My Dad, My Hero.

Through this article, I would like to introduce to you to one great person, who introduced me to this world. Yes, it is my dad, Mr.V.V.D.Dhayanandam, who I fondly call ‘Ayya’. My dad, aged 80 passed away on 20th Feb 2013.

As I sit back to munch the 44 years of my fond memories, I have shared with him, my eyes wells with tears of joy. Each moment I have spent with him, is something I will forever cherish. Interesting incidents, interactions and some conversations that happened between me and my dad, right from my childhood days keep flashing now and then in my mental screen.  The earliest memory I have of my dad,  are the days he used to get me ready to school, right from dressing me up, polishing my shoes, combing my hair and sending me off to school every morning with a  big smile. Being a last kid of the family, I enjoyed a very special status of being his pet child. He made me feel special in his own ways. He admired me, for what I was and for whatever I did. He appreciated me even for my small accomplishments and laughed at my silliest jokes. I don’t remember having heard a NO from him, for anything I asked for. It was either given to me immediately or little later, but never rejected.  But, this did not make me a spoilt child, as one would assume. The more he said YES to me, the more conscious I became as to what I should ask and what I should not. The inner fear that I should never hear a NO from him, made me tread with caution as to what I should ask.

Just like he never said a NO for what I asked for, I too made it a point not to say NO to his wishes. His wishes were my commands. I always looked into his eyes for approval, before I made any decision. 

As a kid, I aspired to do so many things. He saw the spark in me and kept the flame burning, by adding fuel of positive, encouraging words.  It would not be an exaggeration if I say, he believed in my abilities, more than I believed in myself. He put me in a boarding school, right from my sixth standard, so that I learnt to become independent. He did not give me a direction, as to what I should study. The choice was always mine. His simple advice was study whatever you want and I will support you. I wanted to do my MBA in a foreign University and I knew it is going to cost him a lot of money, but when he came to know of my desire, he said, if you would like to pursue the study go for it and no matter how difficult, I will support you. After I completed my studies, he helped me to set up my own business. In the initial few years, I ran into a number of business losses, but he never questioned me or stopped trusting me. He just kept telling me, that it is all part of learning and that if I keep trying sooner or later, I will be successful. These words made me endure the difficult times.

My dad was not much of a social oriented person or a business oriented person, but he was very much a family oriented person. To him his family meant his world and his world meant his family. He truly loved and cared for each and every member of his family. He lived his life, catering to the needs of everyone in the family. He found his life purpose and sense of joy in doing so. He put his family first and everything else as next. My dad was an advocate of a joint family system and he is someone who practiced what he preached. He can be looked upon as a perfect role model, for anyone who is interested in leading a joint family successfully.

Of all his wonderful qualities, the one which I have admired most is his “Patience”. He was an extremely patient man. Throughout his life, he trusted people and remained patient with them. And most often his patience was aptly rewarded. 

He had a unique way of showing his protest when things did not go the way he wanted or did not like what I was doing. He used to keep silent and his silent used to hurt me a lot. I have always wished he scolded me, rather than keeping silent. Now that he has gone into everlasting silence, I feel the pain even more.

The type of relationship me and my dad have shared, is something extremely rare and unique. It is an experience that can never be expressed. Here is to my dad, my parting words, “Dad, I love you and I miss you. May your soul rest in peace.”

Happy Reading,

D. Senthil Kannan

Article Dated Mar'13

THE UNREASONABLE MAN

 “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

- George Bernard Shaw

I am sure many of us have heard or come across the above quote. Accepting the possible is the mark of a reasonable man, whereas wanting something that is impossible is the mark of an unreasonable man. A reasonable man accepts the explanation given by someone as to why something cannot be done. The unreasonable man does not accept the explanation and is never willing to take “Not Possible” as an answer. This is how many scientific inventions and discoveries have happened. This is how much progress has happened to mankind.

