The Adventurer

 

I lifted my head up and looked around tentatively. It was deceptively calm and a gentle breeze played with the strands of loose hair around my face. That was good news. The breeze meant that it was my second awakening and I am not too far from the great hills where the breeze is constant. The quiet also meant that the forces were away. My heart leapt - this could be the day. As my vision cleared, I looked ahead and saw the gentle hills rise up in the horizon and my lips broke into a smile. Seeing the great hills tends to do that to me. They looked taller than usual today but that did nothing to diminish the happiness that surged in my heart. The sheer cliffs and slippery slopes don’t deter me but egg me on to try my new-found strength. They are a challenge, a calling that cannot be ignored. After all, it is at the foot of the great hills that I discovered my life’s purpose. The cave came much later, eerie in the quiet darkness that is its core, beckoning to me to venture into its depths and unravel its secrets. But the cave is an adventure for another day for that is what I am. I am an adventurer. 

Not for me the life of quietude in the plains, spending the day eating, sleeping, playing and being content with what the plains have to offer. Not that what the plains offer are not wondrous. The plains have been kind to me. Long ago, when I lay helpless, weak with limited vision, unable to fathom the land I was in, they had nurtured me. Those days, I could not see the hills and did not wonder at what lay beyond. But even then, the embers of the fire within me pushed me to exercise, to work on my skills, to improve my strength, and of course to test the forces. Slowly but steadily my range of movement increased. Then, one day, I had ventured farther up the plains and found myself at the foot of the great hills. They stood like sentinels guarding the beyond. The hills gave my life new meaning. Since that day, I have made it my life’s purpose to conquer the hills. Every morning, after my first awakening, I consume as much nutrition as I can and take some much needed rest. It’s the second awakening that brings me close to my destiny. When I say destiny, I do not mean the beyond. I do not know what lies there. It could be a wondrous land or a dark abyss that would consume me. My destiny is the adventure itself - to pull myself atop the great hills and behold the beyond.

I lifted my head up and looked around tentatively. The quiet seemed complete. I could not sense the forces around. I ventured forward slowly but steadily towards the hills, my senses tuned to detect the slightest movement, the slightest sound, anything that would indicate the presence of a force, for the presence of a force would doom my mission. I have often wondered whether the forces are good or evil. I have come to realise that they are not malevolent. Just as I have a purpose, they have one too. They are the keepers of the beyond. I learnt a long time ago that I cannot fight the forces. The forces have power and speed beyond measure. But there is one great secret that makes my adventure possible. I have been studying the forces for long and found that they are not constant. They can only be in one land at one time and there are other lands they need to be. Around the plains and the great hills, they are strongest at night and weakest at my second awakening. So that is when I strike. Stealth is the key.  As I made my way up the hills, I realised that they are indeed taller today than usual. But that is to be expected. The hills tend to be taller when the forces are weak. I pushed forward doggedly, pulling myself up with the new-found strength in my arms and pressing my tummy against the sheer sides for support. As I stretched my hand up to find my next hold, my fingers came upon a flat surface. Finally, I was almost there. I gripped the surface and pulled myself up with all my strength. In an instant, I was sprawled on top of the hill I had chosen to climb this morning, my arms still gripping the surface and my tummy just ahead of the incline that I had just climbed. My legs still dangled down pointing towards the plains far below.

I was startled by the suddenness of the change around me as I heard a rumbling like a thunder cloud drawing near. Oh, no. While I had been busy savouring my success, I had let my guard down and the forces had drawn near. I looked ahead and could see the beyond stretching ahead of me. I knew it was too late but being the adventurer that I am, I lunged forward in one last desperate attempt as the forces swirled around me and enveloped me. As the forces took over and carried me far away from my beloved hills my disappointment and frustration poured forth in a heart-rending cry that was drowned out by a rumble that sounded like, “Anu, stay off the pillows or you will fall off the bed”.

I often wonder what is going through the head of my seven month old daughter when I pull her away from atop the pillows kept around the bed to keep her from falling to the floor. If you could understand her language, I imagine, this would be her story.

Book Review: Predictably Irrational

As Mark Twain once noted about Tom Sawyer, “Tom has discovered a great law of human action namely, that in order make a man covet a thing it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain”. As per Dan Ariely, in his book ”Predictably Irrational”, this is exactly why Tahitian black pearls are today considered prized possessions.

Dan Ariely is a professor of Behavioural Economics at Duke University. This book is an excellent compilation of the results of his experiments on human rationality or the lack of it. While the book could serve as an excellent introduction to the field of Behavioural Economics, the stated objective of the book is to make its readers more aware of their propensity to make irrational decisions. The author’s conviction is that by understanding our predictably irrational behaviours, we can adjust for them in our decision making process and make better, more rational decisions. In short, this book aims to do for behavioural sciences what Stephen Hawking did for space science with “A Brief History of Time” to become the coffee table book on human irrationality.

The premise of the book is that while everyone (except several traditional economic theories) acknowledges that humans are not rational beings at all times, we do not fully appreciate the extent of our irrationality. In the introduction to the book, Dan promises to help us understand why we fail to stick to our diet plans when the dessert cart rolls around, why we buy things we do not need, and why honour codes reduce the incidence of cheating. By the end of the book, he achieves this and some more.

Each chapter introduces and discusses a different type of irrational behaviour. The brilliance of the author and the editors lies in the fact that a chapter starts with carefully chosen and perfectly worded questions to get us thinking about the specific irrationality that he would be discussing in that chapter. For example, he starts the chapter on ‘The Cost of Zero Cost’ by asking whether we would buy something we do not need (let’s say coffee beans for a tea drinker) if it were discounted from 50 cents to 2 cents (from Rs. 30 to Rs. 1). The answer for most people would be either ‘No’ or ‘Maybe’. Now, what if the same thing is discounted to zero and given away for free. The default answer for just about everyone would be a resounding ‘Yes’. He starts the chapter by asking why we cannot stop ourselves from accumulating things simply because we get it for free. By doing this, he gets us thinking along the lines of why we behave the way we do even before he introduces us to the experiments he has conducted in the area. He ends each chapter with his thoughts on the implications of the irrational behaviour and its applications in areas from day-to-day decision making to government policies.

What this book is not about is a simple step-by-step solution to irrational behaviour. The book does not claim to be all-encompassing in terms of human irrationality either. It aims to make us more aware of human behaviour so that the next time we plan a diet or look at the ads for an appliance we plan to purchase or plan our negotiation strategy, we take these irrationalities into account. It is an interesting read for everyone, and especially for MBA grads with exposure to both economics and organizational behaviour.

 Rating: 8/10