Known

Paradox of the Known

~ Rishi ~ Leave a comment

We all know our race is evolving faster than ever. And we are all riding along the wave.

And yet, some of us feel we are on top while some of us feel the exact opposite.

Over the last couple of weeks, as I jostled with a new subject that I am studying, I found myself in this paradox. Between the unknown and the known.

I don’t have as much knowledge of this new subject, so it is of course an unknown. And I know I will have to build my know-how and expertise in it through my own efforts.

As I started studying the subject and its basics, it became evident to me that I could increase my pace of learning by using AI tools.

With these tools, we don’t just have all the information at our fingertips but also efficient ways of harnessing it.

So, the reasoning was that these tools will help me learn rapidly, improving my knowledge base. And help me identify best approaches and strategies to decide between two different things.

It will cut down on my unknown areas quickly.

But when I started using these tools, I realised that while my know-how started improving quickly, I was scratching the surface.

I understood the basics faster, but this knowledge gathering only equipped me so much. I still didn’t have the required depth to decide on which choice to make or didn’t develop an independent point of view on some of the aspects I was studying.

Then, I looked back at my life and it became apparent that this is how things have been all this time…

All through our life, we have learnt much more and in a shorter timeframe than before. We have more information available to us, and so we are generally better informed about things.

Yet, unless we have spent time on a subject matter and have gone through the grind to build our point of view, we haven’t succeeded in that particular endeavour.

And unless we have done that, we didn’t become an expert on the subject.

So, while we continue to have easy access to information, for the unknown to become well known, we still need to put in the time and effort!

And that’s the paradox of knowing our unknowns today and yet being aware of how to convert them to “known-knowns”.

Capacity or Constraint

~ Rishi ~ Leave a comment

It seems like a long time ago. The year was 2002 and I was lodged in the Military Hospital (MH), Pune.

I had an injury in my cervical spine and was admitted and then transferred to MH Pune for treatment, as it was known for doctors specializing in orthopedics. There were quite a lot of us in that hospital then. Cadets from the National Defence Academy, Indian Military Academy, commissioned officers from different regiments and corps, non-commissioned officers from all ranks. Everyone who had some complication with any of their bones or joints inevitably landed up there.

With my robotic neck movement (it had been reduced severely due to the injury), I made some good friends within that circle. We used to have a lot of fun talking to each other, hearing stories, reading books, playing cards, and so on. What else could we do being in a hospital, all alone with only each other to take care for.

Apart from the many things we did in those days, I distinctly remember one observation. There were a lot of repeaters among us – people admitted repeatedly for the same injury/dislocation/fracture. We were looked upon with amusement by some others. But the thing to note was, many of those whom I met with such repetitive injury occurrences had one thing in common. They had all got used to living with their injuries.

For some it was shoulder dislocation or wrist or elbow dislocation. They would come into the hospital, get their treatment, get their joint back in shape, and go back. A couple of particular cases, which were very severe, had reached a point where the person could himself reset his wrist / shoulder and put the dislocated joint back into the socket…

Howsoever these people, including me, had got used to our often repetitive nature of injury/pain, it was viewed by us (and I am sure by others) as increased personal capacity to bear/handle/live with pain, but also as a constraint that limited our options within the armed forces.

While after a few such occurrences and the non-healing nature of my cervical spine injury led to I moving out on medical grounds, some of them I am sure continued and served out their full terms. What must not have changed though is the capacity vs. constraint dichotomy, which exists at least in my mind.

As I reflected on these thoughts in one of my quieter moments this week, I realized that there are other aspects in our life that place us in this dichotomy. There are many things that we have a great capacity for but some of them also constrain us.

High capacity to do the best in everything and achieve perfection constrains us from moving fast and breaking things. Or having the capacity to work well with everyone constrains us to sometimes not be our authentic self. Or capacity to assimilate knowledge and process it quickly at times constrains us from accepting the viewpoint that others may have.

Similar is the case with organizations. Capacity to endure mediocrity constrains output. Or capacity to do multiple things constrains focus on those streams which could transform the landscape. Or capacity to continuously succeed at any costs constrains the culture and how people feel about each other and their work.

The bottomline – as we move ahead in life, some of the capacities that we have developed also lead to constraints on other related aspects. We constantly live in such dichotomies and cannot escape them.

What we can do though and is important is to recognize which of those constraints are necessary to be removed. And then moving forward to remove them, even if it means developing a new understanding or unloading some of our capacities!