90-10 Principle

Life Lesson - 90-10 Principle

Description

• It is the ability to handle any situation without getting ruffled.
• This can be used in almost every situation in life, anywhere, everywhere and with anyone.
• It helps us to change a problematic situation into manageable situation.

Intent

• Exploring the possibility of 90/10 Principle – responding to a situation and not reacting to a situation.
• Apply this principle and avoid undeserved stress, trials, problems, and headache.
• We really have no control over 10% of what happens to us.  The other 90% is different. We determine the other 90%!

  

Life Lesson: 90/10 Principle

You’re eating breakfast with your family. Your daughter knocks over a cup of coffee onto your business shirt. You have no control over what just happened. What happens next will be determined by how you react. You curse. You harshly scold your daughter for knocking the coffee cup over. She breaks down in tears. After scolding her, you turn to your spouse and criticize them for placing the cup too close to the edge of the table. A short verbal battle follows. You storm upstairs and change your shirt. Back downstairs you find your daughter has been too busy crying to finish breakfast and get ready for school. She misses the bus. Your spouse must leave immediately for work. You rush to the car and drive your daughter to school. Because you are late, you drive 40 miles an hour in a 30 mph speed zone.

After a 15-minute delay and throwing $60 (traffic fine) away, you arrive at school. Your daughter runs to the building without saying good-bye. After arriving at the office 20 minutes late, you find you forgot your briefcase. Your day has started terrible. As it continues, it seems to get worse and worse. You look forward to going home. When you arrive home, you find a small wedge in your relationship with your spouse and daughter. Why? Because the way you reacted in the morning.

Why did you have a bad day?

A) Did the coffee cause it?

B) Did your daughter cause it?

C) Did the Policeman cause it?

D) Did you cause it?

The answer is D. You had no control over what happened with the coffee. How you reacted in those 5 seconds is what caused your bad day.

Here is what could have and should have happened. Coffee splashes over you. Your daughter is about to cry. You gently say, “It’s OK honey, you just need to be more careful next time.” Grabbing a towel you rush upstairs. After grabbing a new shirt and your briefcase, you come back down in time to look through the window and see your child getting on the bus. She turns and waves. You and your spouse kiss before you both

In any given situation reactions may go like a chain of reactions and response always ends with positive and peaceful.

Questions:

1. In a situation, when provoked what do you do?

2. What makes you to react in a situation?

3. Have you ever felt that a day was particularly a very bad day?

4. Can you share experiences where you had responded instead of reacting?

Situations:

1. Your mother asks you to go to the market. But you want to study. So you refuse to go. Your mother scolds you very badly. You get extremely angry. But still you ignore your anger and go to the market.
2. Your family is going on a tour. The van breaks down on the way. Every one is disappointed. The van cleaner walks down to the nearby town and brings a mechanic. The van gets repaired and you continue the journey.

3. Three people decide to take an auto to central station. One of them calls for an auto, but does not bargain the amount. All the three of them reach central. The auto driver charges 20 rupees more. The person who paid feels cheated and gets extremely angry and shouts at the driver.
4. A person travels to a new place. While returning the person is alone. And the train ticket is not yet confirmed.

       

Students’ responses (some examples)

1.      Action: Not studying the lessons as told by the teacher

Reaction 1: teacher’s anger Reaction 2: student’s remorse, insult and anger

Response: understanding that and reading the lessons the next time.

2.  Action: mother doesn’t cook food well

     Reaction 1: daughter gets angry.  Reaction 2: mother feels bad

            Response: father pacifies and arranges alternative food

3. Action: not taking pen to the exam Reaction 1:  tension, reaction 2: she forgets answers to some questions Response: teacher gives her a pen. She writes the exam well. 
4. Employer scolding the employee for his mistake - Action, Employee getting angry at employer – Reaction 1, Employer getting upset and scold – Reaction 2, Employer takes revenge – Reaction 3, Keeping quiet and realizing the mistake accepts it and does work rightly – Response

5. Taking poor marks in the exam – Action, Dad scolding – Reaction 1, Your weeping – Reaction 2, Mother upset – Reaction 3, Assuring Dad and resolving to take high marks and systematically work hard for it – Response

