The Mind Block

 

During a research experiment a marine biologist placed a shark into a large holding tank and then released several small bait fish into the tank. As you would expect, the shark quickly swam around the tank, attacked and ate the smaller fish. The marine biologist then inserted a strong piece of clear fiberglass into the tank, creating two separate partitions. She then put the shark on one side of the fiberglass and a new set of bait fish on the other. Again, the shark quickly attacked. This time, however, the shark slammed into the fiberglass divider and bounced off. Undeterred, the shark kept repeating this behavior every few minutes to no avail. Meanwhile, the bait fish swam around unharmed in the second partition. Eventually, about an hour into the experiment, the shark gave up. 

This experiment was repeated several dozen times over the next few weeks. Each time, the shark got less aggressive and made fewer attempts to attack the bait fish, until eventually the shark got tired of hitting the fiberglass divider and simply stopped attacking altogether. 

The marine biologist then removed the fiberglass divider, but the shark didn’t attack. The shark was trained to believe a barrier existed, so the bait fish swam wherever they wished, free from harm. 

Point: Many people, after experiencing setbacks and failures, emotionally give up and stop trying. Like the shark in the story, we believe that because we were unsuccessful in the past, we will always be unsuccessful. In other words, we continue to see a barrier in our heads, even when no ‘real’ barrier exists between where we are and where we want to go. 

You cannot change the past but you can change what is going to happen next.

Paradise and Hell

 

One day a samurai came to the Zen Master Hakuin and asked:

– Where is paradise? Where is hell? And where are the gates of heaven and hell?

Samurai knew only two things: life and death. He did not have any philosophy, he just wanted to know where were the gates – to escape hell and go to heaven.

– Who are you? – Hakuin asked.

– I’m the leader of samurais – the warrior replied – and the Emperor pays a tribute to me.

Hakuin laughed and said:

– Are you really the leader of samurais? You look like some poor raga-muffin!

Samurai’s pride was hurt. He forgot why he had come for, whipped out his sword and was going to kill Hakuin. And Hakuin laughed again and said:

– This is the gate of hell. With a sword, being in anger, with your ego you will open it.

Samurai realized that idea, calmed dawn and sheathed his sword. And Hakuin continued:

– And now, when you calmed down, you open the gate of heaven.

Heaven and hell are inside you. And the gates are inside you. If you are not conscious, this is the gate of hell. If you are vigilant and conscious, this is the gate of heaven. But people continue to think that heaven and hell are somewhere outside. Heaven and hell are not after life, they are here and now. And the gates are always open. At any moment you make your choice between heaven and hell.

 

 

What is Greed?

A little boy asked his father, “What is Greed?” The father said, “In order to answer your question, we should go through the chocolate factory and there you need to pick one chocolate you like the most. But there is a rule. As you pass through the factory, you cannot turn back. You must pick the chocolate as you go forward only.”

The little boy and his father went to the chocolate factory. His father stood outside the factory and asked to go by himself. As the boy walked through, he saw the one big chocolate wrapped nicely, he instantly liked it but he wondered that he may find much bigger one further. So, He walked further, then he saw another chocolate. But again, he thought the same. When he started to reach near the end of the factory, he couldn’t see any chocolates as big as the one he didn’t pick earlier and started to regret his decision of letting it go.

Finally, he gave up. He went back to the father who was standing outside the chocolate factory with an empty hand and gave an explanation of what he did.

Smart Explanation

The Mughal emperor Akbar once asked his courtiers who was more powerful of the two: God or Akbar. The ministers were in a fix because clearly the answer was God but to say anyone was greater than the king might mean getting your next haircut with a guillotine. And giving the wrong answer, which would be perceived as blatant flattery, might still result in the same fate. One by one though, deciding to speak the truth, everyone said that God was more potent than their emperor. Everyone but one person.

The wisest man in the royal court, Birbal, proclaimed that Akbar was indeed more powerful than God. The courtiers secretly rejoiced seeing Birbal in the soup. Finally, it was out in the open that he was messing up with the king, they thought.

“Obviously, you just want to impress me, Birbal,” the king spoke sternly, shaking his head. “I’m disgusted at your blasphemous reply. How can I be more powerful than God?”

“His Excellency,” Birbal replied, “Indeed, our emperor is more powerful than God. God is beyond discrimination and favoritism. He is bound by dharma, every act of God is in line with the meticulous working of the infinite Universe. But, your highness is not bound by any law. You can punish anyone even if he is innocent. God can’t do that.” Praising Birbal, Akbar rewarded him amply. 

Later in the evening, when Birbal’s wife heard what had transpired in the court, she confronted him gently, asking him not to give such risky answers in the future, and why would he even do that? “Because,” Birbal replied calmly, “it was an ignorant question.”

