Category: Life & Living

Do I know myself ?

I am not sure. Every time I think I know myself I am wrong. I find I have discovered something new which I did not know. Life is full of possibilities and and I am no different than life. I do believe that human beings have unlimited potential and I am not an exception.

Let me recall the events of my life from my childhood. At school, I had never participated in any debate or elocution competition. My english teacher called me one day and encouraged me to participate in a hindi poetry recitation competition. I was nervous since I had never done so. But he said I will do well and that I should try. I did and not only did well but got a prize.

I was always keen to contribute my little bit to society. At college, I was in the first year of my graduate course. My chemistry professor nominated me as the president of the Rotaract club. I was nervous again since we had members who were senior to me from the second and third year of the graduate courses. But, I did serve the full term and contributed my best to the social causes, together with all the other members of the club and with support from all.

Then at the work place, it has happened many a time. My managers have made me volunteer for many projects and even made me lead projects where I thought I was not capable of. I remember I was asked to lead a SAP HR project, where I did not know much except a bit of HR. But It was executed in time and to the satisfaction of all stakeholders.

I had successfully completed my corporate career and returned to Bangalore to settle down and enjoy life. This time my community elected me as the President of the residents’ association. Again through the difficult years of the pandemic, there were many challenges but we did succeed as a team and executed more than 26 projects successfully during our term of two years.

All the above instances prove that I still do not know what I am capable of ? Every time I get into some project or activity or lead a team, I realise I still have some potential to discover in myself. We possibly grow up in a society where realising one’s potential may be left to ourselves. I was lucky to have teachers in school and college, managers and leaders at the workplace to enable me to realise my talent. Everyone may not be as lucky as I have been. But I do realise that I also may have put in some efforts to discover my latent potential.

Today when I look back at my life so far, I realise that may be I am still discovering myself. The journey of life may be filled with crests and troughs. But, it is upto us to sail through these challenges and realise our potential. If I give up when I am down and out or if I do not grab opportunities coming my way at different stages of life, I have nobody else to blame except myself.

The most auspicious day to start is today and the time is now. Lets just do it.

S Ramesh Shankar

12th August 2021.

How to make life and work fun everyday ?

I have enjoyed my work life right through my career. I worked in public sector, private sector, joint ventures and multinationals but always found ways and means to enjoy my work. I have been asked by many of colleagues the secret of my enjoying work under all circumstances.

I would say the answer has been simple for me. Every day I used to think that I will try out something new. We have so many issues to deal with in life and at work. We always struggle to find solutions to all the problems we face in life. But the day we decide that we can always try something new to solve a problem, life and work is fun. We may succeed in our efforts or we may fail. Either way, it makes work and life more interesting for us.

Many of us feel that we do not have the freedom to experiment. We forget that we are the CEOs of our life, so nothing can stop us from experimenting in our own lives. Similarly at the workplace, if we want to try out a new way of solving a problem, nobody is going to stop us. Most of the time, it is our own lack of will which comes in the way. Like Albert Einstein said “Where there is a will, there is a way.”

The “will” is within us and it is upto us to set the fire to try out new things every day in our lives. It is like if we cannot get up early for a morning walk or job, nobody stops us from cycling or playing badminton in the evening. Similarly, there is no problem at work, which does not have multiple solutions. Generally, we try one or two and then tend to give up. If we try out something new, it not only makes life interesting but fun too.

I remember I used to have a white board in my office to note down all the crazy ideas I got every day. I would then try them one by one as I could experiment or would request my team members to help me try out these ideas. Jokingly, many of my team members refrained from entering my room for fear of getting new ideas to try out every day. On a serious note, I found most of my team members enjoyed experimenting as much as I did and together we had a lot of fun.

It can be as mundane as ideas for a fencing in our home garden. My wife was fed up with shrubs outgrowing and the need to trim them regularly to keep them under check. She suggested that we try laying brick separators. I went ahead and explored wooden and pvc partitions. When we went around our community garden, we realised that the options were many. We could use stones or even old bottles as separators. So the choice before us is limitless if we are willing to experiment and try out.

Life is fun when we are willing to look at every problem as an opportunity to find innovative solutions. On the other hand, if we look at work or life as a series of obstacles to make our life challenging, then we may be losers. It is upto us to try and fail or succeed. If we succeed, we could celebrate and if we fail, we can learn and move on to try out another idea.

Let us view life and work as full of possibilities every single day from today.

S Ramesh Shankar

6th August 2021

Respect the person or position

Many of us fall in love with the position we hold in life be it in the family, community or at work. We think our position gives us status, pride and respect. While it is true that many people respect the position more than the person, but when you leave a position, you are respected only for the person you are.

It may be invaluable to realise early in life that people respect the person in you more than the position you hold. Position may come and go but the person remains forever. You may be the President of your country or the CEO of your business but tomorrow, you remain only the person behind the position.

Some of us get away with unpardonable behaviour when we are holding positions of authority. We may wield our power and get away with whatever we say or do. But as soon as we vacate the same position of power, people either ignore us or forget us.

On the other hand, if you are grounded and live a life loving everyone around you and respecting them irrespective of the position you hold, then people remember you forever. They remember the way you treated them even if they forget the position you held while you treated them that way.

Our behaviour is permanent while our positions are ephemeral. We tend to get stuck to positions and forget the person in us. We tend to believe that the position we hold will take care of us and insulate us from the repercussions of bad conduct.

While this may be partially true till we hold that position of power, it fades always as soon as we move on. People do not remember the positions we held forever. Positions are static and temporary while persons are dynamic and live their life time.

It is important for us to realise that people respect our behaviour because of the person we are. They may continue to respect us for our behaviour even if we move on from the positions of power as long as our behaviour continues to be endearing. The day we think position and power can get us everything in life and we can get away with all our actions , we may be misled.

This basic tenet of life is true for family, community, society or even organisations. We love our parents since they are caring in nature and treat us with love and dignity. We love our teachers because they have nurtured us, irrespective of our tantrums and never wielded power to guide us.

We respect colleagues at work who have always guided us and led us to behave well through their actions more than their words or positions. We tend to follow what we see in them rather than what they say or what position they hold.

Let us mould our behaviour and shape our personality to be loving, caring and endearing always, to everyone around us.

Positions will come and go but person remains the same

S Ramesh Shankar

1st August 2021