Learn and Lead: thoughts

Came across a tweet by a respected TV journalist today:

r day should be a celebration of creative genius of india, not of armed forces might. fewer tanks, more music. gnight

I have heard people cribbing and providing their alternatives in the past also. “We should not spend money on games, the same could be used for the poor”, “why do film stars get awards, they should be given to intellectuals” and so on.

Mostly we rant about why we shouldn’t do the things that are happening and why we should shift our attention, money, focus to something else. It seems as though magically by doing that we would solve the seemingly bigger problems. How I wish it was so easy. How I wish that poverty would be eroded by not spending the money on games but by giving money to the poor.

Unfortunately it’s usually never a case of EITHER OR but almost always a case of AND. We must have games AND solve our poverty problems, the Republic Day must be a celebration of Armed forces might AND creative genius of India, awards must be given to intellectuals AND film stars.

Do you see yourself using Or in your workplace or are you using AND? Using AND can give shape to ideas and your suggestions stand a better chance of being accepted.

My 10 year old son wrote a creative writing piece as part of his home work that I just had to post here. It has some interesting insights into the lessons of life he might be imbibing at this age. So here it is with due permissions from my son to post it on my blog (with corrected spellings).

A day in the life of a student

As everyone knows that student life is difficult, I would first plan my day so that I don’t have to plan it afterwards. I would go to school, do my homework. But it isn’t as easy as it looks like. Some ma’ams (teachers) give hectic homework which makes my brain heavy as a kilo, and some ma’ams are so sweet that I get overconfident for the UT (Unit Test) she has made and I get bad marks. Some are both so I get confused is she strict or sweet.

There are always two choices, a bad side or a good side. The bad side is full of cool guys and bullies while the good side is full of kids who only study! Half of the bad side becomes prefects and a quarter of the good side become prefects. This student life is so confusing.

So a day in the life of a student if hectic, difficult, confusing and weird.