Leaders eat first

It’s that time of the year when everyone starts resolving to make a resolution for the New Year. Most are clichés. Clichés that pretty much puts into perspective a surge in gym memberships after the binge drinking in December. Studies from various parts of the world report 8 out of the 10 people who sign up for gym memberships, stop by the end of January. I stand by the altar of the guilty as well. 

Last year, though, I shied away from a fitness resolution. Instead, I filed away two altogether different resolutions. The first, that I will practice meditation for at least a half hour every day. The second, that I will either meet one new person, or latch onto a new book every week.

I am happy to report that for all practical purposes, my resolutions stand executed. I do not intend to make any this year. Because there is much work to be done on these old ones.

December is as good a time as any to reflect on the learnings and outcomes that have emerged until now. With the benefit of hindsight, I think I know three things.

1. When confronted with silence, the head is a very noisy place.

2. Between listening deeply to people share their stories one-on-one, and reading from the pages of a book, listening beats what is embedded in books.

3. There are no bad people. Only circumstances. It is just that each person responds to fortune and adversity differently. That is what makes each one unique.

A caveat must be filed. The reason I stated upfront that “I think I know" is because these learnings are basis my perceptions so far. As that saying goes: “When the facts change, I change my mind." There is no consensus around who said it first.

Regardless of the mutability of facts, the things I’ve learned in conversations with the people who have earned my respect over the year are these.

The sky is blue

When it came to meditation, one of the first things I was told was to practice sitting in silence, meditate, and focus on just breathing in deeply, and exhaling completely, to the exclusion of everything else. When starting out, I was told to attempt the exercise for no longer than 10 minutes before progressing to longer periods. “Sounds ridiculously simple," a voice in the head suggested.

That this is extremely hard dawned on me only when the practice started. That was also when that phrase, “the mind is like a monkey" started to fall into perspective. It is the kind of creature that can tease, provoke, anger, amuse, infuse thoughts of all kinds—and do it all at once.

Over time, I could begin to see what those who are close to me have always told me—that I am a difficult person to be with. And that the demeanour I put on with those who don’t know me too well of being an easy-going bloke is a façade. In attempting to stay silent and focus on the breath, I could, for the first time, see myself in the third person and witness that I am indeed a difficult person.

My mind is constantly “chattering". It has an opinion about everything. I could hear myself talk and opine all the time—until even “me" started to get infuriated by the voices in my head. Can’t I just shut up?

Some conversations with an experienced practitioner of meditation offered pointers.

Such behaviour, it seems, is difficult for people who cannot deal with ambiguity. People like me need a clear line of sight on what must be done. But life does not offer such luxuries. It plays itself out. The best of plans can go awry. You adapt and go with the flow.

Those who insist on a clear line of sight are plain pig-headed and not cut out to be either chess-players or leaders. They can get cranky and are inevitably difficult to live with. To understand that better, I was asked to look up at the sky. There are days when it is cloudy. Then there are other days when it rains and dark clouds appear. But anyone who has been on an airplane knows that the clouds are only an obfuscation. And that once you cross the turbulence, there is a clear blue sky. Clouds, by its nature are transitory. It comes and goes with the wind.

Getting agitated then is an exercise in petulance if you implicitly understand that the sky is blue. All you need then is the patience to let the clouds pass, and develop a mental muscle memory not to do anything stupid when it gets overcast.

GyShiDo over perfection

I am, so to speak, frequently conflicted. On the one hand, I admire perfection and remain convinced nothing must go out until, as it were, that greatest of artists Michelangelo himself may approve of the perfection in it. Then on the other hand there is the idea of a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) embedded in my head.

Personally, I can trace the roots of this conflict to my days when I used to report to a team of editors based out of Munich. When looked at from their West European eyes, they’d cluck their tongues in disapproval at the slightest hint of tardiness and convey their displeasure in no uncertain terms. They wanted perfection down to the last detail before the product could roll out.

Then on the other hand, my training as a business journalist, conversations with entrepreneurs of all kinds who make things happen at scale, getting hands dirty in a newsroom where deadlines are tight, and in attempting to take things off the ground, it suggests GyShiDo—a polite way to say, “Getting your shit done"—is the way to be.

Over the last year on the back of experience and multiple conversations, I now veer towards that view that perfection can wait. GyShido comes first.

By way of example, men like Leonardo da Vinci and Steve Jobs are celebrated for their obsession for being perfectionists. But what is not spoken of much in the public domain is that Steve Jobs’ quest to find perfection also made him a jerk. He bullied people, was a control freak, and had no moral qualms about building a monolith by exploiting cheap Chinese labour. I am still to read Walter Issacson’s biography of Leonardo. But there is no taking away from the point that his quest for perfection made him a procrastinator and his worst enemy as well.

When looked at from that perspective, it is possible to argue that the quest for perfectionism is an ideal pursuit, and one that must be a lifelong one at that. But while at it, implement a minimum viable product that gets you off the ground. You iterate and fix things as you go along.

If any evidence of the viability of this process is needed, look no further than what is apparently the most evolved of all businesses: Software. Each time a new version is released, it is touted as an improvement over the previous one. Nobody complains. Instead, everyone complies and upgrades.

There will be naysayers and doomsday predictors of all kinds. Pay heed to their voices for all that it is worth. But at some point, you’ve got to take a call and roll with what you have. Ideologues talk from pulpits. People who make the world go around place a premium on GyShiDo.

There are no bad guys

Contrary to what popular narrative would have us believe, there is no such thing as “us" and “them". Only different ways of looking at the world. The world needs ideologues who stoke debates and the kinds who make things happen. Both are fiercely motivated and believe deeply in what they are invested in. So even if you subscribe to the GyShiDo manifesto, it would be outright stupid to dismiss ideologues.

