Tag: #powerofsee

Attention — the Essential Energy to Achieve & Improve Anything.

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Complexity, Critical Thinking, Dibyendu De, Education, Engineering, Failure Analysis, Industry 4.0, IOT, Maintenance, Management, Rapidinnovation, rcm, reliabilityLeave a comment

Information enters our consciousness either because we intend to focus attention on it or as a result of attentional habits based on biological or social instructions.

For example, driving down the extremely busy and often chaotic streets of Kolkata, we pass by hundreds of cars without actually being aware of them. Their shape, size and colours might register for a fraction of a second, and then they are immediately forgotten the next moment.

But our primary objective is to reach from one place to another without an accident or suffering a scratch. But how do we achieve that goal?

So while driving, we occasionally notice a particular vehicle, perhaps because it is moving unsteadily between lanes or because it is moving too slowly or because it looks strange in some way.

The image of the unusual vehicle enters our focus of consciousness and we become intensely aware of it unusual behaviour.

In our minds, such visual information about the car (the abnormal behaviour) gets related to information about other errant cars stored in our memory, which helps us determine into which category the present instance fits. Is this an inexperienced driver, a rash driver, a drunken driver, a momentarily distracted (talking on a mobile phone) but competent driver?

As soon as the event is matched to an already known class of events, it is identified. Now it has to be evaluated: Is this something to worry about? If the answer is yes, then we must immediately decide on an appropriate course of action: Should we speed up, overtake, slow down, change lanes, stop?

All these complex mental operations must be completed quickly and in real time. But it doesn’t happen automatically. There seems to be a distinct process that makes such reactions possible. This process is called attention. It is attention that selects the relevant bits of information from a potential of thousands of bits available.

It takes attention to retrieve the appropriate references from memory, to evaluate the real-life event and then choose the right thing to do.

Despite its great powers, attention can’t step beyond the limits as already described. It can’t notice or hold in focus more information that can be processed simultaneously. Retrieving information from memory and bringing it into the focus of awareness, comparing information, evaluating, deciding — all make demands on the mind’s limited processing capacity. For instance, the driver who notices an errant car will have to stop talking on his cell phone if he wants to avoid an accident, which is, in fact, his goal.

Some people learn to use this priceless resource very efficiently while others simply waste it. The mark of a person who is in control of his/her consciousness is the ability to focus attention at will, to stay away from distractions, to concentrate as long as it takes to achieve a goal and not longer. The person who can do this effortlessly usually enjoys the normal course of everyday life and can effectively meet the challenges of everyday life.

Improving reliability of industrial equipment needs such keen attentional energy which Reliability Centred Maintenance helps one to achieve. It, of course, depends on how well a Reliability Centred Maintenance System is designed, developed and implemented.

But what is essential is the development of memory bank, which can be only developed through comprehensively designed training and education system run over a long period of time.

Computerised Maintenance systems, Condition Based Maintenance technology, rigorously developed Maintenance Planning, Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence can all help but without a broad-based deep memory bank of different types of failures, failure modes, interactions and mechanisms that create failures, methods to detect failures, interpretation and evaluation of relevant information and deciding the right course of action –improving reliability of industrial systems would remain as a desire only,

Attention is the key to achieving desired outcomes and improving any system. It can’t be ignored.

 

By Dibyendu De

Observing Complexity

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Complexity, Complexity, Consciousness, Creativity, Design Kata, Engineering, Entrepreneurship, Management, Nemetics, Rapidinnovation, vibration analysisLeave a comment

To me, observing real life systems is something like this:

A real life System comprises of a meaningful set of objects, diverse in form, state and function but inter-related through multiple network of interdependencies through mutual feedbacks enclosed by variable space, operating far from its equilibrium conditions not only exchanging energy and matter with its environment but also generating internal entropy to undergo discrete transformation triggered by the Arrow of Time forcing it to behave in a dissipative but self organizing manner to either self destruct itself in a wide variety of ways or create new possibilities in performance and/or behaviour owing to presence of ‘attractors’ and ‘bifurcations’; thereby making it impossible to predict the future behaviour of the system in the long term or trace the previous states of the system with any high degree of accuracy other than express it in terms of probabilities since only the present state of the system might be observable to a certain extent and only a probabilistic understanding may be formulated as to how it has arrived at its present state and what would keep it going, thus triggering creative human responses to manage, maintain and enhance the system conditions, function and purpose and create superior systems of the future for the benefit of the society at large.

