Futile Pursuit

An old joke tells about a farmer’s dog that used to wait for vehicles to come around. As soon as one appeared he would run down the road, barking and trying to overtake it. One day a neighbour asked the farmer ‘Do you think your dog is ever going to catch a car?’ The farmer replied, ‘That is not what bothers me. What bothers me is what he would do if he ever caught one.’

The dogs are plain playful or taking on an imagined foe. But, we must ponder whether we are in futile pursuit of meaningless goals. We need to ask ourselves whether we will find the goal to be worth the pursuit if we were to attain it.

Daniel Gilbert and Loewenstein found through multiple experiments that humans can never be as happy as we think we will be with an outcome. The research goes into depth about human decision-making and the affects of our decisions.  What Gilbert has found is that we overestimate the intensity and the duration of our emotional reactions – our “affect” – to future events.

For instance, we might believe that a new car will make life perfect. But, surely, it will not be as exciting as we anticipated; nor will it excite us for as long as predicted. Aldous Huxley said it well: ‘Happiness is not achieved by the conscious pursuit of happiness; it is generally the by-product of other activities.’

So often, we set out in futile pursuit...
when at hand lies the happiness fruit!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.

True Sharing

During childhood, my brother and I would accompany our father on visits to homes during Zatras, Feasts or other special occasions. No sooner the plate, of sweets and spicy eats, was placed before us; our father would urge us to eat. We would feel self-conscious as he loudly kept saying, ‘go ahead, have it!’

After one such embarrassing evening, I asked him why he insisted that we polish off the plate instead of well mannered pecks at the offerings. He confided that being miserly in eating would send wrong signals to the hosts. He shared an invaluable insight: sharing is not just about gifting what we have... sharing is also about receiving with love!

Over the years, I see great happiness in the uninhibited receiving of somebody else’s gifts. For instance, when we visit an old age home or an orphanage rather than only sing our songs, we listen to their tunes, as well. Instead of only giving them our delicacies, we share the meal with them. Instead of giving, we choose to receive from them.

So often, so many of us share our riches with others. But love is about allowing others to share their treasures with us. While giving is good, it is greater to receive with dignity. When sharing is one sided, it is benevolence. But when sharing is a mutually two-way traffic, then it is beyond generosity and can be termed as pure love!

Gifting what we have is benevolent giving
Acceptance of other’s gifts is true sharing!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India

Litter-Arty

In the early 1950s, loads of waste was left over when Chandigarh, designed by Le Corbusier, was built up. A road inspector had a vision of creating art out of the bits and pieces of the litter dump around the city. He created a fantasy, which he called the Rock Garden.

Passages of rock and concrete open out into spaces with human figures studded with tiles and marble. Walls are studded with broken tiles, bathroom fixtures, old crockery and switchgear. Discarded water pots form fences. Whimsy birds fashioned of concrete sit on the roof of a little hut. A waterfall cascades over an open-air theatre paved with broken slate. Turquoise bangles make peacocks. An upturned enamel basin serves as a soldier’s hat! 

The Rock Garden is a legacy that will live even though its creator, Nek Chand Saini is no more! Nek Chand was honoured across the world for his work. While the Indian government conferred the prestigious Padma Shri, the French awarded him the Grande Medaille de Vermeil. His achievement seems more spectacular as he had no formal training in the art of sculpture.

Nek Chand showed that one man’s garbage can be another’s dream. While beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder, some draw out this beauty from what seems to be useless and allow others to see it as well. Nek Chand’s fantasy teaches us that nothing is really litter… and that everything can be turned into a piece of art… when positive vision is backed with proactive action.

Look again... what seems litter is actually art,
Great possibilities awaits our proactive start!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India

Imperfect

’You are imperfect, permanently and inevitably flawed. And you are beautiful’.  - Amy Bloom

All of us want to be the best or the second best. Similarly, when we build our team, we seek for perfection. But an obsession with perfection is detrimental. It makes us unable to accept our mistakes, other people’s mistakes and unable to accept untoward events that happen in life.

In ‘Don’t sweat the Small Stuff’; Richard Carlson suggests ‘making peace with imperfection’. A vicious cycle begins when instead of conceding the error; we engulf into guilt and berate ourselves. Otherwise, we refuse ownership of the mistake and enter a state of denial, possibly blaming someone else. Neither of these states is helpful in correcting or preventing the recurrence of the error.

The fact is, we will err, and often we will err repeatedly. We must be patient and calmly note the reasons for the mistake, and simply try to avoid it in the future. Making peace with imperfection extends to others as well. It is unreasonable to expect perfection from our colleagues, particularly given our own lack of perfection.

It is pertinent to note that life is imperfect. Things go wrong. We must learn to accept such things. The world is imperfect, we are imperfect, but that need not stop us from being happy. Happiness comes when we come to terms with our own imperfections and those of others.

Happiness comes from courage to accept…

That like we are.... others too are imperfect!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.

Pointer

Zen philosophy maintains that truth has nothing to do with words. It equates Truth and words to a moon and a finger, respectively. Even if the finger can point to the moon, it is necessary to look beyond the finger to see the moon.

Being fixated with the pointer is pointless. More often than not we spend too much time in analysis of the pointer. We generally get stuck in the validity of concepts and models. Surely it would be better to step out and experience something directly.

The pointer is based on a belief, a perception, an image or a thought process. If the pointer is right, we can see the destination. But if it is incorrect, we have to discard it. Most of the time, our pointer keeps changing depending on the position we are in and our desired destination.

It is more important to connect to real territory. Too often, we allow the pointer to become an addictive restriction. Whether it is our own ego, life purposes or larger community concerns, we must move beyond the pointer and embark on the journey of real experience.

Real experience is the one to refer…

We must look beyond the pointer!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.