Blog@GraceJunction

Last week I happened to visit a nationalized bank after a long time. Frankly speaking I expected to see some changes in the office premises and the attitude of the employees. Not that all of them were the same always, but there were some branches whose employees were extremely helpful and courteous but I was talking about the approach adopted in these competitive times.

When I went to the counter to enquire, the officer just pointed me to another desk without even looking up at me. When I confirmed the direction, he just nodded and seemed to not care. The next experience was not too good either, a middle aged lady was handling some customers and wore a frustrated look, probably because of handling a continuous flow of customers from the morning. My problem seemed to evoke some interest on her face when she realized that she can get some easy deposits but that too disappeared when she came to know that I wanted to continue it at another branch of theirs. What followed were the same old pointers with fingers without much human touch.

After that I was on my way to a private sector bank hoping to meet a friend there and some better treatment. We all have seen this nation go through the effects of globalization, the service industry being one of the biggest objects of change. Especially new banks which took away bulk of the business in the name of services. We all were happy to be part of that change and many of us have seen ourselves become active agents of this change by working in this industry.

But that day I saw something unusual, the employee looked under lot of stress and I was surprised that the cashier was rudely refusing the customer for some specific services. It was almost as if he had forgotten all his etiquettes, the cosmetic smile and the lessons that he would have undergone under the best trainers available to the industry.

He looked as if he had put in as much work as his father would have put in, in his lifetime. He looked tired, the pressure seemed to be mounting, and some were complaining about the stock markets all the while and another just wanted to put in his papers soon after the last lot of stock options got credited to his account.

But then this was not something that I saw through the week only once, I saw that especially the young who were yet to go through the rigours of life, looking desperate and tired of life. First I thought that the world was reeling under the pressure of economic slowdown but I realized there was more to it than what just met the eye. The expectations of every man had risen so much in the good times that he could not reconcile with these tough times. The very fact that there was tough competition everywhere and all his fellow beings were equally struggling, made things look difficult.

What I felt was that in the earlier days, there was this great impetus on developing social relations which was also like the cushion to take the shock effects in our lives. But over the years we all forgot when we were enjoying the economic and philosophical liberalization that not only were we changing but we were forgetting to invest in relations, invest in life. Fathers had not invested enough in their children, marriage partners had not understood each other after living together for so many years, and siblings have not understood each other in the quest for making something of their lives.

Now when you look around for a shoulder to cry, you find that you are not the only person going through these times but also that there were not enough people around who would help you get through in these difficult times. Now when you look around for the old friends, you realize that you have lost track of them, your children are away in foreign countries, your parents are disconnected from your way of life and your colleagues with whom you spend most of the time are traveling with you on the same boat.

May be what I saw, you did not notice, may be it was just a blip on the radar or something that’s not as alarming as I have made it sound. But we can learn some things from the way things are going, firstly, life in itself is something which cannot be lived out with short term perspectives and we need to do the basics right everyday. We cannot live for the short term goals alone but live everyday knowing that no matter what our jobs and careers demand we cannot overlook the need to invest in relations, families and our duties in general to the people around.

Secondly, we need to look at life and ask what are we achieving and at what cost? If we win the whole world and in the end we lose ourselves (which includes family, relations, people around) then what have we achieved? Let’s understand that we can loose everything that we gain over a period of our lifetime in a space of seconds. The stock market crash, an expensive heart treatment or loss of all those for whom we were running around in a tragic accident, can happen to any of us. If our lifestyle doesn’t allow a correction then if I may say it bluntly, we need to look for options?

But in these times, we cannot run away from the world either. But in these difficult times, where there is a need for people to just rest their heads and cry, we need to provide a shoulder. You yourselves will go through difficult times but the objective is to gather a few like minded people around yourselves and be there for each other. Not only that but make a genuine attempt to be the love that people are looking for. When things are difficult around you your smile should give a hope, when people feel lonely and dejected your pat on the back can make a difference, when everybody is running away from the situation, you stay there and make a difference.

The Bible says in Mathew 24:12, 13
‘Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.’

This is the statement Jesus makes about the signs of the end times. I am nobody to say that the time has come and I am not here to make a doomsday prophecy but we need to reconsider our ways.

Especially THE WAY shown by Jesus, if you see that the love of most have grown cold around you or is slowly heading that way.

Tags: families, globalization, increase of wickedness, nationalized bank, relations, shoulder to cry, stock market, Stress, the way

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 11th, 2008 at 10:19 pm and is filed under Articles, Economy, Finance & Money, Navin, Purpose of Life, Relationships, Society, Stress, Thoughts, Trends, Troubles & Problems, Workaholic, Youth Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.