Keeping Those Trampoline Springs In Good Condition

For The Springs Cushion The Fall And Bounce You Back
If you have stumbled into this article in your quest for information on trampoline construction and maintenance; then I am sorry to say that this article is anything but that. This article is essentially for seekers of nirvana. But wouldn't do any harm spending a few minutes to find out what this article is all about, before returning back to the wild of the internet. Relax and make yourself comfortable, please, for the journey of the next few minutes should prove to be insightful.


But it is very interesting to watch kids playing on the trampoline. Or to experience the awe of watching trapeze artists in the circus swing so exquisitely flawlessly from one platform to the opposite platform high up in the air. Both the kids and the artists feel safe in the knowledge that were they to fall, the trampoline below them will not only absorb the shock of the fall, but also its springs will use the energy of the shock to push them back. So that they can keep bouncing up and down and remain in the air for as long as they want to, and when they do decide to return to earth, they can do so gracefully, on both feet rather than on the head. The fabric of the trampoline plays a role of course - it shouldn't be tattered or have holes in it. But an even greater role is played by the springs; the springs have to be of just the right quality - not too rigid, and not too loose; and they should always be kept in good condition. It is the springs that absorb the shock of the fall and it is the springs that use the absorbed energy to hurl you back.


The metaphor of the trampoline comes handy when working at ways of coping with crises that buffet us every so often. When everything is going fine, and days and nights are passing by in one smooth clip, we are quite at ease with ourselves and with the world - almost like sailing in the air. And come some crisis, and we come crashing down to earth. Flailing our arms to search for that support that we can cling to, to prevent the crash. At this moment, we need the safety net of the trampoline that can catch us, that can absorb the shock of the fall, and that can use the same energy of the shock to push us back. Thinkers have given the need for and benefit of such a trampoline in our life, the exotic name of "resilience".

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* 'The Resiliency Advantage: Master Change, Thrive Under Pressure, and Bounce Back from Setbacks' - by Al Siebert, Amazon.com.
Resilience is a leitmotif that runs through the subjects taught to management students throughout their curricula. It is drilled into their heads that organizations always have to be on the lookout of threats to their profitability, to their assets, and most important of all, to their basic existence. And while doing so, keep working on strategies and implement plans that will increase their profits, augment their assets, and take them to the top of the league, all of which translates into forcing crises into the lives of competing organizations. It is a game that is played all the time; almost nobody can escape it.

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* Original Silicon Graphics Logo, wiki. There was a time, circa 1987 perhaps, when young computer techies would scramble to drop their resumes at the offices of this blue-chip IT company. Learning the Motorola 68000 assembly language programming, along with gaining hands-on experience on the Unix Systems V OS, was considered mandatory before anybody could think of gaining entry. This very same company was delisted from NASDAQ in December 2008, and then on April 1, 2009, Rackable Systems announced they were buying the company for a song (USD 25 million). With respect to the company's management, it is obvious that the trampoline springs were not kept in good condition.
As managers, for example, they always have to keep in mind the risks of internal sabotage. Some disgruntled employee somewhere might copy/paste - or simply type out or write down on paper - vital information from the secure, confined screens of the company's intranet. And then scramble it and send onward to the company's competitors waiting at the other end to consume this information for their business advantage, and also possibly wreck havoc on the employee's current home-company. Or transfer all vital source code to one's personal archive; so that when the time comes to chuck the job and set up their own outfit, they will already have asset capital to boot their business.



[ The back-stab of betrayal, image by nulus, sxc.hu]

As managers and business leaders, they have to brace themselves to the possibility of some radically new and disruptive technology that suddenly unleashes itself in the marketplace. Who knows, while they were busy counting those beans, dishing out incremental upgrades of some product here or making some cosmetic touchup to that service there, a bunch of smarty pants worked stealthily in the basement of their house to develop a new product or service or technology that is cheaper and / or much more advanced than anything in the market. And on the way they impressed some deep-pockets enough to pump capital into their venture; so that when they surfaced and emerged and unleashed their first marketing ad, they are well protected from the usual shrapnel from competitors. And they also quietly put in the place an ecosystem of vendors and suppliers that will help them project their invincibility when they launch. The suddenness of such disruptive technology hitting one's business can sometimes be so thorough that the order-book can go blank, all top-line forecasts for the next year can go for a toss, and all investments in machinery and infrastructure can become dud. From Top Gun, you become an also-ran and then become a has-been. Unless. Unless, that is, the trampoline springs are sturdy enough and good enough to cushion your fall and you use the energy of the shock to bounce back with a quick strategy to counterattack and win back your market share.

