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Career
Q.
I’m working as a captain in a 3-Star Hotel. The banquet
manager had recently resigned. To my disappointment, my assistant was
promoted to that post, instead of me. I’m depressed, but
I can't resign the job as I am the only bread-winner in
my family. I don’t have any negative remarks in my
5-year career with this hotel. Why wasn't I promoted?
In any organization, employees can be classified into 3
categories. The first group which consists of 40 percent of the employees
under-perform.
They are considered liabilities and get fired at the
first opportunity. The second group which consists of
another 40 percent of the employees
deliver
what is expected of them. No more and no less. They are
considered assets, but they are dispensable assets. The
third group consists of 20 percent of the employees who
over-perform. They are not only assets, but they are
indispensable assets. They are the ones who get
appreciation, increments and promotions. Look within
yourself. Be honest to yourself. Which category do you
belong to?
Q.
I’m working as teacher in a reputed school and drawing a
monthly salary of Dhs.2000/-. Though the salary is not
satisfying, my job is very satisfying. Recently I
received an employment offer from a bank to work as a
marketing executive. I’m offered a monthly salary of Dhs.3000/-.
It involves shift duty as well. I’m not very much
interested in this offer as I don’t like selling. I like
teaching. But my husband wants me to take up this new
job as it pays more. I’m in a dilemma. Can you please
advise me?
Job satisfaction is more important than the monetary
reward. Job satisfaction ensures that the best in you is
fully utilized. Job satisfaction ensures that there is
no job-stress which could adversely affect your physical
health and mental health in the long run. If I were you,
I would prefer to teach; not to sell.
You can take up a part-time teaching
assignment or a week-end teaching assignment which will
supplement your income.
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Health
Q.
Your ‘Talk Show’ on 89.1 FM was very informative. You
advised one of the callers to avoid/reduce milk
consumption, as it is not a healthy food. In my family all
of us drink milk daily. Though I as well as my children
do not like its taste, we drink it because we believe it
is healthy. Why do you say milk is not healthy?
Once upon a time, milk was a healthy food- when the cows
ate grass, sesame cakes and drank the water that was
used to wash and cook the rice. Do you know what is fed
to the cows today? Slaughter-house wastes, antibiotics
laced food, hormone injections, and genetically-modified
soy beans. Result - mad cow disease, osteoporosis, precocious
puberty, teenage pregnancy, obesity, low immunity and
early grave. I’m not against drinking milk, provided
your cow eats grass and sesame seeds and not meat and
soy beans.
Q.
My children as well as my husband love chicken. There
must be a chicken dish everyday. You advised us to
prefer free-range chickens to poultry chickens. But
free-range chicken is three times costlier than poultry
chicken. Is it really worth the price?
A chicken raised in the fields takes 7 months to grow
before it is ready for the dinner table. But in the
poultry farm it is fattened in just 48 days with the
help of growth
hormones. Eating poultry chicken meat ingrained with
growth hormones leads to precocious puberty which is the
main cause of teen pregnancy. It is also the major
contributor to obesity which in turn leads to diabetes.
If we consider the cost of obesity,
diabetes and teen pregnancy, the price of free-range
chicken is cheap.
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Prosperity
Q.
You are a certified forex dealer. Yet you do not
recommend forex trading as a way to quick money. Why?
First I would like to clarify that I’m not against forex trading. I do not recommend forex trading only for
those people who would like to trade without having a
sound grasp of the fundamentals that move the exchange
rates; and for those people who have meager savings and risk their
entire savings on forex trading.
I recommend forex trading, provided you meet these
conditions:
i)
Don’t borrow funds for trading.
ii) Trade no more than 10 percent of your investible
funds
iii) Have a thorough knowledge of the economy and politics
of the countries that are always in the limelight.
iv)
Follow the time-tested wisdom “Cut your loss quickly;
Book your profit early”.
Q.
My wife insists that I cancel my credit card. She is
afraid it will lead us into a debt trap. I use my credit
card occasionally. What do you suggest?
Credit card is like a knife. A knife in a
surgeon’s hand saves lives. The same knife snatches
lives, if it is in the hands of a murderer. If you are a
spendthrift, cancel your card immediately. If you are a
person who thinks
twice before buying anything, then you can keep your
card.
Here are a few suggestions that’ll ensure
you against the risk of falling into a debt trap:-
i)
Use your card only if cash is not accepted like budget
airlines, internet purchases, etc.
ii)
Settle the outstanding in full, before the due date.
iii) If you can’t settle in full, pay the maximum you can
afford, not the minimum required.
iv)
Shop around for a value-for-money card, based on the
interest rate, interest-free days, free-for-life,
theft-protection, etc.
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Knowledge
Q.
Who is knowledgeable? Who is intelligent? Who is wise?
A
Knowledgeable person is one who possesses thorough
understanding of a subject; He might have acquired that
skill either through study or through his experience. He
my or may not be intelligent. There is no dearth of
knowledgeable people in the world.
An intelligent person
is one who possesses the mental ability to grasp the
problem correctly and bring out an ideal solution. He is
also knowledgeable otherwise he cannot grasp the problem
correctly.
