We fanned those flames?

 

 

“Do you have job security?” One of my hi-bye friend asked me this question. Yes, today we engaged ourselves beyond hi and bye.

The easiest thing to ask these days (maybe till mid Jan) is “How was last year?” I had started by wishing him a happy new year and then as I was going to ask the question my HB friend asked “what new year? one more year gone.” Immediately, being a great self motivator, I was getting ready to offer him some wisdom, but I kept my control. While we were walking and talking, the conversation came to that point of Job security. He was really fanning the flames.

That day we had planned a mini school get-together. A friend was visiting Bangalore after many years. My true north for the day was meeting my school friends.

It was a good setting and as they say we are the average of the friends we hang around with. Our friendship is over 30 years old. So naturally the conversations went around our old flames. The discussions were about those bold guys (now bald) who had the guts to script those words and share and how they got beaten by the teachers. We contrasted those days with the current mileu. It was done with a pinch of salt as most of us have teenagers. The contrast did fan the flames of fathers who had daughters. I don’t remember what we ate as it turned out to be food for thoughts for parenting.

The most interesting conversations were around the way of life we are having today. One envied the other person for leading a self-actualizing life (I shared Maslow’s law and atleast one person knew it, else it would have been a damp squib). The enterprenerial hustle of one, Corporate skyrocketing of other and finally creating a startup , our different lives were all discussed. Then the discussion went into Artificial Intelligence and someone said that it is going to rock the world and our careers. The technology disruption discussions lingered for some time and it fanned flames in all of us.

My walking friend and my school friends, all touched upon job security and technology shift. I was drawing a correleation. If at all we need to have security in today’s world with job it has to be not on job security, it must be on skill mastery. The question that needs to be asked is, “I cannot expect job security. I want to build skill mastery, but will I be prepared to put that skill to use?”

How do we master our insecurities? How can we fan the flames of skill mastery and not job security?

I received a gift from my cousin this year which is a nice “Ok google” AI platform. My daughter was fascinated and loves to ask all kinds of questions to it. I am teaching “Ok google” like a child. It’s a work in progress with the device struggling to understand me and Indian situations. The best part which I heard from the device is that “It is difficult for me to understand now, but I am still learning.”

OK google gave me the answer. Be child like. As Naveen Jain says, “Don’t bother to take the horse to the water, instead make the horse thirsty.” In our case we must fan the flames with “Intellectual curiousity” and become a platform like OK Google to connect with the nearest wifi (which is our universe of friends, mentors, Internet resources and your areas of passion & interest) and keep pushing the limits. The only limit you have is the limit you set yourselves and you can fan the flames to become limitless in an unlimited world.