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OnLive Inc Logo, courtesy www.onlive.com. When a new device called "MicroConsole" was unveiled by a never-before-heard startup company called "OnLive" at the 2009 Game Developers' Conference, analysts wondered about its implication for the likes of Microsoft's Xbox, Sony's PlayStation and Nintendo's Wii. The spin-doctors from these biggies will not acknowledge that they are on the back foot. In the course of time they will come out with suitably calibrated reactions to the new threat to their products, reactions that will range from dismissing-the-new-competition-outright to declaring-that-their-own-version-is-on-the-way. But that the product has the potential to change the way the game is played, there is no doubt.

Such threats come and go, that's no big deal. What _is_ big deal is how we respond - not react, but respond - to such threats. The ability to come up with the right strategy that will counter the threat and convert the shock of the threat into an opportunity, is an ability that marks men and women from the boys and girls.

Organization leaders realize that resilience is not like a plug-and-play module that can be purchased from the market and installed in the system. Resilience is like a fruit that ripens over time, which has to be pollinated and nurtured by carefully worked-out assumptions and values. Once ripened, the fruit can go into the nice salad dish along with the fruits of other unconscious beliefs, assumptions and values that pervade the thinking of the organization's members. It is this salad dish that forms the heart of the organization's culture, which is more subtle and more powerful than the visible artifacts and structures and processes that make up the facade of organizations. Resilience drives away over-narcissism, fatalism and paranoia, and prepares organizations to handle crises as and when they decide to turn up and show their face.

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'Organizational Culture And Leadership' by Edgar H. Schein, Jossey-Bass, Amazon.com. The economic turmoil of the past one year has brought a number of companies down like a pack of cards. Whether it is the grocery store belonging to the retired couple whose sole income was the stuff that they sold over their small counter, or it is the employees of trans-continental companies who were used to being given VIP treatment by concierges at multi-star hotels because their companies pandered to their whims - everybody has been affected. While crashing down on the earth is a natural phenomenon, gravity pulling you down is a natural Law; what matters is how much faster you can bounce back. This you do by using, to push you back up in the reverse direction, the same energy that pulled you down in the first place.
As with organizations, so with human beings. Here we are, cocooned in our days and nights of the same routines and patterns, when bam!, something happens that disrupts the rhythm. When the intensity of the disruption is mild, we merely put up with it as a nuisance and after having adjusted with it, move on. But when the intensity is severe, boy! Visualize the accident that maims us, or maims or kills somebody near and dear. How were we to know that there was a car round the dark corner and that it was being driven by an out-of-control inebriate? Visualize being told that our house, located just a few yards away from the levee, is bang in the midst of the hurricane that has hit the country couple hours ago! Fortuitous that we were visiting relatives far away from the hurricane's wrath; else we might have submerged in the floods. How were we to know that the supposedly impregnable levee would be breached like so, and that the nearby pumping station too would go under the waters? Visualize the doctor announcing that we or somebody we know has a medical condition that has sniped away the quota of breaths, which means that there are only so many breaths to be inhaled and exhaled, left. How were we to know that some incurable germ was lurking somewhere deep in the folds in the body? Now, none of this and more could have been anticipated, could they have?

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* New Orleans, Louisiana in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Adversities need not be so life-threatening all the time, of course. Separation with one's life partner because of evaporation of love and compatibility, being laid-off because the company one was employed with has folded up because it was in turn not resilient enough to cope with the market conditions, are two "popular" situations that pop up in the lives of many amongst us.


Accompanying these adversities is the feeling of being lost - the way ahead that seemed so clear up until now suddenly becomes foggy and cloudy. Surety and certainty gives way to confusion and uncertainty. Solidity of the ground under the feet gives way to the quaky vibrations of an earthquake, or worse still, we discover there is no ground beneath the feet and that there is a free-fall, a free fall into some abyss without any bottom. It is during the free fall that we require that trampoline that can not only cushion the impact but help us get back on our two feet.

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* Image of double mini trampoline competitor at WAGC in Quebec November 2007, wiki.
It is in these times that we get the chance to actually discover what and who we are. What and where our capabilities lie. It is the intensity and the pressure of such times that force us to get off the hammock of our lazed inertia and to cast the empty pail of hope into the inner well of our endurance and draw out the sparkling waters of insights and abilities that we had never dreamt existed in us.