Because at the end of the day, there is no getting away from the reality that perfection is an ideal state. And one must do all that it takes to get there. It is a journey. The issue on hand is, which path do you take to get there the fastest. That is where decisions must be taken.

But how do you choose? Which path do I take? I asked an entrepreneur who subscribes to GyShiDo even as he keeps track of where may perfection lie, how does he manage.

His answer was a simple one. He does not judge people. He only evaluates the idea. In doing that, he asks himself some questions.

1. If I adopt this suggestion, is the outcome reversible? 

2. If the outcome is reversible, how fast can a new iteration be created?

3. If the suggestion is irreversible, what may the possible outcomes be? 

4. How many people can potentially be impacted by a negative outcome? 

5. Does an option exist to an irreversible suggestion? 

The answers to these questions are ones he cannot obtain by consensus and in a democratic manner. It is his cross to carry. Whatever be the outcome of his decision, it is conveyed and executed. But his decisions have to be made in real time. People look up to him. To that extent, he is a very lonely man.

But to stay the course, he is also aware he must also perform at his peak potential at any given point in time. To do that, he needs some creature comforts. That includes right of way and an implicit mandate to eat before the others do.

This was first published in Mint on Sunday

Grown men don't cry

As is my norm, I woke up a little while ago. Around 4.00 am. It is a Wednesday morning. My two mugs of chai are ready and the sounds of silence are around. The silence will last a while longer. Grim news was conveyed to me by my friend and family physician around midday yesterday. “He’s got 72 hours on the outside.”

It was dad he was talking about.

The first time I had attempted to write about dad and him slipping away was when a stroke too him down. The prognosis sounded grim then as well and the physician attending to him the ICU sounded as unambiguous. But he survived — to put it bluntly, as a vegetable.

Since then, for all my philosophical differences with dad, it compelled me to step back and look at life from his perspective and the times he lived in. When looked at from there, I feel grateful for all of what he gave me.

Much water has passed under the bridge over these months. An ecosystem of sorts has come to breathe around this semi-comatose man who lingers in Bardo as articulated by the Tibetans, or in Purgatory as his Catholic faith defines it. I am no authority either in theology or on the medical condition and can be challenged. But in my limited understanding, this is where he now lies. I don’t intend to delve into the philosophical moorings here. But on the ecosystem that has grown around him. And how, like he would have, I have come to empathise with it.

Every morning, on the dot at 8.00am, the doorbell rings and a nurse walks in. Come hell or high water, festival or domestic problem, she’s there. My little girls are comfortable with her, and over time, she has grown to be fiercely protective about them.

She is now as much part of our home as any member of the family is. She spends most of her waking hours with us. She is the one who knows most about dad’s physical condition; the one mum has gotten used talking to most often because they are more or less of the same age; and perhaps share the same set of concerns.

When in doubt about what her son ought to do, she sends him to me. When in distress, she shares it in confidence with my wife.

Yesterday morning, though, I thought she looked troubled when she walked in and started on her routine of checking his vitals. She called my wife and me aside. “His time to go has come”, she told us quietly. I asked of her what is to be done next.

“Nothing," she said in the quiet Marathi we talk to each other in. “You can call the doctor if you want a second opinion.” That’s how my friend had gotten there.

But unlike dad who would have dropped everything else, I had other things playing on the mind. Such as calls to make for a story I had been obsessed about for a while. And other fine print to be pored over. Life, after all, must to go on and death is a part of it, a voice in the head said.

“Are you doing okay or in denial?” my wife asked a little later. This had to do with that a little before the nurse walked in, the attendant who spends his nights at home, from the time dad fell unwell, told me first thing in the morning on waking up was that dad’s time to go had come.

“And how do you know?" I asked him.

“I’m not a doctor," he told me. “But I’ve worked at a hospital all my life. And I know when a man is dying. He and I had gotten to bond over the months in an interesting way. The first thing I do when I wake up is brew the both of us chai. Two mugs for me. A small cup for him. He tells me I make lovely chai.

Each night, a little after the nurse leaves, he comes home to spend the night. Like her, he has become a part of this ecosystem.

My younger one waits for him because she likes what his wife cooks. And he makes it a point to bring a little portion of his dinner for her. It’s pretty much part of her daily routine and they seem to enjoy it.

Yesterday morning, though, things were different. He looked different. Even as I started my routine, he walked into the kitchen and, the devout Catholic that he is, asked me to call in the priest to administer the “Last Sacrament”. That’s what had triggered all this activity around.

I muttered “not again" and asked him if he’s up to a chai. “Whatever," he said. “But call the priest." A little after the nurse walked in, basis her observations and jottings, she confirmed the man’s prognosis.

One examing dad, how did the my friend, the doctor, conclude he has no more than 72 hours? Things certainly couldn’t be as clinical as he made it out to be. “He is now in coma. The pupils aren’t dilating in response to light. The urine output is negligible and the swollen body means his renal system has begun to fail. But he can’t feel pain."

“So what do I do now?”

“Stop all medications. His kidney’s cannot process anything, any more. Reduce his liquid feeds from 2,500ml to 2,000ml. Let the nurse take a call depending on what she thinks is right."

I eventually managed to connect with Dr Rajat Chauhan, a close friend. He put things in perspective: “It is a physician’s assessment basis his diagnosis and the statistical evidence that supports the diagnosis. He may be on or off the mark by some time. But accept it and move on." 

I got the point.

The way I look at it, the only person who needed to be cared for was mum. She needed to be prepared the fact that her spouse with whom she had spent all of her best years was on his way out. And it was best if my brother and I had a conversation with her. But I guess she intuitively knew. 

My wife told me later that the nurse attending to dad is the only earning member of her family. I’ve known that for a long time. But over the many months that she’s been the primary caregiver to dad, she had confessed how she has gotten emotionally attached to him and our family. 

