COVID-19 Changing our Lives !

We all need to understand and answer one important point that COVID-19 is different from a SARS or an EBOLA virus. Why is that?

SARS transmits from a infected person to another in the 2 week after infection which is why it was easier to be controlled as doctors had 1 week of a lead time to kill it. This virus also originated from China and initially everyone thought it is due to the same mammal Bat etc too. What is being observed the PANIC which has taken over the world is not just because of the deadly virus but also because of quarantine. CHINA had locked (Forced) the city where the VIRUS had originated from and countries followed the same process. We as Humans love are freedom to move around and if thats taken away we tend to feel choked or breathless. Also need to understand human psychology to have your loved ones around you when you are sick as that gives you motivation, both are not possible in case of COVID-19.

Is COVID19 a BioWarfare tool ? was SARS the first phase of the deadly virus due to the a lot of similarity between the two affecting the respiratory organs in humans. Was Obama aware of such virus coming in future ? These conspiracy theories are floating around with substantial evidences. 

Obama did state about a pandemic and infact predicted its timing too. Obama warned in 2014, that we must be ready to deal with an epidemic. 

“So that if and when a new strain of flu, like the Spanish flu, crops up, five years or a decade from now - we’ve made the investment - and we’re further along to be able to catch it”, the former president had asserted.

Obama called for more pandemic preparedness following the Ebola epidemic in West Africa, which was then seen as a global threat. 

(Video link to his speech)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBVAnaHxHbM

This virus has changed our lives and now we are more careful then ever (even young kids) to avoid touching anything outside and stay away from food outlets or restaurants. This will impact the overall Food and beverage industry and you will be see lesser food outlets as people avoid eating out and would force them to close out. A friend of mine who owns a restaurant shared that the footfall (in-seat dining) will be down by 60-70% or more even though they are following strict rules around sanitization of cutlery utensils and regular screening of the staff. Deliveries dont fetch much revenue, not even close enough to pay rent and salaries of the staff employed.

Trends show that Domestic travel (leisure) would pick up first. The countries will still be reluctant to open borders for passenger travel. Cargo business is moving upwards and will reach its peak by end of 2020 as more and more shipments move around the world. However for the nations who highly dependent to run their economy through tourism, Student programs etc are the ones having major economic challenge by end of 2020 or post COVID 19. We will see a drastic drop in the international leisure travel as compared to last year.

Business travel shall be reduced considerably post COVID19 as now we have seen and experienced the technology to hold meetings without actually being onsite for meetings .

What does this mean for Airlines Hotels etc : More focus on touch less move, Hotels to use electrostatic technology for in room things. Regular sanitation of room keys etc and Moving away from check-in counters and have touch less process in place for airports. Reporting time before your flight would change and increase as now we all would have to follow social distancing protocols and screening requirements. Also having a medical facilities to counter any identified patients. Touch less Immigration clearance technology would be introduced must faster especially at tourist destinations etc.

Airlines will also have some policies on regular sanitization of the aircraft and frequent touch areas.and what if someone is identified to have symptoms of the virus at a transit point or at the time of boarding.

There will be a drastic fall in the airlines operating as many wont survive and the ones left floating would be on reduced capacities. So gone are the days when airlines were finding ways to add more seats to their aircrafts or buying bigger aircrafts. Airbus and Boeing have seen cancellation of aircraft orders including the A380's. 

Multinational aerospace corporation Airbus has warned its employees that the company is “bleeding cash at an unprecedented speed”, amid lockdowns around the world to combat the Covid-19 pandemic, BBC reported on Monday. Airbus Chief Executive Officer Guillaume Faury told the 1.35 lakh employees to brace for potentially deep job cuts and warned that the firm’s survival is at stake.

“The survival of Airbus is in question if we don’t act now,” Faury said in the letter, according to Reuters. He added that in just two months the company has lost one-third of its business. “And, frankly, that’s not even the worst-case scenario we could face,” Faury said.
What would be the new seating structure to adhere to social distancing norms. COVID 19 has changed that and now airfares will rise up to compensate for the empty middle seat to meet the social distancing norms .. people will still be reluctant to travel as frequently as they used to 5 months back.

What will be the outcome over all and effects our lives in long run.. is still unknown.

