Zero Is The New Hero

Urssila Sumant
Assistant Professor, AISSMS IOM

Recently I read a news that “A dead body of a beggar was found in his hut along with millions of rupees. I wondered, what was the use of such wealth? But then at least he was rich when he died! Wasn’t he? The next moment a thought crossed my mind, is this what is really called rich? I started thinking about money, respect, social responsibilities and so on.

As a matter of fact, the middle class people are actually the poorest. Because we have to follow the rules of the society being a part of it. For example “Get good marks and become a doctor or a engineer, and then your next life will be easy.”

We tend to spend our entire childhood and youth on the same mission about which sometimes we are unaware of. With the fear of losing or that we will remain behind in the race, we take up a job and continue to earn a living, at an average  salary, to sustain in the society. The circle of life begins- getting married, having kids, buying a new house, getting a new car, branded clothes, and with all this the ghost of Amy takes on us forever, but unfortunately  we do not want to change or go the unconventional way  because we have been watching this for generations. Will we not learn it? We definitely will, someone has rightly said “Seeing is believing”

But no one has ever told us what life should actually be! From  my experience, I say that we can learn and unlearn few things for our own good. My experiences have made me believe that there main deroflifes hould always be zero, for which some  calculations are to be done.

Young generation is now standing at two opposite poles , for one it does not matter about the result or the future and the other will do whatever it takes to get what they want. The latter may be a positive way of looking at it but the ways of achieving it may not always be ethical.

I always ask this question, in my introductory class, why MBA? What are your futures plans? Is there anyone who knows how to achieve those ? 90 percent of the kids don’t know the answer. When   I thought about it, I realised that the parents do not have the time to tell their children about what can their goal or passion be, or   what is good and bad food for the mind. At times it is due to the societal pressure as well.

What could be the solution to this problem ? How can we teach our next generations about ethics, management, empathy and   maturity ?

The answer is self help books in addition to the educational books.

One can say this not news, we know this from decades.

According to my observations, when I teach Emotional Intelligence, students are well aware about their behaviour, strengths & weaknesses. They know their strong points, areas of improvement but are unable to use them to their benefit.

We must encourage the students to read books that feed good thoughts to our mind. This may help them to solve most of their problems. It would help them improve their personality and give them a better perspective towards life.

Going back to where all the thinking began, the beggar who had been a beggar all his life did not carry anything with him after death nor did he pass that wealth to someone needy. Can he  called rich?  Wealth is not the only parameter to define richness. One enters the world with empty hands and leaves this place empty handed. All those additions, subtractions that you do during the lifetime makes you rich in true sense. Such a positive perspective can be obtained with the help of such self help books.

 I believe that one must return back all that he has received, to everyone who has been a part of his journey called life. One must give back the love, respect, security, happiness that it recieves from those kind heart edsouls. Give almsto then eedy, return back what ever belongs to the others and keep nothing that does not belong to you. Learn the language of gift.

At the end of the division don’t lose heart my friend even if the remainder is zero, you will still be rich ! The New Hero!!!!!!!