SIEGE MENTALITY AND MENTAL HEALTH

 

              

 

 I.The initial symptoms:

1.’’Work environment is toxic.Management is toxic.’’

2.’’There is no work-life balance.’’

3.’’I am overworked and underpaid.’’

Not suggesting this is fictional.Just overhyped and stressed to a point where your professional life becomes dysfunctional.

II.Perpetrated by socio-professional media platform:

This is typified in social media impotent rage reactions where real and reel mix, and we are a perceived victim of systemic injustices and inequalities.The trouble lies with everyone else ,except me/us(the victims of the system).The mob culture reaction afforded by safety and comfort of anonymity of social media makes us spew venom on all and sundry.Contrarians are trolled and vilified.

III.What is SEIGE MENTALITY ?:

It is a real psychological phenomena requiring intervention.It is group victimstancing. It is a collective state of mind in which a group of people/even individual believe him/her/themselves constantly attacked, oppressed & exploited in the face of the negative intentions of the rest of the world.

We can together identify the why of it.And create curated solutions to discover that every crisis creates an opportunity.

KNOCK THE DOOR

 

I run tax law classes ONLINE and I invariably run a clip of Steve Jobs video where he recounts his experince as a 12 year old picking up the phone and straightaway dialling the number of Bill Hewlett the co-founder of Hewlett-Packard,and he recalls:
''“His number was still in the phone book, and he answered the phone himself,” Jobs recalled.

[Jobs introduced himself]: “Hi, I'm Steve Jobs. I'm 12 years old. I'm a student in high school, and I want to build a frequency counter, and I was wondering if you had any spare parts I could have.”

Hewlett laughed—and then he did something extraordinary. He not only gave Jobs the spare parts but also offered him a summer job at HP, working on the assembly line.
“I was in heaven,” Jobs said.

“Most people never pick up the phone and call. Most people never ask,” Jobs said. “And that's what separates sometimes the people that do things from the people that just dream about them.”

Its a huge tragedy.People say they dont ask because seniors dont tell or ridicule.But that should not deter you.Keep on knocking -one day the right door will open-and life will change.
For whatever I am worth,I am also sitting behind one of those doors-three decades of learning and growth in tax law-in career and mind management -to give away-waiting for my kind of learner.Waiting to open that door.Waiting for that knock.

You have the speed.But I know the way.

So don't fear-just ask.Just knock the door.

AI

 

A very thought provoking piece by the writer Ms.Leher Kala on AI

Read :
https://lnkd.in/daShiWc2

Here is my two penny's worth (And I belong to a gen ,which predates even the author by a fair bit..hitting stone age)

Apart from intellectual dishonesty which the young today consider a concept bereft of meaning ,there are other real dangers of AI impact.One is generating the non existent.Recently an IT decision by income tax tribunal contained non existent decisions,presumably generated by chat GPT.Likewise ,it also has two things which i lable as

1.The google bias
2.The algorithm manipulation

Search engines,lead you in direction they are programmed/tweaked to.

AI goes further .It creates alleyways...narrow,
constricted answers which are projected as manna from heaven.It conditions you to suspend effort.Typing replaces vectored thinking.

In my field ,tax law ,requiring exceptionally high analytic ability,comprehension,creation and articulation ,this system supposedly tells you answers to all.And therein lies the danger.I see it all around me already.Such average performers...articulation ability ,critical discussion ability,juris prudential skills ...nearing nil. ...fighting for crumbs...and blaming the system for it.

Its complete suspension of creative thought.
The point of worry is the gay abandon with which the young are running to it.

Like money,AI is a great servant but a bad  master.

Till it disseminates data and information ,great.The moment it dishes knowledge....that's the red flag.It is unable to distinguish between fact and fiction.It has to provide a solution.

The creator is in danger of getting enslaved by the creation.

A definition of AI by an "old fashioned" me:
" AI is merely a combination of bits and bytes created from an infinite data base on pre defined parameters."

Its no genius .

To me the ultimate quote on AI still is this:
“I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes.”

:Joanna Maciejewska

Note to the" young" turk :

"we may be older son.But we aren't dumb.
You may have the speed.But we know the way."

FEMININE REACTION : THE REVERSE STORY

A thought provoking post was made on Linkedin today on alleged exploitative and extortionist (alimony) ways of feminism and how men are being exploited.

It triggered some thoughts in my mind.

Two reasons why this happened:

1.Actual exploitation over hundreds of years reducing women to second class citizens and treating them as objects to be owned and used .In ancient history it wasn't so.Medieval history tells us about this.My study of psychology tells me that suppressed rage is the most dangerous kind- a burning,seething anger not given vent to.Because of oppressive injustice and denial of dignity (Many of us have it.In dark recesses of our mind.)This got created.

2.In post 2010 era ,internet ,and social media created global village .We become overaware.

Perceptions got distorted ,narratives started replacing truth.Entitlements overcame hard work.

