After the lockdown…what is the one thing that you will do differently as an individual?
It could be
– reducing the consumption of one time use plastics
– continue to help with household chores
– buy more from local vendors etc etc..
The point is – are we going to do anything different after this experience or will we be back to our older ways and that too with vengeance.
So what is it that you will change in your lifestyle?
The Abilene Paradox refers to a situation when a group makes a collective decision that is counter to the thoughts and feelings of its individual members.
The Abilene Paradox was introduced by management thinker Jerry B. Harvey, Professor, Emeritus of Management at The George Washington University, in an article on the subject.
It occurs because human beings have a natural aversion to going against the feelings of a group – they want to conform socially. According to Harvey, the paradox may be driven because individuals believe they will experience negative attitudes or feelings if they ‘speak up’ on a topic. And if no one ‘speaks-up‘ then the group ends up making a decision that is quite opposite to the wishes and feelings of the group.
The below example illustrates this concept beautifully –
“On a hot afternoon visiting in Coleman, Texas, the family is comfortably playing dominoes on a porch, until the father-in-law suggests that they take a trip to Abilene [53 miles north] for dinner.
The wife says, “Sounds like a great idea.”
The husband, despite having reservations because the drive is long and hot, thinks that his preferences must be out-of-step with the group and says, “Sounds good to me. I just hope your mother wants to go.”
The mother-in-law then says, “Of course I want to go. I haven’t been to Abilene in a long time.”
The drive is hot, dusty, and long. When they arrive at the cafeteria, the food is as bad as the drive. They arrive back home four hours later, exhausted.
One of them dishonestly says, “It was a great trip, wasn’t it?”
The mother-in-law says that, actually, she would rather have stayed home, but went along since the other three were so enthusiastic.
The husband says, “I wasn’t delighted to be doing what we were doing. I only went to satisfy the rest of you.”
The wife says, “I just went along to keep you happy. I would have had to be crazy to want to go out in the heat like that.”
The father-in-law then says that he only suggested it because he thought the others might be bored.
The group sits back, perplexed that they together decided to take a trip which none of them wanted. They each would have preferred to sit comfortably, but did not admit to it when they still had time to enjoy the afternoon.
In groupthink theories, the Abilene paradox theory is used to illustrate that groups not only have problems managing disagreements, but that agreements may also be a problem in a poorly functioning group.
There are three things that leaders can do to avoid their teams being a victim of Abilene Paradox –
Do you want to share any of your examples?
Once upon a time, there lived a King who, despite his luxurious lifestyle, was not happy at all. One day, the King came upon a servant who was singing happily while he worked. This fascinated the King; Why was he, the Supreme Ruler of the Land, unhappy and gloomy, while a lowly servant had so much joy?
The King asked the servant, ‘Why are you so happy?’
The man replied, ‘Your Majesty, I am nothing but a servant. My family and I don’t need too much – just a roof over our heads and warm food to fill our tummies and your blessings.’
The king sought the advice of his most trusted advisor. After hearing the story, the advisor said, ‘Your Majesty, the servant has not yet joined “The 99 Club”.’
‘The 99 Club? And what is that?’ the King inquired.
The advisor replied, ‘To truly know what The 99 Club is, just place 99 Gold coins in a bag and leave it at this servant’s doorstep.’
When the servant saw the bag, he let out a great shout of joy…so many gold coins. He began to count them. After several counts, he was at last convinced that there were only 99 coins. He wondered, ‘What could’ve happened to that last gold coin? Surely, no one would leave 99 coins!’
He looked everywhere, but that final coin was elusive. Finally he decided that he was going to work harder than ever to earn that 100th gold coin.
From that day, the servant was a changed man. He was overworked, grumpy, and blamed his family for not helping him make that 100th gold coin. And he had stopped singing while he worked.
Witnessing this drastic transformation, the King was puzzled. The advisor said, ‘Your Majesty, the servant has now officially joined The 99 Club.’
He continued, ‘The 99 Club is a name given to those people who have enough to be happy but are never content, because they’re always wanting that extra 1, saying to themselves: “Let me get that one final thing and then I will be happy for life.”
We can be happy with very little in our lives, but the minute we’re given something bigger and better, we want more…and even more! We lose our sleep, our happiness, as the price for our growing needs and desires.
That’s “The 99 Club“…Zero Membership fee to enter, but you pay for it with your entire life !!!
