It’s dangerous to think in terms of “passion” and “purpose” because they sound like such huge overwhelming ideas.

If you think love needs to look like “Romeo and Juliet”, you’ll overlook a great relationship that grows slowly.

If you think you haven’t found your passion yet, you’re probably expecting it to be overwhelming.

Instead, just notice what excites you and what scares you on a small moment to-moment level.

If you find yourself glued to Photoshop, playing around for hours, dive in deeper.

Maybe that’s your new calling.

If you keep thinking about putting on a conference or being a Hollywood screenwriter, and you find the idea terrifies but intrigues you, it’s probably a worthy endeavor for you.

You grow (and thrive!) by doing what excites you and what scares you everyday, not by trying to find your passion.

One’s ideal represents the
summation of one’s passions,
one’s aspirations, competencies,
and one’s engagement with
life as it presents itself.

The realization of one’s ideal
results in a transmutation
of all of one’s energies into
a single frame of Living,
not in the ‘now’, not in the
past, present or future, but
living in one’s infinite possibility.

Mostly people operate from either a ‘doing’ identity, or ‘having’ identity; i.e.I am good because I have this job. ‘Doing’ identity is I am good because I do this work. However these identities lock you up. If my identity is in ‘have’ then I get locked up in a mode where I judge myself (and others) automatically, and end up being materialistic.

Put simply, when my identity is linked to ‘what I have’, I judge myself in ‘what Ihave‘. E.g., ‘what do I have’ comes from ‘what do I do’. But your identity is at a very surface level. When I am doing, my identity is a little deeper, at an action level. And in terms of ‘being’ it means ‘who am I’, ‘am I happy’. Usually ‘be-do-have’ is used as a framework for whether I am happy, I am fulfilled and I am comfortable, those kinds of areas start coming here.

But I find that ‘be-do-have’ framework is not a very good framework for living life.

Actually the framework that one can move into is ‘being and becoming’. Beingthen becomes your role and becoming comes through contribution.

‘Be-do-have’ is a static framework of life. It gives a static identity. ‘Be-do-have’ is a snapshot of who you are right now; so – who are you? what do you do? & what do you have? Because it is static, it locks you up where you are. If I am locked up in ‘having’ then I become locked up in acquiring more and more. If I am locked up in ‘doing’ then also I am locked up, because then I become process oriented in life. Because I am more worried in what I do compared to what contributions I make. In ‘being’, I am excessively concerned about whether I am happy, not happy, whether I am ok or I am not ok. So there is an excessive concern with oneself and it becomes very static. Everything looks frozen in life.

On the other hand ‘being and becoming’, takes a radically different view of myself as a person in motion. One is the static view of oneself and one is an evolutionary view of oneself. When you view yourself in evolution then every experience becomes a learning experience. Every trouble becomes a challenge which I overcome and transform myself.

If I am in static framework then every change looks like a threat to me. It makes me go into a shell and I operate little out of fear.Then even in small matters, I want to keep people out of things. So, if I am working on something, I do not want others’ feedback, I do not want others to get involved, etc.

All these happen in an organization. They happen because it is all ‘be-do-have’. It is not because the person is bad, just that you are locked up in a static view. Any new thing comes, it becomes a pain in a ‘Be do have’ framework because I am in a static frame then any change is not good.

So, ‘being and becoming’ is a ready-to-go state of mind in life. ‘Becoming’ happens because of active contribution.

My general recommendation is that people should have a dynamic view of life because life is itself changing. The ‘being and becoming’ frame gives lots of space to grow and be happy while in ‘be-do-have’, you get locked up very badly very soon.

This is the difference.

(excerpts from a talk with the i-become team -14th December 2009)

There is no outward becoming without inward becoming.

(original version 26th Nov 2009)

Do I want to become?
That is the question each one of us must ask ourselves.

What does becoming mean?
I don’t want to just ‘do’ and ‘have’ all the time.
I want to become as a human being; I want to become a larger human being.

Am I my salary … no!
Am I my job description or role … no!
Then…Who am I?

I am what I can become!
Each one of us has to answer the question – who am I?
Becoming has to be seen as an answer to oneself.
Each one of us has to truly go deep within and experience this becoming in ourselves.

i-become is a visioning of a new state!

(Original version 10^th December 2009)

Very few people construct a whole new model of a career. If you have to construct a model, then you have to spend years actually constructing it. Hence, most people look at existing career models. Also, the HR way of looking at this career choice in terms of – “X percent are looking at this much salary” etc. does not really work.

Can we make a statement that many of these engineering companies, Siemens, L&T etc. all have the same career model? There may be small differences, but all of them can be clubbed together as one career model.

You need to propose some career models to the people. Show career-seekers that “this might happen to you”.

Offer them the possibilities.

(original version – 2007)

A ‘dynamic’ practice is to think in terms of – what is my “role” and what is my “contribution in that role”.

As an i-becomer you shift from a static practice to a dynamic practice.

Another static practice is to look at one’s qualifications and competencies as frozen. And dynamic practice will be to see them as evolving and configurable.

(Original version – Nov 2009)

Hence it takes on an amorphous shape and form.

Identities can either be disabling or enabling.

A disabling identity is one that says I am limited. This is true about all of us, but when I constantly focus on my limitations, it becomes disabling.

One can otherwise have an enabling identity – which says I can contribute, I can make happen, etc.

Many people get locked into disabling identities. Hence by making them conscious of their enabling identity, we are freeing them. Then their career takes off and their life changes.

(original version June 2009)

Erich Fromm, in his book “To have or to be” (1976), has done a complete philosophical argument on this subject and I recommend that one reads it.

This freedom is not easily obtained.

To attain this freedom a student has to go far beyond aptitude tests and lists of colleges and Universities.

To attain this freedom, an individual has to learn to think for himself or herself.

The individual must develop approaches to ‘scan’ the environment, translate day to day ‘events’ and ‘news’ into ‘career trends’.

Most important of all, the individual has to learn to understand the real relationship between oneself and society, which is that of contribution and its resultant self-esteem.