Being Mindful Will Certainly Make You More Charismatic

 

Practice Mindfulness in the Age of Mindboggling Complexities

Mindfulness is the quality of being conscious or aware of something. It can be defined as a mental state that is achieved by focusing one’s awareness on the present moment while calmly acknowledging and accepting one’s feelings and thoughts. It’s a basic human quality to be fully present and cautious of what’s happening around and how to respond to it.

Once a blind, old man was walking on a road. He had a lantern in one hand and holding a clay pot in another. One passerby stopped him and asked, “You are blind, day and night are same for you then why you need this lantern?” The old man replied, “The lantern is for you dear young man! So that you don’t hit me in dark and cause damage to my clay pot.”

To explain the importance of mindfulness I would like to quote the words of Viktor Frank1, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

Mindfulness is an innate quality that every human being possesses, we need not acquire or conjure it up; we just need to learn how to access it. It guides us not to overreact or being unnecessarily overwhelmed by what’s going on around us. When your jobs become Anxiety-provoking and the day-to-day happenings put a significant stress on you, mindfulness can help. Being mindful will certainly make you more charismatic; let’s learn how to practice it:

 

Mindfulness Means Making the Most of Your Abilities

Be mindful to what you can do and how to prove it, whenever given an important responsibility, always take care of making the maximum use of your abilities and let never others overpower your skills and strategies for the task. When Lord Krishna lifted the Govardhan Parvat, many people in Gokul came rushing in and supported it with their sticks. They had a misunderstanding that it’s their power that had lifted the mountain; Lord Krishna had only one tiny finger to support it. So be rational in utilizing your strengths and keep a check if people try to misuse it. Mindfulness allows us to improve our focus, it brings us back to the present moment over and over again, thus reducing the strain on our brain.

Being Mindful is Being Purposeful

During the pandemic we all have developed an ability to reflect and understand that every moment of life is precious and having a purposeful life turns these moments into immeasurable happy memories. A mindful living can win over instant gratification and drives you to gain self-knowledge. It helps you differentiate between the futile, superficial goals and your realistic goals which further propel you to go beyond your boundaries and rediscover your SELF. Being mindful enables you differentiate between your act due to anger and the one done with patience. 

Mindfulness Helps You Forget the Past

People waste a lot of time and energy feeling guilty or regretful about their past, they keep judging how good, bad, successful or failure they were at certain points in life. This hankering after past makes our life miserable and we find ourselves in a quandary. Mindfulness doesn’t mean stop thinking or reflecting, it means to pay a close and sincere attention on your sensations and EMOTIONS so that you can observe and analyze them and grab the solutions quickly and efficiently. Mindfulness makes you kinder to yourself and more caring to your well being.

Spare Your Mornings to Cultivate Mindfulness

We all know that practicing a diligent approach to mindfulness can do magic as it helps you create a short mental space between an event and your stimulus to respond to it. Morning hours are the best to work on it; because the mind is very focused, creative and expansive during that hour of the day. A 10-minute meditation can be of great help to channelize your infinite energy. Take a breath, feel your own breathing and be in the present moment before you proceed for your day’s activities. Stop multitasking as it is a pernicious myth which prevents us from attaining contentment and peace of mind. Never check mails in the morning neither pay attention to the pop up notifications as such practices keep your mind occupy all the time and reduces your productivity. Spend your mornings with you because none can be a better companion to you than yourself.

Mindfulness transforms us and teaches how we should relate to the events and experiences in our life. It changes our way of reacting on trivial issues and trains our mind how the important ones can be taken into considerations wisely and with a problem solving attitude. Problems and frustrations keep mounting when we don’t deal with them properly. Our habit of making judgments on every day to day’s problem drags us into the pit of sorrow and regret. This habit restricts our creative thought process and skillful responses. Cultivating mindfulness helps us pause and ponder over a situation, get a clearer picture of the situation, find the options to resolve the issue and respond with a poised demeanor.

Being mindful is staying strong and motivated in all situations; awards or appreciation- neither to boast about if received nor to sulk if not. It encourages you to select your responses wisely and make calculated choices instead of ending up to irrational and impulsive acts and decisions. Let’s learn to be less reactive and more in tune with the present.

Your Success is a Sum of Many Known and Unknown Contributions

Be Thankful to Those Who Contribute to Your Success

In the final battle of Mahabharat, when Arjuna and Karna were opposite to each other, displaying their skills of archery, each of them was sure of his win as they were incredible and invincible warriors. As Arjuna would shoot an arrow, it hit Karna’s chariot with a fierce speed and the chariot was pushed 25-30 feet back. Not just the people around, even the Gods from heaven were amazed to witness ARJUNA’s skills and his extraordinary powers.

