Be different!

For some reason all of us feel a need to be different from others. No one likes to be compared to others. And yet we look for people with similar ideas to hang out with, cant make friends with someone who has totally different views than ours. With multi-billion people in the world, whats the probability that you are different than everyone? Almost zero.
Nothing wrong in being different from others. In fact, I encourage us to be different from others. Otherwise, the world would be very boring. I was in Toronto for work. As soon as I landed in the airport, I saw these amazing ad boards. Each board has a picture, for example, a man wearing a tie/suit etc and the board says "dashing" on one side, "playing safe" on the other. below, it says, world is would be a boring place without our disagreements. And I couldnt agree more. There were these boards all around the airport. The city was no different. It is a true cosmopolitan. The city is interesting because the people are different and each succeeded in making their impression on the city. Truly marvelous!
Being different is necessary for development of human kind too. If everyone was happy hanging from trees, then we wouldnt have had any civilization. Someone thought different and settled down to civilize and thats how civilization started. Someone thought different from using animals for transportation and hence we have automobiles. Someone thought to leave the land and fly, to give us airplanes. Someone thought why the heck should I be with opposite sex and hence we have gays and lesbians.
Being different is not just dressing up differently. People dress up differently, color their hair and make a statement that they are different, while at the heart they are no different. Well, one can argue that this thinking is different from others. may be so. I don't argue with that.
To me being different is to think differently from others. Faced with a challenge, there are folks who shut down and run away from it, some who ignore and try to find ways to circumvent it, some who march forward to capture it. Some think quite different from others. That's how innovation come into existence.
Let's take an example. There was a problem in a company on its assembly line. This company packages the soaps into their boxes. Once a while due to misalignment, or other issues, boxes are shipped without soaps in it. Management wanted to ensure that this wont happen and so it presented this problem to its engineers. A team of engineers came up with an elaborate solution which involved passing the soaps over a weight scale, a robot arm which would pick up the empty boxes, and this robot requires maintenance and is expensive. And then there was this team, which came up with a brilliant solution which was installed eventually on the assembly line. They put a fan on the side of assembly line, that would blow away the empty boxes into a collector. Thats it; no robot arms, no complicated weighing machine, nothing. Simplicity and ingenuity at its maximum. Now thats thinking differently.
I have interacted with so many of my colleagues, who still have H1-B visas in US. Most of them want to start up their own businesses someday. You ask them what they want to do, they have some idea, but not a complete picture. You ask them, why they are not finding out more about if their business idea works or not, most people respond with this excuse: "I am still on H1-B, I cannot do anything. I will start figuring out when I get Green Card." Well I disagree with that point. Its true you cannot work for another company on H1-B, but no one said you cannot figure out all the details of your business. You dont have to wait till you get your Green Card. Figure out everything now so that once you get your Green Card, you would be ready to start running your business. A few people are different to have already done so. I admire them. They deserve recognition.
Encourage people to be different, let them be different. Lets have a colorful world, filled with people of different thoughts!