“Today, as I immersed myself in R.K. Narayan’s ‘Salt & Sawdust,’ I was compelled to contemplate the temperament of one of the characters, sparking a deeper exploration into the concept of temperament as inherent human nature.” Throughout my two-decade software career, I’ve witnessed numerous occasions where colleagues, managers, and even C-level executives have displayed public or private outbursts of temper. Beyond the workplace, whether in cinema halls, government offices, or even casual gatherings, I’ve observed people reacting passionately towards one another. Recently, online platforms like WhatsApp groups have emerged as arenas for individuals to express previously unseen levels of irritability, impatience, and frustration over various issues. The introduction of new waves of emojis has further intensified the expression of disagreement and contention.
I seldom lose my composure at work, and I can recall only two or three instances where I’ve found myself impatient with my colleagues. Age, life experience, philosophical approach in viewing life and death and the ability to assess impacts have instilled in me a propensity to carefully reconsider before allowing my temper to flare.
Temperament and Career:
WE often hear people saying that they haven’t got the aptitude or the temperament for a particular job or profession. ” I shall never amount to anything as a lawyer or a doctor because I haven’t got the aptitude or the proper temperament.” This is an argument that is most frequently employed by persons who have failed to achieve success in their endeavors or are skeptical about their future. But this is neither a true nor a complete explanation.
It is no doubt conceded that there are infinite tendencies to be satisfied in every individual and the stifling of any one of these arrests his growth to that extent and makes him weak. In the early years of a child we find the child developing strong likes and dislikes for various objects. But a careful and a deep analysis would reveal that they are not deep-rooted. Psychological researches have shown that human beings dwell in ‘ general ability.’ They have not proved to what extent these differences are caused by inherited nature, how much they are inborn. We do not deny that some people possess by nature special abilities and disabilities that determine their career in life. We have the example of the first class geniuses. The great musician composing at his 5th year, the great painter painting while tending his sheep, are all of an exceptional kind. They are unusual persons.
But, for ordinary average human beings, out of the infinite tendencies exhibited, the urge to show our attempts at its best in any held of activity should be most strongly developed. As the human personality is highly gullible in the early stages of its evolution, a long trained and highly regulated mixture of education enables the individual to take to any calling or activity in life with natural ease and eventually leaves a permanent impress on the mind of the individual that even the mere contemplation of change to any other is bitter for her/him. Hence likes and dislikes are more the outcome of life and environment that the one that shapes and molds human personality. Why else do we condemn instinct and impulse so vehemently and with such consistency ?
“If education is not the mere collection of facts but the concentration of mind,” should not a man who has had the benefits of a sound educational system be capable of adapting himself to the circumstances and try to make the best out of a bad job. Should he/she not strive to spring up to the top, however slowly he/she might be placed ?
Hence, a sound educational system should be one that in a general way harmonizes between the intellectual, the moral and the practical parts of human nature. The human will or determination should be made capable of obeying the joint impulses of these directing forces. In its cultivation does his success depends, and not on that vague and undefinable thing, called temperament which is nothing more than but an insubstantial bogie.
sivaayyala 