1. As long as I have an excellent heart, I am fine with weak kidneys and a suboptimal liver. This is ridiculous but this is how we normally live our lives.
We believe that we can only excel in one dimension, one realm of our lives, not in all or more dimensions. Out of various realms of life – persona, professional, partnerial or parental, it is possible to excel in one of these. SPICE intends to fix our fixation with one-dimensional life.
2. Boys fix things. Girls need things fixed. This is ridiculous, again, but we normally differentiate between genders like this. Men are physiologically and psychologically better programmed for professional pursuits and women are similarly better suited for partnering, caregiving, parenting, and family building. SPICE wants to break the ‘separate spheres ideology’ that men should excel outside the home and women should excel inside the home.
3. Is a ‘list of deathbeds regrets of women’ available? Well, no, no one ever thought about it. We only have such lists for men. Ridiculous, but true. The realms in which women are expected to excel are not given the importance that they deserve outside the home. Partnerial and parental skills are ‘lowlights’ and professional skills are ‘highlights’ of life. All the work that goes into raising a family, sustaining a marriage, fostering self-improvement and solving world issues is just a side dish on the plate of life. SPICE strives to bring women perspective in the professional arena with the dignity that it deserves.
4. If you are a marathon runner and a CEO learning from running can improve your skills as a CEO and vice-a-versa. But people are ‘domain dependent’. They fail to recognize the same idea when it is presented in a different context. They feel that transfer learning happens amidst machines only. SPICE ventures boldly into the importance of transfer learning between various realms of life.
5. You are 65. Please retire from work and life. Ridiculous once again. But followed by most of us. We retire from living by the time we become platinum and wait gloomily for diseases and death to strike. This is our worst service to ourselves. SPICE embraces life after 50 as the beginning of a robust second-half of career and life after 75 as a dignified dotage plan.
Are you ready to incorporate these changes into your mindset? If yes, excellence is waiting for you. If no, don’t complain about your present.