The Human Resources Services Company, based out of Bangalore had announced a training program for top management members from the corporate world in a five star hotel in Chennai. They had tied up with a top notch faculty and hence the company was confident that there would be willing takers getting enrolled. The accounting head had mentioned that unless there is a batch size of twenty five, the program may not fetch returns to the company. The marketing head was reaching out to as many companies as possible with a lead time of two months to enroll and ensure this batch size. Three weeks before the program, the marketing head reported thirty enrolments to the CEO. However, later that day, the accounting head met the CEO and said he was concerned about the break even, as only three had enrolled!
It took some probing for the perplexed CEO to understand that ‘confirmations obtained’ were enrolments in the marketing head’s mind while ‘payments received’ were enrolments in the accounting head’s mind. The program ended with about eighteen participants showing in retrospect that neither was completely right or wrong; the truth turned out in between!
‘Perceptions’ of the mind had played a role in how they viewed happenings and this in turn created their convictions. Mental filters in some form or the other are at work when we view people or incidents; we talk or act not being very conscious of the filters. Hence there can be several takes on the same happening depending on the tint in the spectacles. Observing our mind and witnessing how these filters operate is difficult but not impossible; this is a necessary but not sufficient step in handling our mind to build self efficacy.
Self efficacy is said to be the belief that one has mastery over the events of one’s life and can meet challenges as they come up. To master the mind is the first challenge. A little contemplation reveals that events don’t hurt us, our views of those events do. Then they become injuries which continue as pain points in our memory only to perturb us time and again. The mind makes or mars; it ‘makes heaven of hell and hell of heaven’.
Perceptions appear to be formed with a combination of ‘memory’ and ‘interpretation’. One of my cousins with artistic leanings drew in a card and wrote a poem to wish her spouse on their first wedding anniversary. Not given to such sentimental expressions, he commented that she had saved money by making her own card rather than buy. What’s more, he went through the poem as he would read a newspaper article in the papers and put it aside! My cousin after fifteen years of marriage is yet to live it down! Her mind interpreted his act as ‘indifference’ to her and her art. Being sensitive, she still feels hurt claiming ‘victims have long memories’. Her husband thinks it is ‘much ado about nothing’ and is at a loss to understand what this fuss is all about.
Our interpretation of an incident makes us feel victimized and seems to get stored in special corners of our memory; it has the uncanny knack of popping up at the most inappropriate times to make us miserable. An indulgent interpretation may help us to be more accommodative of the ‘perpetrator’. To forgive becomes human and to forget thereafter is a natural corollary; this wipes the mind clean of self-inflicted scars.
Each of us is wired differently. When we accept ourselves as wired, it is feasible to watch our patterns objectively. This understanding highlights aspects which may be beneficially altered and those that can just be gently monitored and kept under check. There would be few patterns that may be left free on their terms; some others may be positively stroked, fed and nourished. As Browning says, ‘as is your sort of mind, so is your sort of search; you’ll find what you desire’. This confirms that ‘as we think, so we become.’
Mind is a Rubik’s cube which keeps twisting and turning in multiple ways by itself. So long as there are non-aligned shades, we feel bewildered and restless. Solving the Rubik’s cube needs persistence and practice. Likewise with the mind; it can be controlled with observation and awareness. That would empower us to pick ‘sunshine’ over a ‘tempest’ within. If so chosen and attained, our life would be a series of meditative smiles.
(The writer may be contacted at smilinglyyours7@gmail.com)
