The rainbow wouldn't be as beautiful as it is if it only had your favorite color, if it was only red or only blue or only green. The rainbow has different colors, you may not like every color individually, but together they make a beautiful rainbow. Such is life. Not every moment of everyday is filled with joy or pleasure. Sadness, stress, joy, pleasure, excitement, peace- they are all the different colors of life. They together make life beautiful. To feel them is what it means to be human. So feel them. Embrace all the colors of your life. Marvel at how beautiful life is, much like a rainbow in the sky.
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If I were to describe human behavior by comparing it to animals, I would pick donkey and dog. As the famous story goes, when the donkey is shown a carrot, it chases and walks towards it. That applies to many of us as well. Show us a reward and we will get to work. Others of us behave more like dogs. Now, what do dogs do that donkeys don’t? They sniff. All the time. If there is a bone in the room, they will sniff and find it. They don’t need to be shown the bone in front of them for them to go and get it, oh, no. You put the bone in the next room, they will sniff their way to it and get it.
To put things in better perspective, let’s imagine a conversation between a donkey and a dog…
Dog: Hey Donkey, why are you standing still? Why don’t you look around for carrots?
Donkey: I don’t see any carrots.
Dog: Yeah.. but why don’t you go search over there, you might find something?
Donkey: Yeah, there is a chance that I MIGHT, but what if I don’t? Why waste time and energy when I could just stand here and relax. (relatable, anyone?)
Dog:Dude, what?! How can you be so lazy… Whatever. I’m going to search for a bone.
Donkey: Where though? Do you know where the bone is?
Dog: No, I’m just going to start searching..it usually works..If I search long enough, I usually end up finding something.
Donkey: Wow…that never works for me. Any way, good luck, I’m just going to sit here and relax.
Some people will follow their curiosity and interests without thinking about the ‘carrot’- the end result or what they may get out of it, thus exhibiting dog-like behavior. They will sniff and keep sniffing and eventually find something valuable. You know who I’m talking about. That kid in your class who stayed up till 4 am reading about quantum computing just because she was interested to know more, and ten years later, she’s in Silicon Valley inventing cutting-edge technology. Or that guy with a day job who devoted his entire weekends to making YouTube videos just because he ‘wanted to try it out’, without necessarily having a plan or vision or making any money, and five years later, he’s a Youtube Millionaire. I recently spoke with someone who runs a brilliant podcast — he doesn’t make any money out of it, he doesn’t have a vision or plan of where he wants to take it, no concrete idea of how it will help in his future career. But in addition to having another job to make ends meet, he runs this podcast, and it’s amazing.
...You get the idea. There are people like that. And then there’s me. Or, well, people like me. The donkeys. Unless we see a carrot- a clear, concrete idea of what we will get out of doing something, we will not do it.(I understand that this isn’t always the case, there are some activities that may give you intrinsic pleasure and you may do them without seeing a ‘carrot’. For example, if you like to play the guitar, you’ll play everyday, for fun. But you probably won’t quit your job, start a band, invest in professional equipment and record an album.. unless you see it going somewhere, will you?)If you’re a donkey like me, do not worry. It’s not over for us. There are several successful people who are donkeys. We just need some different strategies to get to work.
1. Write Down Your Goals
Write down your goals. Pen and paper, please. And be as specific as possible. For example, don’t just write ‘lose weight’. If you want to read everyday about a particular subject, set that as a goal. And don’t just write that you will spend half an hour everyday reading about that topic. Write down the exact number of pages/chapters/articles/books you will read everyday.
2. Look At Your Goals Everyday
Stick your goals on a wall in your room where you are forced to look at them everyday. This helps keep the motivation up.
3. Track Your Progress
At least once a week, record your progress. Now this is super-important.
You need to believe that you’re getting closer and closer to your carrot with every step you take.
I like to do it on the papers I have stuck on my wall: For example, record your weight every week. Or, if your goal is to read a certain number of books by a certain date, record the number of pages you read. Also write down what you learnt from that, and how it will help you attain your bigger goals.
4. Reward Yourself
Promise yourself a reward for attaining your goals, and be sure to reward yourself when you do. We donkeys need to have our carrots and eat them too. (See what I did there? :))
P.s.- I’m not saying it’s binary for everyone- some of us are sometimes more like dogs, other times more like donkeys.
The four steps mentioned above would help anyone and everyone, regardless of whether you’re more like a donkey or a dog. But donkeys definitely need it more.
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So I just finished reading The Element by Sir Ken Robinson, and ended up taking some notes, as usual. Thought I'd put them up here. Again, they are personal notes, focused on what I personally found relevant to myself- to get a full picture of the book, I'd encourage you to read it yourself.
What is The Element?
The activity, passion or work that gets you 'in the zone'.
