Emotional Resilience

  Today, a close friend of mine expressed anguish at the following incident. Yesterday, he learnt of the death of his sister’s father-in-law. He was close to the deceased gentleman and they had spent many moments together solving crosswords and discussing other similar mysteries of life. He went over to his sister’s house and started […]

It is very difficult to share our feelings. We have been taught and conditioned to “keep a stiff upper lip” or as the Greek philosophers said – be a stoic. Sometimes we are afraid to share our feelings – people may think we are weak, or cry-babies. There may also be retaliation, or someone may […]

I know that I am supposed to do a particular activity like an assignment, or study a book or write letters. But I tend to postpone these indefinitely, citing various excuses. Charles Handy talks about 3 things that are required in the motivational calculus. I should know my needs. These can be the need for […]

For that matter, why do people do anything? De Becker talks about 4 things. Justification: we make a judgement that we have been wronged, hence we need to retaliate. If we think about it, we have justified each of our actions (or inaction). Sometimes we say it was necessary or unavoidable. Sometimes, we assume an […]

In medical emergencies, such as a large scale disaster, where need is more than the supply of resources, “triage” is a way of determining priorities. At the most primitive level it is: Those who are likely to live, regardless of what care they receive; Those who are likely to die, regardless of what care they […]

We join the MBA program with visions of “leading a team of dedicated professionals towards a pre-defined objective.” We hope to meet like-minded folks and pit our wits with them. We hope to meet professors who will reveal the arcane workings of the stock market, of marketing and of corporate strategy. We hope to discover […]

I see students alternating between extremes: depression and elation, weeks of procrastination and sudden bursts of frenetic energy, greed and contentment, love and hatred, ‘never’ and ‘always’. Since these swings are a function of time, they can be considered as emotional waves. The energy provided to a wave can be expended in two ways: laterally […]

  It can be said that we procrastinate because of the following reasons: We are not motivated We are afraid we can’t finish the task, or we will fail or we will have to repeat the success The task is not important enough We do not know how to do the task so do not […]

  I was talking to someone in my daughter’s generation about emotions and she mentioned that some of  her friends have sort of created a wall around themselves, because they have had failed relationships or been hurt emotionally, and they do not want to get hurt any more. This wall prevents them from having emotions. […]

Whenever we, as students, think that study or an assignment is burdensome, our minds go into overdrive how to avoid the work. The following rationalisation statements comes to mind It is of no use, in a job or in an interview. No one else is doing it. There are other pleasurable things to do. Not […]