So, in spite, of her economic compulsions, and in spite of knowing what medical evidence tells her, she does not intend to take up another assignment. It turns out that she needs time to get over her bonding with dad, my kids and her being part of what is my home. It isn’t only the money that keeps her going. 

For a man who starts his days at 4 am, 11 pm is a late hour. The eyes were beginning to droop. But my younger girl, who is now four and a half, wouldn’t let me be until we had shared our secrets for the day and exchanged notes. 

“Dada, can we take daddy (my girls call dad that) for a picnic when he is fine? Daddy looks so tired."

I didn’t know what to tell a girl as little as that daddy will never be fine again. 

The best answer the atheist in me could come up with was “Some angels want to take daddy for a picnic baby. So we’ll have to wait."

“Oh! Dada, can I talk to them? I’ll give them my chocolates if they let me be with daddy for some more time and take him out."

“They’ve been waiting for a long time baby. They’re friends of his, you know."

“Angels don’t like chocolates?"

“I don’t know. Maybe they do."

“I’ll give them my chocolates if they let daddy stay."

My eyes drooped as she snuggled close to me. For the first time I felt a tear run down my cheek. I wished I had spent more time with dad. The lines from a song I’d almost forgotten existed started to play in a loop someplace in the back of the head. 

I’m sittin’ here with my kids and my wife

And everything that I hold dear in my life

We say grace and thank the Lord

Got so much to be thankful for 

Then it’s up the stairs and off to bed and my little girl says 

“I haven’t had my story yet." 

And everything weighin’ on my mind disappears just like that 

When she lifts her head off her pillow and says, “I Love You Dad" 

I don’t know why they say grown men don’t cry 

I don’t know why they say grown men don’t cry

This is an abbreviated and modified version of a piece that was first published in Mint in October 2016

Hackers and Painters

I snitched this headline from the name a book. Hackers and Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age. If you haven’t read it yet, may I urge you to? It is a lovely book authored by Paul Graham, a computer scientist, venture capitalist and well, a writer. And if you’re among those not inclined to read a book, he captured the sum and substance of it all in an essay back in 2003.

Some lovely learnings emerge out of it on what comprises the hacker ethic, in which he underlines the significance of relentless practice, devotion to beauty, why a premium ought to be placed on disciplines we are unfamiliar with, the humility to try and imbibe from others what we don’t know of, and above all else, inculcating a habit that allows us to share and collaborate so that we become lifelong learners.

Philosophically, it influenced many in computer science deeply. Because that is where he was best known and enthusiasts—or hackers, as they were called then, when the word wasn’t as bastardized—were enthused by his ideas. They could see the value in what he proposed. When I came of age, I could see merit in his ideas and was among those who embraced them.

But personal philosophies are malleable and susceptible to influences. That is why, at some point, I started to question the premise. I argued against the most beautiful of his ideas—collaboration.

“Maybe, I’m not a nice guy. I don’t care," I wrote once. Friends who knew me as a technology enthusiast and someone who had benefited from it were appalled at what they thought was a complete misunderstanding of a powerful idea. In a scathing indictment, I was told, “the most unfortunate thing is that we have journalists like you..."

In hindsight, I suspect I may have felt insecure with the idea of sharing. Because at the end of the day, my livelihood, I thought, is a function of the ideas and the words that came out of what I think up and my networks. How can I possibly give it away for free? 

That is why, I argued, “by thinking something up and offering it to the collective to improve upon, I stand to lose my livelihood... it leaves me with no incentive to write". Therefore, I ought to do all I can to protect what I come up with.

But much experimentation, conversations and learnings later, I now concede I was wrong. I stand corrected and an apology is in order. I admit the world we live in now wouldn’t have gotten to where it is without collaboration.

So much so that even Microsoft, the bastion of all things proprietary, after having fought to keep the world out of its doors, is now seeking to collaborate. Otherwise, it knows, it will perish.

So, who are hackers and how did hacks get into the lexicon? Everybody, it seems, is into hacking. Computer hacks, study hacks, sleep hacks, food hacks and, to top it all off, life hacks. 

To put that into perspective, let us first understand what a hacker is not:

• Geniuses who write books on “ethical hacking" and sell courses on “ethical hacking" are, well, geniuses. Because it needs a genius to find a market full of idiots willing to pay money to become a “certified hacker". None of what Graham articulated needs to be certified. It is a world view.

• Then there are management gurus who take terms like jugaad—a word most north Indians are familiar with. Loosely translated, a quick fix or, well, a “hack" as it is now understood. Packaged for the West and management schools, it is rephrased and given a lovely twist—frugal innovation.

By way of example, think of a contraption like the jugaad which plies on north Indian roads. The handle of an old scooter, tyres and engine of a motorcycle, the frame of a bicycle, the body of a bullock cart and a diesel engine to are retro-fitted to create a dangerous contraption. 

This is then deployed on the roads for pretty much everything from ferrying people to livestock and goods. It does not fall under the ambit of the Motor Vehicles Act. It is jugaad, and fits the framework of “frugal innovation".

But two problems exist here.

1. It cannot be scaled.

2. It violates the law because it is a safety hazard. So much of a hazard that the Supreme Court had to intervene and has asked all states where such vehicles ply to provide the court with details of what authorities are doing to take these contraptions off the road.

My limited submission here is that the Hacker Ethic in its purest sense is not about finding shortcuts like these. 

Instead, it focuses on finding truth, purpose, beauty, meaning and goodness in an optimum manner. And like I said earlier, this ethic insists we place a premium on optimizing ourselves and our work, so that we can devote as much of our time as we can to learn.

How? Allow me to provide a few instances:

• The other day, I stumbled across an interview of Mark Zuckerberg, the billionaire co-founder of Facebook. The 25-minute interview in which he articulated all of his ideas revealed clarity in thought. But what struck me was something else altogether. While in college, he studied both psychology and computer science.

