On pent up animosity, brutal honesty . . . and MORE.
Dear Reader,
As the flames rage across the U.S. and the National Guard has been called into Minneapolis to try and put a stop to the madness going on over the death of George Floyd, way too many people are asking all the WRONG questions.
First thing you know, is any of this madness justified at any level?
Does the actions of ONE person — or a few — speak for the thoughts, feelings and actions of a community — any community at WHOLE?
Does any of the senseless violence, ARSON and looting do respect to Floyd’s memory — and have ANY benefit for anyone — or even ensure to any degree that this sort of thing never happens again?
Negative on all counts, and if anyone reading this (or not) tries and gets “publicity from any of this” (which it seems the mayor of Petal did this morning when he said “if can say he can’t breathe it mean he is” — a statement so stupid I’m pretty sure the good Mayor didn’t just up and say that without prior thought) then that is just plain wrong, as is the wrongful death of ANYONE INNOCENT regardless of RACE.
When someone’s shot, and say they’ve been shot, does it mean they haven’t been shot?
Like I said, a dumb ass remark, but the actions that are taking place (w.r.t the looting, rioting, arson etc) are NO LESS dumb in ANY way, shape or form — if anything, more so since they’re endangering members of their own community!
Anyway, all of this brought to mind something my father (with whom I disagree on just about anything) once told me about “festering animosity”.
It only takes one little thing to break a relationship up for good, he once told me, and the truism of that saying is being hammered home GLOBALLY (and unless you have been living under a rock, you know what I mean).
And this would be also be a great point to bring up brutal honesty, and how I’d rather be brutally honest than any other way.
It may get me hated by a large number of people, and usually does but that is FINE. As a friend of mine once told me, at least with you know I know where I stand Rahul. That’s what counts!
And it does.
Back in the day, I worked for an I.T. company — a startup where I made sales galore within a week or so of me joining the place, and with NO staff in place at the time of joining.
That’s right. It was a rank startup, and has grown a lot from back then to what it is NOW — and yet, at the time of joining the facts were that there were NO staff excluding myself, the HR manager (who later became a “general manager” of sorts) and the Operations Manager.
I was, I suppose the de facto sales manager (and supervisor at a certain point albeit very unwillingly) without the title, hehe.
Or wait. I DID have the title, I think. I’m not sure!
Anyway, you that have read the book KNOW what happened at that job.
The first few months went swimmingly well . . . until I asked my then boss for a raise which everyone agreed was well deserved (and which my boss himself at the time of hiring me had said that would be given based upon good performance if that were to be applicable).
All attempts were made to NOT give me that raise, and once I got it — all hell broke loose.
I was routinely and roundly castigated for the smallest of things.
Things that didn’t “seem to matter” before suddenly did now — DESPITE results coming in, and DESPITE my boss and others acknowledging those results at the time they came in WRITING, and then later simply “denying that the results were as good as they were being made out to”.
One thing led to another and sadly, what happened was a complete breakup in communication and an acrimonious parting, which was not good for any of the parties involved.
Certainly not the company itself.
A year or so later, the G.M. (by now) of the company had this to say to a question I raised about SALES.
“Of course we’re doing GREAT! Do you think we were just sitting around after you left us?”
This WITHOUT me insinuating the above in any way, shape or form.
And yet, he would be the first person to acknowledge the GOOD I did for the company, including this remark “There has been no-one in our company like Rahul that can hammer out emails at a minute’s go regardless of the situation” (this was with regard to a particularly troublesome client at the time we were trying to deal with and finally did deal with).
Ah, if I had just taken my skills back then and done what I am now.
But that’s a different story, and hey, hindsight is always 20/20!
Point being, pent up animosity.
What many hated at that company (well, maybe some, the rest didn’t really care) was me coming to work at a time of my choosing as opposed to the usual 9–6 requirement.
But here’s the point.
I worked OVERTIME from home at night “servicing” and getting new clients, and I was getting RESULTS.
If I had come into the office from 9–6 and NOT gotten any results, chances are excellent and second to none I’d have been shown the DOOR within a coupla of months.
