The Cat School and A Crown I Refuse to Give

It was quarter past 7 in the evening. Anne and I  were seated on the veranda chairs for our daily dose of post-dinner conversation. The day had been very warm. A cold moist breeze gently blew in. “It's raining somewhere,” I said. She didn't reply. She put a finger over her lips and then pointed towards the cat on the road.

We live in a gated community. The colony road, at its broadest outside our house, serves as a tiled pad for turning vehicles. The mother cat was there with her kitten. A child in the colony had brought the mother cat into the colony as a kitten. She was smart and grew up to be a beautiful cat. Ever since, tomcats in the neighbourhood viciously vie with each other for her affections. She litters regularly. 

Seated majestically, she had a rat under one of her paws. Her kitten sat curiously watching the rat struggling to escape. Without warning, she let the rat free. What followed was a hunt in slow motion. The rat ran for its life. The kitten seemed lost. Mama chased the rat, caught it, returned to where she was and settled down. Then without warning she released the rat again. The kitten chased the rat  but failed to catch it. Mama wouldn't let the lesson end in failure! The lesson was repeated a few times. The rat also must have got tired of futile attempts to escape. Finally, the kitten got it right and caught its first feast. “Efficient teacher,” remarked my wife. 

Jungle demands survival skills and matriarchs invest a lot in enabling progenies. What about us ? I wondered. 

There are more than one answer to each question in life. They are present around us. But it reveals itself only if one has the eye to see, ear to hear, head to decipher and heart to relate. I had my chance. This issue had come up for post-dinner discussion a few days before the ‘cat’ incident.

A friend of mine had recently ventured into the field of business. An attempt to start something, especially a business, that demands a lot of physical and mental commitment when one is well past sixty, the decision and follow through, the least to say, is incredible. My friend had retired from the army where he held a very senior position. He had a pension and could spend his days pursuing his passion. I was proud of him. “What prompted you to start this?” I asked. “See Jacob; I couldn't have handed over my designation to my son. But in business, I can anoint my children,” he replied. 

Awash with guilt for a moment,  I realised that I had done nothing like that for my girls. All along when they grew up, they were guaranteed only facilitation for their education. They had to be on their own for everything else. They did exactly that. They chose the field they wanted and toiled hard. One a Masters in Business Administration and CS and the other an IITian, they never disappointed me. They roughed it out in the wide open world and found their space.

Did I fail my children? 

Enabling progenies by creating a conducive environment is a parenting responsibility. Empowering them to achieve their goals is a step ahead. They have the authority to decide for themselves. They have the responsibility and therefore the accountability to themselves for what they have become or haven't. Handing over a crown and anointing them was never on my agenda. Did I abdicate my responsibilities?

There was no reason for me to grudge his reasons but his cause was at great variance with my convictions. Right and wrong is a matter of perception, a considered choice of every individual. He  might be right. 

Was his endeavour a pursuit of passions or driven by compulsions? Passions could be compelling but can compulsions become passions? Maybe!

It is said that survival is the toughest in The Savanna. Life and death are in an undetachable embrace there. Every death in Savanna sustains many others' life and every living thing, flora or fauna, is a potential death threat to another. Each mother in the wild Savanna knows that chances of survival of offspring depend solely on their ability to defeat death at every corner and every moment. We comfort ourselves in the belief that such life is confined only to the wild. We call it ‘Law of the Jungle’!

Think again. We could be wrong. They may be better off than we think.  A close look will reveal that odds stacked against human species are far more than that we currently comprehend. According to one study, the entire human population is cramped into less than 1.5 million square kilometers, a mere 1% of the total habitable land on the planet where as the wild animals have about 40 million square kilometers a whopping 38% as Forest. We normally speak about endangering other species by encroaching into their space, but remain silent and criminally oblivious to the unpardonable death and destruction we cause to our own species in the quest for religious, political or economic dominance. In such an environment, shouldn't we be enabling our offspring far better and more seriously than the mothers in the wild?

Unconsciously, it is the same parenting instinct, as in the wild, but greatly skewed that compels us to create tangible assets to be handed over to our offspring in the belief that they will take it forward and hand it over to their offspring. Unfortunately, inadequately enabled and insufficiently empowered, the recipients soon waste out the assets.

“पूत कपूत तो क्यों धन संचे,; पूत सपूत तो क्यों धन संचे" wasn't said in vain.  

Creating assets in pursuit of one's own passion is great, but driven by compulsions to crown the progeny may not always yield intended results. Each Empire and each Kingdom of the past bears testimony to this profound truth.

Pursuit is a personal choice and compulsion a state of helplessness.

I have no crown to handover.

Additional Input

For those interested

The planet can be divided as follows

Land mass -149 Million Square KMs ( 29%).

Oceans   - 361 Million Square Kms (71%).

Of the total landmass  (149 Million Square KMs)

106 Million Square KMs (71%) is habitable.

 15 Million Square KMs (10%) is Glacier

28 Million Square KMs (19%) is Barren Land

Of all the habitable land in the world (106 Million Square KMs )

48 Million Square KMs (46%) is used for Agriculture.  

40 Million Square KMs (38%) is Forest

<17 Million Square KMs (14%) is Shrubs

>1 Million Square KMs (1%) is settlement and Infrastructure

>1 Million Square KMs (1%) is Freshwater

MEA CULPA ELIZABETH !! MEA CULPA...

