I have always wondered whether the pursuit of material gain and professional growth should gain precedence over gains for the personality, the spirit, the family and the community. I come from a typical middle class Tambram family where simplicity and frugality marry well with hard work, sincerity and excellence in academic pursuits.
My parents never pushed me hard to study and do well, but study hard I did. And I did fairly well too. I started out at Godrej & Boyce as a Management Trainee at a princely stipend of Rs. 1700 per month in 1983. At that time this was considered a decent enough pay, so much so, that when my father, out of a sense of pride, took my appointment letter to show it to Shri Tarachand Barjatya the proprietor of Rajshri Pictures for whom he worked, the sethji promptly raised my father's own pay! I am quite certain that that was not my father's intention, though I have to thank Godrej for this development in our lives at that time.
Even in those days a Godrej job was not considered to be very hip. After an MBA one typically took up jobs with the likes of Hindustan Lever or Johnson & Johnson or Citibank or HSBC that gave both a career and money. I somehow never hankered after money but also felt at the same time that I had reasonably enough to live the life I wanted to. Looking back I also realize that I wanted was quite a simple life most of the times...sumptuous food, decent clothes, simple house and a job where I felt wanted.
Many of my colleagues sky rocketed in their careers within the first five years. Pradeep Kar became a very successful IT entrepreneur with his Microland. C.P. Tahiliani became the youngest General Manager at J&J. Vijayan Subramani was hand picked by Citicorp to be part of their international cadre of management trainees to be trained in Greece to become a currency dealer and a treasury professional eventually. And the list went on. Batch mates zipped around the world and came back with their stories. I listened to their anecdotes and wished I could get there someday too.
It was around this time that I adopted and understood the phrase that I am about to state.
YOU ARE ALWAYS HAPPY IN THE ABSOLUTE AND MISERABLE IN COMPARISON.
But I have never been able to successfully overcome the debate of "if I don't compare how do I constantly improve and if I do compare how I avoid being miserable". One of the methods was to try and be anchored in something higher to avoid sinking into the depths of the mundane. And that "something" higher made me gravitate towards spirituality at the great risk of being tagged with the line that "folks who can't make it in their careers take up spirituality"
Many of my colleagues egged me on saying I needed to get out of the well that was Godrej and out into the big great world if I was to grow in my career. I never felt the need nor the urge. May be I was risk averse or just plain lazy but I never looked out of Godrej for 10 long years.
When I take a look at my class of '83 now and do a rapid review I find that the position each person holds is no longer what it was when we started out. Big egos have got flattened, life priorities have changed, people who thought success couldn't be theirs are indeed successful and so on and so forth. This brings me to another phrase that I adapted from a book title that I browsed some years back.
TOUGH TIMES NEVER LAST BUT TOUGH PEOPLE DO.
In one's career it's important to build one's capabilities and develop strength of character to be able to handle the downturns and the tough times and still be humbly able to ride the crests. It's a tough ask because when the good times come its difficult to give the credit to others and to higher powers and still remain humble. And when the tough times hit you its difficult to steer clear of the negativity and the waves of pessimism and still not do anything rash. I wonder if there is a case for writing a book with the title "Good times don't last but Good people do".
I saw the Hindi movie "Om Shanti Om" sometime back and what stayed in my mind was the simple yet profound speech that the lead character, played by Shah Rukh Khan gave on receiving the Filmfare award. He says, things always work out in the end and if for some reason it has not worked out for you, believe that it is not yet The End!!
I am still not 100 % certain that one should pursue career growth at all costs. I haven't seen very many successful professionals who were also good human beings. At least not till the last 4-5 years. These days I am more convinced than I ever was that being fundamentally good pays off in the long run. I see lots of evidence around to support this hypothesis to convince me to pursue this line of thought and behavior.
And in case you are still not convinced, go see "Om Shanti Om" and get convinced by the King Khan himself!! :-)
My parents never pushed me hard to study and do well, but study hard I did. And I did fairly well too. I started out at Godrej & Boyce as a Management Trainee at a princely stipend of Rs. 1700 per month in 1983. At that time this was considered a decent enough pay, so much so, that when my father, out of a sense of pride, took my appointment letter to show it to Shri Tarachand Barjatya the proprietor of Rajshri Pictures for whom he worked, the sethji promptly raised my father's own pay! I am quite certain that that was not my father's intention, though I have to thank Godrej for this development in our lives at that time.
