Category: Everything else

I turned 24 today. The disappearance of the manic high of birthdays past is conspicuous by its absence. It’s been a feature of the past few years – the ‘# of calls at midnight/early in the morning’ index is evidence of that. As a kid, you often feel like the world ought to stop and celebrate you. Now, it’s a lovely opportunity to take stock and celebrate this wonderful life.

The year that went past was among the most eventful years of the 24 that have gone by. I will remember it for many reasons – learning to play the guitar, seeing many new places, experiencing one big success and an accompanying failure; both of which taught me a lot, and getting engaged. Most of all, I think I will remember it as the year that taught me to calm down.

I’ve found myself discovering two insights that Seth Godin describes beautifully in his recent book – that of the infinite game and that of relishing the opportunity to dance.

My own synthesis of these past months involve learning to believe that, whether I understand it or not, the universe is unfolding as it should. We get to play our part in this process and our progress is typically correlated to the effort we put in. There isn’t much more we can do. The success in the game isn’t about making progress, but about just playing. If progress, as we define it, happens, that’s great. If it doesn’t, it’s typically life’s way of telling us to look at the situation differently. Things don’t always work ‘well’, but they tend to work out just fine. We just need to keep focus on plugging away and doing our bit to make the most of this life.. and enjoy the dance.

Voltaire said: “God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.”

His thought encapsulates my wishes for the year ahead. I am working hard on giving myself the gift of living well by getting the simple things right – exercising more, reflecting more, giving meditation a shot, continuing to read, and taking on as much as practically possible so I fail more, learn more, and give myself a chance to accidentally make a positive difference.

Looking forward..

This week’s book learning is part of an 8 part series from The Honest Truth About Dishonesty by Dan Ariely. (Parts 1, 2)

After having understood our tendency to cheat ‘just a little bit’ when given the chance, we left last week with the question – How does the cheating process work in our heads? As a first step in that direction, we’ll explore confabulation.

Two researchers, Richard Nisbet and Tim Wilson, set up camp at their local mall. They arranged 4 pairs of nylon stockings on a table and asked women shoppers which they liked best.

By and large, the shoppers preferred the pair on the far right. When asked for a reason, some said they liked the colour, others said they liked material, and the rest pointed to texture or quality. This preference was interesting considering all 4 were identical.

So, Nisbet and Wilson repeated the same experiment with night gowns. The result – same. Not one cited the placement of the items as a possible reason.

Even when they told the participants that they were actually identical, the participants denied it.

The big learning here is that we don’t always know why we do what we do. The obscurity of our real motivations doesn’t stop us from creating logical explanations or confabulations.

Sketch by EB

Confabulation leads us to a very interesting point in our study on dishonesty. If we manufacture “logical” motivations every once in a while, does our creativity come into play? Taking it a step further, what is the relationship between creativity and dishonesty?

All will be revealed in part 4..

Happy weekend everyone!

The next time you’re tempted to curse your luck when life throws a curve ball at you, stop and repeat “Maybe I’m meant to learn something from this..”

Philosophy and faith are powerful healers. Our ingenious minds are also brilliant at doing what they were designed to do – to think. A negative situation is easily transformed into a profound learning experience.

It’s wonderful to remind ourselves of the power we have within us. We can transform the nature of a situation or experience with one simple question or statement.

And, who knows, maybe the fates did mean to teach you something..

It’s a bad deal if you want it a lot more than the other person and a guarantee of problems in the road ahead.

It’s like a lover desperately trying to get in with you – a put off.

If you know enough to be prepared to walk away from something you know will change your life, you’ve just increased your likelihood of making it work.

Success is a culmination of one counter intuitive action after another.

Contentment comes from looking at how far we have come. Happiness comes from focusing on the now and enjoying the journey. And, ambition comes from looking at how far we have to go.

Too much looking back means lesser than necessary focus on happiness and ambition. Less focus on happiness and ambition means less good done today, which in turn means less content tomorrow.

We are hardly ever going to get the ratios absolutely right. That’s life. But, we owe it to ourselves to get as close as possible as consistently as possible. What does that mean for today?

1. Reflect on learnings from yesterday and as you do that, think about what your learnings might have been on the same day last year – a great reminder of how far you’ve come

2. Write down three things you plan to do today. Add a fun thing to the day if you aren’t looking forward to the three big priorities. 

