Thursday, March 10, 2011
Sheena Iyengar, the woman who gave us the wonderful The Art of Choosing, mentions a study conducted by Daniel Kahneman:
Commuting is by far the most unpleasant part of the average person's day, and spending even an extra 20 minutes in transit is one fifth as harmful to your well being as losing your job.
And this is the single most important truth of my life today.
I travel almost 21 kms (one way), everyday, to work.
When I told people I had said yes to my current job because the head office was shifting closer to my area, most of them laughed it off.
Yes, I had a very good profile and it was a good professional leap - quite frankly, I was happier because I would be traveling less within a few months time.
Having mazed through Powai and Saki Naka for close to 4 years, I cannot underline my absolute abhorrence for traffic jams and long distance travel in Mumbai.
When I told people I had said yes to my current job because the head office was shifting closer to my area, most of them laughed it off.
Yes, I had a very good profile and it was a good professional leap - quite frankly, I was happier because I would be traveling less within a few months time.
Having mazed through Powai and Saki Naka for close to 4 years, I cannot underline my absolute abhorrence for traffic jams and long distance travel in Mumbai.
You may point out to people who travel from Dombivli and Thane to VT/Churchgate. I even had professors who travelled from Pune to Mumbai, every single day.
I am sorry for them.
I hope we move towards better planned cities - places where people do not have to travel more than 5-8 kms. for work.
Time is money after all, and who would know it better than a Sindhi?
Ahem.
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2 comments:
:) interesting read, although I differ. I love to write on people in their natural state of affairs, which very well works when commuting. You get to see so many stories around you, struggles and life. It's tiring physically for sure.
P.S.: I m just shifting to Mumbai for work in a couple of months and would be a better commentator then :)
@aakash - welcome to the blog :-)
I started out with "reading" human behaviour too.
But over time, you realise that more than reading others, you need to read self... for which, you need more time for yourself... and traveling 3-4 hours in slow moving traffic and living on harmful smoke (pollution) is definitely not an ideal way to self realisation :-)
I look forward to hearing from you when you juggle with Mumbai traffic!
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