Karna was no less than his formidable opponent, when he shot to retaliate, Arjuna’s chariot would shake and go back 3-4 feet. Krishna was so mesmerized with Karna’s archery skills that every time when he hit Arjuna, Krishna applauded him wholeheartedly but he never admired Arjuna, not even a single time.

At the end of the day, Arjuna was angry and felt agitated over Krishna’s partial behaviour and couldn’t hold himself for longer to ask, “O Lord, my arrows shook Karna’s chariot and displaced that more than 30 feet every time and he couldn’t move me significantly, yet you praised him a lot and not appreciated me even once." Krishna smiled and replied, “Hey Parth! How can you forget that your chariot is protected by the Mighty Hanuman, you have me as your charioteer to guard you against any attack and Sheshnaag at its wheels to strengthen it, yet the whole chariot would shake and displaced at every shot of the valiant Karna so why shouldn’t I appreciate his valour and skills?”

It is said that when the battle got over, Krishna refused to get off the chariot and he forced Arjuna to leave it first. As soon as Krishna left the chariot it caught fire and charred to ashes. Krishna concluded this as: "O Arjuna!, you don’t know, your chariot was destroyed by the arrows of Karna, a long time ago but I kept it intact so that you can continue the battle. But never forget that you alone could never win this battle, you must never have the arrogance to boast about your bravery and skills, never think that you have achieved great heights; if you have really achieved something it’s all because of the divine contribution and the contributions of your well wishers that always guarded you, cleared your path and provided you with the right opportunities at the right time”

This story and conversation of Krishna and Arjuna are still relevant in our day to day life and associated with every small or big story of success. But, ironically the moment we take a step higher, we forget the previous step taken, we forget that there were many behind us who pushed and supported us with a little extra force so that we don’t stumble while taking a leap higher. We ignore the importance who knowingly or unknowingly,  intentionally or unintentionally, took pains to make us happy and to clear our roadblocks.

Gratitude is the most powerful universal phenomenon that can brim you with joy and abundance yet, most often overlooked. We forget that when we were struggling hard to achieve our goals, someone had offered his/her shoulder to let our head rest on, someone was there to say, 'Don't worry, every thing will be fine', there were many who clapped for our efforts and there were smiles in galore to celebrate our victory.

Never Forget the Good Deeds

It’s important to remember and revere whatever good done to us by others, whether a small or a big one, our people contributions holds a great significance in our life and what we can do in return is just a moment to acknowledge and appreciate their support and concern during the period when we were grappling with the hardships in our life. People often forget the good deeds done to them and take pride in their own self without being grateful to those who contribute to their success. And this self pride eventually throw  you into oblivion of all those known and unknown contributions to your life. Make introspection a daily habit and enjoy the world of goodness around you. When you look within, you find that your success is a sum of many known and unknown contributions of the people around and they leave no stone unturned to make your life worth living. 

Interesting Read: Life of Maharana Pratap

Thanks Giving is the Best Virtue

If we acknowledge and express our gratitude to every minuscule contribution made by others to support our journey of excellence, it fortifies our potential and powers to achieve the unsurmountable. The practice of thanksgiving has tremendous benefits on your intellect the quality of LIFE. No pleasure can soothe you if you are clouded by conceit and angst, no victory can glorify your courage if you don’t accredit it to the sacrifices made by many. The pursuit of excellence and happiness is the sole aim of each human life and we often tend to forget spare a minute and say thank you to those who contribute to our success. Thanksgiving always help us to connect to our larger and stronger self. It makes every day of your life like a festival that you celebrate with fervor and zeal.  

In the words of Khalil Gibran, "Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruits." And to experience this love let's cultivate the virtue of thanksgiving. Let's spare a little time to appreciate the efforts of others that made our life fulfilled. Let's never forget that our success is a sum of many known and unknown contributions.

Obstacle Can Never Be A Barrier Until You Make it One

Obstacles Are Not Barriers in Your Life

An obstacle can never be a barrier until you make it one, and the struggles, efforts and achievements in the life story of Bhavya Jain proved the same.

Bhavya Jain, 36,  son of an advocate, was a bright student throughout his school years and wanted to become a Judge. To fulfill his ambitions he chose to pursue law. He was self motivated and determined in his pursuit but suddenly things start falling apart when he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, a mental health condition causing mood swings. He was only 25 then, and his life took an unexpected turn which was extremely agonizing for him and his family. Today, talking about mental health is not a taboo but during those days, in the year 2010 it wasn’t as easy as it seems today. Bhavya’s battle with his mental health and the pressure of his dreams left him swinging between hope and despair. He decided not to quit, not to surrender to the obstacles and passed his LLM as one among the toppers. He continued his hard work and efforts to finally clear the Delhi Judicial Service Examination after eight years, in the category of persons with disabilities. Yet, the challenges weren’t at cessation, he was declared unfit to discharge his duties by the high court administration. And it took him three more grueling years to fight and win the legal battle when the Supreme Court allowed him to join his service.

