बत्तमीज से दोस्ती का परिणाम | Making Friends With Bad Behavior

एक महानुभाव ने फेसबुक पर एक फ्रेंड (दोस्त) बनाया। शुरू में ही समझ आ गया कि दोस्त "बत्तमीज" था। पर "मेरे साथ ऐसा नहीं होगा" के अति-आत्मविश्वास से ग्रसित महानुभाव ने कोई कदम नहीं उठाया। बत्तमीज दोस्त आए दिन एक-एक कर किसी न किसी को अपने गुस्से का शिकार बनाता। महानुभाव सौम्य स्वाभाव के थे, डर जाते पर कुछ किया नहीं। "निगेटिव" को नजरअंदाज कर "पॉजिटिव" पर ध्यान केंद्रित किया। बत्तमीज दोस्त की लिखी बातें ज्ञान-वर्धक जो थीं! 

एक कहावत है - "मेमने की माँ कबतक खैर मनाएगी"। एक दिन महानुभाव का बुरा दिन था। बत्तमीज दोस्त के "हत्थे चढ़ गया"। बत्तमीज दोस्त ने अपनी "परंपरा, प्रतिष्ठा और अनुशासन" का प्रदर्शन कर सबके सामने महानुभाव की आरती उतारी। ऊपर से दोस्ती तोड़ ली सो अलग। 

महानुभाव पछताए कि क्यों इस दिन का इंतजार किया - "मेरे साथ नहीं होगा" की मानसिकता पर उन्हें खेद हुआ। 

बत्तमीज से दोस्ती का परिणाम अच्छा नहीं हो सकता। आज नहीं तो कल, उसके दुष्परिणाम भुगतने को तैयार रहें! हमारे ऊपर वाले महानुभाव जैसा न बनें। 

- राहुल तिवारी 

Society: Should Marriages Be Saved At All Costs?

I remember an old incident. There was a viral video being shown on TV and circulating in the media at that time. It was a scene from CCTV camera of some home in Gujarat where a daughter-in-law was beating up her mother-in-law with a wooden stick. The old lady was sleeping on a cot when the daughter-in-law enters and starts beating her up brutally with a wooden stick. She beats her up black and blue. The incident had invited large scale condemnation. To that, one person said something which remained in my memory forever. He said, “When the man tries to save his marriage at all costs, such things happen”.

I think what he would have tried to say was that every big incident had some background. If a person does a small wrong thing and gets away with it, the person may be encouraged to feel safe and might do a bigger wrong deed next time. If that is also ignored by others, the person may do still bigger act next time. This goes on and one day we hear news like the above incident. No one becomes a hardened criminal at once – normally there is a “background”, as we see in the movies too.

Realizing this, it can be argued that the above woman may have done some smaller sins before and would have gone unpunished. Hence, she would have ended up doing the above. What is the message for married people from this?

The message is that one should not ignore small incidents of bad behavior from one’s spouse. It is true for men as well as women. If they would ignore small incidents of abusive behavior, the spouse may be encouraged to do worse next time. The idea is to stop the evil from sprouting into a big tree by stopping it while it is just a small thing.

At the same time, if the threshold has been crossed, one should have the courage to “let go”. One should not tolerate abuse just to save one’s marriage. Of course, this does not mean that one should always expect “perfection” from one’s spouse. Mistakes happen and we all do mistakes. But intentional abuse is a different thing and we all can identify when it happens. In such cases, one should be ready even to sacrifice the marriage rather than keep tolerating the abusive behavior from one’s spouse. What is the threshold and when to know that time is up? It is an individual case and one can decide this for oneself. And of course, never feel shy to take expert help from others before making the decision.

- Rahul Tiwary

Psychology: Father Son Conversation

The other day in office washroom I overheard a telephonic conversation between a father and his kid. The person called up his child (let us assume it was his son) and told him that he had received a Whatsapp message from school that the kid had not submitted an assignment which he knew he had taken to submit the previous day. “You had taken that assignment yesterday to school. Why did you not submit it?” The kid said that he had indeed submitted his assignment. Then the person asked him if that was the case then why did he receive a message reminder from school. The kid answered that the message must be a common message to all irrespective of whether the concerned student had submitted the assignment or not. The father simply said okay; accepting the reasoning. Then the kid asked him if he had received individual message or in the group. The father accepted that he had received the message in the “group” i.e. Whatsapp group. 

Two things struck me in the conversation. 

First, the father did not trust his son. When the son said that he had submitted the assignment, the person tried to trick him into accepting the opposite by doubting “if son had submitted the assignment then school won’t have to send a reminder!” The son had to explain how the generic messages work and then the father was satisfied. 

