Category: Attitude/Discipline

Accepting defeat with grace…

We witnessed elections in the world’s largest democracy over the last two months. It was characterised by political debates, accusations, allegations and counter allegations as one can expect from such an event.

I admire the Election Commission of India for meticulously planning and organising a fair and largely peaceful election in a seamless manner. We were possibly the first country in the world to adopt electronic voting machines. We can be proud of this accomplishment, which many developed nations have not been able to adopt so far.

However, what we see as an aftermath of such a massive exercise is blame game. Political parities find faults with the election commission. They also blame the electronic voting machines for their losses. Today a political leader even went to the extent of blaming foreign forces for their defeat.

I am amazed at such reactions. One life lesson is to accept a “win” with humility and a “loss” with grace. After all the public at large comprises of citizens like you and me. We are well educated and make our judgement based on ground realities. We elect parties or leaders for their credence and not for any other reason.

We need to educate our political class to adapt to the technological changes impacting them. Today is it is electronic voting machines. Tomorrow it could be artificial intelligence or the blockchain, which may play a role in elections. What surprises me is that the so called educated politicians, who are professionally qualified like lawyers, management graduates, engineers, doctors etc are the first to criticise this way when they lose or their party faces defeat in the hustings.

My learning in life is to accept defeat with “grace” as much as treat victory with “humility”. This is what we can learn from all the best sportspersons in the world. A sportsperson glowing with arrogance after a victory fades into history. On the other hand, the humble sportsperson, who bows out with grace even in defeat is always the winner in our minds.

Politicians need to learn this lesson in life. We should not end up blaming our constitutional bodies and institutions for narrow political gains. After all, the citizens in modern India want better roads, clean drinking water, good health facilities and world class infrastructure. We want jobs for all who need it and health and happiness for the common man. We envision India as the best and the happiest country in the world.

It is time for political parities and politicians to rise above narrow archaic beliefs and work for the larger good of the nation. Let parliament work for 100% of the days, pass all needed legislations. Let the honest citizens be rewarded and the crooks in society be booked.

It is time for us to make India the best democracy in the world apart from being the largest. The government and the opposition needs to work hand in hand like the twin lilies in the photo above.

Let us learn to accept defeat with grace and victory with humility.

S Ramesh Shankar

26th May 2019

Why is common sense uncommon ?

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I have never understood as to why common sense is uncommon ? The first incident which taught me this was when I was in college. My college was next to a suburban railway station. There was a subway being constructed at the level crossing near the college. One side of the road to the subway was being dug in a broader way than the other side. Both the sides did not seem aligned. As a student, I was bewildered. However, I thought the civil and design engineers were more knowledgable than me and hence may be I did not understand.

However, after the construction was almost completed on the subway, they realised that this was indeed a grave error. There were two different contractors working on either side of the railway line and may be they never had a joint meeting and hence they designed and constructed subways on either side, which were not aligned. They did not realise it till it was almost completed although to a common man like me it was quite visible.

Such incidents happen almost every day in our lives. There are some things, which are very obvious but we do not realise it until someone points it out to us. It is like standing under a shower and turning on the hot water tap without realising that we need to first mix the hot and cold water to the right temperature before walking under the shower. Isn’t it obvious to us that hot water will burn our skin but still many of us end up doing just that.

Another every day incident which baffles me is our reluctance to wear helmets or safety belts while we ride bikes or drive cars. All of us are aware that the maximum deaths happen on the road due to accidents. We are equally educated that helmets and safety belts can help us prevent fatal accidents. We undergo training and even make written commitments to wear them. But when we take out our bike or car, we end up not wearing them stating that with so much traffic and such slow speeds, nothing can happen to us.

The most common thing I see nowadays is people crossing the road speaking on their mobile phones. I have nothing against people speaking on mobile phones or chatting on apps. But what baffles me is why people do not realise that crossing a road speaking on the mobile phone could be fatal. Isn’t it common sense that while you are speaking on the phone or chatting on it, your attention cannot be on the traffic and you may not hear the horn and hence it may just take a fraction of a second to meet with an accident.

I realise that I cannot blame the world for my uncommon sense. I have to take responsibility for applying my common sense and not make it uncommon. I need to commit to myself that I will question myself every time I realise that I am not exhibiting it. If I promise myself that I will wear a helmet or safety belt every time I drive, I should stick to it whether the world is watching me or I am all alone.

As in the photo above, why we do not use safety devices when we are expected to do so for our own safety.

The only way of making common sense common is self discipline. I cannot blame the world for an accident if I cross the road while I am speaking on a mobile phone. The earlier we realise this basic tenet the better it is for ourselves. It is up to us to use our common sense. If we don’t, we have to blame ourselves and not the world around us.

Let me begin today.

S Ramesh Shankar

I am the past, you are the future…

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One of the best lessons I have learnt in life is that the more your share, the more you learn. It starts from our childhood. As a elder sibling in the family, we have to learn to share with our younger siblings and be willing to learn from them. Then you grow into an adult and have a lot to share with younger ones around you. You get into a job and work in a team to share and learn.

As you get married, you learn from each other all the time. Then as you have kids, it is time to give back again. This is the time I realised that the best attitude to share and give back to the next generation is to believe that ” I am the past, you are the future..”. If we live our life with this attitude, we will always be willing to share more, learn more and give back more. We have to realise that we create the future of our choice.

I have to believe what happened in my life is history. I may have succeeded or made mistakes. But the future is with the next generation. Hence, if I believe that I am the past and the next generation is the future, I will happily share my knowledge and skills without expecting anything in return. Many of us conserve our knowledge, skills or experience thinking that if you share you erode your value.

I would argue that it is the other way around. The more you share, the more you learn and grow. I have respected all the people who have shared with me in life and career. I have seen them grow and become more knowledgable and respected in society. On the other hand, people who have conserved knowledge or experience are neither respected nor do they blossom in life.

There is a reason for me to believe that our attitude to life and living should be – ” I am the past, you are the future..”. If we believe, we have experiences of the past, we have a responsibility to share with the next generation as they are the future. If we share our failures and successes, the chances are they will not have to go through the same issues in their lives. If we do not believe in this, the next generation will do the same mistakes we did in our life and their learning curve will be longer than ours.

In corporate life, we always believe that the lessons we learn from our failures are much more valuable even than our successes. Life is no different. We should have the courage not only to accept our failures but the willingness to share what we learnt from them so that the future generations benefit from it. If all of us conserve our knowledge, skills and experiences and take them to our graves, we neither benefit from it nor does the future generations.

This is true in every aspect of life. We need to share and learn in a continual way. We need to believe that the more we share, the more we learn in life. We need to believe that we are the past and the next generation is the future. We are responsible for the past but we also have a responsibility to create a brighter future for the next generation.

We have a responsibility of developing the future generation as in the photo above.

Let us live life king size. Let us learn to give back to others more than we have got in life. I can share that this could be a wonderful way to be happy and grateful in life. We have neither inherited knowledge nor can we take it to heaven. It is this realisation, which will make us give back in abundance. Let us learn every day of our life and let go all that we have learnt to others so that they benefit as much as we did.

The day to start is today and the time is now.

S Ramesh Shankar