 The Promises!

An affordable ala carte of tests from a large array, possible on a tiny drop of blood drawn from a finger prick!

No more uncomfortable, scary and painful veinal blood draws!

The Story

An unbelievable biotech feat that can change diagnostics the way we now know. Defiantly disruptive an idea, marvellous the stated mission, formidable the connections, acclaimed investors and bountiful their investments, nothing could have stopped the young lady, who dreamt it all up, from endless possibilities, opportunities and an eternally enviable place in history. She was indeed crowned the youngest woman billionaire entrepreneur on the planet. 

The story of Elizabeth Anne Holmes, former American biotechnology entrepreneur is a lesson for materialists, spiritualists, philosophers, scientists and every one else living and aspiring.

In 2003, she founded the health technology company Real-Time Cures in Palo Alto, California to "democratize healthcare”. She later renamed the company Theranos, the name, a portmanteau of “therapy” and “diagnosis’. She also put together the most illustrious governing board in U.S. Corporate history, for Theranos, essentially securing powerful connections and a sense of immunity from prying eyes. By end 2014, her name appeared on 18 US patents and 66 foreign patents. In 2015, based on the $9 billion evaluation, Forbes named her world’s youngest self-made American female billionaire who “rebooted laboratory medicine”.

The dream run, however, was short-lived.

The very next year Forbes revised its estimate of Holmes’s net worth to zero. Fortune featured her in its article “The World’s 19 Most Disappointing Leaders”. Eventually, on November 18, 2022, Elizabeth Anne Holmes was convicted on multiple counts of fraud and sentenced to 135 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Edward Davila.

A phenomenal trajectory that traversed both through dizzying heights of fame and fortune, and then plunging into the abyss of dismal ignominy, a roller coaster ride from being hailed as the next wonder kid drop-out from Stanford to being dumped as a fraudster! The all black looks and turtle neck that reminded others of Apple’s Steve Jobs didn’t help her much.

She a Con Artist?

With many patents under her belt irrespective of how she bagged it and the audacity to commercialise one out of it, she cannot be called a con artist. She had a dream, developed a design out of it and got a patent too. She truly believed in it and went ahead though a learned professor cautioned her that the idea was unworkable.

But isn’t that the case with each and every disruptive technology that has finally found its way?

In her own words; "This is what happens when you work to change things; first they think you're crazy, then they fight you, and then all of a sudden you change the world.”

She saw it all; glory, money, honour and fame. She was out to change the world, driven by intense personal experiences. She believed, she was the change. She wasn’t a con act; not a bit.

A Brilliant Idea Sabotaged?

With unbelievable layers and levels of secrecy in everything she did or said, with each bit of information generated, moved within or moving in and out being monitored like state secrets,, employees sworn to secrecy and subject to severe and overwhelming legal repercussions the organisation had turned into an opaque labyrinth. In such an environment of mutual suspicion sabotage was a distant possibility. Looking at how things unfurled, it was evident that the focus of all secrecy and security was about guarding even a whiff of inabilities and failures getting out. There were serious design defects! They did everything to hide it.

There was nothing going right enough to be sabotaged!

How Did It All Go Wrong?

She had invested so much time, efforts and money into an idea she thought could revolutionise diagnostics. But it just did not work as expected.

But Isn’t that normal for almost all inventions?

With luminaries on the board of governors, too much of media glare, glitz, exposure and publicity, and early declaration of success ostensibly to attract more investments into a closely held private venture, the burden of failure could have been unbearable and unacceptable. Success had to be bagged and bagged at all costs, even if it was through dubious means. She seemed to believe that success was around the bend and it will come. So rather than retracting and re-examining the idea she continued to reinforce failure.

Each successive failure made the need to succeed faster more intense. Despite her claims of ignorance about what was happening on the lab floor, she seemed to have been party to resorting to dubious means to buy time till they succeed. She pushed herself and her company into a retrograde cycle. The harder she struggled in the quick sand, the more she got sucked in to it. The air of infallibility so meticulously crafted turned counter productive.

What Could She Have Done?

Rather than reinforcing failure and adopting deceit to buy time she could have easily gone public about the problem her design had encountered. A mere mea culpa would have in all likelihood won her the required trust and time to pursue her dream. After all, every idea that became a design and eventually a product did encounter problems and required time to mature. Unfortunately the young lady, gave herself the mantle of perfection and allowed herself to be immersed in the mantle of genius the media gave he. She even used the very same media to launch a counter attack to cover up. Failed counter attacks can have disastrous consequences. It sealed her fate and hastened the fall.

Lessons

Belief in oneself is good but allowing oneself to believe in flattry is nothing short of foolishness. Deliberately turning blind to one’s own flaws is an open invite to failure. It is normal for projects to take unexpected directions or encounter obstacles. To approach design and development arena with an air of infallibility or invincibility is recipe for disaster. Errors and setbacks are inherent to all developmental efforts.

When obstacles are encountered, it is important to pause, evaluate and then progress. When things don’t go as planned it is important to be honest and open about it. It helps reset, recalibrate and relaunch.

