of our circumstances or do we have a choice? – What do Leaders do to challenge their “Scripts”? Leaders are possibility thinkers and hence their past has no influence on them. Let us examine what is possibility thinking? In simple terms Possibility thinkers are “Future focused” and followers are “Past focused”. Suresh chasing a Mercedes to prove himself is a typical example of “Past focused” – there is no one in this planet to prove as “everyone of us are trying to prove to a non-existent entity and no one is interested or having time to notice who achieved what?” I wish to refer to a Zen story to illustrate this point:

“There was a Zen master living in a monastery where many people used to visit. After worshiping him they used to stand outside the monastery and exchange their pleasantries & problems with each other. There was a blind beggar sitting outside who used to listen to their conversation. The beggar being blind, his listening was quite strong to capture the inner dialogues of the people while they were sharing or listening. The Zen master one day died and there was a condolence meeting in which the beggar was invited to speak along with many of the devotees. The beggar spoke as follows:

“I was listening intently while people were sharing the events of their life with each other. Whenever one shared happy news I found the other person congratulating in words but fuming and fretting in his heart due to jealously. Similarly whenever one shares his problems the other was responding with sympathizing words; but feeling happy internally that it had not happened to him. I could get the inner feelings from their tones. But I found whenever the Zen Master responded he was happy when he heard happy news and really sad when he heard sad news. In other words he was “authentic” and the common men are “hypocrites” – and that is the difference between the ones who have “arrived” and the vast majority who are in the maze of mundane ephemeral life.

The above story proves the point that there is no one in this universe who is waiting to acknowledge our achievements and trying to “prove ourselves” to this non-existent entity is like chasing the mirage and leave nothing behind to the legacy. The Leaders never try to prove themselves but keen to make a difference in this planet.

Human beings can be classified into two major categories – the one who always wants to challenge what life has to offer and the other believes in fate and karma who generally succumb to them eventually. Some of us are on the side of the “problems” and some of us are on the side of the “solutions”. The leaders are generally the “possibility thinkers” which is my main topic of discussion today.

The Possibility Approach:

Possibility thinking believes that everything is coming from “Sunya-nothingness” (sunya is a Sanskrit word for nothingness). Looks complicated? Let me explain with an example. Where was the cell phone before its invention? The answer will be “Nowhere” Is it not? Where was this universe before big bang? Nowhere again! Vedanta says everything is in its “Un-manifest” form and comes into “manifest” form. The mango seed is the “un-manifest” form of the mango tree! We are in the planet now; where we were before birth? The answer is the same - everything from "Nothingness"

Another characteristic of possibility thinking is “Everything is cyclic”. Before Galileo’s time people believed that earth is flat and if we continue to travel in one direction we may fall out of it!! Galileo was poked in his eyes for challenging this belief and unfortunately for him there were no satellite image of earth to show what he was saying! Now we know that we can fly to US from India via east or west. In the universe we notice all phenomena are “Cyclic” – the day & night, seasons, planetary motion, flora and fauna, and so on. Science also confirmed this through “Law of conservation of mass or energy” which says energy or mass can neither be created nor destroyed and they can only be changed from one form to another. This is what I mean by "Cyclic" - No beginning and end! One cannot show where the beginning and end in a Globe.

In essence, a Leader always believes that he can create anything from nothing and moves forward keeping his /herattention always in the side of the solution and not on the side of the problem as a common man do. Creating something out of nothing offers lots of “ambiguity” as future is unknown. It is always easier to run life through “Script” as nothing is “ambiguous”.

Allergic to Ambiguity:

One of the Blocks psychology identified is “Allergic to ambiguity” which means that we get intimidated by the lack of clarity of an un-born future which has full of possibilities. Vast majority of us are capable only in “conforming” situations which are quite familiar to us. I dealt this in detail in my earlier topic “Rocking the boat”. Overcoming the intimidating feeling due to lack of clarity is the ability the leader develops over a period of time. Let us look at a simple scenario the leader faces – How big the business can grow? How to enrol the people for the common vision of the company? Is it not an ambiguous situation to answer these questions? Like these the Leader faces lots of questions on a daily basis; in other words “Ambiguity” is the order of life for a leader. In essence the future is unclear and creating it has infinite possibilities. The possibility thinking with tremendous optimism is the only way the leaders create the unborn future.

In Summary:

• Script is the operating system of your Life which is the result of your childhood conditioning

• Script makes you to live your life “Past Focused” to prove yourself as Suresh did – it has no possibility

• Possibility Thinking is “Future focused” – creating anything you wish.

• You are the integral part of this universe which has perennial creativity
• You can create your future with the support of this universe as you have the same capacity as the universe
• Future is ambiguous as it is coming from “Nothingness”
• Allergic to ambiguity will intimidate you from moving forward to create your future.
• Leaders will overcome the Allergic to ambiguity and live life in possibility thinking to leave something for legacy

Cultivate Possibility Thinking and create a Great Future for you and the Humanity.

Jai Gurudev

NC