6. Going to school late – Action, Teacher scolding – Reaction 1, You get upset – reaction 2, Preparing and going punctually from next day onwards – Response

7. Copying in the exam – Action, Teacher scolding for it – Reaction 1, Get punishment – reaction 2, Ask sorry and realizing the mistake and study well – Response

8. Hitting of car – Action, Driver angry – Reaction 1, Fight start with the exchange of abuses – reaction 2, Going by compromise and finding settlement – response

9. Watering plant – Action Growing of tree – Reaction Bearing fruits – Response

   

10. Watching TV – Action, Parent scolding – Reaction 1, Ignoring the advice result in wearing optical – Reaction 2, Controlling and watching select program in TV is Response

     

Activity: Role play concept

Scene 1

Morning 6’ o clock, newspaper arrives. The brother and sister in a house fights with each other as to who will read the paper first. Both of them pull the paper and it gets torn. Father shouts at them.

Scene 2

Both of them fight for the newspaper.  The brother suggests that they can share some pages and read.

Four Seasons

Life Lesson: Four seasons

Description:

Just like there are four seasons, there are four lessons that are crucial to our life. The four seasons are silently teaching these lessons. By becoming aware of them, learning them, and applying them in our existence, there is no doubt it enable us to craft a very fulfilling life.

Intent:

To understand different phases of changing life

To prepare one self to face the changing situations

To equip oneself and to avoid future troubles

Life Lesson: Four seasons:

Handle the winters:
Every year, winter comes. It always comes. We deal with it by preparing for it. Whether it’s changing our clothing or changing our way of life, we always get ready for winter; because we know it’s coming. The same applies to our life. Rough times WILL come. No life goes smoothly without a problem from beginning to end. Thus, we have to be ready for it, for when it does come, we are not stuck in the cold without a coat. Be ready to handle the winters in our own life.

Take advantage of the spring:
Every year, after a long winter, comes the spring. This is a time where opportunities arise. Flowers blossom and creatures come out of their hibernation. The same thing applies within our life. After a challenging time, we will be faced with a great opportunity. It is our duty to take full advantage of the springs when they pop up. This is our moment to plant the seeds of greatness to come. We never see all the beauty that is life and nature on this planet decide not to awaken one year in the spring! It does because it is meant to do so. Hold our own existence to that same standard. Make our springs the springboard to getting where we want to go.

Protect our summer:
After having planted our seeds in the spring, soon the summer will come. This is a time where we can reap the benefits of our crops. As well as being a time of joy and comfort, it is also a time to be careful.  There is a saying, “all good will be attacked”. If we are not careful, our crops will be either stolen, destroyed, or spoiled. Therefore we must do whatever it takes to protect our crops. Once we have achieved something in our life, we must defend it. We must stand up for it, and protect its value. Otherwise we may find ourselves losing it.

Take responsibility in the fall:
As the autumn comes, the trees change color, lose their leaves, and the weather gets cooler. As we gear up for another winter, it is the best time to take full responsibility of what happened in the previous seasons, both good and bad. This is the time where we can open ourselves to learning the lessons that the previous seasons taught us and put everything into perspective. They say that the fall is the time of the year where there is more depression than any other time. This is due to people not taking such responsibilities and learning from previous successes and/or mistakes. Only by doing so can we be ready once more to handle another winter that is coming and plan for the following spring & summer.

  

Questions:

What are the four seasons in our life?

How good we are in our planning to handle seasons of life?

What would happen if we are not prepared?

What are the seasons our family passed through in the past?

Have we noticed 4 seasons from our friends and relatives life?

There is a saying – Prevention is better than cure; Can we relate 4 seasons with this?

Role play concept:

Scene I : Not doing what is need to be done in each season

Scene 2 : Exactly doing what has to be done

Highlight the moral of the play

Creative Drawing:

Draw four seasons connecting various phases of our life.

Are you listening to Stomach and Tongue?

Life lessons – Are you listening to Stomach and Tongue?