We may have all heard this story, in our school days or as a grown up in any of the training sessions. The story goes like this: There was a king who wanted to walk around his kingdom, but owing to the scorching heat of the sun, could not walk on the hot streets barefoot. So, one day, he turned to his minister and ordered: “I want you to carpet the entire kingdom by tomorrow morning. The poor minister sat up the entire night thinking about this impossible task. Suddenly, an idea struck his mind and he set off on a task. The next day, when the king woke up and went out, he found not an inch of carpet anywhere, so he began bellowing for the minister and in a few minutes the minister appeared before the king, clutching a pair of foreign objects in his hands. He said “Oh your highness, please be so kind first to wear these on your feet”. The king agreed, and then the minister slipped the world's first pair of carpet slippers onto the king's feet. Instantly the king's anger turned to delight. He was able to walk wherever he wanted to go, without getting his soles burnt. He was a happy man, thereafter.

The moral of the story or the message, one aims to convey through this story is that we cannot change the entire world, but we can adjust ourselves to fit into this world. This is what we have taught our children and our future generations have very wellbought this idea. The moral of this story, does not appease me. To me, the King looks like a selfish man. As soon as he found a

solution to his problem, he forgot about the same problem which all his countrymen would have been facing at that point of time. In case the king persisted that the whole kingdom should be carpeted, he would have done a greater good to his countrymen, so that not only him, but the entire population could enjoy walking barefoot. I am not saying this is a logically correct decision, but this could be the intentionally correct decision.

In a way or other, all of us are like this king. We try to protect ourselves and only ourselves in an unsafe world. If there is going to be indefinite strike, we tend to buy and store as much food grains and grocery as possible, so that we do not starve. If there is going to be a fuel price hike, we fill the tank to minimize our expenses. In order to ensure uninterrupted power supply to our house, we install extra-large tubular batteries to store as much power as we can. This is exactly what a reasonable man will do. But the truth is, this is just a temporary solution to a permanent

problem. In the days to come, this will further escalate and things will get worse. If we need a permanent solution, we need an unreasonable man who will look for a solution beyond the purview of his self. While a reasonable man is concerned about his own safety and security an unreasonable man is selfless in motive and is truly fearless amidst so much uncertainties.

Many unreasonable people have walked this planet making this world a better place. We have seen unreasonable men in the form of Gandhi who quit his job in South Africa and returned to India, to free his countrymen from the clutches of the British Empire; in the form of Mother Teresa who left her home country, to serve the poor and the uncared people in the streets

of Kolkatta in the form of Narayanan Krishnan, who has quit his job from a 5 start hotel and is now feeding the desperate people in the streets of Madurai.

There are many such examples, of selfless social leaders. The world is need of more such unreasonable men. Dare to be one and make a difference!

Happy Reading,

D.Senthil Kannan

Article Dated Feb'13 

Do you ASK or Do you TELL?

If you start to observe closely, the way, how people communicate you will realise that there are predominantly two types of communication styles. One is ASKING and another is TELLING.

 So what is the difference? The difference is simply in the way you phrase the sentence. That is all! But the type of response you get when ASKED Vs when TOLD could be significantly different. For example, when we are in need of something or need to get something done, we could either ASK or TELL.

If we are a TELL person, our communication style will be something like this:

·        *    Please get me some water to drink.

·        *    I would like you to meet me at 5pm.

·        *    I would like to discuss something important, right now.

·        *   I have installed new software and don’t know how to use it. Please come and help me.

Whereas, if we are a ASK person, our communication style, for the same above statements, would be something like this:

·          *   Can you please get me some water to drink?

·         *   Will it be OK for you to meet me at 5pm?

·         *   When is the best time, I can talk to you?

·         *   Can you help me with this new software?

On the surface level, both the statement types looks polite and courteous, but ask yourself which one sounds better and which one has a likely chance of getting someone’s cooperation?

Perhaps, the second one. Why is it, so? It is because, if you observe closely, you will notice that in a TELL statement the onus is on the “I, whereas in a ASK statement the onus is in the “You”. When we TELL, our communication is self-centred, whereas when we ask, our communication style is, other centred. That is why when we ask, people feel respected, whereas when we tell, people feel commanded. People tend to respond positively to request than to orders.

