STANDARDS AND VALUES

Standards and values are very important qualities in human life. They may be ideated, proposed, discussed, decided, established and executed by an individual, society, state, company or religious body for creating and sustaining an expected and desirable order of discipline and achievements, in the short or long run, minding the welfare and happiness of those depending on a family, business or other entity of human interaction. Generally standards and values stand for high moral values and virtues practiced and appreciated by idealists and thinkers of a society or nation in an age. They help bring an order in a set of disorders, demerits and chaos. Standards and values are like foundation on which a great structure of beliefs and practices can be established and continued for long. People die. Employees quit. Family members miss or pass away but standards and values keep influencing that entire structure of holistic culture. I present some hypotheses to let you understand the difference between standards and values.

1. Ramana is a very poor man. He has five children. He belongs to the community of barbers. He decided never to quit that profession to honour his forefathers. It is his standard, which he set for himself and his future generations. He or anybody after him should never indulge in unfair professional acts for making a profit fast. This is his value. Whether his descendants follow his standard and value is beyond his control. He believes and practices those norms.

2. Govind Sahani started a milk business in his village in 1898 for his livelihood. He used perfect measurements to weigh milk while selling it to others. It was his standard. He never added water or any other substance in the milk to earn more profit, cheating others. He could not make a profit out of this business by 1913. Many fraudulent business entities entered this segment of business by this time. Govind could sell milk to very few ones. He could not look after his family members well. They did not like his attitude. They begged and warned him to change according to the trends of the time. He did not change. He did not like to cheat others even when he was in adversity. A man, who believes in the greatness of virtues, should not leave that path of ideals, despite hardships on the way. This was his value. He believed in, struggled and followed that culture.He died in 1935, leaving nothing back for his family members. Values keep a man so strong and inflexible that he cannot quit that noble path even on a deathbed.

3. Standards are mostly rules and regulations specifying who should do what, when, where and why. For example: My father gave me 100 mango fruit and asked me to sell each of them at a price of five rupees in our local market between 9:00 am and 5:00 pm. This was to test how I follow what he said. These were standards I should follow. He also told me that I should sell them to highly honest, poor and admirable customers only. He instructed me how I should sell those mangoes. I should ensure these qualities in them, through a casual chat with them or otherwise, before deciding to sell our mangoes to them. My father explained me ‘how’ I should reach my goal. These are the values I was expected to follow while selling mangoes as per the standards set by him. I should sell them meeting these standards and values only. My father would not be there. Nobody would question or doubt me even if I had sold them according to my mood and preferences. If I had subjected myself to what my father instructed me, I was just an implement in implementing a culture established by him. If I did not find such customers on a day, I should not sell them to undeserving ones. I should bring them back home. My father may throw them in a manure pit.

4. Ramesh comes to his company in time, stays there for nine hours, does what his supervisor said and behaves politely with all. He is following standards set by his employer blindly without applying his intelligence and common sense. He is an automated and artificial employee. The company does not grow much by such employees.  Ganesh argues with his superiors whenever he finds that something is wrong there. He does not talk politely with all. He reprimands anybody with indiscipline and narrow-minded attitude. He often advises the management on key areas of business growth, clearly knowing that they never value his inputs considerably. His effort is to do what is good, not what impresses others. Ganesh is a man of standards and values but Ramesh is just a man of standards. Doing something formally and mechanically does not bring much progressive change in any society. Some standards make us into machines. Values make us into sensitive, analytical, rational, ethically oriented, visionary and constructive thinkers and practitioners. Standard is like a road. Values are like direction boards placed along.

One following standards and values should not think or worry about profit or loss while talking about or doing something but whether it is good or bad to his customers, family members, employees, people, beneficiaries, victims or country. Doing good things is his ultimate and unalterable motive, goal and destination. He must be prepared to lose anything to reach this goal but not reaching there somehow. There is no place for arguments and discussions in the grand path of standards and values. Do or die is the policy to be implemented. It is a journey of self-imposed discipline, ideals and vision. He does not do anything to satisfy his ego or false prestige but to hold on to a virtue, which he believes firmly. The struggle is for perfection and adherence to a noble objective and philosophy. It’s an ordeal for all. In history, we remember some great figures because they lived for such standards and values.

The Journey

How we live and what we do regularly for ourselves or others largely depend on standards and values we believe in and practice. We mind our mind when we follow standards. We obey our conscience while adhering to values.

1. Standards and values are not those which can be changed frequently according to our moods, circumstances and preferences but those which change our attitude and lifestyle. They should change us. We should not change them.