Such a representation of an observation looks quite involved. Perhaps it might be stated in a much simpler way. Most real life systems behave in a complex manner creating multitude of problems of performance and failures. But how do we get rid of complexity and uncertainty as exhibited by systems? We may do so by deeply observing the complex behaviour of the system to improve our perception to gain insights about the essence of the system; find out the underlying ‘imperfection’ that causes the apparent complexity and uncertainty and then find ways to improve the existing system or create new system and maintain them in the simplest possible manner. We do this by applying the principles of chaos, reliability and design. Surprisingly, the same process might be used to troubleshoot and solve problems we face on a daily basis. If done, we are no longer dominated or dictated by the ‘special whims’ of the system.

The crux of the matter is how we observe reality and understand it so as to make meaningful choices as responses to life and living.

RGB waves in Real Life

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn #powerofsee, Consciousness, Management, NemeticsLeave a comment

The first pillar of Nemetics, as described in my earlier post 5 Pillars of Nemetics, is the RGB Waves, whose description is as follows:

“It helps us understand any phenomenon happening around us in the material world.

R wave represents ‘events’ that take place around us.

G wave represents the ‘behavior(s)’ of human beings and of systems that initiate any event.

B wave stands for ‘intentions’ and ‘beliefs’ that lead to particular behaviors which precipitate ‘events.'”

Here is an example of how the principle of RGB waves works in life. It is taken from an experimental work on psychology.

In this experiment, researchers examined the effect of two beliefs that run in society on personal behavior and results.

Belief 1: Women are not very good at math.

Belief 2: Asian students are good in math.

These social beliefs are the B waves that direct personal behavior to produce subsequent events or results. Let us see how.

In their experiment, psychologists Margaret Shih, Todd Pittinsky, and Nalini Ambady took two groups of female Asian students to take a math test.

But before taking the test the two groups of female students were primed differently to modulate their behaviors (G wave) to see whether holding on to beliefs produced different test scores (R wave).

For one group, the female students, who would be holding on to their identity of “Asians,” were primed by asking questions like — “Is there anyone in their extended families who spoke languages other than English?”

For the other group, who would be holding on to their identity as “woman,” the female students were primed by asking questions such as “whether they lived in a coed dorm?”

After being ‘primed’ both groups took the test. The primed B waves produced dramatically different results (R wave).

The scores (R wave) plunged for the group whose B wave was ‘Women are not very good at math.’

However, the scores (R wave) soared for the group whose B wave was “Asian students are good in math.”

I consider this as a good example, where a particular B wave directs behavior and performance (G wave) to produce different results (R wave).

It also informs me that if performance or results are to be improved it might simply be wise to pay attention to the B wave and modulate it to produce desired results. However, most often educator, leaders, politicians focus on results and behaviors and get busy changing or correcting those instead of paying attention to strongly held beliefs and intentions of individuals and groups, which generates complex behavior patterns and results.

Ref:

1. Counterclockwise: Mindful Health and the Power of Possibility

2. Winning Anywhere – the Power of SEE

3. Workshops

A Networked Community of Fragmented ‘Selves’

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn #powerofsee, Books, Design Kata, Nemetics1 Comment

Most of us are not one unitary self, as we think we are. Rather we are a networked bundle of ‘selves’ somehow getting by in the same body.

For example, Self 1, of a young lady might decide that she must lose some weight within the next six months or so. So, she goes to a gym that promises her to help her shed some specific weight within a specific time period. She then reads up a a lot on ‘diets’ and invests her time and energy in following those. That ‘self’ in her also buys a bathroom scale to keep a watch on her weight reduction program.