The fact that I wasn’t despite my “strange habits” (as one person said) speaks volumes as to the RESULTS I produced there.
And yet, this was something never openly talked about.
At the time of congratulating me on my results, if my boss had simply said that results don’t count and time spent in the office does — well, I’d have walked out of the door right there and then MYSELF without further ado (as it was, I pretty much walked out myself anyway on TWO occasions after that).
Point is, results are what count. Nothing else, especially when we’re talking a person hired pretty much to produce results.
There were other things, but this “pent up animosity” is the reason we’re seeing the madness erupt across the US right now, and it seems to be worse than after the Charlottesville incident.
Donald Trump is being roundly pilloried for an “in the flow” comment about ‘if they loot, we’ll shoot’, and YES, while I’m aware of the racist origin of the term . . . HERE is a question.
IF someone enters your house and loots you, what would your response be?
Try and stop ’em, or bend over backwards and let them have their way?
I think any rational minded person knows the answer to this question, and to forget the real import of the President’s words (which were basically — does this manner of responding honor Floyd’s memory in any way) is just being partial, biased, and having an AXE to grind.
Sorry if that offends anyone, but its true.
And as for what this has to do with brutal honesty, something which I’ve always been told to tone down upon, and something I never have and never will?
Well its this.
At least with me, you KNOW WHERE YOU STAND!
There is no “pent up” anything. If I have to say something, and I can say it, then I say it and if circumstances don’t permit me to say it at that point in time, I say it AS soon as I am ABLE to.
I’d rather simply say what I feel, and say it like it is and not let “shit hit the fan later”, in other words.
When I tell you my books on pull-ups are pretty much all you need, and indeed the BEST darn resource out there in terms of getting better at pull-ups, then guess what — it’s TRUE, and the testimonials are but PROOF of that fact.
REAL people, real words as I say on the page.
When I tell you I don’t shy away from saying it like I see it, again, that’s TRUE.
When I tell you that bodyweight exercises do work, and in most cases better and more efficiently than weight lifting, or pump and tone, puff and buff routines at the gym with the bros, then guess what — I’m saying that for a reason.
If I wanted to, I could EASILY make a living selling weight belts, or any such contraption that is all the craze these days (in other words, make a quick buck selling what people want and by saying what they want to hear).
But I don’t, my friend.
Because that ain’t my style, or the 0 Excuses Fitness style.
I could easily tell you that crunches are all you need in order to get a toned midsection, and sell you a $9.99 book on it, but I don’t.
I’d rather sell the $97 book I am on Advanced Hill Training, because guess what.
It ain’t cheap, but the exercises and routines mentioned therein just flat out WORK my friend.
I would rather risk the chance of losing a sale NOW than to have someone come back later and say “he duped me”.
Nah. That ain’t me. And for a very good reason as well, as you can tell.
Moral of the story — say it like it is, my friend — in a FRANK and unapologetic manner.
There truly IS NO other way, my friend!
Best,
Rahul Mookerjee
P.S. — FWIW, the cops are there to do a JOB, and often times they are in the unfortunate, yet necessary situation of doing what they have to temporarily until matters get sorted out. There have been, for instance, cops stopping me late at night during my school days for no other reason than just to “check my ID” — and on one occasion, because “someone that looked like me” had committed a serious crime somewhere nearby.
On all these occasions, yes, I was inconvenienced, but I complied with the officers. And in ALL these cases, I never felt the slightest hint of racism -perhaps IMPATIENCE at being made to wait when I had done nothing that warranted it, but again, there’s a reason things are done.
In fact, I still remember the friendly manner in which the officer handed my ID back in the first instance and thanked me for being co-operative for what was essentially a routine late night stop . . .
Point, again?
Is that not everyone is racist, and simply bracketing the entire community (any community) out to be “bad” (as seems to be happening now) is just as bad and abhorrent as painting out all black people to be “potential criminals” for one.
No, I am NOT justifying what happened, but rather, trying to bring a touch of REALISM to the overall scene, if that makes any sense . . .
P.S #2 — By the way, if motivational tips and reads are your thing, then go right HERE — https://0excusesfitness.com/gumption-galore/
