Tag: plain speak

Touched by Inertia.

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

As ironical it may seem to be, the world keeps going the way it does, not only because of what we do or the way we act, but more because of what we do not do and what we don’t act upon! Join me here as we take a fleeting look at how this omnipresent problem and facet of Inertia- tends to serve us a world that we perhaps end up earning for ourselves- simply by deciding what not to do or by not acting when we ought to have acted! So here we go!

Our modern lives are nothing more then the play of Inertia, for a few of us it comes in as a blessing and yet for a few of us it comes in like an intertwined curse! Whether we like it or not, accept it or not, it persists and it very much pulls and pushes us- by simply through the nature of it’s existence around and within us! Whether it is the measure of success in the corporate world, the desire to create a new narrative for tomorrow or perhaps as simple as getting out of your bed and making it- each of these and many such day to day instances are replete with how Inertia influences what we are able to do, get done or not!

Whether it is the school kid that doesn’t seem to listen to you, or the grown up teen up or your boss at the workplace or the relationships that you deal with- each and every person that you connect and engage with, for whatever the reason there could be, is at all times either being what they seem to be working along their inertial construct- for some it could be about not doing anything and wanting to be the way they always have been and for yet others it could be about transforming on an ongoing basis based on what the surrounding developing contexts are simply to either consolidate their presence, grow it or at times just plain- survive!

There is nothing right or wrong about how you want to deploy your meaningful existence- whether you want to seem meaningful to a few or to the many- all depends on how compelling that drive is- something which is a story of your intrinsic love or hate for inertia. We have all known someone who got run over by change and then we almost always know someone who crated their lives because of change- so if you closely see what has actually transpired- in one instance it is the case of hugging inertia to stay where you are in the other instance it is about embracing it and partnering to take a leap of faith banking on what seems to be coming your way- hoping you will develop all that it takes to manage that bit on the journey to the new hazy destination!

The world of corporate houses and the corridors of political leadership that influence public lives and alter the way people live or can live is no different! You have leaders who want to stick to the ways of the tried and tested not wanting to rock the boat or even take it to some place and yet you come across Captains’ who are driven by an intrinsic urge of wanting to challenge what there is and want to chart a new compelling course which hold the promise of a better tomorrow. It is not that one approach is better then the other, the reality is that a little both of both is required to make an meaningful progress at optimum costs, go a bit too long either-ways- the chances are you would end up doing more damage then progress to whatever you are setting out to achieve! So what really is Inertia all about?

To put it simply it is that mind game that your brain is constantly playing with you- a function of our primitive mind- which only cared about one thing- not getting you killed! So when it comes to complex thinking and challenges of the modern day world that we have come to be- no matter how great or superb the brain is as a thinking organ- it too tires and fatigue sets in- when you a tired thinking mind- chances are it will push the button to hold on to what there is and follow the one simple rule- if doing what is being done and what has been done has not as yet got you killed- chances are you will survive going ahead! This is how students say “yes” when they are asked “if they understood or not” – simply because their mind has read it- if the teacher has not been able to explain three times- the fourth time is likely going to be a waste of time and energy- the teacher may have- but your tired and hungry brain has lost its interest to infer, deduce and compute so that’s when you cling to what there is! Likewise when you grow up and start walking the office corridors- “the boss is always right” because why would you care- if shit does happen- it is at the bosses’ table! Well when you have politicians and administrator’s who are given the task to create, sustain and develop the social framework-bitten by the inertia effect- well you see societies either stalling and stagnating or getting stripped and layered all the time on different parameters- looking statistically vibrant but completely wrecked at the human level!

The real point here is that, whether we act as individuals or as a society or a group- it is our disposition and orientation towards inertia that either makes us surge ahead or compels us to keep on repeating the same cycle over and over again! There is no truth in seeking continual change, just as there is no truth about never changing! The reality and essence of meaningful change resides somewhere in between- that space is empowering meaningful change aligned to what is required in the now and the arriving tomorrow! Needless to say not all of us can go on to decipher that bit and lead the many- the irony of the issue is that followers often have the ability and quite a few leaders are stuck to the earlier stories of the good old days and this fundamental difference of having to work for a myopic leader or a myopic leadership is at the heart of people leaving organizations and people failing to relate to the countries and societies that they live in! So what can be done? Well read on!

To being with you, can do something, only if you are able to agree and concur to the reality that something needs to be done- it is only when this compelling intellectual thought has been verified and has been able to successfully over-ride the pressures of your intrinsic inertial state is that you will be able to act decisively – either as an individual or as a leader of a group! Unless this step is not completed- it will almost always be the a case of few steps ahead and a few steps back! It is only when you are able to make your Intrinsic Inertia your friend that you will be able to decipher exactly when it is time to act and when it is time to wait and that is the secret and essence of being successful or not in the view of the world as it measures success, from your stand point- acting on the pivot of known inertia will empower you to make choices which are an expression of your identity and help you stamp your authority on whatever you choose to do- irrespective how big to small that act is!

I leave you with these thoughts for now, guess my Inertial urge for a coffee to think the next idea, is calling me in a quite compelling way! Until then stay wise, stay connected and yes, do strike a connect with your Inertial connect and decipher what tick you and what ticks you off- for there resides the secret to your empowerment!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another one! Until then stay safe, stay wise and stay connected! Yes, before I go, A Big Big Thank You for being a part of this journey of ours- this is our 250th Blog! Thank You and Keep sending in those mails and ideas on what you want to hear next!

Limited by Thoughts and Liberated by Action.

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

We live in a world, where we are constantly bombarded with some data point- relevant or irrelevant, meaningful or meaningless, true or not, really doesn’t matter! We are in effect becoming what we are consuming, perhaps less about food and more about the data bits that are being served to us whether we willingly seek them or not! Join me here as we take a look into this space and try to understand what this is all about and what is that you and I can really do about it to create a meaningful and engaging outcome around our existence on an ongoing basis! So here we go!

Societies have always been known for their potency of ideation and original works, the more original and greater the contribution that societies have been able to offer, more have they developed, progressed and thrived. if you were to flip the books of history the period of 1700s onwards has been more or less a saga of success by virtue of individualistic and collective brilliance and this paved the way for what a wonderful place the world can be- science, arts, innovation all that we see and experience around us are nothing more but the seeds of yesteryears which are now bearing fruits! The only reason why the fruits that we harvest today are so uplifting, is solely because of the empowering thoughts that lead to their creation in the first place! The bygone area was of limitless ideation and a consistent strife and struggle about not wanting to accept status quo and keep moving ahead, sure enough, you may argue so what is so different about that, it is unfolding even now- well the only difference and the most impacting one is that- today’s pursuits are more and more a story of application of limiting thoughts to seek calibrated outcomes, rather then creating an open canvas that allows collaboration and a more lasting contribution!

The problem with these limited thoughts resulting into calibrated outcomes is not limited to the closed lab doors or political powerhouses, but rather every segment of a society ends up getting entrapped, the moment you limit your thinking to address issues or create new innovations to meet what is unfolding in the now or to alter the way what is being consumed in the now and this is perhaps one of the greatest fallacies of our modern age! If you have ever wondered why despite so much of breakthrough, very often a lot of it means so little, well this is the answer- the trap of limited thinking!

Needless to say, as thinking and ideation begins to get limited and narrowed down in its focus and purpose, the resulting actions too will end up manifesting half baked solutions and recurring problems which keep coming to haunt you with a predictable schedule! Well climate change, save nature, plant more tress, go green, recycle- all of these (important or not) keep coming every year, at a scheduled time, every year announcements are made for new breakthroughs, solutions and technologies to address the problems, but the problem simply continues to be where it is and what just goes on is more conferences, meetings and more solutions for a never ending problem! Think! This is why limited thinking ends up entrapping and societies keep finding solutions for problems that are not there and real problems remain as they are, going nowhere! This is what brings us to the critical importance of knowing what liberating action is all about!

The translation of ideas into action, execution, operations has been the core of all management education for a long time and perhaps the corporate world has been the best testimony to see first hand how limited thinking creates more problems rather then solving the existing ones’ let alone come up with something awesome for tomorrow! You see, the problem with limited thinking or that of, limited circulation of thoughts is that it ends up being a death spiral for any innovative and original thought for an existing challenge or any new challenge with each passing moment. This deadly entrapment of human intelligence by virtue of short sighted and myopic definition and deployment of intelligence and intellect through thought and corresponding flawed actions ends up short serving our future and screws up our today as well! We end up being a society nothing to celebrate today, nor having a party planned for tomorrow, just being survivors for today and the tomorrow which always seems to be a continuation of the bygone yesterday! So what must be done and can be possibly done?

