Harmony at Work

Source: NYTimes.com

“Indonesia has launched an interesting experiment to teach its young to be honest. It is opening a chain of honesty cafes where there will be no cashiers. Customers are expected to pick up whatever snack they want and drop the requisite money in an open plastic box. The idea is to make young Indonesians think hard about cheating and honesty.” –Mint, Quick Edit (17 Jun 09)

A New York Times article on the story quoted a teenager as saying, “This motivates us to be honest. Especially since there is a lot of cheating in class, at least we’re learning to be honest with money. I think it’s also important for society because corruption is a big problem in Indonesia.”

Another teenager reported, “Some of my friends don’t pay the right amount.”

What would make this experiment even more interesting would be to interview those “customers” who don’t pay the right amount—and those who don’t pay at all. We might expect to find them laughing freely about all the free food and drinks they enjoy.

Laughing, perhaps, but for how long?

Indonesia’s experiment highlights a central question haunting many people today, especially those working in business. A physician in India put this question to Swami Kriyananda, as he writes in What is it, to be Practical? (Lesson 5 of Success & Happiness through Yoga Principles)

“I believe in high principles,” he said to me earnestly. “Practically speaking, however, how can I follow them? Life makes demands of me that I simply cannot meet unless, occasionally, I cut a few corners ethically. I have a son to put through college. I want to live by dharmic (righteous) principles, but if I did so always I couldn’t survive.”

It was that question which inspired me to write this course of lessons. For what I have seen from personal experience to be true is the exact opposite: To live determinedly by high principles is the surest road to material security—and beyond that, to glowing material success. My hope in these lessons has been to convince people that by giving high ideals the highest priority in their lives, they will succeed far better at anything they try in life than if they think—in the name of a practicality that can see only the solid ground at their feet—that, by cheating someone today, one has made his profit and needn’t worry about tomorrow.

My observation has been that many people—in India nowadays especially—share that doctor’s concern. The solution to his question depends first of all on another simple question: What is it doing for you? I couldn’t easily ask my friend to look in a mirror and ask himself that question, though in fact his face showed some of the ravages of his inner conflict. The truth is, when people “cut corners” ethically, they cannot help creating an inner war—as at Kurukshetra—which pits the two selves within them, the higher and the lower, in heated combat together.

“What is it doing for you?” See whether it is giving you more inner peace, or—instead—more inner anguish. The very fact that my friend asked that question showed that he was suffering this anguish. A more hard-headed materialist might say, “What nonsense! I feel no such anguish!” That is because he has surrendered to the pull of his lower self. Let him ask himself then, instead, “Am I happy?” I don’t believe his answer will be in the affirmative!

Copyright © Hansa Trust. All rights reserved.

            What are these?

Tags: business ethics, cheating, honesty

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 21st, 2009 at 11:53 pm and is filed under business ethics, success course. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.