Coming down from the rarefied heights of abstract thinking to the more practical plane of reality, how do we summon the spirit of resilience? From the metaphor of the trampoline, let's shift to the metaphor of encounters with creatures in the sea. To my mind - and of course I am oversimplifying it -, all it takes is to not get carried away, half-drowned, in the negative torrent of emotions and thoughts that usually accompany crises.



For here is the first threat. Within the stormy waves of the flood lurks the box jellyfish of self-doubt, its slimy tentacles ever-willing to first sting us with the deadly poison that neutralizes our sense of control over our life, and then having stunned us into immobility, chomp into our body at leisure.

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* Box Jellyfish, NationalGeographic.com. The venom from this beautiful jellyfish is the deadliest in the world. You know why? In the torrent of crises, its venom reacts with and neutralizes whatever sense of control over our life we have stored in our soul. Once our sense of self-control is neutralized, then we become easy prey to it. Beware!

And what is the antidote? Store away an abundance of self-control. A sense of control over the way we steer our life. A self-assurance that whatever be the circumstance obstructing the highway, we have within us to find the way through it and keep to the highway that takes us to our right destiny that we know we deserve. Build so much of this stock of self-control that the entire stock of the box jellyfish's poison will fall short in neutralizing our stock of self-control.
Here is the second threat. Beneath the choppy waves of the ocean of despair, waits in ambush the fearsome barracuda of disorientation, its powerful jaws and strong teeth waiting to pounce and tear into our armor of bearing and perspective. Once the fabric of our perspective is shredded, oh then it becomes so easy for the barracuda to eat into our delicate flesh and finish us completely. So vulnerable we are, aren't we?

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* 'Scuba diver inside a school of Chevron barracudas' - wiki. That this somber-looking, sleek-bodied, fear-inspiring sea-dweller means business, there is no doubt. It is not known to forgive people with a weak armor of bearing, and we aren't talking the magnetic compass here. We are talking about our sense of perspective of where we were before a crisis erupted in our life, where we are right now while in the midst of the crisis, and where we want to go and be after the crisis is over. Drifters, beware! During crisis, you will be the first to succumb to distress, anxiety and disorientation.

And how do we add strength to our armor of perspective? What material do we carburize the metal of forbearance with, to become invincible during times of adversity? It is the material of reflection and introspection. Set aside some time in the diary to introspect on our life path. Reflect on where we have come from, right from the cradle, and envision the path that we will be walking on, on the way to the grave. Maintain a sense of understanding of who and what we were once, who and what we have become now, and who and what we are going to transform into in the future. Rise, for a few moments every day, above the daily humdrum of breathing and living, and see exactly what is happening in our world. You will feel very strange and funny when you begin thinking along these lines, but boy! You will soon begin enjoying these moments of introspection. Not to mention that the armor of perspective will become so fortified that not even the sharpest fangs of the greatest barracuda can create a dent, leave alone tear into. And that's a guarantee.
And finally, there is another dangerous creature that has the power to destroy us while we are allowing ourselves to be carried away by the flow of circumstances. And this is the stingray of disconnectedness, whose serrated tail can pierce into the flesh of our sense of being connected with our inner core, our sense of being connected with others, and our sense of being connected with a Higher Being. Once it pierces through, it does not waste any time in spraying from its grooves the poison of isolation into our being. And the sense of feeling isolated, whether in a crowd full or in a wayward space station - is very debilitating. Not to mention fatal.

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* A stingray relaxing in the cool, clear waters in Stingray City in Grand Cayman, wiki. Don't be deceived by the docile personality of this beautiful dweller of the sea. And don't use this creature's tail as toothpick to dislodge food from the teeth! This fish takes sadistic pleasure in hunting down people who suffer from a sense of disconnect. This disconnect can be with one's own self, and / or with the society, and / or with the Higher Force that Guides us all. People with low self-esteem, with low self-ease, troubled by insecurity, beware! Run away from the stingray if you see one!

