A branch from the blue

 

I am a prolific note taker. On that day, at that time, I asked myself  “how is ‘note taking’ helping you to ‘take note’ of your situation?”

It was tipped as the “Bheja Fry” date with the group in Talk Temple called TILT – The India Leaders Think-Tank. We had just completed a wonderful 4 hours plus book review session at the TILT forum. It was not just a book review like part 1 on the Code of The Extraordinary Mind. The content we generated in 3 hours was beyond my expectation – mind boggling to say the least.

I was waiting for the Uber driver around 4 PM. On the app I saw that he was 2 minutes away. After 2 mins I saw that he was 8 mins away. ANT’s had already taken over and I was getting irritated at the driver. Coming fresh out of the meeting, I remembered that our subconscious mind takes only 0.3 seconds to get us and hence always be aware of what you are thinking.

Suddenly from no where I was hit on the head by a branch from a tree! 

At that moment I had a choice to blame the Uber Driver and question why I stood beneath the tree. BUT wait … Did I have another choice?.

In those four hours we had spoken a lot on positivity. We have to be like the seed till it becomes a large tree. We should be like the banyan tree for others in life. In fact I even praised a large tree in front of the building (check the picture). There were also references of the years of tree by seeing the inner rings of the tree once it is cut. I wanted to leverage the learning from the past 4 hours. In an instant I rubbed my head and took some head selfies in the car just to make sure that there were no swellings and spots!

Each time the driver shifted gears I changed my thoughts to what I should do. A key takeaway from the session was to collaborate with people and reach out to people for help and support and If you are not growing others you are not growing yourself . I had received a message from an acquaintance who wanted some tips on blogging. I decided to call him and explain. The shift of this gratitude helped me to overcome that “hit episode” which otherwise could have spiraled into a negative loop.

We had learned in the last few hours “How to hack yourself”and I was happy that I was doing just that after that branch hit my head.

The mind is an excellent servant but a terrible master. In any given situation our subconscious takes over in 0.3 seconds before the conscious brain is even aware of it. Later that week i heard this nice line  to shift your vocabulary from “I have no problems, I’ve only puzzles. What we have to do is “mind hacking’ for that the formula is –  P and FO – Be Positive and Forward Oriented.

When you are faced with a situation are you a thermometer or a thermostat? Do you heat up when the heat is on or do you try to cool yourself down and you adjust your environment.