Being Right or Being Happy

Dear Friends,

Welcome to Anbusivam's Blog Page.

When I wrote about being right or happy in my previous post, many of my readers were keen to know more about it. Here comes my thoughts and understandings on one of the key learning’s from my counselling course.

"Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy...?"

Think for a moment when you were in an arugment and want to be right, don't you remember that you had to compromise on your happiness. I realised this when I was in an argument with one of my friends few weeks ago. I obviously wanted to make my point, knowing that he is not correct. But he was not in a mood to accept that he is wrong, which would be a blow to his big ego. After long arguments and counter arguments, I suddenly realised that the discussion had stuck into an endless circle, without any further progress. I started playing devil's advocate, carefully changing side to accept his point knowing very well that it's not right. I decided to do this only to stop those endless arguments just to prove a point. When we departed he was really happy that his point was accepted and finally he had won the argument. But I am sure that he himself had a doubt on the entire discussion and the point he was conveying and trying to convince me.

Later in the evening when he was little relaxed, I approached him with a clean reference supporting my argument stating that I was right in the morning. In no time he accepted the truth and apologised for being adamant during the morning discussion. I felt happy and he too was.

When I was thinking about the day that evening, it did strike to me that, though I was not right in the morning ultimately I was happy at end of the day. Many a times we tend to stick to our point in arguments and discussions with our loved ones, friends and colleagues without even thinking about the real purpose of the argument.

We should be courageous and courteous enough to give up something, though we know we are correct, while letting the other person win over us. This will be of utmost important especially with our family and loved ones, where the relationship and bonding is of highest priority than being right in a petty issue. Moreover these kinds of heated arguments and discussion always lead to fights shifting focus on the person instead of the real issue. When we are discussing an issue with another person, let's better put our focus on where it should be, on the real problem, not the other person.

When we choose being happiness over the need of being right, obviously a great relationship blossoms over there.

Whenever we are stuck in an argument with our loved ones, we should ask ourselves.

Do you want to be Happy or do you want to be Right...?

Thanks for visiting my page.

With Love,

Anbusivam

Mode of Motivation

Hello Friends,

Welcome to Anbusivam's blog page.

After writing one of my earlier posts Why do we need motivation…? I started eagerly observing people around only to understand their mode of motivation. Though it widely varies based on various factors, people’s mode of motivation is broadly based on the two ways, towards pleasure and away from pain. Our life becomes easy, if we can find out what the mode of motivation is for people around, those whom we want to inspire, influence, motivate etc.

Just by asking simple questions, we can easily find out one’s motivational mode. I asked a simple question to two waiters of a small south Indian restaurant nearby here in Bangalore. My question was “What makes you do this job?” in different occasions. First guy said “Sir, I did not like my previous job, I quit and I am here now in this restaurant. It’s all my fate; no one can help….hmm….hmmm”. Second guy said “Wow, I want to build a home in my village, open a small hotel there and settle down with my family”

Here we could clearly see the two different motivational modes. People with Inspiration/toward use words like “achieve”, “success”, “attain”, “accomplish”, “victory” and those with Desperation/away use words like “pain”, “avoid”, “get out of”.

If we can get to know the motivational modes of people around, then I am sure it’ll be pretty easy to get things done, by using the right choice of words and appropriate communication.


With Love,
Anbusivam

Human'Culture' Vs Agri'Culture'

Hello Friends,

Welcome to Anbusivam’s blog page.

Human'Culture' is essentially the interpersonal relationships, I am talking about. Relationship is the way we relate with people around at home, work place, club or community. We are always surrounded by people with varied interests, attitudes, behaviors, dreams and so on.

Yeah, I got the same question you’ve now. Why agriculture here? in the concrete jungles, where we live today. I am sure our younger generation either doesn’t know or never had a chance to understand the great wisdom of our age old farmers and their cultivation methods. By saying Human'Culture' equivalent to Agri'Culture' the point I want to make here is Personal Relation is almost equivalent to Cultivation. If one can understand the simple things to be followed in cultivating a crop and getting a good yield out of it then the same principles could be effectively used in our personal space as well for better relations.

After publishing my earlier post on Leadership = Gardening , I had been to an interior village in Tamilnadu to attend one of my cousins family function. Every time I go there I would say the amount of knowledge and wisdom I get is always in abundance. Yeah, it’s from an 80yrs old Granny nearby. The way she interacts with people is amazing and I’ve never seen such a person in our great corporate houses. Lessons one could learn from her can never be found in any best sellers or from great management gurus. It had come all the way from her 80yrs of lively experience in that small village. She could relate any personal relation with agriculture and cultivation. Here, I am posting few of my learning’s form our Granny’s wisdom.


Agri'Culture' : No quick fixing and short term corrective action will work.

Human'Culture : Quick fixing will actually worsen the situation in relationships.


Agri'Culture' : Cultivation is a pursuit and can’t be done in a weekend.

Human'Culture : Rebuilding relationships (marriage, Children, friendships etc) just can’t be done over a weekend.


Agri'Culture' : Procrastination in cultivation destroys the crop and yield.

Human'Culture : Procrastination in personal relations ends up in great emotional stress.


Agri'Culture' : Cultivation is based on Natural laws regardless of our awareness or obedience.

Human'Culture : Personal relations are based on emotional feelings regardless of the individual.

Once she asked, Can you go days without milking the cow, and then get out there in a weekend and milk like crazy? So also in our personal relations, there is no quick weekend fix as such. It should be a pursuit day in and day out.

In cultivation, one should prepare the ground well before the rains, put in the seeds on time, water it and weed it regularly, then naturally there is growth, development and yield. Same simple steps would work very well in our personal lives as well.

Let me know your comments and thoughts on this.

With Love,
Anbusivam