Today morning I was meeting a guest at work in a common meeting room. I had booked it from 830 to 0900 hrs only. My meeting spilled over and the receptionist at our office promptly and politely reminded me to vacate the room as the participants for the next meeting were waiting.

I realised that I had over stepped my time and apologised for the same and vacated the room as requested. As we came out and sat in the lobby to conclude our meeting, the receptionist told us that we can continue and conclude our meeting in the same room. When I enquired what happened to the other meeting, she told me that she had arranged an alternate discussion room for them.

I wondered why it happened . On reflection, I realised that every day when I pass through the reception I wish them and return back their gleaming smile. I try to be polite to them always. So, today I realised that if I am nice to people around me, they always try to be nice to me.

It may appear a simple thing in life but difficult to practise. All of us want to be good to others all the time but the circumstances make us vulnerable many a time. Imagine you have parked your car in a no parking zone and on your return you see a cop placing a fine on you. What do we do – we say we were not aware that it was a no parking zone. We go further and justify stating we had parked only for a few minutes. In the end when fined, we lose our patience. Was it our fault of parking in a banned zone or the cop’s mistake of rightly fining us.

At work, we behave no different. We keep rescheduling meetings as per our convenience and changing priorities. When someone does not attend a meeting on a rescheduled date and time, we express our displeasure. We forget that we had rescheduled, postponed and advanced the same meeting five times to suit our convenience without checking on the convenience of our team members. We were not nice to our team members’ convenience but we expect them to be nice and adjust to our convenience all the time.

We expect our bosses to adjust when we fall sick all of a sudden. But when a similar things happens to any of our team members we preach the importance of maintaining good health and the criticality of work on those days when our colleague is sick.

We are equally belligerent at home. We do not bother to wish the security guards in our homes when we pass by them every day. On the contrary, we expect them to salute us and wish us every single time we pass through the main gate of our campus. Is this fair ? If we do not have the courtesy to treat security guards and our maids as human beings, can we expect them to treat us humanly ?

One of the drivers at my workplace who is a diabetic told me that one day his lunch break was delayed and he requested his boss for a 15 minutes break so that he could quickly have a bite. His boss not only denied him the break but also made him feel small by asking how he could ask for a break when he was so busy at work that day. His boss was possibly not even aware that his driver was a diabetic.

My learning in life is that if we expect our family, friends or colleagues to be nice to us, we need to learn to be nice to them. If we treat our servants, drivers, security guards etc humanely, they will reciprocate humanness with equal measure.

As in the photo above, our security staff took care of us 24×7 even beyond their call of duty since we treated them with respect.

Lets learn to be nice, if we want others to be nice to us.

S Ramesh Shankar

5th September 2018

The world is witnessing one of the worst tragedies ever seen in recent memory. This virus has spread to every nook and corner of the world and destroyed countries, communities and families.

While our scientists and medical fraternity are working day and night to save lives, they are limited by resources and limited knowledge of this deadly and evolving virus.

It is at such times, we as individuals, families, communities or nations need to spread hope and positivity. We need to remember that positivity is infectious and if we are able to spread it faster than the virus, the despair of people suffering can be minimised.

While we cannot compensate a family, who has lost a loved one, we can pray for them to withstand this tragedy in their lives. We can share stories of innumerable good samaritans working around the world to save lives.

Every day I read a positive story, my belief in humanity soars. I know of young volunteers helping individuals and families getting beds, ambulances, medicines etc. I read of actors driving ambulances to save lives. Today I read of bikers using their motorcycles as mobile ambulances to take patients to hospitals.

While we may have every right to criticise governments and those in administration for the lack of infrastructure or timely support, it may be more helpful at the current juncture to provide a lending hand to the already crumbling support systems.

The tragedy has spread far and wide. It has made life dark for many. In this situation, we have a choice – we can either light a candle in their lives or light a fire. It may be more appropriate to light a candle and kindle hope rather than fume despair.

We as individuals can support our own family or friends. We can volunteer in our community and spread positivity. This is enough. If each of us can take care of our family, friends and community, we may have done our bit.

It is time for us to salute them. It is time for us to be grateful for whatever they are doing within the limited resources available to them. Let us fight this virus together and wait for things to normalise before we fix the blame as to who is wrong and why.

We need to remember that the medical fraternity, the healthcare workers, the sanitary staff, municipal authorises and the bureaucrats running the administration, the ambulance drivers, the crematorium staff and innumerable others are working 24×7 only for us.

I would appeal to politicians also to sink their partisan differences and work as one team supporting and enabling each other to succeed. Let the experts and bureaucrats work independently and we need to ensure their success.

I would appeal to the media – both print and TV to share positive news first. I am not for one recommending that we need to hide facts or suppress news. Let the headlines be of heroines and heroes, who are saving lives of common men and women every day. Let the other news be on the back pages.

Last but not the least, I appeal to every individual to take responsibility for themselves. Let us spread positivity and hope among our family members, community and society.

Let us use social media responsibly and share news of hope, service and bravery. Let us appreciate the small deeds of unknown women and men around the world working round the clock to save lives in a global crisis like this.

As in the photo, it is time to light the lamp and spread hope.

I commit to spread positivity in every possible way. Will you please join me ?

S Ramesh Shankar

11th May 2021

We meet people of different hues in our lives. Some are adorable and a role model in every respect and some we feel like forgetting them as soon as we meet them and experience them the first time. One of my colleagues recently talked about the self motivated and the selfishly motivated people in the world.

I thought about the people I have met and worked in my life and wondered if I could distinguish between the self motivated and the selfishly motivated people in my life. What are their distinguishing characteristics , how do we differentiate them and how do we deal with them in our lives ?

Lets start with the self motivated category. These people are like live electric wires around us. It is easy to spot them. They inspire you with their actions and are always willing to work for your success. They never give up and never allow others around them to give up either. Their motivation comes from within and they are selfless. Their motivation against all odds is infectious and positively impacts others’ lives.

On the other hand, the selfishly motivated are self centred. They believe that they are born in this world to succeed at any cost. Their motivation comes from outside. They want to win at any cost. Others success or failure is of least concern to them. They may appear to be outwardly inspiring but are inwardly hollow. You can see through them as they do not have any depth in themselves. They may put down others to ensure their own success.

Now is the tough question, as to how to deal with these two categories. The first category of self motivated people are easy to deal with. The motivation touches you and hence the more we interact with them, the more they inspire us. They are born optimists and never give up under any circumstances. Even a cup of tea with such people helps you to energise yourself and hence we should not miss any opportunity to be with them. We should spot them in the family, work place or society and find ways and means to be with them.

On the other hand, the selfishly motivated category may be avoided to say the least. They set the wrong role models in society. They create a political work place and are always working at their goal accomplishment at the cost of everybody around them. While one may learn from their determination, one may be demotivated by their behaviour. It may be sometimes difficult to avoid them if they are members of your family, colleagues at work or even your boss. It is best to spend the least time with them and learn from their dogged determination to achieve their goals. One may consciously avoid to learn the selfishness from them.

As in the photo above, the self motivated will find a road for themselves and others while the selfishly motivated will find a road to escape from others.

The world is a mixture of selfless and selfish people. The former are self motivated and the latter are generally selfishly motivated. It may sometimes take time to distinguish the two. But our honesty will make it easy to know the difference. Once identified, we can do everything to be with the self motivated and avoid the selfishly motivated whenever possible.

Let us learn to be self motivated.

S Ramesh Shankar

5th August 2018