Unpredictability in Life

[Applause]

good afternoon

thank you for the lovely introduction

i’m from new delhi

and uh it’s all right i mean uh the

place that you call home doesn’t have to

be you know it doesn’t have to be

anything you can call any place

home if you if you be with the right

people if you

do the right things if you do everything

in such a manner that it makes it a home

a very good afternoon

to all of you and i hope that tedx logo

is visible

is it visible to everybody am i the only

one who thought that ted is an actual

person

initially and i used to wonder this

uh minute after minute every day uh

after

uh learning about ted that why is there

an

uh platform named after a person and why

does that person never appear

and everyone else appears on its

platform on his platform

everybody uses ted’s platform except ted

himself or herself

it is only after a little bit of more

research i uh

get i got to know about the about how

beautifully this platform has been

curated

to where technology entertainment and

design converge together

and give birth to innovation and it came

to me so

unexpectedly that it gave me a very very

beautiful insight

into what life might be and since

everybody present over here has been so

generous to present me with their

precious time i would like to share this

inside with you

i would like to conduct a very small

activity i just want

you all to raise your hands i’m going to

give say a statement

and if you fit the criteria raise your

hand all right

raise your hand if you have never

ever fallen ill in your life if you have

never been

injured in your life not even a single

scratch

not even a common cold or cuff

perfect what a unanimous response nobody

has raised their hands

all right a lot of us are college

students over here or have been students

in our past or

probably may pay students in the future

or

raise your hand if you have always

scored what you expected in any sort of

examination

any sort of test paper any sort of

activity that you have taken part in

in the school in the college or

somewhere else

sir i would please please give him a

round of applause he has scored

an expected score in everything that he

has done raise your hand

if you have never been sad if you have

never been angry

even if it was for just a

everybody scored a little less than what

they expected at some point in their

lives

the result is pretty obvious these are

things that we cannot

avoid but we still end up experiencing

nobody wants to fall ill

but we still do nobody wants to fail in

life or score

do perform less than what they want to

but they still do nobody wants to be sad

but we still end up being sad or angry

there is a very very common very very

appreciatable pattern in the three of

the examples that i gave

can anybody help me point that out

we expected in three of the examples

that i just gave we expected but

what we expected did not happen talking

about

expectations expectations have always

been a part and parcel of our life

i guess we expect in every situation

every situation that comes up any event

that happens

we tend to assume the outcome of the

event

but what usually happens is that uh what

most of the time it happens that we what

we assume

and what actually happens do not fall in

line right

so uh coming getting into the world of

digital content creation before

lockdown happened i had a major 1300 to

1400 followers on a

platform called instagram and uh after

uh as our host uh summed it up perfectly

real scheme the format of short video

content sharing platform

and it miraculously uh uplifted my

visibility

throughout the masses and i’m really

grateful to be here today and i hope

that i keep growing

however getting into the world of

digital content creation there are

certain specific problems that

i am pretty sure everybody who is who is

in a similar niche as i am

face on a day-to-day basis one of them

is growth not happening or if it happens

it may stop at any point of time so

there is a constant feeling of

apprehension which surrounds

this whole world of content creation

whether we are able to reach the amount

of people that we expect or not whether

a certain number of people will engage

on the content whether they like it

share it or comment on it or not

whether uh people will follow us or not

i’m pretty sure there have been a lot of

fights regarding instagram uh followers

and

uh everything

i’m pretty sure something of uh related

to followers has

happened in everybody’s life and uh

you know the whole phase where we do not

get

the desired reach the desired engagement

the desired number of followers

it it is popularly called shadow banning

it happens very frequently

with the creators almost all everybody

who’s on instagram

trying to put out content over there and

everybody who’s

working hard striving every day to put

out fresh content

even after so many efforts they face

this situation

i’m pretty sure anybody can guess what

comes after

a brief period of sadness a brief period

of self-doubt probably

frustration also why is my growth not

happening it was happening everything

was

fine a few days ago what happened now

i’m pretty sure that something similar

to this has

happened in everybody’s life right we

expect something to happen

but it does not happen and it ends up

making us sad or angry

what can we conclude from this can we

say that expectations

are the root cause for emotions like

anger

sadness and those surrounding it am i

right

right expectations when not fulfilled

may lead to anger may lead to a brief

period of sadness

because yes we expect the things do not

go our way

we become angry we become sad but at the

same time

now that we have come to this conclusion

that expectations

lead to not being fulfilled they lead to

anger or sadness

so anybody who’s listening to me right

now may think

all right so expectations is the root

cause of why i am sad or why

i i am angry let us let go of all

expectations

problems solved you reckon to hell with

everybody right

i’m sorry to anybody who’s thinking this

way my apologies

i had i hate to break it to you but that

is practically impossible

as you see um expectations as i said

have become

an integral part of our human behavior

of the human thought processes

right and at the same time let’s assume

hypothetically

a person has no expectations there are

