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Showing posts from April, 2015

Intangibly nice people

Being nice is so obviously a good thing. The fact is that you'd be hard pressed to get a single, succint definition of "nice". Courteous? Yes. Reciprocal? Yes. Well mannered? Yes. Not rude? Yes. Win-Win? Yes. Giving? Yes. Etc. Etc. In public interactions, nice is synonymous with keeping peace, moving in unison, making things easier for everyone. This is absolutely the right way to conduct oneself in the world, if we want to move the world. It is the habit that many of us mold our childhood innocence into, to make the world a better place every time we practice it. But the nice that I want to frame today is different. It isn't a quality, but more than that. Without offending all of us, it is safe to say that only a few people are this nice. Of course, some of these nice embodiments are given to you - parents, siblings and early childhood friends. Their niceness lasts a lifetime if  you are gifted enough to tend them against the escape velocity that space a

The Zen of Trust

Zen master Himadri was reputed to be a great leader who built stunningly successful institutions multiple times in his life. One of his disciples, Supyo, wanted to know the secret to his success, so he could build an organization himself. Himadri said, "leadership". Supyo was a little irritated with this answer. He had read everything about leadership. Countless tomes, written by countless leaders. Every one explained how they (or someone else) succeeded in building something that lasted for a long time. But none of it explained how someone can succeed so well so many times. Supyo wanted to not just create something once, but may times, much like Himadri. And he knew he had other precedents (none of whom had written about their success, strangely.) Supyo had heard of Master Jobs and Stargazer Musk. He considered these two giants to be the only exceptions to the rule - that it is rare to even get one attempt at creating something stunning and extraordinarily valu