Message for Young India

Yogender Chaudhry writes-

A young lady executive in a MNC came to meet me with a smartly dressed young man . Later on she asked my opinion about this young man. she wanted to marry him. I personally thought that the young man was dense in brain , lacked manners and etiquette , was showing off too much and his body language was of someone whom you cannot trust . During interaction with him he also betrayed a very negative mindset and utter disrespect for women ....lolz....the way i am ....i conveyed it to this young friend in as much polite language as possible :))

She was visibly upset and replied " Sir , how can you say that he is not good.... Do u know he drives the latest BMW , his wrist watch costs 22 lakh rs , usne mujhe itni sari shopping karwayi , do u know he got me a customized iPhone 5 with my name engraved on that , he is so stylish and only wears exclusive designer made cloths :)

Here lies the problem of most of the youngsters ....

They adjudge people by the money they have , by the car they drive or the page 3 parties they attend .....they are least bothered about how this person got that money or what are his other qualities !

Hence a Kalmadi , a Raja , a Abhishek Verma and thousands of others plays on this weakness of the society . They know and understand that once they loot the money....this money will give them respectability in society , that same youth who burns candles on India Gate against rape n corruption will slurp when they see their Rolls Royce and Lamborghini . They don't realize that when they equate wealth with respectability ....than they are indirectly promoting the corrupt . Crookedness cant be equated with smartness or efficiency or ability. Please look at the source of the wealth . Also look at the personality and ethics of a rich or powerful person.

Marcus Aurelius , the Roman Emperor when asked by a friend on how many of his civil servants inspite of being selected through a exam are so mean and vicious" said this in his classic diary " the temptation"....
" never adjudge a man according to his Birth , status , wealth or intellect . Rather high IQ is historically associated with the meanest moral character. Its is their high IQ which forces them to be extremely servile to those in power above in hierarchy and absolutely mean and uncaring to those below them because they don't matter in their scheme and calculations.

Rather a man should only be adjudged only on the basis of his positive attitude and his contribution to society. See how he behaves with those below him in status. See if he is humble and makes others comfortable around himself . See if he is kind to pets and animals ....see if he respects the elders and women. "

Pls look beyond the BMW's, Rolls Royce , designer clothes and page 3 parties .

It will not be easy but see if you can stem this negative change in society's perception about judging People :)

- Yogender Chaudhry has been a mentor to many young people, and is a serving Civil Services professional in India.

"Why are some people more successful than others?"

Why are some people more successful than others? Why do some people make more money, live happier lives and accomplish much more in the same number of years than the great majority?

I started out in life with few advantages. I did not graduate from high school. I worked at menial jobs. I had limited education, limited skills and a limited future.

And then I began asking, "Why are some people more successful than others?" This question changed my life.

Over the years, I have read thousands of books and articles on the subjects of success and achievement. It seems that the reasons for these accomplishments have been discussed and written about for more than two thousand years, in every conceivable way. One quality that most philosophers, teachers and experts agree on is the importance of self-discipline. As Al Tomsik summarized it years ago, "Success is tons of discipline."

Some years ago, I attended a conference in Washington. It was the lunch break and I was eating at a nearby food fair. The area was crowded and I sat down at the last open table by myself, even though it was a table for four.

A few minutes later, an older gentleman and a younger woman who was his assistant came along carrying trays of food, obviously looking for a place to sit.

With plenty of room at my table, I immediately arose and invited the older gentleman to join me. He was hesitant, but I insisted. Finally, thanking me as he sat down, we began to chat over lunch.

It turned out that his name was Kop Kopmeyer. As it happened, I immediately knew who he was. He was a legend in the field of success and achievement. Kop Kopmeyer had written four large books, each of which contained 250 success principles that he had derived from more than fifty years of research and study. I had read all four books from cover to cover, more than once.

After we had chatted for awhile, I asked him the question that many people in this situation would ask, "Of all the one thousand success principles that you have discovered, which do you think is the most important?"

He smiled at me with a twinkle in his eye, as if he had been asked this question many times, and replied, without hesitating, "The most important success principle of all was stated by Thomas Huxley many years ago. He said, 'Do what you should do, when you should do it, whether you feel like it or not.'"

He went on to say, "There are 999 other success principles that I have found in my reading and experience, but without self-discipline, none of them work."

