What's on my Mind

Category: Opinion

  • What is it like to be around “Resentful People”

    Disclaimer : This is not a self help article , so don’t be worried about getting any free advice. 😛 If you are looking for some, you are better off reading LinkedIn posts that offer “Superhuman” tips to deal with resentment.

    Over years, I have noticed there could be several sources of resentment. So, how do you know where the bitterness is really coming from? Do you even realize what just happened to you was an act of resentment?

    Well, I might have not mastered dealing with resentful people but I certainly have made some progress in identifying its several forms. 😎

    Do you recognize any of these not so pleasant episodes of resentment?

    1. Let me hold it back .. To throw it back

    Have you encountered someone who seems to be holding onto something? Who often makes subtle references to it BUT when you talk about it -THEY SAY NOTHING. Chances are – they are piling up surprises for you in their Santa Claus bag.

    Then one day, when you are with them, trying to fix something, you notice that eerie silence surrounding you. You think you are doing it right and just then you screw it up. That’s when, then they let it all out.

    Did you anticipate that shriek – “I told you but you never listen” ? That’s just their bottled up disappointment in you (a root of resentment), waiting till this moment.

    2. You talking to me? I wasn’t the one being Promoted

    Have you worked with a friend who was super nice but suddenly became grumpy after that promotion of yours? Did you feel like you were talking to walls when you were asking for their help or venting about your new role? Is it just you or have they also withdrawn from others?

    Unfortunately, the world is unfair and your friend might have realized this later than you think. So, they leave you all alone to battle this crazy world. It’s just their way of revenging humanity.

    That feeling of how the world is unfair, can root in some long and strong resentment.

    3. The Perils of Parenthood

    There was a time in my life when everyone around me was having kids. All my social feeds were filled with cute baby pics and it made me introspect the purpose of my life. 🙄

    But, then I met this dear friend of mine who unlocked the other side of this story. She wished so often to go back to her good old days that it felt like she regretted having a kid. 😆

    Having kids can make you go nuts. Kids don’t sleep. They don’t always eat. They are almost always hyperactive.They love to play but with YOU and not their TOYS. And if you disagree with any of these, crying comes to them as natural as walking. You might think that you are taming them but in reality – They are taming You.

    If you notice a parent constantly bickering about their kid, you’d know where this resentment is coming from – regrets due unrealistic expectations and wishful thinking.

    4. I don’t trust you No More

    Have you ever received this ultimatum in last relationships – It’s either me or her? A study says most times this question ends up in a divorce. So, if I were you (who faced this deadly choice), I would vest all my energy in searching the root cause.

    Have you been showering compliments around while your wife stood staring, next to you ? Have you been graciously displaying your manners to co-workers when everyone at home knows you as a Couch Potato? Did you forget to praise your partner in that lovely green dress? If the answer to any of these is YES, I think we all know why you received this ultimatum. 😆

    Your split personality has been causing quite some insecurity. It destroyed the little trust your partner had in you, resulting in a boiling resentment.

    5. And Sometimes, It’s just Chain Reaction

    So, you got yelled at office today or someone humiliated you publicly? Does that make you feel like a “Nobody”? Do you feel powerless? Chances are – whatever you are feeling right now has the potential to release the monstrosity hormone, that will help you take back control. It might as well result in chain resentment where everybody is just trying to find some balance.

    The hunger to be in charge or feel powerful has carved some very Lunatic Resentful people in this world. I hope you are not one of them and neither are you planning to become one. 😉

    Anyhow, I had enough of sharing these not so pleasant episodes in a single day. The only point I am trying to convey here is that everyone is resentful at some point in their life. They might just not realize it at that moment. And the cause of this resentment is often within them (not external).

    While it feels bad to be at the receiving end of resentment, it is no party for the resentor either.Those who resent are sufferers themselves.

    So, the next time you meet a bitter person, I hope you recognize his/her resentment and its origin. I hope you come out positive, feeling pity for the person.

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.

  • Finally I’ve finished this 1000 pages book

    In the beginning of March, when Covid 19 had not become a phenomenon yet, I bought this bestselling book on suggestion of my spouse. He read this book when he was young and it left an impression on his mind so deep, that he has been constantly nudging me to read it once.

