00:00Since 10th onwards, I have been into this competition, in this competition cycle.
00:05Now, if a person is always into competition, when would he have time to pursue his passion?
00:11If he is always competing with someone else?
00:13What we have seen is, what history suggests is,
00:16the ones who run by themselves, for themselves,
00:21are often seen beating the competition without wanting to.
00:28They said, how has this happened?
00:31We never intended to be ahead of others.
00:34The intention was something else. What was the intention?
00:37The intention was a love affair between me and this thing that I am doing.
00:45One fellow came to me and said, three hours a day he wastes on just tracking the competitors.
00:51Not just tracking them, actually laying traps so that they waste half an hour or something.
00:57Then how much time do you use, wasting their time?
01:01Three hours every day?
01:03This is not the way of love.
01:07This is not the way of authenticity or commitment.
01:10Do what you have to do and the results.
01:13So, my question to you is, since 10th onwards, I have been into this competition, in this competition cycle,
01:25like first getting good grades in 10th, then later on clearing J.
01:29Then after coming to college, we realized that we not just have to be good at academics,
01:34but also develop communication skills and get exposure and also worry about our placements.
01:42After getting jobs, I have seen many people talk about perks, incentives, etc.
01:47I had recently read a quote in your recent book, Truth Without Apology.
01:52What's the book?
01:57One second.
01:57The quote says,
02:11The joy of overcoming yourselves is much deeper and more authentic than the fleeting pleasure of indulging yourselves.
02:18Now, if a person is always into competition, when would he have time to pursue his passion?
02:32If he is always competing with someone else?
02:34That's right.
02:36Well said.
02:39Well said.
02:39See, there are two types of competitions.
02:46One is when you are running alongside the other and continuously looking at the other.
02:56Obviously, if you are continuously looking at the other, there can be no passion, no love, no inwardness.
03:03You are just looking at the other one and the other's actions are not controlled by you.
03:11The other can suddenly slow down and you will feel happy.
03:17But this happiness is borrowed happiness, right?
03:20Something happened there and he dictated when you would be happy.
03:24In fact, he can just smile to himself and say, let me make this one happy now.
03:29Let me slow down a little and he will start laughing.
03:33Equally, the other one has the power to make you sad.
03:37He will say, let me just accelerate a bit and this one will start crying.
03:42So, this is the first kind of competition in which really there can be no fun.
03:49The second kind of competition is when you are running with yourself.
03:57You are acting because you want to act.
04:03You have known what deserves to be done and you have jumped into it and immersed.
04:11And in this, again it is possible that there are others running ahead of you, beside you, behind you.
04:23It's again possible.
04:23But now you are not looking at them.
04:29Externally, situation 1 and 2 may look almost the same.
04:34The critical difference is whether you are doing something with respect to others or whether you are doing it.
04:45What we have seen is, what history suggests is, the ones who run by themselves, for themselves are often seen beating the competition without wanting to.
05:12They don't even want to beat the competition and at the end or at some point, they discover that they are ahead of most of the pack and are surprised.
05:27They said, how has this happened?
05:32They said, how has this happened?
05:35We never intended to be ahead of others.
05:38The intention was something else.
05:39The intention was something else.
05:40What was the intention?
05:41What was the intention?
05:42The intention was a love affair between me and this thing that I am doing.
05:45That was the intention.
05:46That's what I did.
05:47And no, I suddenly find I am ahead of the pack.
06:01And this surprise thing, I'll give you two examples.
06:07The first one from IIT and the second one from somewhere else.
06:13Like everybody who prepares for the JE, I too had targeted a top 100 rank, didn't get it.
06:21In fact, missed it by a mile.
06:28So there was this curiosity, reached the campus, what is special about the top 100 rankers?
06:37And since it was IIT Delhi, we even had a few of the top 10 rankers.
06:45We chose the CS branch, they were there.
06:49And what I found quite curious was that many of them, most of them said that they were taken
07:01aback by their rank.
07:07That the rankers came as a surprise to them.
07:14These were people who really had their heart in what they studied, at least at the JE level.
