See with your Heart – Yawar Baig & Associates: Recent Episodes
Mirza Yawar Baig
Indeed 2024 has been full of cruelty, injustice and suffering. But it has also been full of courage in the face insurmountable odds, refusal to despair, faith in our Creator of a level that we had only heard stories about in the scriptures. We have seen people stand up against injustice in places that at least I would never have thought possible. True it is, that hardship brings out the best in some people and the worst in others. We saw evidence of both. That is why I decided on the tagline in my New Year card –
“Happy Another Chance to get it right.”
Truly that is all that we get. All that we will ever get. Not only every time the earth makes a circle around our sun. But also, when it takes a turn around itself. Another chance to get it right this time. Get it right for ourselves by understanding that the only way is by making it right for everyone else.
To do the right thing because it is the right thing to do. Because it is about us. Not about them. Not about anyone else. About us.
My dear friend and Sensei in Aikido, Julius Aib, sent me a picture of our class from 1994. Another friend asked me if I remembered any moves. I said that I did. But even more I remember the philosophy of being centered on yourself – living in the present always conscious of what you can do in the moment and doing it with total commitment. In Aikido there are no halfhearted moves. It is total commitment to the move, the stroke of the bokken or Katana. You win or lose based on the commitment of the move.
As we go forward into a new year, we have the opportunity to make a new world. The principles on which to make that new world are as old as time. That in a connected world, in any society, the welfare of the individual can only be achieved through the welfare of the collective. That is called kindness and compassion. That individual ambition must be redefined in terms of its effect on the collective. I can be happy only when others are happy. Anything else is called exploitation. It is the happiness of the vulture and the leech.
That in our world of cause and effect, peace is the effect and justice is its cause. To enjoy peace, we must establish justice. That until justice is established, any apparent peace is only a recess between wars. That what comes at the point of the sword or out of the barrel of a gun is death. Not peace. That we must change our role models and icons from conquerors of land and destroyers of people to conquerors of hearts and minds.
Values drive behavior and behavior drives results. Metrics are the best indicators of values. If you want to see what someone values, see what they measure. See how they define success. So, in this new year, let us examine our definition of success and redefine it to include peace, justice, harmony, and the welfare of everyone. Let us redefine the health of our society by the condition of the weakest. Not by the wealth of its most powerful. Define society by the number of poor and homeless with no access to education and healthcare, instead of by the number of billionaires and you will see how that will transform our societies. The healthiest, happiest, most noble society is the one in which no child goes to bed hungry. As J. Krishnamurthy said, “It is not a sign of health to be profoundly adjusted to a sick society.” We are very sick. We must cure ourselves before we perish.
I know that sounds idealistic. I am shamelessly idealistic. Every child is born an idealist. Every person begins life, work, marriage, or any stage of life, as an idealist. With a dream in their heart. With eyes shining. High energy, passionately wanting to change the world. Then life happens to them. And strike after strike, hardship, betrayal, and failure after another, their idealism gets dampened. They lower their standard and drop progressively from idealists, to optimists, then realists, then cynics, then pessimists, and finally, indifferent. The slide into oblivion. Into status quo. But the flame of idealism that they were born with is never extinguished, no matter how hard they or the world around them try. That flame will die only when the person dies.
That is the reason when you are idealistic, people will resist. They will tell you to ‘get real’ to ‘grow up’. They will ignore you, laugh at you, criticize you, fight you and then they will join you. They do all that before they join you because you remind them of what they had been like one day and your idealism forces them to face themselves and see what they did to themselves and how they allowed the flame of their idealism to fade. Not away, but fade. If they can shut you up; if they can dampen your flame, it justifies their actions in their sight and they can go back into their comfort zone living in echo chambers behind high walls, refusing to acknowledge their responsibility to drive change. But when you walk on, you don’t engage or fight back because you are too focused on your goal, that rekindles their flame, and they will join you.
In 2025, let us resolve to rekindle our flame of idealism, to invest in ourselves by investing in others, to work to change the lives of others because that is the only way to change our lives. Let us ensure that we do our best and use all our resources to ensure that nobody is left behind. As Mother Teresa said, “If you can’t feed a hundred, feed one.” Let us do whatever we can because the truth is that a day will come when we will stand before our Creator.
Then we will not be asked, “What happened?”
We will be asked, “What did you do?”
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It was December 1975. I was sitting on the steps of Cozy Corner, Aunty Mohini and Uncle Raj’s home, lost in grief. Grief that is fresh to this day, 50 years later. Aunty Mohini passed away on December 22. She had had cancer which she didn’t tell anyone about, apart from her doctor, my father, sworn to secrecy. She didn’t take any treatment, if there was such a thing in India then. And she passed away with the tremendous dignity and courage that she lived her whole life. An inspiration in death as she was in life. The last scene I remember was the day she died. She was in terrible pain. She asked for me and I went in to see her. There were many people in the room. Uncle Yadgar Chinoy was standing at the foot of the bed. My father (he was her physician) was in attendance. She looked at me and smiled, through that pain. She said, “Yawar Baba, take care of yourself.” I can still feel the pain in my heart. But I dared not cry. I can still see her lying there, her hair combed and dressed properly in a classy gown with a sheet covering her; in pain, but in control of herself with dignity and pride. No self-pity, anger, or frustration. No sign of any weakness. No sign of any fear. What a memory to have alive with me all these decades. What a woman!! How fortunate I was. It was an honor to have known her. To this day as I write this, my tears flow freely. After the funeral was over, I remember sitting on a low wall under the tamarind tree at the bottom of the garden of Cozy Corner with Uncle Rama (her brother and my dearest friend and mentor), knowing that life would never be the same, ever again. It wasn’t. But I hope that if Aunty Mohini could have seen me today, she would be pleased with what she helped to build.
I started with this story because that is where Aunty Ronnie came into my life. I had heard her name because she co-authored the book, ‘The Days of the Beloved’, with Aunty Mohini. I am a Hyderabadi and deeply interested in the history of my people. One of the heroes of that history was Asaf Jah VI, Nizam Mir Mehboob Ali Khan (Mehboob Ali Pasha) about whom the book was – Mehboob means, ‘Beloved’, which he was very much. But I had never met Harriet Ronken (Ronnie) Lynton. Aunty Mohini had told me that Ronnie Lynton was planning to come to Hyderabad, but she was not able to come while Aunty Mohini was still alive. But she arrived a few days later and was staying in Cozy Corner. That morning, I was sitting on the steps leading up to the front door, lost in my grief that I would never see Aunty Mohini ever again, when someone came up behind me and said, ‘Yawar, I think I know what Mohini meant to you. Will you allow me to take her place?’ I looked up to see Ronnie. I deeply appreciated that she understood my grief and so I smiled. That friendship grew and lasted for nearly 50 years.
An interesting side-note. One day several years after this first meeting, Aunty Ronnie and I were talking about the time that Uncle Rolf and Aunty Ronnie had first come to Hyderabad and said that they lived in a house in Masab Tank on the hill from the terrace of which they could see leopards on the rocks of Banjara Hills. When we joined the dots, I recalled going to that house when I was in St. George’s Primary School to attend the birthday party of my classmate and friend, their daughter Maya. I didn’t recall meeting Aunty Ronnie at that time, but obviously I must have done. Life is indeed strange and time flies. In the ensuing years I helped Aunty Ronnie with researching material for her book, ‘My dear Nawab Saheb’, about the life of Nawab Sir Salar Jung I, who was the Regent of the Nizam Mehboob Ali Khan. It was very interesting work, reading documents in the State Archives, meeting people and translating for Aunty Ronnie from Urdu to English. I would drive her around in Aunty Mohini’s iconic Indian black Ambassador car. Today as I write this, remembering Uncle Rolf and Aunty Ronnie, I am most grateful for having had the pleasure and privilege of their wonderful friendships.
In 1979 I went off to Guyana where I worked for Guymine Berbice Operations, for 5 years. I lived in a small mining town at the edge of the River Berbice, called Kwakwani, which the Amazonian rain-forest threatened to push into the river in an unwary moment. Five wonderful years running a whole town at age 24 and hunting and fishing on the weekends. Aunty Ronnie and I remained in touch through letters which took about a month one way but gave us each other’s news. They invited me to visit them but the US Consulate in Georgetown wouldn’t agree and so I couldn’t go. I finally got a visa, thanks to the intervention of my dear friend, Rev. Thurston Reihl, with his friend, Dennis Goodman, who was Assistant Consul General when I was returning to India in 1983.
Back in India I entered the tea plantation industry, a childhood dream come true, as Assistant Manager on Sheikalmudi Estate. I was a bachelor and lived alone but had a very good cook/butler called Bastian. Aunty Ronnie visited me there and Bastian did a decent job of ensuring that she was comfortable, and we had some wonderful meals. Bastian was a magician, especially with souffles and he plied his art with great gusto. I would see Aunty Ronnie after returning from work and we would eat dinner together and sit on the veranda in the night and talk about life.
On the weekend, I took Aunty Ronnie to the Anamallai Club. As you drive to Valaparai town from Sheikalmudi along the road passing through Uralikal Estate where the border of Valparai Coffee starts, on your left is a deep ravine. On the other side of the ravine in the scrub secondary forest, was a herd of elephants. I stopped the car and pointed them out to Aunty Ronnie. But for the life of me, she couldn’t see them. Until the herd bull decided to push over a tree because he was trying to get the succulent leaves in its crown. When the tree fell suddenly the herd became visible to Aunty Ronnie and we both marveled at the incredible camouflage of this enormous animal which can disappear at will into the bush, hiding in plain sight. We reached the club and a couple of hours later, after dinner, headed back the 30 kilometers in the night on windy estate roads. On the way we passed the ravine where we had seen the elephants and saw the most incredible sight. A synchronic flash of fireflies. Fireflies gather on vegetation in the forest and each one makes a tiny flash to attract a mate or to warn off predators. But when there are enough of them, in this case maybe a couple of million, and their individual flashes synchronize, the forest suddenly lights up as if in a flash of silent lightening. It was the most marvelous sight you could ask for. This is a rare occurrence and in the 7 years that I spent in the Anamallais, I think I must have seen the phenomenon only two or three times.