It's not for Elizabeth alone. It’s for all of us. It’s applicable to each venture we undertake in life. It holds true in relationships too. Sense of infallibility precedes every fall!

For Elizabeth the story isn’t over yet. The patent still belongs to her. If it can be dreamt about, it can also be created. After all, whoever first thought man could fly would have been ridiculed. That dream became reality. Elizabeth can still work on her design, prove the professor wrong and revolutionise diagnostics. After all, we all need that contraption.

It's not in falling but not in attempting to rise up and run each time one falls, failure is complete. 

Elizabeth, the essence is time. Ideas need gestation time. Elephantine ideas need elephantine gestation. Keep greed and greedy people as far away from you as possible. 

In every atom resides the element and every atom the element. Certainly every drop of blood must tell us our physiological story. It's for us to find ways to read it. You had the audacity to dream of doing it. Patiently persist, you will find a way. Edison will work.

Elizabeth Anne Holmes, I hope you do it. I hope to see you in the very same black redeeming your pride.

Is Descent Inevitable after Ascent – Strategy to Stay on Top for Long

Newport in Rhode Island is a beautiful place. Situated by the Atlantic Ocean it offers visitors with frames for perfect pictures. It also houses some stunning mansions.  I had never heard of Newport before, but was the recipient of the large heartedness of Issac Simon, my brother-in-law who not only suggested the trip but even offered to take us on the eighty-five  mile drive to the mansion town. The drive, one of the many such, he graciously hosted so far, was beautiful from the word go with the fall painting the entire route with colours, I had seen never before.

With tickets in hand, we actually walked into a piece of American history. Ahead of its times, each room stood out well appointed carefully planned and exquisitely executed. In fact, everything about the mansion was bathed in audacious opulence and grandeur, all funded by slices from the immense riches the individual had amassed over his lifetime. We spent almost three hours within, what was once, someone’s summer house, admiring each inch of space and every piece on display. To top it all, the Atlantic Ocean right outside the mansion premises gave it a touch of magic. I walked out of the mansion in awe of the owners and headed for the blue expanse of Atlantic ocean.

The wind was picking up and I started feeling cold even through the bright sun. As I gathered my jacket closer, and turned around to look at the grand mansion, a sudden thought occurred to me;  how are their descendants living now? Are they still rich and living like their ancestors ?

One of the first things I did, on my return, was to search for details. I was surprised to find that the wealth they had once amassed, barring few patches of comfort, had all but been either diluted or  squandered away. What a tragedy! What about other rich families of the yore?

I searched for other known rich families across the world. The story wasn’t much different. Almost all of them had their wealth either completely wiped out or they were just pale shadows of their glorious past. It  then occurred to me that it was not just rich families! Great empires, kingdoms and  organisations were no different!

Is descent then the inevitable next, after the ascent?

I recall my elders talking of the four-stage cycle of ‘rags, riches and back'. Depending on the diligence exercised by individuals in the family or those in control, the cycle may gather or lose momentum. However, the cycle, according to the elders, is inevitable. 

Starting from abject poverty, the poor (‘Daridran', in my native language Malayalam) spends his life in misery. His children having seen, experienced and driven by poverty dream of better life.  They, with fire in their bellies, strive with all their might to change their state of existence. They essentially live out their life in hard-work accumulating wealth slowly. They are mostly misers (‘Lubdhan’) and seldom spend anything on themselves.

Having seen what the parents have gone through and inheriting the seed capital and better footing, a lubdhan's  children continue to work hard and soon become rich (Dhanikan). Born into affluence and plenty, children of the dhanikan have no clue of the hard ways the family had come through and therefore have no qualms about splurging and squandering their inheritance. This is the generation of the prodigals (Dhoorthan). 

With floodgates open, wealth flows out of family vaults and soon they fall on hard times completing the cycle. Children of the Dhoorthan inherit empty vaults and debts and soon are divested of anything that is left over. They soon become Daridrans! The cycle is completed.

Despite this universal truth being known by everyone, the cycle continues to play out, day in  and day out across the world. Each stage, however,  could accommodate more than one generation depending on diligence applied.

The same principle applies to emperors, kings and family run institutions. We have learnt of ancient civilizations and their magnificent existence. What happened to them? Why did they vanish? Did this cycle-rule apply to them too?

A close look at our self, our family or even the organization that we work for could reveal the stage we are at in the cycle. It would then be natural to ask; can we  prevent the downward arm of the cycle from befalling upon us and our family?

To my mind, it all depends on how much of our hunger for growth we can pass on to our next generation and how much we have insulated them from realities of life. In the garb of making things easy for our progenies, we tend to insulate them from the rough and tough of life and end up making them unfit and inadequate to face challenges of life. We end up extinguishing the fire within their bellies rather than fuelling  it. Our misplaced love end up depriving them of opportunities to attempt, fail, learn and then relaunch themselves. In other words the current generation has a strong influence in what the next is up to.

Most of us, irrespective of where we are in the cycle, believe that we have come up the hard way. We tend to exaggerate our sufferings and discount what we got. Many believe that it is their divine duty to provide their progenies with whatever they were denied or couldn’t afford.  In the process they create the next generation that, might or might not, have an idea of the cost or price of their possessions but they certainly have no clue about its value. Even those in the splurge mode do find ways to lament their lack of avenues and resources.