2. Standards are enough in some aspects of life and profession. There is no need of values. Suresh donates 1,000 rupees to an orphanage every month. He believes that it is a good entity, serving the disadvantaged ideally. He does not check every month whether they are following their stated standards and values regularly or not. He has no time and intelligence to do it optimally. It is his blind belief that they are good. So, he is just following a standard. Karthik walks to the extreme left of a road in any part of India. It is a regulation of the government there. He is following it blindly. He does not think whether it is good or bad. Following something blindly is also necessary in many aspects of our lives and professions. Obeying to laws on our land; saluting a superior in defense services; submitting document proofs to get a license; leaving footwear outside when entering a shrine; smiling at others to share a feeling of joy and togetherness; taking something to offer when going to meet children, patients, old people and pregnant women; standing up when all are singing our national anthem; swiping our attendance in a biometric device when getting in and out of our company and things and activities of this order. There is no question of morality in these ways of life and profession. Just do it, is the norm. We need not think about it much beyond that.

3. Values define and dictate how we should live and act in many contexts and circumstances. They are like carvings on boulders inscribed by sculptors. Once written, we cannot change them. We have to follow them strictly or get out of the race. It is a struggle for the highest order of discipline and accountability to one’s self, not to others. It is our sincere effort to award a certificate of merit to ourselves impartially, questioning and debating within us about what we achieved, who benefited from it and how we did it all. Manohar asked his 10-year-old son what he would like to become. He promptly replied, ‘I want to become a doctor’. Manohar asked another question, ‘Why?’ He said, ‘I want to serve the poor’. Later, Manohar tried a lot to change his attitude. He sent him out of home at a stage. His son did not change. He became a doctor due to his willpower and idealism. He served the poor in many parts of the world and earned a page in the history of humanity as a great doctor with ultimate values. Those with values don’t talk much. They express their character and attitude through their noble acts of humility and humanity. They don’t analyze their character much. They don’t mind the arguments and comments of others, including media. They believe that doing something is great. They do it without compromising at any stage of their life. They don’t change their attitude, behavior or lifestyle to satisfy anybody, including their employers, rulers and God. They are dictators of their own accord. They dictate themselves what is right. They practice it to satisfy their inner self.

4. Standards and values decide the value of a person, society, religion, nation or company, in the short or long run. One talks a lot in public places to impress others but does not implement any of them. People act smart roles before him. They don’t trust or respect him internally. Many Indians frequent different bodies of religious and spiritual discourses and practices for formality sake. They never change to the better. What is use of such religious cults? Many shallow politicians and unscrupulous economists often struggle to project India as the biggest democracy in the world or in such a way that it is great in many respects. Our political criminals spent millions of rupees to conduct commonwealth games once but they don’t have money to build adequate number of shelter homes for millions of desperate Indians, who have been sleeping and dying on footpaths, graveyards and roads in pathetic conditions. On one hand, in our decorated temples, we preach that ‘service to man is service to God’ and on the other hand we treat poor Indians like mosquitoes and flies and rich Indians like honourable citizens of this nation. There are no standards and values in Indian politicians or majority of Indians now. This is why India turned into a dustbin of unrest, poverty, pain and loss over the last few decades. Very few know what standards and values are. Very few of them only follow these standards and values. No nation thrives for long without standards and values.

5. What are they teaching in our premier business schools and colleges now across the world? How to make a harmful product but present it as a useful and attractive one? How to sell it fast and make huge profits? Nothing to worry about the health and welfare of our customers, who buy our products taking them as great ones, based on what we are projecting in our ads of various kinds. Why are foreign companies recruiting some of those coming out from IIMs with huge packages of salaries and perks soon after they complete their MBAs? They are masters of cheating. They are chameleons. They are hypocrites. They are wizards of words and acts. They tell sweet lies and sell poison to ignorant and impoverished people in many countries. They are trained and conditioned actors to the core. They devise unbelievable plans to bring huge profits to their employers. They have no standards or values. Their standard is to sell more. Their value is to expect more from their employer in the form of increments, bonus and other perks. When our educational institutions are preparing such idiots there, how can we expect standards and values in our entrepreneurs and businessmen in many fields? 60% of the products we are consuming now in India are either of low quality or highly adulterated ones. What are our politicians doing? What is the President of India doing in Rashtrapathi Bhavan? What are our lawyers and judges doing in courts of law? What are our police and regulatory authorities doing? They have no standards and values. They mind their comforts, luxuries and privileges. They are not bothered about penury of our helpless people? They make us come to a police station or court of law until we get disgusted about that process and withdraw ourselves from that complaint or case. They have no morality or capacity to solve our problems. They are not interested to know about our difficulties and pains as ordinary people. They sell alcohol at a roadside shop. When we go to a cinema, they play an ad advising us not to consume alcohol. They advise us how to save ourselves from thieves, robbers, rapists, fraudsters and criminals because our police, lawyers or judges cannot do anything against them. Law and order is a formality. Democracy is a game of the influential for fun and comfort of their own for a period of time. The fixed role of opposition parties is to blindly blame and criticize those in power, somewhere, somehow, to make people believe that they are supporters of their rights and custodians of their self-respect. Where are standards and values in this scenario of India now?

