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EPIC DECISIONS

By on September 20, 2017
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EPIC DECISIONS

The Mahabharata offers excellent examples to understand the art of decision-making

Is decision-making a feeling-based art, or a logic-based science? When decisions are based on feelings and love is based on logic, both tend to meet with disappointments.
What is more important than knowing how to make good decisions is knowing when to make those decisions. And what’s more important than knowing when to make decisions is knowing when not to make them!
Here are seven circumstances in the Mahabharata that reveal when and how decisions ought not to be made.

Fear-driven decisions: The tortoise shell protects as long as it is above the animal, but as soon as the tortoise flips over, the shell is rather useless and the tortoise flaps around helplessly.
Similarly, a person who takes decisions out of fear flaps around, and takes stubborn, abrupt steps.
In the Mahabharata, Ashwatthama - when cornered by the Pandavas - took the most foolish decision of unleashing the deadly Brahmastra capable of destroying the whole world. This decision stemmed from his intense fear and need for his own security. The Brahmastra was meant to obscure his fear and create fear and insecurity for the Pandavas, which ultimately backfired.

Affinity-driven decisions: A cloth hung on a hook, takes shelter from it. The same hook tears the cloth, when it is pulled away forcefully. Just like the cloth, those who take decisions based on unnatural affinity to people they are hooked to, get torn apart!
In the Mahabharata, since all of Karna’s decisions were based on his assumed affinity to his friend Duryodhana, he was torn apart between his loyalty to dharma and friendship. The hook of friendship gripped him tightly and when decisions had to be taken, his dharma was torn apart.

Read the full article in 'Viva Goa' magazine copy.
Viva Goa magazine is now on stands. Available at all major book stalls and supermarkets in Goa.

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