3. Write down three things on your bucket list that you are working towards/three things you’d like to get done in the next five years. Take a small step today.

That’s 5 minutes of writing. It doesn’t take much. It does accomplish a lot.

(PS: The list will not look rosy every day as you chronicle the downs along with the ups. But this way, you make sure you don’t just trudge through life. You reflect on how it feels to actually live it.)

A friend of mine quoted the ‘never eat alone’ concept referring to a need for good company during meals at work. I thought I’d provide the counter point.

Enjoy the solitude that comes with lunch alone. If you are introverted, it’s bliss anyway. And, if you are extroverted, it’s a great opportunity to catch up with your thoughts.

There are so many equally amazing options – take a book along and read alongside, listen to a book while staring into nothingness, stare into nothingness, relish every bite of what you’re eating and remember how blessed you are to be where you are, among others. Your pick.

So, just for today, find a quiet corner and have lunch by yourself. Consider making it a weekly habit at the very least. You tend to get very less ‘alone time’ as life goes by.

Treasure it.

Over the past few years, I’ve tested out a bunch of ideas and experiments on various audiences. Taking out the disinterested lot, I always found the interested ones to divide themselves into 3 groups.

– The nodders. Lots of smiles and nodding with no follow up

– The wannabe hustlers. While smiles and nodding aren’t a pre requisite, the wannabe hustlers DO follow up. But, the follow up doesn’t last long. They love the sprint and hate the marathon.

– Hustlers. I’ve been fortunate to work with hustlers of all kinds of personality types. A couple of them I know don’t say much but follow up with exemplary execution. Some others say a lot but also back it up with stuff that gets done.

There are 3 learnings I take away from witnessing this behavior.

– I am learning not to get carried away after a meeting. I’ve realized that the true success of a meeting can’t be measured immediately. It’s a metric that shows itself in time and is dependent on how many hustlers you met.

– I am learning to test ideas with folk and see what their preference is. A work or project relationship is a two way relationship. Push doesn’t help.
(And yes, hustling is a preference)

– I am learning to ask myself the ‘Am I nodding or hustling?’ question every once a while. Hustling is a painful preference since you dedicate a big part of your down time to doing just that. But, integrity is about making and keeping commitments. It’s so hard to keep commitments that we often tend to forget the first half of the deal.

The lizard brain may hint that not making commitments is safe. But, hey, who are we kidding?

We wake up every morning faced with many choices. Today, let’s remember to check in on whether we want to nod or hustle..

This week’s book learning is the first of a 8 part series from The Honest Truth About Dishonesty by Dan Ariely. (Part 1)

Can increasing the psychological distance between a thing and money increase the “fudge factor”, meaning people cheat more?

Dan Ariely tested this in the communal refrigerators in MIT dorms. In half the dorms, his team placed 6 cans of Coca Cola and in the other half, a plate with six 1 dollar bills. The Cokes disappeared within 72 hours while no one touched the money. They could easily have taken the $1 bill, walked over to the vending machine, and bought a coke. But, they didn’t!

To test this further, Dan and team revisited the matrix experiment with a new “token” condition. When students finished solving the matrices, they now received a token/plastic chip stating the number of problems they had solved. Once they received the token, they walked 12 feet to another table and exchanged it for cold hard cash. The difference from the normal condition was that collection of money was one step removed from telling the volunteer how many problems they solved.

Cheating increased to twice the normal amount.

Sketch by EB

These experiments explain the shrinkage problem in companies – employees are more likely to take expensive stationary home than money lying around in the office. Our moral compass slips when the “fudge factor” increases. Would the famous credit default swaps have been used to disastrous ends by banks if they looked like dollar bills?

It brings up the next interesting question. How does the cheating process work in our heads? Next week, same time, same channel..

Relationships have a big transactional element. The strength of a relationship is typically directly related to the willingness of the two individuals involved to give more than take. It is something we all are aware of at some level (the degree is self awareness dependent).

The funny quirk here is that the moment you consciously think of a relationship as a transaction, you have sealed its fate. Perhaps it is because the thought of the word transaction has us focus on “what’s in it for me?” 

The trick is to approach giving in relationships like lunch. You do it every day. It’s good for you and you don’t think about it.

(And, similarly, approach ‘taking’ like an unhealthy midnight raid of the fridge – I realize this analogy doesn’t apply if you are a university student…)