MSMW - 13th December 2021

There is no ordinary moment. There is never "Nothing Happening".  Close your eyes and you'll hear the rustling of leaves, birds chirping, children playing in the alley, the fan, the TV, and the list goes on.

Each moment of our lives we are undergoing experiences, we are learning. We may not realize what we've learnt at that moment, but when we look back, we find a treasure-house of learning. 

The idea about the series of 'My Story My Wisdom' emerged from the everyday tiny experiences that are responsible for making us a better person day by day. It’s the outcome of a preaching monk within us who is ignored in the hustle of routines. We organized this series for all of us to gather and share our wisdom stories to lite the lamp within. 

On 13th December 2021 some of us met online and shared our stories. our vulnerabilities. we listened. we learned. Here's a recap of the stories shared that day. Do leave your feedback. :)

 Story 1: Respond more React less

In the last two years, the pandemic changed our lives completely. Sanjana was also grappling with the new normal. Around May 2021 - during the time when the 2nd wave of the Covid 19 pandemic, there were numerous restrictions imposed on public transport and public places. Sanjana had a domestic help who helped her out with the domestic chores, and various other work around the house. However, due to the travel restrictions, she stopped coming. Sanjana had to manage everything all by herself; her office work, her 7 years old son, and household chores. She was also struggling with ill-health. Life was a mess for her but in August as things started coming back to normal, Sanjana's help started coming again. She finally began to feel a bit relaxed.

However, one day her help didn't turn up without any prior information. Sanjana was furious as she wasn't prepared and not knowing what to do next, she attended her daily scrum call at 10am. Her mind started getting clogged up with numerous thoughts about why she hadn't turned up suddenly. Finally, at 10:45am her help turned up and Sanjana was just about to scream at her (read: react) when she felt that something wasn't right. In her 3 years of leadership as an R&D manager Sanjana had learnt the art of listening and observing. So, she quickly controlled her reactions and asked her help about what was wrong. 

The help replied saying that she had lost her father the previous night and was coming straight from his place after dropping her kids off. In that moment of shock and pain, she had forgotten to carry her phone with her and hence couldn't inform Sanjana about her delay. Sanjana was silent and felt thankful about being able to respond in the right manner. In her professional life, Sanjana had to deal with a lot of things. She had to listen to a lot of people and a lot of things. Her effective listening skills helped her to respond to the situations she faced, instead of reacting. Listening not only means we are lending an ear to the other person. It also means we care for others, and this helps in building a bond of trust. We can build better relationships, based on trust by listening to one another. It also helps us to take better decisions as we can understand the complete story and not just be blinded by our own prejudices.

All it takes is patience and a heart that's willing to listen.

Story 2: The art of staying prepared

This is an incident in Shirley's life when her mother had to visit a dentist for a wisdom tooth surgery. Although the initial estimation of the surgery was 20mins, due to come complications it went on for more than 45mins. The dentist seemed to be totally exhausted after a very complex extraction and struggling with her mother's teeth. After almost an hour, the surgery was over. Shirley thought to herself that surely the dentist would now take some rest. However, without resting for a moment, the dentist started sanitizing his equipment and tools one by one. He arranged them neatly and kept them where they belonged. Shirley was amazed at seeing his patience and commented that she was very amazed to see him arrange everything perfectly.

The dentist replied to her saying that it wasn't just about arranging things. This work could have easily been done by any of the assistants. However, he chose to do it himself because the next time he did a surgery and there was an emergency, he would be able to act quickly as he'd know the exact position of his tools, and this would save time and the life of a person. The dentist didn't consider this work as something he needed to do, but rather as something that could save the life of another person.

Shirley was deeply impacted with this incident and took this learning with her in every area of her life. After cooking she would put every utensil in their correct place. After winding up work, she wouldn't shut down her laptop in a hurry, but would rather makes notes about the meetings and small details that she might otherwise forget. Staying prepared and planning makes us get our job done quicker and saves a lot of time. It is our attitude towards work that makes all the difference.