New laws got made ,old laws were made to look at from a WEAPONIZING angle.The whole urban milieu and some part of townships discovered power- not just to defend and get justice- but to reverse exploit.

Suppressed rage too found voice.

Poetic justice is not recognized in law - nor is justice of time- but both exist.And express themselves when they deem fit.

They suffered.Now we do.

वो जब्र भी देखा है,तारीख़ की निगाहों ने

लम्हों ने खता की थी,सदियों ने सज़ा पाई।

Two wrongs dont make a right.But sometimes they complete a story.

OF LOVE, LUST AND ALL THINGS IMPORTANT

I had a very interesting consultation session with a small town professional about love and future of love.Confidentiality reasons compel me not to divulge specifics ,but the case study is so interesting that some abstract detailing is necessary to fill up this blog’s theme.Session was impromptu ,scheduled late night Sunday because of situational exigencies.The professional ,in mid twenties had a typical ,small town-teenage girl meets boy story .She was propelled internally by a desire to be together for life which made her ‘’give in’’ to the physical compulsions of the boy and it culminated in ‘’as he pleased weekly rendezvous’’ of unprotected intimacy.

The dilemma arises now-talk of formalising relation leads him to say ‘’oh yeah’’ on good days and ‘’c’mon ‘’on bad days.

The girl says she is in a spot.But she SAYS she wants a happily ever after.

I doubt very much that it will happen(though I did not say so.)As counselling golden rule says-don’t give answers.Let them discover their answers.Just clarify.Just simplify.Just amplify.

We leave the rest and come to the generic point arising therefrom.The provocative proposition I place for erudite readers is this:  young women ,not yet into the intimacy channels ,feel/think that giving up on virginity or fornicating with a man they think they are in love with will somehow culminate into a commitment to marry-specially in a small town set up.In big cities too ,the minimum is expectation of reciprocity in love.

But mostly ,hopes fly and despair embraces.

Why?

 

Because ,and now I speak purely of male psyche – women who take off their clothes easily –never get respect in the eyes of a man-unless it is a very explicitly agreed ‘’MUTUALLY AGREED ,RAGING HORMONES NEED TO BE QUIETENED’’ agreement.

Never.

Men will never ever respect such a woman-who in their grossly mistaken notions of progressive permissiveness and bandwagon syndrome – let go with gay abandon.

On to my main  proposition.

Whenever you feel you are smitten by and besotted with a guy,ladies,-or -guys who think the soulmate girl has been discovered,but feel unsure- ‘’will this last?’’-arrows-just ask yourself  THREE QUESTIONS:

1.Do I TRUST this man?

2.Do I RESPECT this man?

3.Do I UNDERSTAND this man?

 

Only after the three yesses,ask yourself: do I LOVE this man?

[Great sex is not even part of the conversation.Its a standalone.Necessary to get things going but never sufficient as far as longevity goes.I dont advocate Victorian prudery at all.Just saying be clear as to why you are doing it.Do not treat it as a unspoken promissory estoppel .Lust can thrive without love any day.Its just compelling biology.You can address it as a standalone.Just do not confuse it with love.]

 

And once you are through this –ask him –and yourself:

1.Do you TRUST me?

2.Do you RESPECT me?

3.Do you UNDERSTAND me?

 

And only after three yesses ,ask him: do you LOVE me?

 

After 3+1 and 3+1 yesses,go ahead.Live together ,marry.Live,laugh,love.

And keep on asking- whenever you have reasons to question your choice-the moment one out of the six yesses turns into a NO-you will find that LOVE left too.

Because love always was an incomplete emotion by itself.

 

MATSYA NYAYA

 

 

   Arthashastra  chapter 1.4. shloka13-14

‘’apraṇītaḥ tu mātsyanyāyaṃ udbhāvayati.

balīyān abalaṃ hi grasate daṇḍadharābhāve. ‘’

 But when the law of punishment is kept in abeyance,it gives rise to such disorder as is implied in the proverb of law and order of fishes (matsyanyaya udbhavayati);

for in the absence of a magistrate (dandadharabhave), the strong will swallow the weak;but under his protection, the weak resist the strong.

The phrase "matsyanyaya" appears in the ancient Indian political treatise Arthashastra by Chanakya (Kautilya): it refers to a law of nature where the strong devour the weak, similar to how larger fish eat smaller fish. 

In Arthashastra,  historians tell us,Chanakya uses the theory to explain why a state should increase its size and security. He argues that without a government or rule of law, society will degenerate into anarchy, where the strong will exploit the weak.

Chanakya emphasizes the importance of "danda" (strong authority) to prevent the law of "matsyanyaya" from prevailing. He believed that government, rulers, and laws are necessary to overcome this natural law and protect the weak.

The idea of "matsyanyaya" is similar to the idea that the state ensures protection to the small, while in nature the big overwhelms the small.One can easily connect it to the Darwinian theory of ''survival of the fittest'' or even to the food chain theory.