Two basic self-improvement principles.

 

From a high level perspective, most self-improvement knowledge can be summarized as two principles below:

1. Love yourself, work on your self-esteem. Take responsibility for how you feel/think/act. Work on reducing your ego. Do not let people/situations hurt your ego, and if hurt, do not act on the thoughts when hurt. Center your mind before you act.
2. Love others. Boost their self-esteem. Do not intentionally hurt other people’s ego.  Keep developing people skills so you will reduce the probability of even unintentionally hurting others, and increase the chance of making others feeling good about themselves and hence you. 

Let us look into these in further detail:

Principle #1:
Our ego is the single reason why we experience all the negative emotions and all the suffering.  Our ego is just a thought of who we think we are in terms of what we do, what we own, and what others think of us. The entire spiritual path is about reducing our ego. As our ego’s reduces, wisdom naturally increases, and our life gets better. Loving ourselves is very Important. Self-esteem is the critical component that determines the quality of our lives. The core teaching of self-help is that we are responsible for our lives, and that no matter what happens around us, we are responsible for how we feel. The meaning that we associate to events is what creates our feelings. By consciously assigning empowering meaning  to events, we can always control how we feel. Wisdom is in knowing that it is never others that hurt us, but we choosing to hurt ourselves by the thoughts we think.

Principle #2:
The other side of the the core self-help knowledge is to love others and make them feel valued. Although it would be great to have people around with no ego, practically speaking, all people around us have egos, just like we do. Wisdom thus lies in boosting people’s self-esteem - to make them genuinely feel good and appreciated. While it’s clear that intentionally hurting other people’s ego is not a good idea, what may not be that apparent is that we unintentionally hurt people thanks to our lack of skills in dealing with people. Much of classic self-help knowledge such as ”How to win friends and influence people” and most books on “relationship skills”  are about learning skills so that we become a master of dealing with people. There is a psychology for every situation, age group, sex, and profession. Our ignorance of human psychology leads us to untold pain in dealing with people. Becoming more and more skilled in dealing with people the right way so we do not violate principle #2 is a great asset. This part can take a long time to master, as life always leads to new situations/people in which we have not yet learnt the  proper psychology for the situation. For example, many people struggle with marriages simply because of ignorance of psychology of the opposite sex.

Many relationship problems are a result of not following these principles
Most of the relationship problems between two people, whether at home or work, happens due to people violating either principle #1 or principle #2. The patterns of all friction between two people A and B happens in one of the following ways:

1) A violates principle #1 =>  B violates principle #1
Example:
A gets angry at B due to an expectation B did not meet, and his ego is hurt. B in turn is hurt by the negative energy A is sending him, and reflects back the anger in some way. He may become hurt, depressed, sad or send back anger.

2) B violates principle #2 =>  A violates principle #1 => B violates principle #1
Example:
B unknowingly hurts A, due to some ignorance, perhaps lack of people skills. A takes that action personally, gets hurt, and sends some negative energy towards B. B in turn retalitates with negative energy.

Solution to many relationship problems lies in simply following these principles
The solution to avoiding friction between two people happens in one of the following ways:

1. A follows principle #1 => B has no problem.
2. B follows principle #2 => A has no problem.
3. A violates principle #1 =>  B still follows principle #1 => no problem  (i.e B does not retaliate)
4. B violates principle #2 =>  A still follows principle #1 => no problem  (i.e A does not retaliate)

Apply these principles on yourself, not others
The interesting thing is that even as we break one of these principles, we expect our counterpart to follow them! For example, we knowingly/unknowingly hurt the other (principle #2), but yet expect our counterpart to not act out as they do when hurt (principle #1). Or, we hurt ourselves by giving disempowering meaning to events related to what the other did (principle #1), and expect the other to make it right ( principle #2) Wisdom lies in applying these principles on ourselves, and not on our counterparts. We can only control ourselves, not others. Expecting others to comply only leads to disappointment.




The reason we are creators of our life is that regardless of whether people around us are following these principles or not, if we follow them, we are able to completely direct the experience of our life. Not following these principles leads to negative, dis-empowered and painful situations, and following these leads to positive, empowered, and happy experiences.
 