  In India, this is an alien idea. The way things are, computer science is kosher because it can potentially make an engineer out of you. Psychology is not because it falls in the domain of liberal arts. 

  To cite but one instance, while talking with a doctor the other day, I asked him what his son was up to. He told me the original plan was to get the young man to pursue a career in medicine. But if he doesn’t get through the exams, “let him do arts or some shit".

  The tone was not condescending, but one that smacked of downright derision.

  Hackers sneer at people who speak this language. That is why Zuckerberg studied psychology. All thanks to it, he could ask, “What is it that people want the most?"

  His understanding of the domain taught him that humans seek other people out the most. What he learnt at his computer science class helped him create a software platform that could take his understanding of the human mind into a place he would otherwise not have been able to if he were wedded to either one of the disciplines. In his head, the disciplines collaborated.

  Having done that, he sought out people who understood the other arts, like design, and domains like business to build what is now one of the most formidable entities in the world. He optimized himself by collaborating between disciplines and others.

• Then there is this nonsense I come across every other day about how large organizations are trying to “replicate the start-up culture". And to do that, they have begun by “breaking down silos". This includes doing ridiculous things like spending obscene amounts on creating “open offices".

  Apparently, “open offices" facilitate conversations and an “open culture". Who is to tell them the Hacker Ethic includes an idea called Deep Work? And that there is evidence that conclusively demonstrates open offices are actually an insanely stupid idea because they kill productivity?

  This is because, to get meaningful work done, the human mind needs to find the optimal state to be in—the Flow, as defined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Most people call it as “being in the zone". To get here, they need their space.

  But organizations, in attempts to ape Facebook or Google without understanding the ethic that drives them, compel people to operate under suboptimal conditions. Zuckerberg didn’t start out trying to build a company. Neither did the founders of Google. They started out by trying to solve problems that real people face.

  To do that, they worked with the resources they had on hand. Which is essentially what a start-up is. That profitable entities came out of it is another story altogether. 

  But in trying to replicate start-up cultures, you cannot force-fit the Hacker Ethic into it. The most charitable thing that can be said of such attempts is that it is a horribly atrociously version of jugaad. It is destined to fail.

• And why will they fail? Because hackers share. They work with the collective. By way of example, take the Human Genome Project (HGP). It is the world’s largest collaborative biological project, conducted across 20 universities and research centres and funded by the governments of the US, UK, Japan, France, Germany, Canada and China. 

The database is there for anybody to access on the Internet. When looked at in isolation, the database can be gibberish because the quantum of information in it is so huge, it is impossible for any single entity to make any meaning out of it. Unless individuals and organizations collaborate to make meaning out of it for the greater common good.

Are there profits to be made out of it? Most certainly. Businesses have come to build around the ecosystem that is the HGP and provide highly personalized services to individuals across the world. The system is still evolving and who knows what may come out of it?

• Now, this ought us to introspect and ask: Am I a hacker? Let’s put it this way. If you think of the Hacker Ethic as a way of life, then yes. It isn’t always about coding and computers alone, but about looking at the wisdom they have gained and trying to emulate it. 

They don’t seek shortcuts. They seek elegant solutions to complex problems. When wrong, they have the humility to admit that they were in the wrong, move on and find the next optimum. They seek, they search, they look for the best ideas and they share as openly as they gain. This ethic is a life of learning, adapting and not scrimping.

This piece was first published in Mint on September 17, 2016

Field Notes from an ICU

Contrary to what I always imagined, the ambience outside the intensive care unit, or ICU, where my dad sleeps now isn’t antiseptic. Around me are a few chairs, and a few weary faces. Pretty much everybody is glued to mobile handsets. The only time they come to life is when one of the security personnel shouts out a number. The guardian of one of the human beings admitted in the ICU then jumps up and scrambles to do whatever it is that the resident medical officer (RMO) or nurse in charge wants them to. 

The only times I have seen my dad are when the number he is now identified by is shouted out. I haven’t been allowed in any place close to him since he was wheeled into the emergency room earlier today. Since then, he has become just another body that lies sedated in a sterile environment, in sharp contrast to the air outside. I don’t know what will become of him when he gets out of there. The doctors in charge claim they don’t know either. “Under observation for 48 hours," is all they mutter.

*****

I think it was yesterday. Or at least it seems like that. The two sons of a junior warrant officer (JWO) in the Indian Air Force (IAF) and his wife would walk the lanes and bylanes of Sion, a suburb in Mumbai, every evening. 

At some point, the young officer would strike a deal with his sons. Either they could stop by a street vendor who hawked comics where they could debate and deliberate further on which title of Amar Chitra Katha they ought to settle on, or whether they’d much rather everybody share a plate of vada sambar or masala dosa at Hanuman Restaurant right across where the vendor sat. The only times there was no debate was when the latest copy of Tinkle hit the stands.

At all other times, the officer was clear it had to be either the comics or the food. Certainly not both. The boys resented it because they thought they were being disciplined into making choices. The young officer made it sound that way while the mother looked on indulgently. More often than not, the comics won over the food.

Purchases done, all of them would troop home and the young man would lie on his bed, open the comic, the boys on either side, and he’d animatedly read out tales from the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, Valmiki, the Jataka Tales, and every once a while stories of heroes from contemporary Indian history that Amar Chitra Katha thought appropriate to publish. 

The older boy grew to become me—a journalist; the younger one, my brother, a researcher in the neurosciences. Thirty-five-odd years down the line, in hindsight, the both of us know the young officer wasn’t trying to teach his sons to choose. It was because a JWO in the IAF then barely took home enough money to make both ends meet. 