Later that year, I wanted to attend the ISABS Behavioral Science Lab in Jaipur and Uncle Rolf spoke to his friend Dr. Udai Pareek, who was the President of ISABS to allow me to attend the AHP Lab at a subsidized fee, thanks to my poverty-stricken state at the time. Udai was kindness itself and two years later was also my teacher when I was at the IIM Ahmedabad. I spent two weeks in the Clarks Amer Hotel and among the highlights was that I met Aroon Joshi who became another mentor. That experience set the course for my career and launched me on my journey to become a leadership trainer. It took me 13 years of working in a full-time job and spending every weekend and all holidays and every spare penny to acquire the experience and training necessary to be a leadership trainer. It took my wife’s total support and willingness to take the hardship to let me pursue my dream and in 1994, I launched ‘Yawar Baig & Associates’ in Bangalore.
In 1985 we got married. Aunty Ronnie gave me the best marriage advice in the world which I want to share with you, and you are welcome to share it with the world. The proof is that 40 years later we are still happily married. Aunty Ronnie told me two things. She said, “Your biggest challenge will be communication because you are strangers. So, develop your own special language that only the two of you will understand. That is a sign of love and intimacy and unique to you.”
“Secondly”, she said, “keep a notebook on a table which is accessible to you both and which you pass by many times a day. In that notebook, write all that you appreciate about one another and express your gratitude. And do it every day.”
“What about complaints?” I asked.
“You can write that also, but complaints are best spoken face to face. And only if it is at the level of a house on fire.”
Believe me, we had that notebook on a table in the hallway for many years. We don’t have it now because we don’t need it. But it was a lifesaver. As I said, 40 years is evidence.
What was remarkable about Uncle Rolf and Aunty Ronnie is how they treated each other. He treated her like his queen, and she looked at him with such honor, respect and love, that I can see that gaze to this day. In all the years I knew them and the many times they stayed with us, sometimes for long periods, I never saw them quarrel or mock one another or treat one another except with great caring and respect. They joked and laughed. They were two of the happiest people we knew. And the most dignified in every way. That is the secret of a happy marriage. Respect for each other, expressing love in every action, showing gratitude and laughing together.
Aunty Ronnie and Uncle Rolf visited us in Ambadi Estate, where I was managing a very large rubber estate and factory with militant communist labor unions. That is a whole different story which I have written about in my book, ‘In a Teacup’. The Lyntons visited us in Bangalore also and one of our beautiful memories is going to Cubbon Park in spring, when it is full of flowers. Over the years we remained in touch though not as frequently as I would have wished. I visited them in Fearrington, N.C when they moved into their home there. A lovely house with excellent light and an open airy design.
I learned many things from Aunty Ronnie and Uncle Rolf but perhaps one of the most valuable was the importance of documentation. Uncle Rolf was very particular about keeping detailed notes about his work and experiences. Their book about their experiences in ALOKA in Sri Lanka is a classic read which illustrates the value of documentation. Thanks to that I was able to write my books, The Business of Family Business, From India to the Indies, and In a Teacup. Another even more important learning was kindness. I can’t think of two other people who were kinder than they were.
The years passed and my last memory of meeting Uncle Rolf and Aunty Ronnie was when we had lunch at the Secundrabad Club. I got very busy after that with international travel and consulting assignments, and we lost touch, but of course they remained in our hearts. On March 18, 2018, Aunty Ronnie passed away, but we had no idea. I can’t imagine how this could have happened given the many common friends we have but there you are. We didn’t know. It was only when Uncle Rolf passed away in December 2024 and I asked how Aunty Ronnie was that I learned that she had passed away in 2018 at age 97. Uncle Rolf and even more Aunty Ronnie were my lifelong mentors from 1975.
Their friendship is a privilege that I will always cherish.
Finally, a piece of advice to you, the reader. As I wrote this, I wished that I had written this while they were alive and told them all these things. I can’t change that now, but if you have people in your life who you love and appreciate, don’t wait for them to die before saying it. Go and tell them now. And tell them that I sent you.
Rolf Lynton has led a remarkable life. Listen as he shares stories of some of his experiences.
The post Half a century of memories appeared first on Yawar Baig & Associates.
By the rays of the sun, by the light of the moon,
By the vast empty space and the stars that dwell therein,
By the rain and the snow, that help our gardens grow,
By the trees, by the fruits, by joys and sorrow,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
By the flowers in the Spring, by the dew on the rose,
By the Summer, by the colors of Fall, the herald of Winter,
By the music of the brook as it plays on the rocks,
By dark skies, by falling stars, by wisdom, by stupidity,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
By the life giving rain, by sunshine likewise,
By the dewdrop on the thorn in the light of the dawn,
By the fire of sunset, as it lights up another land,
By the bugle of the stag, by the beating of my heart,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
By dreams that came true, by dreams unfulfilled,
By prayers answered, sometimes in unexpected ways,
By prayers unanswered for which we thank you today,
By parents, by siblings, by children, especially teenagers,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
By the silence of the forest and the grandeur of mountains,
By the depth of the ocean, hiding treasures unknown,
By the fish, by the birds, by the Black-capped Chickadee,
By the Cardinal in the snow, by the waiting Blue Heron,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
By the Marlin as he rises on his tail and throws the hook,
By the song of the Loon on the night of the full moon,
By the storm, by the typhoon, by Covid, and still being alive,
By waking every morning, by sleeping every night,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
By a future that looks dark, promising a dawn very bright,
By our values, our compassion, our courage, by Islam,
By those who lift us when we fall and fight for us when we can’t,
We know You, we love You, we thank You and worship only You,
We know You O! Allahﷻ by Your Bounties, uncounted.
Mirza Yawar Baig
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Welcome to The Hope Forum
Imagine a desert. That is our world. A desert of hatred, suspicion, violence and despair. Imagine wandering in this desert, throat parched, fearing enemies all around, nearing the end of your strength and just as you think you can’t go any further, you see an oasis. That is The Hope Forum. It is an oasis in the desert.
What does an oasis have that the desert doesn’t? Life giving water, shade giving trees, fruit to eat, grass to lie down on and gaze at the sky through the fronds of the trees, listening to the birds singing, the croaking of frogs on lily pads and the occasional plop of the Kingfisher when he dives for the unwary fish. The scorching life sucking wind of the desert, cools down and becomes the cool breeze that’s now wafting over your face. That is what passing over water and does to it. It cools it down.
What else do oases do? They attract rain clouds. What’s the good of that in a desert? Have you ever seen a desert after the rain? For a brief span the desert blooms. The bleak, parched landscape turns overnight into a carpet of green and flowers. That’s not because flower seeds rain out of the sky. It is because every desert has in it, seeds of flowers. All it takes is some rain to make them grow. So eventually if oases grow and multiply – lo and behold – no more desert.
That is what we hope that “The Hope Forum” will do. Give sustenance and life to those exhausted of traveling in the desert. Let them drink crystal clear, clean, cold water; eat sweet fruits, listen to birdsong and rest on the grass. Let them meet. Listen to each other. And think of how to create more oases.
If we can do this together and if we can do this enough, then a day will come, when people of the world will take charge of their destiny and wrench it back from those who control it today. The people of the world will put more value on life than on death, on virtue than on vice, on compassion than on cruelty, on justice than on greed. Then and only then can the wars end. Refugees will go back home. People will smile once again. Global security will no longer be under threat and our children will read about how the world was saved, because their elders broke the cycle. The cycle of hatred. The cycle of suspicion. The cycle of violence. Having lived for decades in a world where security checks were unheard of and you just walked onto a plane and got off safely at the other end, routinely without comment, I know this is not a pipe-dream but very possible. It just requires the will. Since I don’t know anyone, including TSA guys, who love security checks, I don’t see why it can’t happen again – if we want it to.
The Hope Forum is a place that the injured from Twitter, Facebook and other social media can come, to detox and cure themselves from the negativity of the world. There’s much good happening in the world that gets no lift. Bad news sells. So we’ll give each other good news for free. And you’ll be automatically chucked out if you post anything negative. The rule for this forum will be that only productive and positive things can be shared. Nothing negative. No criticism of anyone or anything. No praising yourself. Praise others and let others praise you. No pontificating, no proselytizing. No promoting of any particular religion, ideology, politics, shop, product, service or yourself. Only appreciating what others are doing. Let others speak about your work while you do it quietly and sincerely because you believe in it and in yourself. The Hope Forum is something that seeks to change the whole culture of social networking which is simply another name for self-promotion and one-upmanship. We have nothing against any religion, ideology, politics, shop, product, service or you. Just that if you want to promote any of this go somewhere else. This is not the place for it.
The Hope Forum is about promoting others. Showing the world how many good people there are, in every country, every nationality, every race, who are working quietly to make this world a better place. Your job as a Hope Forum member is to find them and tell the world about them through The Hope Forum. That is if you want to join.
Share a good song, story, picture, thought, dream, idea. But only good, only positive, only thankful, only appreciation. Tell all of us who are with you on The Hope Forum, what you liked, appreciated and recall with pleasure.
She knelt and bowed her head
“I failed”, she cried.
The Master said, “Thou dids’t thy best. That is success.”
For in the final analysis, we will not be asked, “What happened?”
We will be asked, “What did you do?”
