It does not look that stupid, when you are a part of it

Punam said...
Dear thinking writer,why don't you write something on a subject like instinct, gut feeling and decision making? this is a very intriguing topic and I am unable to think through.I look forward to your views on this.

It does not look that stupid, when you are a part of it

I know I may not exactly writing what punam asked me to. This is a view I conceived a long back & it relates with GUT feeling & decision making.

I always looked at the choices people make & every time I figured out a better choice. Surprisingly it always appeared like obvious to me too. That makes me feel if I am better in decision making than all of them or they are plain dumb.

The finding keep me bothered for a long time.Why people don't see the real big picture & why do they take half hearted decisions? Slowly but surely I found out that being there is completely different than reading or thinking about it".I realized they are not plain dumb & even I was not that smart. But that never meant that I took it as it was.

I decided to challenge it. I have seen people taking good decisions, I admit only a few of them but they do take it.

I dig a little deep into it & I found that the more important a decision becomes for me, More foolishly will I behave.Somehow, somewhere I as a human has developed a tendency of taking bad decisions when they matter most.You should ask If that's what we do then why do those decisions work for us. It's really simple, almost always taking a decision is much more important than taking a right decision.That's why they worked. But just because they worked it does not mean we stop looking for better.

I starved for reason & I found it. I will state it as

"When you go too close to a problem, you become a part of the problem"

When you get attached emotionally,physically or mentally with a situation, you lose your ability to see & understand the things in the way you saw them normally. Our senses do interfere with our ability to make a decision. At that point we do two things simultaneously

1. Thinking about how to solve the problem
2. Relating our good & bad experiences (including about people involved with solution) with the problem & becoming a part of the problem slowly, surely

Now as we are slowly getting attached to the problem If you solve it quickly, it would be easier. I have seen people taking quick decisions & yes it is effective.

You stop thinking about it & just take a decision by getting completely associated with the problem i.e. by using your gut feeling. I saw people employing that . It is effective too.

Third & most unexplored part is to get abstracted from the problem. See it not as a person who is solving it but as a observer who is observing someone solve that problem.

It is right that " It does not look that stupid when you are a part of it". So the most efficient way is to get out of the scene all of a sudden & see what are you doing. Be the third person & analyze if its the right choice.Yes its not me better than you.It never was.I saw that third person always takes a better decision.

That's why having a hierarchy in a company makes sense. The third person can see & solve your problems in a better way than you can be. So whenever you can't solve a problem you approach him & most of the time he gives you a solution & you say he is good. Unfortunately he is not that good,but the reason making him good is good. He is just a third person, emotionally detached from the scene. He can see the problem in your solution finding approach as it is not his approach.

If you can see your approach in that way.then that's the key of problem solving & decision making.

"Don't be a part of it. You will notice the stupidity".

Arpit

Even This Shall Pass Away

Even This Shall Pass Away

We use this statement whenever we face sorrow, sufferings or pain. Though I never understood fully how can sorrow pass away but happiness stay. The thought seems inherently fallacious & tops the list of things that disturbs me often.

I was a small kid when my mother told me to study hard for 10 days in exam & then I will have vacations. I was jubilant, I worked very hard as exams were somethings made to make me suffer. They were the price I needed to pay to get my vacations, my share of happiness.

It was first day of my vacations. I was at top of the world but so disappointingly last day came & I was forced to think If exams the evil, the suffering; is short lived & the vacations, the happiness; is permanent? Then I came to realize happiness or sorrow, pain or joy will come & go, what will be important for me & all of us is to enjoy them equally. I got this fact fairely early, but I guess people knew it earlier than me & possibly few will never got it right!!! Let me show you how?

ONCE in Persia ruled a king,

Who upon his signet ring

’Graved a motto true and wise,

Which, when held before his eyes,

Gave him counsel at a glance

Fit for any change or chance.

Solemn words, and these were they:

“Even this shall pass away.”

Trains of camel through the sand
Brought him gems from Samarkand;

Fleets of galleys through the seas

Brought him pearls to rival these.

Yet he counted little gain

Treasures of the mine or main.