It is for us to decide weather to accelerate the growth phase or let a freefall occur. But first let us check where we are? That calls for real introspection.

 

Harvesting Cognitive Dissonance

 Go Along 

Comical acts online or on TV, invariably comes along with an abundant dose of ‘canned laughter [1]’. We might miss the joke but not the laughter. Sooner than later, we too tend to laugh along; even when we don't quite get the joke. Our compulsion to go along is more pronounced when there are people around!  

WhatsApp group discussions play it out best. Anyone could have initiated it but inevitably, it gravitates to align with the opinion of an individual or a group of individuals. Initially there could be many widely differing views; strong, loud and clear. As discussions progress, differing voices either fall in line, or just fade into silence. Views that differ from the majoritarian are gradually given up, willfully or under pressure. It is not always necessary for the majoritarian opinion to be correct legal or valid, yet everyone goes along! Don't believe it ?

Revisit previous discussions on your mobile; it could provide undeniable proof! You can easily identify the dominant ones, the dormant mutes and the browbeaten. Eventually everyone tends to go along; to be in the group.  

Two seemingly isolated events but connected by a profound human compulsion called cognitive dissonance; the compelling desire to be with the dominant majority! 

 

Do We Always Go Along  

When our thoughts run contrary to the one predominantly held there is a sense of discomfort within us and we are driven to address it. The easiest way is to align oneself with the majority in view. Individuals to start with, homes, society and even Nation States are not exempted from this behavioral aspect. The degree and intensity of the dissonance experienced differs from person to person. More rooted one is to one’s belief, higher is the intensity of discomfort. If the dissonance has existential risk attached, likelihood of ‘going along’ is stronger.  After all North Koreans adore their leader!  

What happens when there is no existential threat? 

 

Conscience versus Pragmatism 

Mob lynching has become a common occurrence in many places. Individually nobody likes to kill or be killed. But seldom do we find anyone from within trying to prevent the mob from lynching the hapless. At least momentarily conscience of each individual in the mob goes dead.  

Many a time, people tend to go along even when they know, what they're going along with, may not be right. The discord within one’s conscience is often drowned in rudimentary survival need of being part of a group; the predominant human trait that helped us survive the wild, create societies and nation states and even wage wars against one another! Deeply imprinted into our genes, as an acquired  trait and perfected in the course of one's life, giving in to the majoritarian view guarantee us our place in the group and provides a sense of protection irrespective of what we hold as right or wrong. After all; it is more important to be alive to fight another day for another cause that may be more important to us: though that day may never come! In the choice between living by one’s conscience and being alive, spine gives way to survival instincts.   

The debate necessarily need not be on survival issues. Yet; it is it easier to be part of a group even though one knows that the group’s view or decision is wrong. It is our innate quality that draws us closer to the group even against the call of our conscience, justifying the unjustifiable. Those who stand firm by their conscience are either expelled from the group or forced to get out. They either perish in solitude or emerge separately creating groups that hold another set of views seemingly driven by their conscience. This is the path seldom trodden.  

Understanding Majority

Majority may not necessarily be defined in numerical sense always. One strong man can create a majority being the nucleus. Others, join for selfish reasons and the bulk, is made up of people often referred to as silent majority. They are there for fear of being seen holding contrary views. They easily shift to another power center when the wind blows that way. 

Driven by incompetence to voice, impotence to stand up and be heard, they are easily afflicted by cognitive dissonance. Organisations, associations and such bodies are infested with such people; certainly selfish and often scheming.   

Can Cognitive dissonance be productively channeled? 

 

The Mantra for Corporates

Getting teams to deliver and meet deadlines is one aspect that every organization wants. While diversity in skills, domain expertise and opinions add to the quality of options generated, success depends on convergence of thoughts post decision on the way forward and unity in action thereafter. Cognitive dissonance can be ‘managed’ effectively without impinging on individual’s esteem and eroding his skill set and willingness to deploy it. If such a conducive climate is created it can help the organisation reap rich.  

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[1] Canned laughter or laugh track is the pre-recorded laughter inserted into a audio or video programme. It is essentially a cue for those watching or listening to laugh.

Milk Negativity for Gains

 

Exhortations

The most repeated exhortation in motivational and corporate training circuits is about remaining positive’ irrespective of circumstances. Having been on the circuit, I have done it, many times over.  But talks about positivity is meaningless unless we understand negativity, its contours and content and context.

Negativity is everywhere. Overt or covert in application, crass or sophisticated in execution, words or deeds its manifestation, its existence recognised within or experienced from outside, negativity comes in countless shades and has little in common to call as character. Inseparable companion for some, identity for few, fuel for aggression or weapon of defense for many, we encounter negativity in some form every day.

Interestingly, people reeking of negativity complain most about others’ negativity.

 

Power of Negativity

I realised the power of ‘negativity’, first time in the mathematics class. We were attempting to solve a linear equation. When answers were called in, we found ourselves in two camps. All of us noticed the negative sign but most of us ignored its implications and turned in wrong. The vigilant few who recognised its power took appropriate steps turned in right.

Life is like that; you ignore negativity to your peril. It is omnipresent. Success and happiness to a large extent depends on how well, one can recognise and manage negativity in life’s equations. Unmanaged, it can be overwhelming. Negativity can impact personal life, as also play significant roles in shaping social issues and its outcomes.