Next up, Robinson talks about the 3 features of human intelligence:
1) It's extraordinarily diverse. You can be socially intelligent, spatial intelligent, emotionally intelligent, logically intelligent...the list goes on (I think there are a total of 12 such, but not too sure - Google it)
2)It is tremendously dynamic. Intellectual growth comes through embracing the dynamic nature of intelligence.
3)Entirely distinctive: Every person's intelligence is as unique as their fingerprint.
When we connect with our own energy we're more open to the energy of other people. The more alive we feel the more we can contribute to the lives of others.
Disclaimer Number 1: People who have found their element are not 'in the zone' 24X7. They have their moments of 'down' time.
Finding Your Tribe
Finding Your tribe means connecting with people who share their passion and a desire to make the most of themselves through it.
It gives you validation, inspiration and the "alchemy of synergy".
Interaction with the field, in person, or through their work, is as vital to our development as time alone with our thoughts.
It provides inspiration and provocation to raise the bar of your own achievements.
When tribes gather in the same place, the opportunities for mutual inspiration can become intense. For example, in ancient Greece, philosophy emerged through a series of interlinked groups- Plato's friends, Aristotle's school, Socrates' circle.
"Do You Feel Lucky?"
1. Lucky people tend to maximize chance opportunities. They're especially adept at creating, noticing and acting upon these opportunities when they arise.
2. They tend to be very effective at listening to their intuition and do work that is designed to boost their intuitive abilities.
3. They tend to expect to be lucky, creating a series of self-fulfilling prophecies because they go into the world anticipating positive outcome.
4. They have an attitude that allows them to turn bad luck into good. They don't allow ill-fortune to overwhelm them, and they move quickly to take control of the situation when it is not going well for them.
Perhaps not appropriate for a summary, but here's an example Robinson gives in the book to illustrate the four points above:
In a social experiment, a scientist by the name of Dr Wiseman arranged to meet two self-proclaimed “lucky” and “unlucky” people for separate interviews at a café, a venue which seemed neutral but was staged by Wiseman. He arranged for the place to be so packed with customers, there was only one free chair, next to a wealthy businessman. Wiseman also put a $5 bill on the front step of the coffee shop. The “unlucky” interviewee arrived, and because his thoughts were anxiously focused on the interview, he walked right past the $5 bill. He sat down at the café’s only free seat, next to the businessman, and did not speak a word to him, but simply waited nervously for the interview. When Wiseman arrived, he asked the interviewee, “So, how was your morning?” The reply was, “Oh, nothing special. Same as usual…”
When the “lucky” subject arrived, he saw the $5 bill, picked it up, and pocketed it. After sitting down next to the businessman, he struck up a conversation and the two ended up exchanging business cards. When Wiseman arrived and asked him “So, how was your morning?” he responded, “I had a great morning! I found a five-spot on the step and met a promising new business acquaintance. Lucky as usual!”
-> 'If we keep our focus too tight, we miss the rest of the world swirling around us.'. ...
^THIS.. Something I feel have learnt, to a certain extent, but need to more fully incorporate into my life. On another note, maybe I'll write my next blog post about this...
On The Role Of Mentors...
Mentors are very important. Period.
1. A mentors who has already found 'The Element' in a particular discipline can help you find your Element in that discipline, by recognizing the spark of interest.
2. Encouragement- mentors lead us to believe that we can achieve something that seemed improbable or impossible to us before we met them.
3. Facilitating- Offering advice and techniques, paving the way for us, standing by us to help us recover from our mistakes.
4. Stretching- They push us past what see as our limits.
Final Points
- You don't necessarily have to be making a living from your passion to be in Your Element. You can do it for recreation.
- It is not necessary to drop everything else. For some people, at some stages in their lives, leaving their current jobs or roles to pursue their passions simply isn't a practical proposition.
Final Disclaimer: Discovering the Element doesn't promise to make your richer. Quite the opposite, actually, as exploring your passions might lead you to leave behind that career as an investment banker to follow your dream of opening a pizzeria. Nor does it promise to make you more famous, more popular or even a bigger hit with your family.
However, for everyone, being in their Element, even for part of the time, can bring a new richness and balance to their lives.
P.S. :
Started reading the sequel of this book, 'Finding Your Element', but realized one chapter in that it is something I'll be working with and getting back to over and over again, until I find 'it'.
The teacher asked the girl what she was drawing. Without looking up, the girl said, 'I'm drawing a picture of God.' Surprised, the teacher said, 'But nobody knows what God looks like.' The girl replied, 'They will in a minute'.