This is my first post. It is about this young man I saw in Pune – Samir Key Maker. Samir is a very Indian name and can belong to someone from any religion. Mohammed Samir (my nephew), Samir Joshi (a very good friend), Samir Singh, Samir Joseph. So Samir represents Indian youth to me. The best in Indian youth. A symbol of courage and confidence. He doesn’t just sit there on the pavement. He announces who he is. He has his phone number on the sign so that people can call him if they don’t have the time to stop by. He has a white sheet on which the tools of his trade are set out. What does a white sheet signify? To me it signifies quality. He is saying, “Look at my sheet and see if it is clean to decide what the quality of my work is going to be.” Now that is a statement of great confidence. His sheet is spotless. If you meet him, tell him I remember him. He doesn’t know me. But I know him. I remember him. I honor him. And I tell the world about him. Samir is the symbol of hope.
If you want to share a problem, a pain, a complaint; then reflect on it and think of a solution. Then share it with the solution. So the only problems we will allow are problem definitions of solutions. As someone said, ‘Every problem has at least two possible solutions. Do not enter this room until you have thought of both of them.’
The Hope Forum is open to everyone; any age, gender, religion or not, nationality, race, ethnicity, waist measurement, height, weight, strength; whether you can sing or croak, whether you can dance of shuffle, whether you can run or toddle, whether you are tall in your own imagination or in people’s eyes, whether only you can eat your cooking or others also can, whether anyone else, other than your dog loves you or not – we do. So join us. But read the condition below and stick to it.
The Hope Forum is open to everyone who accepts and agrees with our conditions of being a member i.e. good only, positive only, appreciation only, smiles only, solutions only.
No other conditions for joining.
For you The Hope Forum is born the day you join. Long may it survive. Fast may it grow. And great may be the goodness it brings to all the world.
I will not allow what is not in my control, to prevent me from doing what is in my control.
So you want to get married? Good luck. But think about what that means once you return from the honeymoon, for the rest of your life. Your marriage is an IKEA project. It can be heaven on earth or its opposite. What you want it to be, is for you to construct. Here’s a checklist.
Be kind. Especially when you are angry or after an argument.
Pray Tahajjud together. Wake each other up and pray Tahajjud. Those who pray together, stay together. Do you want the dua of Rasoolullahﷺ for yourself? Then wake each other up for Tahajjud. He asked Allahﷻ to bless the husband and wife who do that.
Keep all arguments and screens outside the bedroom. And no screens at the dining table.
Never, ever, sleep without making up and forgiving each other.
Marriage is not a P&L Account. It is a Savings Account. Keep depositing and it will be there for you to draw on when you need it. Try to ‘balance’ it and ask, ‘What did she do while I did all this?’ and you will make your life miserable. The surest and fastest way to destroy a marriage is to be an ‘Accountant’.
Keep confidence. What’s between you two must remain between the two of you only. Nobody else. She’s your Best Friend and you are hers. Respect that relationship and your marriage will be a source of great blessing. Let anyone else into that relationship, mother, father, sibling, anyone, and it’s doomed. It’s as simple as that. And it’s in your control.
Respect your wife and show that respect in how you treat her. Always. Especially when there is nobody else watching.
Her money, earning, inheritance, property, jewelry, gifts from you or your parents or her family are all her’s and Haraam for you. Except what she may give you as a gift. You are not even allowed to ask how much it is and she’s not expected to tell you.
Her food, clothing, shelter, all personal needs are your responsibility for which you are answerable to Allahﷻ from whom nothing is hidden. She doesn’t need to do anything to get these from you. They are hers by the right by which you married her. Qur’an. (Nisa 4: 1 & 4: 34)
She is not expected to help or support you financially in any way whatsoever. If you force her, no matter how subtly or obliquely that may be, you’ll answer to Allahﷻ .
Her responsibility is to be your best friend, respect you, be your confidant, be your moral support, create a beautiful home full of tranquility and free from stress and conflict, be your partner in the service of Allahﷻ, raise righteous children and make dua for you. Please notice that I didn’t say, ‘Cook and clean for you, polish your shoes, wash your clothes, etc. etc.’ That is because she is not expected to do any of that, including change nappies for your children. All those are your sole responsibilities. If she helps you, she is doing you a favor. Show your appreciation and thank her. If she doesn’t do it, she is still entitled to the rights that Allahﷻ granted her.
Value her dua of support and fear her dua if she’s oppressed. You may rightfully be wondering by now whether, given all the rights that Allahﷻ gives to the wife, it is worth getting married at all? All I can say is that until you say – Qabool – the escape hatch is always open. Those much wiser than you or I have taken that route. Maybe that is evidence of their wisdom.
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The best advice I can give you is what I remind myself – Fear nobody except Allahﷻ. Try to please nobody except Allahﷻ. Follow the Sunnah of Rasoolullahﷺ because that is simply the best way of doing anything. Remember that people will not remember what you did or said. They will remember what they felt.
Remember that everything you say or do has an effect, in this life and in the Hereafter. You can say ‘Sorry’. People may forgive you but they will not forget and that will affect your interactions with them and your reputation for years to come. For your part, forgive others but remember the lesson. Learn from history – your own – because those who don’t learn from history are condemned to repeat it. To make a mistake is human. Not to learn from it, is a choice.
Remember that reputation can be an asset or liability and you are the only one who gets to decide what you want it to be. Reputation is not what you did, but what people experienced. Reputation is built, word by word, action by action, day by day. But it can be destroyed in one stroke, by one wrong word or action. Seek feedback. Listen carefully. Thank the person. Act on what is relevant. Be brutally honest with yourself. Because only you can deceive yourself. Because only you will pay the price.
Reputation or rather Positive Reputation is another term for Trust. Trust is another word for success. So it is important to think before you speak because the words are momentary but their effect lasts for a very long time.
Remember that it is only Allahﷻ who truly forgives. So seek his Forgiveness. People don’t forgive, so try never to do anything that is likely to require you to seek their forgiveness. Remember never to do anything where the one you did it to, can raise his hands in and ask Allahﷻ for justice because the dua of the oppressed one always reaches Allahﷻ, even if he is a disbeliever.
Look at that picture. I took it in Pune, India at a traffic light. What story does that picture tell you? In that story is the key to your success, no matter who you are, what you do, or where you live. Write the story the picture told you, in the comments section of this blog.
Remember that only action counts. Only action yields results. Only action can leave behind a legacy. You can’t act when your face is buried in a phone. Take your face out of the phone. Meet real people. Talk to them face to face. Make real friends. Eat food without taking photographs of it. What do you say about the world of the future where machines will enslave people and they will do whatever the machine wants them to do?
Lo and behold! That future is here and now. The machine is called, ‘Smart phone’. Smart phones and stupid people are a deadly combination. Break free.
Always do what benefits others. Always give more than you receive. Be merciful and forgiving. Don’t be stupid. And always smile a lot. It is Sadaqa (charity).
Say, ‘Please’, because it is not your birthright that someone should pay attention to you. And say, ‘Thank you’, because it keeps that door open for you, the next time you need it. An attitude of gratitude enhances your enjoyment of life. It is about us. Not about them.
Finally, always build bridges. Not walls. Build a bridge after you have crossed the chasm. Let that be your legacy as someone who made it easier for another to overcome.
Remember that in the end we will not be asked, “What happened?”
We will be asked, “What did you do?”
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I had been in Kwakwani, Guyana for a year and decided to go to London for my annual vacation. It was 1980. The only person I knew in England was my uncle, Aziz Ahmed who lived in East Finchley and I wrote to him that I wanted to go to London. He very kindly invited me to stay with him. I had never met Aziz Mamu (uncle) before but had written to him on the basis of our relationship, as he was my mother’s cousin. He, very kindly gave me directions of how to get to him from Heathrow on the Tube and I arrived at his flat with a vast emptiness within me. I couldn’t understand why I was so hungry because it was brilliant sunshine and didn’t look anywhere like the end of the day and dinner time. I felt hesitant about asking for something to eat, so just remained hungry wondering when it would occur to my uncle to ask me if I wanted to eat anything. Aziz Mamu was the quintessential bachelor and after showing me my sleeping place, disappeared into his study. I took the opportunity to look around his flat and suddenly saw a small clock on a decorative mantle shelf. It showed the time as 9.30 PM. I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was bright sunshine, and the time was 9.30 PM. That was my introduction to England in the summer.
England is grey, wet, and cold in the winter. But in the summer, it transforms into the most beautiful scene that one can imagine. Clean, green, flowers everywhere, bird calls, bubbling brooks, brilliant yellow mustard fields, sheep that look like animated balls of wool (I guess that is what they are anyway), each with two lambs gamboling around them and where there is a shepherd, then his Border Collie keeping order. I can go on endlessly, but I won’t. I would leave my uncle’s flat every morning and return late in the night. I walked the streets of London town, investigated the shops, went to the theatre (saw Mousetrap and Evita), visited London Bridge, took the free Bus tour and just watched life happen on the Thames. Meanwhile my uncle said to me that a friend of his was coming to stay with him and so I would have to move. He gave me the key to the apartment of a friend of his who was away on holiday and told me to stay there. I was totally on my own in this flat but after I got used to the idea, I rather liked it.
Question was, what was I to do with myself for the rest of my holiday? I picked up several tour pamphlets from the London Underground station and decided on coach tours. I took two coach tours. One to Windsor Castle and another to Edinburgh. I must recommend these coach tours. Very good value for money with excellent guides and very comfortable. One little thing I recall from my Edinburgh tour was that on the bus, I was so taken in by the beautiful scenery that I said to my seatmate, “England is such a beautiful place.”
Edinburgh, Scotland – 1980“That may be, but this is Scotland”, he said. That was a lesson in geography and nationalist spirit, two in one.
Having done all this, one evening I was sitting in solitary splendor in front of the TV when I saw a horse-riding holiday advertisement in one of my tour pamphlets. The business was called Sunday Sight and was in a village called Bellingham, near Hexham in Northumberland. I called the number and the very friendly voice of Sally Bell invited me to come, gave me directions and the next day I was on the train. The holiday was outstanding and unique, first of its kind in my life, but much more importantly, I made friends, Sally and Michael Bell who have been my friends now for over forty years.
