Business to the Buddha

Month: March 2013

  • Wealth and Wisdom

    Wealth is the abundance of valuable resources or material possessions. Wealth in itself is of no value, someone owning it gives “it” some “value”.  Similarly Wisdom (Hinduism) is considered a state of mind and soul where a person achieves salvation. Again here salvation is achieved by “someone”. So salvation may not be anything in itself, right? Once you achieve it there is no “self”, that is another side of it though.

    The definition of wealth (or for being wealthy) in my opinion is – when you have no more desire to earn more possession – when you have complete disinterest for money – you are wealthy. Because there is no end to earning. There may be a possibility that you are the wealthiest person on earth in the list of Forbes. You may not be interested to say “enough is enough!” I don’t need more money.

    http://media-cache-ec3.pinterest.com/originals/af/fa/97/affa97f31778a0e75cb506d1e38f0f95.jpg

    According to me one is wealthy – if one decides doing things because he/she enjoys doing the work and therefore does his/her work just for the hack of it. Say if I go to office with a motive of Salary at the end of the month, I am not wealthy. But if I do the same work because I enjoy doing it, feel self-satisfied and content. so the salary is not the desire but the fulfillment I achieve makes me wealthy. The later becomes reality with wisdom.

    What if wealth and wisdom meet? The age old approach of the west (wealth) meets the even older approach for life of the east (wisdom). I do not think the world would remain the same, this world would become wealthy and wise. Largely we would stop running for growth, to bailout countries and to make more money. This would be the world where the Business would meet the Buddha and people would do their work as their duty rather than compulsion.

    Definition source – Wikipedia

    Image source – Pinterest

  • 33 – Understanding change and change in understanding

    33 Understanding change and change in understanding is a book by Richard Saul Wurman. You know TED conferences? He created that. I want to write a lot of blogs (perhaps one for each page from the book).

    Professor Mankad gave this book to me, when I requested him for opinions on few of my blogs. The book is very interesting, I will read it again before giving back to him. Today I am referring to a chapter of the book – I am a zoo episode.

    The protagonist is astound at the arrogance of man. The author writes – “… they are just so proud of themselves in all their various religious books, the Bible, the Koran, the Book of the Dead, the Bhagavad Gita and many, many more.

    In every one of these tomes it was man this man that man, and besides the fact that it was men and women, the arrogance of thinking of ourselves as a single species just amazed the Commissioner…”

    “Bacteria, the Commissioner knew, subdivide and reproduce, in effect multiplying by division. The human body… …has many trillions of cells and 90% are bacteria!…”

    “I am a zoo, the commissioner said, Because that is what I am. It would be only religious arrogance to see myself as a single species.”

    I wonder if the author wanted to say zoo in terms of our thoughts too. We have so many so diverse thought that we are a zoo and a jungle within our mind too.

    We are much more than what we think we are. I was recently talking to my father and he suggested – “we are made of various tissues, tissues are made of cells and molecules and atoms and particles. Now each particle is in effect an energy packet. So we eventually are indestructible in that sense.”

    What we need to remember is – understanding the change helps in change in understanding!

  • Budget 2013 & rainwater harvesting

    I was on twitter when Budget speech was going on. I read investment in so many good projects and felt good about it. Suddenly realized – wait, should I objectively look at the expenditure? How are these expenditure be accounted for and use? What best use is possible of this money? Can we reduce some expenses by approaching a lot of things differently? Though I did not mean overlooking required support to common man, but still is there any alternative way? Is there any Jugad as we call in Hindi.

    My previous blog was on the plight of farmers in Maharashtra – Self respect. In Budget 2013 Drinking water and sanitation is allocated 15,000 Cr and watershed 5000 Cr. So, I connected these thoughts and remembered a discussion with my father last Sept when I went to Indore. We discussed that the area of Indore is about 500 square-KM. Each year Indore receives average of 39 inches of rainfall about 1 meter. Rainfall is calculated as based on a simple method – how much water would a container receive in the rains, if the container is kept open under the sky?

    If only 10% of this rainwater is harvested, how much would it be? This 10% is very least which can be done. Right now I can think of  this 10% as roof tops of private & public buildings, unused space under Govts possession e.g. polo ground (a place in Indore), University &  college grounds and say roads (with proper water canal diverting water to the harvesting area).

    Based on the definition of rainfall measurement if that 10% is the container, this container would be of a size of 10% of 500 square-KM

    Container size would be about 50 square-KM.

    This container can accumulate a whooping 50 square-KM water upto 1 meter height during the rains.

    Let me convert it into cubic meters – 50X 1000 X 1000 (Square meters) X 1 meter

    50,000,000 cubic meters of water!

    If it is assumed that population of Indore is 2,000,000 and each individual uses 40 cubic meter water per year, 63% of the water requirement (50,000,000/2,000,000X40) of Indore can be fulfilled by harvested rainwater itself. The surplus saved water (which otherwise required in Indore) can be used by farmers around Indore. What if that is done all over India? Government can save a lot of extravagant expense on  irrigation & drinking water schemes.

    Advantages –

    1. Budget money saved by water harvesting

    2. Life saved by reducing chances of drought

    3. Increased agriculture produce due to availability of water – addition to the GDP!

    I belong to a small district headquarter Dhar in MP. About a thousand years ago a King ruled Dhar – Raja Bhoj. It is said that during his tenure he made 12 lakes for water. All these lakes were connected to each other for collecting rainwater. If during rains one lake overflows, the water would flow to the other. This was 1000 years back. I wonder what are we doing now.

    Now watch this Ted talk for solution implemented even before Britishers came to rule India. There is hope, just Wake up and take action.

    [ted id=702]