The Domino effect

Everything is interrelated.We, our families, friends,colleagues,relatives, acquaintances,animals, trees etc. This has special advantages. We can learn from everyone for everyone knows at least one thing better than me. I had a peculiar failing when I was a school student, all of 12 years old. I just could not spin a top. You know, the ones with the thread called latti and the wooden top with a metal pin sticking out. Countless times I tied the thread round the top and threw it on the ground. And every time the top would lurch to one side and then would overturn or twirl sideways on the ground for a second or two and then stop. My embarrassment knew no bounds. All my friends would snigger and look amused whenever I did my top antics. On the way back from school, I had to go beside a row of shanties every day. I used to look with envy at the boys, some much younger than me, who would carelessly throw the top in the air and effortlessly draw on the string such that the top would land on the hand and start spinning!!!!

                       

I mustered up courage one day and tentatively asked one boy whether he could teach me how to spin the top. He looked at me condescendingly and asked."Sahab log ki school mein sikhata nahin?" I mumbled,"No". He took pity on me, and started to show me the technique. It took me a couple of days and countless tries before I started getting the hang of it. I learned how tightly I had to wind the thread, what was the force required, the timing, the pull etc. Within a week, I had got the hang of it. My friends stopped laughing. I started to modify the technique and perfected some stunts like catching the top between my legs etc.

But I have never forgotten the torn vested, unkempt haired boy who showed me something which I could not have ever done without his help.

So, I taught some other boys, and they taught others, and I dare say many boys gained a skill ,which though materially unrewarding , did a lot for confidence and self belief, which I am sure, they carried on into their later life and their children. This is a positive Domino effect. That is why education and teachers are so important for society, because they can have the most widespread domino effect, spanning decades and states and countries.

Domino effect can also be negative. Specially the cheap tricks carried out by politicians like Raj Thackeray.

By creating discrimination on the basis of language and geography, they can create the same Domino effect of violence in the villages and towns and cities and the whole country. No one denies him his opinion of home jobs for home people. But by reserving jobs, they are merely creating a pampered society which shies away from competition. My greatest thrill was when I came through an All India competition. I knew from that day, that I could face competition and survive. That feeling can never be in your core, otherwise. And it is that feeling and belief is what you fall back on in your darkest days. And you survive, strong and confident than ever before, because you trust yourself, and you back yourself anywhere, anytime.

Enough of homilies. Enjoy this wonderful truelife Domino effect.