Risk Beads

I caught a taxi the other day in Sydney and had a great chat to the driver as we drove the back streets from the city to Strathfield.  Many of these narrow suburban roads built in the 1930s and 1940s were never intended to carry the kind of load they carry today.  As the driver weaved in an out of the traffic on the bumpy concrete roads, he had both hands on the wheel, he also has a set of beads around his wrist.  When we stopped at the lights he would wind the beads off his wrist and feed them one by one through his fingers, counting one by one.  There was no cross attached to the beads but I presumed for most of the trip that they were Rosary beads and that he was a Catholic.  As he fingered through the beads at the lights I assumed he was saying the Rosary in his mind. 

The Rosary is a set of thoughts and prayers used to remember the mysteries and principal events of salvation.  There are a range of various and diverse ways a Catholic can pray the Rosary but this set of beads numbered approximately 50 and normally a Rosary has three times that number and has a cross attached.  So, I became more curious as we travelled and watching the driver run through this process at sets of lights and lengthy stops in the congestion.  You can imaging in Sydney just how much he must fiddle with these beads, most of the freeways are parking lots.

As I watched him run through this process I became more curious, whilst not a Catholic, my theology told me his routine didn't make sense.  After about 20 minutes I couldn’t resist so I asked the driver if he was a Catholic to which he replied no, he was actually a Muslim.  So then I asked about the beads and he told me they were his concentration beads.  He had had a serious accident in the past and since going back on the road in his taxi, he used the beads to concentrate and also to release some of his edginess, aggression and impatience.  He had his own set of meditations and things he thought about as each bead passed through his finders which he had thought up himself.  He said they wouldn’t mean much to anyone else but they meant something to him, things he needed to remember.

It made me think, I know some people in the management of risk who need such a set of beads, lets call them risk beads.  I’m not suggesting we should carry these beads on the job but maybe we could use them on the way to work to help us meditate on some important things eg.

1. There is no reward for rushing
2. Observe your mates and have conversations about risk
3. My priority is my family and friends who I want to see tonight
4. If I come back for defects I’m doing the job twice
5. Shortcuts are risky
6. Don’t work high risk work alone

You get the idea.  A good idea from a Sydney taxi driver, worth  thinking about.