Having decided to go on a horse-riding holiday I realized that I didn’t have any gear. Sal told me that they could probably give me a hat, but I needed a lot more than that. So, off I went shopping in London. I didn’t have the guts to go into Harrods, which has riding gear. I found a shop called Riders & Squires in Kensington and headed there. It was a very upmarket shop and way above my budget, but nevertheless it was very interesting to browse. I did, waiting for a chance to leave unnoticed with my honor intact. At that moment two very aristocratic ladies entered. The shop attendant promptly left me and rushed off to gush all over them. “Lady Whatnot,” she gushed, “I love that grey of yours.” She meant the grey horse that Lady Whatnot owned. “Which one dear?” asked the lady. “I have seven greys.” I almost said, “The one that looks like you, Madam.” I’m sure the poor girl would have appreciated the support, but I decided that getting away was more important than chivalry. So, while the flattened shop lady was applying balm on her bruises, I managed to make a neat getaway. I found what I needed at Marks & Spencer at a price that didn’t threaten to ruin me and headed home.
I arrived and was met at the station and driven to Sunday Sight. English villages have a charm of their own. Cottages with thatch roofs, stone walls, dating back sometimes more than a century and gardens that clearly showed the enormous attention and effort that was put into them. Always a church and a cemetery, very peaceful and quiet, which explains why people die to get there. Flowers in beds and in hanging baskets, creepers on walls, sometimes even a neat patch of lawn. Neat hedges, buttercups and daisies, fenced fields and pastures with sheep and cattle grazing in them, the picture of tranquility. Brooks of clear water, bubbling over rocky beds. The cawing of ravens, fat pigeons feeding on grain with one eye to the sky, scanning for the peregrine falcon, their only but deadly enemy. If you are lucky you get to see a shepherd with his black and white Border Collie, working to separate a few sheep from the main flock for reasons known only to the shepherd. The man and dog working with a telepathic connection that is magic to watch.
My solitary photo from that trip – all the others are in my heartNext morning, we went on our first ride, Sally Bell, Jenny and Nicole Herbert, the latter two friends of Sal who boarded their horses at Sunday Sight. I was an excellent rider, having ridden horses all through my school and college days in Hyderabad but I hadn’t ridden for over a decade, so was a bit apprehensive about the likelihood of my parting company with my saddle. Here we were riding over the moors, sometimes along the famous Hadrian’s Wall. At other times in the environs of Kielder Forest and Kielder Water, both man-made. This is what Wiki has to say about Kielder Forest. “Kielder Forest is a large forestry plantation in Northumberland, England, surrounding Kielder village and the Kielder Water reservoir. It is the largest man-made woodland in England with three-quarters of its 250 square miles (650 km2) covered by forest.”
To return to the ride on the moors, it meant being totally alert all the way because though the land was familiar to Sal, Nicole, and Jenny, it was totally new to me. I can’t recall the name of Sal’s or my horses, but Nicole Herbert was riding Amrix and Jenny was riding Kismet. Amrix was a stallion and very spirited. Kismet was a gelding and very gentle and sedate. The ride was sometimes over rough pathways, and at other times, cross country including a couple of jumps across a trench and a low fence. I managed to remain glued to my saddle and thereby vindicated my honor and that of my riding instructors in Hyderabad. I was particularly chuffed as I was riding, as I mentioned, after a decade or more and to be able to do it competently in those circumstances, made me very happy indeed.
Michael Bell is an MG enthusiast and restores classic MGs and drives them like MGs should be driven. That means that if you happen to be the passenger, you need a strong heart. Michael gave me a couple of rides which I recall most pleasantly. We would ride horses in the mornings, have lunch at a pub along the way and return home late in the afternoon. Groom our horses and bed them down – it was that kind of holiday – and then have a shower and get ready for dinner at home. I was very glad that the kind of upbringing I had in Hyderabad riding club, I knew my way very competently around a stable and was able to do all my tasks comfortably. Dinner was Sal’s cooking, very delicious, wholesome, and quintessentially British. After dinner we would sit in front of the fire and tell stories. In Northumberland nights are cold and a log fire is most welcome. I had a lot of stories to tell of Guyana and India, some of which you would have read and are on this blog and in my book, “From India to the Indies”. Eventually it was time to leave and head back to London and from there to Georgetown, Guyana. As a parting gift, Sal gave me a pewter horse head on a wooden base, that she had made herself. A lovely gift to remind me of my lovely friends.
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I wish children didn’t grow up so quickly, that dogs lived longer…that coffee was free, and that more minds were open. ~ Kelly’s Treehouse.
Indeed, I wish for all those things but most of all that dogs lived longer. All through my childhood, youth, and all the way until I was 42 years old, I had dogs. Usually more than one. The last one I had was Bonnie, a beautiful, chocolate colored Doberman bitch who was a friend, companion, confidant, and who I miss every time I think of her. First a disclaimer. In our present politically correct world of ‘woke’ culture, my auto-correct is objecting to the use of the word ‘bitch’ and says that some people may find it offensive. My response to anyone who finds the word ‘bitch’ offensive is, ‘Feel free. It is a free country.’ I refuse to use the alternatives offered, ‘lady dog’, ‘female dog’ etc. I think that Bonnie would have objected to being called ‘whatever dog’. “I am not a dog. I am a bitch.” Yes Bonnie. I agree.
Bonnie came to me in a very quaint way. It was 1983 and I had just begun my career in tea planting when the wife of our Managing Director, visited the Anamallais. When I met her, she asked me if I was happy and if I needed anything. I told her that the only thing I missed was having a dog. A couple of months later, I got a message from her that she had a puppy for me and that I should arrange to collect it. I was delighted. It was summer and intensely hot in Chennai, where the puppy was. So, I sent for one of the workers from the estate, Veeramuthu Josiyar (Jyotishi – Fortune Teller). Being a Jyotishi meant that he always did light work and others didn’t mind. I gave Veeramuthu a large plastic woven basket with a folded sheet in the bottom and gave him detailed instructions about how to bring the puppy. He had to take a bus from Murugalli Bazar to Valparai. Then take another bus to Coimbatore. Then a train to Chennai and then an auto rickshaw to the Managing Director’s house and after picking up the puppy, retrace his steps. For the return journey, I was so worried about the comfort of the puppy, that I booked an airconditioned coach seat for Veeramuthu on the Nilgiri Express from Chennai to Coimbatore. Two days later, Veeramuthu arrived safe and sound with the little puppy in the basket and said something to me, the shock and regret of which remain with me to this day. He said to me, “Dorai, thanks to your dog, I was able to ride in an airconditioned train. I never thought I would be able to do this in my life. I want to thank Dorai for this.” Out of respect, in our languages we almost never say, ‘You’, but instead we speak in third person. To say that I was mortified would be an understatement. The fact that what happened was not deliberate but because of my thoughtlessness, was no solace to me. I apologized to Veeramuthu, much to his surprise, setting off a torrent of counter apologies from him. But it drove home to me, very hard that every action of ours has consequences and just because I may not have done something intentionally didn’t mean that the consequences would be any different. Very powerful, though painful lesson. The long and short of it was love at first sight with the most expressive liquid eyes you could imagine in a chocolate face, long legs, very short docked tail, which meant that the whole little butt wagged, powered by an internal dynamo that worked 24×7.
Bonnie, in Paralai Estate, Anamallais – 1986I named her Bonnie. Bonnie stayed with me through my marriage, five estates, and three cities. She traveled with us by car, truck, train and in the cargo hold on an Indian Airlines plane, in a traveling cage, specially constructed for her. I had to tell the Captain that he had live cargo in the hold and so must keep the hold pressured and heated. Finally, in 1997, when we moved to America from Bangalore, Bonnie went to live with my dearest friend Bertie Suares on Burnside Estate in Kotagiri, where one winter morning, she passed away in her sleep, on the lawn, basking in the sun.
When Bonnie came into my life, I also had two cats. A Siamese called Choti Billi and a jet-black cat with green eyes called Brinjal. That rather strange name was given to her by a Spanish friend, Oriol Pujol, a Gestalt specialist who was visiting me. At meal times, Bonnie would sit on one side of my chair and the cats on the other. They maintained a cautious, cordial relationship based on the principal of ‘smoke the peace pipe, but keep the gunpowder dry’. Bonnie was a born lady. Polite, charming, and very friendly. But cats are cats. They dislike the arrogant and look down upon the humble. For my part, I stayed out of the politics of these relationships, as long as there was no murder and mayhem in the offing. There wasn’t. By the time Bonnie came into my life, I’d had many other dogs and had trained them for obedience, defense and tracking and I knew that training dogs begins with building a relationship of trust with the animal.
My dear friend, Gudducha (Jaikant Chaturvedi) with BrinjalSome thoughts about dogs before we talk about training. Dogs are very intelligent. They have good memories which is what makes them trainable. They are pack animals who have total loyalty to the pack. Depending on the pack hierarchy, they can be dominant or recessive. Dogs are creatures of habit and like humans, old habits die hard. Dogs have highly developed senses of sight, hearing, and smell, which are not comparable to ours at all. Theirs are aeons ahead and I will tell you in a minute why you must never forget this. And finally, like us, dogs do things for their reasons, not ours. Training is about giving the dog a reason to obey you. That reason, can be fear or love. It is up to us to decide which one we want it to be. The results we get will depend on that. Even more finally, all the above is our understanding about dogs. Nobody ever consulted a dog about whether this is correct or not. It is good to keep this in mind when trying to speak like an expert. We aren’t and we will never be.