So pray what is the solution to regain one's sense of connectedness? The best solution is to first develop a sense of ease with oneself. To accept the self as a precious entity, a person of value. Once this happens, then forging bonds with people around us is facilitated. We begin accepting people the way they are, become comfortable in their company and enjoy the give-and-take. We also begin acknowledging the existence of Somebody Higher who is taking care of us mortals all the time, and especially when times are a-trying. And Who protects us from all these dangerous sea creatures.
To remain calm and collected and philosophical, intellectually objectivized, clinically detached, amidst the tempest of turmoil. To never let go of the sense of perspective of what is going on in our life. To realize that ultimately, the storm will pass and calm will return. To realize that when a problem is thrown at us, the solution too is thrown at us alongside; and at times a solution presents itself even before the problem has manifested, only we never noticed. Do you see how the heroes and heroines in the movies get divine intervention just when they felt they were going under? Something miraculous happens that saves the hero or heroine's day. And do you remember the thought that passed your mind that dismissed such incidents as being possible only in the script writer's or movie-director's fantasy? Actually, no. Look back and reflect on your own life-script and see how you received solutions concurrent to or even before the problems reared their scary heads. See how you were taken care of. Now tell me, what are you afraid of and why?


* Nature at work. Unless there is some biological flaw coming in the way, the process of healing the wound begins almost instantaneously no sooner the cut occurs. It is like some divine angel at our shoulder, who steps forward and takes over. Nature knows that every drop of blood that oozes from the wound is precious, and it does its damnedest best to stem the ooze. Medications aid and abet, but the body's defense mechanism is powerful on its own. As with the body's defense mechanism, so with the mind's defense mechanism. In times of crises, we have to learn to trust our mind, and whatever else we may do, we have to maintain our sense of control over our destiny, our sense of perspective and our sense of connectedness. These are the springs in our very own trampoline that will push us back into the air.
Does it sound too much of a tall order? To not get caught in the stream of thoughts that usually accompany crises? To remain calm and collected and philosophical, intellectually objectivized, clinically detached? To never let go of the sense of perspective of what is going on in our life? To realize that ultimately, the storm will pass and calm will return? Actually, no, if we practice it in our daily life as a matter of fact. The only tool for practice that I can proffer is meditation.


Resilience amounts to coping with adversity, and not just coping, but coping positively. Spiritualists say that events come into our life to test us in some manner. We are made to examine some basic, core, foundational principle that has thus far directed and dictated the script of our life. We are asked to reflect and introspect on whether this principle is really serving us or whether the time has come to discard it in favor of some different principle. The act of falling makes us reflect. And we bounce back when we discard that which has outlived its purpose in favor of something that is now more worthwhile.


Sometimes there is no choice, as in the life-threatening situations we discussed earlier. There is no choice, we simply have to accept what has been handed over and move on. In such situations, the choice actually lies in what state of mind to adopt: whether to remain perpetually unhappy, sad, morose, and regretful --- or to root ourselves in a state of peaceful acceptance of whatever is going on, a state of happiness, believing that whatever is happening, is for our best. To keep searching for the "good" - even if it is kinda hard - within whatever "bad" we think we are experiencing. In the dark of the night, we can spend our time cursing the sun for not showing up. Or, we can spend our time enjoying and appreciating the beautiful twinkle of the zillions of stars embroidered in the svelte fabric of the sensuous sky. There is no choice, you say? The choice, you see, rests entirely with you.

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* Trailer of the 1986 movie, "Top Gun", performed by Tom Cruise, Kelly McGillis and Val Kilmer, YouTube / foxter65. Daredevil, bold, Pete Mitchell is just the right candidate to win the coveted trophy of "Top Gun". Crisis strikes when his flying wingman is killed in an air-crash. The death of his best friend destroys his will to win and with that he also loses his competitive edge. And he ends up handing over the Top Gun trophy to rival Iceman. At one point, he even ponders whether he should quit the job altogether.

It is when Pete "Maverick" is thrust into the middle of close aerial combat, with fellow mate Iceman in danger, that he rediscovers his courage. Rebounding from the fall, Pete engages the enemy, downs their aircraft, and rescues Iceman. The energy of the shock of his best friend's death pushes him back from the brink.

Though this is a movie, a fantasy; yet, similar if-not-so-sensational things happen to us and we too cock a snook at our set of threats and emerge a success. Look at yourself, for example. Go back over your past crises and see how much stronger - and wiser - you have become as a result of what you went through. That was the purpose of those events in your life. See? See how blessed you are? See how much precious you are to the Universe?
Returning to the metaphor of the trampoline. The trampoline has great use in our life. Therefore, ensure that the springs used in it are of good-quality, so that you can bounce back faster.