If you are jobless, you don’t really have.....

If you are jobless, you don’t really have the luxury of choice. In tough times, even a peon’s job would be acceptable. So, if you are unemployed, SSC CGL is not a bad choice for you.

However, if you have the capability to clear UPSC or equivalent exams, earn ₹1.5–2 lakh per month in the corporate sector, or have the mindset and dedication to run your own business, then you might not be happy after joining SSC CGL. You may keep thinking that you could have done something better but didn’t.

However, SSC CGL is not a bad choice overall. But if you have exceptional skills and potential, aim for something more rewarding. Let SSC CGL be an option for those who are above average or average.

-Nitesh Sharma, Superintendent at Central Board of Excise and Customs

Advice is like a bitter medicine

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Love and Relationships

 Movies teach something very wrong on “Love and relationships “ especially Bollywood movies.

Yesterday I was talking to a friend . He was in a early stage relationship with a girl and then the girl changed her mind. My Friend has been deeply affected by this (some people are sensitive ). you can change the gender as well . There are so many such stories of our youth .

Our movies like Veer Zara , Kal Ho na Ho Or Aashiqui series or any romantic story you see they talk about Pure and unconditional love . Our youths follow movies religiously and yes, they have deep impact on our values while growing up .

I felt this has destroyed the lives of many .

Love unconditionally, but to those who deserve

Trust , but verify them

if someone wants to go, let them. If you hold back there will be many negative repulsions. Let them explore. It may happen that they may come back to you after failing . But let them try

When someone does not reciprocate , chill out . Be good friends. But expect nothing . Have a good life outside it . Remember nothing is worth your happiness

Do not be artificial, but be practical

There is nothing such as perfect person or perfect couple as people portrayed in social media. Love lies with in you . When your intention is clear, you will find it

Abinash Mishra , IAS , IIT KGP

Principles of Natural Justice

 Dale Carnegie in his book ‘How to win friends and influence people” narrates an interesting story.

On May 7, 1931, the notorious killer “Two Gun” Crowley was hunted down and captured. He was one of the most dangerous killers in New York.

Once, he was sitting in a car with his girlfriend when a policeman walked up and asked for his license. Without a word, Crowley drew his gun and shot the man.

But when Crowley was captured, police found a note in which he wrote: "Under my coat is a weary heart, but a kind one—one that would do nobody any harm."

Crowley was sentenced to the electric chair.

When he arrived at the death house in Sing Sing, did he say, "This is what I get for killing people"?

No, he said, "This is what I get for defending myself."

The point of the story is this: "Two Gun" Crowley didn't blame himself for anything.

When you don’t care about others’ opinions and seek your own validation for your actions, you tend to justify your actions, however horrible they may be.

Hence, if you wish to know the truth, you must be fair in your judgment.

To arrive at a fair judgment, you must follow the principle of natural justice.

The three core principles of natural justice are:

1. No one should judge their own case (Nemo Judex in Causa Sua),
2. Everyone has the right to be heard (Audi Alteram Partem),
3. Decisions should be explained (Reasoned Decisions)

Hence, if you want an honest assessment of your actions, you must not be the judge of your actions and hear the point of view of other people as well, and then you must try to find out the truth, not emotionally, but through reason and logic, weighing all the opinions.

-Awdhesh Singh

Happiness

Imagine that you have gone to withdraw cash from a bank ATM.

You insert your card in the slot and then enter ₹10,000 for withdrawal.

Would you get the cash?

The answer to this question depends whether or not you have sufficient balance in your bank account.

• If you have deposited ₹10,000 or more in your bank account, you would get the cash.
• If you have not deposited ₹10,000, the ATM shall show you ‘insufficient balance’ and won’t give you any money.

The rule of the bank is that you have to deposit the money before you withdraw it.

In the same way, there is one rule in life.

You have to earn you happiness, before you can enjoy happiness.

And earning happiness is always painful.

You have to first suffer unhappiness before you are entitled to enjoy life.

• You have to slog for months before examination to get good marks and enjoy your result.
• You have to practice for several years painfully to get great performance in sports in the field and enjoy the accolades of the world and win the medal.
• You have to work hard for several years and take risks in life to acquire wealth and become rich.

You have to pass through tough times and suffer failures several times before you can enjoy your success.

If you are not willing to face tough times in life, you can’t enjoy happiness because only through sufferings, we earn our happiness.

Hence, when tough times comes, face it boldly, because when you would reach to the other side of tough time, you shall be welcomed by the happiness because you would have earned your enjoyment by facing the tough time boldly.

Don’t blame the bank if it refuses to withdraw cash from your account due to your inability to make sufficient deposit in your account.

Don’t blame the world, if it refuses to let you enjoy your life because you refused to suffer pain in life.

-Awdhesh Singh

Why there is so much pain in your life?

Optimal Forager Behaviour

Source of picture: Google Images

Once the rain is over, an umbrella becomes a burden to everyone

 There is a famous saying, "Once the rain is over, an umbrella becomes a burden to everyone.”

The bitter fact of life is that in our world, loyalty ends when benefits stop.