Moral:- Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well.

The Most Unforgettable Character I Met

“Sales is a numbers game!” Initially it was just a statement for me but as I progressed into my career I came to know the meaning of it. It is said that never underestimate the market, and never ever underestimate the marketer. This lesson I learned hard way. It’s been more than two years in this company, and lot of things happened since I joined the company, I joined this company, when West region was doing better, at number one position at PAN India level. In west region Pune was the territory which was pulling west to its peak. It was the time when Mumbai’s contribution was very less, as compare to Pune. So in short I was a part of winning team. We won All India team excellence trophy, which included India, Nepal and ShriLanka. I witnessed of all the glory and gilts. Our team bagged almost all the awards, and in that also, one person was there who bagged six awards, and he was Saurabh Deshpande. I have never seen a person like him. He was ingenious, smart, and was having all the good qualities which an ideal salesman should have.

When I first joined the company I was introduced to market by him. He knew how press buttons and how to generate sales. I was looking up to him as my role model in this field and want to be more like him. The way he interacts with customer, the way he carry himself, the way he notice small things about the customers and most importantly the way he generate the sales was absolutely mind-blowing. Was I making a mistake by following him? or it’s just the desire of being number was luring me in?  Whatever it is, but I was fortunate enough to be his colleague.   

Every good thing has its ending; otherwise it no longer remains good. And so does our good days. In corporate everyone is in search of good opportunity and Saurabh was not an exception to it three months ago he left the company, and joined other company with better salary and better post. After Saurabh left the company some shocking facts came to our notice, our company gives 10% free stock to purchaser on purchase of bulk quantity. Saurabh took advantage of this policy. This is how it happened, suppose if a client purchase 100 products then as per policy he will get 10% extra means 10 more products. If these products get expired dealer will replace the expire goods with the new ones. This is the policy. Now if say, client used 50 products out of 110, and 60 are of near expiry, these 60 products were returned to stockiest and issued new 60 products to client as a replacement. Instead of just replacing the 60 products, Saurabh showed sale of 60 products and on that 10% extra means 6 more products. Whatever expiry goods are returned to dealer is going get minus from entire team’s sale. Which means expiry of 60 products will get equally distributed to six of us. So on paper Saurabh is having sale of 176 products minus 10 return products but in reality he sold only 116 units.

I knew him since last one year we were very close to each other, but I had never thought of him doing such bad thing just for the sake of achieving the numbers and to get the highest incentives. I have never seen such strange and money obsessed side of him. He was the only person from our region who was earning highest incentives. But still he wanted more. As rightly said by M. Gandhi there is enough for everyone’s need but not for enough for everyone’s greed. But this was just one dark side of him. The darker side was yet to come.

He resigned on 2^nd March. Every year we get our increment in the month of March. Company gives funds to our regional head to distribute among the employees Saurabh being a top performer of the west region he supposed to get highest raise, so as per the valuation and increment criteria the given funds were distributed in every team. All this happens on last day of February. Saurabh knew this process, and left company on 2^nd March. So whatever the distribution has happened on 29^th February was locked and Saurabh’s amount was returned to company. If he would have left the company on 29^th February then the increment amount would have divided into total minus one employee of entire Pune region and we would have got higher raise but he didn’t want that either.

After showing all the inflated figures and getting all the incentives, we as a team left with huge stock with dealer but on paper there is very little amount of stock available with the dealer. That day I realized why people say sales is all numbers game. Today we are again on top of everyone all across India. I don’t want to go in details of what happened and how we got situation under control that’s not the topic of discussion here, what I came to know from this incidence is the most unforgettable character I met.

I still wonder when I see this side of Saurabh. How money change one’s thinking, how thinking turns into action and action into behavior. Today also if you asked me who is the best sales person in your company I would say there is none, the best has already left the company and qualities what made him best also no longer there in him, because he used them for short term monetary gains. Market enjoyed his good service qualities and other sales qualitybut in return spit him back on the floor making him all helpless.

He might have did this just to prove his supremacy and wanted to show us down but nobody is superior than time. Ultimately we also got onto top, without his help. That proved our efficiency, we worked more as compare to our salary/incentives which we were getting to meet the numbers, but we finally achieved our target. And that’s what I love about this field its number’s game; you just need to know the application of numbers. And I am loving this game!

Is money everything in life?If yes then what about your values, your faith and last but not the least a good night sleep at the end of the day? And an inner satisfaction of doing some honest thing? Today’s youth is all becoming money oriented, they are ready to compromise on their values, faith, and integrity just for the sake of money. And we are forgetting the most unforgettable character traits which our elders, teachers and education system taught us. Respect you profession and profession will take care of you.