Bamboo In The Wind

It's a strange thing. Being present in the thick of the action and unconcerned about the surrounding.  We are completely unaware that we are at a distance from the hustle, trying to make sense of many things in one go. We experience quiet playback, randomly picking up signals, tuning into them, and turning up the volume. Is it intentional? Probably not. Are we drifting? Perhaps. All signals are intact, but we are unreachable for a moment. When invoked, we effortlessly assimilate into the surrounding, only to fall into oblivion shortly after. Is there a way to harness this state? If we entered oblivion with intent, it might mean context-switching on parallel thinking.  We can create space within us despite being in action. If we did, it might construe strength. An ability to go in and out of various bogies in a running train. The environment you experience in each is unique.  Finding a quiet, empty space for ourselves is such a powerful concept. Switch off noise we don't n...

There are instances where the evolution of our environment takes place without rules. There are no set patterns to follow, no restrictions, and no reward. Our experience depends on our attention, action, and comprehension of the results.  Actions continue or change based on how we understand the experience of carrying those out. If we feel happy and satisfied by performing the acts and if the results seem acceptable, there is a strong chance we might continue the actions. An unstructured environment thus brings an element of surprise, newness, and lack of discipline in many evolving natures of certain aspects of intense work areas. It reflects intensely busy yet inefficient transacting, interacting, and deciding methods.  It is so because it needs more structure in organizing the required steps for getting something done. It needs a system for decision-making. This work involves doing learning-tuning-repeating. The repeatability of results in such an environment is never guara...

You feel like being in the Wilderness when you are involved with something that is not your authentic self. We are governed by commonplace priorities that reflect society's norms. They are binding, restrictive, and hence imposingly adopted versions that you face friction with! In the long run, you can see everything going your way - family, office, career, recognition - and still be in the Wilderness. It's a vulnerable state to be in. It feels like a trap!  No matter how much fame and success we gain, the state of Wilderness is unavoidable. Traverseing through it needs reconciling with the difference you have developed between reality and expectations.  You must confront Wilderness hiding in plain sight with all your might! There is no use hiding from it!

Knowing we are back to our best is a terrific feeling! It stems from doing the things that matter. Being clear-headed helps avoid temptations. Saying NO to unnecessary distractions frees us to focus on what we want. Yet, it's hard to be like that. It is hard because we are perpetually biased to do better than o set our eyes on the competition and think we want to beat them. Focusing on competition is actually a distraction. Instead, concentrating on detecting our convictions does a whole lot of good. Beliefs are usually grounded in realities and based on our experiences instead of our biases.  Once we spot places of our convictions, we know we have gained a position of strength.  The strength makes us focus on fundamental needs rather than fashions, which are often pompous and short-lived! When we shed fashions, we are bound to back on the rise, calm and composed.

When we have pleasant experiences, it is usually because things look neat and tidy, spick and span. We are impressed with how things were organized, how expectations were set, and how the crew strived to deliver on those. We are also keen to see how we are handled when something unexpected comes across. Meticulously planning things to deliver something that changes things around us keeps us happy. More so when we see the care for what may go wrong. Because we then know you have built-in consideration for those affected by what you do. If that is our premise, it's only fair on our part to entrust you with the responsibility to give you a chance to serve. You may be starting out with rough edges around the corner. We know you will diligently plan and positively surprise us with your entire approach. And we know you will care to show understanding when you don't! That you will immaculately plan for us!

Many workplaces and institutional learning initiatives are set up to pursue the status quo. If we are willing to fit in, we are incentivized. Only if these places build an environment for exploration and learning from failures would it give rise to the boldness to pursue work that matters. These places are full of us. That means we must change how we think about setting up environments ourselves. Whether offered or not, we need to take charge and rely upon our ability to set challenging plots. Just wishing someone would do that for us won't cut it. This is why mustering the courage to express what we need and intend to accomplish is an essential trait.  Achievers know how to express much before they are seen to be achieving!

We resort to stopping any good action because of the story we tell ourselves. We can look at what we encounter with suspicion and find reasons that tell us how we will be robbed of freedom and taken advantage of.  Albeit,  being watchful safeguards our interests in the near term. It reduces cycles we spend on convincing ourselves of ways to avoid risks. And that is fair. The only caveat being it also brings a higher risk of constrained experience.  The more we learn from our surroundings with an open mind, the more opportunities for engagement it offers. It is bound to expand the horizon of our experience vastly. An open mindset has the potential to extract the best distillation of what we experience. It also attracts the best of our work!

The battle is between your adopted thoughts and those that emerge to you through your own discovery. The emerging thoughts involve stumbling into many unclear flashes and ideas. You discard many as superficial ones and segregate the lingering ideas that come back repeatedly to you at various times. These ideas come in front of you in multiple forms and shapes, but the underlying foundational thoughts relate to what resonates with you. We then begin to see the pattern. Once the pattern is clear, you find it easier to settle on the one that moves the needle inside you. Adopted thoughts, on the other hand, definitely excite you; they, too, engage you in constructive work and exploration. But what if they leave with the desire to tune into internal melody. What if they lack internal resonance? That is the inner calling we put aside due to resistance. We often only know we can face it once we find what we end up doing is not our first choice. And so, you must embark on a search for patterns...

Here is an example of the contrast in outcomes; a sample from the 2022 Soccer World Cup. When someone is adaptive over being rigid, there is a definite chance that will favor those who know how to adapt! There is much to learn from how Ronaldo and Messi ended their world-cup participation. The difference was in their approach. Ronaldo's conduct was out-of-tune with his understanding of his state as a player, and Messi's conduct was in-tune with his own. But that made all the difference in how they ended their prime time! Ronaldo, 37, flailed because he couldn’t adapt to his physical decline. He insisted on playing as if he were 10 years younger. By acting as if he was essential, he became superfluous. And in his final game, a flaccid defeat to Morocco, he came off the bench, contributed little, then left the field in tears -  without shaking hands with his opponents or consoling his bereft  teammates. It was a pathetic way to exit. That’s the counterpoint to Messi’s victory. ...

Often things we see, experience to learn about resonate with us. They do because we feel a connection with them. There is something inexplicable at first that looks relevant to us. We either feel happiness and excitement or get a sense of fulfillment. But we need to understand the reason for it. The reason we feel that way is because there is because we comprehend everything through a lens of our biases. The prior experience provides us the foundation of likes and dislikes. It gives us a reason to expect things to align with preferences we have built from experiences over the period. When we encounter a pattern of experience that matches our preference for what we have learned to expect, it places us in a comfort zone of knowing. We feel safe and balanced that new experience has ascertained our prior biases. When new experiences break that pattern, we are surprised. For, our horizon has just expanded. Our prior biases were shattered. The exposure to new uncertain territory is disturbin...