Prompt and instant

Recently, during a book-reading session with my friends, I came across a line which asked, 'How long is your response to stimulus?' The stimulus can be anything that's external or internal. How fast we are in answering the stimulus determines our speed of action. The world is delighted with prompt and instant replies and actions. The slightest delay that we do in our prompt responses results in sowing seed to a disease called procrastination.

 

The general perception of people about others is that people are lazy. Each one has his own set of problems which seem much bigger than that of others. Amidst the chaos that one is going through, it's generally tough to be alert all the times when there is an external calling. It might not just be the problems, even the to-do list of a person might be too long to cater to someone else's calls. Unfortunately, the outside world is completely unaware of the problems that we are entangled in or the tasks that we are entitled to fulfill our duties to. When opportunities knock our doors in the form of others, if we are not prompt in answering them, they move on to the next door without waiting for us. Hence problems or our work can never stand as a reason for not responding promptly to others' requests. On the other hand, if we are prompt in responding to an external request or call or an order, we are respected for our quick responses and opportunities shall follow later.

 

Prompt response does not mean that one has to leave all the tasks at hand and start answering the external request. If each one left their work to fulfill what others ask for, then not even a single work will be completed. Prompt response only means to answer the incoming query and providing a suitable action plan for the same. Once a prompt response is given and an action plan is stated and decided upon for a task, it enters the to-do list of the person and should be done as and when required. However, work will happen only when our responses are instant and prompt.

 

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Responses differ at times

The most unpredictable thing on this earth is the mood of a person. You might have experienced it many times that the same friend of yours reacts in different ways for the same thing at different times. The reason is the change in mood of your friend. The teacher comes to class and scolds even the best student for no reason while the same teacher on some other day is cool with the antics of the students. Once again the mood of the teacher was responsible for this contradictory behaviour.

 

Incidents on a daily basis keep influencing our moods and emotions. The worst part is that they carry their impact on other things that later enter the daily schedule of a person. As a result, the other things face a response which is a carry-over from the earlier experience. It so happens that we are not aware about what kind of a situation that a person has undergone before we go up to him/her to share our thoughts. At such times, the imagination of the response of the person in our mind is much different that that happens in the real scenario. At such times we make a general mistake that we conclude about the character or the attitude of the person which is not completely right. All of us are humans and not hard stones. As a result our moods are bound to swing with varied experiences across a day. So, whenever the response from a person is different from what we expected because of the wrong mood, instead of getting disappointed we should give some time or soothening words to the person to come back to the normal state and then re-narrate our words.

 

Not just humans, even non-living things respond differently under different circumstances. A very simple example is that of an iron rod which gets bent very easily when heated but is strong as a rock when cold and unbreakable. Understand the situation of a person before evaluating his/her response or attitude. You can feel free to share your feedback on is.mohanbn@gmail.com
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Empathy - an art to learn

Can you feel the same what the other person can? It's a bit difficult. I can understand. Different people have different notions and hence different emotions regarding the same incident or circumstance. However the best relationships are between people who can share and emote the same level of feelings and emotions. When water is flowing it can always flow through a level same as the previous one or at least below. It cannot rise against ascending levels except for high forces.

Let me relate the water flow example here to the levels of empathy. Empathy is all about putting oneself in the shoes of the other person and trying to feel what the other person felt. So if one can emote same level of emotions or deeper ones like that of the person who is sharing his/her experiences then sharing will continue. More the sharing, better the relationship. However if the person in front cannot feel what the other person is sharing then it feels just as a plain talk and hence the person might just stop sharing further if the person opposite cannot respond. Only in cases of extreme conditions the person might go on sharing irrespective of the opposite person's response. A single person cannot go through all the situations in this universe. We also have to remember that every situation has something to teach us. To learn and also to guide a person one must be able to feel the emotions with the same intensity as that of the other person and this is called perfect empathy.

The better a person can empathise with other people, the easier it becomes for others to share their feelings, emotions, thoughts and experiences with the person. Only when complete details are shared a good suggestion can be provided to make the situation better. People feel close to those who can understand and empathize with them better than others. So learn and master the art of empathy to have great relationships. Do let me know your views on is.mohanbn@gmail.com

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