Sunday, March 20, 2005
Saturday, March 19, 2005
MM Hypothesis - We have to fail to succeed
There was an overwhelming response to the last column(Don't Hurry, Be Happy). Over a hundred of you wrote in to say it meant something to you - I was especially touched to hear from readers who confessed to being on the other side of 55. There seem to be enough of us who don't believe in the idea of 'sunset years'.
A few of you, ironically the younger among the lot, were sceptical. "All very well for me to decry soulless ambition," one young thing harrumphed, "but was it all just because I was successful? What if I'd been a failure instead - would I still feel the same way?"
Perhaps this is the core issue. The humongous fear in our hearts, built over years of conditioning that we should, at all costs, avoid the slightest possibility of being a failure.
How do I explain that every time I sit down at the keyboard, way past the deadline set by this magazine and stare at the blank document grinning maniacally back at me, I am petrified of not having anything meaningful to say? How then I wish I had a journalist's job, interviewing other people, collating their points of view and reporting on the news - so much easier (I think) than writing 700 words on, well, whatever comes to mind.
Failure is that little guy, sitting on my shoulder as I type this, casting a bored eye on the proceedings, seeing if I'll screw up again. Oh, and screwed up I have. I have failed as a columnist many times. I'm, perhaps, proud of only less than half the 50-odd columns I've written in the last two years. I certainly could have done better. But I've survived. And, perhaps, I'm missing the mark less often than I used to.
Or more often. I'm not sure. Heck knows I've failed often enough at stuff - I've been a mediocre vacuum cleaner salesman, written ads that sucked, taken decisions that came close to shutting down companies and putting people out of job, and even been dead broke several times in my life. But you know, it's okay. I lived through it. So did the others who were affected. We're all alive, and kicking.
Listeners at my talks come across and worriedly repeat the statistic that 95% of all new businesses fail - so am I being irresponsible in evangelising entrepreneurship? My favourite reply is that 100% of all human beings die, so should you bother with living?
Don't focus on failure - think a little beyond. Nobody dies of failure. The failed entrepreneur just gets up, and starts again. She may fall down yet again, but nobody stays down for long. Like Stallone in Rocky, we are all more than capable of that heroic feat of taking a blow and standing up again.
It doesn't matter if you're a winner or not in the world's eyes at the end. It will matter though - to yourself - that you stood up for what you believed in, and kept standing.
It is an old adage, but quite true, that nobody succeeds without failing. You've probably heard that Einstein failed at school, that Gandhi failed to make lasting peace in the subcontinent, that Tendulkar failed till a few matches ago, but you didn't take it to heart. Do so.
You don't succeed without learning. And you don't learn without failing, or making mistakes. Not only does failure not result in death, but it is also only failure that can make you grow. Only failure can help you live.
Why do magazines celebrate success? Will it not be more inspiring to celebrate failure?
Here's something to be more scared of: if you've been 'reasonable' like you were advised to be, if you've assiduously avoided failure, perhaps, you haven't done much at all. If Galileo was reasonable like the Church asked him to be, if Gandhi was reasonable like the British had wished, we'd all still be living in the dark ages.
It's only the unreasonable, the unafraid to fail, who cause us to progress. Give that a thought. Be unreasonable, be unafraid.
If any of this means something to you, drop me a note. I'll know then that I didn't fail with this column.
A few of you, ironically the younger among the lot, were sceptical. "All very well for me to decry soulless ambition," one young thing harrumphed, "but was it all just because I was successful? What if I'd been a failure instead - would I still feel the same way?"
Perhaps this is the core issue. The humongous fear in our hearts, built over years of conditioning that we should, at all costs, avoid the slightest possibility of being a failure.
How do I explain that every time I sit down at the keyboard, way past the deadline set by this magazine and stare at the blank document grinning maniacally back at me, I am petrified of not having anything meaningful to say? How then I wish I had a journalist's job, interviewing other people, collating their points of view and reporting on the news - so much easier (I think) than writing 700 words on, well, whatever comes to mind.
