Attitude: Importance of Groundedness

Whilst resolutions and aims that are tangible, measured, and time-bound are absolutely necessary, often it is our ‘attitude’ that leads to the achievement of these, and possibly much more than what we specify. So this article is about attitude, and hopefully it is relevant for all, but more relevant for those who are succeeding at present. Even though the need to avoid personal complacence is so evidently essential in attaining lasting success, whilst it is spoken about by people sometimes, it is seldom taught in training, reading, and other forms of management learning. An easy way of avoiding complacence is by comparing ourselves not with our peers, or those who aren’t advanced as us, but to those who are superior. I was fortunate to hear from spiritual teacher, Bhakti Rasamrita Swami recently who provided three useful tools we can use in this regard by giving examples of three addresses of God, which when compared with ourselves, should help us keep our feet on the ground at all times.
 

Cause of all Causes

I led the execution of a project that went well a few months back, and when people heard of the project, they immediately look to who was responsible for organizing it. Eventually you become associated with it, and it's success. A few months later, a similar project was to be executed again, and this time I was not in town to oversee it all. It was as successful, and in fact achieved some additional things that the first project didn’t. I wasn’t even there for the execution. In business, no matter how much one thinks that they are successful and the factor that holds things up, the environment is such that there will almost always be people likely to step up and make up. So we should never come under the illusion that we are irreplaceable, and are responsible for the success that comes. There are a number of benefits of this kind of awareness; an attitude where the leaders know they are not the all in all cause, will cultivate more respect for those contributing in every way they do. If we are aware we are not the all-in-all, we will likely be more giving with our knowledge to others, to ensure things can indeed continue at least as successfully, if not even more successfully when we are not there. One senior business leader in Hong Kong said to me recently that senior executives living in places where there is enormous avenue for personal recreational enjoyment, are reluctant to relocate back to their home countries as they don’t want to give up these luxuries. This leads to them ‘guarding’ their roles, and not developing an environment where succession is planned very well. An attitude of being aware that we are not the cause of all causes, that it is about others helping in success, will lead to a very mature way of leadership that will lead to far greater scale results in the long term. In this connection, Bhakti Rasamrita Swami explains how one of the names of God is ‘Akhil Karanaya’ or the ‘Cause of all Causes’. Any action or event has a number of causes that lead up to it. Perhaps the end action or event we may take the credit for, but we certainly cannot take credit for all actions and events leading to it. Such an approach that needs to be managed carefully, and not necessarily externally demonstrated, but should always be known inside to keep ourselves grounded at all times.
 

Without any Cause

Robin van Persie, recent recruit at Manchester United, after scoring a record number of goals by any high profile signing who has moved from one big club to another said, he feels like he is in a team of champions. Clearly his own effort and ability are big, but he credits so much to the others around him to help him achieve the success he has so far. Books on achieving greatness always talk about learning from those who have been successful. People have idols, or others who provide inspiration to continue. This principle of learning from others and gaining inspiration from others is universal and clearly applies in world of arts, sport, and business. Therefore, is it just humility alone that leads to crediting these others when success is achieved? Not really. It is just honesty on the situation. The fact is that more often than not, our path and success has more causes external than us than just us on our own. We can certainly achieve more if we learn from others. If it seems our success is purely based on our hard work, we should question whether we are really accessing others as much as we could be to achieve more. Bhakti Rasamrita Swami in this connection says that God is the only Person with no cause, or ‘Nish Karanaya’, and that everything and everyone else has so many causes both immediately, and ‘behind the scenes.’ The result of this is awareness in the corporate and also personal context is that we acknowledge that our success has many causes, and that when this is attributed to these other sources, we become grounded, and also cultivate a mood of further learning.

Most Wonderful Cause

We also often see that very successful people do not boast about their qualities and achievements. Rather, they sometimes look to their shortcomings. What better way to cultivate a mood of improvement, which is so important for success. There is a spiritual story where a personality called Dhruva Maharaj entailed in thousands of years of meditation in the previous ages on the Supreme Person, in order to attain rulership of opulent kingdoms upon pleasing the Supreme Person. After this many years of meditation, his attitude and his goals changed. He became self-realised, and did not have such a strong desire for these things, but ended up meditating on the Supreme Person with a pure motive, not for kingdoms etc. When the Supreme Person appeared before him, Dhruva Maharaj recalled his motive so many thousands of years ago, and said how unfortunate he was to have cultivated such a desire although having given up such an attitude thousands of years ago. In our own lives, Bhakti Rasamrita Swami cites that we may even be the cause of so many things, but not all of those things are wonderful, however God is the most wonderful cause – Adbhuta Karanaya. We will have done certain things that did not have wonderful outcomes, where there is learning to be taken away, and we should be aware of this as we succeed also. This has a number of benefits; if we note our shortcomings, we will tend to be more consultative in our style, and therefore attract more collaboration, joint wins rather than individual efforts. The above points are all concerned with attitude, and should be considered and implemented with great caution and awareness of the particular dynamics and individuals we work with.