    So when the lockdown began and I had ample time to stay at home, it was indeed a good thing that I bought this thick read. I sat in peace with coffee & kindle, slowly reading through 1000 pages of the book – “Shantaram”

    When I heard the name of this book, I thought it was written by an Indian author (coz its name sounded so Indian). But, I was mistaken as the writer is actually Australian. Gregory David (the author) was once a convict in an Australian prison. He escaped the prison and somehow ended up living in Mumbai, one of the largest cities in India. Here he took refuge in a slum as he had no money and no belongings.

    He starts a humble life in a slum but eventually joins a mafia gang and becomes a criminal. He makes some friends in this journey who love him, leave him and perhaps also manipulate him. You would gradually see his mental transformation as he lives through all of it. You would also notice how it changes him and makes him almost one of them.

    In this book, the author narrates what he saw, experienced and lived through in the streets of Mumbai. While most books end up boasting the cultural side of India, this book unravels difficult, brutal and sometimes repelling side of this country. The story is so eventful and gripping that it almost feels like a movie. I remember reading the first half of this book in just two weeks.

    Being an Indian, I thought I knew a lot about India, people and their livelihood in general. But I realize now that as a middle class citizen, I was probably too comfortable and ignorant to witness what the massive population of this country lives through on daily basis. I crawled through the last 400 pages of this book,trying to sink in each scene & its description. The details around black market, life in slum, mafia operation and the Afghan war look so realistic that it was hard to believe why the author puts this book in fiction category. I think it might be because he likes to disassociate himself from the doings he describes!

    Anyhow, in a nutshell, I will recommend this book to (at least) other Indians as I’m sure it would give a good perspective of the uglier side of India. A warning though – you need to be open minded to read and appreciate this book. While media, television and most Indian expats promote culture, yoga and Indian food, this book does a decent job describing how life really looks like for more than 60 million people in India.

    If you are an adventurer, planning a trip to India, you might as well like to give this book a try. Just don’t be scared and extrapolate these experiences to your travel plan.

    I’m glad to have finally finished reading this book yesterday! 🙂

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.

  • I wouldn’t have known North Korea without this Book

    [Spoilers from the book included]

    Few years back, if you were to ask me about North Korea, I would tell you – it’s just some country in East Asia. I didn’t know then about the totalitarian regime in North Korea and how distinct it was from South Korea. Neither did I know, how life in North Korea differed from rest of the world.

    Last summer, when I read a book titled ” A river in darkness – One man’s escape from North Korea, I uncovered the mystery of life in North Korea. It painted a picture so deep in my memory, that I still find myself thinking about it some days.

    This book, is a story of its author – Masaji Ishikawa, who moved to North Korea when he was just thirteen years old. Before moving to North Korea, he lived in Japan with his parents, His father was originally from South Korea while his mother hailed from Japan. After their marriage, his parents moved to Japan, where his mother earned little wages from menial jobs and his father grappled with discrimination. The story is set in 1960s, just a few years after the Korean war.

    Somewhere around that time, the government of North Korea launched a propaganda to attract millions of Koreans from Japan. They desperately needed laborers to rebuild economy after the Korean war and luring back Korean immigrants seemed an easy option. North Korea was promoted as a land of opportunities with jobs, free education and food for all. Masaji’s father, who was brainwashed with these false promises, convinced his entire family to move to North Korea. He didn’t know then, the stark differences that exist between North and South Korea(where he hailed from).

    Masaji remembers the first meal he received after the long journey to North Korea. It was rubber like chewy & pungent smelling meat from remains of an animal. Hungry and tired, he quickly ate whatever was served to him but felt deeply disgusted once he learned it was a dog. He did not know then, that food was a privilege in North Korea and not everyone slept with their stomachs filled. Anything that was alive was deemed edible and people felt grateful to be able to just eat.

    Upon their arrival, Masaji and his family were taken to a small village and granted a small hut. All their personal luxuries were either stripped off or stolen soon. Anyone who dared to speak against the government officers, disappeared overnight. Equality existed in the neighborhood in sense that everyone was poor. And if anyone, managed to afford any luxury, the government made sure to rip that off and beat him to death.

    Masaji describes how his schooling tamed him in North Korea. He arrived there while he was young and learned to obey like all other children in his school. They learned to sing praises for Kim II sung – the ruler of North Korea. Their teachers made them regard Kim II sung as their holy father. It was natural to grow up as a blind devotee and loose any independent thinking.