Sure enough, this is not a public policy document, to come up with fine print strategies for arresting the problems related to myopic intelligence and the resulting feeble ideation and thoughts from that space, however one thing that can be done and must be done, is encourage and propagate original and unconventional thinking and ideation as much as any society can! For the real essence of the future and the ability of creating empowering and life changing narratives only will be upheld when space is made available to allow limitless yet directed thinking which is aimed at the greater good! So what’s the way ahead?

Well, as a first step, to come out of this endless spiral of self-consuming and self-centred construct of pursuits at individual and social levels is all about incentivizing thinking and ideation that is selfless and for the greater good and the next crucial step is allowing a platform to sustain and propagate that thought- not by force but by compelling choices that are able to narrate with clarity the benefits and promise of those ideas. It is only when this stage is achieved, that any meaningful action will emerge and that action will be empowering and liberating as it stands on the solid bed rock of empowering ideation which is meant for the many!

Liberated action when unleashed has the power to embrace all those who believe in it and even those who are skeptical about it! Just as the Sun doesn’t make any discrimination as it spreads its’ light, the ability to progress on the power of liberated action too rests on what is being perceived, how well and whats is being done with what has been imbibed! The essence of empowering lives doesn’t reside in the self-help books or motivational workshops or leade4rship games, those things perhaps do help for that fleeting moment, but for enduring and sustaining shift in an approach for being able to receive and share something empowering all the time, we all need to be surrounded by limitless thoughts and liberating actions, all the time or should I say, as much as possible! The progress and growth of societies and individuals will be directly proportional to the exposure and acceptance that they display to adapt these new age, relevant ways of empowering ideas and allowing them to breathe and live through equally accommodate execution and deployment spaces in the social construct!

I leave you with these thoughts for now, urging you to take a moment from your life and strive to make a habit of creating limitless thoughts and liberating actions- whether that is a seed that you plant or a corporation that you lead!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another one, until then stay safe, stay wise and stay empowered!

Surviving the “New Year syndrome”

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

Each year, come 31st December or 1st January, humanity seems to just want to drown into all kind of utopian commitments to the world, society and unto themselves, the result, well we have more stories of resolution failures and a more screwed up year than the previous one! Join me here, to understand what this “New Year Syndrome” is all about and what is that you and I can do to survive it and ensure that we cling on to sanity and rational pathways irrespective ho strong the temptation is to believe and try to follow meaningless promises of the utopian kind! So here we go!

The New Year is among the many reasons to celebrate for actually no real reason and perhaps one of the most compelling ones’! This is the time when uploading that picture, being on that trip, being at that venue and all those kind of crazy things tend to over ride any remaining sense of rationality and people go to no end to ensure that they have their annual post cards ready- even as they know well withing- all of this is just unwanted spectacle played out to the social audience sheer out of social conformation bias, compulsion and just to ensure that they are not seen and isolated as “the odd” ones’ and to feel that false sense of comfort being part of a larger social construct who all “believe in celebrating” something that has no real essence or relevance!

Well, no is denying or suggesting a sadist way of saying that there should be no celebrations- but the point here is what is that is being celebrated? I mean every nation on the planet, sure enough has their own “new years” aligned to religious and belief systems that they follow, a nation like India has over a dozen new years’ that are celebrated through the sections of the diverse society. Not to forget your own personal new year- yes- your “birth day”, actually if you ask me- that should be the most important one- simply because that is something against which you can benchmark you won personal growth- your rise and fall and there can be no dispute around that absolute space- because you know when you were born and even if the nation doesn’t join to celebrate and even if your family hates you, at least you have yourself to celebrate what you achieve or promise to and trust me doing even this much can add great and continuing value to your life then the countless birthdays and new years you would have ended up celebrating by now, for no real rhyme or reason! So what is it really about the “New Year Syndrome”?

Well “The New Year Syndrome” as the name suggests develops and emerges mid of December every year and lingers on until mid-Jan or in some rare case until end of Jan every year (that is the time till reality presents itself back and all utopian pledges and wishes bite the dust and people are brought back to their senses!). Why does this happen and recur every year with such accuracy and predictability if this such a wasteful and pointless experience? Well, the fact is that it is within these crashing utopian dreams and hallucinations that thread of the next big thing are woven and often then not these threads are picked up by watchers, bystanders and observers of humanity as they go about dabbling in the “New Year Circus” of humanity and once the party is over- these bystanders get a first seat insight into the emerging though process, behavioral patterns and can then move for the kill knowing which way and what direction humanity is probably going to move ahead!

You see, the social conformation bias , that eternal human urge for the sense of belonging, go a long way into getting the sea of humanity celebrate meaninglessly on the date every year- with nothing really ever changing in a meaningful or potent way either for them or the society that they move about in! Knowing well that there is nothing more that we can do about this space and accepting that this dumb way of celebrating nothing will go on as long as humanity exists and as long as people agree to this calendar date as being the one to adhere to , this mega-scale celebration of stupidity will go on with people celebrating and gong back to doing exactly the same dumb, un-serving ways and means to cling on to their lives what they have given to themselves without any direction or purpose to even wanting to make to that bit incrementally better! Well at least that is what the story will be, whether you agree to not and that is a fact- whether you like it that way or not! So what is the way to deal with this space and can this be avoided?

Well, if you really think you want to avoid the “New Year Syndrome” it will take a one-two punch approach, the first punch ironically enough will be about participating in the social dumbness- yes hitting the party floor- so that you get a first hand ticket to observe and record the levels of progress and regress that society around you has made and the second punch is about knowing what you need to do next to ensure that your next year part arena and list or people around you is a shade better than what you would have experienced! Sure no one is asking you to help everyone around you, in fact the whole idea is that you help yourself enough all through the next year so that you know exactly what you want to avoid the year next and that alone can help you create that essential operational manual for 2021 so that you hit the floor running doing everything that matters so that you end up with the party that you aspire for and not that you get stuck with!

Sure enough, there is no golden pill or “the way” to surviving the “New Year Syndrome” which gives you a high for the day and leaves you battered for the whole year that follows. But what you can do about it to survive is, simple and quick, as long as you are able to tag a purpose, meaning and direction to the celebration that you want to dive into, trust me you will be just fine as you emerge out of it and importantly probably you will be more focussed, rejuvenated and re-dedicated to the purpose and direction that you have set for yourself- perhaps it is a task, goal or a business objective- whatever that may be- rest assured you will excel and hit that goal only because you knew well about that bit even as you went into celebrating the new year and unlike the majority around you- you stay unique by this singular definition and this is what puts you in a small set of people who know why they are enjoying, what they will do post this break and when they will come back to enjoy further and what is that they will have on their mind then!

The essence of surviving the “New Year Syndrome” wherein you risk to end up creating similar experiences, face similar problems and encounter similar pathways in a never ending loop is all about being able to shift the control of the narratives that come towards you; to you rather than allowing that power to reside with those who serve you those narratives! Like someone has said it before, Life is more about how you choose to react to what Life throws at you rather than what and how you think and feel it should be! You see, Life has it’s won weird ways and whether we like it or not that is how it is going to always be! As long as you are able to understand this space and ensure that you will stay aligned and rooted to your purpose, goal with a directed intent, rest assured you will survive the “New Year Syndrome” well enough and will be able to connect with and create new meaningful pathways for the times ahead and escape the trap of ending up doing the same thing again and again (expecting a different outcome) and then calling that a life well lived! I mean seriously, sure enough a chef who cooks the same dish will end up doing the same thing again and again- but even while the chef does that, a different experience is created in the context- simply because the customer is almost always different! This is what is yet another important aspect to always remember and take note of! It is not about whether your approach to life has repetition or not, it is not about whether you are always doing new tasks and there is more vibrancy in what you do or not, it is more about how do you create and further value in what you choose to do, whether that is the only thing you choose to do in 2021 or whether it is the only thing that you want to do each day through 2021!

Each one of us is unique and it is the unfailing ability to harness that intrinsic uniqueness within which will empower each one of us to pursue and achieve what we seek and this is the way to ensure that we are away and over the “New Year Syndrome” because once we take this route; we are able to keep walking on a path that is aligned to our core belief systems and aspirations which are as meaningful as our aspirations are and as long as these are not utopian or some hallucinations, you will never find yourself in a loop and will never be bothered or preyed upon by the fatalistic and fabled, “New Year Syndrome”!

I leave you with these thoughts for now, even as you are gearing up to embrace 2021, the best possible way you can, just remember, make that bear hug memorable, inspiring and meaningful for yourself and others around you so that you don’t end up becoming another casualty of the “New Year Syndrome”!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another one, until then stay wise and take a path that propels you ahead!

Live your life The Santa Claus way!

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

As we approach Christmas, what better then to discuss around what it takes to be a Santa in the real essence of it on the Eve of Christmas! Join me here as we explore the space around this and understand why perhaps living the Santa Claus way is the only way to regain and restore sanity in the crazy world around us!