Dogs have been companions of humans from the earliest days of cave dwellers when the first dog (or wolf?) chose the warmth of the camp fire and eating what humans threw away, to living out in the cold and hunting for its meal. That doesn’t mean that dogs have lost their ability to hunt. Apart from breeds that have been bred for cosmetic purposes and are incapable of surviving on their own, any breed will go feral if it needs to. We have ample and tragic evidence from Ladakh (see the film ‘Khee’) where local ‘Indian pie dogs’ go feral in winter and form packs and hunt humans. It is good to remember this that any of the larger breeds which are generally classified as ‘Working dogs’, is more than capable of taking down a full-grown adult man on its own. In a pack, they can take down more than that. Respect is a good thing to have in any relationship, including in our relationship with our pets.
I am introducing a familiar word here, ‘pet’. Remember that to you, the dog is a pet. The dog, however, doesn’t understand what a ‘pet’ is. To the dog, you are one of two things, the pack leader, or a pack-mate. If it sees you as a pack leader, it will obey you. If it sees you as a pack-mate, it will be friendly but may obey you or not and may even try to dominate you. Size plays a big role in the animal world. Big is better than small. And so a big dog is more likely to give you a hard time becoming obedient that one of the smaller breeds. Also, since dog packs are led by Alpha males, a big male will fight you more than a female, in the initial phase of training. He will try to dominate you and if he succeeds, then you will never train him. If you raised the dog as a puppy, you will most likely, not have these issues because the dog bonds with you as the pack leader (mother). That has nothing to do with your gender. For the puppy, anyone feeding him is his ‘mother’. But if, like I used to do, you want to train grown animals, you will need to establish your dominance if you want the dog to obey. Some people ask if certain breeds are more trainable than others. Yes, they are. However, in the end it is more about how good a trainer you are and less about the so-called trainability of the breed. Every breed can be trained if you know how.
So, how do you begin training? You begin by establishing a relationship. As I mentioned earlier, the relationship is based on fear or love. I have always preferred the latter because that leads to trust and loyalty literally to the end. It takes longer than fear, but it is the best guarantee of success. I have known trainers who to make money by speeding up their throughput of dogs, starve and beat a dog into submission, literally to the point where when the dog sees the trainer, it whimpers and urinates in terror. It is not a good sight. And in my view that is a horrible way to earn a living.
Bonnie and Yeager – Paralai Estate, Anamallais – 1986 Dogs are pack animals and loyalty comes naturally to them. It is a survival thing. Loyalty to the pack is rewarded by the pack’s loyalty to the animal which it critical to survival. The trainer’s task is to take the place of the pack leader. There is no alternative to this. If you want to train the dog, it must see you as the leader. We get there by a fine balance of two things, setting boundaries and rewarding obedience. In this, the fact that dogs are highly intelligent, creatures of habit and highly sensitive, all play a part. Dogs, like children, test boundaries. The dog wants to see how serious you are about the boundary. Once it realizes that the boundary is non-negotiable, it will obey. Secondly, dogs don’t understand your language and words. People talk long sentences and all kinds of endearments to dogs and will swear that the dog understands them. What the dog is reacting to is the tone of the voice. When training, short commands, given in the same tone every time, is the fastest way to train the dog. It doesn’t matter what you say. You could talk in Mandarin or Zulu or simply making a sound. To the dog, it is a sound, which means whatever you want it to mean. He will respond to that as long as you say the same thing in the same way every time.
What also happens which most of us don’t realize is that the dog is not only listening to your voice, but to the underlying intonation, the sad, glad, bad, mad tone. The tension, the trembling, the joy, the fear, the whatever it is that you are speaking with. He is looking at your face and imprinting your expression and linking it to the tone of the command. He is looking at and is sensitive to your body language, the way you hold your hand, the way you put more weight on one leg than on the other, the way you incline your head. As I mentioned, the dog is far more sensitive, alert, and intent than we can ever imagine and he is bringing it all to bear in the training. For you it is just one command, like ‘heel’, or ‘sit’, or ‘stay’, or other commands depending on what you are training the dog for. But for the dog, he is responding to the entire combination of voice, tone, facial expression and body language. You may not be aware of all these things, but the dog is. That is why I say that to train dogs is to discover yourself.
Sometimes, when training dogs for other people, you complete the training and call the owner. You put the dog through its paces and the owner is delighted and takes the dog home. You think that all is well, until you get a call the next day saying that the dog is not responding to any command and has forgotten the training. You ask the owner to bring the dog back. When the dog comes to you, it behaves perfectly and does everything that it was trained to do. But when it goes back home, it doesn’t. The problem is with the difference in communication from the dog’s perspective between the way you commanded it and way the owner does. After the first time this happened, I used to insist that the owner spend a day or two with me and the dog and learn to command it in the way it had been trained for before taking it home. We never had any comebacks after that.
Different breeds act differently to the same commands. For a Doberman, everything is a test. Dobermans tend to be highly strung and will obey instantly and if they fail in their effort they get upset. For Labradors and Golden Retrievers, everything is a game and the dog has great fun whether he is retrieving a duck in a shoot, or a ball that you threw for him to fetch or he is pulling down an attacker with a knife. It is all a game. What I have said above is generally about the breed. But in the same breed, individual dogs have their own characters and so it is important to get to know your dog. I am a great believer in spending as much time as you can with the dog that you are training and to observe it closely and intently and notice how it behaves in different situations. This will give you an understanding of the animal and help you to understand how it responds to training and what you need to do to help it to learn fast. Consistency is key. Same command in the same way, every time. That is why you must be self-aware. Reward obedience. Ignore disobedience but repeat the command until you get obedience. Always end on success. Don’t punish the animal. You don’t want him to fear you but to obey you because he wants to please you. When he is rewarded for obedience, it encourages him, and he will do it every time. Finally, and very importantly, don’t tire the animal out. Once the training session is over, let him run free. Feed and water him and leave him to do whatever he wants to do. You want him to look forward to the training and not to fear it.
The biggest benefit of having a dog from my perspective is the companionship that the dog provides, of non-judgmental, unconditional love. For the dog, you are the most precious, beautiful, and admirable person in the world to whom the dog dedicates himself lifelong. No matter that in the eyes of the world you are poor, ignorant, fat, or thin, your socks stink, and you have warts, for your dog, you are the absolute best thing that happened to him. There is nobody else in the world and in your life, who will be as loyal to you as your dog. And I mean that without any exceptions. Treat a dog with love and patience and it will enrich your life and give you memories which will make you smile, years after the dog has died.
One last word, in many cases, dogs have to be euthanized because they have some painful incurable ailment in their old age. Many owners take the dog to the vet and hand it over and leave as they don’t want to see the dog dying. Never do that. For the dog, you are its life. In his last moments he wants you to be by his side, maybe with his head in your lap as he breathes his last. The vet will sedate him, and he will not feel any pain, but to leave him in the hands of strangers only because you tell yourself that you can’t bear to see the end is extremely selfish. Stay with him. Talk to him. Stroke his head. Be with him and let him look at your face as his eyes close. He lived for you. Now you stay by his side as he goes on his last journey. This is the most painful thing about having dogs, but it is inescapable. Be faithful to the one who was always faithful to you.
As I said, I wish dogs lived longer.
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I love animals. And among those, I love dogs and horses the most. I also love cats. But there is a very distinct difference between a dog and a cat. As someone said, ‘A dog looks at you and says, ‘He must be God because he is looking after me.’ A cat looks at you and says, ‘I must be God because he is looking after me.’ Dogs are beautiful, responsive, and completely unconditional in their love for you. A dog will love you whether you are good or evil, beautiful, or ugly, rich, or poor. For a dog, you are the center of his life, and he/she will stick with you to the end. That is the only thing about dogs that I totally, and completely hate. That they die. There is nothing more tragic than that. Ask me. I suffered that over and over until the day I decided that I would not have a dog again.
In my early years 1968 – 1977, when I was at school and college, I had the good fortune of meeting one of the greatest dog breeders and trainers in the world, Nawab Nazir Yar Jung. He was an icon in the world of International Dog Shows and Field Trials. When I expressed my love for dogs and demonstrated that I was good with them, he allowed me to work with him caring for and training his dogs at his home in Hyderabad and accompanied him to some Dog Shows that he was judging. In those years, I learnt more about myself than about the nuts and bolts of dog rearing or training. I learnt that when you work with animals, dogs in particular, your own sensitivity and communication improve. Language is useless as the animal is only responding to to the tone of your voice, facial expression, and signal. So, the importance of being precise not only in what you say, but in how you say it and being aware of your body language when you are giving that command are essential to get the instant obedience that only a dog can give you. Dogs are so incredibly sensitive that they will pick up your facial expression or the way you hold your hand when you give a command. And the next time you don’t give it in that exact way, the animal gets confused. It is always essential to be extremely self-aware to be a good trainer. On a side note, owners sometimes complained that the dog had not been trained properly because it was not responding to the commands that he had been trained for. But when they brought the dog back to us and we commanded it, it obeyed instantly. The reason was not the dog’s training but the way the owner was giving the commands. That’s why we insisted that the owner or handler spent a few days with us and his dog and learned how to give the commands that the dog had been trained to obey.
I realized that training dogs was equally if not more about training myself in how to communicate effectively. It was hands-on experiential learning in being intensely aware of myself, my posture, facial expression, tone of voice, mood, and overall disposition. I learnt all this training dogs, but over the decades since then this helped me in communication, public speaking, negotiating, and coaching people across three continents. All this and more, I learned from my dogs and applied successfully in some very difficult situations in my life and work. It is this special capacity of the human to learn something in one situation and apply it in a totally unrelated situation that sets us apart from animals. Animals also learn, but they can’t conceptualize and so their learning is very topical. Ours is applicable across boundaries.
