Back in 2004, Dad bought a new home and we decided to have some custom furniture built on-site for it. The work completed a little late, and the carpenters gave us a bill, which was well above the market quotes we had received. In India, it is very common to haggle on prices of almost all the commodities and services a consumer may use. Dad, having lived in a metropolitan city for more than 25 years, was very well aware of the fair price to pay for the work done by the carpenters. He made a payment, and the carpenters accepted it after negotiating for a bit.
Here's where the story starts...
At ~ 10pm, we received a call from one of the carpenters. The person on the other side of the call was quite (obviously) drunk, and sounded very dejected. All I could hear was that he was sad because he had not met his goal. When I think of that incident, I phase out in a completely different level of thoughts.
The carpenter had a family in his village with 4 kids, whom he visited once every 6-8 months. He worked hard in the city, saved some money, and went back to his village with all the wealth he had amassed, including gifts for the wife and kids. A couple days spent with family, and he is back to business.
The part I want to highlight here is -- He had set a goal with a deadline. The goal of saving some amount of money and buying gifts.. all within 6 months. Unfortunately, this time around, he couldn't make it. This had led to disappointment.
I tried comparing his situation with the case of more than 90% people having jobs in this modern world. There are far too many similarities in the set-up than you can imagine. The only thing that is different in the two cases, is the "deadline" for personal goals and ambitions.
Forget the aspect of money for a while. Lets talk about goals.
Can the carpenter afford to not return to his village after 6 months? Could he `take it easy' for a couple months? Can he afford to loose track of his goal even for a single day? Will he be happy living in the city without honoring his responsibilities towards his family in the village? I keep going back to Chetan Bhagat's speech, where he said :
More info. here.
In some ways, although the carpenter's race was long, he was lucky. He had a deadline to meet; Every 6 months! In the case of most people working from 9-5 daily, however, there are no strict deadlines (not for daily tasks, but for personal goals). "Stable income" is what people coin the term as.
Are people fooled to believe that they have ample time to do what they want to do? Do we, at some point along the way, forget what we are here for and loose track of our goals? Do we let the comforts of day-to-day life in the modern world lure us into believing that we have all the time in the world to realize our personal goals?
Here's where the story starts...
Source: Google Images
The carpenter had a family in his village with 4 kids, whom he visited once every 6-8 months. He worked hard in the city, saved some money, and went back to his village with all the wealth he had amassed, including gifts for the wife and kids. A couple days spent with family, and he is back to business.
The part I want to highlight here is -- He had set a goal with a deadline. The goal of saving some amount of money and buying gifts.. all within 6 months. Unfortunately, this time around, he couldn't make it. This had led to disappointment.
I tried comparing his situation with the case of more than 90% people having jobs in this modern world. There are far too many similarities in the set-up than you can imagine. The only thing that is different in the two cases, is the "deadline" for personal goals and ambitions.
Forget the aspect of money for a while. Lets talk about goals.
Can the carpenter afford to not return to his village after 6 months? Could he `take it easy' for a couple months? Can he afford to loose track of his goal even for a single day? Will he be happy living in the city without honoring his responsibilities towards his family in the village? I keep going back to Chetan Bhagat's speech, where he said :
"Life is one of those races in nursery school. Where you have to run with a marble in a spoon kept in your mouth. If the marble falls, there is no point coming first. Same with life, where health and relationships are the marble.."
More info. here.
In some ways, although the carpenter's race was long, he was lucky. He had a deadline to meet; Every 6 months! In the case of most people working from 9-5 daily, however, there are no strict deadlines (not for daily tasks, but for personal goals). "Stable income" is what people coin the term as.
Are people fooled to believe that they have ample time to do what they want to do? Do we, at some point along the way, forget what we are here for and loose track of our goals? Do we let the comforts of day-to-day life in the modern world lure us into believing that we have all the time in the world to realize our personal goals?
1 comment:
Your post has provoked many sleeping thoughts and goals for me. thanks!
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