warikoo Wanderings

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TRAUMA IS REAL, BUT NOT PERMANENT

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When I first wrote about the book "Courage to be Disliked", I shared that the book centers itself on a very unpopular opinion:
There is nothing called trauma.

Not surprisingly, I got a lot of strong reactions from all of you around that.
Professional psychologists, who were upset I would say something like this.
Young adults, who had experienced trauma in their life, found my statement igniting those memories.

And I too believe that the book got most things right, but not this one.

I feel that trauma exists.

What happens to us as we are very young, affects us in meaningful ways. Unfortunately, also in uncertain ways.

Abuse, mental or physical, by relatives, or even parents.
Loss of someone close.
Being accidentally or intentionally abandoned.
Being scolded, punished, rebuked, bullied.

All of these do happen, and cannot be assumed to not exist.

So yes, trauma does exist.

BUT

I also believe that we have the power within ourselves to change the effect it has on us.

Early on, when we go through such events, we do not even know how to comprehend them.
We are way too young to figure what even happened to us.
And thus while it affects us in meaningful ways, it also affects us in uncertain ways.

So as we grow up, we begin to see the trauma manifest itself in our personality.
How we behave in relationships, how to treat others, how we treat our own selves.

And I think at that point, we have 2 choices to make

1. We attempt to unravel how what we went through affected us and what it has led us to
2. We make our trauma as excuse to continue with who we have become

Unfortunately, most of us make the 2nd choice.
Because we cannot explain how the trauma affected us, we attempt to make it the cause for our life.
Often, unknowingly.

The first choice, though harder, is one of the ways to deal with what happened to us.
The book does a commendable job, in my opinion, of explaining how.

If we stop to think of trauma as the cause and us as the effect, we might begin to think of trauma as the reason for us to change.

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YOU HAVE A JOB THAT YOU HATE

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In this week's podcast episode, I speak about an often asked question
"I am in a job that I hate. Should I quit?"
My answer is no!

To know why, listen to the episode.
Give it a listen on Spotify, Amazon Music, Google Podcast, Apple Podcast, JioSaavn or Gaana.

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BOOK I AM READING THIS WEEK

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This week I picked up a light book, which I am happy I picked.

​Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time​

A student of my time management course suggested I should read it, so that I can incorporate the lessons from this book in the course. Not only did I like the book (and the simplicity of it), I will actually incorporate the key lessons in an update to the course.

This will definitely be one of the best Rs. 172 you will spend :)

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QUOTES TO SHARE

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The biggest lie sold to us is that there is a deadline to achieve things in life.
​(Share on Twitter)​

Think of yourself as a student, in front of those who you follow. Think of yourself as a teacher, in front of those who follow you.
​(Share on Twitter)​

You are in the wrong relationship if it is your responsibility to keep the other person happy.
​(Share on Twitter)​

Money buys freedom. Freedom is a privilege.
​(Share on Twitter)​

A manager builds a team where it's obvious to figure who the manager is.
A leader builds a team where it’s hard to figure who the leader is.
​(Share on Twitter)​

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RESPONSES TO LAST WEEK'S QUESTION

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Last week I asked you:

If all of the following courses were for 3 hours each (pre-recorded) plus 1 hour live Q&A every month (for 6 months), how much would you pay for each of these courses?

1. How to manage your personal finances?
2. How to manage your career?
3. How to manage your relationships?
4. How to manage your time?
5. How to lead a mentally and physically healthy life?

The intention was NOT to determine the pricing for my new courses :)

It was to figure which of these 5 aspects of life do we ascribe more value to, according to age bands.

Here are the results

Here are my observations:

The table shows the median (not the average) of the responses, for each age band.

1. For each age row, I have highlighted in Yellow the highest price they are willing to pay, which shows me what is most important according to that age band
2. For less than 18, it is (surprisingly) healthy life. Could be a result of the pandemic, where WFH/Online has resulted in a lot of burnout for this age group
3. For 18-22, it is career and time - which makes sense
4. For 23-30, it becomes money, which is same for 31-40 as well, though healthy life gets added
5. For 40+, it is healthy life. Baaki sab cheezein jaaye bhaad mein :))
6. Interestingly, the actual quantum does not change. So while the paying propensity of someone older will be a lot higher than those younger, the medians, show they are more or less the same. Which I found fascinating.
7. No one really thinks that managing relationships can be taught or are just as important as others.

Funny piece

There were so many of you, who listed the price as 101.
Yahaan par bhi shagun ka lifaafa? :)))

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THIS WEEK'S QUESTION

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What makes you most jealous of people?

1. They have more money than you
2. They are more good looking / fitter than you
3. They are usually happy in life
4. They are professionally more successful than you
5. They are in happy relationships

I know the right answer is ALL OF THE ABOVE, but if you had to pick the most important one, which one would it be?

​Click here to let me know your answer (anonymously)​

You can of course always write to me, by simply replying to this newsletter. I love reading all your emails, even though I may not be able to reply to them all.
Yes! I READ ALL MY EMAILS. ALL OF THEM.
​(Gulzar ke khoobsoorat lyrics ki kasam!)

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