The Country Road Heroes

Its been 2 weeks since I blogged the first time. Since then I have been travelling and finding less time to write, I am doing this journal from jabalpur airport, where I am waiting to board my flight to Indore and then to Mumbai on my way back from a training for Sales Managers of a tractor manufaturing company.I travelled to their Nagpur factory on the 11th and 12th of June 08to conduct Sales Manager Training for delegates who joined me from Vidharbha Region, a spot which has been in news for its number of farmer suicides in half a decade. It was truely an amazing experience to interact and to be their trainer where I experienced the power of simplicity in its true sense. There were 28 partipants in all. Many of them have a great clarity of thinking. They knew that the work what they did, meant a nation's economy that depended so much on agricltureand farming. I have great regards for these men. They lead simple lives. They did not depend on internet or wifis for their communication needs.They travelled distances...day on day...month on month...year on year... to ensure that tractors worth over half a million rupees are sold to whoever thought he was a farmer.

I have a great learning from their story. They achieved a growth rate of over 400% (In numbers of tractors sold) in the last 2 years for the region, using a processed based selling system that was taught to them. I experienced conviction in their words and saw confidence in their eyes. They were open to learning a and keen to progress in all they did. Why I think that their efforts are remarkable becasue despite the prevailing negative socio-economic conditions among these farmers, these heroes achieved a significant growth over the past 2 years. Many of us may not know that a tractor costs over Rs. 5 Lacs....probably costlier than a car in the midsize segment. If this team were to be put on to car sales in any metro with the right the amount of training, I believe that they would soon change equations in the sector.

With my experience in the corporate world, I yet have to find a Sales force with this zeal. My learning from this team is that any process which has a logical base will consistently produce great results if followed with enthusiasm. I wish them all the best.

Spirituality and Religion

My understanding is that 'Spirituality' is very much individual whereas religion is all about group movement. Each individual has his spiritual progress as per his prakruti ( natural attributes gifted by the universe ie God). Whenever somebody has attempted to get in touch with the ultimate universal truth, he has been able to take a few steps ahead and experience the magic of God in bits and pieces. Later when he tries to verbalise his experience and guide his nearones, the essence is lost in transit. Therefore a cult or religion may take birth with a lot of distorted ideas. When these ideas are dissiminated to a group of people with different thinking and understanding capabilities, a religion starts forming with many flaws. However, fear being one of the biggest attributes of a human being, he tends to follow what is understood by him without any compromise and believes that any other spiritual or religious practice may go against 'God'. Since we lack sainty leaders who can streamline and control religious groups, the groups are controlled by individuals in the form of clerics who have personal inerests in religious activies. This scenario results in spiritual anarchy and degradation of the society. Therefore I BELIEVE that each individual may practise tools to improve his spiritual strength rather than focussing on group activities. One may start with simple activity of spending time on introspection about his own self. He may take help from scriptures and self help books for a better understanding of his existence and start with other activities such as meditation, chanting and being constantly aware of his actions. This will surely help him kick start his spiritual journey.