Nurture Angel Within

During earth formation, neither angel nor demon existed. At ancient times, humans were like all other animals. Their main purpose of existence was survival and reproduction. Nevertheless, human was one of the most intelligent animals, having mind, consciousness, intellect and ego of better quality. Beginning of inclination towards ownership became the root cause of all problems. Probably, that is the point when angels and demons birth took place. 

Anyways, it is difficult to establish how we evolved but as on today every one of us carries an angel and a demon within us. We use them as a tool to fulfill our desires in self interest. If I ask entire human race, no one will agree that he/she has a demon within. He/shewill prove with all his/her logics that he/she is a good person Alas, if this would have been the case; then there would have been no crime, no pain, no hate, no jealousy and no greed. The major problem of today's life is that everyone wears a mask of an angel over his/herintentions of a demon. 

I usually tell my friends that most of us worship God due to two main reasons. Either we have a desire to get something or vice a versa. The intensity of desire/ fear decides what is going to be picked up within us, weather an angel or a demon. When angel is selected, we spread happiness and pleasure around us but when we prefer demon, we always spread pain and problems around us. 

If we analyze human acts, we can put them in following six categories:-

1. When a person acts with cruelty where his/herintentions is to completely destroy others. In this case, person is in complete control of a demon. 

2.  When a person acts to fulfill his/her desires and gets pleasure even at the cost of pains for others. Still the person is in control of a devil. 

3. When a person is concerned about his/her own benefit and is not bothered whether others will get a pain or a pleasure, he is standing at the boundary where sometimes he acts like a devil and sometimes like an angel. 

4. When a person never harms others for getting his/her own benefits, he/she is acting like an angel. 

5. When a person just acts and is not bothered by pain or pleasure, he/she reaches stage known as enlightenment. 

6. The worst situation is when a person acts with ill intentions wearing a mask of an angel. Nowadays, population of such persons is increasing day by day. 

To achieve permanent bliss, destroy your demon, adopt angel and try to move towards enlightenment where neither you need a demon nor an angel. 

Retire When Retarded

 Recently when I was devising a retirement policy for the company, the question- “When really a person should retire?” stuck my mind. Most of the companies set an age limit for retirement (normally between 58-65). But in my opinion it is not a wise policy. I have even seen septuagenarians with a very active & creative brain and also people in their 40’s, lethargic and uncreative. An organization should have a policy that the day the person stop adding any value or his contribution falls short in comparison to his compensation or he is not performing his duties diligently, he/she should be asked to retire. People who are doing purely physical job may start losing physical strength as they age. However, people whose job is purely intellectual; they may become more productive with age and experience. 

 However, if you are working for an organization that has a retirement policy then you have no option but to plan your next inning after retirement. I have seen many people at the time of retirement are physically and mentally fit but only because of not having planned about work-life post retirement, they suddenly start losing their physical and mental strength. And they start ageing rapidly. It may be social work or work with minimal remuneration; one must keep working till he is mentally active. Read about top 10 celebrities who despite of having some kind of physical disability became super-successful. Case of Stephen Hawking is worth reading. http://techblogbiz.blogspot.in/2006/09/ten-famous-disabled-persons-who-became.html?m=1

 5 Tips for Planning Life Post Retirement:

 1. One should never retire from work unless & until one becomes physically and mentally incapacitated. 

2. In case your organization has a retirement policy, plan well in advance about how you are going to keep yourself occupied in constructive way. 

3. Sometimes it becomes imperative to give chance to next generation, so it is better to handover reins at appropriate time but plan your future engagements properly. 

4. In world there are lots of needy people and organizations who can benefit from your experience. That may not give you a monetary satisfaction but will give lot of spiritual satisfaction.  

5. Last but not least; planning your finances, regular income, wealth and will is foremost. 

Love is optional but Hate shall never be an Option

 Generally, you do not love the one who harms you. A normal human being won’t love Dhatura, Pig or a Terrorist. For them, there are 3 options. Fight, Ignore and/or Hate. For example we may fight with mosquito, ignore the snake and hate the pig. We fight when we know we are more powerful and can win. We ignore when we know that there is no point in fighting because the opponent is more powerful than us and it is not going to harm if we ignore. However, we hate when it is neither possible to win nor to ignore. And it has either harmed us or we are fearful that it will harm us.

 Every religion teaches us to love and not to hate. If one goes deep into the feeling of hate, one can find that winning & ignoring is almost impossible. We may feel defeated & sometimes angry which develops the feeling of hatred. But we have to realize that hate is responsible for depression, disappointment and stress which harms us only. Hate is like an acid. It can damage the vessel in which it is stored as well as destroy the object on which it is poured. Hate is too strong emotion to waste on someone you dislike. It’s not worth. In my personal opinion, hate is a psychological disease which eats us from within.

