Pass it on

The young kids in our football team eventually started to weasel out of post match lunch or our occasional dinner plans. I thought they don’t want to waste time with us and have better things in to do in life. But few days ago one of them dared to share the real reason. We , the working folks, don’t let them pay and the kids feel that must be a burden on us. And we go to places which are not “affordable” for the pocket money they carry.

That was surprising, but I think from their perspective kids were trying to do the right thing. I had to share a little background to this. Its not we paying for them, it’s we are paying back.

For years , almost a decade, have had the seniors around me never letting me pay. This was the culture at IBM where I have worked for ~4 years. This was the unsaid culture during my school and college days too. I am a military brat (Dad is retired Indian Naval officer), gentlemen like behavior was not just something we read about, I have grown up around chivalrous behavior and taking care of folks under your wing.

Just like these kids, one day I too had dared to ask one of my senior, why wouldn’t they let us chip in too. I could afford it. He said he knows I can, but he too is “paying back”. I don’t think I understood him very well back then. But it felt so nice to be amongst such wonderful seniors. I know in military they fight and die for each other. Thats not what we do in corporate world. But these little treats made me resolve, when my time comes I too ll treat the young lads once in a while and this way I’ll be paying back for all the fun parties I have attended and seldom paid for.

This might not make much of financial sense, but emotionally it does. Its like you are part of some unsaid “bro-code”. Some code of conduct you are BOUND TO TAKE FORWARD. You don’t realize what it does until you see the proof. I remember few weeks ago my cousins met over dinner at Pune, and my brother and our cousin elder to him were fighting who ll pay for it. “If Ashwin Bhaiya was here, he wouldn’t let any of us pay. I am the eldest after him, so its my bill to pay.” 

I got to know of this after few days, but liked how people remember you for such little things. And what good example these two set for our younger cousins who have just started working and finding their place in this corporate world.

So I told the kid who shared the real reason, that “I am paying back for all the treats I have enjoyed. And one day you ll take care of some even younger kids you ll play with or work it. You pay when your time comes. Now its mine.” Not sure he understood as neither had I when I was of his age. But one day he will. And hopefully ll carry it on.

This feels like a super power. Where we can be a catalyst and propagate what we have in us.

What I didn’t share with the kid, because I thought he is too young to comprehend the whole concept, is that we have power to stop the negative behavior too. But that’s for some other day. 

Mahatma Gandhi once said “be the change you want to see in this world”. I thought I m not powerful or influential enough to impact the world. Recently I realized I don't have to be. My world is - me, may be my family and close friends. Lucky if people around me too are letting me have some influence on them. Doesn’t matter how big or small, its MY WORLD. And I truly can be the change I want to see in it.

I am sure you too have lot of positives and good in you, which the world deserves to benefit from.

Just pass it on!!