But ‘Self 2’, of the same young lady also likes to splurge on the latest ice-creams and chocolates and grilled ham sandwiches  and that ‘Self 2’ takes care to load her refrigerator with assorted kinds of ice-creams, chocolates and sandwiches, which her ‘Self 2’ would like to enjoy when ‘Self 2’ would be bored or happy for some reason.

Similarly, ‘Self 3’ wonders whether a little infidelity would make life worth living. But her ‘Self 4’, conditioned by years of conditioning at school and home would only let such a thing happen over her dead body.

While all these ‘selves’ are fighting with each other, Self 5 desires to do well in her post graduate exams so that she would be able to crack the tough test for getting a prestigious job in the Indian Administrative Service.

Likewise, there are so many ‘selves’ in a person clamoring for attention and action. These different ‘selves’ existing within each of us, have their specific intentions, specific behavior patterns that result in actions (mostly predictable and repeatable) that take up our time. She fills up the day with many activities that lend a comforting support to her different ‘selves’ nested within her body. She is in a constant race against time to fulfill the intention of each self. Therefore, she becomes too busy maintaining her different selves, which might wear her down by the end of the day. In fact, she through her effort creates too many inauthentic constraints that impedes normal flow of life. The constraints she creates, both authentic and inauthentic, shape her destiny.

The point is we are psychologically ‘fragmented’ but most often we might not be even aware of such internal fragmentation. We might be simply too preoccupied with a confused whirl of fleeting sensations, memories, intentions, feelings, thoughts, behavior, must-do-tasks and emotions. Caught in such a vortex we are certainly prevented from seeing and noticing what needs to be seen or noticed. We are lost in a haze of preoccupation and anxieties for different reasons or we are numbed by the sheer sensory overload that comes from modern living. It affects our health and living. There are always too many things to do, so many people to see (physically) or interact over social media, so many meetings to attend, so many things to be told to so many people, so much money to earn, just so many deadlines to meet. Years might pass before we finally stop and look at these different selves within ourselves before we decide to create a new course of life based on focused attention.

So, the questions are:

What happens if the ‘selves’ weren’t aware of each other?

What happens if the selves simply knew each other well enough to form a community of strongly networked selves that help each other grow?

What happens if a person tries to create or design synergy between different selves?

How does one become a better spectator and player in the networked community of human society that constantly interacts with nature – both within and without?

 

Ref:

1. Quantum Theory and Nemetics

2. Winning Anywhere – the Power of See

 

Another review of “Winning Anywhere – the Power of See”

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Books, NemeticsLeave a comment
It feels nice to get good reviews from old friends who have stuck with me for a long time and have seen me in action. Here is one such review from an old friend of mine for my book ‘Winning Anywhere – the Power of See.’
“Your book has plethora of Global and Local contextual issues. Modular approach also connects sensitive minds in ‘whole’ & ‘part’.  Connects one’s experiences either in ‘Personal’ or ‘Professional’ Field  or may be both. Its the lucid expression that brings connectivity and makes it appealing. PLS3D is closer to my heart. To my mind, ‘5th State of Awareness’ is  similar to “Raj Yoga”. Topic Unenlightened NEMEs draws silhouette of a mind as perceived within or from distance but brought out a chuckle in me. —–AR………..”

If you visit my den…

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn #powerofsee, Books, NemeticsLeave a comment

Friends who visit me in my den (actually my studio), where I write, paint, consult and think over difficult problems, have strange feelings, most of which are rather pleasant.

Here is one of my old friends who wrote to me the other day about his feelings —

“I usually cross Dhakuria Bridge and take a right turn. Immediately able to feel few additional springs get activated underneath the sole. Makes my heavy frame bit lighter. Feel continues till the door-step & pressing the bell. Sensory organs gets relaxed. The aroma of the room fills my nostrils. Mostly smells that of a family room, at times smell like a bachelor’s den. Smoke engulfs the room. Words & topics do not restrict themselves. Mind becomes mindless. Amidst all these and Clucky’s (pet) joyous overture then wrestling, feeling that emanates is a rich blend of  “Power of See”  and “Creativity” in its “Winning Ways” ……… AR………………………”

Princess of the Blue Hills…

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Books, NemeticsLeave a comment

Once upon a time, in a far away place, hemmed by big and tiny blue and green hills, lived a young and beautiful princess who was about to leave the great comforts of her home and intense love of her family to join her newly wed, unfamiliar, husband in another far away land — barren, arid and hostile.

