"It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently. "

-- Warren Buffett

SMS#1 – Father & Son!

Oooh!.. Wait. Wait..I know most of you will be busy snatching your head to know what SMS means here right!. For few, (Thanks to the mobile word), the moment we read the acronym SMS, our brain automatically uncovers as ‘Short Messaging Service.’ But relax!, the SMS here nothing relates to any of that!!.

SMS is your FootPaths’ new series of posts named- Short Message Stories. These are short stories that I read and embraced a positive impact.

Recently, I read an article which talked about Story Telling. The message it conveyed was loud and clear - …’Story Telling is going to be the future mantra of Management concept.’ Even many management experts believe this is true. When I say Story, it means the RIGHT STORY worth sharing! (Others please excuse!)

Story telling is not new. We all used to hear stories right from our childhood. For many, the stories we listened during the bed time, shared by our Grannies’ still remain afresh. Most importantly, the moral we learnt (at least for me many times…) guide us during many cirumstances. And the best part about the story is not about telling it. But, it’s about mixing the right story, its rhythm and the timing that all counts.

Here is one such Short Message Story received through an email chain. It goes as below…

“A man was polishing his new car; his 4 yr old son picked up a stone & scratched on the side of the car. In anger, the furious Man took his child’s hand & hit it many times, not realizing that he was using a wrench.

At the hospital, doctors informed, the child lost all his fingers due to multiple fractures. When the child saw his father....with painful eyes he asked ’Dad when will my fingers grow back?' The father was deeply hurt and speechless.

Tempestuous Father went back to the car and kicked it many times. Devastated by his own actions, sitting in front of the car, he looked at the scratches and was surprised to see His Son had written 'LOVE YOU DAD.'

Ashamed of his action, the Next day the Father committed suicide...!!"

Message
Even though many moral can be derived from the above story, a message is crystal clear. Don't ASSUME things and always ASK what is the real INTENTION instead of getting furious.

$.1 pencil point is:
It’s not the Action that counts, but, practice looking at the Intention that triggered the action!. The deep intention of the boy in the above story is to express Love towards his Father!.

Just by trying to understand the intention we can choose our furture steps creating a positive environment.

Your thoughts are welcome!

More SMS’s to come…

Special thanks to my colleague Praveen Babu for sharing this short story!

Thought for the Day!

Recently, I came across wonderful lines which touched me personally and wanted to share with you all. Many times be it in our professional career or personal life, we always just wanted to have immediate result and focus all our energy towards it, rather than looking at the BIG PICTURE! Here is a citation that is very simple to read,but, the message it conveys makes a lot difference to ourselves if digested to the fullest. (Reference - Tim Sanders Blog)

"...You need to get out of your Comfort Zone,Think Bigger about your future and get involved with something Bigger than Yourself..."

My $.1 simple question - How often we sacrifice our comfort zone and volunteer to take distinct challenges that would make difference not only to ourself, but also to others?

Few of us might already practice this,but, for the rest it's the time to flip-flop and move forward!

Let’s start Communicating!

The way we create a connection with the people is by using communication.
Communication forms as a powerful channel for two people to express their thoughts and share opinions. For many of us, the moment we say Communication, a picture of big iceberg forms into our mind. Then,breaking the ice becomes a difficult task. We create within ourselves an unimagined fear thinking of the past failures. Next time when we try to communicate, this past fear forms as a barrier for our communication. The result is we become cautious and march five steps backward for every single step forward.

A famous quote says, “Communication is not only the essence of being human, but also a vital property of life.” The only way we can talk with the other people is through communication. We do not communicate properly because;

We feel during communication our character will be revealed!
We feel we need to accept the others opinion!
We feel we might loss in conversation!
We feel we might end up in arguing!
We feel the other party is too small to communicate!
We feel the other side is always blue!
We feel our status quo will be lost!
We feel fear of ending relationships!
We feel we can’t think!
We feel our secret is revealed!
We feel fear of misunderstood!
We feel fear of rejection!
… And so on…

If Opacity is the measure of Transparency then, Acceptance is the measure of Communication. 100% Opacity signifies the sate of complete see through. In the similar fashion, the kernel of communication is our ability to practice judgeless acceptance. By being acceptable, you extend yourself to think from others point of view and start listening. We must listen to the people instead of listening to what we wanted to listen.

Rather thinking of breaking the ice, let’s practice Acceptance and start Communicating effectively with free mind and without fear.

Have a Great Week ahead!

Your thoughts and comments are welcomed…

Experience - A Fresh Look!

Experience and Expertise both form two sides of a coin. We use these 2 words very fairly without getting the inner significance. Most of the time, we say or affirm, Experience automatically results in Expertise. Let explore more...

Trying to understand meaning of the above 2 words, we would be able to pull out many definitions from Oxford dictionary, Wikipedia and other reliable resources. But, in simple term, we can understand:

'Experience is an outcome of an event' and 'Expertise is Learning from that event which causes change in behavior.’ Expertise comes alive from the Experience.

It’s interesting to watch by looking deep into the above perceptive. Both experience and expertise evolve out-off an event with significant differentiation factors namely, Learning and Change in Behavior. Now, let's consider a scenario illustrated below:

'A young child enters into the kitchen and finds a beautifully designed knife on the floor. Being attracted towards it, the child picks up and begins to play. While playing, she accidentally hurts herself in the finger and blood started oozing out. She immediately throws the knife, run towards her mother and takes medication…Again another day, she finds the same knife, again picks it up and starts playing. But, this time, she handles it very carefully and used it to cut papers and didn’t hurt her finger!'

The above scenario could be broken into the following pieces of information and correlated to:

§ The Event - Child playing with Knife

§ The Experience – An unexpected hurt while playing using knife

§ The Learning – Knife would cause harm

§ Child's Pre-behavior - Playing inattentively with the knife

§ Child's Post-behavior – Knife can be used to cut papers

§ Expertise gained – Being attentive

Here, considering the above child’s experience, she learns how to use a knife and gain knowledge of being attentive. In similar fashion, we encounter in our daily life such significant sources of unexpected events which mount into our experience and translate into our expertise. But, unless and until we recognize and experience those events, it will just remain as a ‘match stick without a spark.’

Many times, we consider ourselves as an Expert as our Experience enlarges. But then, stop now and move a step backward and ask ourselves, Did We Really Experienced an Experience?

Experiencing an Experience generates learning which in turn develops Expertise.

Let’s all try igniting our Match Stick this Weekend!

Have a Happy Weekend!