    What I found moving in this book was the constant description of hunger. Masaji and his family starved for months on rations that were meant to last for few days. They were forced into hard labor and their combined earnings rarely sufficed to buy any food. They woke up every morning, thinking about food and slept on empty stomachs, dreaming about food. Most of his family members died of hunger year after year while Masaji somehow survived in North Korea. He had no money and no connections which made it difficult for him to escape the country. He ended up spending thirty years of his life in North Korea.

    And then one day, he finally managed to escape the country, alone. I thought his agony would come to an end after his escape from North Korea. But unfortunately, that was not true. Masaji never managed to bring back his family to Japan and lived the rest of his life worrying about his wife and kids, who were stuck in North Korea. He could also not make a decent living in Japan as he lacked education 7 skills that were deemed crucial for most jobs.

    After I finished reading this book, I felt restless. The emotional torment of Masaji’s survival was devastating. He escaped North Korea in 1990s. That does not seem far too behind in the history!

    I wonder how North Korea has changed since then. Very often, I hear strange pieces of information about North Korea – Threat of nuclear attacks, disruption of all communication with South Korea , military escalations and so on. I wonder what people living in North Korea experience ? Do they still suffer? Are there more Masajis, whom we must rescue? And if yes, who will own the responsibility to establish their rights and freedom?

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.

  • ‘C’ for Coronavirus

    I was shopping in the market,
    when they all flee,
    Saying, “death by corona
    will come to thee”
    I stopped by my friend,
    who would not see me
    Saying, “We are quarantined,
    My wife and me”
    So, I sat down in a restaurant,
    But they did not feed me
    Saying, “ We are closed
    Until further decree”
    Alas, I reached home
    & switched on T.V.
    Watching lock down news
    while the dead counts spree    .

    (The Coronatime has made me either creative or crazy!)

    On the evening of 24th March, India announced a nationwide lock down starting midnight. Back then, I was on a vacation in India so the news brought some stress and worry. Domestic flights were shut. International flights cancelled. Theaters, restaurants, shopping malls, public transport and e-commerce were put to a grinding halt. My return to Amsterdam was suddenly unpredictable. All I could do was wait and watch, in hope that the normalcy would return soon.

    That was the time when India had registered close to 300 corona cases and seven deaths. It was hardly comparable to the plight of Italy and Spain. So, I wondered if the lock down was due pandemic or panic.

    As it turns out now, it does not matter which one it was, for either reason could have not have changed the outcome – The soaring number of deaths in this country.

    There exists no right way to lock down a nation that has the second largest population in barely 2 percent of the world surface. In India, close to 64 million people (almost the size of Italy) live in slums. Mumbai hosts the largest slum of Asia which is so congested that no man can live in more than 2 sq mt space. It is the saturation like this that makes social distancing unrealistic. Hence, many people get infected and some die in spite of a lock down.

    While some may die of Corona itself, many more die of its Collateral damage.It is estimated that more than 300 million workers (including landless laborers, self-employed and daily wage earners) are on the verge of losing their livelihood in India. This is owning to the lock down and the subsequent job losses. Most of these people, live hand to mouth and are unable to sustain on their meager savings. Government surpluses can help them buy rations but the surge in black markets keeps supplies out of reach. Cash subsidies can help them survive but since most don’t own a bank account, their fates remain unchanged.

    Apart from above two, there also exists a third category of dead in this crisis – People who die in the name of God’. Religion is bigger than science in India. It is for this reason, amidst lock down, thousands gathered in mosques and temples and god knows how many other holy places. The paranoia following these incidents not only spread the pandemic and raised death counts but also queues riots after corona.

    Over a month has passed now, watching this existential crisis in India. The country has now more than 70000 cases and close to 2000 deaths. (and numerous unaccounted Corona Causalities). All of this, in the period of lock down. It is not certain how and when the crisis will finally end. Neither can we rely on any predictions. It is also not certain how the country will look in the aftermath of crisis and how normal our lives would be. For all we can do now is – wait and watch, while this alters the course of our history.

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.

  • God save humanity!

    Close to 75000 species become extinct every year. This is nearly 1000 times the natural rate. (Thanks to the human intervention). We have 8.7 million species today. At this rate, all of them will be extinct in 116 years. A Stanford study estimates that our civilization might collapse by 2100.

