Archives
April 2024
Categories
All
|
Back to Blog
NOMAD5/11/2023 My friend and publisher is a certified Global Nomad. He's travelling now for two years all over Europe and apparently now in Mongolia with his partner while working on his businesses. He writes for Medium and will get his book published soon on the same topic. He's not rootless as what it seems like. Global nomadism is not place-centric but lifestyle and values-aligned life design. Designing this kind of life requires an intentional and deep way of honoring your truest desires and bringing them to life in a way that supports yourself and your needs, the environment, for long term. Who is this for? For those who are not adhering into 'living and dying in one place' where there are choices that lie open wide and are taking it. Cyber work propels and invigorates this culture shift. Globalization in ICT power charges it. Culture shift in this area is taking place. The exodus has just begun. More and more people are moving not just for greener pastures but to elect a different life. For sure this is not for everyone. But some people are not troubled by lack of security, lack of social ties in one place, or lack of family supports and other familial things when they're life is in flux. Some people flourish in that kind of mobility and dislocation. They take the road as their offices and cubicles and learn the ways of the people they meet and share coffee with on a train, bus, tuk-tuk, or tourist tram. My friend is living the life that he desires and not flinching about it. We can be nomads in your town as well. We can exist in one area but totally isolated from the rest of its current realities. This is not about travelling and moving but deciding to not participate with life in all of its dynamism. Nomadism is a choice, by far a choice that creates its own limits as well as possibilities. If you elect to be so, where would you go and what would you like to learn in the process.
0 Comments
Read More
Back to Blog
UNPERSUADABLE4/20/2023 We know for a fact that not everyone will like what you do and will believe what you say and stand for. That's very obvious. But there's a class of people who will never believe and will not be persuaded even in the face of great supporting evidence or contrarian evidence. We call these people unpersuadable. They will dig on their heels but will never capitulate maybe because of ego, apathy, lack of trust with the other person or their leaders, or merely because they want to play that way. What is insidious is the fact that this attitude is totally annoying and a barrier to engagement. Organizations dealing with these kinds of people are reluctant to confront the unpersuadable for fear that they could be more entrenched with an extreme position or lack thereof. Change management analytics will determine that a different strategy should be employed for the unpersuadable such as keeping them at arm's length and providing information that they need without the urge to win them over. Realistically, let them know that it's not okay to be unpersuadable. It's a character flaw and by acting that way, shows you their real worth. If it's someone you have no relations or context with, walk away.
Back to Blog
SHOW MONEY3/17/2023 When I immigrated to Canada on 13 July 2010, I had two suitcases and a big Balikbayan box (used to send goods home for families who stayed behind). At the immigration desk, I was asked about my show money- a money you guarantee that you have with you at the time of landing that you will survive in the next few days or weeks, or maybe if you have a lot, a few months to stave away destitution. Where is your show money? To prove you can survive in Canada on a shoe-string budget and still feel happy with your decision to uproot yourself, your career, and your life for no apparent life-threatening reason but to improve your chances of greater success- whatever that is, a house mortgage, better education, fresher air and food, elevated status-The Great Canadian Dream. Us, immigrants we all had it. The grim determination that we will no matter what it takes, overcome and will get that coveted Canadian passport, identity, language, and social ties under our belts at last. The folks back home will be super proud of what we have done and will say, better in Canada struggling than back home. As I eased into the new Canadian living, the show money transformed in a different way. Where is your Canadian experience? It's like saying that you will never make it here as a landed immigrant if you don't have the Canadian experience which is synonymous to "killing the immigrants softly." How exactly will you get the Canadian experience if nobody will take the risk of hiring you? In order to survive, they have to take survival jobs which is like a penance of choosing Canada as their home. In my last successful job interview, I told them, " I am fresh off the boat and with no Canadian work experience at all yet but I have travelled the world-world-weary and worldly enough to be flexible and adaptable." I got the job! They sure can't believe that I have just arrived and now competing against 500 work applicants in that city. The rest is history. The next show money question is different. It is all about in their heads, "what are your credentials that will allow us to respect you and believe that you can help?" This one is tough to crack. But, there's always a way around it. Of all these questions, one thing is for sure, not all will be pleased and will accept who you are and what you're here for in this country, this city, this small town, and neighborhood. There will also be people like that. But as immigrants who discovered a new home, a new identity that could fuse with the old, and new relations on top of the discarded ones, suggest that we can completely write our own stories with ourselves as the main protagonists, despite the odds. I guess, striving to win every time. |