Doubt and belief, are they live together or separate? HR message from nature

Can we relate or find any significance to the famous saying ‘we believe our doubts and also we doubt our beliefs’. This pattern is seen obviously in people in the corporate world? The question is whether animals also get into the above jigsaw / the paradoxical situation?

What is the real meaning of the above saying? Doubting the possibilities and believing the doubts to be true is the most common mistake many people do in the corporate. Whenever a new project idea or implementation plan is discussed, many people in the corporate would raise the eyebrows and doubts about the possibilities of the new venture. They tend to doubt the new proposal as how it could be possible and ironically also believe their doubts to be true. But with time, they would dispel their doubts and join the main stream in making the endeavour a grand success.

The debate is not about having doubts on some new idea / concepts / project proposals / implementations, but how long one is going to carry such doubts or continue to live with such doubts. When doubts appear for the sake of validation or verification then it is healthy and if it prevails just as an extension of anxiety over the future course of action, indeed such doubts are the clear signs and symptoms of some mental disorder. In any case, having doubts is fine for some degree, but continuously believing such doubts is very dangerous.

Can we see any other better example in nature where some animals do carry doubts and live in their doubts? Certainly rats are the best example. When rats move out of its hole, usually they watch very suspiciously around them and then move forward. They go forth and quickly return back to their hiding site and at every step they exhibit their fear and doubt.

The rats raise some doubts on the presence of a danger or predator and it is the characteristic feature of many other animals also. But rats believe in their doubts while moving around. Invariably, they become ‘paranoid’ due to their doubting system and become an easy prey to their predator. Another interesting phenomenon seen in rats is that they display the behaviour of neophobic or avoiding anything new.

Several scientific studies have proved that any new food substance is given to rats and however delicious it may be but still rats usually avoid them for the first instance. The rats do not even come towards such new food substances. Until some familiarity is established with the new food substance they will not prefer them. Quite contrary to the above, rats do eat the food stuffs that are totally unfamiliar to them but are stored in the cupboard and not given to them as feed.

The co-existence of fear and confidence or belief and doubts are the only likely genesis of all confusions seen among human and animals.

The message to be learned by the corporate employees is that please do have doubts but do not let your life to be defined by disbeliefs and doubts.

Dr S Ranganathan