Step Your Game Up

The afternoon session of Abhyas Varg B was designed to give us the tools to enable us to push ourselves further and aspire for excellence. We watched a video from the TED website – an organisation that does talks and seminars spreading innovative and creative ideas.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/barry_schwartz_on_our_loss_of_wisdom.html

To push for excellence, he motions the idea of ‘virtue’. To illustrate his point he gave the example of a hospital janitor. His job description does not involve one aspect which requires human interaction. However, when interviewed, many janitors gave stories of how they ignored orders and parts of their job description in order to help patients such as helping them with their rehabilitation. So, despite not requiring any social interaction as part of their described role, many janitors feel it is necessary to do so and this helps the hospital run smoother and create a pleasant environment.

So values such as kindness and empathy are an essential part of their job. A wise person requires the moral will and moral skill in order to do the right thing and knows when and how to make an exception to every rule. A wise person is adaptable and changes according to the situation.

A wise man is made, not born. Wisdom comes from experience and this requires trying new things and accepting and overcoming failure. To be brilliant, you need not be wise but without wisdom, brilliance is not enough.

Applying the above to society today, we see a world full of compliance and bureaucracy. Rules are rigid and we often hear the phrase, ‘I hate to do it but I have to follow rules.’ Has it occurred to us that rules often prevent thinking and initiative? Rules and incentives are useful in the short run but in the long run they deprive thinking and discourage people from using their moral will and doing the right thing.

But this structured and regulated society we live in is rife. Today’s education system hampers creativity and promotes mediocrity. Children are losing their ability to think and their creative prowess is diminishing. I, like many other university students can relate to this. To pass our exams, all we do is memorise a few lecture handouts and read the core textbook (obviously, not just the night before the exam!) and once it is finished, we forget everything that we learnt. As a result of the current education system, we often lack initiative and struggle to adapt to working life which is fast paced and ever changing.

To address this issue, the speaker spoke of how the education system needs revamping in order to promote creativity and forward thinking. In addition, work needs to be re-moralised – people should be inspired to do the right thing and this requires moral will and initiative. Furthermore, social interaction is needed to gain a greater sense of community spirit.

In many of our lives, we will be faced with the following dilemma – do we follow the rules given or do we use our moral will and do the right thing?? What would you do??

Adding Value...

Each day of every SIP Abhyas Varg begins with mind cleansing Safai and Mantras. Safai is performed in the mindset that we should always leave a place in a better manner than when we arrived thereby ensuring your marks is left. When someone enters the place after you have left, they should feel your were there. During Safai we try to identify areas where we can add value, in this case we are looking to add value to the Karyalaya, OUR Karyalaya. The building should give swayamsevaks who visit it a sense of pride and belonging. Just in the same way that a multinational corporation's state of the art head office does. Beginning a day looking to add value in everything we do, is a great benchmark to set, always striving to see where we can fill gaps and be better in all aspects of life. The experience of Safai in SIP has spurred me on to do tiny little things in my life. Such as picking up an empty can if I see one on the street, rather than kicking it down the road assuming someone else will sort it out. Or at home, when normally I have to be told to pick washing off the line, or dry dishes, now I am actively looking to see opportunities where I can help out, or add value, and then I simply do them. An extremely inspiring video detailing an example of adding value whenever you can, not simply because it aids you, is this. The little boy who tries moving the tree by himself has no vested interest in clearing the road. He could quite easily walk around it, yet he sees a problem and decides to do something about it. Can we be like the boy? Or will we sit on the sidelines assuming someone else fill fix things?

Conviction...

A question that we ask many a time within our own circles is: how do we instil conviction of the organisational mission within our Swayamsevaks? One method I have been experimenting with, is providing inspiration in the form of stories about great people. Simple graphic novels with morals behind them, such as Amar Chitra Katha, small books such as the Bharat Bharti series (Available from Hindu Sahitya Kendra) and full blown biographies are all sources of inspirational stories on great people such as Guruji, Jijabai, Shivaji Maharaj, Swami Vivekanada. These great people lived in a way befitting an example of our mission, and exposing swayamsevaks to their experiences and deeds is bound to inspire a deep conviction. Baudhiks at Shakha are a good platform for telling of such stories, role playing stories and doing anything else creative that provides the underlying message of the lives these great people lived. As members of Sangh, we too have a responsibility to be a living example of our mission. We cannot afford to have separate lives, for example, one at Shakha where we do not swear or mess around and are generally beacons of society, and one outside Shakha, where we act in a completely different manner altogether. We must act in a way that 50 years from now shikshaks will look back on our lives to draw inspiration for their students. If we do not, shikshaks will forever be referring to the likes of Shivaji Maharaj. Though his story is immensely inspirational to us, young swayamsevaks are slowly losing the ability to relate to someone from such a different time. We need people leading by example today, not just at Shakha, but 24/7.

An Inspiration, A Leader

In the morning session, we discussed greatly about the topic, leadership. We discussed the different types of leaders ranging from inspirational to spiritual. What was unique about the discussion was that we talked about how shakha creates leaders; how it identifies leadership and how it taps into this potential. Having attended shakha for many years, I had never discussed this topic and had always assumed that leadership was a quality that shakha just nourishes, without a second thought.

After being split into groups, we set about answering the questions posed. Having never examined the structure of shakha and how it develops our character, I found it difficult trying to pin point the aspects that I felt develop our leadership skills. However, with greater thought, ideas began to flow readily.

After reminiscing about my younger days as a swaymsevak (I’m still only 20 so still class myself as youngster), I realised that the whole shakha environment is aimed at nurturing our leadership skills. At first, this may sound ludicrous – for most people, the purpose of shakha is to play games, have fun and make new friends. Although this is true, there is something deeper to shakha and with further introspect these answers can be found.

Firstly, as swaymsevaks, we subconsciously learn the art of leadership by being led by others. Not only do we pick up the way in which they lead and organise activities, it also shows us the importance of respecting our elders, an ethos which our religion promotes greatly. Secondly, the environment of shakha encourages us to become leaders. Playing games such as kabadi exhibits skills such as teamwork and communication – skills which are crucial to becoming a leader. Therefore, even with no given responsibility, the seeds to becoming a leader are already being planted.

Camps and vargs such as SSV & SIP are designed to further enhance these leadership skills. Learning about the history of Sangh; gaining greater knowledge of Hinduism and being taught how to take shakha instils a sense of pride, discipline and commitment; again characteristics required of a leader. With these new profound skills, it should lead to introspection and conviction – one should realise the higher cause of shakha, uniting Hindus and emphasising the importance of serving our community to the best of our ability.

Another fundamental feature of a leader is that they must be inspiring. Shakha infuses this by having passionate baaudhiks on great figures in our history such as Shivaji. Admiring such great characters and implementing their qualities into one's life builds character. One meaning of inspiration can be, ‘to breathe life into another.’ It is a feeling or an emotion which is critical because it informs us what we value and this moves us to act. This act should be selfless and out of devotion (sadhana). A unique feature of leadership is that it is self inspired – it comes from within.

I often feel this is a quality that many Hindus lack. Looking back in Indian history, we have always had to rely on one leader, one inspiration such as Swami Vivekananda to lift us out of darkness. Why is it that we always require an individual to inspire us? Why can't we be bold and have the inspiration from within us to act? It is this area in which I feel shakha can help develop leaders by giving us the tools to search for inspiration from within. However, it is an arduous task and one that we all must ask in order to find our true inspiration.