Self-discipline is the key to personal greatness. It is the magic quality that opens all doors for you, and makes everything else possible. With self-discipline, the average person can rise as far and as fast as his talents and intelligence can take him. But without self-discipline, a person with every blessing of background, education and opportunity will seldom rise above mediocrity.

"No steam or gas drives anything until it is confined. No Niagara is ever turned into light and power until it is tunneled. No life ever grows great until it is focused, dedicated and disciplined."
~Harry E. Fosdick

Courtesy

Anupam Vaid

www.traveltolearn.in

Fifth Space

"You must do your bit for society even if it’s just a drop in the ocean."

Young people have been exhorted thus to do their duty. It’s an advice that falls mostly on deaf ears, as the young people are quickly drawn into the adult workforce of a nation on a high growth trajectory with a sole focus on employment and consumption. But there was a time not so long ago when young people were at the forefront of the movement for India’s independence. It was like an ocean on the march. When did the ocean turn into a drop?

Somewhere during the formation of the republic, young people were asked to cede the governance spaces to adults. For instance, let’s look at the indicator of political participation. Even though 26% of the population in the first Lok Sabha comprised of young people in the age group of 26 – 40, only one cabinet minister was in that age group and the average age of the cabinet was 52 years. This trend grew worse over the years with the political participation dropping off rapidly and by the 2009 Lok Sabha, the average age of the cabinet had gone up to 63 and youth representatives had dwindled to 6.3%. When the young population of any country turns apathetic about the politics and common spaces the health of the community can be said to be on the decline. So by approaching youth with a lack of an abundance mentality, spoon in hand, we have turned the ocean into a drop. How do we help young people connect again in the common spaces? How do we help to understand this exchange between the inner and the outer world, the ‘personal’ and the ‘political’?

Society today, legitimizes the four hang out spaces for young people: family, career or studies, friends, and leisure and lifestyle. We need to architect a 5th space within the mainstream imagination where young people can safely explore the world inside-out; that is to explore the connection of self to society; to experiment with changing the world but more importantly to watch consciously how the world changes them as well. In the process young people will pick up skills and perspectives that will help them nourish all the other youth spaces.

As facilitators of such a 5th space we ourselves need to become deeply aware of ‘who we are’. We also need to have the correct perspective on youth development, effective workshop design and facilitation skills, and a systemic understand of the whole world and its hidden interconnections. We call these the imperatives of a youth facilitator in the 5th space. The Ocean in a Drop Learning Voyage, constituting of 30% of the time in workshop spaces and 70% in real world on your own youth challenge, can not only change the way you approach young people, it can transform your entire approach to life.

Read more

http://www.oceaninadrop.org/content/fifthspace.php
The Ocean in a Drop
Published by SAGE

Why hang on to the past

This moment is the best moment, our mantra and the spirit of the youth. 

Why do adults live in the past and youth for today?

Secrets of the Most Successful College Students | TIME.com

Secrets of the Most Successful College Students | TIME.com


A growing body of evidence, however, suggests that the most significant thing about college is not where you go, but what you do once you get there. Historian and educator Ken Bain has written a book on this subject, What The Best College Students Do, that draws a roadmap for how students can get the most out of college, no matter where they go.

Read more: on Time.com

The Promise and Peril of India’s Youth Bulge

FROM THE DIPLOMAT

By Danielle Rajendram

"...in order to accommodate the 300 million people that will join India's workforce between 2010 and 2040, India needs to create roughly 10 million jobs a year."

As China, Japan and many other nations face an aging demographic profile, the youth segment of India’s population is growing rapidly, and is projected to continue to do so for the next 30 years. Provided India can act quickly on health, education and employment, this demographic dividend has the potential to inject new dynamism into its flagging economy. Failure to do so, however, will result in demographic disaster.

Today, more than half of India’s population is under the age of 25, with 65 percent of the population under 35. By 2020, India’s average age will be just 29 years, in comparison with 37 in China and the United States, 45 in Western Europe and 48 in Japan.This demographic trend will confer a significant competitive advantage upon India. About a quarter of the global increase in the working age population (ages 15-64) between 2010 and 2040 is projected to occur in India, during which time this segment is set to rise by 5 percent to 69 percent of its total population. Roughly a million people are expected to enter the labor market every month, peaking at 653 million people in 2031. As a result the IMF projects that India’s demographic dividend has the potential to produce an additional 2 percent per capita GDP growth each year for the next twenty years.

Creative infinity Mind is a revolution of human thought

Nisaragadatta Maharaj mystic of Bombay (Mumbai): Everything is a picture made of light. 