Santa Claus has captured the imagination of every child around the world like nothing else ever has and perhaps it is the first real unifier moment for kids all over the world irrespective of what their belief systems or ways of faith are! As kids, all of us knew very well the promise that Santa brought along and what every kid was required to do for being able to qualify to receive the gifts from Santa! We begin our journey from this lens and try to make sense of what it is firstly to receive what Santa offers and then we move on to understand what it takes to become a Santa! So here we go!

The promise of Santa, tells us something far deeper and valuable about who we are as humans! Even as kids, we learnt early the values of being able to share and care and no matter what faith your follow or not, these values are perhaps the most fundamental values to each one of us and for kids- the Santa coming to town and pushing the gifts down through the chimneys, as a reward for good behaviour and being who one is meant to be, has been perhaps the most iconic and visible communication pieces that connects with kids the world over! The simple act of being good and kind can be rewarded and that being instilled within young kids is what keeps hope alive for humanity as a whole!

As we grow up, somewhere as we begin to figure out the rational space around Santa and the gifts that Santa provided, we end up not only disregarding Santa, but (unfortunately) even the very essence and the soul of what Santa represents! This is where societal divergence begins and this is why grown ups in offices need a complete leadership training around building empathy- simply because they lost that bit as they lost faith about Santa being real! This goes on to get replicated with many other facets and value systems as well and that is how even as each one of us grow with and through the values enshrined by Santa, sooner or later, they get ripped away one by one slowly but surely!

As we grow up, given the societal contexts that we operate within, we begin to embrace and practice all that takes us away to the diametrical side of what Santa stands for. Sounds too philosophical, well yes, it is and sure enough nothing to blame anyone or suggest what is right or wrong- the simple fact remains that as humanity begins to slip away form the core values of sharing and caring for one other and disregard humanity as one big family, not only do we end up loosing the values that Santa instilled in us, but we also end up the part of Santa that actually resides within each one of us!

It may sound that I am trying to oversimplify the challenges and the problems that we as grown ups face day in and day out, but if you take a pause and listen to your heart and see within you will know instantly that the root for many a problems resides in the very basic and fundamental space of disregarding core values which define what humanity ought to be! Whether it is about the communication break downs among colleagues, friends, families or whether it is the challenge or begin able to collaborate and work together in a work area or within the society- aspects like these and many more simply signify the fact that as we tend to move away from our core values and belief systems and to put it more aptly the wisdom of Santa, we just set up ourselves as failures in the world that we roam around in! So what is that we can do to get Santa back again and guide us along the path ahead?

To get Santa back into our lives, the best and the most simplest approaches would be to get that kid back! Sounds funny, well think about it! Once you get the humility, you had as a kid and the zing of curiosity along, soon enough you will end up surprising yourself on how differently and how refreshingly you are able to see the same problems that dodge you day in and day out and how this shifting mindset – rather holding the mindset of a Santa helps you to sieve through apparent blockages and empowers you to see pathways and solutions where you saw none! No way am I suggesting you to be casual or adopt a hippie like care free approach to life- rather on the contrary it is about approaching life with due respect but empowered by the curiosity and humility that the kid in you can provide you with for it is within this space that you will feel responsible, light and driven at the same time and more importantly be aligned to values and teachings of Santa and this will go on to provide you an opportunity to live your life the Santa way!

Living life, the Santa way, is not only about sharing and spreading the goodness of life and rewarding humanity where it is due, it is also importantly about being forgiving and forgetful of what one must be and how one can be! The Santa way of living is all about seeking and touching empowerment from the pivot of your own soul and harnessing all the goodness that resides within and ensuring your keep enriching it all the way through your journey and share that aspect with people around as you continue your pursuits of life! Sure enough, there will be setbacks there will be problems and there will be days and times when you will have to retreat and takes a few steps back, but what matters is that as long as you build your foundational values on and around the Santa learnings, you will be able to bounce back and surge ahead- how fast you can do that and how often you will be able to do that- is a factor of how well you are able to imbibe the spirit of Santa within you and how well you are able to share and spread the Santa within you, around you!

I leave you with these thoughts, on a Christmas Eve, urging you to connect with Santa, get rewarded for the goodness that you have been able to hold onto and this Christmas, make that effort to be a Santa for someone else ad share what you can and care as you can- this is the only way that you can embrace the Santa way of living and make the world a shade better than what it seems to be!

Ciao for now, Here’s wishing everyone A Merry Christmas! ; And yes, humanity needs Santa and each and every one of us has Santa tucked away within us- Perhaps it’s time that we let the Santa within us, out to make the difference that we aspire for as Individuals and collectively as humanity!

2021: Calling Leaders!

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

If you thought that 2020 is coming to an end, think again, the impacts that we have felt and observed and the developing residual effects are far more over and threaten to play mind-games with humanity for many more years to come then you would have thought! Join me here as we take a fleeting look at this space and appreciate why this becomes the perfect compelling case for more Leaders to emerge from the shadows and bear the torch once again so that humanity can break free from the shackles of disengagement and disconnected togetherness! So here we go!

Unlike the earlier years what 2020 has ended up doing (much to the amusement of many, who have still retained their sanity!) is that, it has created contradictory narratives for every sphere of human life, across societies, nations and every imaginable constituent of the society! It hasn’t been that there have never been competing or contradicting narratives earlier, they sure did exist- but they had one fail-safe valve and that valve was of moderation! This moderation was done by different elements of a society at different times and to varying degrees of efficacy. This ensured that no matter what happened narratives and contradictory spaces within a society always grew only to the extent and proportion that the society could cope with! Each time the narratives seemed to threaten to run away with something or fuel discord or anarchy the moderation mechanism would step -in ( most of the times) and save the day for everyone around! 2020 is the year, perhaps the first one, where the world was shown how the fail safe moderation system can be broken down, over-ridden and at places shredded away by the other vital pillars of a society- singularly or collectively! This sure enough is something that the world has been presented with for the first time and the worry is that this won’t be the last time!

You see, 2020, has provided alternative and confrontational narrative for every element that a society chooses to deal with! Whether it is about politics, it is about faith, its is about science, it is about upholding values or throwing them away- almost each and every of these aspects have been debated and discussed as always (which is what the way should be) but what 2020 ended up doing is largely, has made the whole issue of having a divergent or a different point of view a taboo and something that has not been welcomed by societies across the world in 2020. Humanity for long has dealt with perplexing issues and that has been the hallmark of what has made it successful yet turbulent. However, the new challenges presented by the recent developments have made a strong case for harnessing the pivotal power which can make amends and restore all that is broken and that power is Leadership!

The problems presented in 2020, were not all, necessarily something unthought of or not factored of, they were allowed to emerge (the way they did) a good deal simply because of the incompetence and incomprehensibility of the people who were dealing with what they had coming at them! Sure enough, you may argue that, any person (with the kind of crazy stuff that 2020 has been able to throw at societies) would have filed or faltered- perhaps you are right- but the point here is not that of “not failing” rather it is more to do with the ability to recover after failure and that is where real Leadership thrives! If there was one thing that was strongly felt and needed in 2020, it was the “Leadership Deficit”.

Much of what societies have had to endure and deal with was also a factor of having myopic leaders and their wayward ways of dealing with what came their way! Whether it is about the civil unrests, protests, social issues, the sections of societies contesting a point or the pandemic – whatever the cause would have been 2020 showed all the wrong ways to deal with people and their challenges and provided a masterclass on how leadership should not be! This I think should be among the most fundamental takeaways from 2020, a fact that as humanity we had through our agreed social construct possibly asked the most incompetent ones’ to lead us- to nowhere! Sure enough, it would be simply unfair to say, nothing worked and all were incompetent or lax, but that fact is that, as the majority tend to emulate what a few incompetent ones’ do, soon enough, the few good ones’ are sidelined and resigned to fighting their own existential battles! So if this is what it is, how can we expect 2021 to be different, is there anyway that change can be infused when incompetence and myopia is rampant at the leadership levels?

Well, “Leadership overhaul” begins from the top and when it comes to rewiring leadership in the societal plane it is almost always the case of nudging the leadership at the top from within and around! You see, when it comes to correcting and bringing in efficacy of leadership, that has to happen by setting up alternative leaders as proposed challengers to the existing system and that challenger needs to be supported by equally proactive and aligned base around the challenger! Unless societies agree and realize that there needs to be a fresh impetus to lead a new way, the urgency and push for this overhaul will only go on to delay what societies in general are rightly entitled to – Dignified Leadership which rises to protect and share equity among humanity the way it should be!