Here are a few more (read my previous post on Bucket List here) experiences to add to your bucket list. Pick the ones that excite you –
1. Float in the Dead Sea
2. Sky Diving
3. Bungee Jumping
4. Visit the Nalanda University
5. Whitewater Rafting
6. Visit the Ram Setu
7. See the floating stones in Rameshwaram
8. Take a yatch ride in Dubai Creek
9. Walk on the Great Wall of China
10. Visit the Taj Mahal
11. Click the iconic pic in Maladives
12. Hot air balloon ride in Cappadocia
13. Take the Maid of the Mist ride at Niagara Falls
14. Watch the change of Guard @ Indo-Pak border
15. Try pushing the Krishna’s butter ball at Mahabalipuram
16. Walk thru the clouds at Cherrapunji
17. Smell the tulips in Kashmir
18. Snorkelling
19. Watch Coral Reefs
20. Walk the Strip, Las Vegas
21. Visit the Kumbh Mela
22. Trek to the Manasarovar
23. Watch the Kanchenjunga turn golden at Sunrise
24. Experience the luxury of a Cruise
25. Travel in a Limosine
26. Drive a Ferrari
27. Desert Safari
28. Visit the Chilka Lake
Do you have any other interesting ones to share?
I came across this poem by Kahlil Gibran on one of the social media posts and found it so very apt and timeless that I felt like sharing this with all via my Blog. When you read it, do so slowly and it will surely make you ponder and may be you will feel like reading it again and sharing it with your dear ones too. So reproducing the poem below.
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
“If—” is a poem by British Nobel laureate Rudyard Kipling, written in 1895. He wrote a number of children stories. The all time favourite “Jungle Book” was also written by Rudyard Kipling.
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Many hundreds of years ago in a small Indian village, a merchant had the misfortune of owing a large sum of money to the moneylender. The moneylender, who was old and ugly, fancied the merchant’s beautiful daughter – so he proposed a bargain. He said he would forgo the merchant’s debt if he could marry the daughter. Both the merchant and his daughter were horrified by the proposal.
So the cunning moneylender suggested that they let providence decide the matter. He told them that he would put a black pebble and a white pebble into an empty bag. The girl would then have to pick one pebble from the bag.
(1) If she picked the black pebble, she would become the moneylender’s wife and her father’s debt would be forgiven.
(2) If she picked the white pebble she need not marry him and her father’s debt would still be forgiven.
(3) But if she refused to pick a pebble, her father would be thrown into jail.
They were standing on a pebble strewn path in the merchant’s garden. As they talked, the moneylender bent over to pick up two pebbles. As he picked them up, the sharp-eyed girl noticed that he had picked up two black pebbles and put them into the bag. He then asked the girl to pick her pebble from the bag.
What would you have done if you were the girl?
If you had to advise her, what would you have told her?
Careful analysis would produce three possibilities:
1. The girl should refuse to take a pebble.
2. The girl should show that there were two black pebbles in the bag and expose the moneylender as a cheat.
3. The girl should pick a black pebble and sacrifice herself in order to save her father from his debt and imprisonment.
The above story is used with the hope that it will make us appreciate the difference between lateral and logical thinking.
Here is what the girl did…
The girl put her hand into the moneybag and drew out a pebble. Without looking at it, she fumbled and let it fall onto the pebble-strewn path where it immediately became lost among all the other pebbles.
“Oh, how clumsy of me,” she said. “But never mind, if you look into the bag for the one that is left, you will be able to tell which pebble I picked.” Since the remaining pebble is black, it must be assumed that she had picked the white one. And since the moneylender dared not admit his dishonesty, the girl changed what seemed an impossible situation into an advantageous one.
MORAL OF THE STORY: Most complex problems do have a solution, at times the solution is not so obvious and we need to think “Out of the Box”
There was a farmer who used to sell a pound of butter to the baker. One day the baker decided to weigh the butter to see if he was getting a pound and he found that he was not. This angered him and he took the farmer to court.
The judge asked the farmer if he was using any measure. The farmer replied, “Your Honor, I am primitive. I don’t have a proper measure, but I do have a scale.”
The judge asked, “Then how do you weigh the butter?”
The farmer replied “Your Honor, long before the baker started buying butter from me, I have been buying a pound loaf of bread from him. Every day when the baker brings the bread, I put it on the scale and give him the same weight in butter. If anyone is to be blamed, it is the baker.”
So what do we learn from this story?
We get back in life what we give to others. This is the principle of Karma.
Whenever you take an action, ask yourself this question: Am I giving a fair value for the wages or money I hope to make?
Honesty and dishonesty become a habit.
Some people practice dishonesty and can lie with a straight face. Others lie so much that they don’t even know what the truth is anymore.
But who are they deceiving? Themselves!