Irrespective of its nature and purpose, negativity commences with and from individuals. Whether it is out of an inherent psychological disorder and consequent delinquent compulsions or as an element of purpose, it needs perpetrators and victims; person, persons or groups. Easily weaponised, it can vitiate even the most pristine and benign of environments.

Negativity, becomes a weapon of menacing potency, only if it finds conducive mediums and through them attain the threshold kinetic energy. It is true for individuals, groups, organisations and society.

Weaponising Negativity

Most of us, if not all, suffer from bouts of negativity. It is a natural survival kit that warns us of threats. It kick-starts instincts to survive adversities. Apprehension and anxiety we experience are negativity elements, but extremely useful survival tools. But when negativity persists and becomes the identity and predominant trait of an individual, it is a problem.  Individuals become negative mostly out of unaddressed inadequacies.

Negative outlook, in most cases, is a carryover of abusive childhood, intense physical or psychological trauma suffered anytime in life or flawed upbringing. From the cause and effect perspective, negativity comes from deep sense of insecurity. Responses may vary.

Negative individuals tend to see threat where none exists. Even in the best of situations they can create monsters, play spoilsport, experience discrimination, imagine apocalypse and seed and spread disharmony where such eventualities are otherwise impossible. Some of them do it deliberately and others do it by compulsion. Low on self-esteem,  most of them unsocial and at times anti-social, some withdraw into shells they create, few turn quarrelsome and violent but most are content being selfish and manipulative; and seem to gain immense pleasure even from small acts of disturbances they cause. Mistrust and being untrustworthy are sure signs of deep-rooted negativity. Education, economic status, job profiles or place in the social ladder don’t matter.  Apparently leading normal lives and earning livelihoods, they infect the environment they live in.

Look around; one may find such people.

Negative people seldom recognise their plight. Most of them live in denial, oblivious to their own misery and the misery they spread. Few weaponise it to achieve short-term objectives oblivious to long-term losses.  When others are inconvenienced because of them, they become convinced of the effectiveness of their strategy, only to compound their illness further. Those who can, avoid them and those who can’t, suffer fait accompli.

 

Harvest From Negative Narratives

Negativity is contagious and easily spreads through association. It is the most effective means to get messages across big audiences.

It is natural to view existential threats with apprehension. If such a narrative is created and propagated, it spreads and grips the community. Each individual, if not extremely diligent, by instinct becomes a medium and diligence is a rarity.  More the mediums, more virulent becomes negative narratives. Initially only a few may add content but as is wont, mass gets added arithmetically in the beginning, geometrically then and imaginatively exponential thereafter. 

There are people who thrive milking negativity. Many politicians and religious teachers, world over, exploit their ‘subjects’ deliberately injecting negativity. When the group is fed narratives of an impending doom, mostly conjured and propped up with lies dressed as truth, the threat looks real. The group, then naturally listens. Those who bite the bait not only believe in the ‘negative’ but go around baiting others. World across, the wily have come to power using this magic formula.  

Once ‘we’ and ‘they’ are defined, minds become fertile grounds for negativity. Almost all contemporary political campaigns across the world effectively uses negativity to garner votes. Social media proliferation is a boon for virulent spread of such narratives. Spreading fear about after-life consequences or threat from other religions or even sects within, some religious leaders harvest money, fame and power from negativity.  Growth of most cults, if mapped, often reveal underlying threads of ‘negative’ narratives

Group-negativity, initially is confined to words. However it soon turns into deeds and left unmanaged become reprisals against the ‘other’. The silent many who remained content being spectators sooner than later become participants and perpetrators. The holocaust is a grim reminder to humanity of what negative narratives can yield but time seems to have numbed our senses.

Ironic but true; though negativity starts when objective logic fails, its only logical reasoning that can put an end to negativity. Unfortunately, reasoning dies a few deaths with those taken in by negativity. It is not only the illiterate, ignorant poor that make the gullible crowd but even educated well-placed individuals stream-in, “ever hearing but never understanding”, “ever seeing but never perceiving”.

Is there a way out of the marauding negativity?

 

The Equation

Constructing cause and effect equations to understand situations help deal with negativity. But people drowned in negativity seldom see the life-rope. Persistent chipping away at the causative factors does help but negatives have a strange overpowering presence.

A blot on a clean apparel, however small catches the eye first.  Despite the large clean canvas around the blot often refuses to let the eyes go. Notional or imaginary losses have the same impact. Having made riches off paltry investments, people fret about the falling stock indices. Industrialists, taking their own lives having suffered losses, would not have thought even once about the growth they charted their way up and the huge growth possibilities ahead. Engrossed in the web of negativity they spin about themselves, they distance themselves from any meaningful help only to be fatally consumed.

It is absolutely normal, to feel the burden of negativity. It is good to be aware of the negative within. Willingness to accept its presence within and address it helps us turn in right at the end of the linear equation. Ability to identify negativity outside increases the probability of successfully negotiating it.

The equation is simple, straight and linear. Whoever has eyes, let them see!