Naturally, she was worried, confused and nervous for most of her waking hours.  She thought about the uncertainty of her new life she was about to engage with. She thought about how she must interact with the new family. She thought about how would her husband treat her and how she would treat him in return. She grew increasingly worried about her new future. Slowly, she was become lifeless, dry and stiff.

Her brother noticed the fade of her cheeks and how she was slowly becoming disengaged from daily life — spending most of her time mulling over imagined affairs and about the ghostly demons waiting to pounce on her in future. So, one day he asked her about what was paining her so much and whether he might be of some help.

His offer came as a big relief to her. At least one person in the world, understood the dire state she was in – to offer help. She also knew that her elder brother was known to be wise, honest and skillful in negotiating life. Finding her brother by her side, she emptied her worries and asked him the secret of engaging with life from now on — since everything is set to change for her.

On this, her brother talked about the five principles one might follow to successfully take on life as it unveils. These five were — Wisdom, Love, Justice, Surrender and Patience. He asked her to imagine these five principles as five containers each holding something of those. He assured her that a proper mix and match of these contents helps one to skillfully sail through life.

But she could not understand any of these. She thought how can someone carry wisdom around like money or a handkerchief? Or does it seem to surface only after an event — sadder the better? What one must do to gain wisdom? Is there any step by step process to gain it? Can it be borrowed? If it were to be borrowed, who must she go to?

Then she thought about what is love? Is it about enduring pain? Is it about keeping quiet while one suffers? Is it an overt expression of happiness? Or is it about passion – unbridled? Is it about sacrificing oneself at the altar of compassion or idealism? Or is it doing something without judgment? But that would again bring judgment. Is it about giving others all you have when you have nothing much to give? Or is it about playing a role society determines for you? Or is it about listening to one’ heart, if that may really be listened to? What might be the art of doing that?

What is justice? Isn’t it only reserved for the rich and famous? Isn’t it made by those in power? Isn’t it a secret and clever weapon in the hands of strong men to protect their selfish interests and narrow thoughts? Is justice divine? Is evil always followed by retribution? If so, then why good people go about doing bad things? And why bad people go scot-free after their many crimes? Is it about how people; wisely or unwisely, think societies should run? Or is it about what society does to straitjacket one into particular modes of behavior?

Again, would surrender mean giving up on life? Is it about not having one’s will in anything? Is is close to defeatism? Is it about believing something without rationale and logic?  Is it about letting go and accepting life as it is? Is it about accepting meaninglessness in everything we do?

And then she thought how long can one stay patient about anything? What is the basis of patience? Is it about believing something when nothing is at hand? Is it about applying this theory or that with the expectation that things would work out well in the end or as expected? Is it about deluding oneself in the face of distress and torment? Is it a skill or a tactic? Or is it just a blind belief that things would spontaneously work out in one’s favor? Or is it about holding on tight with all that great nervousness boiling inside without expressing anything about it to anyone? Or is it about pretending to be a martyr?

She could not think any further and felt sleepy out of exhaustion. Soon she was dreaming… and the tautness of her face started melting bit by bit… she seemed enjoying her dream. Soon a glow of happiness engulfed her.

She wasn’t aware of how long she slept. But when she woke up everything was still around her. Few palace lights were still flickering. The moon on the horizon was waning but held on to her dreamy lustre. Far away on the banks of the silent river small dimly lit earthen lamps were floating on the water, casting the magic spell of their reflections. She knew someone died in the night and the relatives were performing the last rites. But the birds, completely unaware of that fact, started chirping one by one — first the sparrow who lived on the cornice of her room followed by a melodious nightingale roosting on a distant tree standing alone in the pale darkness of twilight.  Somewhere, a lonely cricket chirped to keep pace with the birds. The first shafts of light were breaking free from the pall of darkness — how soothing it was — like the cool turmeric balm her mother applied when her delicate skin got bruised in play.

