A Consultant's take on Spiritual Philosophy...
"Though there are sometimes phenomena which point to the intervention
of beings of another plane, not always or often of a high order, the mass of
such writings comes from a dramatizing element in the subconscient then
predictions of the future and statements of things known in the present and past
come up, but otherwise these writings have not a great value. The object of the
society was, to group in a common intellectual life and fraternity of sentiment
those who accept the spiritual tendency and idea it represents and who aspire to
realize it in their own individual and social action… "
Phew!! I read this flutter of speech in just one breath and closed my eyes, almost losing myself to a trance… admiring the depth and profundity of the writ, marvelling at the harmonious musical rhythm it strung, wondering the source of such a discourse… and at the same time asking myself how much of it did my mind actually comprehend, did it at all? ... my mind seemed to mind that question and mindfully retorted that it was just a mindless assembly of words emanated from an ignited mind… oh wait, the trance-like feeling seemed to have gone, my mind was now talking, (or was it blabbering like that ‘ignited mind') ... Afraid of letting it waiver further, I closed the book that I had been reading, The Life Sketch of Sri Aurobindo, and put it away to rest…
Err ... Ohh ... Sri Aurobindo had descended to give a spiel on Risk Management, was the immediate thought, and I impatiently scuttled at the bottom of the document for references to one of his writings, to find none… but hell, this is how we consultants write anyways. Can’t say how comprehensible this would be for the CXOs, but somehow these words were all crystal clear to me atleast…
To sound jargonishly intelligent and sheepishly insightful is what we consultants do for our bread and butter… at times it can get quite intense and overwhelming, almost sounding unreal and spiritual ... to the extent of crossing that thin, almost invisible, line between consulting and spirituality, if that line at all exists ... I would like to believe it does, so started making a case for how different (superior, if I may add) consulting is compared to spirituality …
Phew!! I read this flutter of speech in just one breath and closed my eyes, almost losing myself to a trance… admiring the depth and profundity of the writ, marvelling at the harmonious musical rhythm it strung, wondering the source of such a discourse… and at the same time asking myself how much of it did my mind actually comprehend, did it at all? ... my mind seemed to mind that question and mindfully retorted that it was just a mindless assembly of words emanated from an ignited mind… oh wait, the trance-like feeling seemed to have gone, my mind was now talking, (or was it blabbering like that ‘ignited mind') ... Afraid of letting it waiver further, I closed the book that I had been reading, The Life Sketch of Sri Aurobindo, and put it away to rest…
To distract my mind from the incomprehensible, I decided to get back
to a far more familiar and comfortable zone, my work… an email from a colleague
on a point-of-view to be presented to some CXOs on risk management was pending
for review… such consulting work is at the core of my heart and a great
stimulant for the mind .... Risk Management as an area has always attracted a
special interest, I must add… I immediately started feeling at ease, to be back
in my own domain… I began reading the paper and it went -
"The evolution to an enterprise and value network view of ‘risk’ has been necessitated by the diversity of sudden geo-political risks, tragic natural events, and daily operational/financial disruptions. Complexities in our global marketplace cause a domino effect – one domino falls or falters, and the others may well follow. Comprehensive, “mature” risk management programs with risk awareness, top-down organization and network alignment help alleviate the effects of risk on enterprise performance. A holistic approach to business resilience and risk management is needed that combines resilience and risk efforts taking place enterprise-wide — integrating them into a cohesive whole and applying the results to all business decisions and value optimized risk management strategy…"
"The evolution to an enterprise and value network view of ‘risk’ has been necessitated by the diversity of sudden geo-political risks, tragic natural events, and daily operational/financial disruptions. Complexities in our global marketplace cause a domino effect – one domino falls or falters, and the others may well follow. Comprehensive, “mature” risk management programs with risk awareness, top-down organization and network alignment help alleviate the effects of risk on enterprise performance. A holistic approach to business resilience and risk management is needed that combines resilience and risk efforts taking place enterprise-wide — integrating them into a cohesive whole and applying the results to all business decisions and value optimized risk management strategy…"
Err ... Ohh ... Sri Aurobindo had descended to give a spiel on Risk Management, was the immediate thought, and I impatiently scuttled at the bottom of the document for references to one of his writings, to find none… but hell, this is how we consultants write anyways. Can’t say how comprehensible this would be for the CXOs, but somehow these words were all crystal clear to me atleast…
To sound jargonishly intelligent and sheepishly insightful is what we consultants do for our bread and butter… at times it can get quite intense and overwhelming, almost sounding unreal and spiritual ... to the extent of crossing that thin, almost invisible, line between consulting and spirituality, if that line at all exists ... I would like to believe it does, so started making a case for how different (superior, if I may add) consulting is compared to spirituality …
Let's see ... well ... Consulting is an intangible deliverable (wow!)
