Myshkin Ingawale, co-founder and CEO of Biosense Technologies
(Image: Myshkin Ingawale)
On the way to give a talk at the recent TEDx Jaipur
event, I had a bit of a surreal experience on the flight over from
Mumbai. I was sitting next to a gentleman called Nithya Shanti, a
spiritual teacher. He was having the following conversation with the
other person in the row -
NS: "Do you think the universe is benevolent, malevolent or indifferent? I think it is most definitely benevolent"
Now, to many people, this might seem an innocuous enough statement. Not to me.
Me: "...by the way, I couldn't but help overhear you talking about the nature of the universe. Interesting topic!"
NS: "Yes, indeed. In my experience..."
Me: "But it most definitely is indifferent. It has no benevolence and no malevolence. "
NS: "Yes, but..."
Me: "Consider, if you may, the engineer designing this Boeing
aircraft. We are lucky he or she designed the aircraft bearing in mind
the indifference of the universe to it. Winds at 20000 feet are not
benevolent to a flimsy aluminum tube with wings. They may blow hither,
thither, and at whatever speed they wish. The engineer has to assume
the wind is indifferent to his or her design and will not be the
slightest bit benevolent. In fact, we are lucky the engineer did not
assume the universe is benevolent!"
NS: "That's a great way to put it. However..."
The
reason he believed that the universe was benevolent, NS told me, is
that, believing so made it so. Going through life thinking that
everyone is against you is harmful to yourself. He reasoned that you
can always find what you are looking for in the world; if you look for
happiness, you will find happiness. Therefore, it is better to believe
in the universe's benevolence, and be happy.
Me: "That makes sense, at some level..."
Like any bona fide academic, I was ready to launch in with the magic
words - "however, in this context..." As in, "In this context of
utter-self-delusion-to-make-one-self-happier", this made sense.
However, being wiser than I was at 17, I let it drop and ended up
having a great conversation about pretty much everything with NS.
Later on, after I had given my talk at TEDx about the twists and
turns of my entrepreneurial journey, I started thinking about NS's
question again.
If you are an airplane designer, please believe firmly in the
universe being indifferent. Once you are done with your design and can
do no more, take a break and feel free to indulge in a little "belief
in benevolence" - this is going to work out. My dog loves me. They're
going to serve mango ice-cream in the canteen today. Whatever works for
you.
However, if you are an entrepreneur, believing in some kind of
universal benevolence is almost a prerequisite. For entrepreneurship,
you need more than a plan, you need more than logic, and more than an
analysis of all the indifferent ways your plan could fail. Dare I say
it - you need faith.
You need faith in your team and faith in yourself. Faith that things
will work themselves out at some point. Faith that even if they don't
necessarily work out in the way you planned in that fantastically
complicated Excel workbook, they will work out in some other way that
you hadn't planned. Faith that you will land always on your feet, come
what may. If that isn't blind faith in the benevolence of the universe,
I don't know what is.
Entrepreneurs are not people who believe the universe will be
indifferent to them. They tend to be the kind of people who buy into
corny lines like "If you truly want something, the universe conspires
for you to get it".
For all my dispassionate talk of "the universe is actually
indifferent", a year ago almost to the day I voted with my feet by
jumping off an airplane (in other words, I left a comfy, well paid
consulting job). I was only able to do this because somewhere, deep
down, I expected that the universe, in all its benevolence, would teach
me to fly rather than leaving me hurtling me towards the ground.
So far, the blind faith has paid off.
http://www.newscientist.com/
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