Secondly, the father was proven stupid when he confirmed that the “message was sent in the group and hence was a generic reminder” and it was not sent individually to him. The father should have understood this very simple fact by using common sense. So, the son would either have noticed that his father was stupid or else he would have noticed that he did not trust him. Either way the inference coming out from the conversation was not healthy. 

Lastly, these generic reminders are weird and often create confusion. I remember in my previous organization all of us used to receive emails asking us to take some mandatory actions and then in the end there would be a sentence saying, “Please ignore if you have already done this”. In the age of advance analytics and artificial intelligence, such “generic mailers” are simply time-wasting stuff which also add to the unnecessary stress to the employees. The fact that this was happening in an IT company makes it look more stupid. 

Now in my childhood days, my father never checked upon me if I had done assignments or not. I would of course do the assignments most of the times, since otherwise I would look stupid in front of others in the class and would also get punishments. Therefore, I do not understand this need to add a new check and “alert” mechanism which today’s parents are trying to put. If kids know that parents would remind them and alert them if they were missing something, they would have some less serious “sense of responsibility” and rather focus on having some better excuse making capability and certainly better “argumentative capability”. Now these may not be totally useless skills but still I would choose the scenario where the kid owns his decisions regarding school matters and has his own mechanisms of reminders, rather than his father calling him from washroom and asking him stupid questions to trap him, while being involved in something more urgent (using the washroom). 

- Rahul Tiwary

[Reflections] Our Life, Our Goals and Our Relationships

For the last 5 years Rohit wanted to go to an onsite assignment from his company. Today when he got an opportunity, he does not want to go anymore. He does not feel the need any more to go. Why? Because, whenever he thinks about going, face of his newly born son comes to his mind – and he does not want to miss being together with him. It is a classic case of changing priorities. And I think there is nothing wrong in it. What appears important today, may not appear important enough tomorrow. So what do we do with this learning? Let us not be rigid about anything – this can be a good lesson.

One of the truths of life is that no goal is permanent. We all are taught in the childhood and younger days to be ‘focused’ towards our ‘goals’. But most of those ‘goals’ are not ‘our’ goals to begin with – those are the goals which our parents, family members and society have decided for us. When we are young, no one cares about what we want – because they don’t trust our instincts – and hence they write prescriptions for us based on what they think is best for us. But sometimes we get so much used-to with this prescriptive mode of decision making, that we waste a large part of our life in fulfilling others’ dreams rather than our own. Some of us even forget that we could have our own dreams.

Relationships are the most difficult stuff in this world. Because it is one area where you don’t have individual control over it – you depend on the other person or persons for doing anything. Sometimes I feel that to find someone who goes on nicely with you – is such a rare thing in this world! The other person need not be like you, or think like you, or do things the manner in which you would do it too, but that person’s thinking, way of doing things and being makes you ‘complete’ and ‘content’ – and that I think is the ultimate test of compatibility.

Even in the matters of relationships, I think our society has taken the easier path. They tend to find ‘equality’ most of the time – which may not be the same as ‘compatibility’. Most of the social conventions and norms are made with ‘simplicity’ and ‘practicality’ in mind, not specifically efficiency and effectiveness. This can be understood because it would not be possible for society to determine and guess things are a micro level. And hence they made rules at a macro level. It is up to us to remind us of these limitations while imitating what society has framed for us without customizing it according to our needs or situations.

The most unfortunate thing in life would be to lead a long life lived on others’ terms. For life is often judged by its outcomes and not on its insides or content – which again is due to limitations in social control. I think we ourselves are the best judges on our lives. There is no one else who knows us and our situations better than us; and hence it would not be possible for others to judge us and our life.

This is one subject where thinking and talking does not help. Everyone is constrained by a numerous things and hence for us to expect the other person to act or react in a particular fashion would be a wrong thing to do. But where does this leave us in the matter of relationships where we are forced to depend on the other person for its success? A lot of people either go into a shell or end up breaking the cord when faced with an intolerable prospect. It would be harsh to judge them – a principle we made and must follow. So where does it lead us to – can we conclude anything on relationships?

I think where it leads me to is the realization that it is a matter of great luck that we come across the ‘right’ person or persons. Having once found such persons, it is our responsibility to tread cautiously and ‘protect’ the relationship. But here again, it gets tricky. As someone said – relationships are like holding sand in our fist – if we put pressure, it escapes from the gaps of our fingers and if we hold on it too softly – it again is lost. So all that is in our control is to try and hope for the best.

So does Lord Krishna’s teaching on Karma comes best to our rescue? To do best that is in our hand and to leave the results to the Supreme? Well, it may be unexpected but it indeed seems so…

- Rahul Tiwary