Month: August 2011

Last October, I decided to take inspiration from some of the popular blogs out there and put in a picture with every long form post.

Over the past many months, I have been amazed as to how easy Google Images has made it for Bloggers to find pictures.

And today, I thought I would pay tribute..

This post has been coming for a while. Ever since I finished up my camp last week, I have been trying hard to synthesize my top 3 learnings from the week. That’s taken a while though – thanks largely to all the ‘catch up’ that’s been in progress.

I needed some time to sit down, reflect and then have a conversation with a friend (I learn by talking out my thoughts..) and this process took a good part of the week. And finally, thanks to a great 4 hour discussion with a close friend, I feel like I have my top 3.

Firstly, I would like to thank the Super Team.

From Left Bottom: Nash, Baptiste, Ashish, Ankur and Zhixin

From Right Bottom: Cecile, Riccardo, Justin, Eugenia and myself. :)

The camp truly was an unforgettable memory. And here are my top 3 learnings –

1. Who you choose to spend your time with, defines you. I blogged on this topic last week. The following come to mind when I think of the learning –

– Top performers cluster. It is always the case. I’ve seen it happen time and time again that the best always spend time with the best thanks to a relentless focus on pulling each other up.

– Either you are bringing people up or pulling them down. It’s always one or the other.

– It is NEVER fully ‘comfortable’ when you hang out with people you learn from because they are always questioning your beliefs, always pushing your buttons and always ensuring they have your best interests at heart.

It’s not easy to do this. But again, what’s right is almost never easy.

2. The only route to success is by being yourself. This one came from Jack Welch. And what’s amazing about the ‘Be Yourself’ learning is it’s simplicity.

I realized the impact of this one in my own work life. It is common knowledge among colleagues who do know me that I derive a lot of my energy from my little initiatives like this blog among others. And that knowledge and reassurance that they have accepted me as I am plays a big role in my happiness, and thus my commitment to work.

It’s not always easy though because of our strong desire to ‘fit in’ and act unnaturally if necessary to do so. This is a reminder that alarm bells should be ringing if we see that happening.

Again, common knowledge but not common practice.

3. There is no greater form of respect (in my eyes) than for those who ‘do’. I am finding this difficult to express in writing and feel a longer explanation is due.

I am obviously very biased to RealAcad – I have been a proud RealAcader since 2007 and have made ‘giving back’ to RealAcad a part of my life. What I love about RealAcad is that every camp has a ‘life of it’s own’ – it is highly dependent on the people who show up and what they bring to the table. It’s magic lies in the fact that it is incredibly customized – so much that so that every person walks out having learnt something entirely different. My belief is that this magic means you learn what you most need, at that point of time. I’ve been fortunate to attend 8 camps over the past 4 years and every camp has resulted in a completely different set of learnings. Some camps taught me to keep trying, others told me to believe in my dreams, yet some others pushed me to ‘act’ and yet some others reminded me of the bigger picture.

All that said, what makes RealAcad truly magical in my eyes is that it has given me a constant stream of people I respect – people who live by ‘practicing’ what they preach. There is nothing taught at a RealAcad that hasn’t been practiced and therein lies its uniqueness. It is not theory, it is ‘real’.

In my case, it had been a good 18 months since I’d attended my last camp and I must admit that I had a my doubts on the kind of impact it would have on my life. I had changed lots, ‘grown’ a fair bit and had my own set of strong opinions. I was going to be helping lead the camp with friends I hadn’t worked with for a while (working together via Skype is wholly different from being on show for an entire week of course) How would it go? Would I walk out with the usual ’10/10′ at the end of the camp?

And I clearly remember ‘that’ moment on the 5th day (I think). We were amidst an intense discussion and I found myself looking around the table and feeling extremely happy at being amidst a group SO dedicated to learning and growth. It was that warm, fuzzy feeling of being amidst friends who were committing to practicing everything they learnt and in that process, working hard, playing hard and laughing lots.

I did walk away from the camp giving it a ’10/10′ rating. And I can’t remember a week when I have laughed more. Nor can I remember the last time I cried and laughed all at once, while waving goodbye to the team as they drove off leaving me by myself to catch my flight at San Francisco International airport..

It felt strange to be left alone.. after that week.

It was very special.

(And this was the gang that left me at the airport crying.. :))

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For those of you who are wondering about RealAcad, I have posts from the past here and here. For the complete list, do just key in RealAcad in the search box on the side. :)

This week’s learning draws inspiration from ‘Success Principles’ by Jack Canfield.

Jack Canfield’s mantra for success revolved around the philosophy of ‘Ready, Fire, Aim.’

When he and Mark Victor Hansen started marketing the first ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul‘, they decided to send excerpts from the book to local newspapers with a request to print a box that would acknowledge the source and mention the book was available at the local bookstore.

Since he didn’t know what was the right way forward, he simply faxed a note with the excerpt to various editors. A few weeks later, he received a reply –

‘Dear Jack, I was annoyed by your fax. How dare you assume that I would be interested in your article?

And then I read your article. I was very touched. And needless to say, I will print it…

Best Regards,

Jack Bearman, Editor-in-Chief – LA Parent

In the subsequent phone call, Jack Bearman generously taught Canfield how to submit a request to magazines and gave him feedback. Now, he was in the game!