When you ASK, you generally get either a positive response or a genuine response. I am purposefully using the word genuine response, instead of negative response, because most of the time, the reason for us to TELL instead of ASK, is that we are afraid to hear NO as an answer, so we put our statements, in the form of instructions. But the truth is when we TELL people to do something, it is a sort of a compulsion on them and therefore their willingness is minimal.With minimal willingness, we often get a half-hearted co-operation or a low quality work done.

By asking questions, we encourage people to think for themselves, rather than just bull dozing our ideas and plans on them. When we are looking for a genuine co-operation and thinking in terms of developing a long term relationship, with someone it is always better to have their consent, before entrusting them with any job. Moreover, when they say YES willingly, they take personal responsibility and therefore there is no need for supervision.

Question yourself, “Do I ASK or do I TELL? Identify your style and if you are a TELL person, take conscious efforts to become an ASK person. Try this with the members of your family, circle of friends and colleagues at your work place. See what difference it makes. You will find that you are able to get more out of your relationships.

It may sound that this is just a diplomatic way of manipulating a person to get work done. Well,it is not! It is just like having a sugar coating in the tablet. Though we know that it is the bitter tablet, that is the reason for cure, it is the sugar coating that makes it easy to swallow. Is it not? Similarly, when our words are sweet, people love to help us, even if the work is hard.

Happy Reading,

D. Senthil Kannan
Article dated Jan'13

Learning together, Growing together

For ages, whenever we talk about learning, we have talked about a learning hierarchy: Guru - Shishya, Teacher - Student, Trainer Trainee, Mentor- Mentee, Superior - Subordinate or some sort of a higher intelligence- lower intelligence. The teacher or trainer, have always been looked up as a highly resourceful person, who has an answer for any question under the sun. But in this digital era, the equations have changed. Information is available in abundance. So, information is no more a differentiating factor, for a person to consider himself intellectually superior.

Moreover, today we are talking about multiple intelligence, which means that, everyone is intelligent in a different way. So, the concept of one person being a superior and another being inferior, in terms of intelligence, is slowly vanishing. Everyone is intelligent is his own way and there is a great opportunity for us to learn from each other, if we are able to come out of our ego trap. In the world today, if we need to sustain and to grow, we need to be open to the idea of learning from everyone around us. It could be our friends, our colleagues, our children or the people who work for us. I think the new age is all about co-learning or collective learning.

I have personally experienced, the significance of colearning as an emerging trend, especially in the area of life skills training, through some of the programmes, I attended this year.

The beginning of the year, I got introduced to a programme called TCI - Theme Centered Interaction. The highlight of this programme is that there is no trainer, but only a facilitator. Participants, including the facilitator sit in a circle formation, everyone facing everyone. A particular theme is put forth for discussion and every participant is asked to share his experience or thoughts. The duty of the facilitator is just to keep the momentum of discussion alive and on track. When someone speaks, others listen. No one interrupts the flow of thoughts. There is no validations, no judgments, and no arguments for or against. Everyone who speaks is expressing their view, based on their own experience and therefore they cannot be judged right or wrong. Even at the end of the session, the participant does not have a “take home message”. All he has gained is a renewed perception of life. I found it interesting and a new learning dimension.

Just a month later, I enrolled myself, in a basic counseling skills programme at Asha Counseling Centre, Coimbatore. I experienced an almost, similar type of learning atmosphere here. Participants are encouraged to share their experiences. They bring to open their problems. The counselor by way of listening and asking genuine questions, helps the participant to gain clarity and a higher level of awareness. This awareness helps the participant to find his/ her own answers. I realized that there is so much of richness and originality, in this way of learning. Everyone comes with a treasure of their own experiences, of which none can be discounted. When they share the same with others, it is not just for other's to know what is happening in their lives, but also to know what we could learn from the other person's experience. It was yet another learning dimension.

We live in a world, where we talk about synergetic growth. Synergy means that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Similarly, this collective intelligence is far greater than our own limited intelligence. I found this insight very meaningful and hope this sharing, can widen your learning dimensions. We have always talked about learning ladder. It is time we start talking of learning circles

Happy Reading

D. Senthil Kannan

Article Dated Dec 2012