"What is wealth?" the king would say;

Even this shall pass away.”

’Mid the revels of his court,

In the zenith of his sport,

When the palms of all his guests,

Burned with clapping at his jests,

He, amid his figs and wine,

Cried: “Oh, precious friends of mine,

Pleasure comes, but not to stay;

Even this shall pass away.”

Lady, fairest ever seen,

Was the bride he crowned his queen.

Pillowed on his marriage bed

Softly to his soul he said:

“Though no bridegroom ever pressed

Fairer bosom to his breast,

Mortal flesh must come to clay

Even this shall pass away.”

Fighting in a furious field,

Once a javelin pierced his shield,

Soldiers with a loud lament

Bore him bleeding to his tent.

Groaning, from his wounded side,

“Pain is hard to bear,” he cried.

“But, with patience, day by day,

Even this shall pass away.”

Towering in the public square,

Twenty cubits in the air,

Rose his status grand in stone;

And the king, disguised, unknown,

Gazing on his sculptured name,

Asked himself: “And what is fame?

Fame is but a slow decay

Even this shall pass away.”

Struck with palsy, sere and old,

Standing at the gates of gold,

Spake him this, in dying breath:

“Life is done, and what is death?”

Then, in answer to the king,

Fell a sunbeam on the ring,

Answering, with its heavenly ray:

“Even death shall pass away.”

THEODORE TILTON.

Making of the joker -- Part II

Making of the joker -- Part II

There were a lot of topics in my engineering course. There were good topics, bad topics, irrelevant topics, insane topics & awesome topics & unfortunately awesome topics were very few. However the deal was very raw. It was to gather 30 questions, (not 300 this time!!) search for the most brilliant answers to these 30 questions & then to do what I was really good at; Cram them by Heart!!!. They wanted me to do what I had already done so many times. Amazingly convenient & deservingly absurd!!!
Choice was not easy for me. I decided not to cram anything or read to get passing score. I tried to challenge everything I read. Initially, It was like a part of me was saying to move ahead, as the topic has already been crammed. It surely looked insane to any spectator. I read a topic. It was crammed by me & I was still reading it to understand, what it was actually. Initial days of changed reading habits were turning out to be tougher than I anticipated.
After lot of hustle I started questioning the theories & getting huge amount of frustration in return. It was a 3 step process I remember

1. Read a theory
2. Challenge It!!
3. Find someone with whom you can share your thoughts

I have never done a tougher job in my life than to get Step 3 done. Gradually I was surrounded by all who were crammers one way or the other. So 5 out of 10 times I challenge a theory & can’t satisfy my challenge but I believe rest 5 times was worth & amazing.
After spending a lot of struggling time with the book, I sat in the exam. Interestingly I only studied 1 subject out of 6 this way & I didn’t get any time to study rest 5. I was scared. I used to walk into examination hall like a king, as I always knew the questions & the answers to those questions. But that time story was different. People were confident & I was scared. Then it began.

Again all of us sat in a Hall. It was a good time to make reputations & automatically it seemed like a very bad time to play the gamble I was playing. I sat there & I was very nervous. It was like I could get 99 & why I chose not to? At that moment all my challenge theories had buried & the old Joker was in front of me, staring on me & bidding bye to me. Fortunately it began. I saw the questions & it was like a puzzle. It drained me in 3 hours.I loved those 3 hours & as a result I got 75 out f 100 & people even got 95 .

Wow! Was I simply dumb or stupid. I chose 78 + 3 hours of enjoyment + 4 months of struggle instead of 95 + 3 hours of labour. People were playing with same spirit. 99 out of 100 were celebratable in college even. But this time I was not playing it. I was watching it. Trust me when you are part of it. It doesn’t look that stupid!!!! But from there It looked like one of the biggest mistakes we have made to ourselves.

I remember all of them were about to be engineers. They were supposed to take this country forward by solving immense puzzles of the world. Yet they could not saw the puzzle they were a part of. World was spinning in front of me & people were celebrating. It was unique but painful. I think it was the pain. Pain of transformation.I was pushing 10 years old joker out.It deserved to pain

Arpit