Saturday, March 18, 2006

How I (Observing people: An Intuitive Science)

It all started when I was in 9th standard. I used to see my cousin reading books on face reading as part of her course in psychology. I got fascinated about it. But it is difficult for a dabbler to concentrate on one particular hobby. I tried to read a book but at that time I had many other fascinations to pursue so I left it for future .

One day in engineering, I got Sherlock Homes in my hand (those days reading books were one of my favorite pastime). I was thrilled, the way he used to find out information from smallest of clue. It revitalized my sleeping desire to learn how to get information about others just by observing. Some people said, it is all Bull shit. But I never took note of any such view.

Now my task was to find out how to start. I tried to get some books but thanks to my laziness, I was not able to arrange for even one. But all the best things in world have more than one way to get them. Same with this science . I started practicing with my close friends. It somehow became my habit to observe people closely. In the beginning I failed many time, misjudged many times and some time unexpectedly successful. Time kept on passing and it ingrained into me.

Sometimes it so happened what I said from the current information just came true. This strike rate started increasing. During my job, I started practicing this art. It helped me a lot to tackle people. One of my colleagues always used to ask me my views on any particular incident. These cases used to be a real test of my expertise. I myself was not very confident in the beginning but those few informal talks with my friends helped me a lot. We used to stand in front of food court for sometime and it became my practice ground. We used to observe (I don’t need to tell whom) and I tried to come out explanations for some unusual stuffs. It went on and my practice sessions helped me a lot to improve.

By the time I entered into MBA, I mastered this art of finding out some facts about people just by observing them for some time. But now I have a second mammoth challenge, to get feel of a system, predicting it’s functioning and decisions. Till now I have failed miserably with very less strike rate. Only I can say with surety how a system doesn’t work. But I hope in 6 more months I will learn how to read into an existing system.

It may sound very nice to read about all this. But there is a serious hazard. Things are not always rosey. Sometimes I meet people who don’t think good about me, hate me or want to harm. At times it is difficult to maintain the same distance that I would have kept otherwise. Sometimes I need to behave like a fool, sometimes serious guy and list is endless. But in general, I enjoy. Sometimes things are so funny that you simply fall out of laughing. But when things are touching, it is very difficult to handle the situation because you know what will follow.


Time one takes in reading this mail itself tells many things about the reader. Think about it.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Shakun,
looking at things from a different angle (than what 'normal' people see) and getting a hooked over it, brings lots of things with it. for one, you can never understand things from a layman's perspective. as a man from visual communication, when you constantly have to be in the audience's minds, it becomes a hell. have you experienced it yourself?

smit shah
smitenator@gmail.com

Shaks said...

Smit,
But there are few points like I enjoy reading minds so it is not much of a problem in that sense. Although, ya I am unable to have layman' perspective and sometimes resist few things which I would have accepted otherwise.