 

Mighty Elephants And Mightier Mahouts: About Us As Hostages And Our Dependent Masters

Gentle Giants 

Majestic, mighty, intelligent and highly social, elephants are called gentle giants. The image that comes to us first, when we speak of them, is of the ones regally decked-up for various social and religious functions. We are so enamoured with its serene beauty that we easily miss the chains on its legs and the puny little man standing next to it carrying two stick like things.

Has the narrative about its gentle nature been so much ingrained that captive elephants seem to have forgotten its might?

What else can explain the power of a mahout, often drunk, making it obey his biddings. The only weapons a mahout bears, beside his words of command, are a cane and a hooked-baton. The chain that the elephant always carries around its legs become shackles only when the mahout feels threatened or wants to hold it to a post. Most often, the mahout just rests the baton on one leg of the elephant while he sits to drink or rest; the elephant doesn’t move that leg for fear of consequences. If by chance the stick falls, the elephant by itself picks it up and puts it back exactly where it was kept.

 

Individually, the cane, hooked-baton, chain and not even the mahout can match the strength of an elephant. The mahout depends on the elephant for his daily bread and the owner for returns of the sum invested. With its intelligence, it can turn situations to its advantage and easily break free. Yet, it remains enslaved till its end.

Types of Elephants

Depending upon the circumstances and surroundings, elephants fall into three categories.

The first and the luckiest roams the wild, free. They have to contest with natural enemies and overcome plenty of challenges to stay alive. Aware of their strengths and weaknesses they live in herds and grow up learning the art of negotiating adversities and remain free till poached or old age takes over. Majority of elephants belong to this category.

The second category consists of elephants captured from the wild. These unfortunate ones, once trapped, are trained, claimed and traded. Broken in body and mind, they spend rest of their lives in torturous captivity. Only death relieves them from their living hell. Despite legislations, purportedly in place, to protect them, barbs beatings and shackles hold them in place, lending regal looks to ceremonies. Controlled by a mahout, another les miserable, they suffer their indignity much like slaves of the yore under slave masters.

Blessing or curse, they possess phenomenal memory and recall experiences. They don’t ever forget that they were once free and roamed the wild. They recognise their tormentors, the mahouts, and never forget treatments received. Once in a way, fleeting though, they make it known.

A sizeable population still, their numbers are slowly falling. Increasing awareness both amongst humans in concrete jungles and elephants in the natural wild have resulted in decreasing numbers of elephants in captivity. Yet unending human greed will trap more elephants to live a condemned life of indignity.

The third and the worst of the lot are the ones born in captivity. They never have had the chance to experience or explore forests, roll in mud or laze around in streams. The reassuring presence of a herd is unknown to them. Born in captivity, life in chains filled with physical torture and verbal abuses is natural for them.

Blessed or cursed, never having tasted freedom or the liberty to walk free, chain isn’t an appendage, but an additional limb that brings along the opportunity for travel. Despite the unimaginable daily torture meted out to them, these elephants tend to consider their mahouts as their benefactors. They just fail to see the truth. Unfortunately, the population of this group will grow on some pretext or the other.

Think of it, are we also not like elephants?

Elephants That We Are

Don't waste time wondering which class of elephants we belong to. Definitely, rule out the first. Enslaved by visible mahouts and invisible fears that they instill in us, we keep sliding to and forth between the second and third categories, depending upon circumstances.

Born into families and societies, compelled by conforming rituals, practices, faith, beliefs, religions, politics and nationalities we mostly remain in the third category. However, stifling these may be, all of that are normalised and bondages, each one imposes, are internalised as identities or bonding relationships. We are slaves in such relationships. We are at home like the third category of elephants. These bonds are so normalised that most of us celebrate it. Fear of the unknown, greed for eternity hope of life beyond and ideologies that give us predominance over others are the batons our mahouts wield over us. We never dare question the veracity of such beliefs however illogical they may be. Those who dare are deemed blasphemous. They can make us conform to anything they want.

Man is neither conceived nor born free! Even in death, he isn’t free.

As we grow up, we knowingly or unknowingly let people and circumstances dictate terms. It could be through interpersonal relations like parent-child, sibling, spouse, friends, superior- subordinate or even organisational ones like member of a society, cults or organisations. The list is as imaginative as possible. Even our own behavioural traits can become our mahout masters. Our selfish obsession, jealousy, greed and such other vicious inner beings can enslave us and rob us off our freedom. These, over time, become toxically demanding and enslaving. We willingly allow ourselves to be manipulated in the name of nationality, religion, ideology, clans, tribes, faith, relations, and countless such machinations.

Inevitably we end up being held hostage by the ones propagating the scheme; much akin to the Stockholm syndrome!

Though to everyone else, the manipulators, manipulations and manipulated are obvious, many a hostage remain blissfully oblivious. Attempt enlightening them and risk receiving unbelievable response! While some may be aware of it, pressures and compulsions could force them to act oblivious. The fear of post break-out uncertainty is a deadly hold-back to escape from captivity. Willingly or grudgingly, we ruin our lives as a member of the second category. The sad part is that our mahouts are dependent on us and parasitically feed on us till either their end or ours.

Recently, I witnessed the sad culmination of a brilliant life. Held hostage, by his conviction to serve just one individual, he lay waste everything else in life.  Refusing to see a world with anything but his parent and hence unable to shake free of it, all his brilliance was snuffed out; tragic waste of a genius. He was not the only one; he is neither the first and will not be the last. The story of a bright mind taken astray with emails purportedly from deep within the caves of the mighty hills is another example. Whether it’s a case of such an enslavement or the deft art of a con artist can be debated.