2021 provides an immense opportunity and rather makes a desperate appeal to have meaningful leaders and meaningful, purpose driven leadership to steer societies further and away from the chaos of 2020 and to create new pathways and ways of life to make 2021 and years beyond more sensible and humanistic! The breed of new age leaders for 2021 and beyond is not about having some magical new formula or theory at work, rather its is all about revisiting the basics and the most fundamental aspects of human society and getting attuned to the core values and essence of being human! The new leadership has to create enough sense and sensibility to let everyone know that even as humanity races ahead with automation and technology powered interventions, unless human intelligence is not automated and put to use as default to begin with every attempt to arrive at sane solutions to ever increasing complex challenges will come crashing down as they did in 2020, when AI models were used in the beginning to predict doomsday scenarios worldwide, while none of them was even sensible or enough meaningful!

The new leaders of 2021, require to harness the limitless power of common sense, science and rationality in that order and always understand the essence of deploying “just enough” as they go about dealing the problems of the day! You see, you don’t see a neurosurgeon for a headache pill, sure enough that can help, but that is not how it is supposed to be! The Leaders of 2021 will have to work hard to create enough space for competing narratives without having any of the narratives to be ridiculed and disregarded simply because they emerge from a certain pocket or section of a given society or social framework! More importantly as societies tend to get more and more vocal and local about how they feel, think and live their way and express to have their way- the leaders and their leadership will have to work overtime to ensure that this doesn’t end up trespassing into someone else’s pathway and way of life!

If 2020 was about, faltering and failing leadership across societies, the leadership stories that get written around 2021 will be the ones’ that are abe to turn the tide fast and take the hard turn safely enough to navigate the challenges coming to them without loosing the focus on what they wish to aspire and reach! The Leaders of 2021 will have to work extra hard to do away with the weight of humanity’s dumbness quotient and try to instill the much needed sense of being human the way we are supposed to be!

If you have been thinking this is all about the social space, well, this is also about our workplaces and it is also about how we lead ourselves- because it is only when the basic constituents within a social fabric begin to fail and falter is that societies begin to derail and this brings to another essence of the 2021 leadership challenge which is about, “Personal Leadership”. 2021 will also be all about Individuals- you and me and about how each one of us is able to and not able to display and deploy the leadership that we wish to demonstrate as individuals who we are! It is from these confines that the new age leaders of 2021 will emerge- to lead societies, business and themselves and the people who they wish to influence and share the story of progress with! The only real fundamental thing that has the power to create a big impact and bring about a wider influence across societies through 2021 and beyond will be the leaders and their amended and meaningful ways!

I leave you with these thoughts for now, urging you to take some time through this holiday season, and figure out your own defined space for the leadership that you want to deploy and the leader that you want to be! 2021 can might as well the moment that you have always been waiting for to take charge and lead the way- for yourself, for others or perhaps for the community that you come from!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another one, until then stay wise, stay blessed and remember, every increment of progress is the promise of your leadership!

Every “New Year” is the same! Unless…

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

We are now racing towards the very end of the whatever is remining of 2020 and needless to say, like all the other bygone years, 2020 too would have been no different- the exception being that people would have had and borne the brunt of amplified experiences and learnings, irrespective whether they were happy stories or grim reminders! This article is not about this space, rather it starts from here, this is all about, what is that you and I can possibly do and not to ensure that 2021, doesn’t seem like the year bygone and what is that we can do to ensure that we don’t end up walking into the trap where “Every New Year” begins to seem the same! So join me here as we decipher this space and try to figure out what is that can be done and how much of it- to ensure that 2021 is more meaningful in an absolute sense, not banking or calibrating on 2020 which I believe would have been an intellectually exploitative year for all us irrespective what we did , or not!

To begin with, we need to accept and understand, “why do all new years’ almost always end up the same way!” You see, you need to be really honest with this space, think and reflect around yourself, see what has been unfolding around you and within you, are you getting a sense of moving around in circles (so big that, you actually think and feel that you are walking straight only to realize around every December, that you ended up walking a whole year, to come back to from where you started? Whether it is your job, the business that you, or the art that you pursue or whether it is about the people that you engage with, what has been your story, year after year? Are you actually living the same year, multiple times through your lifetime? or are you at least putting up that vital effort to create and make a difference for yourself to begin with and then for others, so that the year that you live and goes by, actually begins to stand out as something radically different and meaningful over the previous one? What do you think is really unfolding within and around you? take your time and read further as you get a perspective on this question, for that is really important for anything else to make sense and help you with! As long as humans end up living the same year, again and again and keep celebrating the change of calendar; with nothing meaningful or worthwhile done or accomplished, humanity will suffer- simply because as more and more individuals tend to accept mediocre approaches- sooner or later societies and nations begin to pay the price for that mass level idiocracy and journey to nowhere!

You see, all of us, each one of us, take a pledge whenever we hit the new calendar year- whichever calendar that you may want to choose, the problems begin as we start to fail and falter very much on own own set intentions and aspirations, why does that happen, well there could be many reasons- intrinsic and externa- I have written about this in detail, recently- you can find that over here. As people falter, they do only one thing that everyone should and can- revert back to what was safe and what has been time tested! This is the “on mode” of your mind to keep you safe from damage beyond repair and for ensuring that you re-group and rejuvenate well enough to fight your chosen battle yet another day! Once this is done, you are automatically going back to what you are familiar with, what you feel safe and comfortable with and with all that- any bit of risk taking, enterprise is all but taken away! Well at times in life this is fair enough, but when this is the only things that keeps happening over and over again, you basically end up living the same experiences and same problems with variations in intensity, thereby living that same year all your life! So what does it really take to create something meaningful and really have a “new year”, well read on!

Unless, you make an effort and rather a very serious one at that, to create value and meaningfulness aligned to the purpose that you seek to achieve, everything else that you propose to do will eventually fade away bringing you endlessly back to the beginning each and every time! A careful observation of the few who end up really creating meaningful “new years'” every year will let you know that, the only way that is possible is by doing and trying what was never done before and trying to accomplish something that has never been! Sure enough, not all of us need to fight with the polar bear or climb the Mount Everest, it is simply about creating a sense of purpose and direction within us, just enough so that we are able to focus with clarity and drive on what “new” we want to create or reach out for! It could be as simple as trying the new ice cream flavor or as complicated as building the next rocket engine which will make space travel simple and uncomplicated for humanity!

There is no rule book on who one can achieve or find their concept and space of trying or doing the “new” simply because each one of us is as unique as we get to be and when it is about the stories of our life- who else can be better than ourselves to write, re-write and manifest something that is inspiring and lingering! This is the strength and the weakness at the same time, simply because, it takes a lot of grit and determination to prevail and overcome the intellectual inertia (which always makes us so comfortable- simply because it is safe-tried and tested). When people succumb to this inertia, they end up allowing their uniqueness to become their greatest weakness, but when they are able to thwart the ongoing onslaught of their inertia and move ahead- irrespective of the pace- they go on to make incremental progress which when done consistently and repeatedly over time- compounds into creating a completely new person, a new journey and needles to say the manifestation of a new destination altogether! It is this intrinsic ability to overcome the internal inertia which alone can help people create a real “new year” and pursue meaningful objectives to add some purpose and meaning to their limited lives!

I leave you here with thoughts on a busy Monday, even as we race ahead to Christmas and want to catch the once in 800 years celestial spectacle of Jupiter and Saturn coming together; urging you to do what it takes and devise the way that suits you fine, to ensure that 2021 is meaningfully enough a real “new year” in every essence of what it should be for you!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another one, until then keep moving and stay unique for that’s when magic happens!

The fallacy of festive celebrations!

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

If you ever wondered why you wait for the whole year for that one big festival ( whatever that you want to choose and define as one for your sake!) and then ended up being more miserable towards the end of it, well this quick piece is just for you, to help you know why after the highs get higher, the lows are simply unfathomable! So join me here as we unravel this space of humanity and try to know why and when do celebrations fail and what is that we can do about that bit, if we want them to linger on as something to look forward to in the real essence of it!

Humanity is perhaps the only other thing alongside wine that tends to get exciting with time! to know the fallacy of festivals, we need to take a step back, in fact, quite a few steps to try un and understand how the whole concept of festivals perhaps evolved- no I am not an anthropologist, just plain uncomplicated stuff based on common sense and science and sure enough you can read about this in more details by going through the favorite books of your choice of human geographers or anthropologists- whatever comes easy to you!

So the story starts right at the very beginning, when humans were able to form the very first types of ordered societies – the very first time! to monitor and create order within those- coupled with the existing and evolving belief systems/ values (which were developed over time), the dawn of festivals was ushered in! Back then festivals were more of a method to mind societies so that the element of cohesiveness and divergence was visible and was always within the allowable limits as set by those who ruled those societies! One way of doing that effectively was to align these festivals to the broader belief systems/ value systems and make them as a bench mark for social conformation! So typically, if you were part of society that broadly believes in the belief or faith type”A” then alongside with the duties and responsibilities of following that faith/belief the rewards would be these much sought after festivities which would further more work to reinforce the ongoing prevailing value/ belief systems (as they have been rewarded with the festive spirit!) All is well until this point as societies are still fragmented not much inter connected among each other and there is a more or less a steady space as far as the mix of the value systems/ faith/ belief followership within the social frames that exist. This ensures that festivities are held orderly with a purpose with an intent and with a solemn reaffirmation of realignment to the broader cause of the established belief/ value system of the said society!