Story 3:Remaining true to ourselves

Sammy had been transferred newly to Chennai and was thrilled to work with a new team. Sammy's supervisor was very happy with her and would often praise her for her work. Due to her diligent work, Sammy was made the team-lead for a project which had 5 people working with her.

Although Sammy was made the team-lead, her supervisor would always instruct Sammy about how she needed to be strict with her teammates and how she would need to notice the entry time of each team member. Sammy believed more in letting her teammates work freely and believed in discussing issues within her team before escalating them to her supervisor. However, her supervisor wanted Sammy to escalate issues and create a fuss out of small things that could easily be resolved within the team.

Slowly some tension started building up between her and her supervisor. At that point, a new girl joined the team. Sammy would sometimes join her supervisor for a coffee break and would find that the entire group would make fun of the new girl all the time and looked at her suspiciously using phrases against her such as "she looks cunning and clever", "did you notice how she laughs?" and so on.

Sammy felt terrible being a part of such conversations and would excuse herself from them. Meanwhile she started befriending the new girl and helped her come up to speed with the rest of the team. This was something the supervisor and her so called friends were not very happy about. They slowly started avoiding Sammy and stopped behaving nicely with her. However, without letting their behavior affect her, Sammy worked double hard with her teammates. She stood her ground and did not let this affect or change her attitude towards them.

Her team won the best project of the year award that summer. Staying unswayed by negative influences ultimately results in greater good is something she learnt from this experience.

Story 4: Hi Dad, I am here for you……

 

Priya shared an extremely heart touching incident from her life. After the sudden death of her mom, she was bereaved, and it was difficult for her to accept it. She was in a zone where she avoided people and phone calls and it took her long to get back to routine. One fine day, sitting beside her husband in silence, she realized that he was always there to comfort her and with his help, she was getting at a better emotional stage day after day. But suddenly a thought invaded her mind that dad is all alone after mom left the world. She comprehended how the presence of her husband besides her in this tough phase revived her to liveliness again and realized the loneliness of her dad. After that day, she decided to be the strong pillar for her dad. She knew that the damage due to mom leaving at a sudden point cannot be revoked but after that realization, she makes at least one phone call daily at her dad's place to understand how he is. With this action she realized that initially her dad was avoiding many details, all alone in the phase of sorrow but slowly he became comfortable. Now he shares his joy and sorrow with her and has the confidence that Priya is there for him. This was the tiny point of wisdom in her life and we all can understand how communication can revive the liveliness for our loved ones.

 

 

Story 5: The Power of Speaking

 

Tina shared her story from childhood where she was a shy person and avoided public speaking due to  fluency disorder. Slowly her confidence went low due to stuttering. It was difficult for her to manage in school and society. Being under-confident, she turned into a silent personality and avoided communication. Teachers at some point discouraged her from being a part of poetry competitions and opportunities of elocution. This went on for some passage of time. One fine day, an observant teacher found that, it's not the medical disorder that Tina is suffering from. It was the placement of tongue while she initiates speech . He advised  her to practice mirror faced speech therapy and forcefully push the tongue inside while speaking. With this in place, slowly Tina's speech fluency improved, and she started gaining the confidence that was shattered some other day. She also actively participated in competitions  and tried better way of communicating with parents and relatives. The result of this continuous process was so beautiful that on the day of oath ceremony for student council, the Principal asked Tina to give the oath to the council members instead of the head boy doing the honors as practiced every year. This was first time in the history of school that the Head Girl did the honors. It was a winning day for Tina. She won over all hear speaking fears. While narrating this, she added that power of listening is of course a great thing, but she has experienced the power of speaking in her life.

We are thankful to all the participants who voluntarily nominated themselves and made the first session of 'My Story My Wisdom' a success for us. Looking forward to upcoming sessions on this platform.

 Note: Names have been changed for maintaining anonymity.