Failure is that little guy, sitting on my shoulder as I type this, casting a bored eye on the proceedings, seeing if I'll screw up again. Oh, and screwed up I have. I have failed as a columnist many times. I'm, perhaps, proud of only less than half the 50-odd columns I've written in the last two years. I certainly could have done better. But I've survived. And, perhaps, I'm missing the mark less often than I used to.
Or more often. I'm not sure. Heck knows I've failed often enough at stuff - I've been a mediocre vacuum cleaner salesman, written ads that sucked, taken decisions that came close to shutting down companies and putting people out of job, and even been dead broke several times in my life. But you know, it's okay. I lived through it. So did the others who were affected. We're all alive, and kicking.
Listeners at my talks come across and worriedly repeat the statistic that 95% of all new businesses fail - so am I being irresponsible in evangelising entrepreneurship? My favourite reply is that 100% of all human beings die, so should you bother with living?
Don't focus on failure - think a little beyond. Nobody dies of failure. The failed entrepreneur just gets up, and starts again. She may fall down yet again, but nobody stays down for long. Like Stallone in Rocky, we are all more than capable of that heroic feat of taking a blow and standing up again.
It doesn't matter if you're a winner or not in the world's eyes at the end. It will matter though - to yourself - that you stood up for what you believed in, and kept standing.
It is an old adage, but quite true, that nobody succeeds without failing. You've probably heard that Einstein failed at school, that Gandhi failed to make lasting peace in the subcontinent, that Tendulkar failed till a few matches ago, but you didn't take it to heart. Do so.
You don't succeed without learning. And you don't learn without failing, or making mistakes. Not only does failure not result in death, but it is also only failure that can make you grow. Only failure can help you live.
Why do magazines celebrate success? Will it not be more inspiring to celebrate failure?
Here's something to be more scared of: if you've been 'reasonable' like you were advised to be, if you've assiduously avoided failure, perhaps, you haven't done much at all. If Galileo was reasonable like the Church asked him to be, if Gandhi was reasonable like the British had wished, we'd all still be living in the dark ages.
It's only the unreasonable, the unafraid to fail, who cause us to progress. Give that a thought. Be unreasonable, be unafraid.
If any of this means something to you, drop me a note. I'll know then that I didn't fail with this column.
MM Hypothesis - Don't Hurry, Be Happy
I've spoken at well over 25 colleges in the last year, and I see this strange phenomenon. Our best and the brightest are in a hurry to go places - and worrying themselves insane about making the right career decision.
One of my students called a few months ago saying he hated his job. I asked him why; after all, it was from college placements. He said it was the highest paying job offered and with an overseas stint - he couldn't imagine not taking it up. He was, in fact, proud that he had 'won' it. I then asked him what he wanted to do - and it was something completely different.
All I could tell him was that he would be happier if he followed his heart - and that it was more important to trust your gut than your designation, location or paycheque.
I can't blame him. I was victim to what I call this 'ambition' syndrome. Each of us is taught that we need to have clear, specific goals - and that we should do our best to attain them. I was no different. A long time ago - or so it seems - when I'd settled down in advertising after a few false starts (trial-and-error, as I called it), I decided to prove things to everybody by having 'ambitious' goals. I secretly aimed to become a creative director by the time I was 28 and to run an ad agency by the time I was 30.
As things came to pass - I did become a creative director by 28 and, two years later, ran an ad agency - that too in the US, having started off in India. I thought I should be incredibly happy.
Surprise. I felt empty. The world didn't change. The sun still rose in the east. People still treated me the same. If that ambition was the purpose of my life, it suddenly felt completely meaningless. By focussing on the 'destination' and working insane hours and driving myself crazy to get there, I felt life had gone by in a blur. I suddenly felt 30 and old.
It came to me that carrying on further on this path (I had thought I would then set goals like earning my first million by the year X and so on) would make life even more meaningless.
Now your mileage may vary, but I decided to change. I consciously said I would forget about the 'destinations' and try enjoying the 'journey' instead. Out went targets and ambitions, in came simple things like enjoying every moment, seeing beautiful places, making room for serendipity and actually getting to know people. Some years later, my wife and I had a baby, and this belief only got further cemented. I was sure I wanted to be at home with him - and not go off tromping to work every day.
