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Experiences, Stories and Insights These are some experiences and stories with their insights, that I found very useful. Some are from personal experiences and some picked up from different sources. Back to Main Page 'Driving Through Life'My Brother Ramu Died At The Age Of 10 I suffer because of my own baseless expectations.
How a small and insignificant thing can make
a difference
far beyond imagination.
I have many options.
It is in
it's nature to stink.
One Living Self and Infinite Dead Selves
I am fascinated by
my dead selves and never see my present living self.
Am I the wave or
the sea?
We Do Not See The First Parts Of People
Is he acting or
reacting?
A lion can kill
an elephant but it can't take out it's own thorn!
Nothing Lasts
Forever
A Lifeless Plant Gets a Grand New Life A dead looking plant acquires a grand look after drastic pruning. Sam Fell Flat On His Birthday He Has Choices After The Fall. Is It a Rope or Snake? Once I see it's true nature I have no problem My Approach * The first step taken is the most important. It shows the intention and sets the direction. * Collecting an ocean of words, thoughts or concepts should
result in a ‘Trickle of Actions’ at the least. Else, what a colossal waste of
precious time and energy!
Sam fell flat on his Birthday The Birthday boy Sam, not a
boy really, but a young man, invited many families for a party
at his house. All of them assembled early in the big
party
hall at the first floor, waiting for him to appear on the scene.
Sam was briskly coming down the steps from the second floor.He was dressed in a beautiful suit and his face was beaming happily. All the visitors were watching him coming down, anticipating the celebration.He came almost to the second last step, suddenly missed a step and fell forward with his knees hitting the carpet with a thud. All the guests fell silent with not a word. A few standing close to him ran forward to help him rise up. There was a pin drop silence. Sam was stunned by the fall. He was not badly hurt and was able to get up on his own. Now he has two choices - Choice One: Sam could feel mortified, miserable and ashamed at the way he fell on his birthday in front of all his guests. He can show his misery by apologizing to them repeatedly, continue to feel miserable throughout the party and distribute his misery to all his guests. He could completely destroy every one's happy moods. His guests would remember his fall and the miserable way he behaved after it, all their life. His primary suffering due to the pain in his knees might disappear in a few hours but his secondary suffering for falling in public might linger for many days, weeks, months or all his life. But he has another option. Choice Two: Alternatively, Sam could rise up feeling surprised, look closely at the place he tripped and exaggeratedly laugh saying "What a day to fall!". He could then join the guests feeling silly rather than miserable and make every one feel at ease. His guests would remember his response to the fall with admiration and wish they could take their own falls as smartly as Sam. The same person, the same fall but what a contrasting choice of responses! Totally different responses, with totally different impacts on own self and others. What choice would you recommend to Sam or Paul or to yourself when the next fall takes place? Choice one or two? A Lifeless Plant Gets a Grand New Life There
were a row of plants by the
side of the road leading to my office. The purpose of
these plants was to show off their
green leaves and colorful
flowers, giving relief to
the eyes from the drab
concrete buildings and roads.
The plants were about 6 feet high. They looked absolutely drab most of the year with woody stems and hardly any fresh leaves. In the flowering season, beautiful yellow flowers would be seen but as soon as that season was over the plants were an eye sore rather than a relief. This was in spite regularly watering them. Watching them many times a day on my way to and from my office room was a pain for me. As an experiment I told my people in the civil maintenance department who were maintaining the plants, to prune only one these plants drastically, leaving only a foot of the trunk from the ground. This was done promptly. I was worried whether I destroyed the plant and created a bigger eye sore. I watched them eagerly every day for the results of the experiment. After about 2 weeks, small green shoots were coming out of the trunk. I was relieved that at least the plant was not dead. Every day the number of vigorously growing shoots increased dramatically. In a few weeks there were hundreds of fast growing shoots. In about 3 months, hundreds of shoots with fresh green tender leaves had grown 3 feet high. This born-again plant was a feast for the eyes. We repeated the process with all the other plants with similar happy results. This dramatic and unexpected transformation of an otherwise totally lifeless plants set me thinking ... Those plants were looking lifeless and as good as dead. I was in half mind to uproot them and plant new ones in their place. They looked as though they had no energy to grow new branches and leaves. But then what happened after the drastic pruning? A giant dormant power was unleashed when the plant was pruned drastically. That power was so big and readily available that it could quickly initiate hundreds of new shoots and sustain their vigorous growth to several feet. The plant did not need any extra inputs for it's rebirth - no extra water, fertilizer, insecticide or attention. It had all it's requirements in abundance. Could this phenomena be true for individuals, teams or whole organizations? Can the drastic stoppage of the routine, ritualistic, dull and meaningless activities unleash giant dormant powers in them? Could it be that their lifeless performance is due to blocking of their powerful energies by life killing activities? Can getting rid of these responsibilities and activities unleash the hidden giant powers and give birth to lively new activities, like those seen in the born-again plants? This great transformation may be possible without giving them any additional rewards! It Happened Suddenly! As a maintenance
engineer in a
continuous running plant, I had to
face sudden stoppages of continuous running machines due to mechanical
defects. I had to answer the
management for the consequent losses to the company.