This inspiring and heart touching story of Bhavya Jain narrates more than what it comprises. The terrible years that he passed while grappling with his health issues and his aspirations weren't easy and none of us can imagine what he must have gone through in accomplishing what he had yearned for. But ultimately when he won everything, it was clear that obstacles can have a fleeting impact but aren't insurmountable. They teach you that there’s nothing wrong in feeling low when you are passing through hard times and feel incapacitated to see so many obstacles blocking your way. We may encounter health issues, financial and relationship problems, but most often these obstacles arise from our mind and during such difficult times, all we need is a shift in our thinking; the thinking that reinvigorates our strength and efforts to prove that obstacle can never be a barrier until you make it one.

 

Obstacles Are Opportunities in Disguise

An obstacle is always an opportunity in disguise, if you grab and succeed it’s an achievement if you fail it turns out to be a learning lesson. So both the ways obstacles play a very important role in our life, the fear of failure ensures only one thing and that is failure itself, so keep moving forward despite the challenges and obstructions on your way. Develop a conviction that whatever you dream, is achievable and learn to think about what you can do instead of what you cannot. Neither we can control the obstacles nor the circumstances; we can only control our attitude towards them. If you treat obstacles as opportunities to prove your potential, you will emerge as a winner so have an unshakable faith in your hard work and efforts.

Maintain Your Emotional Equilibrium

Obstacles harm our emotional health and expose our weaker and vulnerable side to the world. Our actions and decisions both get badly affected causing a smaller hurdle turn into a bigger one and we end up in misery. It’s very important to maintain your equipoise because a strong Emotional Immunity provides you the best and creative solution to all your problems. Lack of morale and composure can overpower determination and one may gravitate to one’s own fall. Be resilient to face these hurdles and make yourself a warrior, not a worrier because your worries will not change your destiny but the warrior in you can certainly do it.

Audit Your Capabilities

Knowing yourself is very important to overcome any challenge and tunnel through the obstacles. Your self-assessment can be of great help when you deal with hardships in life. Talk to yourself and analyze your strengths, weaknesses and areas for development, it will prepare you to battle hard and attain facile victory even in the worst situations. When you don’t audit your capabilities and make resolutions they peter out soon because you don’t have good propensity to come out of your Comfort Zone and breaking your own boundaries so if you wish to be prepared for challenges, audit yourself and know your abilities.

Stop Complaining Start Appreciating

Learning the art of appreciating every small thing in life empowers us to not get influenced by the vagaries of mind and emotion during hard times and galvanizes our senses to face the wrath of obstacles in our day to day life. Appreciating the good around you and being grateful to the little things in your life channelize your attention to what nurtures and sustains you in life, it makes you understand one thing very clearly no good or bad can be controlled by you but you distinguish that good is to be appreciated while the obstacles need to be dealt with an iron fist. It instills a positive mindset that eventually bolsters your morale and refrain you from having a jaundiced view of life which usually happens when frequently confronted with obstacles and hardships in life.

Smaller or bigger, obstacles are the inevitable reality of everyone’s life; we all have them, face them and rise above them. These unparalleled challenges do not determine our life; our own interpretation about them, does. You cannot always get what you like so learn to like whatever you get. The obstacles are the best teachers in your life, they teach you your real worth and train you to endure and handle your life with Perfection while passing through the fire of tough times. Obstacles fall your way to enrich your life with experiences and achievements; remember the words of Helen Keller, “Life is either a great adventure or nothing”, Helen who, despite being blind and deaf, wrote her life story with golden words while fighting and conquering the infinite challenges on her way. 

You can only hold your Happiness and persevere, you can’t change the circumstances, you need to wade through them so the moment you consider them as barriers they start consuming you and if you resolve to be resilient against them you overcome them. 

Decision-Making: One of the Most Important 21st Century Skills

 Why the Ability of Decision Making is very Important in Life

Every day our life's platter serves us myriads of confusions and dilemma and every moment of our day we are rattling our brains to make some or the other decision. Our decisions can be related to simple daily choices or for Long Term plans to give a new definition to our life. These decisions can vary from petty issues like what to wear or what to have in lunch, to the bigger events like what course to pursue, which career to choose or whom to marry. Some people take quick decision and some take a long to research, mull over and finalize something in their life. Some even approach their friends and family to seek advice before taking a decision. Many resort to decision making by choosing a slip or tossing a coin and sometimes praying God for a cue to decide on something. We all are different in our decision-making ability but let's never forget the fact that everyone is born with unlimited potential and the ability to unleash that potential, to make a plus from a minus and the skill to draw a bigger line can only be cultivated when we are strong enough to make good decisions in our life.

