The plague called Optimism January 17, 2009

The title of the post will possibly raise many eyebrows, and I will try my best to send your eyebrows to Mars  after  you have finished reading it. Well, that’s an optimistic start.

The good thing about writing a blog is that you suddenly attain this position of authority, and yet  at the same time, distance yourself from the reality as if the situation in no way affects you. That possibly, you haven’t committed the same mistakes which you would like to point out here. It is so amusing to write,  to dictate, to prove the follies we commit, the fallacies associated with our lives and not be humble enough to accept our mistakes or rectify them.

For years I have wondered the state of mind of being “Optimistic”. What does it actually mean? And how is it supposedly superior to being “Pessimistic”? The Bear can make as much money as the Bull. Logically, the Bear will make money when the Bull will not. And vice-versa. But there is a counter argument to it, which says, even the Bear is “optimistic” about the bad times in market.

Human beings would always like to be optimistic. It is a good thing, to be optimistic, to hope that things will turn around, that there will be light in the end of every dark tunnel, to know what you are doing is always right and believe that it will yield results. But that is where the main reasons for debacle lie.

Look around you. Do you see good things? How is your life?  Does the future seem bright? No. No at this moment. No matter what status you have in your society, no matter how much you earn, no matter how secure your life is, the future does not seem too good.  But why? Why this is so, possibly lies in the instinct of human beings being  ”Optimistic”. The belief that things just cannot go wrong. The absence of humility that plagues us, erodes us every day, preventing us to believe, that we can go wrong.

This is not about always treating ourselves as failure. That is not the point I am driving at. The hindrance to development does not lie in the instance of thinking that we can go wrong. On the contrary, it might help us to reassess what we are doing or what we are about to do. This cannot be termed as second thoughts. But it is just giving us a space to look at things from a different angle, and to try to make all angles perfect. But our prejudice forbids us to explore.

We just cannot face up to the fact that we may be wrong, we may be incompetent and we may not possess appropriate skills. Sometimes, when we attain a certain age or status, learning is seen to be a matter of disgrace. I feel that the word “Learning” has some sort of a long term (equal to Economics’ terminology) connotations attached to it. This is absolutely not true. Learning is continuous. It happens every day, every minute, and every second of our life. This process of learning and replicating is so subconscious and so continuous, that we possibly do not even understand or stop to look at, or marvel at this process. But there are some things in life which need to be consciously learned, and replicated.

For that we need the humility. Humility, I am afraid, cannot be learned.

It was this optimism; that things just could not go wrong; which made people in US cash in on the Realty Boom. Everyone knows about the roots of this recession. But no one questions the Why. Why didn’t anyone anticipate the fall in the demand? And why didn’t anyone reassess the situation; how will things change if the demand fell? And why did anyone not act upon it?

It is not the Greed, that people so scornfully refer to, that has destroyed Economies after Economies. Greed, per se, does not destroy you. The fables of Ali Baba does not hold true in the age of Capitalism anymore. Rather, if you do not have the Greed, you probably will not explore potential areas of growth. And the importance of Growth cannot be overemphasized anywhere.

It is Humility of not accepting that Human Beings can go wrong, because they are humans.

It is Optimism, and illogical Optimism that, which makes us turn the blind eye to us being Humans.

Answers by an Unknown September 8, 2008

In the midst of a crowd, among the noises and the commotion, I try to sit quietly, and plan my next move. What should I do to calm my senses, to regain myself which I have been fast losing being amongst so many people at a time? I just cannot seem to find the answer. 

It is so easy to lose yourself when one is with so many people at a time. Who am I now? Where do I fit into this new scheme of things? How to stretch myself? It is so hard to find what I want. So many people telling you what you should do, what you should not do. How to approach a problem, how to solve it. It is almost like you are fast losing your identity, because the way you do things is what makes you. How can you even try to break yourself and build a new you? Prejudice stops you and so does your vanity.

 So, I sit back and observe the people around me. There are some who are constant sources of information. It is easy to read them. They are the ones who have issues which are trivial and they are continuously trying to cultivate it as an excuse to brood. Do I sound arrogant when I say this? May be yes, but I stop to think, why react to people who have no effect on you? Why react to situations which cannot change the way you get on with your life? Why not focus on issues which you have full control, rather than divert your energies to those which you do not have control upon?

 And then there are some people, who can be phlegmatic and unfazed by people as if they are not visible, as if their words do not reach their ears. People around them are unimportant, their actions meaningless. I admire these people, and I feel intrigued as to how they can make everything related to them, when in reality, for an outsider, he may well seem to be someone who sits in a corner and looks at everything with expressionless eyes. Nothing moves him. You may talk to him; say something about why things are what they seem to be. He listens, with those expressionless eyes, and then turns to whatever he seemed to be doing before, that is nothing. 

I feel flustered. When you articulate your emotions to human language, you expect a reaction, even a wry smile or a monosyllabic reaction. But then I stop, and I realize, what is the need to react to people? Is there a compulsion to always have a reaction? And that too for someone whom you don’t know? People have been forced into the relationships of acquaintances here, we all have been. But we cannot be forced into making reactions, to the people and to the situations around us.