With Great Responsibility comes Great Power

The Concorde Club

After returning from a two day trip to India the primary topic of conversation amongst the team was work, with a close runner up being luxuries. It made for a very interesting set of observations. The discussions started with the quality of lounges in Hong Kong, then in India, then the rest of Asia, and then the Middle East, and then the rest of the world. We then moved onto airlines, and airline clubs, and then to the tiers of membership within those clubs. We then went to many of the additional benefits one gets as they progress, namely having a couple of square feet extra space, a personal member of staff to serve you and bring you what you want, and a number of prestigious credit cards. As one becomes more senior, they will tend to have better facility available should they choose; and most do, and it does not by default mean the people are bad people at all - values has nothing to do with whether a person is rich or poor, in first class or economy - in fact there are some very humble people in my experience in luxurious lounges, who are often far more considerate than some at the other end of the plane – it is all to do with how we view and use the things at our disposal. The problem arises when people with opulence and power misuse it and become absorbed in their own apparent greatness; this is a problem because it very likely an inaccurate view of reality in the bigger context, and secondly it will very likely bring disappointment as not everyone in the Universe will recognise such self-recognised greatness. Groundedness, and alignment with good values will help us to be in touch with reality, will help us be very strong; and this is not just a nice to have – in an environment where groundedness and values, whilst not non-existent, are often rare and easily compromised- we should be very bold, strong and determined so that these values can prevail. What follows are some related accounts in what the lack of values and self-centerdness can lead to, verses what values can lead to.

Excuse me???

The Vedic teachings tell of one of the original progenitors of human civilisation called Prajapati Daksha. Praja means the people, and Pati means Lord. He was therefore a very esteemed person, respected by even the demigods. His daughter had married Lord Shiva. Lord Shiva is a very unique personality, and increasingly even today photos of him are in yoga studios all over the world in deep meditation wearing very simple items of clothing and covered in ash, and he is seen as an embodiment of devotion, deep detachment and focus. The daughter of Prajapati Daksha, called Sati, married Lord Shiva. She was extremely beautiful and amongst her description it is described that she had eyes like those of a deer cub. Once there was a large sacrifice taking place, to which all of the demigods were invited. Lord Shiva and his wife were also present. When Prajapati Daksha entered the arena, he was offered complete respects by all of those in the arena except by Lord Brahma, and Lord Shiva. Lord Brahma was his father, and therefore etiquette had it that Prajapati Daksha offer his respects unto his father. Withstanding that, Lord Shiva did not pay his respects; this was completely unintentional as Lord Shiva offers respect to everyone being completely transcendentally situated, but was more by accident, and by higher arrangement. Prajapati Daksha became furious. Here were the most powerful personalities in the Universe, paying their respects, and his son-in-law, did not. Radhanath Swami explains in this connection that ‘For one who is accustomed to being honoured, dishonour is worst than death.’ In the infamous gang cultures today, in interviews, gang leaders and drug lords more often than any other answer, cite “respect” as the cause of murders. Prajapati Daksha, who was otherwise a highly evolved and cultured being, began to unload countless insults unto Lord Shiva in the presence of everyone. The story continues, and this ended up to be the cause of his eventual downfall to a very very humbling material position in which he returned to Lord Shiva with folded palms. The Srimad Bhagawatam concludes on this that “Although the six qualities of education, austerity, wealth, beauty, youth and heritage are for the highly elevated, one who is proud of possessing them becomes blind, and thus he loses his good sense and cannot appreciate the glories of great personalities.” It is therefore so important that no matter what our material circumstances and success may be, that we remain firmly grounded and keep reminding ourselves that each time any success comes.

With great responsibility comes great power

Here we argue that whilst Spiderman had the great saying that ‘With great power comes great responsibility’, and whilst this is certainly true, the converse is also often true. If we take responsibility, i.e. being able to respond positively and responsibly, we will actually attract great power. Arjuna was one such example, who at one time had everything at his disposal, he was highly esteemed loyalty, with great palaces, and even large chambers just for thinking. But there was a substantial difference between his possessing this, and President Mugabe for example, who today possesses a very luxurious residence. Some of the essential differences lie in values and mindset. Arjuna was noble, truthful, benevolent towards others, he did not think he owned these things, rather that he had been given them by the grace of God to be used in the service of God and others. It certainly may be questioned whether such values exist in many people with opulence today. Arjuna’s values bought him power. Lord Krishna even declares in this regard that wherever Arjuna is and wherever He is, there will certainly be opulence, victory, extraordinary power and morality. So these values and devotion in Arjuna actually attracted opulence, and power. We should therefore certainly aspire to i) be successful , ii) with a higher consciousness, and not give up in either regard. In fact, if we are inclined towards higher values, and decide to give up, what will this make for? Those with less regard for values will come to power. We are influenced by our leaders, and often times in the workplace we subconsciously take on the mood of our leaders to some extent, and sometimes even need to in order to progress. If therefore, as people aspiring towards values driven leadership, we are not successful, we are actually paving way for a landslide in the other direction in the years to come. Whilst we may not align in every way with the rock band, Manic Street Preachers, their lyrics "If you tolerate this, then your children will be next," may be very useful when remaining determined to uphold essential in our workplaces and communities.