Monday, May 24, 2010

Reminder

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high,
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action– into that heaven of freedom,
My Father,
Let my country awake.

Rabindranath Tagore

Sunday, May 23, 2010

Leadership

These are few links I found on Leadership

Wanted: Courage, Compassion and Character - Round Table Conference at Stanford University (Link Courtesy :My Husband)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTRcPlNfynA&feature=player_embedded#!

Solitude and Leadership

http://www.theamericanscholar.org/solitude-and-leadership/

Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp0HIF3SfI4&feature=related

Kavita Ramdas at TED

http://www.youtube.com/user/tedtalksdirector?blend=1&ob=4#p/u/20/n9Z_pccScW0

The Mythical Hero's Journey

It is never evident in our teenage years what plans life has laid down for us.I do not believe in a fatalistic view of life,but I do believe that life has its goals which somehow get fulfilled through the individual experience.When I look backward and connect all the dots,some experiences make perfect sense in the present moment.But looking forward or imagining where the chips fall would be bad idea.To be prepared for the storm is fine by all means,but lets not predict its exact moment.The journey each individual takes is so unique.Books, road maps,amulets,gurus,secret incantations,beauty,power,ambition,luck,intelligence ...nothing can prepare us.None of these, will save us from the blows which life would give.Lets choose the battles wisely.The hero has to return to the starting point.The sacred circle of return would be marked by a change,which would never appear on the outside...but would be deep within the inner realms of his/her soul.Too much time is wasted fighting other's battles,or taking detours with topics which don't matter.Once we know what matters most,we focus,learn and evolve....

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Hands on Experience

As a electrical engineer,I feel I am blessed to have a job where I get to see how strategies are employed.I am there from the start. ... A rough model is got by brainstorming,converted into a reality by experimentation and then placed into the product and validated.It not a one "person" show.It involves around a hundred employees doing their best.When I graduated the mindset I had, was so different.I existed in a world which was idealized and complex models existed as mathematical equations.In the real world no such thing exists.The toughest thing is not to solve the mathematical or logical questions.The hardest part would be to make everything work.It requires understanding human Psyche,and being non judgemental.It requires understanding other's perspectives.It requires knowing that even though you may have a advanced degree you are not advanced than others..You are like everyone else...with faults..with fallacies which come out unexpectedly like everyone else.

A skill which we use our own hands to built stuff is necessary for everyone.When humans first evolved they used their hands to build everything.Somehow we are losing touch on the elemental fundamentals.I am not saying that we should treat automation as a bane.But we need to understand the pain that people take to build stuff.Everything comes out of some one's sweat and it may be invisible but it is still there.Even though I have not perfected the art of not judging other professions.....I am improving...

Every job is noble and has its own worth...Who am I to rate it as better or worse...But the teachers have told that if I fail,I may end up doing the menial jobs..But to unlearn this program in my mind..it may take me some time..

Taken from New york Times Article...

The visceral experience of failure seems to have been edited out of the career trajectories of gifted students. It stands to reason, then, that those who end up making big decisions that affect all of us don’t seem to have much sense of their own fallibility, and of how badly things can go wrong even with the best of intentions (like when I dropped that feeler gauge down into the Ninja). In the boardrooms of Wall Street and the corridors of Pennsylvania Avenue, I don’t think you’ll see a yellow sign that says “Think Safety!” as you do on job sites and in many repair shops, no doubt because those who sit on the swivel chairs tend to live remote from the consequences of the decisions they make. Why not encourage gifted students to learn a trade, if only in the summers, so that their fingers will be crushed once or twice before they go on to run the country?

http://prayatna.typepad.com/education/workbased_learning/

Sunday, May 09, 2010

The Unlearning Curve

Education gives you knowledge for a particular skill.It makes you a specialist in a field.Gives you a comfy job,by which you make a living.

Wisdom on the other hand does not depend on these narrow limitations.It cannot be taken for granted that a person who has degrees from the best university,highest number of letters has the most amount of wisdom.It is such a difficult unlearning curve for me.I take it for granted that... Education= Wisdom.A poor person ,a person who is illiterate,a person who begs on the street may still have the wisdom which I lack.Kabir was an illiterate weaver.

Why is it so difficult for me to love tribal music?

Why does the melody which stirs my heart is refused by my mind... as not good enough???

Why did mythology which has so many avenues to wisdom was rejected by my scientific mind for such a long time??

What conditioned bias do I hold inside me which refuses the divinity of tribal gods and embraces the modernity of sophisticated philosophical theories??

Only time can help me unravel my own difficulties of accepting the vast manifestations of creativity which lies in each of us.

References

Deep Forest - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtgcmLS6B8E&feature=related
Bare Foot College-Bunker Roy Talk
http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail783.html

Friday, May 07, 2010

Social Reform

Other than having interest in social entrepreneurship,my life long ambition is to be a part of the social reform process in India.I never knew the deep diseases which the Indian society suffered till I stepped into the realm of higher education in India.This is a common sight among lot of professional colleges in India,where there is a steady influx of all classes of society(lower,upper and middle)
If higher places of education have so many problems,it really shocks me even to think the problems faced by the dalits in the improvershied areas.

The upper class maintaining its strong hold on wealth,were no different than the lower and middle class.They suffered the same bias.The engineering classes became a lecture in tribal hierarchy formed by the so called "mini adults".I call them mini adults as they reflect the environment in their homes.As I studied in Hyderabad,I can write more clearly about the problems which trouble the girls there.I was outcast(I am a Tamilian!!!! and to add another layer of discrimination a veggie loving Iyer)
Dowry,skin color discrimination,second rate citizenship on basis of gender and to be treated as if "being born as a girl was a curse !!!!!!" was few of the things which I could see as on a regular day to day basis.
A assistant professor in Electrical Engineering coming to the class and encouraging the boys to study more hard so that they can fetch more dowry in the future.(The college I studied was branded No 1 that year for Elec Engg...)
The problem which bothers me even now(so many years after I have graduated)...is that those girls thought it was normal to be treated badly.Their hope lied in getting married, giving birth to sons and redeem their position in the male dominated world...I could see how female feticide was a big problem clearly after I heard these reasons...(Rajasthan had the highest number of female feticides in the last decade)
This is one of the things I love about USA...People get treated most of the times(99.9%) as a equal.I dont see any discrimation on such a deeper level like India.Workplaces and educational institutions command respect and the professors behave with maturity.There may be a random bad fruit in the bunch,but on the whole "HUMAN DIGNITY IS PRESERVED"...

The question remains

It bothers me..
Why should it bother me...
When it does not bother those girls..???
Change comes from within ...It cannot be forced...
Is social revolution possible in India???


Reference

Found this video ...A debate on skin color NDTV(We The People)
Not just skin deep prejudice

http://www.ndtv.com/news/videos/video_player.php?id=1143397

Thursday, May 06, 2010

Moral Principles

In olden days "Religion" was a mixture of legal code,medicine,idle superstitions,wise direction and dirty politics.In recent times, we do see a division of all these disciplines in a country.The lines between all these divisions are blurred and for a ignorant few,they don't even exist...

To solve our moral dilemmas using ancient texts would be wrong move.Firstly,they may have value in their era.Once these texts have been displaced to our time,they lose their contextual laws.Trying to use Laws of Manu(in the case of women rights) in recent times, would be a grave mistake.Like a river washing away ancient debris,moral debates should be solved with fresh perspective.They should consider the socio-political and economic conditions of the present time.Historical texts should not be discarded,but they may be used as a pointer to better alternatives.