 But it is difficult for me to inculcate that behavior. I find myself thinking a lot, about a situation which I have no control upon. So much so, that I try to force myself into believing that it is under my control. Everything around is under my control, and if it has to be out of my control, then that shortcoming rests with me. This clouds my mind, and I lose myself because such things make me weak. The fact that things are out of my purview make me jittery and I question myself. And the answers are hard to come by.

I wish again that I could look at things without expressions and without emotions. I wish I could learn how not to involve myself with lifeless things, just like the expressionless-eyed fellow. But then, I would become him, someone I don’t know.

Truth and Consequences: Budget 2008 March 1, 2008

 I love the way how the entire country and its citizens are perpetually obsessed by numbers. It doesn’t limit itself to financial and economic arena, though. Just look at how we are so engulfed in questions like how many centuries has Sachin Tendulkar scored and how many thousand runs he has passed and how many test matches he has played etc. At the end of the day, in the moment of truth when we need to win the match, those numbers rarely bail us out.

Quite similar is this year’s Budget. Keeping in mind the elections and yes, the people who vote in elections, the Finance Minister has cleverly and shrewdly provided us a secret gift in a shiny wrapping paper.

What also had to be kept in mind is the slowdown in global markets due to increased fears of US recession, an impact which could directly have in the growing Indian economy. Plus, those fears that the India’s honeymoon with the GDP growth rate was ending. Such slowdown, if true, would be devastating, when the funds riding on the stock markets are primarily of the FII’s, reaping in the benefit.

This post would hardly help the academics or the people preparing for interviews for B schools. What we say there (and I am included too) is what we want to believe and what we want to achieve, NOT what we think is going to happen. Call me cynical, a forbearer of bad news or someone who secretly wishes for doom, but all does not look too well. What the minister did was to tweak a thing or too, which would probably keep the growth rate in Indian economy still at an impressive rate in the next year, enough for his government to get re-elected. As some one sarcastically put it, “The only thing not announced in the budget were the election dates”

To explain things simply, individuals were given a breather with reductions, and other concessions, (One already knows all the numbers). Increasing the disposable income means more buying, more consumption (thereby inducing more production and the Govt coming up with reduced interest rates) with more investment thereby boosting growth in the GDP. Along with this, the budget proposes to increase government expenditure to an all time high with numbers no one had ever dreamt of to increase India’s GDP with a long term intention along with a short term objective to attract all the potential voters and potential Investors.

People, who look at numbers and believe them, would be satisfied at them when they do come out next year. And professional individuals, right now, are also very happy because they think that a high disposable income would increase their ability to buy more. What they will not understand, is that only disposable income increases while goods bought (and necessary ones, those) will not get any cheaper. Inflation will increase, due to increase in money flows, so you pay more than what you are paying now. And you live in an illusion that you have more money now. Measures to check inflation, although, have been conveniently left out in the budget.

The most important question, that everyone is asking right now, is how will the Government arrange for 60,000 crores? That’s not that difficult to explain. The process of loan waivers is a 3 years process, as said by the Finance minister. We only see tax sops to individuals. Corporate tax, on the other hand is a different story. There are stringent rules applied and corporates don’t get any relief. Government hunts down its revenues from here, definitely more than that of individuals.

This budget is actually again a plan suggesting the measures. Implementation is easier said than done. For example, since India still has a deficit in its balance of payments, the loan waiver and other government expenditure has given something to think about. It doesn’t matter if the government is re-elected or not, taxes are bound to increase for the corporate sector next year. Such increase would again cause to look for more SEZs and again the SEZ policy has also been conveniently hidden underneath the carpet, even though Nandigram and Singur were such burning issues this year.

But I do place my facts on the probability that the measures that the government has proposed will be implemented. The building of IITs and IIScs and 16 central universities are still in papers and such “mandatory” announcements are made every year. Evaluation is not done, and the only effects proposed would be short term effects. The numbers, the growth rate, the inflation rate and the tax rate are huge matters which are always applied with a short-term intention, while the consequences are not given any importance.

If the annual financial budget is only created to keep the investor’s confidence, the voter’s confidence and the confidence that India is growing, by whatever measures necessary then what is the need for such annual disclosure? The government and the finance minister can come out every time with their policies when there is an issue at hand, like global markets or economic recession.

Growth is a concept which is never short term. The problem is that foreign investors look for immediate results, through the growth rates. Immediate results can always be arrived at by applying tweaks like increase/decrease in taxes. But in this process, the whole point of the growth of Indian economy in real terms, is absolutely lost.

The Void September 30, 2007

Here is a little story for you. Once upon a time, there was a city. A city filled with people. People with extraordinary ideas, talents and skills. People who came together, to share their expertise, they exhibited them and received recognition in the world stage. It was they, that made this city the haven for all artistic creations, for unconventional thoughts, for supreme innovations in music, art and culture.