It happened twice yesterday.

– First up, it happened during one of those tough and fairly long discussions with a friend that could have been averted. My gut had been telling me that there was an issue to be dealt with for a couple of weeks now and I still decided to avoid it. Bad idea.

– The second was a post lunch discussion with a friend which finally cleared some miscommunications that we had with regards to a process he was going through as a result of my insistence. In truth, I should have managed expectations a lot better. Again here, my gut told me 3 weeks ago that there was a high chance something would go wrong.

And in typical style, I decided to ignore it. Luckily, we dealt with it yesterday or it could have resulted in a rather unpleasant experience.

I am more of an intuitive decision maker. Every big decision I have made in my life so far has had a mix of logic and emotion. Logic helps me understand if the facts are okay but it’s my emotions that give me the final go-ahead, and hence, have the final veto. If it doesn’t feel right, I don’t do it. Over time, I’ve learnt to make friends with my heart and these days, I find it much easier to listen to it – despite the overarching noise from thoughts and other distracting noise.

Yesterday, it struck me that it’s high time I made friends with my gut too. My gut is typically quicker than my heart – if my heart tells me that a certain decision or situation doesn’t feel right, my gut has probably given subtle hints many weeks ago but for some reason, I just chose not to listen.

In fact, what I often find myself doing is actually fighting against my gut, trying to prove it is wrong. I guess it comes from a schooled aversion to making snap judgments – which is really what the gut does. From my experience over the past few months atleast, I’ve found this to be a big waste of energy because my gut’s warnings have been unerringly accurate. Maybe it’s a hint..

While I don’t think listening to my gut is the answer 100% of the time, I do think it has earned it’s right to be heard. Time to make a new friend..

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(Credit to Malcolm Gladwell’s ‘Blink’ as well for helping me understand the science of snap judgments a little better. If I were a reader, I wouldn’t take his book to be THE authority as he has a ‘news-reporter’ style focus on topics but he definitely does give some valuable insights!)

Of late, one of the ideas I have been most inspired by is the concept of ‘The World is My Family.’

I first heard this a few months ago during a conversation with my uncle, who is quite the prolific entrepreneur. While I should save his ‘story’ for another blog post, he left home when he was 19 and had a very eventful journey, full of ups and downs that included times when he didn’t have money for food or a place to stay and eventually ended up in a proverbial ‘rags to riches’ tale as he found success and fortune running Rasa, a popular chain of restaurants in the UK.

‘The World is My Family‘ is his expression – he uses it to describe how he found care, affection and love from the world outside home. It was his way of expressing how he learnt to expand his heart beyond the love for his family to love for all who he met, and cared for, during his journey.

And when I think of it for myself, I left home (albeit in very different circumstances) for university 5 years ago now and I have constantly been amazed at how I’ve found family wherever I’ve gone. It’s almost felt like it’s meant to be – I’ve found close friends when I needed them, older siblings when I needed them, younger siblings to pamper and develop, parent-like mentors all through who have more than looked after me – they’ve cared for me enough to give me the hard knocks when necessary and yet, always made sure they’ve been around to catch me when I’ve fallen.

And this family is only growing. 2 years ago, I began writing emails 3 times a week to 3 very close people I considered ‘family’. Now that list has expanded to over 10 to write to every weekend, and another 10 to write to every month, more every 3 months and is only expanding. The more I seem to open myself to the influence of others, the more I seem to be finding family. It truly amazes me.

In my case, I realize it started thanks to my very admirable mother, who has always encouraged me to be open, accepting and welcoming. As a result, when I started out, I found I was probably less wary than most, but yet not-so-welcoming. But somewhere down the line, I found myself beginning to realize that we have space in our hearts and minds for more people than we can ever imagine.

We just have the open, accepting and welcoming.

(Thanks Mom! The more I ‘grow up’, the more I find myself impressed by the depth of the things you have taught me.)

Are these people who are lifting you up or pulling you down?

Are these people who ask you uncomfortable questions and help you re-think your points of views and perspectives or are these people who just smile and ignore?

Are they folks who hang around only to have fun or stay back to clean after the party’s over?

Are these folks who only care enough to put paper over cracks that need mending or are they the kind that care enough to help mend these cracks with you?

Are these folks who encourage you to do more and grow mentally, physically, emotionally and physically or ‘having fun’ all they care about?

Do you spend more time hanging around with the ‘stars’ of their own fields and organizations, with those that inject energy and enthusiasm, with those that do and think ‘action’?

There are 2 big myths that are prevalent when we talk about company –

1. Growth and learning can’t be fun.

2. True friends don’t make the other person uncomfortable.

Remember when we were kids?

When every new thing we learnt gave us incredible joy, when every question we asked led to another and then, to another?

When our relationships with our friends in the playground were just incredibly simple?

We may find some answers there.

The simple fact is that who we are is determined by who we spend time with. We can choose to spend time with people we can learn from, or not. We are constantly making choices – when we choose a movie over a book, we choose Will Smith over a Richard Feynman or a Napoleon. Just because it isn’t obvious doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.

Like all things, it’s a choice. And like all things, it’s all about finding a balance. And like all things, it matters that we make the effort.