We grew up in an India where “India was Indira and Indira was India". My folks hadn’t heard of economic liberalization and its potential benefits until the early 1990s. Not that it made sense to them. But by the time they did and figured out what it meant, their boys were ready to join the workforce. Until then, the only kind of parenting most middle-class folks like them knew was to give their boys the best, like buying comics pretty much every other day. If that meant mortgaging little pieces of gold at the local pawn shop from our mother’s meagre dowry, then that is what they did.

But something happened, a mutation if you will, between generations. The kindness and genteel parenting dad weaned us on got replaced by “helicopter parenting" of the kind my generation and I practise. 

My older daughter Nayanatara doesn’t have the time for long walks with me. Just out of Class IV, her mornings are crammed with a ruthless curriculum that leaves no room for simple joys like Uncle Pai in Tinkle. When done with her formal class hours, she attends classes for taekwondo, kathak, phonics (which will apparently do her diction good), quilling, art and pottery. My wife and I think it par for the course if she has to grow up into a well-rounded individual. 

My folks aren’t so sure. They think their kids—my brother and I—turned out to be reasonably decent blokes given the Rs. 400-odd the IAF paid my dad every month by way of salary. I suspect they may just have a point.

Each time dad tried to tell me that gently, I’d go into a funk and tell him the times have changed. But as he convulses yet again, the RMO tells me they’re at a loss, and that the ventilator sounds the most plausible option—someplace in my head tells me I ought to consider his advice on parenting a bit more seriously. It’s okay to let children be and soak life in without imposing the ideals of what adulthood ought to be like on them. They’ll just turn out fine. So long as you have the bandwidth to attend to their simple needs—be a playmate when they need you and read a few comics together every once in a while.

*****

The kind of literature on medicine I have read includes the compassion of Atul Gawande, the eruditon of Sherwin Nuland and the perspective of Roy Porter. Their expositions on the practice offered me stunning insights into the relentless world of young resident doctors, the nature of how we biologically live and why our cells die. That is why I always thought of medical practitioners as romantic ideals.

But in the real world, across the glass wall where dad lies right now, Gawande and Nuland and Porter are just that—romantic ideals. The resident doctors are—pardon my expression—kids on whom the graveyard shift is an imposed one. They are trying their damndest best to do what the textbooks have taught them. But experience is still to mentor them. 

Over time they will morph into seniors, like the ones doing the rounds now, and who during their normal waking hours are arrogant pricks. Pardon my expression, but there is no other way to describe them. Allow me tell you why. Fed up of the “He’s under observation" line, I thought up a quick one to throw at the senior doctor on the rounds. 

“Excuse me sir, but which lobe of his is affected?"

“You understand medicine?" he asked me condescendingly.

“I’m a practising biochemist," I lied through my teeth. 

“Ah! You’re one of us," he melted and proceeded to take me through the initial prognosis.

Much of it sounded like Greek and Latin. But because curiosity had compelled me to read Gray’s Anatomy and some textbooks on biochemistry closely in the past, and carry an app called HealthKart on my phone that I look up every once a while to understand the nature of various drugs, I managed to nod intelligently, ask some questions, and finally get a fix on what is happening to dad. 

Perhaps I am being unduly harsh on the fraternity. When looked at from one perspective, how can an overworked medic sit down and possibly explain the nuances of medicine to traumatized caregivers clueless about the machinations of medicine? 

I can think of exceptions to the rule like the good Dr Natarajan, an obstetrician, who devoted patience and time to my wife and me when we’d gone through a scare a long time ago when she was carrying our second child. He assuaged our concerns and treated us like humans—not like preserved tissue samples in formaldehyde jars that reside in medical schools. That said, I maintain that the likes of him are exceptions.

But why should it be? If kids weaned on comic books purchased on the back of wafer thin pay packets and mortgaged gold can grow up into informed individuals, what makes medical professionals think they can be condescending? I buy the argument that they soak in an enormous amount of pressure. But what if these medics were put into the pressure-cooker environment that is the newsroom; or a trading room at a broking outfit; or asked to frame policies that rein in the fiscal deficit? None of these professionals can get away without explaining the nuances to the masses. Because if they don’t, they’ll get lynched. 

Why did I have to lie and claim I am a biochemist to understand what’s going on? Why did their doors open warmly only when my brother, who is actually a doctor, walk in? What if I hadn’t lied? What if my brother wasn’t a doctor? Much like the weary souls splattered across chairs outside the waiting room, I’d be groping in the dark and be on tenterhooks. 

The problem with the practical medicine that exists in hospitals outside the books of Gawande, Nuland and Porter is that they don’t understand the nuances of what it means to be human. It lives instead in a cloistered world seeped in arrogance.

The other problem with contemporary medicine—and by that I mean allopathy—is that it exists in silos. There are neurologists, cardiologists, urologists, pathologists, pharmacologists and so on and so forth. Each of them has a microscopic understanding of the microcosm they work on in the human body.

A good general practitioner (GP) with a holistic view is practically impossible to come by. Contemporary allopathy has, for all practical purposes, killed the GP. Philosophically, Ayurveda espouses the idea of holistic medicine. But it is hopelessly outdated. In times of crisis, it is not a science that can be relied on. The way it is now, it is but a body of ancient texts that practitioners turn to. As for homeopathy, anybody who thinks it a science ought to be an idiot. How am I to take any system that believes in the placebo effect seriously?

Where does this leave us when faced with a crisis but to turn to a splintered system like allopathy? For all of its frailties, at the end of the day, it has done more to extend our life spans than any other system. 

Now, if only it could temper the arrogance its practitioners come with! 

*****

Dad thought it only appropriate he marry my mum when he first set his eyes on her. He was 22. She was 20. Her old man, my grandfather, was scandalized in what was then a very traditional Malayali society. He tried to talk the young man out of it. But dad firmly declined. She was his first girlfriend. He was her first boyfriend. They’ve been married 45 years now. Neither will eat a meal without the other. Nor will they end the day without having reported to each other all of what they did during the day.

