Wonderment

11 years ago, I recall my first day at Novartis' head office in Worli. It was my first experience in a corporate setting, my internship that was going to get me my first paycheck. It was thrilling and exciting, and I felt like the world was my playground. I remember having a new phone then and I had recently started using WhatsApp just a year ago or so. There were groups and it was fun to talk as if we were sitting in a school canteen and chit-chatting. I was updating everything in that group of school friends on how my day was going. And then came the news that I was pleasantly surprised to deliver. The text went something like this.

“You know what??

There is a CCD Coffee machine here!!! You can select what you want - you want a Cappuccino, just press a button and you get it! Latte? at your service Ma’am. 

Also an entire selection of CCD Tea bags and all this for free!!

Unlimited! Where am I? What is this company!!”

A kind friend who thought that I shouldn’t embarrass myself any further texted me separately saying this is the most common thing in all offices big or small across India - and everyone in the group is very aware as most were already working before MBA. I was bewildered - how could this ever get boring? It will always be as exciting for me for as long as I work! How could getting a coffee that was Rs 120-150 back then in CCD outlets, for free throughout the day ever become ‘the usual’! Or so I thought!

Just a few months back I discussed with a friend how boring and not innovative was that machine and how offices should do better. The 22-year-old Sayali would have been ashamed!

Isn’t this a perfect example of the Marathi phrase ‘ Rajala rojach Diwali’ translating to, for an affluent person every day is festive. Our brain is an expert at tuning out all sorts of constants in our everyday lives. Like how do you live with the realization that you can see your own nose all the time every time? You’d get very irritated if your brain does not tune that sense out. My previous house in Mumbai was very close to the airport and I only realized the noise starkly when a guest pointed it out saying, doesn’t this bother you? we had gotten so accustomed to it. 

This has a neurological and evolutionary basis called Habituation and Neural adaptation. This is a fundamental process in neuroscience where the brain reduces sensitivity to repetitive stimuli and neurons adjust their response to constant stimuli. This is undoubtedly extremely important for survival and moving forward. Like your eyes will never notice anything new if you keep noticing the nose, or you’ll never be able to work around in your home if you keep getting bothered by the plane noises. But what it does is also the same for the great things in life. The CCD machine no longer sparks the joy it did once. The salary that you get now would have blown your mind had you gotten to know the figure 5-10 years back - but you take it for granted now and perhaps want more. 

But I have been contemplating this phenomenon for some days, mainly on my recent long flights when I was happy to find out that I am still as excited to get the window seat. I almost prayed to never be the person who wants an aisle and rushes out and places no importance on looking at the clouds beneath. Rising above the clouds - it’s surreal. It is surreal and was impossible to imagine a few decades back. Why does one take that for granted? I hope I never do. I hope I never get as smug and boring as the people who say they are tired of traveling to Europe for work. I hope I never lose the sense of absolute wonderment I feel about the ancient cobblestone streets, the stone bridges, their medieval architecture, those peaceful grand gothic cathedrals, the vibrant street performers, and artisan markets, and I can just keep going on.

Is this why we are not as happy as our children are? They are excited about a new spoon! My daughter is too happy to brush every day because she has a nice-looking toothbrush. I remember I must have been 8-9 years old and I dragged my father in our backyard, to show him how the sunrays had filtered beautifully through the leaves and branches of our mango tree. He was not very amused as I had made him stop doing some work he was doing.

Does our frequency of feeling happy and joyous get reduced because we just don’t stop and notice and tune things out? Maybe every time we catch ourselves doing that for something we enjoyed as a child or a teenager we could talk to our inner child and I am sure we would be so much more happy than we now are. Or maybe get as excited about a different spoon along with our children!

Art by Claude Monet ‘The Water Lily Pond’