Chapter 2 of my book. 'Value Education for higher Social Consciousness'

Chapter 2:

Why I chose value Education?

Values are the innate quality of me as a human

Values help me in differentiating right from wrong,

Values are my lifeline!

My values drive me in the various situations I face

I handle them, I face them, I overcome them!

I am values!

When the internal conflict happens

When people’s ‘believe-say-do’are in different directions...

I stick to values!

When I act as per the values I believe in or am brought up by

i.e. when my value & my belief system is my regulator!

I personify Values!

My values are defined by my mother & fathers genes,

Plus the upbringing, the care, and the society I am brought up in

I am synonymous to values!

I Love playing my various roles in life

I Love myself when I am able to adhere

To the values, I am made of... For I am Values!... 'WhiteSwan ‘Anjali’

(With age and time, Since we are all in the process of continuously shedding our physical, mental, emotional baggage to be one with our 'infitnite reservoir of spirituality, I believe all of us i.e. our true selves are 'WhiteSwans'...thus I take the liberty of writing WhiteSwan in front of my name)

Value consciousness, is very personal and internal. The way my belief-system is made with environmental and genetic re-enforcements, has a lot to contribute to the outcome of situations.

The core values of all major religions of the world are similar!

I studied Theology from Dayalbagh University and developed a management model based on Core Values of World Religions (see in the chapter on, that is when I found all major religions spoke about similar values which tend to make us more human.

Even if we see the basic human culture, we believe that one should not speak untruth or cheat anyone, one should not believe what is untrue, for if one keeps on saying right to something that is not right, again and again, it eventually leads one’s internal system to believe that ‘it is right’....hence wrong becomes right!

I have been brought up in a way, where for example, if I am asked to keep in safe custody something what is not mine, (but with a proper explanation), and the moment the person needs his/her things back, I would be very happy to be relieved of the duty of keeping those things.

However, in certain ‘human value systems’, trust takes a back seat to what one can just take without asking and keep it, by giving re-enforcements to oneself that ‘it is mine’, again and again, and in the process starts believing it totally what is not true!

Hence the vitiated de-value system starts getting created!

I call it the ‘value conflict’, it happens with people who have witnessed internal family feuds and conflicts due to mistrust and therefore unconsciously get into the habit of not just taking what is not theirs, but also keeping and start believing, that it is theirs for keeps!

Again taking a situation from physical world of extreme mistrust, where a person overhears some conversation and reacts sharply.

In management training, we use a communication exercise called ‘the Chinese whisper’...in which we whisper a message in the ears of a participant, he or she has to whisper the same message in the ears of the next one and so on...till we reach the last participant, and now the last participant has to tell in front of everyone loudly, what he has understood...the situation in the end becomes so humorous since the message which was initially given is totally vitiated & turns into a totally different message.

This vitiation in the message depends on the communication filters a person may be having or nursing....

In such cases a persons’ ‘Values or De-Values start operating’.

What I mean here is, if I want to listen and see virtue in everything, I can find virtue, if I want to

see falsehood and lie in everything, my ears will hear exactly that!

(The vitiation in communication is happening, even when we are so close to each other that we are actually whispering in each other’s ears! We really need to reflect on situations when the distance is much more)

In real life, continuously nursing vendetta for one’s whole life speaks a lot about one’s upbringing, trust in oneself and others, as well as one’s internal strength.

CHECK: One should self-check, right when the negative thoughts come, maybe due to some miscommunication or a misunderstood communication (positive auto suggestion works very well in these situations), otherwise a further aggravation of the issue may happen, leading to breaking of relationships.

This is a very common communication vitiation where the innate feelings and preconceived notions surface, as in this case of mistrust, unconsciously and leads one to believe that the’ untruth is true’ and keep nursing the grudge...if one is not open to discussion and talks.

I have FAITH in the basic goodness of a human being, and I stick to the belief, that if I keep walking on the path of ‘Values’ the other person will surely and certainly come around, even though he/she may be very strong in his/her belief the wrong way.

I believe and always will in the basic goodness of man, since I am made that way!

While I worked at TeNet, IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) Madras, I headed 16 incubated companies for Training Development & Strategic Direction, also advised the company heads and mentored the CEOs on strategic and system issues.

Padamshree Jhunjhunwala, a Professor in the Electrical Engineering Department of IIT Madras, and also Chairman of TeNet, was my boss. He was a person with amazing intellectual capability and innovation, and gave us huge leeway to exercise experimentation, but quite short tempered.

He used to say when I would be really angry at his shouting in the meeting and stop communicating with him, ‘Anjali never ever close the communication channel, always say what you have not liked, always express what you feel, so that the other person also can explain and amends can be made on both sides’. I have never forgotten this, and taken it as a MANTRA for life!

I wish children today could do the same...parents could be so much more peaceful and everyone could have better relationships and live happily!

My Learning:

A Value for life...

More the clean water of open communication is passed through relationships, the faster the dirt of miscommunication (that may be due to preconceived notions, or a de-value of mistrust) will get washed! The more the clearer water is passed, faster the channel of communication becomes clean and clear and with it the mindsets, biases, stereotypes get broken and shattered. The light of truth and hope starts peeping in...if we give it one chance!