I am a Finance professional and in all my study period I have been told that money is fungible. So my mind is conditioned to believe that and I operate with the same frame of mind, but life teaches you more. It teaches you anthropology.
My domestic help came with a bag of coins, saying her son wanted currency notes in exchange of it. I said I would adjust the amount against an advance payment she had taken from me, little realizing that she was only a mediator.
This transaction was on the behalf of her son and not on her own. She silently accepted my proposal but as the saying goes, silence is equivalent to a thousand words.
In an instant I could see I had done it again. Her face said volumes which her words couldn't, she wanted to say that her son would be expecting notes when she returns home and might not understand the high level math that I had done even though it was mathematically correct.
In the next instant I realized my mistake and my sensitivity took the forefront. I gave her money against the coins and said that her advance would be adjusted in her salary separately. That brought millions of smiles on her face and I think many more millions on her son's face when she went home that day,
Learning and humility is everywhere around us, a mere INR 500 can teach you a lot more than what millions of Dollars can't.
Even if mental accounting is a bias, happiness matters much more than strictly abiding by the laws of school curriculum. It can teach you how well your investment in humans pays you in your times to come and even if it is not about returns all the time, it is about relationships which might fare better than numbers earned by you.
My domestic help came with a bag of coins, saying her son wanted currency notes in exchange of it. I said I would adjust the amount against an advance payment she had taken from me, little realizing that she was only a mediator.
This transaction was on the behalf of her son and not on her own. She silently accepted my proposal but as the saying goes, silence is equivalent to a thousand words.
In an instant I could see I had done it again. Her face said volumes which her words couldn't, she wanted to say that her son would be expecting notes when she returns home and might not understand the high level math that I had done even though it was mathematically correct.
In the next instant I realized my mistake and my sensitivity took the forefront. I gave her money against the coins and said that her advance would be adjusted in her salary separately. That brought millions of smiles on her face and I think many more millions on her son's face when she went home that day,
Learning and humility is everywhere around us, a mere INR 500 can teach you a lot more than what millions of Dollars can't.
Even if mental accounting is a bias, happiness matters much more than strictly abiding by the laws of school curriculum. It can teach you how well your investment in humans pays you in your times to come and even if it is not about returns all the time, it is about relationships which might fare better than numbers earned by you.
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