... But so is spirituality! Ok alright, Consulting can be called tangible to the
extent that it is delivered on a bunch of papers! ... Papers created out of thin
air (originally from the trees of course), lets say air (no not 'gas') that
resides in the ever-prolific minds of the consultants, which is by the way also
responsible for their inflated brains, making them feel ballooned high above
others ... But so do spiritual philosophers behave I guess ...
I realized, to my utter amazement, I was finding only similarities and no real differences as I continued to make notes… spirituality cannot be taught, it comes from within as ones soul speaks… consulting is not an acquired art either, it has to come from within too, from within ones own mind (or from within ones document repository)..
Both rely on heavy usage of non-conversational (cryptic?) words, words which are restricted from usage in a normal conversations and forsaken in some forbidden corners of the dictionary ... any usage of such words automatically make the conversation sound surreal ... here they go… wisdom, truth, morals, sermons, principles, aphorisms, lessons, conscience, beliefs, values, vision, ethics, and most importantly the word ‘life’… Spirituality, perhaps, reserves the sole right to use this word ‘Life’ in all its forms, formats and fonts and take entire responsibility of the living techniques therein… on a similar note, consultants consider themselves singularly responsible for living of everything ‘non-life’…
So give any business or any place or any process or any piece of non-life in the 'responsible' hands of the consultants and they will invariably find a new perspective to it through setting of visions, values (of the chain type), goals, objectives, strategies, context, imperatives and so on… they break down existing structure into elements, skills, initiatives, streams and believe they reach the most atomic level (does it sound like the spiritual chemistry of mind?), introducing new processes, models, approaches, methodologies, enablers… and deliver value through differentiators, metrics, standards, synergies, transformation…
I realized, to my utter amazement, I was finding only similarities and no real differences as I continued to make notes… spirituality cannot be taught, it comes from within as ones soul speaks… consulting is not an acquired art either, it has to come from within too, from within ones own mind (or from within ones document repository)..
Both rely on heavy usage of non-conversational (cryptic?) words, words which are restricted from usage in a normal conversations and forsaken in some forbidden corners of the dictionary ... any usage of such words automatically make the conversation sound surreal ... here they go… wisdom, truth, morals, sermons, principles, aphorisms, lessons, conscience, beliefs, values, vision, ethics, and most importantly the word ‘life’… Spirituality, perhaps, reserves the sole right to use this word ‘Life’ in all its forms, formats and fonts and take entire responsibility of the living techniques therein… on a similar note, consultants consider themselves singularly responsible for living of everything ‘non-life’…
So give any business or any place or any process or any piece of non-life in the 'responsible' hands of the consultants and they will invariably find a new perspective to it through setting of visions, values (of the chain type), goals, objectives, strategies, context, imperatives and so on… they break down existing structure into elements, skills, initiatives, streams and believe they reach the most atomic level (does it sound like the spiritual chemistry of mind?), introducing new processes, models, approaches, methodologies, enablers… and deliver value through differentiators, metrics, standards, synergies, transformation…
The deliverable of consulting, call it a recommendation or a point of
view or simply an advice, by its intrinsic nature, is immortal… it never sees
death, for it necessarily needs to be reproduced to live up to its worth… the
more the number of reuses, the more its value, till it sort of becomes a
doctrine ... Sometimes proudly named after its so called originator (or
aggregator?) ... and this again is exactly similar to how spirituality thrives
and survives, through reproduction... more it is applied, more value it
generates.
Thus, through such multiplied reproduction, great consultants and
spiritualists are born !!! So essentially that thin line does not exist, not
even a dotted one…
I wonder, if Sri Aurobindo had to write a prologue to this blog
(should I say exec summary), he would have said - "The Spiritualists and
Consultants, by their own unaided effort could not hope to succeed. It is only
in proportion as they come into a more and more universal communion with the
Highest that they can hope to overcome both life and non-life with any
finality"
Now that I can not only understand his writings, but also
attempt to write like him, I am seriously thinking of adopting spirituality as
an alternate profession and smoothly hopping over that non-existent thin
line…
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