Now if you were to move ahead in time, say the more evolved societies the age of the Kingdoms around the world, what you witness is a racemic mix of belief systems and value definitions leading to multiple approaches to festivities, the definition of the whole concept of a festival and this is the time in history where festivities begin to compete among each other as a mark of opulence and progress by one set of value/ belief system over the other in a given social construct! This is that point of inflection where, societies which failed to manage and keep these competing ideologies and their assertion through festivals in balance that problems have begun and festivities rapidly began to drift away from the ancient path of being aligned to the puritan belief system/ value system to something altogether new- the embracing of the narrative of the rulers/ governing establishments on how and what the festival must be and when and how it is defined as successful, a grand one so on and so forth! This is how festivals and the celebrations around them stepped into the modern age- already skewed away from what they really stood for to begin with!

Irrespective where you live and what you believe or not, if you take that fabled pause and ask yourself how much of value addition have the festive celebrations done to your own personal life through the years of your life- chances are that you would have too felt the diminishing value of their impact, sense and sensibility like the diminishing value of money! This is nothing to suggest that the value of the festivals or their celebration would have diminished with time, but rather the method, the way and the impact of the conduct has certainly undergone a sea change which has furthermore added to skew festivities and their associated celebrations more further away from even the fundamental belief systems/ values to which they would have been rooted! It’s a classic case of enjoying a party not knowing for what it is and by whom it is! This singular aspect then further easily destroys the remaining core of the celebration and then what we are eventually left with are shadows which are larger than what the festival would have earlier been and more irrelevant then ever! How does this all pay out and manifest? Well read on!

Choose a value systems/ belief system/ faith whatever you may want to refer it as , and seek one festival associated to that system and check for yourself how the values of that festival have eroded with time! You will be surprised when you take a pause to reflect to see that how even you have ended up unwittingly contributed if not accelerated to making those celebrations more and more irrelevant each time that you celebrated more and more! No, the problem is not the celebration of the festival, it is the problem with the changing narrative and the method that has been implemented to define celebration which has created more problems then anything else!

I have intentionally not mentioned any names for the faith systems or the value systems, simply because that sets in prejudice and then one things will lead to another and the whole essence of the subject will go astray! You see, there was never, nor is neither will ever be a problem with the celebration of festivals aligned to belief systems/value systems that’s fine, the challenge starts as the way and method of these celebrations begins to slip away with each passing year and more importantly at times takes or manifests exactly the opposite forms of what the original intent would have been! The result? More and more shopping competitions around every festival, more and more of “display”, “senseless consumerism” and “needless unwanted one upmanship in one way or the other” the result, more fractured societies and and more confused individuals, who know they are celebrating, they know what but sadly none one ever knows what is the right way and what is that should be celebrated!

This is why the moment the “New year” is ushered in come January 2nd and it is aback to to the same old grind of whatever you have grinding upon or been ground into! The moment that instance, the moment those high days of the festivities are over, there is this bounce back to the routine norms of sharing “displayed celebration” over social media handles (which has now assumed sort of compulsive obsessive disorder space now!), those senseless bithcihng around with friends (well that’s a whole new definition now a days!) and family and that non-stop gauging and comparisons of opulence and gaps in the furniture which just go on and on until the next big festival hits home, calling for another celebration and this mad circus goes on with no end and no real rhyme or purpose! All simply because, the original ethos and the connect around them have been forgotten and lost, some intentionally, some accidentally and overall this leads to depleting value and belief systems and that downwards spiral leads one thing to another which eventually leads to societies- where some or the other segment is always celebrating something or the other- whether that makes sense or not! You think you know some society like this? Well! Stay Blessed! and Stay Safe then! So what’s that we can do?

Simple, get back to the basics! That’s the only way to salvage any remaining sanity that a society can possibly do, especially when it comes to aligning festival celebrations to what they ought to be- celebrate a festival- a path way of thought, ideology, belief, value system and you know what the best part is, all of that can be done without needing to have a shopping festival , a discount sale, a selfie contest, posting on social media, none of that is anytime needed and that is perhaps the only way to take your time away from these non productive and senseless pursuits and align your self to the more pressing and more real matters pertaining to the festival and the values/ beliefs that it brings forth and do what you can, to spread the warmth through those timeless values and that, if you ask me is the real essence of the festive spirit and anything and everything to do with celebrating festivals!

I leave you here with these thoughts, urging you to connect with your value systems/ beliefs in a more authentic way so that once you are plugged in right, you can reflect all that matters right and importantly in the way it is meant to be! Festivals and celebrations are no doubt the hallmark of humanity in terms of the civilizational and societal progress, but all that only makes sense only and only when there is meaning to those celebrations and there is a definite method to the madness! Life by itself is no less then a celebration! Celebration of moments form one unto the next and the only meaningful way to celebrate is to utilize the fleeting golden moments as wisely as one can and create values around which outlast the time in which they were created! Think again the next time you head on to celebrate something, take that pause and see if you are living the ethos of that festival by the way you choose to celebrate it!

Ciao for now, Will be back soon with another one, until then keep the festivities on and if nothing else practise the art and science of celebrating life for what it is and what it can be!

Through the eye of the needle.

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

Whether it has been for recreation or for some serious purpose, if you have ever held a needle and used it for the right purpose, then this short piece is for you! Join me here as we unravel what all unfold as we try to navigate through the eye of the needle and why this matters- or should I say how this sums up all that you and I are often engaging with as we go through our blessed lives- whatever way they are being blessed! So here we go!

The first interaction with the needle and it’s eye would have been in most cases on account of that crazy soft toy which either you would have seen your parents create for your or perhaps a little older you would have wanted to create one for your class assignment on middle school or for your little sibling or a friend, whatever that reason would have been, that interaction would have provided you with few valuable simple lessons of life- Attention to detail, Choosing the right thread and having a steady pair of hands to work with and an eyesight which is able to focus and stay! All of this or any of this for that matter is simply a good enough reason for one to be grateful and have a heart filled with gratitude, because there are a few who simply can’t even accomplish this, owing to some challenges that life would have placed in their way! Alongside this feeling of gratitude, is the valuable lesson, “the prick of the needle” well whether that happens owing to a prank or while you are working- it reinforces the point of “attention to detail”, focus and also tells one fundamental truth of life- All that is useful has a context, spin that out of context and the most useful facet can come down bearing upon you as a dreaded adversary! In this case, it is the needle- a tool which promises to help you personify and craft your creative expression, but at the same time, a moment’s slip and it has the power to pain you- so what if it’s momentary- the pain is intense and then you always continue to remember the value of your creation by virtue of the pain that came by! The needle is but one facet of this story and the other important one is the thread!

You see, you may be able to garner impeccable control over the needle and perhaps also develop tolerance to pain as well, through the trials and tribulations of life, however if the thread that goes through the needle is not calibrated, the whole effort is sure to be a waste of time and it becomes a perplexing dilemma especially when the thread goes through initially and then begins to play truant and behave in it’s own whimsical ways by literally getting “thread bare”. The whole effort of ensuring that the thread goes through the needle also depends a lot on the thread that is either chosen or the one that is given to you (when you don’t have a choice to select one!) Think about the times when you lived through this, when the thread was easy to work with and when it played the spoil sport, making you go back and re-start everything all over again, simply because it began to come into its real elements!

If you thought, that these are the only elements that impact the whole journey of travelling through the eye of the needle, there is one more omnipresent factor, the light around us- the presence or absence of it and how we engage with it! As trivial it may seem, ask a young grandmother or a old youngster, what the the struggle is to drive a thread through a needle when the contrasting or adequate background is missing especially when the eye of the needle is fine and the thread is even finer! This is where the real test of skill unfolds! The skill to hold the needle, have the right thread, have that safe pair of hands and fingers alongside the environment which empowers that act to be completed as desired by you- timely, smoothly and efficiently! This is where the real fun begins for we all know that like real life, even when it comes to the humble act of pushing a thread through the eye of the needle- perfect situations are far from true and more often than not it is the ability of an individual to know which element is working for and which is working against, is what makes that attempt successful or a struggle! So you may now want to know, fine, understood all this, so what’s the big deal?