My
people would
tell me that the machine was running fine yesterday or a
little while
back and it failed suddenly. They claim they could not have
detected and
prevented the failure.
I used to practically demonstrate what might have been happening this way. I pick up a paper weight and place it in the middle of a small table. The table is clear of any objects form the paper weight to the clear edge. I move the paper weight intermittently in steps of a few inches. After the first move I stop, look at them and say "Nothing happened!". Again I move it a little and say "Nothing happened". Again I move an inch and say "Yes, nothing is happening". I keep on moving the paper weight in this manner till the paper weight falls on the hard floor with a thud. Then I shout and say "The paper weight has fallen suddenly. It was OK a few seconds back!". People invariably smile and admit that something adverse or unusual was happening gradually before the failure that they were not observing carefully. Or they were seeing some unusual symptoms but felt they were harmless, not worth any corrective action. The gradual deterioration from the healthy condition has to lead to total failure some day, there can be no escape. This could apply to many aspects of life - sudden burst of reactions of people, sudden crisis of some kind etc. We ignore the preceding occurances or symptoms and underestimate their significance. These accumulate over a period of time and one day result in a (sudden?) failure of some kind. If we keenly observe what is happening around us in things and people and know what is a normal and healthy situation and what is a deviation from it, we can predict where this gradual negative change will ultimately lead to and what could be it's consequences. If we take corrective actions in the early stages when we see the adverse movements taking place, the adverse event can be aborted. The so called sudden developments can only happen when we close our eyes to what is happening gradually or choose to ignore or underestimate their significance. This Too Shall Pass A monk visited a kingdom and at the end of the visit, he gave the king a small sealed box. He told the king to keep it in his pocket all the time but open it only when he felt his life was coming to an end. After some time the king was attacked by a neighboring king's army and lost the battle. He ran away with a band of soldiers chased by a large group of enemy soldiers. On the way, he lost all his men while defending him. He was running all alone desperate to save himself. He finally reached the edge of a deep valley. If he went forward he would fall into the valley and die. If he stayed there he would be caught by enemy soldiers and killed. He felt that his life was coming to an end either way. He remembered about the small sealed box given by the monk. He opened it and found nothing but a piece of paper. Written on it were only four words "This Too Shall Pass". He was disappointed that no magic power sprang up from inside to save his life. But he trusted the wisdom of the monk. He took a deep breath, calmed himself and gained composure. He tried to make sense of the four words in the message of the monk. He looked back in the direction he came from and to his delight he did not find any of the enemy soldiers. Even after a long time none came in sight. Apparently the enemy soldiers lost track of him quite some time back. Now he felt safe and walked carefully to the nearby village. Gradually he reassembled his loyal army and recaptured his kingdom. What saved his life and helped him regain his kingdom? Only those four words "This Too Shall Pass". They made him look at his crisis situation from a totally different angle, helped him regain his composure and helped him see the opportunity in that near death scenario. If he did not heed those words he would have jumped to an honorable death, not willing to be captured by the enemy and face a humiliating death in the hands of the enemy. Some Problems Are Solved By Ignoring Them This reminds me of an allied philosophy that I heard from one of our senior managers. We faced a crisis situation due to work stoppage in the manufacturing shop where our Industrial Engineering department revised some standard times based on time studies. The workers were unhappy as their incentive earnings were affected. They stopped work demanding compensation. A team of us from our department and the production department went to the General Manager of the plant and unburdened our distress. We expected a magic solution from him with his rich experience. The General Manager continued to listen but gave no response. We felt he did not share our crisis perception and agitation one bit. He looked cool as ice even after 30 minutes of presentation by all of us. Seeing his coolness was in a sense, comforting. If the General Manager with much larger responsibility could be so cool why should we be so worried? We sensed he was offering no magic solution. One of us finally gathered courage and asked him "Sir! We wonder how you could be so cool when all of us are in such a desperate situation? What is