07:26Maybe not later on in the campus.
07:28So they loved solving problems, physics, maths, chemistry, they enjoyed that.
07:39It was their enjoyment that kept them going.
07:44That enabled them to do the long hours.
07:50And then the result was declared and they said, All India rank 5, how is that possible?
07:58One of them said, I thought it is some kind of typo or something and waited for 3-4 days
08:05in case the JE office issues a clarification or correction.
08:10That's how you beat the competition, not by targeting the competition, but by being with yourself.
08:28My CAT exam.
08:31I was not too keen on the CAT on going to the IMs.
08:36I was preparing for the UPSC.
08:39So my UPSC mains were in the November month of year 2000.
08:48And the CAT was scheduled on December 9th or 11th, so I hardly had a month to prepare.
08:58So I joined a test series so that I may just know where I stand with respect to others.
09:05I joined the test series and I was never one of the toppers there.
09:09I was doing well, fine, but not much of preparation, not much inclination either, not one of the toppers
09:17there.
09:18The toppers again were from IIT.
09:23I knew them.
09:24So came the D-Day, we wrote the exam and the pattern had changed that year.
09:31Instead of 4 sections, there were only 3.
09:34Instead of 180 or 90 questions, there were only 165.
09:38And the questions were a lot tougher.
09:42So I anyway used to do some 120 odd questions.
09:47120, 125.
09:48That year I did 113.
09:50I thought I have not done very well.
09:53And just emerged from the center.
09:57And there I found the others almost sobbing, long faced, inconsolable.
10:06I asked what has happened.
10:08And these were the ones who were scoring 140, 150 at the time of the mock tests.
10:14I said, what has happened?
10:16There was hardly anyone there who had reached even triple digits.
10:2080s, 90s, maximum 105.
10:23It was then that I came to know that the pattern had changed.
10:29The questions were much more difficult than the previous years.
10:35I was not comparing.
10:37Even previous year is a comparison.
10:38Do you see this?
10:40How is the pattern compared to the previous year?
10:43How is the difficulty level compared to the previous year?
10:48So I still did 113 and that was much more than what most of the others had done.
10:52And when the results were declared, I got shortlisted for a particular scholarship.
10:58And the shortlisting there happens on the basis of your CAT score.
11:04So I could estimate that I am probably one of the toppers in the exam this time.
11:10And that was unintended.
11:15You don't beat the competition by continuously wasting your energy on surveillance.
11:24How is this one doing?
11:25How is that one doing?
11:26One fellow came to me and said, three hours a day he wastes on just tracking the competitors.
11:38Not just tracking them.
11:40Actually laying traps so that they waste half an hour or something.
11:46I said, fine.
11:47Do you succeed?
11:48Yes, I succeed.
11:50I am very smart.
11:57I waste at least an hour of my competitors' time every day.
12:01How many competitors do you have?
12:03There are five or six tough ones.
12:06And how much time do you use wasting their time?
12:09Three hours every day to waste their one hour this fellow wastes.
12:17This is not the way of love.
12:20This is not the way of authenticity or commitment.
12:26Do what you have to do and the results.
12:29Let them show up on their own.
12:32And then even if the results are not what the world demands of you, you won't be disappointed.
12:38Why?
12:39Because you anyway had a good time.
12:43You are doing what you love to do.
12:45If the results are great, that is a bonus.
12:49That's an extra thing.
12:51Even if the result is not great, you will be fine.
12:53I mean, who cares?
12:56Who cares?
12:57The food was delicious.
13:00You are already satisfied.
13:02Now if you find a huge discount in the bill, that's a bonus.
13:08Even if the discount is not there, you are already alright.
13:15No?
13:19No?
13:25Yeah.
13:26No?
13:27No?
13:28No?
13:29Absolutely.
13:30No?
13:31What?
13:32No?
13:33No?
13:35No?
13:38No?
13:39No?
13:40No?
13:41No?
13:43No?
13:44No?
13:45No?
13:46No?
13:47No?
13:48No?
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