But then it ended. The people left the city. Some died and with them died their legacy. Others moved to far away places in search of a better life. The city of intelligentsia was now no more. It was left with people who were ordinary and simple men and women who were clueless about how to fill up this void.

The story has continued ever since. It starts with college. Schools press upon a disciplinary code which is hard to break, and has that presence which guards the innocence and the simplicity. Once it ends, the beginning of a new world is upon us, the social interactions increase to greater heights, and the need to be in the control seat is greater than never before.

The basic idea is to differentiate yourself from the mass. In trying to be classy and chic one must constantly try to impress upon others that they are completely ignorant about the exclusive and refined facets of life. Music, art, cinema, books, philosophy — anything that you can lay your hands upon is a weapon. The “I” matters the most than the “You” in any form of conversation. Speaking rather than listening is a common feature.

It is here, that people like me who get snubbed, rather royally. That is the fun part. People have ideas, they have talents, they have thoughts and they have their interests. They need to socialize,  either through the traditional means or through the world wide web. Do they need to share their interests and thoughts?  I think Not. In this game of One-upmanship, there is only one winner. The one who has the most refined tastes of all. He who admires Nietzsche and he who has read Plato, the one who loves Franz Liszt and the one who adores Humphrey Bogart  would be the odds-on favorite. Although, the explaining bit isn’t a part of the exercise. If you were interested and genuinely curious about such exclusive interests, I am afraid the door never allows you to step in. The truth is that on the other side of the door lies the terrible void, which can never be filled up with pretension and affectation. But even pretension is an art, and pseudo-intellectualism a profession in this city and for people like me, a back seat is all it takes to enjoy the carnival.

Independence Day August 15, 2007

 1. Today is the Independence Day. So wish you all Happy Independence Day! Whether you hold a cynical attitude towards India after 60 years of Independence or accept the rosy picture painted by the news media, it actually seems irrelevant. Everyone seems to be basking in the glory and trying to get a fair share of what is there to be taken. I for one am completely bowled over by the innovative opinion polls that the local newspaper seems to come out with every year. Today’s Telegraph edition says that 91.9% people believe that Sania will play a wimbledon final against Sharapova, 58.3% people believe that India will host 2060 Olympics on the moon and 72% believe  that an Indian will win the F1 space race, organized by Richard Branson’s son. I saved the best one for the last though. 57.8% of people think that pregnancies will last for three months instead of nine.

Statistics, my favourite subject.

2. I didn’t catch Chak De India, but the tagline interests me. The day every woman is independent will be the true Independence Day. Yeah, independent as in what? Independence can be in mind, or in terms of self-sufficiency or in decision making. But what I would really emphasize upon is independence from the whole obsession and excessive consciousness of how a woman herself looks or how she perceives others look. I wish women would be more independent in thought.Like thoughts necessarily don’t comprise of clothes, jewellery, hair, make-up and back to clothes again. Also, a passion for something cannot be a fetish for owning 200 shoes or bags.

3.  Independence day means a holiday also. That means family reunion. That means a conglomeration of people in the next house. That means the cute and sweet voices of the kids. That also means turning up the volume on Himesh Reshammiya songs, with some kind of classical music going on in the first floor with 4 Pomeranians barking relentlessly throughout the morning, noon and night.

Ladies and Gentlemen, my Independence Day.

My shortcomings June 28, 2007

How do you treat the deficiencies in you? When someone tries to hold a mirror in front of you and shows you the things that are your shortcomings. Do you treat them as shortcomings?  Do you work with your shortcomings? Or you just try to walk away from them?

Is solitude my shortcoming? The state in which I explore myself, the world and the people around me is my solitude. It gives me pleasure, the ability to see myself from a different angle, my loneliness is what goes with me, and I try and look at things through a different perspective. Thoughts overflow, and I grasp my food for thought which is there on the platter. I read, I write, I watch and I learn. Is it a shortcoming?

Are my emotions my shortcoming? When I react to people who try and judge me and possess preconceived notions about me? Come to think of it, my world would be much simpler without them. But somehow I don’t know why, I force myself into the circus. A good conversation, a pleasant outing is always welcome. But is it so difficult to keep it that way? Why can’t people be moderately polite and subsequently assertive and graciously do things which brings a proper closure? Why do people that surround me make things purposefully difficult? Why is there so much fabrication of truth, especially when the truth is about me?

The only wrong thing I committed, is trying to find out an answer to the Why. There are no answers. There are no solutions. I have been trying to mend things which are beyond my control, walking into world which isn’t my own, talking to people who aren’t my friends and trying to find the light in the dark tunnel, only to be disappointed, again. I shouldn’t do this, I hear telling myself. I can’t find anything that gives me solace.

It is just a feeling that I have which still lingers on, that I can never be what others want me to be. It seems hard but it is the truth. The paths that I want to walk on, do not lead anywhere.

I was me, but she’s gone.

I tried to find me in you.

May be that was where I was wrong.