A Good Decision Can Change Your Whole Life

Before we move on to the nitty-gritty of this complex yet one of the most important 21^st century skills let’s get to read an inspiring story about how decision making can transform a life.

Gulfam Ahmad, stricken by polio at birth, made a decision for himself that he would not depend on others due to his disability. It was a dismal beginning of the life of a family’s fifth child and their hope to find a cure for the ailment of their son brought the family to Delhi from a small village, Bijnor in UP. Gradually they accepted the fact that Gulfam would remain unable to walk for the rest of his life. But Gulfam’s choices and decisions were different for his life- the sight of a broken gate of school compelled him to venture into the building and watch the students over there. One day the school principal spotted him and readily agreed to admit him. It was an auspicious beginning for a boy of 8 but so many obstacles were yet to be tunneled through. At the age of 16, he made one more decision; the decision to join a gym and transform his body just like his favorite Bollywood star, Salman Khan. There he got a chance to meet a powerlifting coach and was introduced to the world of sports for people with disabilities. Here again, he decided to rewrite his destiny and since then the journey became a never ending process, he participated in many national events like wheelchair racing, power lifting, Taekwondo and organized scooter-rides for the differently-abled people.

In 2013, Gulfam made one more decision, to undergo a surgery so as to end his life’s years of crawling. He lived the glorious moment of his life when he won the title of Mr. Wheelchair India 2015, became a superstar and inspiration for many. He is a model, athlete, motivational speaker and a true fighter whose decision making power made him a real hero, whose decisions gave him the power to persevere despite overwhelming hurdles.

What is Decision Making

Decision making is one of the most important 21^st century skills which shows your expertise in choosing the best out of two or more alternatives. It’s a complex process of analyzing the information and options and set priorities for you. You have to navigate the risks and uncertainties before anticipating positive outcomes and consequences.

Why Decision Making is Important

How a good decision changes a precious human life, we have already read; decision-making inculcates reasoning, it trains you how to reason with the present and plan your future, stay aligned with your instincts and remain committed to your goal. The ability of decision making go in coordination with emotional intelligence, it motivates you to be critically aware of your emotions and stay rationale with them. Your emotions serve as perfect foundation for this process and when amalgamated with logical thinking, they result into the best solution.

Be a Good Decision Maker

Everyone can become a good decision maker by improving upon a few things. You need to identify the situation, before you jump into the process of decision-making. If the situation is a prolonged one or recur time and again, you need to be firm and a little harsh to become decisive on the matter. In case you have more options, make a list of all potential solutions and their plan of action. Critically examine the merits and demerits of each option, if your life depends on that decision; just think of the worst outcome also. When you are ready with your analysis, speculate if it matches with your goals and interests and at last Trust Your Instincts to get the best decision. Always reflect back on the entire process before you pick the best one for yourself.

Never hesitate in approaching your trusted friends and sensible people who you can trust for anything, they will reduce the amount of this tedious task for you and choose the best for you. Decision-making ability is an ornament for leaders, it adorns them with creativity and creativity brings innovation.

Your goals and achievements all hinge upon your ability to take right decisions at right time and your success is the fruit that ripens and sweetens during the process of decision-making.

Fear of Failure Impedes the Fulfillment of Your Dreams

 

How to Overcome the Fear of Failure

“Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears.”

-Les Brown

This short line holds a very deep meaning and reveals most of the people’s life stories. Yes, most often people don’t live their dreams because they can’t stop living their fear which is a major road block in the way to success. Fear of failure impedes the fulfillment of your DREAMS; it snatches your freedom of making choices in your life and sneaks into your life to paralyze your determination. Let’s read a short story to get a deeper understanding of it.

Once a criminal was arrested and produced before the king for the judicial proceedings. After hearing the whole case, the king offered him two Choices of his punishment. The first choice was to be hanged till death and the second was to enter through a dark, scary, horrifying mysterious door. The criminal chose to die by hanging. When the scaffold was set and the criminal was brought near the noose, he was asked for his last wish. He turned to the king and asked, “I just want to know what’s there behind that dark, scary door.” The king laughed and replied, “I offer everyone the same choice and it’s surprising that everyone chooses the noose.” The criminal was now more curious to know what was behind the door and to this the king replied, “Freedom, but to my dismay the fear of unknown failure is more fearsome than death so nobody wants to go through the door, they do not try to overcome this fear and choose the noose.”

