Life or Business - There is a selfish ask

On a sunny day - a rare occasion in London, a random thought crossed my mind. I started thinking of how relationships start and grow / shrink.

Doing a rewind on some of my relationships, I realized that it always started with some “selfish ask”, regardless of the nature of relationship - friend, relative, distant relative, community member, colleague, superior or any ABC XYZ. I could not find an example of relationship with self-less roots. There may eventually be selfless behavior in intimate relationships like a Guru - Disciples, Parents – Children, Husband-Wife.

The magnitude of benefit or the selfish ask may be very small but that’s how it start. It could be as simple as asking for 5 Rupees when you want to pay some Rickshaw-wala when you don’t have it. Or it could be as simple a thing as somebody proxy-ing you in the class. Or it may be someone asking for a change of 10 pence for using a machine while he has a 20 Pound note in pocket. Considering the non-financial aspect, a casual talk in the bar falls under this category as well. It’s triggered by the basic instincts of the social animal. Some of these relationships that start small become legendary as well, like most love and hate stories. Needless to say it would be very strong in life-saving occasions.

So what am I trying to conclude here? I think that if there was a currency to measure the selfish ask, life is business, isn’t it? For those of you who are going to comment relating this to my job, you may be right I don’t know. One might also think why compare life with business whereas all we talked about are relations. Well, I couldn’t imagine a life without relations; after all I’m not a Rock and who knows even if Rocks socialize.

Now that I’ve finished writing this article, let’s think of an exception.  If you find one, please let me know...