My Questions

Here are some questions I am trying to find answers for. I have had multiple conversations with a lot of intelligent people regarding these. While the conversations were very constructive, I still found myself without a convincing answer.

1. How to identify your passion?
2. How to take risks?
3. How to make friends?
4. How to deal with your problems?
5. How to become successful?

Biographies of popular and successful people offer a lot of feel good stories and some are even made into movies. They give a good account of situations that worked and didn’t work for the characters in the story. Of all the people (approximately 1000,000,000,000) who has ever lived on this planet, no single case study came out that could be used as a blue print for all situations in life.

I think every situation is unique and there are no set frameworks that can be used for each situation. Ultimately, we are responsible for who we are, what we do and where we are. If you are not happy about the situation do something about it. Sit down, decide where you want to go or what you want to do, and figure out how to get there step-by-step. It is that simple!

What are some of the questions you are trying to get an answer for? Please share your thoughts.

You are an Expert

Find your area of passion and expertise. I enjoy asking questions, not to test one’s cognitive ability but to learn and have a meaningful conversation. It is amazing what you can learn by asking right questions. I believe every person is an expert in something. Everybody knows something only 20% of the world’s knows (if can take the liberty to use Vilfredo Alfredo’s principle), which makes that person an expert in that area. It is not easy to figure out your area of expertise. I am not talking about your profession. A lot of people can do what you do as a part of your daily job. I am talking about your favorite pastimes. They could be as simple as watching movies or as complex as studying birds’ flight. People who focus on their passion will be more successful than the people who are out to make money as their primary goal. For Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos making billions was not a primary goal. They pursued their passion for technology and science to the best of their ability, money and success were by products.

Over a period of time people tend to develop skills and knowledge in the areas they are passionate about. This happens subconsciously. After doing daily work, people tend to gravitate towards learning things where they have fun. When we are about to make decisions regarding a purchase, business or a relationship we tend to find a person in our friends list whose opinion is respected in that particular area. Look around, you can probably help your friend to unearth his/her innate ability.

What stops us from doing what we really like to do? Financial requirements could be one reason. But there are much more compelling reasons that stop us from taking that plunge into the area of our interest. Resistance to change and fear of others opinions effect the decisions we make. In a research, Feirong Yuan of the University of Kansas and Richard Woodman of Texas A&M found that worries about image risk significantly diminish employees’ innovativeness at workplace. I think we can apply this theory to the behavior of general population in any social setting.

Replicating the skills of any professional is very easy. There are specific set of frameworks to train engineers, doctors, rocket scientists (seriously)etc. It is very difficult to train people to be passionate as it comes from intrinsic motivation. Spend sometime and figure out what you really like to do. You may very likely have that rare insight into a certain area which can be shared with the society.

Please share your thoughts and comments. I am looking forward to see your feedback.