On another note, his iconic talk 'Do Schools Kill Creativity' just completed ten years. If you haven't seen it yet, it's a must watch!:
...On Practice — your Secret Treasure, and the Power of having a Growth Mindset
Circa 2004, my 8 year old self went up on stage and performed a bunch of monologues from Harry Potter, all by myself. I had never performed on stage alone before. I knew nothing about acting. The thought of going up on stage would give me chills. I would start shaking whenever I had to say something in front of an audience. I was introverted, shy, and didn’t like attention- clearly not the kind of kid who you’d imagine would get into acting. But I did…
There was a huge dramatics event in school where two students from every class would perform a character from a novel in front of the entire school. The performers would be selected through auditions. Being a curious child who loved to try everything new, I signed up. I worked hard on my audition. I made sure I had memorized each and every line such that I could repeat even in my sleep. I also practiced my delivery along with my Dad who had experience with acting. I did all this, not out of any desire to win, or to get to perform in front of the entire school (The thought of doing so actually scared me), but more out of fear of screwing up my audition really bad- I thought that since I had signed up to try something new, I should at least give it my best shot. It turned out that the teachers who took my audition liked my performance a lot, and somehow, I beat the other kids in my class and got selected. And ended up performing in front of the entire elementary school consisting of a 1000 kids and a 100 teachers. I wasn’t as good on stage as I had been while practicing at home- I was really nervous, and my legs were shaking, but they were well-hidden by the baggy pants that I was wearing, so that was convenient. It was still pretty good I guess, considering I received praise and appreciation from fellow students and teachers after the performance.
Fast- forward to 6th grade. I was taking a dramatics class. My teacher didn’t regard me as a good actor, and gave me a B- in the first term. Again, I was that shy, unassertive, introverted kid who’d sit in the corner, and never ask for bigger roles, always being content with whatever little roles that I got in class. That year, I took part in a dramatics competition. I was really not expecting to win. I knew there were better actors out there, especially now that I was competing against 7th graders and 8th graders. Even after my first successful performance a few years ago, I didn’t consider myself particularly good at acting- ‘that performance was just luck and practice, I’m not a natural actor’, I told myself. After the competition, when the second prize was announced, I was pleasantly surprised to hear my name. I later performed my act in my dramatics class and received immense praise from my teacher and fellow classmates. “He acts well”, they said and I was like “wow, I guess I do, now that I’ve done it twice.” At the same time, I felt a slight sense of guilt and embarrassment: I thought that I had tricked everyone into believing that I was a good actor, when all I had done was just practice really hard. I was certain that if anyone practiced that hard, they’d probably beat me. I was like a kid who has found a secret treasure.
I should let them think that I am a good actor, I’ll just practice really hard every time and win, and they’ll never know.
Next year again I took part in a dramatics competition. This time, determined to win again, and to keep everyone thinking that I was actually good, I put in hours and hours of practice, completely ignoring everything else, including my studies. I ended up winning the first prize. And again, everyone said, “Oh, he’s such a good actor”. I was really happy but also wanted to tell them: “hey I’m actually not, I just practiced really hard”. More than anything else, I realized that I loved acting, and I loved entertaining people. So I got involved with acting a lot more. I participated in workshops and competitions, and developed my skill.
My experience with public speaking was very similar. I had always shied away from public speaking before 9th grade. In 9th grade, I decided to go at it, and signed up for an event where I had to make a speech on a particular topic on stage- I worked hard at it: first, on preparing a good speech, and then on memorizing all my lines to perfection, and practicing my enunciation. I managed to deliver a decent speech- it wasn’t the best, but hey, it was the first time I had given a speech on stage, and I didn’t screw up, so I was happy. Gradually, as high school progressed, I got more involved in public speaking, and had become a much better speaker by the time I graduated. Today sometimes people tell me, “oh, you speak well on stage. I don’t.”, or “you have that talent”. Or, “Oh, it’s hard for me, but you can do it easily.” Fact is, that even today, I don’t consider myself a great public speaker. I have learnt the tricks and the techniques, sure. And I have becoming better at practicing, and I know the effective ways of practicing. But at the end of the day, it is still all about practice. Even now, whenever I speak on stage, no matter how small my part is, I still practice with the same amount of effort and dedication as I did when I gave my first speech on stage back in 9th grade.
Why did I just reflect on all of that?
Because there are certain things I felt I needed to remind myself of:
1. First, is the belief that just because you aren’t good at something right now, doesn’t mean that you can’t become great at it. In other words, having a growth mindset: (from a post by Ameet Ranadive)
2. The other thing is practice. When the world sees a great show, they see ‘natural talent’, they don’t see the practice.
Practice is your little secret treasure.
No matter how good the world thinks you have become. Dedicate yourself to it. Love it. And do it like you’re giving your first speech, or performing for the first time, or playing your first match, or writing your first big blog post, or your first side-project or whatever it is that you do. Do it like you did when you first started.
If you liked reading this post, do comment below. This will encourage me to write more :)