Learning from others

There's a lot to learn from our own family and friends. Infact its best to observe and imbibe the good qualities we observe around ourselves, in our family and friends. Then be it someone who manages their time well , or a colleague who's always well turned out ,be it any occasion .. or just some quality we admire in a person which we would like to incorporate too. Let's start by learning something new from our friends and family. Here's a list of what I have learnt ... it keeps growing now as I find something new to learn from every individual I meet..

1. One of my ex-bosses' used to always address people by their first names... be it the liftman or the peon... or the Officer from another department. I saw that this imbibed a sense of "being acknowledged as a person first" in the person being addressed to. I have since started calling the newspaper delivery boy by his first name instead of the usual " Bhaiyya" . Calling him " Ashish" gives him the unique identity that he is an individual first and not just any newspaper boy. So now-a-days whenever at the end of the month he comes to collect the bill , he rewards me with a sweet smile.

There's this lady who comes to pick up the garbage from our apartment. Calling out to her with a smile while handing out the garbage doesnt cost me anything extra but to her it gives a sense of purpose to her otherwise uninspiring (and supposed to be menial by some ) job.

2. My Mom teaches her maid's little 8 year old son everyday for an hour irrespective of how busy she is in her daily routine.( I think a classic example of " Charity begins at home" ) This makes me wonder what is my contribution to society with much free time on my hand. And then again all this time I have been wondering how best to help someone in need but have never been actually able to do it with mom's dedication. Need to work on this at some level.

3. My mom-in-law is impeccable in her sense of dressing. I would describe her taste as "classy". I'm still learning by observing her and trust me I have a longgg way to go. Also she is too good at planning for any event to take place at home..be it some lunch or dinner party or just a casual tea and snacks for some guests to come. She conjures up the tastiest food stuff in a jiffy like a magician... I'm still in the learning phase here again...

4. My friend from my engineering hostel days, Shilpa Vaidya taught me a very important lesson in relationships.Whenever we would have a tiff or a heated argument on something we didnt agree to ( which we did very often as we were both very head strong girls), I would think of never speaking to her again ( how typical !!) , but there again at tea time she would come barging inside my room , tea cup in hand and a wide smile. " Care to come to the mess for some tea??" .. all previous heartburns forgotten while I still mulled over the same. And then as we sipped tea together and laughed out loud at some hilarious event of the day.. i realised that it takes a lot to Forgive and forget and take at first step towards reaching a truce...and she always beat me to it :-)) Hope you read this someday Shilpa ..

These are just 4 random listings .. If I continue all in one post it'll become an epic in itself.. More learnings in next post in this label...Many people to list and many new things to learn too..