I always thought this an old-world relationship that is pretty much impossible to sustain in the world we live in now. I’ve had conversations in the past with friends who practise psychology. Their hypothesis is easy to comprehend.

We live terribly busy lives. Not all of our needs can be satisfied by one individual. So, in theory, it is not just probable, but okay to seek multiple partners so that all of our needs are satisfied. To that extent, I am told many practising psychologists believe adultery is kosher—and that over time, the mainstream will come to accept it.

During one of my long walks with dad, I asked him what he thought of the hypothesis. He laughed gently, as is his wont. “Your mother meets all of my needs," he told me then. “I haven’t looked at another woman, ever."

“You won’t understand how we love," mum once told me. 

That is why, even as his sedated mind now groans out for her, she watches stoically from the other side of the glass door. There is nothing she can do but hold his hand in the brief moments they allow her to.

A wall of silence separates mum from both of her sons. Her front is brave. But deep down, I guess she needs to talk to somebody. But that somebody lies in a mist. What will happen of their 45-year-old love story if he isn’t around? What will happen of her if he isn’t around to pamper and drive her around? I don’t know.

I wish that I knew how to love like he loved—the good, old-fashioned way—devoid of all pretences.

He tried his damndest best to teach us that through Amar Chitra Katha so we understood how to love our spouses in much the same way that Satyavan did Savitri, so that when Yama, the god of death, comes calling, death can be cheated. 

As I wind these dispatches up, I wait and watch quietly, hoping Satyavan will indeed wake up from the deep sleep he is in now, beat the odds that Yama has placed on him, and walk back home to the Savitri he loves so much.

“We’ll keep him under observation for 48 hours," I’m told again and am jolted back to reality.

This piece was first published in Mint on Sunday on May 30 2015

Dear younger self...

Dear 16-year old self,

At 47, I have no pretensions of being a wise man. Because as Hunter S. Thompson, that godfather of gonzo journalism, whom I worship, wrote so eloquently: “To give advice to a man who asks what to do with his life implies something very close to egomania. To presume to point a man to the right and ultimate goal—to point with a trembling finger in the right direction—is something only a fool would take upon himself."

That said, I couldn’t help but think of what my friend Dr. Rajat Chauhan keeps articulating in so many different ways. The other day, for instance, he tweeted, “Failure is inevitable. It’s about having the persistence to beat the pulp out of failure."

It got my attention and I asked him to make a signed poster out of it that I may frame and keep in my room.

That is why I know what you feel right now. With the kind of scores you have managed in Class XII, you will never make it to medical school. I know you want to go there real bad. So, it’s okay to cry. And feel those tears running down your face. I want you to hurt. Not just hurt, but hurt real bad. I want you to embrace failure, make it your best friend, and learn from it.

That said, there are three instances I want you to particularly fail in as you grow up—love, friendships and work.

I understand I may sound ridiculous to you right now. But let’s face it.

That object of your affection whose hand you hold right now exists only in fairy tales. Even as she consoles you and tells you the both of you can carve a life out in some pretty corner of the world, don’t forget you are only 16, much like she is. Don’t hate me for saying this. What you are experiencing right now is puppy love. I am not suggesting here you ought not to experience it. Everybody ought to. But it won’t last. You know why?

Because right now you are in love with the idea of love. I wish I could explain that as eloquently as John Steinbeck, one of my favourite writers, did in a letter to his son:  “There are several kinds of love. One is a selfish, mean, grasping, egoistical thing, which uses love for self-importance. This is the ugly and crippling kind. The other is an outpouring of everything good in you—of kindness and consideration and respect—not only the social respect of manners but the greater respect which is recognition of another person as unique and valuable. The first kind can make you sick and small and weak but the second can release in you strength, and courage and goodness and even wisdom you didn’t know you had.”

It is a rare set of individuals who find the second kind of love when they are as young as you are.

So, I want you to go out there and get your heart broken a few times, until you find that somebody who can extract goodness out of you—of your own free will. Trust me, the road to finding this kind of love is a painful one. It is inevitable the one whose hand you are clinging to now will move on as will you. It is also inevitable you will find true love. But brace yourself for heartbreak on the way to it.

Because, as David Whyte writes in Consolations, “Heartbreak is how we mature; yet we use the word heartbreak as if it only occurs when things have gone wrong: an unrequited love, a shattered dream… But heartbreak may be the very essence of being human, of being on the journey from here to there, and of coming to care deeply for what we find along the way…. There is almost no path a human being can follow that does not lead to heartbreak.”

And when you do find love, respect it and cling to it.

Much the same can be said of friendships. It is a myth that deep and meaningful relationships are forged in your formative years. The fact is, over time, you outgrow them. The friends you have in your teens are very different from the ones you have in your 20s, 30s and 40s. As you search for meaning, with every decade, you will morph into a different animal and will seek bonds that fit the animal you are then.

By way of example, I can think of this gentleman I met the other day, now in his 60s. There was nostalgia and tears in his eyes as he reminisced about his friend from 40 years ago who sought him out for counsel every other day. Time changed things between them. His friend has gone on to larger things and doesn’t need his counsel any more. His attention has turned instead to others with a larger perspective whom he looks upon with awe and seeks out.

I understand the tears and the nostalgia. But they are rooted in the past. You swear now by friends who roar to Metallica and Guns N’ Roses. But trust me . When you discover the pleasures of Paul Simon, the serenity of Beethoven and the comfort good single malts offers over Old Monk rum, you will wonder how you air-guitared at alcohol-soaked, pot-filled concerts all night long.

