08 Life will let you know when it’s time…

One day, you will probably know it’s your last cigarette, or the last time you’re going to do something, maybe get drunk, or shout at your wife… life has a way of letting you know, by itself, without strenuous action on your part. It may be sudden, or more usually you may have a sense or premonition a few days ahead… but the time will come.

I like to think that we have a certain life quota of these things, and we gradually use it up, as if it were a debit account at a bank. We’ve certainly heard of the parable of the talents, and how each of us is started off with a certain amount to our credit. I like to think that this applies even to bad habits or self-indulgence… we eat and eat greasy food, and one day we just don’t want to any more. We rush around madly to places and people, but again one day we know we’re not going to be doing that any more. I like to think that one day cigarettes will quite suddenly lose their hold over you, because you’ve just finished your life’s quota!

When you see a loved one not giving up some habit, therefore, I think you should not fret too much… the day will come when they would have run through their life’s entitlement of that particular form of self-coddling, and you don’t really have to do much, except safeguard them from life-threatening situations!

There is a book of the Bible which goes by the name of The Preacher, or Ecclesiastes, which has one of the most beautiful and haunting lyrical passages in the wisdom literature of the world: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven; A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.”

It goes on like this, enough to make you weep; but the ultimate message is, why do you labor in vain when God knows everything and will bring it all together… Suffice it to say, in the limited context of this piece, that all things come to an end, including the smokes and the booze that is your lot in life!

07 Small rewards can be habit-changing!

There is an added value to the suggestion of giving yourself small rewards intermittently, apart from taking you out of your blue moods. It is actually an effective way of changing bad habits and establishing better ones in their place. I am especially thinking of breaking an addiction like smoking, at least it may work for some people (it did, for me!). And its less painful than many other methods people have tried!

It works like this. Every cigarette is obviously costing you a tidy bit of money, especially over the course of the day. Firstly, stop buying or carrying full packs… just buy one at a time to cut down the frequency, though it may seem a bit contrived and bothersome at first (and it gets you some walking exercise, assuming of course that you don’t drive to the corner shop!). Then, for every cigarette less that you smoke (because you don’t have a pack or half a pack with you, you can’t be bothered to walk to the shop, or you consciously restrain yourself), give yourself a bonus…mentally or physically, by putting the change into a jar. You’d be surprised at how the savings mount up.

Sit down and calculate how much you’re really spending on your cigarettes. As you cut back on your smoking, once a week go out and get something with the cash you’ve saved. For me it was LPs or books…one a week. For you it may be something else. Over time, hopefully you’ll be less obsessed with your smokes (don’t tell anyone, but there have been times in a misspent youth that we’ve actually crawled around picking up butts off the roadside!), and will have a glow of anticipation for your next book or whatever (till these real things last and are not replaced by digital substitutes!).

There is another sure way of quitting smoking, which I have successfully used twice: a complete change of scene. For me this was my stints abroad. The first time, I’d be damned before I shelled out a couple of pounds for a few fags (equally for a cup of coffee) when I was only getting ten pounds a day as student allowance (and it probably cost one-twentieth back home). Then I came back, and my friends forced me to start smoking all over again. The second time, I stopped smoking again on the flight out, and this time, when I came back after three years, I told my friends to go jump in the lake. It’s been some twenty years now, and I haven’t even touched a cigarette… but then, I do have an awful lot of music and books!

06 You need to create your own reward system

Humans have three levels of motivation in the Greek system of thought, according to Fukuyama: apart from the thymotic urge for recognition, which the government or other large bureaucratic systems are basically weak at providing, there are fortunately two other levels: the baser urges, for things and enjoyment, as well as a higher urge for knowledge and thought. Remarkably, Indian philosophy also recognizes more or less the same three-fold partitioning of human nature: the baser spirit of tamas, the intermediate one of rajas for glory, and the higher one of sattva for knowledge and self-realization. The quest for glory and recognition being more likely to bring you to grief through the vagaries of fortune and the machinations of jealous colleagues and inimical forces, the wise government servant concentrates on the other two, and thereby builds up his own reward system that is not dependent on how others respond to him.

The tamasic urges are easily satisfied by buying or possessing things, travelling to see new places and experience new things, eating out, and so on. It is best not to get too deep into these things, however, as it may push you into a constant competition with others and lead you into all sorts of temptation. It is best to keep your spending within a manageable limit, and make small forays into the market to give yourself small intermittent material rewards. A weekly outing, by yourself or with a good companion, will help to keep the blues away and set you up for the next week of faceless toil.