Look around, we can find many such lives; look close enough, we may find ourselves in that group.

Are we also not in some shackles?

Break that Shackles

Most of us individually are peace-loving. Highly social and intelligent, each one of us know what is good for us. It has been proven many times over, through many studies that the human brain is capable of achieving anything it wants. The advances we have made collectively in science and applied sciences, bears its testimony. Yet, as individuals, we rarely use anything more than an insignificant part of our brain throughout our lives. We can acquire skills and knowledge at will. Our brains can find ways to overcome limitations imposed by physical strength. When it comes to capabilities, we are truly elephantine. But that is also our bane. We can justify anything; even our lack of inclination to free ourselves.

If our minds are made up, then unshackling ourselves from our fetters, self-imposed or otherwise, is child’s play.

The problem and it answer lies within us.

Can you feel your shackles? Star the search now

LIFE’S PURPOSE: THE GARDEN BENCH AND FEW REVELATIONS

Background

The cemented garden bench, across my house, with bright golden yellow borders and white cross members, looks perfect a partner for the strange tree painted on the wall next to it. The unnaturally multi coloured leaves, all imprints of hands, make the white wall come alive. I do not know what the artists want to convey. To me, it represents a declaration of the arrival of the new generation, colourful and different. The symbolic leaves, reveal the unmistakable urge for attachment despite the deliberate choice of detached existence, uneasy coexistence of silent symmetry with loud asymmetry and subtle yet visible order in the chaotic riot of colours. 

During day, the bench and the tree on the wall merge into insignificance with the surroundings. But as darkness descends and the caretaker switches the light on, they transform the area into a surreal spectacle, seen to be believed.

Occasionally few, of those ‘palm-print artists’, occupy the garden bench, in a huddle, mostly loud, sometimes in hush-hush mode, but always deliberately unmindful of our existence.

The Trigger

The post-supper conversation between my wife and I sitting, out on our veranda chairs, is a ritual we rarely miss. Our neighbour a septuagenarian widower joins us nowadays. We find something to talk about every day.

It was the first of February and we were half way into to our discussion when I noticed the caretaker of our colony sitting still on the bench.

Appointed for security, he is of minimal security value.  His primary job is to switch on and switch off the water pump that fills our colony’s overhead tank. Very particular in switching it on, which he does many times a day, he often forgets to switch it off. Sensitive to water wastage, I often switch it off. His disarming demeanour makes it difficult for me to scold him, though I do at times. At 72, he is active, always happy and happier after a glass of toddy, which he manages, at least once a day. Resourceful, he easily manages more. Despite the hard life behind him, he carries no grudge.

Sitting motionless on the highlighted bench, he seemed like one who had achieved the ultimate bliss through denouncement. Whether it was toddy induced stupor or age inflicted deafness, I don’t know, he remained oblivious to the sound of water gushing out of the overflow pipe. I shouted out to bring him back to the duty-bound world. He immediately rushed to switch off the motor and came back with the excuse always given and his characteristic smile. Thereafter, he returned to his room to sleep.

As he walked away, I remarked, look at him! He lives for the moment. Neither today nor tomorrow seems to worry him. He has no savings and estate to leave behind with an elaborate will. His daughters are married and wife has a part-time job in the nearby pump. He is not bothered about how his old age will pan out. He lived like that all his life. Content with his state of meagre existence he lives to enjoy the moment.

Think of it, he is a lucky man.

In the hope of making our old age safe and secure, we exhaust ourselves and our lives, struggling to accumulate and hoard things? If that wasn’t enough, we start working to secure the future of our children and even the ‘yet-not-thought-of’ grandchildren. The self-imposed burden of defining their destiny becomes the very purpose of our life and the sole driving force of existence.  Though we know of the uncertainty, today holds and tomorrow brings, we are relentless in our toil in vain.

This realisation compelled me to ask my wife and my neighbour, “What could be the purpose of his life?” “What is the purpose of our lives?”

The Counter

Anniey, my wife is a very intelligent and practical lady. A gold medalist of her times in academics, she is well read and keeps an ear to the ground. “Well,” she said, “He must surely have had some aspirations in the past and some now.” He would have wanted to have a house, wear good clothes, eat good food, travel. Surely every man and woman would want to have all that”.

Yes. Certainly. Everyone in whatever state he or she is born into, would want to become better. Desire to own, improve one’s own state of existence, part take in comfort should be our aim. I believe its our duty to be richer than when we were born.

That is not what is marketed by all sorts of Gurus as ‘purpose of life’. They tend to add halo to our existence and in the process complicate a simple natural process called life.

Life’s Purpose

The ultimate advice gurus give us, is to define the purpose of life. They convince us to connect our present with the future and life beyond, compelling us to do things, normal living things are not supposed to. Most of us are convinced that we Humans are the only ones blessed with possession of Soul.

Even though every one of us know, that there is a definite end to each one of us, we toil today to live tomorrow and even dictate the life after. Many of us want to leave something movable or immovable for posterity. The driving force, accepted or denied, behind such action of ours is the desire to be remembered by our progeny, their progeny and even the society well after we're gone. Most of our actions under the banner of ‘purpose of life’ is undertaken solely with the aim of leaving our footprints, hoping that it lasts for ever[i].