The only reason you should keep an umbrella is that the rain will not be over forever, and the umbrella will be helpful in the future.

However, if the umbrella becomes too old, broken and has many holes in it, it would surely be discarded forever,

Most human relationships are reciprocal in nature, and most people change their behaviour when you are no longer useful to them.

If you wish to live with self-respect and dignity, you must ensure that you remain useful throughout your life.

It is also important to understand that one day, you will become too old and lose all your utility to society.

In such a situation, the only thing that can make you useful is your savings and assets.

If you have money, your utility will never be over and there will always be a few people to help and serve you.

While there are certainly some good people who remember what you have done for them and would always be loyal to you, however, in reality, loyalty is tested only when you are in a difficult or hopeless situation, and if you are discarded at that time, you will have nowhere to go.

Hence, it is better to keep a backup option in the form of wealth, in case your loved ones and friends discard you at the time of your need.

Clare Boothe Luce wisely said, “Money can’t buy happiness, but it can make you awfully comfortable while you’re being miserable.”

-Awdhesh Singh

Salary in IT after 20 years

Are you Fit to earn much ?

Success and Failure

 One of my colleagues in IRS left the services 6 years ago to join politics.

He has been the most active member of our WhatsApp group and is often called FPM (Future PM).

Before he quit the job (by taking VRS), he and his wife came to me for my opinion. His wife was not happy with his decision as none of their children were settled or married.

I told him that I don’t understand politics and can’t guide him in this regard. However, I warned him politics is very challenging with very low success rate.

However, he was confident that he would succeed as a politician. His confidence was based on his three-time election as president of the IRS (C&IT) association.

He formed his own party, the Uttar Andhra Praja Party, and fought in the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Vishakhapattanam.

Metta was perhaps inspired by a fellow IRS officer, Arvind Kejriwal, who became the CM of Delhi within a very short time of forming the AAP.

Unfortunately, he could get only 326 votes in the 2024 election and placed at 31/34 place.

[1]

I wish him all the best in achieving success in politics, for which he has taken so much risk and is working so hard.

However, you can't become successful just by wishing for it.

It is often said, “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.”

The fact that beggars don't ride horses despite their wish establishes that you can't achieve everything just by wishing or wanting.

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I don’t believe that you can succeed in almost everything if you really want it.

I know for sure that I won’t succeed in many things in life, such as

• Politics: I can’t lie, tolerate the corrupt or criminals, or play casteism or communal card to generate hatred and divide the people.
• Sports: I am a medium-height person, and my body is not suitable for athletics. I also can’t excelll in games like boxing, basketball etc.
• Business: I am very poor at marketing and sales. I can’t pitch for funds for start-ups.
• Celebrity: I can’t become a popular personality like Osho, Acharya Prasant, or Jaggi Vasudev because most of what I say is unpopular and unacceptable to most people.

I believe that I would not succeed in more than 90% of the areas even if I wanted to because of my lack of aptitude in those fields.

---

It took me a lot of time and maturity to understand myself and to identify in which fields I could not succeed.

If I am somewhat successful today as a writer, it is because I have discarded most of the fields where I can’t succeed, focused only on a very limited domain, and worked on it for a long time.

I agree with Albert Einstein's famous quote: "It's not that I'm so smart; it's just that I stay with problems longer."

Hence, if you wish to achieve anything of value in your life, identify the things where you can’t succeed despite your best effort so that you can focus all your time and energy on a limited domain to achieve excellence and become hugely successful.

-Awdhesh Singh

Take a moment to look around and Ask this........

Don't Abandon Your Dreams

Source of picture: Google Images

Footnotes

[1] 

Election Commission of India

You must change your habit

 You must change your habit.

• It is foolish to be too frank all the time.
• It is also unwise to help others all the time.

You must rather learn to speak appropriately before people. You must also learn when to keep your mouth shut.

You must help only those people who seek your help or to those who have helped you in the past.

If you are always willing to help others, how can you blame people when they accept your help?

It is like a charitable person blaming the charity for not giving back charity in return of his charity.

While you have a choice to help or not help a person, other people too have the choice to return or not return your favour.

You must get out of the victim's mentality of finding fault in other people’ conduct and learn to accept the responsibility of your own action.

May be other people finds your ‘too frank’ talk stupid, arrogant and lacking substance.

May be you are helping people who don’t need or seek your help; or don’t deserve help from anyone.

Develop the habit of choosing your actions rightly, if you wish to live happily in this world.

-Awdhesh Singh

Regret

Sometime ago, I met one of my colleagues from the IRS who retired two years ago.

He has three children: one son and two daughters. However, none of his children are yet settled or got married.

He was a very honest and efficient officer, so he made no illegal money in his career, though he was posted to many important assignments during his career.

During our conversation, he confided that he often feels that if he had made some money, he would have been better, and his family would not have faced so much financial hardship.

He must be often repenting being honest, and wished that he would made some illegal money.

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I have another batchmate who was very corrupt and made crores of rupees through corruption. He was trapped by the CBI two decades ago, got arrested, and the government confiscated his illegal money.

