Category: philosophy
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Lessons from the mountain trek
Sir Edmund Hillary, the first person to climb Mount Everest, the highest peak in the world, remarked that “It is not the mountain that we conquer, but ourselves”. Looking back at my trek experience at the Hampta pass (situated at a height of 14,100 ft above sea level), I cannot agree more with Mr. Hillary.…
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Good planners, but bad executioners- the missing link?
Since independence, there is one area where we have done great job! It is in planning things for welfare programmes, developmental initiatives, law & order, administrative reforms etc. For example, “Gareebi Hatao” as a policy goal was expounded in 1970s. When it was announced, there was much fanfare around it, elaborate planning would have been…
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Patriotism vs. humanity OR Patriotism and humanity- that is the question!
Recently, I saw a video where an American suddenly stopped his car in the US on spotting an Indian couple. He confronts them by saying “India is so incredible! Why you just don’t stay in India? Why do you have to come to America?” The Indian man answers with a smile- “To explore world”, to…
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The internal resistance to change- but can it really stop reform?
Long-time back I read a book called “Who moved my cheese?” by Dr. Spencer Johnson. It was a short book telling the interesting tale of two mice, Sniff and Scurry, and two “littlepeople” (of the size of mice) Hem and Haw. This tale was about acknowledging that- “Change is the only reality in life that…
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Acknowledgement of failure- the first step towards accountability
In a risk-averse society as ours, there is a general inhibition to acknowledge and accept that there was some failure or error or act of omission or act of commission on our part which led to some bigger failure later. Take a simple example, when you were a kid and you went to someone’s home…
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What is a human being, if not a living story?
Today marks the one year since the dastardly terrorist attack happened in Pahalgam last year, which took the lives of 26 people. Each of them left behind their family mourning for them, their lives completely shattered, and their story cut short by an untimely, unlucky and unfortunate incident. Every single individual had their own story…
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Means more important than the end?- the curious case of Bhishma Pitamah
I have had the fortune of learning from some of the great teachers. One among them was Prof. Satya Chaitanya, who was a faculty at the famous XLRI, Jamshedpur. We had 1 week of Management Development Programme (MDP) during our training at TATA Steel, which was hosted by XLRI. And there we met many legendary…
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Where do you stand between creation, preservation and destruction?
Creation, preservation and then destruction is the law of the nature. All living beings take birth (creation), they live their life (preservation) and then they die (destruction). Even this universe including the galaxies, stars, planets etc. was created in the big bang about 13.8 billions years ago (creation phase is still ongoing), then there is…
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Eradicating the bottlenecks in your life- The “Strait of Hormuz” story!
Ask any kid aged more than 10 years old about the “Strait of Hormuz” now and he/she will tell you where it is and what is its significance in the energy security of the world! Basically, it is a choke point or a bottleneck passage connecting the Gulf of Persia with the Indian Ocean, through…
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A world obsessed with mistakes and negativities instead of celebrating achievements and positivities!
Whenever the results of Civil Services Exam are out, you will see that the most “viral” news items, among others, are those with candidates who were failures in 10th or 12th exam or had backlogs (we used to call them “fakka”) in college exams. It is portrayed as if the failures or mistakes in earlier…
Anupam- The Dreamer 