Well, the big deal comes from these small facets! Like the needle, the thread, our fingers, our ambiance, so in life, We, our resources, abilities, skills and qualities and the surroundings that we move about in go a long way to determine whether we are ever able to hit our trim levels or whether we end up flattening out even before we realize our fullest potential in whatever we choose to do so! As long as you ensure that you will be rock steady and get to a task that you have set out for yourself, know well what will enable you to reach and get there, and also develop ample skills and qualities to execute that effort, with an environment which supports and further accelerates your seeking, you will be well on your way to achieve your trim levels- because you have a fine needle, a great eye to see the thread through it, an enabling environment and a rehearsed skill which ensures you keep moving ahead more and more as you keep practicing and pursuing what you have set out for- what your needle is! The thread and the supporting environs are the valuable resources which one must choose carefully, and if thats not possible, then must on the way learn to make the most of what is been provided, for the only thing that is within your control is the needle (the construct of you) and the safe fingers that you have with a discerning mind which knows how to harvest the environs to empower the slide of the thread through the eye of the needle! This indeed is the simplified story of our lives, we are the needles that we are and empowered or held back by what we hold within and what we bring out to play and offer to the world around us! As long as we uphold the value to serve the greater good of the many around, we are enabled by all that is around, and the moment we try to sabotage that and bow down to the arena of self serving thoughts and efforts, sooner or later, that very simple effort of going through the eye of the needle begins to seem herculean and impossible! So how do we ensure that we don’t go astray? Read on!

The trick is to know who you are to begin with i.e. what type of a needle are you, what thread are you going to allow to get through and what is that can be created by doing that! You see, many stories of human struggle are simply wasted potential in the wrong areas of life; at times owing to lack of guidance, few times un-supportive contexts and yet other times, plain stupid bravado! Knowing who you are (the needle) is the most fundamental tasks and often humans tend to rush through this very vital aspect! Unless you don’t really know what you are, you will simply be unable to make any use of the available resources around you and may end up thinking worthless things as important and vice versa and the story then is of endless trials and errors and for the lucky few, they live to see the light of success during their life time and for many others’ it is a story of going to the grave not knowing what they did with their lives and why!

Once you know who you are, you are able to know what exactly you need in terms of resources (the thread) and once that is done, you know very well, the craft that you want to come up with and the creation that you want to go ahead with to be known as your legacy! What’s more, once you know who you are and what resources you have around, you can then harness the powers within you to even turn a unfavorable context work for you by adjusting yourself accordingly and if the contextual settings are favorable, needless to say, the coming together of all the elements will propel you on the path to success and empower you to create a lasting legacy in proportion to who you are and what resources you have deployed (the needle and the thread going through it’s eye!)

I leave you here with these thoughts! Grab that coffee and try to think what is that you are, what type of a needle you are, what’s your thread and what is that you are creating or will create going ahead! Whatever that is, make sure, it ends up being a signature statement of who you are and have been and will be!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another one! Until than Stay safe and stay wise!

The virus is not the problem.

~ Parimal Aluri ~ 3 Comments

Many a times, intellectual hallucination and unwarranted cerebral diarrhea leads to aggravating problems rather than solving them and when you try to use the method of applying “collective wisdom” of “empowered group of self proclaimed experts” who have not solved the current problem but something else earlier- we get served what we deserve- More Chaos! This short piece is about understanding how humanity has this unique ability to end up screwing up simple things and create complex problems which tend to become an altogether different problem from the original one! So join me in unraveling stupidity, dumbness and over-rated “specialists” who seem to have answers for all problems that get created while trying to solve the original problem, which remains unresolved!

When the coronavirus problem began, the least I was expecting was a scientific and rational response to meet the challenge and deal with it, but as I look back, what I realized is that more and more people (who are especially in-charge of devising strategies to deal with the situation) have been more dumb and stupid than what their so-called qualifications and experience suggested! Consider this to begin with- The fact that was established way early into this episode of the virus onslaught was that it is contagious and it spreads from people to people when they are in close proximity- within 2 meters of each other- great! so now we know what to avoid- than why the hell do we need to lock down cities, nations and ruin the whole economy of the nations? If there is scientific evidence on how the virus transmission occurs- the common-sense led approach would suggest- have protection, maintain the required distance- whether 2 metres or 20 metres and that’s about- Let the world be what it is! Why do you need to lock down- take way livelihoods- create economic anarchy and destroy a working society? Effective, sustained and persuasive communication in all possible languages and across mediums reinforcing the need of social distancing would have done the needful! Don’t believe me- well , your choice- so can you explain why even after the lock down has been enforced why in few countries the cases keep rising? Well, the answer is simple – Humanity is all about being social and if you ask people not to do something, they will end up doing exactly that- albeit in way that you can’t find out easily! Hence if the messaging would have started with the moral high ground of what one should “Do” rather than “Don’t Do”, things would have been better accepted and hence implementation would have been far more meaningful and so would have the been the results!

Now, if you were to ask the “Coronovirus” what it feels like today, after unleashing mayhem and wrecking the global economy, this is what the Virus would have told you, “You know what, I am simple virus- I hopped onto humans (accidentally or intentionally- you find out!) and found it fun to be here, anyways not many youngsters welcome me that well- so I hardly get noticed- but the oldies do hate me- hence they show their dislike to me by getting sick- and well- that is dangerous for me- because than even I can’t survive- if I they suffer so do I! I never wanted to be within humans any case- I was having fun in the animal kingdom for so many million years! I don’t know how I landed up here! Why is everyone blaming me for economic collapse, I am no banker- I a am a Virus- I may make people sick!,I have nothing to do with economics! You mishandle and misunderstand on how to treat me- how can you blame me for that?! I never asked you to shut down cities and lock everyone in their houses- If people manage their immune system well- by eating well and have personal hygiene- there is nothing that me or any of my cousins can do anything nasty with any of you!

A lot of the problems of the world that we are facing today even as we battle the pandemic is really not about the illness, neither it is about when the vaccine will be available or not, it is far more simpler and I have kept on saying this over and over again! Common-sense deficient decision making is not only ridiculous and foolish it is outright dangerous and fatal! Unfortunately the irony of our times is our so-called experts have all the answers for this pandemic- as if they got killed or survived the last one caused by this virus! The real sane experts on the other hand have been suggesting incremental steps to experiment and deduce in a calibrated manner on- the-go, so that we learn and know what works and what does not in a measured way, rather than creating the global melodrama of the Big bad Lock Down and as if once the Lock Down is lifted we will have the birds singing and spring will be back! This myopic, risk averse and dumb thinking by group of so-called experts has put such a severe strain on all other sections of society that nations will sooner or later feel the shortage of healthcare workers, law enforcement officers and all those who are involved to maintain sanity as fatigue would simple overwhelm them, because they are humans first and no Human being in the entire history of mankind has never won a battle with no definite deadline in sight! If and when societal fatigue sets in, it will rob societies off the very building blocks that define who they are and thereby make each step towards recovery even more harder and difficult, something that will even take time to convince people that everything is safe now! So you may ask me now- If the Virus is not the problem than what is the problem?, and people are dying- so the virus must be real?

Well sure, the virus is real and people are dying for sure- but what is that the people are dying off? Are they really dying only because of the Virus or is the Virus creating biochemical challenges within their bodies which have become fragile because of existing illnesses that is causing the deaths? What are the facts around this? what is the real picture?How many got treatment late? How many were misdiagnose? How many were accidentally killed during experimental treatment? We may know some answers and some we may never know! But this is where the crux of the matter is- Science says that there has to be evidence, predictability, repeatability for things to play out exactly the same way for same set of conditions- well does it work with a virus – the answer is yes and no- yes if the virus is the same and no if the virus – which is a living microbe- mutates! The Influenza virus- cousin of our Coronavirus visits most of us every year- in one form or the other, not all of us die, we struggle and recover- our struggle is proportional to our immune system’s response and wisdom of the healthcare providers! When one of these two factors break down- we have a problem which actually can put us at considerable risk and this is exactly what is being played out in case of the Coronavirus too!

The real problem is the way we are handling the problem- the real problem is “The Problem Definition”. If the Coronavirus has given all the scientific evidence of how that poor little things wants to move from one human to the other, we just need to avoid and break that path- the answer is social distancing- personal hygiene- that’s about it! Personal Hygiene is a private matter-one may say he has brushed his teeth and would not have been doing so for last whole week- you can’t help someone who has a psychopathic mind! Likewise social distancing, like I said earlier it has a lot to do with common-sense- why would you allow a stranger to stand close to you within 2 metres- why? I mean Virus or no Virus- why would you normally also be comfortable with having some stranger sneaking up so close to me, forget about that person coughing, sneezing or even breathing into you face? I mean why? If you say well, that never happens, you manage a high level of personal hygiene, you eat well, you don’t mix with strangers and random people- well than that’s great! so where’s the problem? You just blocked all entry points to the Virus! So what has the Heaven sent lock- down got to do with any of this? Why should you be penalized from taking a walk in the park, walking you dog, picking up your grocery, going for that long drive? Why?