A wise man is one who
accepts the fact that not all problems have solutions
and that not all problems need to be solved and realizes
the fact that sometimes the solutions create more problems than
the original problems.
A knowledgeable person
knows everything about the moon .An intelligent person
can land on the moon and return safely. A wise person just
admires the moon.
Q. I attended your seminar you
gave in
Emirates Training College. You said “Life skills are
more important than academic skills" Can one succeed in
his career without academic skills?
A landmark study which examined the factors behind the
success of the CEOs of 10,000 large organizations which
employ more than 5000 people revealed that their success
was built on the four pillars, namely Communication
skills, People skills, Problem-solving skills and
Visionary planning. A number of other studies also concluded
that our academic skills and Technical skills
contribute only 20 percent towards our success whereas
life skills contribute 80 percent towards our success.
I personally believe
that an academic degree is only a passport to enter a
career. Our career success does not depend on our
academic qualification. When I need a marketing Manager,
I hire someone who has already marketed a product
successfully, rather than an MBA straight from the
university.
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Happiness
Q.I heard you saying in the seminar “There’s a
difference between pleasure and happiness; there’s a
difference between job and career; there’s a difference
between expenditure and investment.” What’s the
difference between pleasure and happiness?”
Pleasure is what you experience physically; happiness
is something you feel mentally. When you eat the
tastiest food of your choice, what you experience is
pleasure. It is short-lived. The moment you swallow the
food and it leaves your tongue, the pleasure is gone.
When you feed a hungry child who has not eaten for three
days and watch the pleasure on its face, what you feel
is happiness. It will last life-long.
Q. Do
we really need money to be happy?
You might have heard the saying ‘Money can't buy
happiness.’ Its true. We cannot buy happiness from the
market as it is not sold. But we need money to buy those
things, the lack of which causes unhappiness.
Money can bring happiness to a mother who doesn't have
enough money to buy food for a hungry child. Money can bring
happiness to a father who doesn't have enough money to pay the
fees to send his son to school. Money can bring
happiness to a philanthropist who doesn't have money to
treat a sick child.
We do not need money at all if everything we need is
available free! Till such time, we need money.
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Society
Q. I attended one of your seminars on lifestyle
Management. One of your posters which had an image of a
female foetus with the message ‘Life is precious; Don’t
kill her’ was very touching. But I heard you saying “The
society must consider legalizing euthanasia”. Is it not
contradictory?
I don’t
see any contradiction. Once a life is conceived, it has
the right to live. No one, including its mother has a
right to take away the right of the unborn. For the same
reason, I’m against death sentence. I believe justice is
another name for revenge.
At the some
time, I consider the right to live and the right to die
co-exists. It is two sides of the same coin-life. No one likes
to die. But if one wishes to die, he has reasons; very
very valid reasons. He considers that his mission is
over. He does not want to be a burden on anyone. His
death could bring relief to someone he loves. His death
could give him relief from all his problems, we never
know. Just as a new life has a right to live, an old
life has a right not to live.
Q. I am surprised
that you support and sympathise with the drug addicts.
Are they not anti-socials? Are they not criminals?
Yes. I do support the drug addicts. Because I see them
as victims and not culprits. They need our support and
sympathy to come out of this addiction. Let us fund the
de-addiction centres and help these unfortunate victims,
instead of treating them as criminals and punishing
them. If someone comes to know that his son or daughter
is a drug addict will he send him to the prison or to a
de-addiction centre?
Do you know that cigarettes are more harmful and more
addictive than certain drugs. Do you know that thousands
of people die every year because of passive smoking.
When we can allow smoking ,why not consuming drugs?
I
want to make it clear that though I sympathise with the
drug addicts, I have never supported the drug peddlers
.In fact we need to imprison them for life so that the
drug addicts can escape from their clutches.
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Family
Q. I’m forty years old and my husband is fifty. We have
two teenage children, a boy and a girl. We are married
for the past 20 years. As far as I know, my husband is a
very faithful
man. What troubles me is that when we go out,
whenever a beautiful girl passes by, his eyes follow
her. Though I ignore it, it still bothers me. Is he
trustworthy?
Here is a piece of Chinese wisdom. ‘The stronger sex is
actually the weaker sex, because of the weakness of the
stronger sex for the weaker sex’. As far as males are
concerned, their attraction for the opposite sex starts
from puberty and lasts till death. It is absolutely
normal that your husband admires beautiful girls. You
must worry only if your husband ignores them,
because in that case he might be abnormal!.
Q. The other day I heard you saying that the ideal age
for marriage is 21 for girls and 26 for boys. Why do you
advise people to get married so early ?
So early! In fact
I want to change my advice. Today the ideal age for
marriage is 18 for girls and 23 for boys.
The average age of puberty remained at 13 for the last
5000 years. But in the last 10 years the average age of puberty has
come down to 10.
Early marriage ensures early conception which in turn
promises better quality offspring. It also ensures
natural childbirth which in turn promises better bonding
between the mother and the child.
The children become independent before the parents
become old which is desirable to both the children as well
as the parents.
Early marriage ensures that young adults do not squander
away their time and energy in hunting for a suitable
mate. It also protects them from falling victims to
social ills such as teenage pregnancy, unwed maternity, smoking, alcoholism, drugs, suicides etc.
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