For our global friends, we celebrate Diwali in all Indian states, but for different reasons. In North India, Diwali symbolises Lord Ram’s return to Ayodhya, while in some other parts of the North, it celebrates Mahaveer’s achievement of Nirvana. In this way, Diwali means something different to each member of our community.
In the 30 days leading up to Diwali and the 3 days following the same, India is met with an unmatched festive spirit. During this period, Navratri, Dussehra, Ayudha Pooja and Durga Pooja are celebrated for 8 to 10 days all across India.
We celebrate our three powers through three goddesses: 1. Physical Power represented by Kali or Durga 2. Knowledge Power represented by Saraswati 3. Economic Power represented by Lakshmi.
With the festival of Diwali, we celebrate Goddess Lakshmi who represents economic power, by decorating and lighting up our houses to invite her into them. We invite Lakshmi into our homes, to fill them with prosperity and knowledge, and to monetise all our knowledge power.
10th September 2021 is the beginning of a Jain festival called Das Lakshan Parva – a festival that marks 10 Virtues over a period of 10 days.
I used to visit the temple during these 10 days with my father and listen to a few lectures at the temple. The lectures would make me feel good but I could not draw any connection between them and my daily life. A few years ago, I was searching for a framework from Indian scriptures in relation to where deep knowledge has been made repeatable. I found the answer in Paryushan Parva, where Jains celebrate 10 principles of a high-performance life over 10 days when they are completely committed to learning.
In this series of audio podcasts, I will try to cover the 10 virtues similar to habits of effective leadership on a daily basis for the next 10 days.
This year, the Nobel Prize for Physics and the Noble Prize for Chemistry are on two ends of the spectrum. The Physics Nobel Prize was given to the discovery of the Black Hole and for Chemistry it was given for the Genome Editing Technology CRISPR.
It’s the infinite power of the human mind to go and discover something which is 26,000 light years away from us. Each light year means 9 trillion km i.e. 26,000 X 9 X 1000,000,000,000 km away. Black hole means where the force of gravity is so strong that it pulls light as well.
It’s the power of the human mind that can also go into the minutest to minutest size of chromosomes and then sequence 3 billion base pairs. They measure this in a unit called nanometers which is 1 divided by 1000,000,000.
In Design Thinking, there are 2 competencies that are important which help in ‘Connecting the dot’ i.e. Perspective which is about seeing from a distance and the second is about Expertise, which is about going into micro details. Today, I am amazed to see the infinite capacity of the human mind to traverse from 26000 lights years to nanometers to solve the complex nature of the universe.
Tomorrow is the beginning of Das Lakshan Parva, which means 10 Virtues for 10 days.
My understanding of this festival: 1. I used to visit the temple during these days with my father and sat down in a few lectures randomly. I used to feel good but was not able to connect to my daily life. A few years ago I was searching for a framework from Indian scriptures in relation to where deep knowledge has been made repeatable. I found the answer in Paryushan Parva, where Jains celebrate the 10 Principles of High-Performance Life for 10 days that are committed to learning.
Article: Published on August 23, 2020 My understanding of Das Lakshan Dharam – Design Thinking in action for celebrating a high-performance life
Tomorrow is the beginning of Das Lakshan Parva, which means 10 Virtues for 10 days.
My understanding of this festival: 1. I used to visit the temple during these days with my father and sat down in a few lectures randomly. I used to feel good but was not able to connect to my daily life. A few years ago I was searching for a framework from Indian scriptures in relation to where deep knowledge has been made repeatable. I found the answer in Paryushan Parva, where Jains celebrate the 10 Principles of High-Performance Life for 10 days that are committed to learning.
2. Process Design: There are 3 innovations in this process design a) Each day is dedicated to understand, reflect and learn about one virtue. b) Guru (Pandit) has to be from another temple or other cities to provide a different perspective of the virtue. c) The learning process has 3 sessions – Morning: lecture form, Afternoon: Dialogue form and Evening: Lecture and Clarifications.
3. I relate the 10 virtues to the similar 7 habits of effective leadership
Habit 1 – Uttam Kshma (Supreme Forgiveness) – Reverse of Anger – Powerful vs. Forgiveness. Container of disappointments poured out on the weakest person in the link.
Habit 2 – Uttam Mardava (Supreme Humility) – Reverse of Arrogance (Ego) – I know it all vs. I need to know.