    Doomsday theories are so prevalent that our minds are on auto pilots to tune them out. There are more than 300 movies about apocalypse and we still haven’t run out of ideas how humanity will cease to exist. As ridiculous as they may sound, the underlying message that someday our species will disappear is not untrue. This certainity is not my belief but an obvious conclusion based on our historical performance. To digest the idea one needs to understand the key to our performance – Human behaviour. So, lets look at it in a very simplistic way.

    Humans are lazy by nature. We invent to live in comfort. Think of agriculture for example. Humans were wanderers before this invention. We were on a constant move in search of food. When we found out how to grow wheat, we settled around a farm to live a comfortable life. With more time at hands, we found pleasure in procreating, producing more hungry mouths than we could feed. To feed them, we found technology, fertilizers and pesticides. We cut down forests to farm new lands. We learned to domesticate animals and made their lives miserable.

    When crops did not suffice, we switched to meat. Animals were bred, fed on farms until they were ready to be shipped for factory slaughter. More forests were cut for animal grazing. More animals cut to produce more meat. Water, trees, birds and animals perished, creating a deadly imbalance in nature.

    It is this imbalance that started the mutilation. So, the ozone is now damaged, the Arctic is melting, the temperatures are soaring, the mountain glaciers disappearing. Hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes and pandemics are appearing out of the blue. More than 50 million people die every year in these natural disasters. All of this started with agriculture, that we discovered to settle down and save ourselves from the labour of hunting.

    Being lazy might have turned out bad but being intelligent, even worse. Humans use their intellect to solve problems at hand. While, we solve one, we create many unforeseen that are worse than the original problem. Back in stone age, we were glad to build stone arrows for hunting animals. In the years following, we improvised to swords and axes. Pistols and machine guns were invented to kill in an instant. An atom bomb was built to wipe out a town. A nuclear bomb could take down a country and biologically engineered virus can perhaps, take down the whole of humanity. Today, more than 1.6 million people die of violence caused by the weapons. (The ones we invented originally to hunt deers).

    Inspite of all this, we live in constant fantasy to explore. You shouldn’t be surprised when someone ate a chimpanzee, only to discover AIDS or when a scientist inventing blood transfusion died in a transfusion or when radiation killed the one who found it . Living in this world of unknown, we cannot fight the desire to explore, to be smarter and find more comfort. It is often our bid to do better that backfires and keeps us constantly bandaging the wounds. With our persistent efforts and a megalomaniac vision, we sure will take our breed to grave one day.

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.

  • Why things go wrong at work?

    Do you wonder why things are not looking good at work? Why does your hard work not pay off proportionally? Why is it that Tom, Dick & Harry got promoted while you are stuck here (reading this post)? Maybe it’s your first time experiencing this disappointment? Or may be you have had this frustration before? When things don’t seem good constantly, there may a reason underlying it.

    In 1969, a psychologist named Dr. Laurence Peter came up with a principle – The Peter Principle that explains how an organisational hierarchy functions. It drills down the cause of why things really go wrong at workplace. While It may seem quite old, I found his wisdom relevant, even today. In fact, they even teach this in several management curriculum.

    Why are some employees so Incompetent?

    Do you ever wonder why you are surrounded by incompetent morons? (well, you may have at least one around?). Think about it this way – The skills required to get a job often have nothing to do with the job itself. This, is relevant in every job and every industry.

    Consider Presidency for example, the skills required to run and win a political campaign are quite different from what it takes to do the actual job. Trump lives this example. Similarly, there is nothing about being a great surgeon that prepares a doctor to run a hospital. So by this means, a lot of people who shine bright in interviews might lack the skills to perform their job. No wonder, why you are stuck with them! 😕

    And why are they getting promoted?

    Speaking about promotions, there is a simple theory to this much coveted phenomenon. Everyone in an organization keeps on getting promoted until they reach their level of incompetence. At that point they stop being promoted. So given enough time and enough promotion levels, every position in a firm will be occupied by someone who can’t do the job.”

    How do we let this happen?

    The truth is, employees in a hierarchy do not really object to incompetence. They merely gossip about it. Question is, how can an employee move up the ladder when blocked by someone who has reached his level of incompetence? The answer – he can’t. Neither by his efforts nor by the help of a patron. This is because demotion is a rare phenomenon. The only way to rise up the ladder is to move into a promotion channel that is not blocked. In reality, this is often visible when people change departments or leave companies.

    What happens when you are super competent?

