“Why, Jon, why?” His
mother asked. “Why is it so hard to be like the rest of the flock, Jon? Why
can’t you leave low flying to the pelicans, the albatross? Why don’t you eat?
Jon, you are bone and feathers!”
“I don’t mind being bone and feathers, Mum. I just want to know what I can do in the air and what I can’t, that’s all. I just want to know”
- Jonathan
Livingstone Seagull (Richard Bach)
Around 7 months back, I decided to fast track the learning
curve of my life… and I decided to do so through a process called experiential
learning. Unlike the formal process which you refer to as education and which I
find tiresome and ghissa pitta,
designed to make a dim-wit out of you, I felt it was time to learn new things
by actually doing them, by experimenting with truth the way I have never dared
to do it before…
Stupid that I am, I felt that this process of experiential
learning will be one of those inflexion points in my life… a journey which will
teach me the unknown, groom me to take on bigger roles for that one big
vision/dream which has been elusive for the last 26 years..
Now, I can go ahead and narrate the story of what I have
done in the last 6 months; what form of time pass it amounted to, how the poor
melts my heart and how frustrating it has been most of the times…. But then,
this story isn’t about all that. It’s about time I reviewed my last 6-8 months,
my learning’s and what is has done for me…
1) Life is difficult, extremely difficult:
When all of a sudden, you limit your spending and try to save every Rupee
that you possibly can, life can sometime become unmanageable…. As a fellow
working in rural development, and as an entrepreneur, let me tell you that
there is absolutely no fun in living on a meager sum of money- never mind that
I still earn a > 10X multiple of the official poverty limits set by our
esteemed Planning commission….I am learning to simplify.... someday I think I will manage to live without a cellfone, internet and all the other essentials of life..
2) Be Open: I remember that on 8th
August,2011 Rahul Nainwal (founder, ivolunteer) mentioned during the induction
program (of ICICI Fellows program): “trust the system”… while I smiled at it then
and I still smile at the thought today, the reason for the smile has changed. I think I have learnt to trust the
system …. I needed to mature as a person, and I think I am slowly doing that. I
don’t say the system is good or great- like all other system, it isn’t perfect
and has tremendous scope of improvement- but then, I think I have benefited
from it quite a lot.
I however,
say this with a disclaimer: the learning is entirely upto you as an individual,
you need to be smart enough to make mistakes, stupid enough to be honest about
it, and greedy enough to focus on your individual development…. Your mentor,
your coach and the rest of the junta will fail to help you if you fail to help
yourself… owning up to my faults is perhaps my greatest learning in the last
7-8 months… I am finally confident enough to say that I am at fault when I am
at fault…
3) Social Work/ Developmental Work: I hear
lots of people say “I want to join the social sector coz I want to help…. “,
the only 2 words I have for you is “Go Away” (apologies for not using
expletives…), The “I wanna Help…” model doesn’t work in social sector… we have
had this attitude for too long which has resulted in too little… we ass-u-me
too many things about rural needs… I realized this when I went for my first
field project… Oh boy….. Was I an idiot? I totally made an Ass of myself with
all the assumptions I made… but on hindsight I guess starting off foolishly wasn’t exactly bad…
4) Connect: I am a decent communicator… I
speak pretty okayishly… but I suck at connecting with people… and if it happens to be in a different
language and with a village community- I am a disaster…. Well- I am still lost
when it comes to connecting… need to figure out how to connect better… anyone?
Any tips? Suggestions? Coaching? Well being a total failure in terms of
connecting with communities isn’t a great sign….especially if you aspire to be
a leader someday…. Need to sort this out asap….
5) Problems Vs Opportunities: I am always
told that I crib a lot… the only response I have always had for such accusation
is a single word: “So?”…. I crib because I care...because I want, desire and
aspire for better stuff… and why is that bad? I have a serious issue with our
Indian mentality of “adjust kar le”... my
question is “kaab taak?” While I
continue to remain a critic of everything around me and continue to complain, I
think the maturity I have gained over the last 7-8 months is to view these
problems as opportunities…now I know that solutions are available, that solutions
can be created and I am ready to take the accountability and role to solve
them…. I say that with arrogance and humility….
6) Patience: Of all the miracles I have
been part of in the past few months, I guess the greatest is in my ability to
be more patient these days. Rural development sounds neat, but I hope the systems
were more efficient. Work in this sector seldom move at the speed and pace I have
been used to. I can now sit and count till 100 without getting frustrated (I have
tried it)…
I can think of many more positives to be
honest… but then I wouldn’t want to pen it all down. As my learning curve
continues to be on the rise, I have just promised to keep experimenting…. There
has been days when I thought that I would like to quit…that I should have
stayed back in the corporate environment, that this rural lifestyle it a pain….
But those days got outnumbered mostly… I wasn’t really successful to a great
extent in the last six months…. Too many failures…too many mistakes… too less
responsibility and too many days of joblessness... But then there were days-
quite a few of them which made all the above possible… which helped me be more
confident and which is helping me be someone more than who I thought I really
was…. I guess had I not taken this step, I would have always been guilty of not
doing all the good I could do in my lifetime….
