HOW TO MAKE BIG DREAMS COME TRUE – BHAGIRATH PRAYAS

 

 

 

You must have noticed a palpable change in the polity of our nation. We have suddenly started setting bigger and bigger goals, and what is more important, we are achieving most of them. Our vaccination drive has now become a legend. No one expected that a country of 1.4 billion people will be near totally vaccinated in such a short time, but we have succeeded in pushing in 2 and at times 3 doses to our citizens. Similarly, feeding 800 million people ever since the COVID lockdown started, thus totally preventing starvation deaths during the pandemic, has no parallel in the world. These are gigantic projects and must have required excellent planning, lots of resources, inspirational leadership and an extremely efficient teamwork for execution.

 

On a much smaller scale I will talk about the dream of writing a Text Book of Plastic, Reconstructive & Aesthetic Surgery. A senior colleague of mine, Prof. Karoon Agarwal had the audacity to dream this and I was privileged to be associated with him all the way. Till very recently we were reading western text books of Plastic Surgery but they often did not have answers to our problems. We had long realized that we in South Asia are different – our challenges are different, our patients are different and their priorities are different. So the Plastic Surgery practiced in this part of the world is and will always remain very different. Ours is a developing world, with an exploding population, a perpetual resource crunch and an absolute necessity to get back to work as soon as possible. A long standing disease or a permanent deformity is a serious monetary setback for the family and if the sufferer is the sole bread earner, then it can ruin not only his/her future but that of the entire family. Again because our patients usually pay for their surgeries from their own savings and less than 4% of the population is covered by medical insurance, the first surgery has to be the best as our patients simply cannot afford complications resulting from our mediocrity.

  

Documenting our research was not a very strong point of Indians and we would often wake up when the scientists in the West would claim patent for turmeric (haldi) and neem. So for us, to dream of writing a 6 volume text book of Plastic Surgery was not a casual one. But we were convinced that if our patients are different, their lives are different, their challenges are different, their diseases are different then how can we expect to find answers to these different situations in western text books? If we are treating our patients differently, then should we not document these different procedures in our own text book? Hence we thought of compiling a multi author test book with contributions from 258 authors for our 120 chapters!

 

While there were many murmurs about the impossibility of this herculean task but my colleague Prof. Karoon never doubted the success of this project and its ultimate utility for our future students. These years of association with this project have left an indelible impression in my mind. I have learned a lot from him and so I want to share with you the gains of this association. I have realized that it is perfectly normal for people to have dreams and goals, but there is a clear difference between those who make their dreams come true and those who spend their lives thinking about what they could have achieved. So let me tell you how you can make your big dreams come true:

 

1. Step 0 - You’re the Only Thing that is Holding Yourself Back: Many people don’t even make it to Step 1 of fulfilling their dreams because they stay on Step 0 forever. This means that even before they have made an effort to reach their dreams, they have already put themselves down or held themselves back. Many people are just too afraid or do not believe in themselves enough. Whatever it is that you keep telling yourself, stop, as it’s holding you back before you even try.

 

2. Step 1 – Hardest Step – how to start?: Even if you have finally psyched yourself up to follow your dreams, you might find that the beginning is the toughest, most confusing, and most discouraging step of all. There are a number of reasons for this:

 

(a)  the goals might be too big and therefore, too difficult to plan for and execute. You have to break them down into small steps and take one small step at a time. Not only will this make your dream seem more achievable, but you will also break down that huge goal into smaller and more measurable ones. We thought of publishing all 6 volumes of our Text Book together but eventually ended up bringing them out volume by volume in the next 5 years.

 

(b) the lack of information. You might have a fantastic idea, but simply lack the knowledge to figure out how to proceed. In this case, it’s very important to do your research, ask people, observe, and do some small experiments so that you know what the status quo is and where your idea fits in the big picture. We held a small meeting of all sectional editors and listened  to their ideas and had words of reassurances for all who were intending to join us.

 

3. Great Things Take Time and Effort: Once you have identified your main and smaller goals, you need to simply start making it reality. For example, if you’re developing a product, you should be prepared to spend a lot of time designing, testing, creating, and improving it before you can go further. While our brains are hardwired to lean towards instant gratification, you can dictate to yourself that your goal might take much more time and work. We started with the First volume on ‘Principles & Advances in Plastic Surgery’, identified our authors and told them what is expected of them. We knew they were good orators as we had heard them in conferences but some were not so comfortable writing. So we collaborated with them, modified their written text, contributed our own illustrations and charts and started building the volume chapter by chapter.

 

4. Not Everyone Will Support You: This does not happen only in politics, it happens in real life as well. Remember how people in the opposition felt that we will take 20 years to immunize 1.4 billion people! We eventually did it much earlier, didn’t we? While those who are closest to you might be your biggest fans, you will encounter many critical people nevertheless. Some might be discouraging you out of jealousy, but you must simply accept that you’ll never be able to please everyone. Your life will be a lot more fulfilling when you don’t think about what other people say or think. During the planning of our Text Book we also encountered nay-sayers and doubting Toms, we convinced some and we ignored some because we believed in our leader’s dream, which now became our dream.

