A kid with bright eyes and a curious demeanour was asked for his name during a school inspection. The prompt answer was
“My name is Johnny Don’t”.
It appeared to be an improbable name, so the school principal decided to probe further, asking about his family background and who had given him that name. He elaborated that his mother was the driving force behind his achievements, and she always encouraged him by saying:
“Johnny Don’t Keep Doing That.”
He was happy that she had taught him to be persevering and persistent. He had accolades from all his teachers for his consistent achievements in every field.
This child had captured the essence of success by displacing the punctuation mark in his mother’s sentence and turning negativity into positivity.
Measuring Incremental Progress
Forward motion starts at birth, as the clock and calendar keep ticking away the years. All progress is being accounted for incrementally. The night pulls us back, as close as possible, to the foetal state — closed, protected and comfortable in the dark. The mind does not remain still, though. The subconscious replays whatever was ignored by the conscious mind during the day in our dreams or intuitive flashes. It is the conscious mind's job to draw inferences from subconscious activity and let it influence life going forward.
Life does not allow us to slip backwards or drop the baggage from the past. We carry the burden of our identity, our experience, and the blueprint that we have once drawn for the rest of our lives. If at all, mishap or misfortune manages to pull us back, it is labelled regression or de-growth, a negative term, not displacement or migration.
Incremental progress is measured from the beginning of life, not from any point in between. What if you took a detour and started afresh at some point?
The Power of Zero
Zero defines and balances both the positive and negative and is yet misconstrued as a state of nothingness in colloquial language.
“Oh, Jack and Social Sciences! He is a Big Zero”.
Have we bothered to check if Jack scored well in other subjects, his relative grades in different subjects under social sciences, or his improvement during a certain period? Does he qualify to be called a Zero despite his other achievements?
We measure life elements on both sides of zero and isolate the fulcrum. That is also the Power of Zero—— of influencing, of giving other numbers their relative position without being impacted itself. It transforms numbers in their trailing position (2400) and lets them be in their leading position (0024). It can shift the value of numbers from zero to infinity by a simple operation of multiplication or division.
What is more potent than Zero?
A tiny dot called the decimal point, something more potent than zero, transforms zero into a placeholder—the value of zero changes with its placement vis-à-vis this dot (0.0024 or 0.2400). However, zero does not lose its importance. 1.024 is different from 1.24 despite the decimal being placed after 1.
I see Zero as the core being, the soul, the source of energy in a human being, while the Decimal Point is the Universal Consciousness, a centripetal force that drives human life. The core is strong, but universal consciousness can help make it aware of its place vis-à-vis all other forces in the universe.
Meditation aims to reach a state of being, not doing. It enables fair and impartial observation of everything happening inside and around us.
How do we focus on Zero?
The burden of the past (birth, heredity, tradition, debts, and transferred life expectations) prevents us from leading self-aligned lives.
Zero-based budgeting is a tool in which one needs to justify every item of expenditure in the present context. The base figures are not automatically approved. It is not an incremental budget built upon a base figure and assumes that all incurred costs will continue.
Life needs to be planned in the same way. Shift the zero to your present position. It will help in the accurate measurement of future progress.
Look for the decimal point, and where has it placed you. The relativity to a circle of your priorities matters more than linear growth.
The only question that we need to ask ourselves is
What would I do if I could start again on a clean slate?
We need to move backwards but stop at zero. Refuse to slide onto the negative scale. The questions that you ask yourself should be :
How is the current situation serving you? Are you learning from it, or is it holding you back?
Which past value or belief stands in the way of your success?
What do you need to shed to move forward?
Which experience or belief is influencing your assumption of the situation?
A limitation, once identified, loses its force and can be overcome. Identify the voice that prompts this to be an impossible option. Think about the circumstances that made that voice say so. Are you facing identical circumstances? If not, then what stops you?
The Balance Sheet of Life
I can hear my business brain say that this approach may not reach the targets. Balance sheets must show a steady upward graph, not a zigzag line. The targets and the approach remain valid if you wish to be measured by the same market on the same parameters. If you don’t, change the path. The targets and goalposts will lose validity. It would be best if you pressed the reset button.
A just social order
The same principle applies to society. If linear growth is taking you in undesirable directions, press Reset. Future generations will thank you for your foresight. We need not leave a legacy that is a burden to them, be it the economy, the environment, or an unjust social order.
Stephen Fry says that our assumptions and vested interests color our perspective of a just society. This video nails the burden of the past and self-interest that we carry and that come in the way of building a just and equitable social order.
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