And while I am at that, another word of advice from a now world-weary man—never, never touch a cigarette a friend offers. It may seem cool and you may look like a wimp if you decline. But the real wimps are the ones who smoke. I know. I’m still paying the price for having indulged in it.

When it comes to work, there is this tussle you will be engaged in. Allow me to assure you once again, like most people, you are destined to fail if you don’t give yourself the room to think through and introspect. Who do you want to be? What is your calling? What are your priorities?

But the exigencies, such as money, that life imposes will push you towards a path often trod by most people. Like I did when looking for a job. Entrepreneurship wasn’t my calling. It was an accident. That it turned out to be a lucky accident and eventually my calling is an altogether different matter. It is entirely possible, though, that you may not get as lucky. That is why I want you to dwell on this passage from The Road to Character by David Brooks.

“I’ve been thinking about the difference between the résumé virtues and the eulogy virtues. The résumé virtues are the ones you list on your résumé, the skills that you bring to the job market and that contribute to external success. The eulogy virtues are deeper. They’re the virtues that get talked about at your funeral, the ones that exist at the core of your being—whether you are kind, brave, honest or faithful; what kind of relationships you formed.

“Most of us would say that the eulogy virtues are more important than the résumé virtues, but I confess that for long stretches of my life I’ve spent more time thinking about the latter than the former. Our education system is certainly oriented around the résumé virtues more than the eulogy ones. Public conversation is, too—the self-help tips in magazines, the non-fiction bestsellers. Most of us have clearer strategies for how to achieve career success than we do for how to develop a profound character."

My final submission to you is, the earlier you can think of a eulogy to yourself, distanced from the exigencies of life I spoke of earlier, the better off you will be for it.

Much love,

Your 47-year-old future self

Trust is just a metric

For all practical purposes I was the oddball on the table the other evening at a plush city hotel. To start with, I was the only Indian citizen. Everybody else was a foreign citizen of Indian origin. 

Everyone was sipping on single malt and looked superbly fit. I looked sloppy in my ill-fitting jeans with a potbelly struggling to peek out. Then there was the fact that everybody else had earned their degree from an Ivy league college in the US. Following which all of them had put in at least a decade at a hedge fund or large private equity firm of global consequence in either New York City or Silicon Valley. To my native eyes, all of them looked well-read, well-travelled, well-versed and well-off.

I’m not entirely sure if I was of any consequence to them. Because when asked what is it I do and when told I expend most of my time writing to earn a living—in the silent pauses that followed—I could hear them hold on to pregnant thoughts. But they were the polite kinds who bit their tongue. 

The more forthright ones have told me in the past what they really think of the likes of me. That in their scheme of things, I am among those who got disrupted by businesses people like them have funded. Anybody in the world now with a story or an opinion can voice it on places like Facebook and Twitter among other social media platforms. And that I have no reason to exist. I ought to reinvent myself. I don’t argue anymore, but have learnt to meet these silences with silence.

But this much I must say. My silences are arrogant too. Because their “coming back to India" spiels now sound like clichéd and regurgitated tripe to veterans like me. I’ve heard that one often. 

The story is a familiar one. Been there, done that (either on Wall Street or Silicon Valley), back packed through Europe, and in a moment of epiphany decided it is now time to “give back" to society. What better place to start from than the ones our parents originated from after having left it decades ago in search for a better tomorrow for themselves and their children? 

To be fair to them though, their parents earned their success the hard way. And to be fair to everyone on the table, they had worked their backsides off to get into premier organizations and positions. There is nothing I can say that can take away from that this was an incredibly intelligent bunch of people I was with.

But that said, the irony was difficult to miss as well. How can you possibly sit at one of the fanciest hotels in India, sip all night on the most expensive single malts, nibble at exquisite finger food, talk of doing something for the deprived, and not as much as cast an eye at the waiter on the table? 

I didn’t stay until everyone wound up for the night. But I suspect whatever was run up by way expenses on food and beverages may perhaps have fed two waiters and their families for at least a month. What may have been playing on their minds? Would they have thought of this as an orgy of obscene consumption? 

The thought lingered for a few days until I finally felt compelled to call Haresh Chawla, who is a partner at private equity firm True North and an active angel investor. I have known him from his earlier avatar as group CEO at Network18, a media firm he helped create, and a place I used to work in the past. There were a few reasons I called him. 

The first was that he graduated in management and engineering. But unlike those at that table, his degrees were rooted from institutions in India. The second was that before turning into an investor, he was moulded as an entrepreneur who had first-hand experience at building an enterprise in India out of India. The third is that he is now an active investor. 

What is his investing philosophy? What was I missing out from on the conversation? Why was my voice both unheard and dissed on the table? Why are the two decades I spent documenting first-hand how India operates not of any consequence to the others who have parachuted from elsewhere? Are their experiences superior to mine?

After having heard me out, Chawla reminded me of some thoughts he had articulated earlier last year and over which we have had multiple conversations. He had then suggested that it is naive to think of India as one country. Instead, he argued it is the aggregation of three countries — each of which has its own complexities and dynamics. He called these countries India One, India Two and India Three

Of this, India One comprises anywhere between 150 million and 180 million people and on average, each of its citizens earn Rs30,000 a month. Now, you have to look at those numbers in perspective because this is an average. 

I am a citizen of Indian One. But I earn a lot more than Rs.30,000 a month. It allows me the luxury to afford domestic help at home and a driver to ferry me around. But the conflict I was staring at, Chawla suggested, was because when looked at from the eyes of those who were with me on the table, I appeared to them as part of the so-called great Indian “middle-class". 

I have only one driver and a domestic help. They have multiple helps and multiple drivers and multiple cars to cater to their every need. In the country called India One that they live in, the poor to them are those whose incomes are closer to the average of Rs.30,000. 