Description:  We are what we eat. Mental clarity and mental toughness were directly related to the nature of one’s diet.  We should eat to survive instead of living to eat. As in, we should value life more than food.  We need to eat food that keeps us healthy; we should ensure food does not become our obsession or addiction. By transforming our diet, we can dramatically reshape our body, moods, energy levels and overall vitality.  All our academic excellence and self improvement techniques will not help us if we do not have the energy and health to apply and excel with them. With proper and thoughtful nutrition, we will have the longevity and ability to achieve our dreams. 

Intent: To understand golden rule - ‘Eat to live and don’t live to eat.

To be conscious of suitability of intake according to one’s bodily needs

            To understand the transient nature of taste

Caring for stomach over tongue

Life lesson: Recently my friend Arun went to Bangalore stayed in a Hotel.  After the day’s work he went to a shopping Mall.  On his return he had seen a small American corn outlet and naturally a desire arose in his mind to have a taste of it. He approached the corn shop. The shop boy asked whether he prefers Rs.15/- cup or R.20/- or Rs.30/- cup?  He preferred Rs.30/- cup as he wants to have more. The boy again asked him whether he prefers with masala or without. He said, with masala.  Arun’s stomach felt semi full.  He had tasted a full cup of corn.  When coming out Arun entered a nearby hotel and it was then past 8 pm, his dinner time.  On looking at the menu list, he ordered onion rava dosa. It took some time for the hotel to prepare the rava dosa and he waited patiently with an eagerness to have a taste of it.  When it was served, it did not taste as expected.  As he had the policy of not wasting food, he ate full dosa.  On coming out he bought a yellow banana after sometime he ate it thinking that it would help digestion.  He went to sleep. Suddenly he got disturbed at 3 am and felt some uneasiness in stomach.  He felt vomiting sensation and vomited to see entire rava dosa came out. His digestion parts struggled for more than seven hours to digest the oily rava dasa and at last lost in the battle.  Strenuous effort to vomit had taken the toll of his throat also. He was in difficulty to swallow anything.  The next day was horrible one for Arun.  He became austere for the whole day.  Most delicious food could not tempt him.

Questions:

1. Do you have any such experience in your life?
2. What should be our approach towards food?
3. Should we allow food an obsession or addiction in our life?
4. Why we are not caring for stomach’s alarm and hasten to fulfill the slightest command of the tongue?
5. Why are not able to resist the temptation of taste? What should we do?
6. Is it possible to take what is good for health though it has less in taste?
7. Do all people go to hotels to meet the needs of stomach or tongue?
8. Can we cultivate enough courage to say ‘No’ to tongue?
9. What are the life lessons we can learn from the above incident?

Role plays concepts:

1. Debate between stomach and tongue (enacting the parts of stomach and tongue)

2. Scene No.1 – Unable to resist the delicious food and succumbing to the temptation of tongue

     Scene No.2 – Overcoming the temptation

3. Scene No.1 – Going after tongue’s sound dictates

     Scene No.2 – Listening to the small voice of stomach

Analyze and Explore:

The most powerful animals the elephant, rhino and gorilla (which has thirty times a man’s strength) all survive on vegetables or fruits.

One Minute Talk:

Junk food and Nutritional food

Creative Drawing:

Food habits – positive and negative effects 

Idhaya Kalvi

Idhaya Kalvi

Idhaya Kalvi (Education for heart) is a simple way of kindling goodness in the hearts of students through lessons we come across in every day life. It is a journey of understanding and accepting oneself, both pluses and minuses. The topics are categorized as Life Lessons to facilitate for ready application in every day life situations.  This can be used for Value Education class, Moral science class and Life skills class in schools.

The uniqueness of Idhaya Kalvi is that it at once connects every  heart and make him/her explore and learn the lessons which life presents to them in a more practical way.  The topics are derived through life experiences at every event or situation and application oriented. These topics are suitable for all standards  starting from middle school, high school, higher secondary schools. The reply and imbibing of the topics varies according to age and experience of the students. These topics have been designed suited to the delivery of facilitation approach, a non-teaching technique.

Idhaya Kalvi is inspired by the Living Values Program of VSET (www.vset.org).