IT'S AN INSIDE JOB

It’s an Inside Job

It was a couple of months ago when I had the opportunity to interact with Mr Shiv Khera; he was in town to promote his latest book, You Can Achieve More - Live by Design, Not by Default. I was part of a small group of journalists, representing my newspaper Asian Lite. What was a media interaction turned into a masterclass with the celebrated motivational writer and speaker.

I was fortunate enough to develop a video of the event which I am sharing in this link. It will be a three part video as my meager subscription does not allow me a long upload.Hence, I am not summarising the talk with him into a written piece. However, there is one aspect of his interaction with us that stood out the most for me, and I share that below.

I had posed at a later stage, a question about how does one know when things are right or not, in one’s life. By the way, the question is not in the video because chai-nashta had been served by then, and the later scenes were more of gupshup over a cuppa, far removed from the more formal tenor of the interaction in the previous part of the video.

When asked this question, I had taken a cue from his TedX talk, he replied that the others know when things are amiss in our life and so do we. The barometer for that is our happiness. So, it is an inside job whether we want to be a millionaire or a saint who gives up every material possession. The test to know whether we are doing the right thing or not is to know our own happiness quotient. In fact, as I reviewed the tape before posting, and  number of times at that, I realised that this is the crux of everything.

If I am happy, independent of every outside factor, then I am doing the right thing. The same stands correct for choices v/s compromises. If I am happy with my choice, it stops being a compromise. It is so easy to not to end up compromising. If am happy with a work or a job, my passion shines through, and in some cases the other capabilities, their presence and absence, may not even affect my performance at that job. I will acquire the requisite skills out of my own volition, and will become actually competent to do the job. The list goes on.

Being the unabashedly spiritual person that I am, I feel this is the mantra for living life. For why else does God place us on this planet, but to indulge in its joys and be happy? We just have to work on our inside happiness to live life the way we intended to at the beginning, as nothing else is ours to keep.

A good note to begin the new year with.