Speech Prowess of Chetan Bhagat

I came across this speech in one of the numerous forwards in my gmail and felt it was worth sharing here - A good article (or rather speech) by Chetan Bhagat. There are a few things in this speech which have a good positive effect on the mind (at least momentarily if not for all your life). Read and have a good thoughtful time - 

This was an inaugural speech given at Symbiosis. It might be a little longer, but is at least worth reading once!!

Good Morning everyone and thank you for giving me this chance to speak to you. This day is about you. You, who have come to this college, leaving the comfort of your homes (or in some cases discomfort), to become something in your life. I am sure you are excited. There are few days in human life when one is truly elated. The first day in college is one of them. When you were getting ready today, you felt a tingling in your stomach. What would the auditorium be like, what would the teachers be like, who are my new classmates - there is so much to be curious about. I call this excitement, the spark within you that makes you feel truly alive today. Today I am going to talk about keeping the spark shining. Or to put it another way, how to be happy most, if not all the time.

Where do these sparks start? I think we are born with them. My 3-year old twin boys have a million sparks. A little Spiderman toy can make them jump on the bed. They get thrills from creaky swings in the park. A story from daddy gets them excited. They do a daily countdown for birthday party – several months in advance – just for the day they will cut their own birthday cake.

I see students like you, and I still see some sparks. But when I see older people, the spark is difficult to find. That means as we age, the spark fades. People whose spark has faded too much are dull, dejected, aimless and bitter. Remember Kareena in the first half of Jab We Met vs the second half? That is what happens when the spark is lost. So how to save the spark? 

Imagine the spark to be a lamp's flame. The first aspect is nurturing - to give your spark the fuel, continuously. The second is to guard against storms.

To nurture, always have goals. It is human nature to strive, improve and achieve full potential. In fact, that is success. It is what is possible for you. It isn't any external measure - a certain cost to company pay package, a particular car or house. 

Most of us are from middle class families. To us, having material landmarks is success and rightly so. When you have grown up where money constraints force everyday choices, financial freedom is a big achievement. But it isn't the purpose of life. If that was the case, Mr. Ambani would not show up for work. Shah Rukh Khan would stay at home and not dance anymore. Steve Jobs won't be working hard to make a better iPhone, as he sold Pixar for billions of dollars already. Why do they do it? What makes them come to work everyday? They do it because it makes them happy. They do it because it makes them feel alive. Just getting better from current levels feels good. If you study hard, you can improve your rank. If you make an effort to interact with people, you will do better in interviews. If you practice, your cricket will get better. You may also know that you cannot become Tendulkar, yet. But you can get to the next level.Striving for that next level is important. 

Nature designed with a random set of genes and circumstances in which we were born. To be happy, we have to accept it and make the most of nature's design. Are you? Goals will help you do that.

I must add, don't just have career or academic goals. Set goals to give you a balanced, successful life. I use the word balanced before successful. Balanced means ensuring your health, relationships, mental peace are all in good order. 

There isno point of getting a promotion on the day of your breakup. There is no fun in driving a car if your back hurts. Shopping is not enjoyable if your mind is full of tensions. 

You must have read some quotes - Life is a tough race, it is a marathon or whatever. No, from what I have seen so far, life is one of those races in nursery school, where you have to run with a marble in a spoon kept in your mouth. If the marble falls, there is no point coming first. Same with life, where health and relationships are the marble. Your striving is only worth it if there is harmony in your life. Else, you may achieve the success, but this spark, this feeling of being excited and alive, will start to die.

One last thing about nurturing the spark - don't take life seriously. One of my yoga teachers used to make students laugh during classes. One student asked him if these jokes would take away something from the yoga practice. The teacher said - don't be serious, be sincere. This quote has defined my work ever since. Whether its my writing, my job, my relationships or any of my goals. I get thousands of opinions on my writing everyday. There is heaps of praise, there is intense criticism. If I take it all seriously, how will I write? Or rather, how will I live? Life is not to be taken seriously, as we are really temporary here. We are like a pre-paid card with limited validity. If we are lucky, we may last another 50 years. And 50 years is just 2,500 weekends. Do we really need to get so worked up? It's ok, bunk a few classes, goof up a few interviews, fall in love. We are people, not programmed devices.

I've told you three things - reasonable goals, balance and not taking it too seriously that will nurture the spark. However, there are four storms in life that will threaten to completely put out the flame. These must be guarded against. These are disappointment, frustration, unfairness and loneliness of purpose.

Disappointment will come when your effort does not give you the expected return. If things don't go as planned or if you face failure. Failure is extremely difficult to handle, but those that do come out stronger. What did this failure teach me? is the question you will need to ask. You will feel miserable. You will want to quit, like I wanted to when nine publishers rejected my first book. Some IITians kill themselves over low grades – how silly is that? But that is how much failure can hurt you. But it's life. If challenges could always be overcome, they would cease to be a challenge. And remember - if you are failing at something, that means you are at your limit or potential. And that's where you want to be.

Disappointment's cousin is frustration, the second storm. Have you ever been frustrated? It happens when things are stuck. This is especially relevant in India. From traffic jams to getting that job you deserve, sometimes things take so long that you don't know if you chose the right goal. After books, I set the goal of writing for Bollywood, as I thought they needed writers. I am called extremely lucky, but it took me five years to get close to a release. Frustration saps excitement, and turns your initial energy into something negative, making you a bitter person. How did I deal with it? A realistic assessment of the time involved – movies take a long time to make even though they are watched quickly, seeking a certain enjoyment in the process rather than the end result – at least I was learning how to write scripts, having a side plan – I had my third book to write and even something as simple as pleasurable distractions in your life - friends, food, travel can help you overcome it. Remember, nothing is to be taken seriously. Frustration is a sign somewhere, you took it too seriously.