Poppins and Ben – Sanatnagar, Hyderabad, 1977Dogs anticipate you to such an extent that to see a highly trained dog and his handler at work is to witness magic. That is what we saw when we saw Nawab Saab working with his dogs. The dog seemed to be doing everything on its own whereas he was doing nothing without his handler’s command. But the commands are so subtle that they are invisible to all but the trained eye that knows what to look for. There is a wonderful program on British Television which shows sheepdog trials. You see the handler standing a long way off in the field directing his Border Collie (the favorite breed for these trails) entirely by hand signals. The dog goes to the flock, cuts out precisely the number of sheep that he is ordered to cut out, and drives them into the pen all on its own by responding to signals that are invisible to us.
I had for my own trainer, the best in the world. A man who had trained everything from sheep dogs to tracking dogs, gun dogs, hunting dogs, and guard dogs. And I learnt from him. I hope I learnt well.
To test how well we had trained the dogs to track, we would stand on one side of a wall that bordered a large area of scrub forest. We would give our dog a ball to hold in his mouth and smell. Then we would command him to sit and stay and throw the ball as far as we could over the wall into the forest. The dog would vibrate with excitement, yearning to go for the ball. We would count to ten and then say, “Get!” And off he would go. A big Doberman would fly over a six-foot wall with inches to spare. A Labrador would scramble over it. And then a few minutes later, back it would come over the wall with the ball in its mouth, circle the handler, and sit on his right side. Then on command it would drop the ball and take the piece of dry meat that the handler would give him as his reward. How can I describe the excitement of testing your skill in the performance of your animal? The lesson learnt – you stand or fall by how your trainee performs – as valuable a lesson in corporate or any other area of leadership as in training animals. A good coach after all is not the one who has the greatest knowledge, but the one whose team wins. If your dog fails, you carry the can. You can’t blame the dog. It is how well you trained it. Same logic in leadership anywhere else.
The biggest learning for me in these early years was the realization that no matter what you do, it is only worth doing if you aim at being the best in the world at it. And to be the best, it is essential to be passionate about what you do. I sincerely believe that it is impossible to excel in something that you do only halfheartedly or because you are forced to. It is impossible to be the best in the world in anything that you are not passionate about because you will never put in the heroic effort that is needed for you to succeed. Another realization was that when you are doing something that you are passionate about, you never get tired or stressed out. You are always fresh and full of energy and those around you also feel this. Passion is essential because it is the only thing which makes the heroic effort seem worthy of the goal. Only the passionate never compromise because compromise is the cancer which kills from within. Passion is infectious; so is compromise. Stress occurs when we do things we don’t really enjoy.
My learning is that if you are in a situation where you find yourself doing something that you have no passion for, then it is essential to do one of two things: Either kindle a passion for this activity by learning more about it and seeing how it is valuable or leave and find something that you do feel passionate about. It makes no sense to do something that you have no love for. Happiness is the result of doing something that is worthwhile, and which adds value and not of how much money you make or what rank you have. Interestingly, it is when the work feels worthless that people get overly concerned about titles, money, and perquisites. That is why I tell my clients who talk about compensation as an issue in employee retention, “Money problems are not money problems, even when they are money problems.” Most people complain about the compensation when they are uninspired about their work. The biggest proof of this are the many people in missionary and charitable activities who work all hours for next to nothing and are very happy doing their jobs. Happiness is therefore more about intangible rewards than about the tangible ones. That’s why I say, ‘If it can’t make you cry, it can’t make you work.’
Bonnie & Yeager – Paralai Estate, Anamallais, 1986Training dogs was a huge learning in human psychology. I learnt the importance of taking a stand and then remaining firmly on it without giving in to pressure to change. I learnt that dogs and people will test your limits to see how firm you are. This is especially true in raising children. Once they test the boundaries and find that you mean what you said and that the boundaries can’t be pushed away, they accept them. Firmness and consistency are critical. There is nothing more debilitating than a leader who is ambivalent and indecisive. I learnt the value of physical courage and how, if you stand with courage, you lend courage to those around you. I learnt the value of leading from the front and that there is only one leadership position – in the front – which is why those who follow the leader are called ‘followers.’ You can’t be a leader if you have no followers. I learnt the value of quiet companionship – there is nothing more relaxing than sitting on a hillside with your dog beside you, watching the world go by. With Nawab Saab, you didn’t chatter. If you had something useful to say, you said it; if you had a question, you asked; otherwise, you kept your mouth shut. The value of silence was appreciated. Without silence inside your head and heart and outside (not speaking), you can’t introspect or reflect. Silence has great value. We didn’t have intrusive gadgets to disturb our peace and so we valued silence. In the forest, silence also helps you to know who else is around. Knowledge that can be critical to survival and enjoyment of your experience.
Nawab Saab taught us to pay attention to the dogs and their highly developed faculties which warn of danger long before you would have been aware of it. This is where his storytelling really came into its own. Every lesson had a set of circumstances that it had been drawn from and that added value and meaning to it. This was not merely theory but hard-earned life experience that we were learning from. From my dogs, I learnt the value of unconditional love and complete trust in someone. When my dog got injured during training, I would order him to lie down and would then clean his wounds with hydrogen peroxide and stitch him up. The dog would lie there, sometimes whimpering in pain but never moving and never protesting or trying to harm me in any way. He trusted me completely and knew that what I was doing was for his good. There is nobody happier than a dog at seeing his master – no matter how ugly or dirty, poor, or hungry, unfashionable, or square his master may be. To the dog, his master is the best, most lovable, reliable, remarkable, and trustworthy human being in the world. And that has nothing to do with whether in fact this is true or not. The dog doesn’t care. Whatever the master may be to the rest of the world, to his dog he is the best in the world. And that is the secret of a great friendship and a great marriage. What you believe about someone and demonstrate in your dealings with them, is what they rise to embody. That is why they say, ‘Treat a man as if he is the best that he can be, and that’s what he becomes.’ Many years later I dealt with some of the most intractable and obnoxious union leaders with great politeness, treating them as if they were heads of state and all their nastiness went away, and I didn’t have to suffer any of it. People used to be surprised and asked me how I did it. I never let on the secret – that my dogs taught me this lesson. Some readers may not take kindly to being compared to dogs – but believe me, there is nothing more honorable in terms of friendship and loyalty. This is what Nawab Saab taught us, and we learned these lessons well, very enjoyably and lived to realize their value throughout our lives.
Cardamom plantationNawab Saab was requested to train a dog squad for Thengakal Estate in Vandiperiyar, Kerala. I don’t know if you have been inside a cardamom estate. Almost 30 years after this story, I planted cardamom in the Anamallais and recalled those days when we were in that estate in Vandiperiyar. We trained the dogs in Vilayat Manzil and in the lands behind Yusuf Tekri in Towli Chowki. Today there isn’t an inch of vacant land in that place. In the early 70’s it was miles of barren land with scrub bushes, some Seethaphal (Custard Apple – Annona squamosa), some Lantana (Lantana camara), a sprinkling of Neem (Azadirachta indica), one or two Peepul (Ficus Religiosa) and an occasional Banyan (Ficus Benghalensis). We would load up the dogs in Khaja Nawab’s jeep and drive to Yusuf Tekri and then spend the day training the dogs. Since these dogs were being trained as trackers and guard dogs, the training was very intense. For tracking, we used Labradors whose sense of smell is more developed and keener than the other breeds we had. For guard/attack work, we used Dobermans and German Shepherds. But all dogs were taught everything, as a backup even though we used them, whenever possible, separately for these jobs.
It was fascinating to see how these different breeds worked. For a Doberman everything was a competition. The dog would get stressed out, angry and would bust his gut to do his best. A Labrador on the other hand took it all as a game and thoroughly enjoyed himself. He was playing and having fun, whether he was following a scent track or attacking an intruder and dragging him to the ground. Temperament has a big effect on the trainability and steadiness of dogs and humans under stressful conditions. Nawab Saab’s training technique was based on gaining the trust of the animal and persuading him to work. Nawab Saab never used force or punishment which was very commonly used by other trainers. The result was that Nawab Saab’s dogs worked much better than anyone else’s. The only catch was that training took longer than it would have taken if you simply beat the dog to a pulp and then forced him to obey. Our dogs were our friends and beating one was unthinkable. The other thing was the knowledge that success and failure was really ours, the trainer’s. Not the dog’s. If the dog didn’t perform, it was I who needed to look at my training technique, relationship with the dog, consistency of command, and my own self awareness, and it was I who needed to work harder. ‘Failing’ the dog or punishing it was meaningless because the dog’s performance was an indicator of my success. Every dog was trainable and if it didn’t get trained, it was the trainer who was at fault. Nobody needed to point that out to me. I knew it. I held myself accountable for it.
Cut to our schooling technique today. Who passes or fails? Teacher or child? Who must really pass or fail? What would happen if we changed that to what really should happen and if teacher’s salaries were docked if children failed and they got a bonus if they excelled? Same thing for the corporate world. Companies succeed or fail because of what decision makers do. Not workers. But who gets laid off? Responsibility must lie where it belongs and those responsible must get the credit or pay the price. Not someone else, whose only fault was that they obeyed orders. Once again, sorry about the comparison, but it is precisely this ability to take learnings from one situation and apply them to a totally unrelated situation that distinguishes human learning from animal learning. That is what I learnt and that is how I learnt it. And that is why I say that I owe so much of my learning to the very unusual childhood and youth that I had and to mentors like Nawab Nazir Yar Jung, Uncle Rama and Aunty Mohini.
To return to our story, we finished our training and took the train with our dogs, to Cochin. The dogs were in the Brake Van at the end of the train. Every few stations, we would run to the back, unleash the dogs, and take them out on the platform to stretch their legs and greet telephone poles. Then give them some water and back inside the Brake Van and we would run back to our compartment. Eventually we reached Cochin where the estate transport met us and we drove for another six hours to get to the estate to meet the Manager, Mr. Rudy Bosen.