 5 tips to deal with the feeling of Hate:

 1.     As soon as you feel that you are developing hatred for someone, stop and analyze the reasons for the same. It may be anger, jealousy, greed, or just an imaginary reason. Deal with those emotions wisely.

2.      Try to see things from the object's point of view. For example, you hate a Scorpio even though you have never experienced its sting. It is foolishness. 

3.     First try to replace your feeling of hate by ignoring. Try to be in-different with the object or subject you hate.

4.      As you start looking from other’s point of view, your hate feeling may convert into sympathy and understanding. 

5.     Loving all is ultimate point of enlightenment which was achieved by persons like Buddha, Mahavira, Christ, Mohammad etc. They did not hate even the people who harmed them.

 

Are You a Strategist?

 

Strategist is a person who decides the path to be taken to reach final destination from the current position. Imagine that you want to conquer Mount Everest and presently you are at base camp. Good strategist will select the best path to reach the destination so that the journey is fast and safe. In our day to day life also we have short term and long term goals. The task of strategist is to make effective plans to achieve those goals. 

 

Primarily in any organization, it’s a leader's responsibility to set the vision and decide the strategy. Organization’s growth or declinedepends on leader’s vision and strategy. Apart from overall strategy, there can be several strategies as per functional areas such as marketing, finance, operations, HR etc. Strategy is the main component which decides whether an entire organization is working effectively or not. Once the strategy is decided then entire team walks efficiently on that path to reach the goal. 

 

5 attributes needed to be a strategist: 

 

1. Good strategy is a combination of experience and imagination. It is very difficult for a completely fresh candidate to be a good strategist. 

2. Strategist believes in brainstorming. He develops maximum possible options to reach goal, evaluates them and selects the best one. 

3. Strategist is a good team builder. He knows that for execution of his plans, he would need a strong and competent team. 

4. Strategist is a good problem solver. He understands that lot of unforeseen factors will erupt during execution and he has to convert those problems into profits. 

5. A good strategist always keeps Plan B as a backup. Strategist never falls in love with particular strategy. As soon as he finds that a particular strategy is no more useful, he immediately changes the path.

20% Efforts 80% Results

Pareto Analysis is a statistical technique in decision-making used for the selection of a limited number of tasks that produce significant overall effect. It uses the Pareto Principle (also known as the 80/20 rule). The idea is that by doing 20% of the work you can generate 80% benefit out of the entire job. In any given task, job, report, project, situation etc. 5% or less is vital task and the rest 95% is not very significant. Many a times, it so happens that we are hooked to that 95% of tasks wasting our energy, time and resources. The 5% tasks which are more significant are often overlooked. 

For example, in accountancy; less than 5% items in the financial statement are vital which needs your attention. If we talk about production, less than 5% machines are most critical which are critical for whole process. In case of marketing, less than 5% customers are most important who can give your maximum business. In other words, this principle is applicable in almost all type of situations. 

5 tips to focus on Essentials:

1. Find out maximum 3 vital areas which are critical for achieving your goal. 

2. Focused and priority efforts in essential areas will give much better results as compared to non-significant areas. 

3. Develop skills and talent to manage those areas. 

4. Focusing on vital areas will increase your efficiency as well as effectiveness. 

5. Vital areas may change from time to time and according to thecircumstances. 

3 Mistakes, Human Make

 

Nothing is Perfect! Man is a bundle of mistakes. Life is a series of successes and failures. It is not possible to find a person who has not made any mistake and has never failed. Mostly, we come to know whether our action was right or wrong only when we get the result of that action. 

 

The root cause of every success and failure is our initial thoughts. Thoughts are the seeds of actions. Thought trigger emotions and emotions leads to actions. So, the process of actions can be divided in 4 major categories. The success of action mostly depends on what process we adopt. Since lot of external factors also determines the result of your action, the major reason of success and failure is the kind of process we adopt before taking action. 

 

1. Thinking Without Action - This is the first common mistake people make. Such people just keep thinking and due to fear of failure, they do not take any action. Hence, there is no question of success. 

 

2. Actions without Thinking - This is the second common mistake generally people make. Such types of people do not think about consequences but rashly take actions. Some time they may succeed but chances are more that their actions will not give proper results. Such people’s actions are governed by their emotions such as anger, unhappiness, overflow of happiness etc. 

 

3. Non-Synchronization of Thoughts and Actions - This is the third common mistake generally people make. Their thoughts and actions are not synchronized. They know beforehand that if they take particular actions, result may be disastrous but their emotions so much dominate their intellect that they forget the consequences and take actions which are more driven by their lust. It may happen that they are escaped from negative consequences but when they fail, they fail miserably and consequences are severe. Quick money, lust for sex, etc. fall in this category. 

 

4. Synchronization of Thoughts and Actions - This is the best process. Thinking properly about consequences and then taking action with well thought out strategy. Still it is not necessary that you will get success always but chances are that your actions will lead to success most of the times.