We all have fear, we feel fear, and it’s an emotion, a process of experiencing something, as simple as any other vital process of our life. The most dangerous of all fears is the fear of failure because it prevents you from doing something challenging. When fear of failure overpowers us we start avoiding struggle, become complacent and don’t like to come out of our Comfort Zone. Let’s read how to fortify your attitude to fight this fear and live your dreams.

Identify Your Fears

Fears are always baseless, irrational and illogical as they always stem from the imagination of ‘what if’ or ‘what might be’. Sometimes fear is aroused by a petty thought like; what others will think of me. Does it really matter, what others think about you? Come out of this fear as it doesn’t matter What People Think about you. It’s your life and you have to steer it the way you want to just focus on how to push your boundaries. Embrace your mistakes with a sense of pride do whatever frightens you.  If public speaking, stage performance or any other activity that arouses fear in you, try to engage yourself more and more as that’s the only way to overcome your fear. It’s very important to identify your fears, know them and challenge them that you are no more influenced by them. Be mindful of your plan of action and perform it without judging, criticizing or berating it.

Stop Overthinking about Future

Overthinking instills fear and inhibitions, when you overthink, you start worrying about the future that may or may not happen and often waste a lot of energy and time which could be better utilized in planning and preparation of an important task. Overthinking gives birth to fear and apprehensions and triggers a barrage of questions which you can’t answer. Overthinkers become like a leaking tap that can’t be turned off, one bad thought leading to another and the series continues till the whole situation turns into a real Conundrum. Feeling anxious about your future or thinking about it will do no good, except a bad mental health and fatigue. Shift your thought process from tiring yourself to finding solutions and pull yourself from the loop of overthinking. Focus on your present because future starts now, not tomorrow.

Circumstances are not Stumbling-Stones

Many believe that if circumstances favor them they can achieve their goal. On the contrary, it is not the circumstances that make you a winner or a loser, but your fearlessness that determines your destiny. You need to see these circumstances through the prism of wisdom and awareness so as to Transform Adversities into Opportunities.  Let’s never get shaken by the unwelcomed events and circumstances in your life, they hold their own importance; they occur to teach you the best lessons of your life and how to keep moving despite the turbulence. Just ponder upon the quote by Samuel Smiles: “It is not ease but effort, not facility but difficulty that makes men. There is, perhaps no station in life in which difficulties have not be encountered and overcome before any decided measure of Success can be achieved. Those difficulties are, however, our best instructors, as our mistakes often form our best experiences.”

Give Your Best and Accept the Result

Let us resolve to quell the challenges on our way and be unshakable within. When you put in your hundred percent and do all the necessary preparation, you feel confident and this confidence is very important to kill the fear of Failure. Focus on the task, not on the results because thinking about the results always makes us dubious of our abilities and takes a toll on our confidence. Comparison peters out your zeal and motivation, seeing somebody outperforming exacerbates your fear and anxiety so never let your confidence plummet by comparing yourself with others. Learn to compare you with your previous version, it will boost your morale and galvanize your efforts. Be true to yourself, give your best and accept the result.

 

 

The greatest treasure of human life is its fearlessness; fearlessness helps us venturing into the unknown and heralds the advent of fame, fortune and accomplishments. That is why until we liberate ourselves from the clutches of fear we won’t be able to live our life at its fullest. Know your potential and overcome your inhibitions. Have fruitful conversations with positive and erudite people. Strength and support of your family always stands out as beacons of hope and can shoo away any fear from your mind, spend time with the people you feel happy and positive with, it will help you develop a never say die attitude towards the dreams and goals of your life. Be proud of your impeccable capabilities and be aware of your weakness that will definitely turn the trajectory of your life and make you the Game-changer.

Welcome A New Year of Hope, Aspirations And New Skills

2022: A Year of Hope

The year 2021 has been a year of grief, loss, unpredictability and emotional turmoil, yet I would like to place hope above all the crushing realities of this annus horribilis. Amid the sense of disruption and misery, there’s a joy of triumph also associated with this year. India, when became the biggest vaccine manufacturer in the world and achieved the target of hundred crore vaccination in the year 2021, we knew we could bounce back even after the greatest fall. Our country’s 100 years’ wait for a Gold in Olympics got over when Neeraj Chopra threw his javelin to rewrite the history of Indian sports and to add more glory to our glorious nation. Every Indian felt elated when Harnaaz Kaur Sandhu, a girl of small town with bigger dreams and aspirations, was crowned Miss Universe amidst thundering applause.