Perhaps, I've been inordinately lucky - but in the eight years since I made this call, I've had the time of my life. I've done different things: design front-ends for Yahoo! and Amazon, think-up programmes for a youth channel, pick VJs, create software, write ads, start companies, sell companies, help entrepreneurs and even write a fun column like this. All mostly from home. I'm not sure I could have consciously planned and been ambitious about any of it. The rolling stone didn't gather moss - but who the heck wants moss on oneself?
I can't imagine retiring and doing nothing, toodling around in a garden. Neither can any of the young people I speak with. Here's my belief - you're going to be doing something productive till you're well into your 70s. And if you're starting out today, or even in your 30s, that means you have another 40 or 50 active years ahead of you.
My point is simple - what's the darn hurry to get anywhere? We all end up in the same place anyway - I understand there's a 100% probability of death for all human beings, regardless of monetary wealth. All you have are your experiences. Why not make your mistakes, enjoy the ride, smell the flowers, explore all your abilities and discover new ones?
Back to my student - he called again a month later, said he'd changed lines, and was ecstatic. With due apologies to believers in reincarnation, I think this is the only life we have. Can we make the most of it?
One of my students called a few months ago saying he hated his job. I asked him why; after all, it was from college placements. He said it was the highest paying job offered and with an overseas stint - he couldn't imagine not taking it up. He was, in fact, proud that he had 'won' it. I then asked him what he wanted to do - and it was something completely different.
All I could tell him was that he would be happier if he followed his heart - and that it was more important to trust your gut than your designation, location or paycheque.
I can't blame him. I was victim to what I call this 'ambition' syndrome. Each of us is taught that we need to have clear, specific goals - and that we should do our best to attain them. I was no different. A long time ago - or so it seems - when I'd settled down in advertising after a few false starts (trial-and-error, as I called it), I decided to prove things to everybody by having 'ambitious' goals. I secretly aimed to become a creative director by the time I was 28 and to run an ad agency by the time I was 30.
As things came to pass - I did become a creative director by 28 and, two years later, ran an ad agency - that too in the US, having started off in India. I thought I should be incredibly happy.
Surprise. I felt empty. The world didn't change. The sun still rose in the east. People still treated me the same. If that ambition was the purpose of my life, it suddenly felt completely meaningless. By focussing on the 'destination' and working insane hours and driving myself crazy to get there, I felt life had gone by in a blur. I suddenly felt 30 and old.
It came to me that carrying on further on this path (I had thought I would then set goals like earning my first million by the year X and so on) would make life even more meaningless.
Now your mileage may vary, but I decided to change. I consciously said I would forget about the 'destinations' and try enjoying the 'journey' instead. Out went targets and ambitions, in came simple things like enjoying every moment, seeing beautiful places, making room for serendipity and actually getting to know people. Some years later, my wife and I had a baby, and this belief only got further cemented. I was sure I wanted to be at home with him - and not go off tromping to work every day.
Perhaps, I've been inordinately lucky - but in the eight years since I made this call, I've had the time of my life. I've done different things: design front-ends for Yahoo! and Amazon, think-up programmes for a youth channel, pick VJs, create software, write ads, start companies, sell companies, help entrepreneurs and even write a fun column like this. All mostly from home. I'm not sure I could have consciously planned and been ambitious about any of it. The rolling stone didn't gather moss - but who the heck wants moss on oneself?
I can't imagine retiring and doing nothing, toodling around in a garden. Neither can any of the young people I speak with. Here's my belief - you're going to be doing something productive till you're well into your 70s. And if you're starting out today, or even in your 30s, that means you have another 40 or 50 active years ahead of you.
My point is simple - what's the darn hurry to get anywhere? We all end up in the same place anyway - I understand there's a 100% probability of death for all human beings, regardless of monetary wealth. All you have are your experiences. Why not make your mistakes, enjoy the ride, smell the flowers, explore all your abilities and discover new ones?
Back to my student - he called again a month later, said he'd changed lines, and was ecstatic. With due apologies to believers in reincarnation, I think this is the only life we have. Can we make the most of it?