He was compulsorily retired a few years ago, and the corruption cases are still pending against him. If he is convicted, he might have to spend several years in jail in his old age.

His family suffered so much disgrace and trauma due to corruption, and his financial condition is also very bad now.

He must be feeling jelous of his batchmates who are still in service at high position and must have been repenting of his acts of corruption and wished that he would have lived an honest life.

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There is no formula in life that can ensure you that you will not regret it at the end of your life.

• There are many honest officers in the government who work with honour, live a good family life and their children get well settled.
• There are many corrupt officers in government who are never caught in corruption and lead personal and professional lives.

It all depends on what you define as success.

If you achieve what you aim for in life, you will never repent, whatever path you have followed.

However, if you fail to achieve what you wished for, you will ultimately repent, thinking that if you had done something else, your life would have been better, assuming the best-case scenario.

The fact is that you can’t predict where you would have been on the path you never followed.

The key to living a happy life is to achieve success because nothing succeeds like success.

Swami Vivakandana gave the following formula of success: “Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life – think of it, dream of it, and live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, and every part of your body, be full of that idea and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success."

Hence, it is not as important what decisions you make in your life as how hard you work after making them to ensure that they are right.

If you are successful in your eyes, you will never repent in your life, irrespective of how you lived your life.

-Awdhesh Singh

It is easy to succeed

Source of picture: Google Images

Things not worth anyone's time

 

• Getting into a road rage. Let the other person overtake you. Better to say sorry and return home than try to be a superman and end up in hospital.
• Getting into a long argument. Don’t waste your words and energy when not required. No one will give you a prize for winning an argument.
• Doing something to impress others. Before buying a fancy car, choosing a career or spending extravagantly on social events, ask if you are doing it for yourself or because you want others to know how great you are.
• Checking your mobile phone every now and then to get updates on social media. The fact is that even if you keep your phone aside for a few days, life will go on normally.
• Surrounding oneself with negative people. You’ll become like them in no time.
• Gossiping in office. What you say may come back to haunt you later.
• Engaging in long friendly chats at work. Not only are you wasting your time, you’re disturbing others. The work that is piling up will not disappear on its own.
• Reading tabloid and useless news (sensational, local crime etc) in newspapers or on internet. Spend some time entertaining yourself by reading such news but don’t let it become an addiction.
• Spending a significant amount of time watching television. By regularly watching melodramas, violent-content and programmes where people are shouting/arguing at the top of their voices, you may be also emotionally draining yourself.
• Spending time with time-wasters. If you don’t learn anything or benefit by being in someone’s company or, at least, enjoy the conversation, run away.

-

Rahul Shrivastava, IFS

I use one criterion to judge my happiness or the happiness of any person:

‘How frequently you get angry in your life?’

If you get angry rarely, you are quite happy.

If you are angry most of the time, you are quite unhappy.

Anger and happiness can’t go hand in hand.

Anger is a reflection of our weakness and ignorance.

Anger is truly a gateway to hell. Please read this Zen story.

“I want to know about heaven and hell,” said the samurai. “Do they really exist?” he asked Hakuin.

A tough, brawny samurai once approached a Zen master who was deep in meditation.

Impatient and discourteous, the samurai demanded in his husky voice so accustomed to forceful yelling, “Tell me the nature of heaven and hell.”

The Zen master opened his eyes, looked the samurai in the face, and replied with a certain scorn, “Why should I answer to a shabby, disgusting, despondent slob like you? A worm like you, do you think I should tell you anything? I can’t stand you. Get out of my sight. I have no time for silly questions.”

The samurai could not bear these insults. Consumed by rage, he drew his sword and raised it to sever the master’s head at once.

Looking straight into the samurai’s eyes, the Zen master tenderly declared, “That’s hell.”

The samurai froze. He immediately understood that anger had him in its grip. His mind had just created his own hell—one filled with resentment, hatred, self-defense, and fury. He realized that he was so deep in his torment that he was ready to kill somebody.

The samurai’s eyes filled with tears. Setting his sword aside, he put his palms together and obsequiously bowed in gratitude for this insight.

The Zen master gently acknowledged with a delicate smile, “And that’s heaven.”

You get angry when you feel that you have been wronged.

In all such cases, you pretend innocence and consider other people responsible for your misery.

Such feelings are usually the results of your ignorance of the full facts of the case and your lack of understanding of the functioning of the world.

World has no personal enmity or affinity with you.

Just like the laws of gravity applies to all evenly, the laws of the world applies to all evenly.

The laws are not going to change to suit your whims and fancy, nor is going to be applied leniently because you are ignorant.

Most of the people spoil their lifelong relationship and good work due to their moments of anger.

They often repent their outbursts, but they can never heal the wounds given by them in the fit of anger.

Aristotle said wisely, “Anybody can become angry - that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way - that is not within everybody's power and is not easy."

Anger is a sign of weakness.

The angry people are usually not only unhappy, but also unsuccessful in life, because ignorance is neither a help for happiness nor for success.

-Awdhesh Singh

Footnotes

[1] 

Heaven and Hell: A Zen Parable on Self-Awareness

Don't be.....