David Bohm (Physicist). Objects are a kind of condensed or frozen light.  

                                               - Dr Kathleen Raine praised these  poetic insights.

John Keats:   Beauty is Truth and Truth Beauty. This is all ye know on Earth and all ye need to know.

Testament of Love . There is no thing in all the world but love, no jubilant thing of sun or shade  worth one sad tear. Why dost thou ask my lips to fashion songs other than this my song of love to thee?    The Camel Rider. Translated by Wilfred  Scawen Blunt from Arabic.

Rumi:  Kings would become disillusioned with Kingship if they caught a whiff of those wines that lovers drink in the heart’s assembly. Rumi wrote of the nightly migration in sleep to the spiritual world; and we too must learn to migrate to the Orient and the infinity mind of the Mystic Sea Folk, who alone understand mystic languages.

Testament of Compassion. I felt for Thoreau and John Keats as young men dying of TB. Thoreau was pitied for his mean and unfortunate destiny by his fellow villagers of Concord, New Hampshire. They called him ‘ The Humblest, cheapest, least dignified man in the village.’  He asked  “ In what respect was a human village superior to a village of prairie  dogs?”   And we may ask of our corrupt politicians and inhuman nurses responsible  for the killing of  2000 patients  by  neglect. “In what respect are these word thinkers lacking compassion and love, superior  to the murderous Kings and  priests of Chimor and the Aztecs of  America’. I intend to write farther at the end of Creative Wisdom on this topic of the mystic world and the exploration of Infinity mind following Rumi’s example as an Explorer of the mind.

Creative infinity Mind is a revolution of human thought; the sheer number of ways of thought and the hissing of Oceanic Thought make our minds different to our forebears’. I think of Rolls Royce growing crystals of pure steel for their aero engines’ turbine blades giving them amazing  endurance. In mystic thought beauty is like this crystallization for it permeates thought giving a  wonder world ability like a miracle. It leads to the greatest minds there have ever been, minds that are also the most beautiful: minds worthy of the splendour and beauty of the Cosmos.  

Ted Falconar

www.creativeinfinitymind.com

Thought Leadership: Corporate Social Responsibility - Executive Education Program - Harvard Business School

Thought Leadership: Corporate Social Responsibility - Executive Education Program - Harvard Business School

CSR is a way of delivering sustainable business and it is more a discipline and not a new way to work. The trends are more pronounced after the financial crises... leadership, sustainable, what ever you call it the key is discipline and the need of the hour to understand the role of on organisation to understand the larger role of corporations in the society.

More in the podcast from HBS

Q & A about what is CSR?

Meet the enemy within

In his Pogo cartoon strip, Walt Kelly said, 'We have met the enemy, and he is us.'

The hardest person in the world to lead will always be yourself. Human nature seems to endow us with the ability to size up everybody, except we all have two problems. What are they?

1) We don't see ourselves as we see others. If we don't look at ourselves honestly and realistically, we will never understand where our personal difficulties lie. And if we can't see them, we won't be able to lead ourselves effectively.

It's said that Frederick the Great of Prussia met an old man who was walking ramrod straight in the opposite direction. 'Who are you?' Frederick asked. 'I am a king,' replied the old man. Frederick laughed. 'Over what kingdom do you reign?' Proudly the old man replied, 'Over myself.'

2) We are harder on others than we are on ourselves. We judge others according to their actions, while we tend to judge ourselves according to our intentions. When we do the wrong thing, we let ourselves off the hook because we believe our motives were good.

And the problem is; we are usually willing to do that over and over before requiring ourselves to change!

Courtesy Anupam@traveltolearn.in

Inside-out Youth Leadership

The Ocean in a Drop

Why is only 6.3 percent of the current Lok Sabha between the ages of 25-40 years, even though 50 percent of the population lies in that range? Why is India, the youngest nation, ruled by the oldest cabinet?

It wan't always so. Young people constituted as much as 26 percent and 32 percent of the first and second Lok Sabhas, respectively. So what happened? Have young people become so self-absorbed that they don not want to contribute to the society any longer?

On the contrary, this book suggests that the answer may lie in the fact that we have lost the link that connects the Self to Society. As Buddha said, "The foot feels the foot when it hits the ground." The authors believe that this vital link can be reestablished in a learning experience called the 5th Space that takes young people on a journey from the Self to Soceity.

Published by SAGE.
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