Even in those days a Godrej job was not considered to be very hip. After an MBA one typically took up jobs with the likes of Hindustan Lever or Johnson & Johnson or Citibank or HSBC that gave both a career and money. I somehow never hankered after money but also felt at the same time that I had reasonably enough to live the life I wanted to. Looking back I also realize that I wanted was quite a simple life most of the times...sumptuous food, decent clothes, simple house and a job where I felt wanted.
Many of my colleagues sky rocketed in their careers within the first five years. Pradeep Kar became a very successful IT entrepreneur with his Microland. C.P. Tahiliani became the youngest General Manager at J&J. Vijayan Subramani was hand picked by Citicorp to be part of their international cadre of management trainees to be trained in Greece to become a currency dealer and a treasury professional eventually. And the list went on. Batch mates zipped around the world and came back with their stories. I listened to their anecdotes and wished I could get there someday too.
It was around this time that I adopted and understood the phrase that I am about to state.
YOU ARE ALWAYS HAPPY IN THE ABSOLUTE AND MISERABLE IN COMPARISON.
But I have never been able to successfully overcome the debate of "if I don't compare how do I constantly improve and if I do compare how I avoid being miserable". One of the methods was to try and be anchored in something higher to avoid sinking into the depths of the mundane. And that "something" higher made me gravitate towards spirituality at the great risk of being tagged with the line that "folks who can't make it in their careers take up spirituality"
Many of my colleagues egged me on saying I needed to get out of the well that was Godrej and out into the big great world if I was to grow in my career. I never felt the need nor the urge. May be I was risk averse or just plain lazy but I never looked out of Godrej for 10 long years.
When I take a look at my class of '83 now and do a rapid review I find that the position each person holds is no longer what it was when we started out. Big egos have got flattened, life priorities have changed, people who thought success couldn't be theirs are indeed successful and so on and so forth. This brings me to another phrase that I adapted from a book title that I browsed some years back.
TOUGH TIMES NEVER LAST BUT TOUGH PEOPLE DO.
In one's career it's important to build one's capabilities and develop strength of character to be able to handle the downturns and the tough times and still be humbly able to ride the crests. It's a tough ask because when the good times come its difficult to give the credit to others and to higher powers and still remain humble. And when the tough times hit you its difficult to steer clear of the negativity and the waves of pessimism and still not do anything rash. I wonder if there is a case for writing a book with the title "Good times don't last but Good people do".
I saw the Hindi movie "Om Shanti Om" sometime back and what stayed in my mind was the simple yet profound speech that the lead character, played by Shah Rukh Khan gave on receiving the Filmfare award. He says, things always work out in the end and if for some reason it has not worked out for you, believe that it is not yet The End!!
I am still not 100 % certain that one should pursue career growth at all costs. I haven't seen very many successful professionals who were also good human beings. At least not till the last 4-5 years. These days I am more convinced than I ever was that being fundamentally good pays off in the long run. I see lots of evidence around to support this hypothesis to convince me to pursue this line of thought and behavior.
And in case you are still not convinced, go see "Om Shanti Om" and get convinced by the King Khan himself!! :-)
Dear Mr Krishna,
Nice inspiring piece and agree with you to the last dot!
I was wondering if that is more because of us presumably being from the same generation (batch of 83 etc) ...for today's so called Gen X is extremely materialistic and impatient.
I constantly deal with youngsters who are just out of college but have no patience to train or learn. They want to be the boss right away!
And at the end of day when I am driving home I catch myself wondering whether I am just out of sync with this new generation or there is something that we got from our parents but did not pass it down to our kids!
Happy rambling!
Best wishes,
Reena
An excellent and profound post! There is much wisdom here. We are all travelling and those of us who focus on being good people also are touching the world in ways above and beyond the tangible. A spiritual perspective is never a hinderance as humans are spiritually minded by nature; so opening ourselves to the spiritual only makes us that much more authentically human and hence that much more, authentic gift to the world.
Thank you again for your wisdom.
~peace~
What an excellent piece! Thanks a lot for sharing this here. It is very inspiring. I too believe in the same philosophy as that of Mr. Gopal, and second the conclusions he derived out of his experiences. A very good read.
Dear Sir,
Thanks for this wonderful post. I have been in industry for around 11 years and have gone through a various searches and researches about what I should be doing. Any sort of acheivement acedemic or material doe not seem to guarantee lasting peace and fulfillment.
Finally, through a lot of soul searching I seem to be getting a hint of things that really matter to me and that I should really do. Unfortunately, these things bring me back to 'square one' the very square I tried to move away from a few years ago. It is like being in Pable Coelho's Alchemist.
I am currently based in London and am pursuing further education long with a job. Would like to connect with you more and get your profound prespectives on this life chnaging situation.
Regards,
Dhananjay