The year 2021 witnessed radical changes in many sectors- education, wellness, sustainability, technology, women entrepreneurship, healthcare, sports, and business but the education system embraced the changes and challenges unfolded by the new normal at a greater speed. The entire education fraternity across the world was so agile in adapting the new normal mode of education. Now, everyone knows that without the set of new skills that includes resilience, Grit, Determination, adaptability and self-reliance, none would be able to sustain in this world for a longer term. The disruption caused by the global pandemic would definitely come to a cessation but at what cost we weren’t aware of so we kept moving ahead with learning, unlearning and re-learning. The morale of many professionals has ebbed due to the havoc caused by the pandemic yet the fighting spirit and urge for sustenance introduced a crescendo in many organizations and a paradigm shift in almost all spheres of life.

The Skills that Redefine Your Course of Life

The seclusion and WFH culture over the past two years have accentuated the importance and need of soft skills; now for professionals, it’s not just the degrees or talent that works but many more aspects of personality hold equal value in one’s professional and personal growth. We all have grappled a lot to accommodate ourselves in this new normal life, and we succeeded also but for a smoother ride on our career path and to catapult our growth graph we have yet to master many skills like; leadership, teamwork, collaboration, compassion, coordination, communication, innovation, empathy and the list is endless. Apart from all these there’s one more issue that needs a deeper understanding; having a wider humanistic perspective which teaches us to look at the positive aspects of everyone and to imbibe the virtue of magnanimity, forgiveness, and reconciliation.

 

Empathy and Inclusiveness

In today’s fast-paced society, everyone has become so self-centered that it feels really difficult to empathize with the people around us especially in the backdrop of Covid pandemic. Recently I chanced upon a quote which intrigued me and that goes as, “I am a person through other people. My humanity is tied to yours.” This quote explains the essence of being a human and how empathy and inclusiveness are two important aspects of any individual. We all are one and interconnected and whatever we do, we think, affects the surrounding, as the butterfly effect propounds, ‘one can’t remove a sand particle from its position without changing the other parts of the immeasurable whole’, which is absolutely relevant for the whole of mankind. The feeling of inclusiveness focuses on creating an environment where everyone is important despite their differences, it ensures that people with diversity can walk together, work harmoniously, contribute confidently, yield better results and add value to the system.

 

Interesting Read: How-To-Become-A-Learner

Let Others Feel Special

In this competitive and well connected era, everyone feels ignored, dejected and alone because social media has made people less social. Just think for a moment, do we actually listen to what others are saying? No, we just wait for our turn to speak, to reply because we are just hearing; when someone is talking, we are engaged with our mobile phones, we only keep it aside when we get a chance to speak. How awkward the situation is! A conversation is a two way process and listening is the most ignored aspect of this process. Avoid using mobile phones when you are sitting with people, lend them your ears so that you can reach to their inner self, understand what they are going through and communicate more effectively. Make them feel special that you are always there when they need your support. Make them feel heard because everyone is battling with some or the other issues of their life and the feeling of being ‘unheard’ can be devastating with the mental health of your near and dear ones. Listening to others makes you more empathetic and aware of their problems; and if you are a team leader you must try to bridge the communication gap with your team to make them more efficient, productive and loyal.

Appreciate Others and be Admired

Appreciation works as a booster dose for everyone’s mental and emotional well-being. It’s the best therapy that you can give to anyone at zero cost. Lack of recognition and appreciation hinders productivity and creativity. Learn to appreciate your colleagues, your family members, your friends and your teammates whenever they do something worth mentioning. Never wait for a big moment to clap for your people; it takes just a small moment to make someone valued and to instill more loyalty. Showing appreciation for others brings a sense of fulfillment and admiration to you as well so never be stingy in doing that, appreciate others and be admired.

Cultivate Optimism

Optimism makes you hope for the positive outcomes, it makes you have faith in yourself and your efforts; as quoted by Winston Churchill, “A pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity while an optimist finds an opportunity in every difficulty.” Optimistic people interpret the ordinary events of life in an extraordinary way and that keeps them always happy and cheerful. With this tendency, they become resilient to stress, are better equipped to embrace the unexpected and accomplish whatever they undertake.

Let’s fuel 2022 with hope, aspirations and new skills to chase our dreams, to expand the arena of our existence and be empowered enough to bring a change in our as well as others’ life. Let 2022 be the year when you give wings to your choices and dreams, when you attain all your resolutions and be the best of yourself.

 

This year, take out more time for your SELF, and your loved ones; life is unpredictable, make it a roller coaster ride, have fun in whatever you do, explore and reform your yourself. In the words of Mark Twain, “The two most important days in your life are the days you were born and the day you find out why.”