    If you are a supremely competent employee surrounded by idiots, you probably should be worried about your fate. 🙄 In most hierarchies, super-competence is more objectionable than incompetence. Ordinary incompetence, as seen, is no cause for dismissal: it is simply a bar to promotion. Super-competence often leads to dismissal, because it disrupts the hierarchy, and thereby violates the first commandment of hierarchical life: the hierarchy must be preserved.

    Then, how do we get the work done?

    If everyone eventually gets promoted to reach his or her level of incompetency, do you not wonder who really is turning the wheels at work? 😳 Well, we rarely find such a system where every employee has reached his level of incompetence. Work is accomplished by those, who have not yet reached their level of incompetence. In most instances, something is being done to delay their progress, so the hierarchy can still exist.

    What does this mean for you?

    Now you know why things don’t go well at work. You may be the one causing it 😉 OR perhaps you are just a victim of Peter principle. Question is, can you change your situation? Maybe. this is easier said than done.

    Most organizations, these days, employ techniques to avoid the pit falls of Peter Principle. They attempt to flatten their organisational hierarchy. Be it by being agile or be it by sharing 360 degree feedback or be it any other mechanism. The truth is, while this might work for some, in most cases it just brings a false sense of accomplishment. (we aren’t all competent to steer this change)

    So, going by the record, the Peter principle is here to stay, We can’t really get completely rid of it. Perhaps, it just helps to know that it exists and that’s why things go wrong at work!

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.

  • Why I stopped watching the News?

    Sunday night news, everyone in my family was watching it except for me. I watched news occassionally earlier but only recently have I started despising it. In times of pandemic when everyone is stuck in their homes, news is all we have on television. The soap operas (thankfully) are not being produced anymore. Reality shows are put to a grinding halt. There is no Movie production or release planned for the entire quarter. We have more than 10 news channels to pick from. Each one following coronovirus day and night and counting deaths every minute. There is so much information out there and so many theories that one can write a book out of it (that actually sells).

    But to be honest, I find the news channels polarising. They not just deliver facts but create a sentiment, voice strong opinons and publicise it. Almost all news channels are now backed by a political party and the funding ensures the interests of party are addressed. This is not to say that all news channels are biased but they frame facts such that it influences public sentiments in a certain direction (conveniently ignoring facts which might keep our opinion balanced)

    To give you an instance, few days back, a news channel announced how an Indian Prime Minister is leading the world leaders in formulating the corona strategy. This was monumental for the nation. I was amused. The news was delivered by a foreign lady and that made it seem like this was some world news channel. Upon some research, I discovered the channel was owned by the then government in power. That explained the news. Imagine, the fake pride and respect it induced within the citizens of India who would line up to vote the current ruling party next elections.

    I also saw news showing theories of labs in china that aided spreading the virus. Some call it china virus. Some say this is a biological weapon for world war III. Whether or not the theories stand right, the photos of bats, labs, testubes and sound effects coupled with it are enough to induce anti chinese sentiment.

    And what about Anti Muslim agenda that is already on rise? Surely, after the corona episode, people won’t mind voilence within Muslim communities. The news channels have been buzzing about Jamats and how they are responsible for spreading the virus. It sure can be a story but imagine when you listen to this, all week on over ten news channels, would you remember which category of Muslim population is responsible or would you remember that Muslims in general are responsible? Constant reinforcement of information creates this radical opinion.

    It is bizzare to see how news channel can gather so much content around the pandemic that the only thing to talk about all day is The Pandemic. What happened to the war in Iraq? Why isn’t trump impeached yet? Is climate change still on the agenda? I am curious about all these topics except that I don’t get to choose what I should think about when I am bombarded with corona information all the time.

    20 years ago, we had one channel on the television. It was the channel for everything (not just dedicated to news). News was delivered by a middle aged women in a monotonous tone in half an hour segment. It consisted of concise facts leaving it upto the audience to form their own opinion. No sound effects, no graphical remakes. People were not brainwashed but open to ideas, discussions and other people in general.

    Unfortunately, times have changed now and so had the news. I thought, the only way out of this constantly stirring intolerance is to stop watching the news channels altogether. I thought it better to not have an opinion than have a radical one.

    Now, I scroll through headlines on print media for limited time each day. The silence gives me space to think, choose my interests and form an opinion that is original and somehow my own.

    Its Sunday night again. Today is the Prime Minsiter’s address to the nation. Everyone is watching the news at home except for me. The me will instead read the highlights later tomorrow.

     

    © Copyright 2020. Megha Gupta. All rights reserved.