“You never win the silver, you just lost the gold”
At a recent office party a couple of days ago, an outgoing senior of the bank in his farewell speech said the above mentioned. It was probably one of the highlights of the evening. The usual meet, drink, dance, eat, talk kind of office party that I generally avoid as I don’t drink and so free booze never excited me and the fact that I abhor cigarette smoke.
Anyway the fun event of the evening apart from the DJ and his brand of Hindi music was a catwalk that made most of us including me to split up into teams and strut on stage to the tunes of the DJ with a 10 minute preparation. My team had 2 women (very unremarkable looking types, even though one was attempting to look sexy and generally failing) and a huge bunch of the typical non model type guys you can think of. The sex appeal was generally well distributed among the other 3 teams. So to suit our image we went on stage with a tapori style, you know the rolled up sleeves and kerchiefs around arms, necks and everywhere, messed up hair etc and we won!!!!!! Apparently our look bowled over the two women judges, so maybe I have an alternative career somewhere?
Pardon that small indulgence, after that small diversion let me come back to the caption, it is really an awesome statement and was a wake up call to me. I may have heard this earlier and it may not even be original but it is truly profound. Often I accept the silver as just rewards to my efforts and was convinced that it was indeed just but the speaker said that the difference between gold and silver can be determined often by not just the ability but chiefly by the effort. I know for a fact that very often ability belies results. There are countless incidents of the less able doing better purely on the effort put in.
Nothing amplifies this fact more than the Indian cricket team; I have been a fan of cricket and Indian cricket. But of late the string of disappointing results has made me to look elsewhere. No more burning desire to see the live telecasts (CAS has been a spoilsport also!) and surf Cricinfo, its just a distant happening. The Indian team does not lack ability, it is endowed with an embarrassing surplus of it but what it apparently lacks is genuine effort the kind of which the Kiwis display.
Personally my takeaway from the party is the same. My winnings in life are only partly due to my ability for I know that ability alone would have taken me elsewhere. Next time if I end up with silver, I will know that the first thing I must do is to seek out if I did enough and of course the next question did I do the right thing. And you will not ask me the question “Hey did you win the silver because there were only two people?”
Anyway the fun event of the evening apart from the DJ and his brand of Hindi music was a catwalk that made most of us including me to split up into teams and strut on stage to the tunes of the DJ with a 10 minute preparation. My team had 2 women (very unremarkable looking types, even though one was attempting to look sexy and generally failing) and a huge bunch of the typical non model type guys you can think of. The sex appeal was generally well distributed among the other 3 teams. So to suit our image we went on stage with a tapori style, you know the rolled up sleeves and kerchiefs around arms, necks and everywhere, messed up hair etc and we won!!!!!! Apparently our look bowled over the two women judges, so maybe I have an alternative career somewhere?
Pardon that small indulgence, after that small diversion let me come back to the caption, it is really an awesome statement and was a wake up call to me. I may have heard this earlier and it may not even be original but it is truly profound. Often I accept the silver as just rewards to my efforts and was convinced that it was indeed just but the speaker said that the difference between gold and silver can be determined often by not just the ability but chiefly by the effort. I know for a fact that very often ability belies results. There are countless incidents of the less able doing better purely on the effort put in.
Nothing amplifies this fact more than the Indian cricket team; I have been a fan of cricket and Indian cricket. But of late the string of disappointing results has made me to look elsewhere. No more burning desire to see the live telecasts (CAS has been a spoilsport also!) and surf Cricinfo, its just a distant happening. The Indian team does not lack ability, it is endowed with an embarrassing surplus of it but what it apparently lacks is genuine effort the kind of which the Kiwis display.
Personally my takeaway from the party is the same. My winnings in life are only partly due to my ability for I know that ability alone would have taken me elsewhere. Next time if I end up with silver, I will know that the first thing I must do is to seek out if I did enough and of course the next question did I do the right thing. And you will not ask me the question “Hey did you win the silver because there were only two people?”
sorry, maybe its just me being dim witted as usual...but I dont understand the caption! :D
ReplyDeleteIt means winning second place is not an achievement, but it should hurt that you did not do enough for the first. Capiche?
ReplyDeleteso true for me and hope i learn like you too to always strife for the best!
ReplyDeletei ve always been a lazy goose... when it comes to effort?! ill be idling most of my time (probably mentally calculating??!!:)
and in the last minute i do somethng and get away quite smoothly... a standing example is my 12 stds i was the only bold lump who was never bothered about my board exams.. but i passed with mediocre results and that too is bcoz of my moms prayers!
hoping to do my best for my Ph. D!