Author: alearningaday

What would scare you more?

Imagine you have just pissed your customer off.
Which scenario would scare you more –
a) The customer screaming their guts off
b) The customer replying with ice cold tones expecting you to think on your feet and solve the problem
Now, maybe you should try what scares you when you are upset, and want things done?
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Notes:
a) I was a proponent of getting wildly upset and screaming at people i.e. option a). Of late, I have been experimenting with the other approach and it seems to give better results. It seems to reinforce ‘Your power is directly proportional to your ability to relax’
b) For readers based in the US, bad customer service is a rare phenomenon. But, Asian and European based readers can possibly relate. It is very likely you’ve had an annoying experience in your last few shopping sessions.

The age of Facebook

As some of the regular readers of this blog know, I spent a good part of 4 great months in the middle east on a project. The project was a simply fantastic experience – a post merger integration of 3 massive companies in Oman. The year long integration process has come to an end and one of our core teammates put up the new company’s logo on Facebook and tagged me and a whole lot of others who were involved.
(Very very very nice of him to share the moment!)
Among the first bunch of commenters were the CEO of the newly formed organization and the co-founder of the firm I work for – i.e. my big boss.
That’s when I thought it was a perfect moment to marvel at the age of Facebook, the age where everything is out in the open. I realized then that Facebook is the one place which brings together my friends from school and university, all classmates, colleagues at work, friends at the not-for-profit I am passionate about, bosses, mentors and lest I forget, family.
All of a sudden, I have my Mom being notified (on her feed) in real time that our post merger integration was successful..
Wow! How powerful is that.
Now, I do know many who have tried to resist this – by blocking colleagues off their facebook, by not signing up or being completely inactive. My view is simple – like it or not, this is the age of information and Facebook is a massive part of it. If you are not on Facebook, it is likely that your photos are up anyway – just that you aren’t tagged on them. And choosing between the 2 options, I’d rather know what content of mine is up online anyway. And if it is privacy you are worried about, well, that’s a lost cause. Don’t bother wasting your emotions.
Instead of trying to resist the wave, my recommendation would be to embrace it. Unless you are a serial drug user who operates in secrecy, I think Facebook (/twitter/blogs) can be very powerful and positive. All of a sudden, your colleagues or classmates see a different side of you – they see the part time photographer, the passionate musician and the persistent philanthrophist. Isn’t that amazing?
Gone are the days of the ‘office face’, ‘friends face’. All our information is out there – whether we like it or not. If it isn’t out there yet, it is going to be, soon. There is no way around it. Why not just be proactive and make the best of it?
And yes, I do hope you have more to show than photos from parties every couple of days.
(Oh, and on that note, you may want to stop putting up messages like ‘work sucks’, ‘boss screamed at me today’. If you are really THAT frustrated and would like your friends to know, try the old school method………. email.)

Kung Fu Panda II – The lovable super hero

Firstly, due credit to all those animation specialists i.e. the unsung heroes who create these wonderful wonderful movies. And what I always find amazing is that there is always so much to learn from these movies – they hardly ever disappoint.
Kung Fu Panda II revolves around the lovable super hero. The superhero who always surprises himself, always makes you laugh by not taking himself too seriously!
My favorite moment of the movie is when he attacks the enemy in a bid to rescue his team. Once his team is free of their chains, they all look at him, express their joy and then ask ‘So, dragon warrior, what’s the plan?’
And his response is ‘Seriously, I didn’t expect to get this far in the first place.’
The movie takes us on a journey with this joyful character in his quest to save Kung Fu and also find ‘inner peace’.
All in all – Great movie. Lots of learnings. Lots of laughs. Watch it. You won’t regret it!

Habitual Impatience

We were paying the security guard at the entrance of our movie theatre complex.

And just as we were settling the change and collecting the receipt, we heard loud honks from the car behind us.

Infuriated at their unfair behavior, I got off the car to ask them what the fuss was about. Surprised and slightly shaken, the guy who honked began talking at full speed, all flustered – ‘I didn’t honk at you. I honked at the guard. It was not you. I have a movie at 1pm. It’s already 115pm’

I didn’t hear the rest as I just walked off.
(My first reaction when I am upset is always to gauge if this is a person worthy of a fight. And he had just proved otherwise. So, no point wasting emotions there anyway.)
Anyway, I was parked within a couple of minute and I noticed the 2 guys (Mr. flustered and his friend) ambling slowly to the theatre. What happened to all the hurry now?
And then it hit me. Their demonstration of impatience was just habitual. And if you drive (/have driven) in India, you probably know what I am talking about.
There are many things that worry me about this country of mine. And this is putting aside the usual evils of corruption, poverty etc. In my mind, the biggest one was always widespread disillusionment. (In one line, that would mean living in the false belief that you are the gold standard)
But habitual impatience, wow.. that is a whole different monster altogether.
Can you imagine a permanently impatient person? This person would have no interest in planting seeds as he wouldn’t be able to taste the fruits, no interest in empathizing with others as he doesn’t care about the next moment anyway, no interest in leaving any place a little better than he found it. It would mean a typically short term vision that is only focused on consumption..
Now multiply that one habitually impatient person with a billion. And we may just have some answers there.
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Additionally, this whole situation helped me understand where parts of my nature comes from as well..

Easy relationships

We have moved towards a life of convenience. Everything is at our finger tips – be it information, hotel, flight or movie bookings, the weather outside, unlimited music and videos.. you name it and you have it on a touch screen device near you.
As much as the rich-poor divide widens, many more have access to a standard living that wouldn’t have been possible a 100 years ago. More women are entering the industry, taking top jobs etc. Many good things.
However, it’s a different era now. Our Grandparents’ era of stable families has gradually dissolved into the age of broken families. This has often led to many questions – is it going to get any better with time, or worse? Is marriage a broken system?

Good questions. But they tend to miss the point as they deal indirectly with the biggest paradox of our generation – While our connectivity has improved thanks to Facebook, twitter and the like, our relationships haven’t.
Relationships require good old fashioned hard work, emotional investment and time. Oh, and one other thing, good old fashioned compromise. And boy, are we not used to that. This is the age where we have ‘everything’ after all.
Well, maybe not everything.

The ‘I Can’t’ Strength Test

Our language makes all the difference in the world to our attitude. Jack Canfield illustrates this best in his workshops with a simple test.

He asks the participants to stretch their left arms out. Then, Jack pushes down on their left hand to test their usual strength.
Now, Jack asks them to think of something they can’t do like ‘I can’t play the piano’ and start saying it aloud. And when Jack pushes down on their arm, it is ALWAYS weaker.
For the final part, he asks them to reverse it by saying ‘I can ….’, and voila! their arms are strong again.

No wonder there was no stopping us when we were toddlers. We were invincible and constantly told ourselves so – we thought could crawl/climb over anything! But, little by little, as we were taught ‘the ways of the world’, our sense of invincibility wore out until we no longer believed we could.

Our brains are designed to solve any problem and overcome any obstacle as long as we feed it with great fuel – the right attitude. So, are we going to take ownership and remove ‘I can’t’ from our dictionary?

Here’s to ‘I can’, and strength this week!

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Source: Success Principles by Jack Canfield