When this pandemic shit is over in a few weeks from now, as the world sits back and thinks about it and as stories will be told to kids who are now under 10-12 year old- they will laugh their hearts out and say it on you face- How come were you grown ups so dumb? Why did you do what you did? Was it really needed? and trust me none of the “so-called” hyper anxious- doomsday centric- “specialist” will have an answer for the virus- well by that time it would have changed itself to be our friendly neighborhood virus which will be kept under check by popping a pill and not Locking ourselves down!

This current pandemic has more to do with the problem of mishandling a crisis and making a bad situation worse more than anything else! t’s a text book example of all that one should not do, during a crisis like this! When problem definitions fail, right questions are not asked and knee jerk- copy-cat solutions are adopted without understanding the contextual realities of life, we set ourselves to a bigger secondary disaster- which at times can outweigh the benefits, making the cure wore than the disease and leaving the original problem unresolved! History is replete with examples when great wars have been won and lost because the challenges were misread or misunderstood, political fortunes and businesses have been created and destroyed all because of incorrect assessment of the gravity of the contextual settings! The problem is not always the “problem”, the problem sometimes is the “way that a problem is perceived and defined” which ends up becoming a bigger disaster than the real challenge at hand! What could have been done, you may want to ask?

Well, simple and straight- social distancing, access to personal hygiene and keeping away risk groups from social arena! That’s about it, three steps implemented well, you have won more than half of the battle! No need for intrusive surveillance, lock downs, travel restrictions and unwarranted narratives! The real challenge with this overly simple solution is that “so called specialists” thrive on making a complex problem even more complicated to earn their brownie points and plain spoken truth gets discounted for unscientific gossip! Until this fixated fashion that “complex problems can only be solved by complex solutions” is not thrown away for good, humanity will keep on suffering from one or the other reason! Simplicity, Plain speak and Common-sense based approaches are the arch enemies of the “so called, know it all, specialists” and that is the real threat, more dangerous than the virus and these threats ensure humanity keeps getting hits by shit in one form or the other from time to time, just to have their inflated hollow egos well oiled!

I leave you with my thoughts here, grab a coffee, take a walk by yourself or walk your dog , eat well, stay fit and rest assured no matter what the “expert” says trust your common sense! Animals have survived with the virus for millions of years and humans have dealt with more nasty visitors coming from mother earth to us than the one we have now with us! So stay calm, and stay wise!

Ciao for now, will be back soon with another piece, until then keep that gray matter ticking and learn it well- Simplicity Works and that’s the way of nature!

Right questions matter over right answers!

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

Well, I have always believed that ; “Our understanding is limited by the perceptions that we build (within and around us) and at times these may resonate with the facts- that really are or at times the facts may seem to be what we seek them to be!” This piece is about that strange spooky place of being absolutely sure and yet getting lost in transit! This is about trying to understand, why Right questions are far more important and meaningful than always having the Right answer! So join me and let’s roll ahead!

As we grew up, we have always been asked to provide right answers to whatever questions we have been asked! Whether it was our teachers in schools, our parents, our friends, our colleagues or any other scenario that may come to your mind, It has always been about providing the right answer whenever people ask us something, whenever people wanted to get some detail or information from us, we have always been told that we are duty-bound to answer right and give the most accurate answer as possible! Well, this is perhaps yet another example of the conformity bias that modern societies live in and lead us like a big herd within! I won’t comment on this aspect further- because that’s not our focus for this piece! My focus rather starts at the other end of the question- yes, “How about teaching everyone around to start asking the right questions to begin with!” You know what once, you have asked the right question, you will always end up getting the right answer- almost always unless you working a diplomatic mission or are a high ranking official for your government! Let me simplify this for you!

Consider, our current global pandemic situation, what do you see? Well at the macro level, you will see few nations have fared better over the others, some of them have taken a more riskier route, perhaps more loss of lives than the economy, there would be others yet, who would have chosen to save lives over their economy- , few others would have walked the middle path and tried to strike a dynamic balance- between lives and economy, well nothing right and wrong here- just plain facts as you see them without any prejudice! So if you see different nations reacted to a common problem differently! Why would this happen? By logic, if you have same problem to be solved, there would be identical ways to address the same, if the end goal is the same (saving lives and livelihoods) isn’t it? So why the difference? Well the answer lies within this plain simple fact that, each of these nations asked a completely different question among their leadership teams, when the virus came visiting! There would be one set of nations who would have rushed to assess and manage the economic damage and decided to go ahead with a collateral damage in terms of human lives (liking it to a war like event) well, this is that group of nation, which would have possibly asked,“What do we save- we have to make a choice- Economy or Lives?” and the answer would have been displayed by the steps taken and the delays and timeliness of implementation of different aspects that go on with it! Likewise the nations that would have chosen Lives over their fragile economies would have acted accordingly! Next, there would have been yet a few other small group of nations, that would have asked, “How can I save most of Lives and Livelihoods both”? These nations would have landed up somewhere in the middle and stand a better chance of a rapid recovery from an economic sense compared to the other two! But these are the three basic and straightforward scenarios which work exceptionally well, especially when government’s don’t want to try too hard and experiment (which could end up being a full scale apocalypse and ends up bring the fall of their powers)! So if you see these nations asked the questions which were very normal, rational and practical- cool! Now see the real fun!

Yet, there are a few nations, which remained open for business as usual and even than the impact was not so severe to cause huge loss of either lives or businesses! So what is the question that these nations would have asked? Possibly their thinking would have moved ahead something like this! “What do I have to do, to ensure my nation remains on the growth/path that we have planned? What can be done so that irrespective of what’s unfolding, we can still be aligned to the national objectives of growth and wellness of the people?” The questions could also have been, “What is my nation, how likely are my citizens to be impacted because of who they are (age/ethnicity/ living standard/culture/access to healthcare systems/preparedness) and for how long and how bad?” There could be more such examples of refined thinking and questions which nations would have come up with, which in turn would have helped these set of nations to come up with radical strategies to meet the Virus challenge unlike the one-size-fits-all- Lock down model!

It is when questions asked by nations become more specific to the need of the nation and the societal requirements of the given nation, that countries have been able to devise and deploy a fail proof strategy which can work right form day 0 and ensure that even as the virus keeps coming in, the same event creates an exit path for the virus to be weeded out of the system with the same speed or more rapidly than it’s initial onset! What does this tell us, Well a simple fact, “The power of your questioning is more important and perhaps the only important thing that you ever require to ensure you get access to the most accurate solutions for the problems that you face! It is never about right answers, It is always and only about Right Questions! Always!

What works for nations, works for societies, city councils, offices, teams, and Individuals! The sharpness , wit and intelligence of the question to a perplexing problem will provide you a great answer/solution! If the quality of the questioning is average or mediocre, the resulting solutions too will reflect the same and as a result of it, you often find people, organizations and nations dealing with the same or similar problems again and again, the cosmetic aspected may change and alter/intensity may vary but the problem broadly remains the same and keep coming back with predictable accuracy! So how do we go about creating a sustainable difference? Well read on!

It all starts with changing the way we define a problem- the space where the problem is perceived- what is the problem – Is it the Virus or the Lack of immediate cure for it? Is it the large ageing population of your nation or is it the lack of trained healthcare professionals available to deal with the crisis?Likewise what is the business problem that you are facing? Is it that you have a great product for a wrong market or you are in a great market with a wrong product? Problem Definition in the truest essence is vital and fundamentally important to get ahead and reach some place to solve a crisis that’s fast coming your way! As your ability to develop accurate questioning picks up, you will find that answers that come your way are more simple, actionable and measurable in the context of time and value!

I will leave you here with your space so that you begin to start framing the right questions, which go on to provide you with even more meaningful and actionable solutions for a more wiser future!

Ciao for now and I will catch up soon with another article!

Adapting to a new way:The human factor.

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

The best thing that happens when disasters strike; everyone and anyone suddenly becomes an expert and has definite answers to “what could have led to the disaster”, but rarely is there an answer ever found even from the certified experts about the “Why” part of it-  why was it allowed to develop into something that it would have and why were the early warning mechanisms either absent or why did they fail! Well this  piece looks into the human aspect of what people can expect coming their way and what could be the possible ways to navigate these times! Whether it is about an Individual, a business or a nation- People are at the very foundation of everything that we do, no matter what you say otherwise and if the people story begins to fail, in no time you will have failing Individuals who will translate into failed societies, resulting into a full blown humanitarian crisis!