6. Never believe that only intelligent, rich and educated people feel and express standards and values in their lives and professions. Illiterate and poor Indians are following standards and values more than the elite in many parts of India even now. I know about many tribal men and women who bring fruit to the local markets and sell them at unbelievably low prices. Middlemen decide the rates there. We bargain with them a lot. We don’t like to pay much to them because they don’t know how to say sweet words to cheat us. We don’t bargain in a showy cloth store or five star hotel because it is a place of beautiful idiots where mutual cheating is the expected custom and false prestige is the accepted culture. There are still hawkers and vendors who walk miles or sit in a corner of a local market to sell their fruit or other kinds of produce to make a little profit. It is enough if they can live out of the profit they make there. Survival is their goal. They don’t cheat others because they are not trained in that art. They suffer silently and die in pitiable conditions in those remote places of India. Are not beggars, disadvantaged tribes, old people and peasant farmers the valuable citizens of India? What are we doing for them? If there are many reasons for why we are able to live comfortably and happily doing a job, a business or cheating somebody directly or indirectly, there are more reasons for why they turned and remained so for long in this nation. If ours is a welfare state, where the welfare of the helpless and the affected is our primary concern as a government or society, what could we do for them during the last 60 years or what can we do in the coming 50 years? We are good at making promises on every stage as politicians or individuals but not in keeping those promises. We are training Indians to live in a plethora of dreams, fantasies, illusions, delusions and imaginations but not reality. We are projecting India as a developed nation before other nations in international media and conferences, hiding our disorders, demerits and crimes beautifully. We are begging millions of dollars from international agencies of financial assistance and spending it carelessly in quite unproductive arenas of human civilization and culture. We beg 100 rupees from a rich country and donate five rupees of it to a poor country. Are we beggars or donors? We don’t ask these questions to ourselves? Our media persons don’t put such questions to our prime minister, chief ministers or businessmen. They ask sweet and soft questions to powerful and aggressive ones. If I am not worried about my standards and values; if others don’t expect them from me; if my parents, siblings, society, state or nation don’t train me in these moral aspects of life and profession, how do I change; how do you change and how do we Indians change? We are being pushed to live and work without standards and values. We are suffering silently because of the negative results caused due to our negligence towards these vital qualities of humanity. We must come out of this dirty path.

Realize and Redirect Yourself

To grow as individuals, entrepreneurs, politicians, employees, devotees, farmers, students, youth…we must understand the importance of standards and values in our lives and follow them as far as we can do.

1. Do what is right in a context or situation. If you don’t know what is right, know it reading great books or talking to experts or idealists in your access. If you don’t know what is right and don’t do it, you remain as an idiot always. To grow and remain as an admirable individual, you should have constructive ideas and ideal pursuits of your own.

2. Doing any business for making profits fast is the choice of sinners and criminals. If you are one, you are a burden on this earth planet. God did not send you to this world to think and live like a scoundrel but a noble living entity. Are you serving the humanity through your business or cheating and punishing them with your harmful products and immoral and illegal services. Believe that your bad Karma chases you. Nobody can save you from that fire of God.

3. We choose leaders to guide and save us from our difficulties and pains. When they fail to be honest custodians of our rights and dependable guides of our lives, they fail to be our good leaders. Time teaches them lessons soon.

4. Don’t expect too much from your employer. Instead of questioning him about your increments, bonus and other benefits, ask yourself, ‘Do I deserve this treatment?’, ‘Am I improving my knowledge and skills continuously to efficiently fulfill my job responsibilities?’, ‘What is my actual contribution to the growth of this company?’, ‘Am I spending my time constructively while in the premises of the company or wasting time regularly?’. When workers and employees don’t have standards and values, their employers lose business and face losses quite often. Instead of participating in union meetings and public shows, think about your plight if your employer asks you to go out. You are depending on him more than he depending on you. You are a helpless and hopeless beggar in his campus. A beggar should not dictate norms to a donor. If beggars make much noise, the donor throws them onto the road.

5. Don’t do what you like blindly. You are not a master of goodness. You are an idiot of false prestige, disorders and demerits. Realize your actual worth as a person or professional. Improve your image slowly changing your thoughts, acts and lifestyle in the right direction. Don’t live cheating or frightening others. It is the characteristic of a fraudster.

6. Don’t go to a meeting or temple for formality. God loses nothing if you don’t go to His temple. That expert trainer or preacher does not feel blissful if you appear to him there in that venue. You are going there to ask God to forgive you and to promise Him that you would live ideally thereafter. Prayer without repentance is useless. Attending meetings for formality sake is worthless. Know something good from others. Practice it to change yourself first.

7. Great change does not happen suddenly. You ruined your orientation of thoughts and lifestyle, due to your ignorance, stupidity, carelessness and eccentricity, for many years. You need to struggle hard and take a long time to cure the psychological disorders of this nature. Accidents occur within seconds. Self-reformation takes many years.

8. Don’t imitate celebrities or admire idiots of any kind. You should analyze what is right or wrong in a person, situation or context, applying your intelligence, creativity and rational thinking. If others always advise or dictate you how you should work and live, when do you use your brain and conscience, the tools of self-defense and self-analysis, freely given to you by God. Start questioning about disorderly things and regressive circumstances around you and contributing your part to the expected positive change around you. Help yourself first. Guide others later.