Would you like to find out in the upcoming year- which is the second most important day of your life!

Your Anger Can Transform Adversities Into Opportunities

 

Anger: A Human Emotion

We all have grown considering anger as a bad or negative emotion, in best of our knowledge. We feel good while talking about happiness, love, enthusiasm and achievements but talking about anger feels like something morally wrong or destructive and the reason is our social, cultural and religious beliefs often manifest anger as destruction and violence. So the youngsters are always taught to suppress or kill their anger and not to express it. In doing so, we forget that anger is a human emotion just like any other emotions such as joy or contentment but we never pay heed to its valuable impacts and benefits on human life and society as a whole. You get angry when you feel like things are out of place and that anger propels you to correct everything around you and motivates you to find solutions of the disorder and chaos in your life. You get angry when you see something wrong happening either with you or the people you feel connected to; your connectivity can be for people worldwide if you are an empathetic person. And it’s pretty natural to have anger, if you really care for your own being as well as others.

Anger Helps You Fight Your Fears

Your anger is the only weapon that can protect you from being subjected to any wrong. It helps you rise over all your fears. It makes you more informed and aware of your powers to help you adapt a better response. Anger is much required for survival and embedded in human mind to protect us and sharpen our focus. Whenever you feel threatened or attacked it is activated and drives you to fight back, act quickly and conquer the battles. Anger gives enough strength and aggression to overpower a stronger enemy and acts as a guiding force to fight our fears and transform adversities into Opportunities.

Anger doesn’t mean harboring resentment against people and waiting for the right moment to retaliate; anger is expressing and showing your disagreement and protest against the wrong. Often anger is mistaken for impulsive behavior, angry outbursts, holding grudges and accumulating bad thoughts. Anger instills optimism and give you bigger dreams to realize, it encourages you to have faith in yourself because whenever you are angry you think of channelizing your maximum powers against whatever angers you.

Anger Promotes Our Actions Against Injustice

It was the revolutionary Bhagat Singh’s anger that electrified a strong militancy in India in the 1930s and triggered a nationwide stir against the oppressive British rule. His anger to vindicate the honor of  a great nationalist, Lala Lajpat Rai, in fact the honor of  the  nation made him a hero in each and every town of Punjab as well as the rest of the northern India. His slogan, ‘Inquilab Zindabad’ still reverberates in every Indian heart and brims it with patriotism and love for motherland. It was the anger of Mangal Pandey that sparked the Indian Revolt of 1857 and united the whole nation to begin the fight against slavery and exploitation. When he felt his religious feelings were hurt due to the new cartridges, he didn’t hesitate in raising his voice against and spearheaded the ‘Sepoy Mutiny’ which eventually intensified the anger and agitation among Indians leading to the first War of Indian Independence.

Anger is triggered when you are denied justice or your basic rights. Anger helps you when to Trust Your Instincts and tells you something isn’t right and need to be corrected immediately. Standing up for yourself always makes you a victor, not a victim; your anger unveils the secret of your own power and determines how extreme you can go to fight against injustice. The people with a productive anger can only withstand the test of time as anger gives you the ability to wade through the unpredictable challenges of disrespect, humiliation and exploitation at both personal and professional fronts. 

Manage Your Anger Don’t Suppress It 

As we have already discussed that anger is a human emotion which can be empowering if managed well. Anything in excess is always bad and the same goes with anger. Anger releases a great amount of energy and if not used productively, it can be destructive. It can spoil your relationships and overall quality of your life.  Do you think you become impulsive when encounter such emotions? Or you breathe deeply and think about the possible solutions and take time to express your disagreement over that situation? It's very important to utilize the energy of anger while maintaining a calm and equipoise demeanor; which is considered one of the strongest social skills these days. If you can’t harness your anger, try to stay quiet for a while and escape the situation if possible. This respite will give you enough time to strategize your plan of action against the circumstances that trigger your anger . 

Remind yourself that getting infuriated is not going to fix anything, start honing your problem solving skills and be resolute and unswerving to your aims. Always remember, anger when released with violence and verbal abuse it vitiates its own powers and leave  one floundering. As Richard Davidson says, “Anger mobilizes resources, increases vigilance, and facilitates the removal of obstacles in the way of our goal pursuits, particularly if the anger can be divorced from the propensity to harm or destroy.”

To conclude, I would say, anger can make you achieve those heights in your career which your talent can’t so learn to harness the infinite energy of your anger and see it can do wonders.