As Human Beings, we have evolved through the years to survive, prevail and better our societies- immediate and the next with a single purpose of making life as comfortable as we can- how  we go about doing that- largely depends on the other aspects of demographic distribution, climate and opportunities which are heavily moderated by the agreed society type and governance models! Mankind has been a witness to many large scale potential wipe out events- whether they have been wars, famines, epidemics; but each time eventually societies have emerged out of the challenge, albeit changed and stronger- for the better or worse- well that is left for you to decide- because the answer to that question directly relates to who you are Individually are and how much impact do things bring upon an individual and what the Individual then decide to do with it- React or Respond! This time will be no different, but since the scale of the event has been global- there will be deeper scars and the time to heal will be longer then usual- which in itself will end up leaving fractured communities and societies as the unwarranted byproduct of the healing process! At the core of bounce back, will be the choice of behavioral attributes that will make the difference between successful adaptability and an ever going struggle to cope up with the new ways and developments!

Whether it be work, private lives or the grandeur of business and public life, as we move ahead and out of the current global slow down, Individuals who display a saintly level of patience and perseverance especially when they are occupying leadership positions will be able to thrive individually and put their teams and the businesses on a super fast growth trajectory, sure enough, contextual settings will matter, if a nation is sinking it really doesn’t matter whether your business strategy is a prize wining one or not!  What this singular grain tells us is that, as humans, we will want to move ahead and calibrate our surroundings to the known levels of familiarity and feeling of being secured at the earliest to begin with, which will be rapidly followed by an intense period of observation and social change which will tend to do away with everything and anything that does not serve its purpose in the new systems and designs of work and life that societies and individuals will now begin to adhere to! Whether this works to the help or harm an Individual or a society will largely depend on the intent of the governance model- which way they would want these steps to move- whether to expand and settle to close to earlier expressions of freedom and access or whether they would want to have a restricted and controlled environment for the next 12- 16 months with an aim to go by the maxim citing, “To Err on the side of Caution”!

To put it in another way, businesses that value people and are able to evaluate qualities exhibited, the value systems displayed with fine prudence will be able to hold on to the most prized and coveted Individuals-who  in-turn will play a pivotal role to drive the business ecosystem. If there is a slight error of judgement in evaluating people and their attributes, as businesses emerge from this disruption, the ones’ who have made bad choices with regards to people will suffer even more greatly in times ahead and will end up loosing any advantage that they would have built in the earlier stages as they will no longer be managed by gifted and professional individuals!

Among the Individuals who will be able to steer themselves and all that they lead (whether a business or a community), patience and perseverance will be the two fundamental pillars, which will be worth their value in Gold which they will be able to utilize in the changing times, even as they demand  consistently evolving individuals. These leaders will be able to sustain and manage the tantrums and discord that will come their way through eccentric or sporadic human behaviors and  complicated business environments with ease and confidence which will further propel their cause and ensure that the lives that they influence and lead are aligned to the all important growth mindset!

People who have been natural introverts or calibrated extroverts will be able to tide over the changing dynamics with more ease as compared to extroverts who belong to the sub type of social butterflies-who thrive on meaningless interactions- which are good to see and observe but carry no valuable content or quality of engagement! Needless to say irrespective of what type you belong to, having a thinking and rational mind which anchors on science and common sense will be of prime importance!

This also happens to be from the anchor point of history- that moment in our lives, where across the layers and maze of society, we will witness that two distinct patterns emerge! The first one will be a set wherein Leaders will create more followers and the second one where Leaders will create more Followers- which of these sets becomes more powerful over the other and takes the popular lead will end up deciding the future fabric of your social engagement and the way we are able to move about doing business, and thereby creating our limiting beliefs and new bench marks of societal confirmation biases for the next decade or so! Which one of these approaches is right or better over the other, well largely depend on the contextual settings of the society, what my understanding is that, Evolved and literate societies will create more Leaders and this will provide these societies to emerge rapidly once again as “Thought leaders” and thereby consolidating their dominance around the world as Nations which create and set standards for the other nations to follow!

I will leave you with these  thoughts, so that you can take them  further and reflect on your experiences; possibly devise strategies that align with your Individuality, reality of you and the group that you lead! So that as we emerge in the times ahead, collectively as a society, we are still able to hold on to the promise of togetherness, even as some of us may agree to have more Leaders and yet some of us may agree to have more Followers! The fine line remains, that Humanity must and should prevail in spite and despite of everything and everyone else!

Ciao for now, will be back with another piece soon, until then stay safe, keep your mind anchored with wise thoughts and remember, humor doesn’t harm!

 

 

Making sense of the nonsense around you!

~ Parimal Aluri ~ Leave a comment

Even under normal circumstances, it would be important to have clarity about what we pay attention to and what we ignore! Given the kind of conflicting mayhem that the world is in right now; it’s no wonder that people now are getting  overwhelmed with the noise around- most of which is pure information garbage! This short piece is about trying to decipher the way around too many inputs and stay focused on the outcomes that you want in a given scenario!

So, depending on where you are on the world map- you are either moving about normally, locked in your own abode or moving around wearing the latest designer masks- which- trust me are doing nothing more then making it harder for you to breathe in and out- unless you are a trained yoga student- with some great breath control techniques at your disposal!

It is in times like these, that we can learn valuable lessons and also understand how we individually process information that we receive on an ongoing basis– What is that we do to know what is the right source, what to believe, what not to and how to verify what is being told and how do we go about that verification process to validate the information that we have been provided with! Many a times the information that receive will be crafted in the agenda of the sender of the message for all the right and wrong reasons!The more critical the formation, more are the chances of it carrying along with it an element of what I call as “Information malware”- which will override the essence of the information’s contents – This malware has one objective to have your reaction directed in a particular manner even before your discerning mind tries to make sense of what the context is and evaluate sensible options to address the contents of the information! So what do we do?- well read on…

To begin with, what we can always do and must always do is keep our approach in life (especially when we are at the receiving end) simple! Yes folks, that’s as easy as this, keeping a simplified approach- but the journey to develop a simplified approach given the complex brain that we carry over our shoulders is very often easier said then done!- At times there is a good measure and reason for it (when you are leading a large organisation or a nation) and yet at  other times you may tend to just procrastinate- even when your decision will not even make an impact on your shadow!- forget anyone around you!

When you do receive a piece of information- When it is  for your survival- well in most cases that will be an order and then overriding all else you will have to simply follow- because any argument will ensure you aren’t there for the next get together among your known faces! Of course this works only on the premise that the sender also has the real single point agenda of saving your life! Recall “brace” positions call out by flight crew, when they say “Brace” or a pilot says, “Mayday” well there’s no arguing and overthinking about what will follow next- it’s simply a clear statement of an emergency and asking each one to follow a laid out protocol- no one holds debates around this time and kind of messages and information flow! In times like these; De-clutter and follow what is being told- when the source is verified beyond doubt to be having the same interest like that of your’s- To stay alive!

When  you receive information through a chain of command in the corporate world- as far as possible and whenever possible – if you can’t figure out (which ideally you should be able to most of the times!) why you are performing a task, it’s always good to ask for clarification- for two reasons- one possibly you may not be the best person to do it (since you need clarity!) and secondly your ignorance can actually cause a far greater blunder (in your attempt to try doing something which you aren’t sure about!). You don’t want to be a first-aid responder who faints at the sight of blood! The corporate world is replete with examples wherein  people have been entrusted with tasks and given instructions only to screw up things even more and ensure more pain is given to the person from whom the instruction came! Why does this happen?- Well, simply because the person at the top had assumed that because you are labelled as what your designation says- you must be competent to manage what has been informed to you! More often then not what is importantly missed out– Is the ability to verify precedents wherein such a situation was previously managed or not by you!

On a societal level, we have always ensured that we are constantly bombarded with an ongoing onslaught of information- most of which is absolutely useless and has no bearing whatsoever on our dear lives! Yet, the confirmation biases and the peer pressure to be part of that large social gang and be able to contribute to general gossip is so overpowering that it also silences the internal correction mechanisms – called your Soul! More often then not it takes away the remaining limited level of intelligence that one may have and once the dumb part of us takes over- we just go on adding to the spread of nonsensical information- ending up being the source and the victim both! Here the way- and possibly the only way is to Avoid!- Avoidance is the only first and last step to battle information nonsense floating round the society! Each time before you click that button on a site,  or share your cell number for that offer by an sms,  or subscribe to that channel on a social handle, pick up that gossip magazine, or supplement from a newspaper (I presume you will be left with only a page or two of real news- the times that we live in!), you are just opening up channels for all that information filth to come and hit you in your private space! Don’t do that!

Instead subscribe to any and all information that serves you to be a better person, enhances your knowledge in the area of your work, information that uplifts your soul and helps you learn something new (hobbies, music, crafts), urges you to explore something better (travel) and makes you more wise in terms of choosing what to hold on to and what to let go! This is the real essence and way to manage the onslaught of information nonsense around us! As the old saying goes- You are known by the company you keep, and more importantly, The company you keep is a factor of the Quality of Information that you hold!

I will leave you with these thoughts for now, take your time to subscribe to new channels and information treasure troves and unsubscribe from glorified nonsense today! Take charge, have your drink and stay wise- making sense from the nonsense around!