Sunday, March 13, 2005
Good Will Hunting
"If I asked you about art, you'd probably give me the skinny on every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him. Life's work, political aspirations, him and the pope, sexual orientations, the whole works, right? But I'll bet you can't tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You've never actually stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling; seen that. If I ask you about women, you'd probably give me a syllabus about your personal favorites. You may have even been laid a few times. But you can't tell me what it feels like to wake up next to a woman and feel truly happy. You're a tough kid. And I'd ask you about war, you'd probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, "once more unto the breach dear friends." But you've never been near one. You've never held your best friend's head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I'd ask you about love, you'd probably quote me a sonnet. But you've never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn't know what it's like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn't know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms "visiting hours" don't apply to you. You don't know about real loss, 'cause it only occurs when you've loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you've ever dared to love anybody that much. And look at you... I don't see an intelligent, confident man... I see a cocky, scared shitless kid. But you're a genius Will. No one denies that. No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my fucking life apart. You're an orphan right? You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you? Personally... I don't give a shit about all that, because you know what, I can't learn anything from you, I can't read in some fuckin' book. Unless you want to talk about you, who you are. Then I'm fascinated. I'm in. But you don't want to do that do you sport? You're terrified of what you might say. Your move, chief."
The Shawshank Redemption
"I wish I could tell you that Andy fought the good fight, and the Sisters let him be. I wish I could tell you that - but prison is no fairy-tale world."
"The first night's the toughest, no doubt about it. They march you in naked as the day you were born, skin burning and half blind from that delousing shit they throw on you, and when they put you in that cell... and those bars slam home... that's when you know it's for real. A whole life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left but all the time in the world to think about it."
"These walls are kind of funny. First you hate 'em, then you get used to 'em. Enough time passes, gets so you depend on them. That's institutionalized. They send you here for life, that's exactly what they take. The part that counts, anyways."
"There's not a day goes by I don't feel regret. Not because I'm in here, or because you think I should. I look back on the way I was then then, a young, stupid kid who committed that terrible crime. I want to talk to him. I want to try and talk some sense to him, tell him the way things are. But I can't. That kid's long gone and this old man is all that's left. I got to live with that."
"I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can't be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free."
"I have to remind myself that some birds aren't meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright. And when they fly away, the part of you that knows it was a sin to lock them up DOES rejoice. Still, the place you live in is that much more drab and empty that they're gone. I guess I just miss my friend."
"The first night's the toughest, no doubt about it. They march you in naked as the day you were born, skin burning and half blind from that delousing shit they throw on you, and when they put you in that cell... and those bars slam home... that's when you know it's for real. A whole life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left but all the time in the world to think about it."
"These walls are kind of funny. First you hate 'em, then you get used to 'em. Enough time passes, gets so you depend on them. That's institutionalized. They send you here for life, that's exactly what they take. The part that counts, anyways."
"There's not a day goes by I don't feel regret. Not because I'm in here, or because you think I should. I look back on the way I was then then, a young, stupid kid who committed that terrible crime. I want to talk to him. I want to try and talk some sense to him, tell him the way things are. But I can't. That kid's long gone and this old man is all that's left. I got to live with that."
"I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can't be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free."
"I have to remind myself that some birds aren't meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright. And when they fly away, the part of you that knows it was a sin to lock them up DOES rejoice. Still, the place you live in is that much more drab and empty that they're gone. I guess I just miss my friend."
Fight Club
"We're consumers. We are by-products of a lifestyle obsession. Murder, crime, poverty, these things don't concern me. What concerns me are celebrity magazines, television with 500 channels, some guy's name on my underwear. Rogaine, Viagra, Olestra."
"Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who've ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."
"You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world."
"Everywhere I travel, tiny life. Single-serving sugar, single-serving cream, single pat of butter. The microwave Cordon Bleu hobby kit. Shampoo-conditioner combos, sample-packaged mouthwash, tiny bars of soap. The people I meet on each flight? They're single-serving friends."
worker bees can leave
even drones can fly away
the queen is their slave
"Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who've ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."
"You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world."
"Everywhere I travel, tiny life. Single-serving sugar, single-serving cream, single pat of butter. The microwave Cordon Bleu hobby kit. Shampoo-conditioner combos, sample-packaged mouthwash, tiny bars of soap. The people I meet on each flight? They're single-serving friends."
worker bees can leave
even drones can fly away
the queen is their slave
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