Unfairness - this is hardest to deal with, but unfortunately that is how our country works. People with connections, rich dads, beautiful faces, pedigree find it easier to make it – not just in Bollywood, but everywhere. And sometimes it is just plain luck. There are so few opportunities in India, so many stars need to be aligned for you to make it happen. Merit and hard work is not always linked to achievement in the short term, but the long term correlation is high, and ultimately things do work out. But realize, there will be some people luckier than you. In fact, to have an opportunity to go to college and understand this speech in English means you are pretty damm lucky by Indian standards. Let's be grateful for what we have and get the strength to accept what we don't. I have so much love from my readers that other writers cannot even imagine it. However, I don't get literary praise. It's ok. I don't look like Aishwarya Rai, but I have two boys who I think are more beautiful than her. It's ok. Don't let unfairness kill your spark.

Finally, the last point that can kill your spark is isolation. As you grow older you will realize you are unique. When you are little, all kids want Ice cream and Spiderman. As you grow older to college, you still are a lot like your friends. But ten years later and you realize you are unique. What you want, what you believe in, what makes you feel, may be different from even the people closest to you. This can create conflict as your goals may not match with others. . And you may drop some of them. Basketball captains in college invariably stop playing basketball by the time they have their second child. They give up something that meant so much to them. They do it for their family. But in doing that, the spark dies. Never, ever make that compromise. Love yourself first, and then others. 

There you go. I've told you the four thunderstorms - disappointment, frustration, unfairness and isolation. You cannot avoid them, as like the monsoon they will come into your life at regular intervals. You just need to keep the raincoat handy to not let the spark die.

I welcome you again to the most wonderful years of your life. If someone gave me the choice to go back in time, I will surely choose college. But I also hope that ten years later as well, your eyes will shine the same way as they do today. That you will Keep the Spark alive, not only through college, but through the next 2,500 weekends. And I hope not just you, but my whole country will keep that spark alive, as we really need it now more than any moment in history. And there is something cool about saying - I come from the land of a billion sparks.

Thank You!

By Chetan Bhagat

Susmit Basu's IBNLive Blog - The rewards of bad behaviour

I loved this article. It came out yesterday (4th Feb 2010) and I read it more than 5 times at a go (not because I din't understand, but I just loved the fact he used simple situations of life to show how interconnected they are with the worst ones.)

As time will pass of, this link will be lost in the world of internet and so, I want to make it a permanent in my directory!!

You can read it here or simply click on the title to reach its actual source!! ( I am sure if you like the article he would appreciate your comments). This story (just like my previous blog of ant and grasshopper) is a very good take on how the world evolves from the worst situations. 

The Rewards of Bad Behavior

"A Well Behaved Child". Remember your primary school report card with those remarks by the teacher? Did your parents' faces beam on seeing the card? Probably not. They were more likely fixated on the B in English Literature to be bothered about recognition for good behavior (their concern shifting to who the best tutor could be to turn that B into an A+ in the next term). On the other hand, the really naughty classmate who had not wreaked as much havoc over the term as he was expected to ended up with a large bar of Cadbury Fruit & Nut from the teacher and relieved expressions on his parents' faces.

When you returned home, it was your demanding, misbehaved sibling who got all the attention, who had to be coaxed and bribed into silence. If you were the content, quiet one, you maybe got a smile and a hug from your folks. Little more.

This is the paradox of bad behaviour. It is always, in a sense, rewarded in a very tangible way. Good behaviour, on the other hand, is mostly taken for granted. Rewards, if any, are intellectual (and rather intangible).

It doesn't end with children. Just as infants discover the profits of throwing tantrums (even with the inherent risk of punishment), a lot of the grown up world does too.

Take the work place. It happens often that part of the work is grudge work which no one in the team enjoys doing. There is always that one colleague who, just like everybody else, does not like it, but who, unlike the rest, makes a veritable mess of it. He is no nincompoop, so you find it incomprehensible as to how he manages to mess things up. You think to yourself that when the time comes, your diligence will pay off, but when less tedious opportunities open up, this colleague is more likely to get a shot at them. The explanation you may get could sound like: "you're good at what you do, but he is not. We're just trying to put him in a role that works for him."

Such contradictions play up in other, more serious settings, such as geo-political conflicts. Militancy has flared up in Afghanistan over the past year with a resurgent Taliban. A large part of the population suffers on account of underdevelopment and unemployment. Some of the unemployed, on the promise of a livelihood may have turned to militancy, but most have not. Yet, the solution being shopped around these days by the Afghan government, with the tacit backing of some nations whose troops are stationed there, is to 'reward' the militants with jobs and cash if they lay down their arms. What does this mean to those who remained unemployed but did not join the Taliban?

Similarly, the financial crisis showed that a big financial institution could get away with all sorts of bad behaviour. If they had lived like high rollers, taken all kinds of unmanageable risks (read: gambled) and lost big, they would not be left to their fate but rescued (read: rewarded) with bailouts. Those institutions which had remained prudent during the bubble years, waiting for the impending doom of the gamblers, could only rue their double misfortune - once for not having lived like the high rollers and again in seeing the house come to the losers' rescue.

People inherently abhor confrontation unless there are immediate gains or the threat of grievous losses out of it, and this gives rise to the tolerance for bad behaviour/ the tendency to reward it. Hence, when confronted by unreasonable and belligerent people, we are more likely to give in to their demands than try to reason with them. Indian political parties have long understood this and have frequently resorted to bad behaviour as a means to realize their political goals, and as a people, we have time and again, given in to their tantrums and in all likelihood will continue doing so.

But, more later. It's time to switch on that reality show where everyone's always in a catfight. It's too enticing! Plus, I do not like that person who's always polite and courteous. She makes things so boring. I'm definitely voting her out today.