Why Honour Killing in India Requires Urgent Reforms

Honour Killing: An Odius Crime

The recent heinous case of honour killing in Aurangabad, Maharashtra shook the society. The intensity of the rage was evident by the act of victim's younger brother who took selfies after beheading his pregnant elder sister and paraded the severed head of his sister in the locality. It was heart wrenching to know that his mother was the accomplice  in committing this brutal killing.

It was reported that a few months ago, the victim, Kirti, 19, eloped with Ajay, a resident of the same village and got married. When informed about their return to the village, both brother and mother of the victim went to meet her. She welcomed them wholeheartedly; little did she know what the motive of her mother and sibling was. While she was preparing tea and snacks for them, was brutally attacked by her brother by a sickle. Her mother grabbed her legs and the brother chopped her head off. The revenge was not yet over; neither it satiated their malice, the brother took the chopped head and showed it to her neighbors to prove that he had taught a lesson to his sister.

Another case of the same state narrates one more gruesome story when a woman and her husband were set ablaze by her father and other relatives as they were enraged on their inter caste marriage. She succumbed to her burn injuries and the man kept battling for life.

Is this the society we dream of? Is this the society we are proud of? And is this the development we are striving for where human rights have no existence and  personal choices and freedom of thoughts are meant to be crumpled under the feet of so called ‘honour’ of a family? Where atrocities on young couples are considered an important lesson for their decisions of marrying to a person of their choice, and everything is fair in the name of ‘HONOR’.

Honor killing is defined as killing for the sake of honor, a brutal killing that is awarded mostly to a woman or her partner by their own family members for getting married against their wishes. Whose ‘honor’ are we talking about? The honorable murderers or the orthodox elders who think that women’s prime responsibility is only to take care of her family members, doing the daily chores and carry the honour and legacy of the family by accepting the groom that they select for her. A girl of the family carries the dignity by not raising her voice against any wrong done to her while a boy preserves the honour by raising weapons, killing innocent and committing crime; such a wonderful parameter of “Gender Equality” in our society. 

The Factors Responsible for the Crime

In India, majority of caste members do not approve an inter caste marriage, any type of relationship outside their caste or within the same gotra is not allowed and this stereotype gives birth to outrage when young generation defies to follow such orthodox norms set by their elders. On the pretext of preserving the decorum and honour of the family; the crime takes birth. Not just the inter caste marriages, some other reasons like; losing virginity before marriage and tag of love marriage also contribute to such killings. To utter dismay, it can be a casual talk also. A dalit boy of 17 from a farmer’s family in Nagar district was beaten and strangled to death because he was talking to a girl of an upper caste. His body was found hanging from a tree in the village. The increasing cases of honour killing in the recent years is an alarming situation and mockery of the law, as per the data of National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), 251 murders were reported as honour killing cases in India and more than 300 cases have been reported in recent 3 years.

The barbaric murders in the name of honour not only violate human rights but infringe the integrity of institutions like police and judiciary also. The attitude of zero tolerance in caste matters is the prime factor behind these killings which are posing an impediment to our socio cultural growth and communal harmony. And that makes a strong reason why honour killing in India requires urgent reforms.

The Role of Khap Panchayats

Even after 75 years of independence, people of India are still victims of social evils like honour killing, Casteism and other violence in the name of communal and religious issues. In India, people still think caste is more important than life and under the fear of losing certain privileges of that particular caste; they choose to kill their own children instead of supporting them. Despite the rule by the Supreme Court that none can intervene in a happy married life of two adults, Khap Panchayats practice the ruthless administration in the villages where there is an absence of structured legislation and people are illiterate and not aware of their rights to freedom and constitutional rights to safeguard themselves from any kind of exploitation. Due to the inaccessible and fragile existence of law and order, these Khap Panchayats flourish in our country and still have the authority to declare punishments and settle dispute among them. These Khap leaders enjoy the power and supremacy by becoming the custodians of the honour of the entire clan and feel no hesitation in giving death penalty to those young couples who marry as per their choice.

A Ray of Hope

Many laws have been amended and government took strict action to curb this crime in Indian society yet we have to go miles. People need to understand the proverb stated by Justice Dipak Mishra, “Liberty, taking the word in its practical sense means the right to choose.” So it’s the need of the hour to change the perspective of considering caste and gotra above human life. Many NGOs have come forward to fight against this social evil and helped young couples.  They provide legal guidance, financial support and safe houses to these tormented couples. They even provide assistance for marriage solemnization and registration.

But will that suffice to curb this ghastly crime, certainly not; the problem is not with the generation gap and the freedom of choices, the problem is the mindset, the taboo which casts a shadow over the budding dreamers and beating hearts who just want a safe and happy life and a life partner of their own choice. Do you still think; they are wrong?

Let’s wait together for the dawn that will witness the cessation of such atrocities on innocent lives.