Manila : Air Phillipines

The Local Transport called "The Jeepney"

I went to Manila for another assignment on the 10th march 2010.
Philippine is a developing nation and is more or less like India was 10 years back. They have cultural heritage which like any other developing nation is being ignored and people are adapting the western culture.

Team at Air Phillipines with the Chairman.

I am always fascinated with the different kind of people I meet and some turn out be amazing friends and some teach me things that I never thought of or considered important in life. and I met few people here from whom I learned that no joy is small and no pain is big. I read that somewhere back during my school days but may be I never realized that with all these years of work and everything I lost touch on the basic fundas of living life. Now a days my priorities are more materialistic and  I started looking for satisfaction in those which I never got.

Like any other new city I go, this as well I was confined in my hotel room and worked after coming back to the hotel everyday. But somehow for this assignment I felt I was prepared, May be because I was coming straight from another assignment I the states. The team here came from different back grounds and still were content as one of them mentioned that "if we don't know whats gonna happen the next minute, than why spending that quality time in thinking about it. Just live the life the way it comes". That made me think and i understood what really meant  to be living your life means. It is not always laughing,enjoying,partying or working ... its to do things which makes you feel happy and content, which one can find peace and satisfaction. I am still seaching for it.

I always felt that god wasn't fare to me, but after meeting this group I felt that I was so wrong. Sometimes we don't value what  we possess and crave for what we don't have but when I look at people on the streets I realised that things I never valued. Trust me I am not good and I thought its a change that I need to bring in myself.


I also learned that the people you love and care for the most in your day to day life tend to put a blind fold cover on your eyes .. which not only blocks your view but also makes you think that everything done or said by him/her is correct. I had this same experience and trust me people when this gets over, it leaves you with nothing but sadness and a feeling of being cheated. But at the same time if you forgive that person and let go of him/her would leave you stronger and at peace.

You all must be thinking how come I learned all this in just one trip, well I guess the thoughts were there in my mind from the very start but I just could not find a right reason to bring that change in myself. This is another trick your mind plays with you, it needs explanation or you need to convince it before you change anything in yourself.

In the end,  I met few people who I will never forget and would keep myself reminding of the facts that no one is Big or small, superior or junior, loved or hated, all are same .. we just need to change the way we look at each other ..

Last few months !!

The Sabre team at Jet Blue, Salt lake city UT

Last few months havebeen really busy, different projects,fifferent locations and long hours of work ... I past few months I have had oppurtinities to interact/meet with people from different back grounds and culture. It was a great learning experience. During one of the projects, I met few people who really inspired me in terms of the way they take life and and they shared there experiences with me whenever we went out. Although I also saw a lot of insecurity among few of the people I met and saw the level of dissatisfaction people have from life, from family etc ..

Jet Blue Team & Me

The Airline Solutions Training Team

Project completed successfully : Jetblue and Sabre team

I was in US for almost a month and a half and those days may be I over worked, the reason was to prove myself and abilities when everyone was watching this project very closely. All that hardwork made me lose on ther other end "personal Life".... Staying away from family for that long, talking to them only once a day and when your back you are in a different city  and you don't see them for another couple of months may be...... for a person like me who gets his all motivation from family, makes me more lonely and sometimes SAD....

When in the office its all together a  different ball game. you have to have a MASK on yourself and always be cautious which stops me from being myself ... people pretend to be your friend and everyone tries to outshine others forget calling themselves as a TEAM ... plus the regional biasness is something that you can clearly see. If you happen to be from Channai or kerala or Andra than you would be preffered by all and if your from north (Delhi) specially they think that your some high brow snob who doesn't know anything and treat you as a complete outcast which adds to the your growing frustration.

As I mentioned above that I lost on the personal front, as I am 1600 miles away from friends whom I met and spent weekends with and above all family specially my mum whom I spoke for long hours ...

but as they say that life is a bitch, I like that work I do no matter even if I am out for 3 weeks in a month but I realised one thing that in past year and half that nothing is more precious than family .. you can earn money any day but if you lose your family it would take you ages to get it back ... or may be you would never get them back at all ...

SO ALWAYS RESPECT and LOVE WHAT YOU HAVE... specially your FAMILY... !!