zero expectations

that a person has a person does not

expect anything

from anyone or from this world can you

imagine the circumstances in which he or

she may

live in or may thrive in or possibly

survive in

a person who does not expect anything

from anybody

will always be in doubt and a person

who always stays in doubt will have

trust issues right

so can we say can we come to another

conclusion that

expectations a certain amount of

expectations are necessary

because they enable building of trust

right so combining the two conclusions

that we

came to a certain threshold level of

expectations is necessary for building

trust

because without them we cannot survive a

newborn

has to expect his or her mother to feed

it to

uh provided nourishment to provided care

i’m pretty sure a lot of uh people

in the audience over here are college

students and uh we are studying in this

institute

because uh you guys have been funded by

your parents or guardians right

we expect them to we expect them to uh

fund us to provide for our education

provide for our food etc

so expectations a certain threshold of

expectations is probably necessary

beyond that any sort of expectation

which has a highly

likely chance of not being fulfilled may

lead to anger or may lead to sadness

right so if

now that we have figured out that

expectations

are only necessary up to a certain

minimum level beyond that everything can

be discarded

now how do we discard it how do we

discard the extra level of expectations

and keep only the minimum level

necessary

in a giving surround given surrounding

in a given context

it is very simple i want everybody to

ask yourself

a good question a very simple question

what’s next what is going to happen next

can anybody in the audience tell me with

full conviction 100 percent guarantee

that what will happen in their lives two

years from now

or probably two months or probably two

days

or what is going to happen after i

finish blabbering and you guys go out

to have lunch we can say

we can say for we can’t be sure about it

but we still can say

but the point is nothing can be said

with full conviction that yes this is

going to happen

which means life is very very

unpredictable

we do not know what is going to happen

in the course of our lives

i don’t think so i think that there must

be something which can be predicted

right

there must be some event in our lives

throughout the course of our lives some

event which can be predicted

i want you guys to ponder over it

but i guess i have a little shortage of

time so i’ll just

give you the answer one day

everybody’s sitting in this auditorium

including myself everybody sitting

outside or doing whatever outside the

auditorium every human being

on this planet is going to die one day

we all are going to pass away we all

will cease to exist death

death is the only certain event which is

going to happen in our lives

and it is compared where it is

associated with

gloom despair probably devastation

am i right life on the other hand

come it is completely the opposite life

is completely unpredictable the future

can only be relatively predicted but

we cannot say with full conviction what

is going to happen in our lives

yet yet it is associated with so many

happy emotions happiness

joy delight it is only when we are alive

that we can appreciate the beauty of

this world

be it a flower growing on the sidewalk

or the vast

expanse of this cosmos or probably a

world which is beyond

what the eye can see we can’t do that if

you’re dead right

so if life is totally unpredictable and

death is the only predictable thing then

why why do we keep

chasing guarantee security certainty in

life

if there is no guarantee then why is

guarantee

the key to success

study well get in a good school get good

marks get

a good percentage in board exams

as luck and lachanzer did i hope i got

your name right

all right get good marks in 12th class

get a good college get a good college

study

hard again do internships be a part of

societies

be do do a lot of extracurricular get a

good job on well settle down

why why do we have to do this

why do we have to chase guarantee and

security

why do we have to keep spend spend why

do we have to spend

all our lives thinking about what is

going to happen next

when we can’t say for sure what is going

to happen next

lao tzu a very very influential

philosopher

in the sixth between the sixth and the

fourth centuries bce

who existed in ancient china once said

if you are sad or if you’re depressed

then you’re living in the past

if you fear something is going to happen

if you live in a constant state of fear

or

if you’re anxious then probably you’re

living in the future

then what is the best way to stay happy

to stay peaceful to stay calm

it is to live in the present and it’s

correct

it is only in the present where we exist

we don’t exist in the future because it

has not happened

we cease to exist in the past because it

has already happened

where we exist right now is in the

present

it is only the present that uh we have

where we are consciously aware of our

surroundings

and we can exert certain amount of

control over

what is going to happen around us the

more we stay

in the present the more we get connected

to our present

the more distant we become from our past

and from our future

and the more and the lesser uh the more

we stay in our present the lesser we

expect

this is how we reduce the extra amount

of expectations that i talked about

and we maintain the certain threshold of

expectations which are necessary to

thrive

and by letting go of all the

expectations there is completely no

chance of them not being fulfilled

and hence our instances of being

angry or sad reduce immediately

however however however let me tell you

at the same time

i’m not saying that it is guaranteed

that you will never be angry or you nev

or you will never be sad

it is very highly likely that you will

be facing these emotions at multiple

points in the future

but at the same time we in the present

moment we will be able to reduce them

to a great extent which will enable us

to focus

focus on ourselves focus on our work and

focus

on what probably may be next

i guess i will leave everybody over here

with fully flourishing thoughts about

the unpredictability of life

that is my time thank you so much

[Applause]