The sattvic, or higher, aspirations are easier to pursue without being drawn into bad habits. A simple approach is to take up some subject of interest as a hobby, or pursue higher studies in it through self-study, distance learning courses, and so on. I’m not trying to be funny here: it is actually a great way of spending your spare time, and gives you a focus outside of your day job. It may even provide you an alternative group or community to interact with, and is an ideal way to baby-sit yourself in those not uncommon spells of enforced idleness between assignments that each of us will fall prey to in the course of a career. It may also provide the basis for a great second career after retirement!

05 They’re just not that much into you!

One of the first things I did as an officer-trainee in an All India Service was to take an autorickshaw right up to the porch of the training institute to report before the President (of the Institute, a grand old structure built on the model of a ceratin English manor house, but I could equally well have tried to go and report to the President of the nation).  They told me to go to the school and search out the caretaker of the hostel. That’s the first lesson I got in the long journey through my career, a journey that’s lasted some 38 years and been a continuous learning experience.

Lesson No.1: They’re just not THAT much into you! You’re  a bright young fellow or lass, who has probably been pretty good at studies and sports and cultural activities, and were probably used to getting a lot of recognition, accolades, certificates, prizes, and so on. Your entering the Service has been the culmination of all those years of study and toil. You’d expect that they would appreciate your efforts, appreciate that they are getting a person of great talent and promise. You’d expect to be treated like a somebody.

Unfortunately, that’s not what you’re going to get. For the huge plant or warehouse that is Government, you’re just one more name in a list, one more cog or nut in the machinery. The huge effort that has gone into the selection process has culminated, and the rest, as they say, is history.  Which repeats itself from batch to batch, slowly moving you along the assembly line until you are ready to drop off at the far end. They have neither the time nor the inclination to get to know you personally, as an individual, your aspirations, hopes and fears. All they can barely manage to do is to find you a place in the huge system, move you from time to time, and see that you get your salary and increments on time. The actual work that you do from day to day matters little, as there is a larger system to make up for slackers and dampen down zealots. The huge ship of state moves on in its slow, stately fashion, as it should, and individuals don’t matter.

Once you accept, even embrace, this reality, much of the pain of not being recognized will go away, or at least become bearable. This goes against the grain of our inherited selves, as public recognition is one of the prime movers of humans, and indeed of many other species too. As Fukuyama describes in his book The End of History and the Last Man, it is this urge, called thymos, that propelled human individuals, communities and nations into deeds of valour and quests for glory.  In our system of thought, too, we talk of this as rajas, the spirit of the rulers. Maslow talks of the hierarchy of needs: having satisfied our basic needs of food, clothing and shelter, we look for the higher levels of fulfillment, which come from effort, achievement, and recognition. Since the system is just not geared up to meet these higher needs, if you are really expecting these rewards, you will be sadly disappointed. The answer to this existential riddle lies in our second lesson...

04 We keep searching for approval

Do you remember when you were a kid, you would keep on tugging at your Dad's sleeve and telling him, look, look? No, I'm sure you don't, but your own child is probably doing that right now (or that pesky neighbour's kid maybe?...).

Some of us (who am I kidding...most of us!) never really grow out of that state of mind. Our Daddies didn't have much time then, and the substitute daddies we look to... spouses, bosses, friends and neighbours, the adoring public, the office girl, our own kids...don't have much time for us either. They'll humour us some as long as they're getting something out of us, but even that may be too heavy a price to pay...how many times are they going to listen to the same joke and the same off-tune song?

Maybe Western societies have a lot more positive reinforcement, but many other cultures are rather dismissive about lesser persons, children of a lesser god as it has been termed by Arundati Roy, and family status, wealth, class and caste are often stronger determinants than an individual's own efforts. I'm not saying this is good or fair, but operating in such a hierarchical, highly judgemental society does require a certain hard-boiled approach to rewards and recognition. What you see is not always what you get.

If you really seriously wait for approval in such a society or organisation, you may end up unfulfilled and dissatisfied. This is especially likely in large bureaucracies and government, where relationships tend to be short-term, hierarchical, and one-sided. On the other hand, you will be pulled up if you slack off. The problem is to keep on slogging without positive responses...difficult for the average person.

So the response here is to take work as its own reward, just like the Bhagawad-Gita says. It's also very fulfilling in the long term, leads to a sense of independence, self-worth and professional competence. And who knows...it may even bring you some recognition at some stage! Conversely, though, let us try to be generous with our own approval...a tough task, especially if we do not agree with the other person's choices in our heart of hearts...which is why Daddies find it so difficult to say, Shabhash, beta (Great, kiddo!).