Her mind was clear — no restless waves disturbed its tranquility. The delicate sun rays while kissing her face with warm kindness, kept whispering — there is hope, there is energy, there is kindness of life nestled inseparably in the deary darkness of every night, however dark that might be — have faith that light would emerge effortlessly to unveil something new. Look at it with awe and wonder…. the darkness and despair would melt away — keep dreaming; the rest of it is a big lie.

As the haze of the night lifted by degrees and the solid black yaks, hanging their heads, stood silently on the dew drops of the green valleys, the distant hills seemed a bit more blue. She was dreaming of the great and exciting life that impatiently awaited her arrival.

In the stillness of the moment her brother’s words took life.

 

(Excerpt from a forthcoming book that follows #powerofsee)..

 

Yet another letter from a friend.

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Books, NemeticsLeave a comment
Here is yet another letter from a friend after he read the book Winning Anywhere – the Power of ‘See’:

“Thank you once again for writing a book, preserving your experiences and knowledge for the next generations to come.   You may be surprised that why I am mentioning next generations.

Knowledge at your level is special because, it is an assimilation of experience, knowledge, thoughts, theories, experiments, results and many other factors which form a unique combination.   Your thoughts can be shared, discussed, experimented and  experienced while you are around.  May be I am one of such lucky persons, who can proudly say, you are my guru.

When you are not around it is this book and many more books which you will write to keep the thoughts in the pages and enlighten the next generations.

Awaiting many more gems from you.

with regards,

Signed

Dated: 7th April 2014

 

Review of the book, ‘Winning Anywhere – the Power of See’ by an Architect

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Consciousness, Management, NemeticsLeave a comment

This is a review of my book, ‘Winning Anywhere – the Power of See’ from a young architect.

Quote:

To be precise, this book has the caliber to boost energy above the threshold level of a person to deeply see something clearly.

Much literature is available to demonstrate a way for a NEME but this book demonstrates a homogeneous way of breaking the ‘thought-mixture’ and then convert it into a fruitful thought, in a way one can feel appropriate.

Abhishek Kumar

Architect

Unquote

I am grateful to all my readers.

Thank you so much.

Note: Apart from paperback and hardcover editions, you may get the Kindle edition here: http://tinyurl.com/oxo8o75

Review of the book ‘Winning Anywhere – the Power of See’ by a Content Strategist

On By Author of #PowerofSeeIn Consciousness, Management, NemeticsLeave a comment

This review of my book, ‘Winning Anywhere – the Power of See’ is by Daniel Durrant, a well respected Content Strategist.

Quote:

Be a more perceptive leader amid complexity

+Dibyendu De guides us to see more clearly, via awareness of our selves, our intentions, and the exchanges we make within the complex adaptive systems of life. We are all learning through interactions and relationships that ‘string’ together in ways that alter the ‘tube-like’ paths we ordinarily traverse.

This book challenges us as readers to connect the dots via serendipity, filling in the gaps with our own wonderment. It contains essential pieces of discussion for those exploring the NEME (notice, engage, mull, exchange). The insights of Dibyendu are masterfully interwoven with his curation of Tagore, Gandhi, Einstein, Guru Nanak and others.

I found that to ‘see’ in the nemetics way is a form of yoga that can break us free of limiting stories. Personally, having participated in dialogues that helped fuel the production of this book, I found it a refreshing reflection on my own personal development.

I thank you Dibyendu for your unique contribution to nemetics and honoring the diversity of human perspectives/intentions that emerge from the wholeness/complexity of life. May many more of us become Maharaja— to win over our selves.

Unquote

I am grateful to my readers.

Thank you so much.

Note: Apart from paperback and hardcover editions, you may get the Kindle edition here: http://tinyurl.com/oxo8o75