Mr. Bosen very kindly invited Nawab Saab, Khaja Nawab and me, to stay with him and his wife Dorothy, who some wonderful chocolate ice cream for us for dessert after a lovely dinner. The estate had a big problem with theft as cardamom is a very valuable spice and easy to steal. A cardamom plantation is extremely dense and very easy to hide in. Thieves would come into the estate across the boundary at night, with sickles and jute bags and simply cut the ripe bunches of cardamom and take them away. To catch them in the dark was completely impossible. That is why Rudy Bosen thought of using dogs and contacted Nawab Saab for help. The dilemma was, how do you publicize the fact that now there are guard dogs which can catch thieves. The challenge was to have the dogs merely as an effective deterrent. Rudy Bosen didn’t really want anyone getting chewed up by a dog because in Kerala that would likely cause a bigger problem than the theft.
Nawab Saab had a unique idea. He asked Mr. Bosen to invite all union leaders and whoever wanted to come from the village to a dog show and competition at the end of which they would be given a sumptuous meal and people could win cash prizes. People came in large numbers with great enthusiasm because there is nothing much to do in the plantations and any kind of entertainment draws big crowds. When everyone had settled down on the Muster ground under the marquee Nawab Saab, through an interpreter asked for volunteers to take part in the competition. He then picked six of the likeliest looking men. He told them to go and hide anywhere they wanted to, in the plantation. But before they went off, he took some item of clothing from each of them. He told them that he would give them half an hour to find hiding places and then the dogs would find them. Meanwhile we put on a show of attack training which looks very ferocious indeed. For that also we took volunteers, dressed them up in protective clothing and then the dogs took them down. For a grown man, who thinks that he is strong, armed with a knife or stick, to have a dog taking him down in one smooth lethal attack, is very unnerving. That is what our objective was; to put the fear of the dogs in the minds of the people and any potential thieves.
Once this demo was over, we got the tracking dogs out and gave them the clothing to get a good sniff of and sent them into the plantation. The dogs disappeared in a jiffy. There was initially some rustling of leaves. Then total silence. We waited with bated breath as this was the final test of the pudding. If the dogs missed even one man, our reputation would be shot. We were literally putting our honor on the line. Then suddenly there was a scream. We ran into the plantation following the calling of the dog. The tracking dogs had been trained to ‘speak’. They would bark at regular intervals of a couple of seconds and would continue for as long as it took for the handler to get to it. Bow-wow-wow-wow and on, it would go. That told us that the dog had ‘treed’ the quarry or had pinned him down and the sound would guide us to the animal. The long and short of it was that we caught every single one of the men. Then we all came out of the jungle to where everyone was waiting to see what had happened. The men looked very sheepish and down in the mouth at having failed to win the Rs. 1000 prize for the one who could escape the dog. In the 1970’s, Rs. 1000 was big money. But Mr. Bosen was a smart man and gave them consolation prizes for participating and then we all had lunch with the union leaders and all competitors. The result of this demonstration was that theft stopped on this estate as if someone had shut off a switch. The dogs had such an effect on the psyche of the people that nobody wanted to take a chance of meeting a dog in the dark of the night. As Sun Tzu says, ‘The wise general never fights a battle. He wins without fighting.’ Nawab Nazir Yar Jung was a very wise ‘general’.
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I was asked some questions about the importance of organization, systems, and processes in ideology-led movements. I have tried to answer these questions below. I hope this will enable those who lead such movements to rethink their attitudes and learn to appreciate those who have the knowledge and skills to enable the movement to succeed.
It is perhaps not too much of a stretch to say that no ideology-led movementseems to have sustained and succeeded over an extended period. At least, I can’t think of a single one that did. Especially a Muslim one. The reasons are not complicated or difficult to identify and understand but the solutions seem to be almost impossible to implement. We have too many examples of failures, some quite spectacular and bloody to boot, and so I am not going to list them here. I will leave you to think of them and ask, “Why did it happen?” As I say, ‘The truth is not difficult to see. It is difficult to swallow.’
Allah sent us, human beings, to establish a system of governance that is good for all inhabitants of Planet Earth based on three cardinal principles; Justice, Compassion, and Accountability to Allah from whom nothing is hidden. In order for us to do this, He sent his Book, the Qur’an and the best of teachers, Muhammad (S), to teach us the Book and demonstrate how to live by the system that Allah prescribed for us. Allah’s concern for us arises out of His infinite Mercy and desire that we should have a life of contentment, harmony, and prosperity. Not for a small group of moneybags but for all humanity and all those who share this planet with us. That is the reason that Islam has a complete system of instructions to deal with the entire gamut of human experience, civil, criminal, social, marriage, inheritance, finance, war, government, food, clothing, prayer, sacrifice, charity; what did I miss? Islam therefore is not an ideology alone but a practice. Its power lies in living by it. Not merely knowing about it.
This gulf between knowledge and practice is our trap. To live by any ideology, including Islam, we need tools. And these tools must change from time to time because society, technology, cultures, and challenges change from time to time. Ideology remains the same. Tools must evolve. This is where we have failed. To give you an example, we are like people who own a library of automobile engineering books. Every morning we walk to the library, read about automobile engineering all day, and in the evening we walk home. Why do we need to walk to the library and back home? Because if you sit on a book of automobile engineering it won’t take you anywhere. If you want to use automobile engineering, you must build a car factory. Then not only will you ride, but you will take the world with you. Now, if someone argues and asks, “Why do we need auto-workers, mechanical and electrical engineers, drivers and so on, when we have these wonderful theorists who know all about the intricacies of the internal combustion engine”, you will say to them that the knowledge of how the engine works will do nothing until you build an engine, put it into a body that can convert the energy that the engine produces into motive power and drive that vehicle on the road. Therefore, to ask who is more important, the theorist, the scientist, the engineer, or the driver, is an oxymoronic question. Each of them is important in his place and time. In my opinion, the reason ideologically led movements didn’t succeed is because the theorists didn’t respect the expertise of the ‘technologists’ and vice versa. The reason for failure lies, not in the theory or the technology but in something entirely different but perhaps more important than both i.e., human behavior. It lies in our inability to deal with dissent, with difference of opinion, with respecting knowledge, experience, and expertise different from our own. It lies in our failure to appreciate that we truly need the ‘other’ person, because without him, we and our ideology will fail. It is time to learn from our traditional mistakes and do something about this and not repeat the mistakes.
The questions that I was asked are below with my answers.
Is the task of the ideology-led movement also to establish institutions to fulfill different types of needs?
That depends on whether the movement is serious about implementing its ideology or not. The question is like asking, ‘Should a movement dedicated to health care, establish or support hospitals?’ Organizations are tools. They are the ‘How’ to the ideology’s ‘Why’. The ideology provides the reason for the effort. The organization provides the means for the reason to become a reality. For example, one of the objectives of an Islamic movement would be to implement Allah’s command prohibiting dealing in interest-based transactions. How are you going to do that without creating Islamic banks? If you don’t have a way for people to borrow money in an Islamically correct way, you can proclaim the prohibition on interest all day, but nothing will happen.
Take another example. Allah made Zakat Fardh and prescribed laws for the division of spoils of war (Surah Al-Anfaal) by 2AH. But it was only after Omar ibn Al-Khattab (R) established the Baytul Maal as an institution that systematic social welfare schemes could be implemented. Until then charity was spontaneous, sporadic, and incidental. The institution of Baytul Maal was the key to ensuring that financial help was given, to every person who needed it. This was also the case with the first standing army with soldiers on payroll instead of booty and the formalizing of land holdings which soldiers owned because of distribution of Ghaneema. Distributing land as ‘spoils of war’ resulted in thousands of square miles of fertile land, especially in Iraq and Shaam lying fallow because the soldiers who became its owners, had no idea about cultivation. The old owners/farmers abandoned the land. Omar ibn Al-Khattab (R) took back the land in the name of the State in the face of great opposition and returned it to its erstwhile owners and established a system of taxation based on what Rasoolullah (S) had decreed with respect to Zakat on crops and produce. This was a huge benefit to the State which otherwise was cash strapped despite having conquered huge territory.
Another example of how the lack of organizations and systems sabotages good intentions, is as follows. Every Muslim and his grandmother will agree on the need for Taziyyatun Nafs and Tarbiyyatul Akhlaaq. But look around you. Do you see any sign of either, in Muslim society? Do you see any sign of it in your own home? Or even in yourself? If you do, all power to you. But the reality is that the majority of our social and interpersonal problems stem from a marked absence of both these essential elements of Islamic teaching. Ask why? When everyone is agreed that it is essential, why doesn’t it happen? It doesn’t happen because we have no institution or organization to implement it. Even in our Madaaris we don’t have Tazkiyyatun Nafs wa Tarbiyyatul Akhlaaq as a special subject with teachers, metrics of measuring progress, and counseling for those who have difficulties with its practice. Just as we don’t teach Seeratun Nabi as a special subject. The complete futility of religious institutions teaching Islam, not teaching the life of Rasoolullah (S) just doesn’t strike us.
We have ignored Tazkiyya wa Tarbiyya and the Seerah for so long, sufficing ourselves with simply talking about it passionately in our Bayans, that we have lost the skills to do Tazkiyya for ourselves or anyone else. Similarly, we talk about the need to unite but do nothing practical to make it happen. Instead, we emphasize differences and demonize those who are different so that unity can never happen. We don’t understand the difference between agreeing and agreeing to disagree. We don’t know how to disagree without being disagreeable. When we have a conflict, there is no system of conflict resolution or body to arbitrate, and everyone suffers. I don’t need to mention the two spectacular splits in the two major Muslim movements in India that happened in recent times, the repercussions of which reverberated across the world. My tears have dried but the pain in my heart is still fresh.