Habit 3 – Uttam Aarjava (Straight Forwardness) – Reverse of Deceit (Maya) – what I think, what I say, what I do are aligned.
Habit 4 – Uttam Shauch (Purity or Contentment) – Reverse of Greed – I want more.
Habit 5 – Uttam Satya (Truth) – The search for real truth not just ‘speaking the truth’. Searching for the root cause.
Habit 6 – Uttam Sanyam (Self-restraint) – Having patience and not hurting any living beings.
Habit 7 – Uttam Tapa – The process of learning – Disciplining Senses and Disciplining Mind.
Habit 8 – Uttam Tyaag – Letting go vs. just giving donation – Letting go your attachments.
Habit 9 – Uttam Akinchanya (Non-attachment) – Detachment from all Emotional attachments and the past.
Habit 10 – Uttam Brahamcharya – It’s not about celibacy but about Total Surrender to the true knowledge of the Soul. Follow Brahma – The power of Nature.
The Process Design and extreme distilling of the knowledge of life in just 10 virtues which can drive ethics, collaboration and continuous learning in a community is the true example of Design Thinking in action for celebrating a High-Performance Life.
And people stayed home and read books and listened and rested and exercised and made art and played and learned new ways of being and stopped and listened deeper someone meditated someone prayed someone danced someone met their shadow and people began to think differently and people healed and in the absence of people who lived in ignorant ways, dangerous, meaningless and heartless, even the earth began to heal and when the danger ended and people found each other grieved for the dead people and they made new choices and dreamed of new visions and created new ways of life and healed the earth completely just as they were healed themselves.
Kathleen O’Meara, pen name Grace Ramsay, was an Irish-French Catholic writer and biographer during the late Victorian era.
This poem appeared in her second novel ‘Iza’s Story’, which was about the struggle of Polish patriots against Russian, Austrian and German occupation. The book compares the Polish-Russian situation to the Irish-British situation and praises the revolt of a small nation against a great neighbour.
Our purpose gets clearer and more relevant every day.
Just three years ago, armed with compassion and a massive transformative purpose, Mission Samriddhi set out to learn and understand the patterns, gaps and opportunities for holistic community development in rural India.
That was Mission Samriddhi 1.0. We are happy to say that we are now ready for Mission Samriddhi 2.0 where we are looking to scale.
Welcome to Mission Samriddhi’s Summit 8 on ‘Design for Scale’
Article: Published on January 29, 2020 Our purpose gets clearer and more relevant every day.
Just three years ago, armed with compassion and a massive transformative purpose, Mission Samriddhi set out to learn and understand the patterns, gaps and opportunities for holistic community development in rural India.
That was Mission Samriddhi 1.0. We are happy to say that we are now ready for Mission Samriddhi 2.0 where we are looking to scale.
Welcome to Mission Samriddhi’s Summit 8 on ‘Design for Scale’ with 4 distinctive sessions.
We kick off with an Expert Workshop where stakeholders from the government, social impact organisations and individuals will deliberate and work out a potential roadmap for each of the following tracks: India Panchayat Forum, Cluster Development Programme, Livelihood and Agri allied, Integrated Education, Healthcare, SHG and Rural Entrepreneurship.
The outcome of Expert Workshops will be discussed in Panel Sessions along with Expert Speakers.
A Sarpanch Roundtable with inspiring leaders from around the country will be part of the event to celebrate The PoleStar Awards honouring winners in the social impact space.
The need for networking time indicated in Summit 7 is being met with a Power Breakfast Session.
Some of the experts who will be part of these sessions are stalwarts in rural transformation in the region. Shri. Sunil Kumar, IAS, Secretary, Ministry of Panchayat Raj, Government of India Shri S. M. Vijayanand, IAS, Former Chief Secretary, Govt of Kerala, Chairman Sixth State Finance Commission, Kerala Dr W. R. Reddy, IAS, Director General, National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Mr. Siddharth Tripathi, IFS, Commissioner, MGNREGA, Government of Jharkhand Mr. Bala Murugan D., IAS, CEO of BRLPS Jeevika,Government of Bihar Mr. Tausif Ahmed Quraishi, Senior Manager, Ultra-poor Graduation Programme, BRAC, Bangladesh
We look forward to each of the sessions with positivity in the hope that we will build a more prosperous India together!
Hello, my name is Arun Jain. I am a design thinker living in Chennai, India. This is my blog, where I post my thoughts, technology trends and tips about the fintech world and many more.