 

5. You Cannot Succeed Without Taking Big Risks: You’ll never be 100% sure that you will succeed, which is why you have to take huge risks at times. If you wait, you’ll never get started. Unfortunately, in life and in business, just because your idea makes complete sense doesn’t mean that everyone will agree and support you. You might have a great concept, but you’ll never be able to fully predict how people will react to it. Our Editor in Chief had to put in a substantial part of his retirement benefits into this 6 volume Text Book project because he believed in his dream. This single act of courage and his 24x7 involvement galvanized our entire team. So in order to succeed there is no substitute to involvement with ‘tan, man and dhan’ (body, mind and money)!

 

6. You Cannot Control Everything: The unfortunate truth is that, despite your best efforts, you cannot make everything go your way. This is especially true when it comes to other people’s actions and behavior. In these kinds of situations, you just need to let go and let things happen the way they’re supposed to happen. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you don’t take action and simply wait for things to happen, but the art of letting go is vital in managing expectations and measuring effort. The repealing of the Farm Laws is a brilliant example of this. In our experience we were sometimes disappointed by some authors because of their refusal to meet deadlines. Their un-punctuality derailed our publishing plans. We coaxed some, cajoled some, and dropped some but always tried to stick to our publication schedule.

 

7. You Can’t Do It All: No one can be jack of all trades. Even as an entrepreneur, you’ll need to get some individuals involved to make your business come to life. For example, if you want to eventually manufacture a lot of products, you’ll need to work with a reputable logistics company to find ways to decrease your work and improve efficiency. When you let go and let other people contribute, you free yourself up to focus on other more important things as well. A multi author book is a perfect example of harnessing the best out of every domain expert. We did not hesitate to go out of Plastic Surgery domain or the geographical limits of our country in order to get the best version of a chapter. Going out of your comfort zone to harness the best talent is a sure shot to success – the best minister in the Modi cabinet, Mr. S. Jayashanker is the best example of this.

 

8. It’s Okay to Fail: Failure gets a really bad reputation because of our drive and desire to succeed. However, in the history of inventors, the great products came about only after a number of mistakes and failures. The good thing about failing is that you can figure out what went wrong and improve it to make it work the next time. Failures are stepping stones of our success.

 

9. Habit versus Inspiration: While willpower and inspiration do matter in terms of pushing yourself to accomplish your dreams and becoming successful, the right habits will influence whether you’ll survive or not. The important habits of an entrepreneur such as hard work, discipline, and thoroughness can have a direct effect on your finances and lifestyles. When you develop the habit, you can continue doing the action even without thinking twice about it. Inspiration is important, but it is only the spark from a spark plug, it will start your vehicle but will not run it, a well oiled engine will.

10. Acknowledge the Contributors and Encourage Feedback: Though it may have been the leader’s brain-child but a grand plan only succeeds with team effort and it is the responsibility of the leader to acknowledge the contribution of his/her team members. This not only lifts the team spirit and self worth of the individual members but definitely improves the overall performance of the team. The leader should always be open to feedback as despite his knowledge and vision he may be oblivious of some aspects or finer details. A team of yes-men is the last thing a leader wants and if he/she is upset by a contrarian point of view there is something seriously wrong with his/her leadership. For the completion of a Herculean task  besides planning, effort and commitment humility is that lubricant which can smooth all rough edges so that the entire path to success remains friction-less.

 

So what is Bhagirath prayas?   

This is the term given to the unprecedented efforts and harsh penance performed by Survanshi king Dilip’s son Bhagirath  in the Himalayas because he wanted to bring the celestial river Ganga to earth from the heaven because only She could bestow nirvana to Bhagirath’s ancestors who were burnt to ashes because of sage Kapil’s curse. After many years of penance Bhagirath was able to please Ganga but was perplexed to learn from her that if she descends down as per his wish her mighty flow might sweep away the whole planet and end up in Patal Lok. Bhgirath was perplexed, he asked Ganga to provide a solution. Ganga replied that only Lord Shiva has the ability and valour to channelize her. If the Lord agrees to receive her in his jata (tuft of hairs on his head), then only the world will survive her ferocious flow. Hearing this, Bhagirath started praying to Lord Shiva. Pleased by the penance, Shiva agreed to let Ganga flow from his jata. It was on the day of Dussehra when Shiva decided that it is time to fulfill his promise. He untied his hair and started looking at the sky without blinking his eyes. Ganga started flowing from the heavens and landed on Shiva’s head…not a single drop of water touched the earth. The river got tangled in Shiva’s hair. Answering Bhagirath’s prayers, Shiva took a strand of his hair and from there originated the Ganga that we know today. This place is known as Gangotri now and since Ganga came out of Shiva’s jata (hair), she is also known as Jatashankari. The bringing of the celestial Ganga to earth was a stupendous task, which has no parallel in history and this effort is called Bhagirath prayas.