In the words of Westminster Fuller, “In order to change an existing paradigm, you do not struggle to try and change the problematic model. You create a new model and make the old one obsolete.” Organizations are essential to implement ideology in real life in a sustainable way. Without organization, systems, processes, performance measurement and metrics, implementation will be based purely on individual energy and dedication. That, by definition, is not sustainable over time and impossible to hand down from generation to generation. As a result, the movement suffers. It is not the absence of ideology but the absence of organization, which has brought us to this calamity.
The success of organizations depends on professionalism which requires experts while the direction of organizations is determined by ideology which requires theorists. How to meet these two requirements simultaneously?
The way to do this is for each to respect the other’s expertise. Historically this has been our biggest failure and continues to be so. We have zero tolerance for dissent and difference of opinion. We, i.e., those who head ideology-led movements treat it like their personal property and behave autocratically. The fact that in many cases, the leadership is handed down from father to son, emphasizes the personality cult and alienates those who are not interested in kowtowing to the ‘Grand Master, Shaikh, Peer, or Whatever’ with prefixes and suffixes to match. The use of grand titles reinforces the power distance and makes hero worship the most desirable trait and questioning, a capital crime. The movement becomes a personality cult which spells its own doom which happens when the founder dies. The followers blindly follow, have nothing new or original to say or do, except quoting the founder in deferential tones with grand titles at every turn. The founder’s words take a Divine color and even the thought that the founder could have been mistaken in some ways, is treated as blasphemy. Difference of opinion is treated as rebellion and treason and dealt with accordingly. This effectively destroys the basis of cooperation and ensures that the movement fails. Our history is replete with examples of this, but we don’t learn from history and so are condemned to repeat it. Those who want to succeed must learn how to succeed. Or they will become another statistic of failure. Change must begin with the self.
What is the ideal form of accountability of the institutions established by the movement?
The process of accountability starts with collaborative goal setting, deciding on measurement metrics, and performance assessment. I say ‘collaborative’ because accountability must be based on mutual respect for the different talents, knowledge, and skills that each brings to the table. This is not an employer-employee or boss-subordinate relationship. Rather it is a collective collegiate assessment of progress. The process must be free of blame and must have only one goal: the success of the mission. The purpose of accountability must only be to recognize success and high performance, and to identify areas of improvement and to chart a course for that to happen. Not for punishing unless a crime was committed. Therefore, before accountability, a culture of mutual professional respect must be established.
Why do many movement-run institutions fail to perform well? What are the real obstacles? What are the ways to overcome them?
They fail because they don’t develop the tools to succeed. Passion, enthusiasm, and sincerity are not a substitute for expertise and skill. To lead the army, Rasoolullah (S) didn’t appoint his greatest friends Abubakr Siddique (R) or Omar ibn Al-Khattab (R) or his cousin, Ali bin Abi Talib (R), all of whom were among the first Muslims and his greatest supporters, highly learned in Islamic knowledge, pious, dedicated, passionate, and skilled warriors. Instead, he appointed a new convert, Khalid bin Waleed (R) who didn’t match the others in either knowledge, or piety but had the skills and track record of being an exceptional army commander. It was merit that drove his decision, not friendship, relationship, or even liking. Yes, there must be a baseline agreement on principles because the purpose of the movement can’t be achieved by someone who is opposed to the idea that the movement seeks to propagate. But once that baseline is reached, responsibility must be given only to those who have the training, skill, and knowledge to perform. Ideology defines the goal and the path that leads to it. Skill is necessary to do what it takes to reach the goal. Leaders must always keep the purpose in mind and not allow their ego, personal likes and dislikes, affiliations, or anything else to get in the way of choosing the right people. Nobody can succeed on their own. Right people are critical to success. No matter how talented, skilled, or learned the leader may be, without competent supporters he will fail. Let’s ask how we hire, especially if the person who is fit for the position is someone, we may have a difference of opinion with or don’t really like very much. The ability to work with diverse people and be able to relate to them depending on the situation defines successful leadership. Please see my book, “Hiring Winners”.
Is there confusion among ideology-led movements about the need for and importance of organizations? What is the solution?
There is tremendous confusion. The reason is that most if not all those who are in top management positions in Muslim ideology-led movements have no corporate organizational experience and so they have no appreciation for it. Let me remind you that the world is run by multinational corporations, for a reason. Corporations have perfected the art of leadership and of its seamless transfer from leader to leader which enables them to call the shots and make or break economies, even nations. All these skills are learnable and usable but only by those who understand the need and are willing to learn. I am not sure that we can apply that definition to those who run Islamic ideology-led movements. Our leaders don’t understand hierarchies, authority, delegation, professional collaboration, or teamwork. Most come with a Madrassa background which is totally authoritarian, with a premium on blind obedience and dissent and questioning brutally suppressed. Working in teams, working with diverse people, especially those of the opposite gender, working with younger people, especially if that younger person is in authority, respecting education, skills, and competence of a ‘worldly’ nature on par with religious knowledge, and more, are not part of the culture of Islamic ideology-led movements. This has a detrimental effect on professionals. Competent ones leave and sycophants remain. The result is inevitable.
To change this is an upcliff task, not only uphill. But unless we learn to respect each other (not merely pretend to do so), we can never work together productively. Most of our ideologues, who head ideology-led movements are arrogant and fearful of others like themselves and disdainful of those who differ. Their followers blindly venerate them, warts, and all, and refuse even to correct any mistakes that they may have made in their speeches, writings, or practice. The mistakes are repeated slavishly and acquire a patina of holiness because of the one who did it. Anyone who points out the mistake must face the wrath of the blind devotees (Andh Bhakt). The fact is that in all the ideology-led movements that I know, there is not even a pretense of succession planning or leadership development. Once someone is in the leadership chair, only death can displace him. I know of one case when the head died, others would not even sit in his chair because of their veneration for the piece of furniture that his backside had graced for so many years. The chair was kept in its place and people sat on the floor in front of it to transact their meetings. I am not sure if I should laugh or weep. Predictably, the organization split with those who had any self-respect going off on their own. The egos of those in positions of authority are the main problem, without correcting which nothing can be solved.
The bottom line to all this is for the heads of ideology-led movements to ask one simple question. “Do we want to succeed or not?”
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But through all those years, through all the pain, the restricted mobility and consequently restricted social life, I never heard her complain even once. That is the remarkable thing about both my parents, that they never complained about whatever difficulties they had to face.
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Be in the job of creating memories for each other. Because that will be your legacy and the only thing which will remain with you one day. Forget justice, think abundance. Forget rights, think duties. You will be questioned about your duties. Not about your rights. If both spouses fulfill their duties, their rights will automatically be fulfilled. See your happiness in the eyes of the other. And know that is what will make you happy. Same rule for life.
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Every time I think of my journey of entrepreneurship, I realize that I didn't become an entrepreneur when I launched my company in 1994, but when I answered Bonnie McIvor's question about why I was not accepting her brilliant offer of a job in GE. That was the critical incident which decided my destiny. And I thank Bonnie for being the catalyst who made it happen. If she had not interviewed me and made the alternative - going back to work for a corporate entity and in this case, one of the biggest and best in the world at the time - so real, I would not have been able to get the clarity I did get, about the reality of entrepreneurship. And I would not have been able to make such a clear choice. It is choices which make or break our careers and lives. Until we make the choice nothing happens. But when we choose, one door opens and another one shuts. For me the door to building a global practice, traveling all over the world and friendships with people from diverse backgrounds, races, cultures, and nationalities, opened with that interview.
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We remember that life is a struggle and those who are successful are those who overcome the struggle they face. Who do you respect more? Someone who lives a charmed life with every happiness and so was never depressed or suicidal. Or someone who faced hardship, loss, bereavement, fell into deep depression, became suicidal, on the brink many times, but then, came out of it, stronger, wiser, full of compassion, kindness, and a heart full of love for others? Dumb question, right? Hardship is a test. Those who overcome it, graduate into another higher stage of life.
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The world is going mad, but not my world. I watch the news. And I am thankful that I am not ‘news’. Can I count the favors of my Lord? What is each one worth? Which of the favors of my Lord will I deny?
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Let us carry on the fight. Let us pledge to fight all hatred, all discrimination, all racism, all apartheid, no matter where it exists. All hatred is fire. All fire burns and the result is always ash. Say this loudly, clearly, and always. Say it especially if you are the only one saying it. Because if even you fall silent, then who will say it?
I don’t expect to see resolution in my lifetime, but then, the point of fighting is to be able to say at the end of the day, “It was a good fight.”
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If you think success is difficult, try failure. To accept mediocrity is to accept failure at the start. Mediocrity ensures that your failure is permanent. That drug is called ‘compromise.’ I know that there are more mediocre people in the world than those who achieve excellence. But ask yourself who you would rather be – who would you like to emulate?
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You become an author by writing. Not by talking about how badly you want to become an author. It is like drawing or singing – people hesitate to do it because they don’t think they are good at it. That explains the popularity of bathroom singing because you do it in what you think is isolation and so you are uninhibited. So tuneless though you may be, you still enjoy yourself. It is the same with writing. People worry about writing a best seller more than they worry about writing itself.
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We are touchy, feely creatures. Our most powerful ways to communicate have always been wordless. When our emotions peak, we are struck speechless. Our gestures, hugs, and tears tell the tale far more powerfully than anything we could have said. Words uttered at such times appear contrived and artificial, devoid of sincerity. We didn’t speak. We hugged. We kissed. We wept with each other; tears of both grief and happiness. This is what being human meant. It still does but thanks to a creature, unseen, unknown but not unfelt, we must rethink what being human means today. How can we fight the physical distance which is translating into emotional distance?
We can write. We can speak. We must. No physical contact, doesn’t need to translate into no contact. This is the new normal. Let’s learn to like it.
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I learnt the meaning of consideration, kindness, sensitivity, manners, social graces, and hospitality. And all these and more, I learnt by seeing them in action. That to me is the true meaning of mentoring. And Aunty Mohini lives on in my heart as my first and greatest mentor.
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