Now that is a rather ridiculous way of looking at the entity that is India because there is no taking away from that 30%, or 400-odd million Indians, earn on average of Rs7,000 a month. This is India Two—that part of the population where the waiters tending to the table come from. They offer all the services that India One needs. But for some reason, those who live in India One cannot see the people who live in the country that is India Two. 

Just to get a sense of what those numbers mean, imagine this: If we were to add all the people in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal, they would be about 400 million. But we aren’t done with the math yet. India has 1.3 billion people. 

India One and India Two account for only 580 million people. What about the 700 million others? Where are they? Who are they? Why is it that their stories don’t get told? Why are they completely invisible and don’t even make it as waiters who tend to the tables of India One? 

Why do the superbly intelligent people who want to do good and live in India One not see those who live the countries that are India Two and India Three? Is it for a lack of conscience? 

It was inevitable then that my mind go back to a well-documented phenomenon called Wilful Blindness. It formed the theme of a much-acclaimed book and a talk by Margaret Hefernan.

Maria Popova, the curator of a lovely blog called Brain Pickings, summarized the idea beautifully: 

“The concept of Wilful Blindness, Heffernan explains, comes from the law and originates from legislature passed in the 19th century—it’s the somewhat counterintuitive idea that you’re responsible if you could have known, and should have known, something that instead you strove not to see. What’s most uneasy-making about the concept is the implication that it doesn’t matter whether the avoidance of truth is conscious. This basic mechanism of keeping ourselves in the dark, Heffernan argues, plays out in just about every aspect of life, but there are things we can do — as individuals, organizations, and nations—to lift our blinders before we walk into perilous situations that later produce the inevitable exclamation: How could I have been so blind?"

This is a school of thought Chawla subscribes to as well. That is why, as a thumb rule, he said, he consciously tries to stay away from those who are like him. Instead, he tries to seek out those who may hold views different from his and have their ears to the ground. 

“I like people like you in the media business," he said, “because you talk to multiple sets of people and have your ears to the ground." 

I didn’t quite get what he meant then and we hung up. In any case, it was getting late and the both of us thought we’d get into angst-ridden territory.

The next morning, it was inevitable my eyes peer again at voices on social media platforms. It sounded much the same again like it was on the table. Every voice suggested people in politics and media ought to be worried. Because they are no longer the arbitrators of power. 

In the past, they wielded it because there was information asymmetry. But because that asymmetry has since been demolished, I ought to rethink my future. And so, by the only metric we know how to measure the worth of a man—money—I am staring at a bankrupt future. Unless I reinvent myself.

Even as I was thinking around the import of all that, news trickled in that the British philosopher Onora O’Neill has been conferred the prestigious Berguren Prize. It is awarded annually to a thinker whose ideas have shaped self-understanding and advancement in a rapidly changing world. 

It was as good a time as any to revisit a talk by O’Neill on what we don’t understand about trust. This is a theme she has spent a good part of her 76-year-long life thinking and writing about. Allow me to quote some excerpts from her lovely 10-minute talk.

“Why do people think trust has declined? ... But, of course, I can look at the opinion polls, and the opinion polls are supposedly the source of a belief that trust has declined. When you look at opinion polls across time, there’s not much evidence for that. That’s to say, the people who were mistrusted 20 years ago, principally journalists and politicians, are still mistrusted...

“But is that good evidence? What opinion polls record is, of course, opinions. What else can they record? So, they’re looking at the generic attitudes that people report when you ask them certain questions."

She goes on then to suggest that searching for trust is futile. Instead, we ought to search for the trustworthy. Because while somebody have the right intent, it is entirely possible that individual may be incompetent to perform the task on hand. 

By way of example, while you may trust a schoolteacher with your child, it would be rather stupid to trust her with tending to a garden. She may be incompetent to deal with the task in much the same way that a gardener may be unable to teach a child. 

Therefore, she argues, “… I think that judgement requires us to look at three things. Are they competent? Are they honest? Are they reliable? And if we find that a person is competent in the relevant matters, and reliable and honest, we’ll have a pretty good reason to trust them, because they’ll be trustworthy... Trust is the response. Trustworthiness is what we have to judge. And, of course, it’s difficult."

I expended much time thinking about the import of what she said and exchanged some more notes with Haresh Chawla. As things are, this is where I stand.

• While everybody has an opinion and access to a platform, are their voices trustworthy? I’ve expended more than two decades in this business talking to people, honing my craft and trying to keep pace with technology as it evolves. So yes, everybody can voice their opinion. But ceterius paribus, I think my voice, much like that of others who are credible in the business, will continue to resonate. I also know that in keeping with the natural order of the universe, at some point in time, I will have to concede ground to those who are younger, smarter and hungrier than me. But I will not have to concede ground to uninformed voices and opinions. To that extent, my daily bread is protected.

• Pardon my language here. But spending as much time in the business has honed my bullshit detector as well. That is why I did not articulate my opinion in exasperation. Instead, it chose to distance itself from the voices on the table and seek perspective.

  Chawla tells me I did that because I live at an intersection that seeks to listen to multiple voices as opposed to listen in to what resides in an echo chamber. If I were to go by the opinions of those on the table and if I were tuned in only to popular trends on social media, I may have imagined I am out of sync with what is the consensus opinion. 

  But after having listened in to multiple voices and seeking out the trustworthy, I am now convinced of what Bertrand Russell once said: “The fact that an opinion is widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd."

  So, for whatever it is worth, folks like me aren’t going to fade into obscurity. Unless we do something stupid to erode trust built over the years. 

  On the contrary, we will continue to shape the narrative. Because trust is worked upon and earned every day. And it grows, like compound interest. It is something money cannot buy, but is earned by the sweat of the brow, not through trading opportunities, arbitrages hedging on futures, commodities, currencies or passing ridiculous opinions on social media that sound good in echo chambers. 

This article was first published in Mint on Sunday