Life's purpose is not a recent discovery. It has been spoken of even in old tests. If we should be driven by a life's purpose now, even those before us would have felt the same!

Examining their life and its outcomes could help us define the purpose of our life and draw up pursuit strategies.

World’s Greatest

The most powerful student of Aristotle, Alexander III, mostly known as Alexander the Great, in 33 short years of his life, ruled ancient Macedonia for 13 years, most of which was spent in ruthless empire expansion. There is no written word about what his purpose of life was, but whatever it was, he would have done everything, with all the force at his command to fulfil it. If it was the creation of an endless empire, or a way of life he wanted others to follow, everything he created over unimaginable bloodshed and countless mutilated bodies disintegrated soon after he died.

Genghis Khan, who created the world’s largest contiguous empire between 13^th and 14^th centuries, often called the ‘green invader’, killed so many, that huge swathes of inhabited and populated land became depopulated and became forests! What his life’s purpose was, remains a mystery. Whatever it was, it isn’t around!

They are not alone. Ruthless rulers, lying leaders, shrewd businessmen; none of them had any different fate. Each of them devised means to decimate opposition, overcome challenges and create suitable environment for exclusive growth and spent a lifetime attempting to create systems to carry their names till eternity. Addiction, it turns out to be, turns them blind to reality.

But we can see! The same story is being spun in vain even now, across the world in every country, society, business and even at home.

Empires, fiefdoms, institutions and people; they all obey this law. One may find few examples to dispute the hypothesis. The disagreement comes from our inability to see the graph ahead in time. Extension of the graph forward on axis of time eventually proves that the exception is merely a visibility issue.

No exceptions?

Exceptions Prove the Rule

There could be an argument that ideologies could beat this law. Therefore, if the purpose of life of an individual is to create and propagate an ideology, would it last long, if not forever?

Dispassionate dissection of the argument would easily dispel the fallacy. The loftiest of ideals, fervently celebrated, could also find itself being trampled upon, at times by the very same people who use it to usurp power. Contemporary National and international politics is witness enough to the weaknesses of the argument.  Communism has acquired capitalist colour driving equals and more equals further apart; religions have evolved finding better ways to sell salvation and assassin of the ‘Father of The Nation’ is repackaged as freedom fighter. Time can make zeros of heroes can and martyrs out of killers.  Nothing is forever; not even gratitude.

‘Purpose of life’ is fallacy that we have been conditioned to believe in; a collective narcissistic pursuit. Though just one element of a complex interwoven food chain, we fool ourselves us into believing that we are special and ordained to lord over others. Kept alive by the grace of flora and fauna within and feeding on flora and fauna outside and mortally susceptible to even the tiniest bacterium or virus, we are only as good as any other species and definitely bad for others. We exploit the earth at the cost of other species and continually endeavour to exploit even others in our own species. Our cruelty remains unmatched among all species. All that we say about finding purpose of life masks either our selfish or escapist motives.

Crass Pessimism?

Against all lofty teachings?

If not for a purpose, what must we live for?

The Truth

Truth is often unpalatable. Purpose of life, irrespective of the owner, has a shelf life.

The Great Wall of China stretching over 21,196 km, was built by a series of Emperors from different dynasties. Built for the ‘purpose’ of fortifying northern borders of ancient China, it has long outlived its original purpose. China continues to claim real estate far beyond the wall, now primarily a tourist destination!

Shorn of hypocrisy and narcissistic masks our purpose of life is existence. Penned plain and simple, there is nothing to achieve beyond ourselves in this life. Everything else, said about us, binds us in pursuit of a mirage. The primary task is to live and let live with dignity. If a purpose has to be defined, then it is just to be good to oneself and others around. Mutually inclusive thought and action would mitigate almost all problems that the world is facing today.

When humans start considering that other races within our species and other species in the inter-species realms have the same rights of existence, the world could be a better place for living. If inventions and discoveries were deployed only for the good of mankind and not used as exploitative means of socio-economic and political dominance, life could have been different for all of us. It still can be!

It is often said that there is enough and more to satiate everyone’s needs. It is the greed of some, that makes it difficult for others to meet even their basic needs. That remains the bare fact.  The pleasure one gets through cheating and untrustworthiness, little or big acts of smartness, would all be in vain.

Being good to oneself can happen even while being just and good to others. Look at life as an opportunity to be good to people.

Bare Fact

On 2^nd February while coming home from the local barbershop, our caretaker fell by the roadside. Passers-by carried him to the medical college nearby. He passed away on 10^th February.

When I went to pay condolences, I saw him peacefully asleep dressed in the purest of whites. I was one amongst the crowd at the funeral. I watched his mortal remains locked in the coffin being pushed into the burial vault. Along with him locked in his coffin, went the purpose of his life; if any he had. Everybody and everything he loved stayed back.

You and I too would soon be gone and with us all that we believe in. All that we built and plan to build will not.

Paradoxical, but true, each of us, leave ‘footprints on the sands of time’, each one momentary, however impactful and seemingly indelible.

Are you still thinking of a great purpose of life?

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[i] Vehement denial could be the first reaction