the secret of your coolness?" He calmly replied "My dear friends! Some problems are solved by ignoring them". We all laughed heartily and came out of his room feeling lighter in heart. In a few days the workers cooled down and a solution emerged to resolve the crisis and resume production. Even after 20 years, his words of wisdom born out of experience ring in my mind some times. Androcles And The Lion This is a story I read in my childhood class books. Later in life, it's deep significance hit me. The story goes like this - Androcles was a slave in a Greek kingdom. Disgusted with the life of a slave, he ran away knowing well the risk of death if he gets caught. As was the practice in the kingdom, a roll call was taken of all the slaves the next morning. Androcles was found missing and immediately a big band of soldiers set on the task of finding him in the dense forest. Androcles ran away as fast as he could. When he could not run any more due to hunger and exhaustion he sat on a boulder resigned to his fate of being caught by the soldiers or be eaten by wild animals. Either way he knew he would die, it was only a matter of time. As he was watching with resignation he saw a lion approaching him at a distance. He knew he had no chance of running away from it in his hungry and exhausted condition. He was watching the approaching lion with resignation. To his surprise the lion was not running towards him. It was walking slowly unlike a normal lion. When it came near him, he saw that it was walking very slowly because one of it's legs was limping. He guessed it must be very hungry as there is no free food in the forest for injured lions unable to hunt. He expected the lion to jump on him any moment and feed itself. But as he was already resigned to his death he continued to watch the actions of the lion with resignation. The lion came to his feet and Androcles saw it raising it's paw about to strike him. He closed his eyes anticipating the paw strike. He was surprised when there was no paw strike. He opened his eyes and found the paw still up in the air close to his face as though the lion was showing the sole of that leg to him. His fear disappeared and his curiosity was aroused. Keenly observing the sole of the foot he found it was swollen quite a bit. He guessed the cause may be a thorn embedded in the sole. He got fully involved in the situation and took the courageous step of taking the paw in his hands, locating the tiny thorn and removing it. He squeezed out all the pus and bandaged it with part of his dress. Now he waited for the lion to attack and kill him. But the loin quietly walked away into the dense forest to his utter disbelief. After some time, the king's soldiers found him, shackled and took him back to the kingdom. As per the prevailing law, his punishment was announced in the kingdom . On the appointed day, the people of the kingdom assembled in the large arena. Androcles was brought in and tied to a pole. A cage was brought into the arena with a lion inside. The cage door was opened and the lion set free. People waited to see the gruesome act of the lion eating Androcles live. The lion came running to Androcles and as soon as it touched him, it stopped dead in it's track and started licking his feet. The people and the king were stunned at the miracle of a hungry lion sparing it's prey and behaving like a pet dog. You guessed it right! It was the same lion he had helped by taking out it's thorn. On knowing about the background, the king set Androcles free. The story ends happily. The events of the story trigger a series of thoughts ... Look at what Androcles did in the forest. When he saw the lion slowly coming towards him he could have run away and saved himself. But he might have been captured by the king's soldiers and met his death any way. He saw the inevitability of his death either way but had the courage to continue to look at the lion and it's condition. He wished to use his available life in the best possible manner. He had the keen observation and a cool mind to locate the thorn in it's sole in that life threatening situation. He had the good nature of trying to help a suffering animal in spite of the immediate risk of his own death. He did not expect any return favor from the lion. Now let us look at what the lion did. It had the presence of mind to see a potential savior in Androcles knowing it will otherwise die of hunger being unable to hunt for it's food. It could be that he had a gun or knife with which he could have killed it. A lion being the king of the forest has to swallow great pride to seek help from a weakling like Androcles. After it got help from him, the lion had the decency of not killing and feeding on the person who saved it's life. The lion is the most powerful animal in the forest. Though it is a small animal, it can kill even an elephant several times it's size. But here is the irony of nature. A lion can kill an elephant but it can't take out the thorn in it's own foot even when that thorn is causing it's starvation and ultimate death. Compared to the lion, Androcles is a weak and puny creature. But he has the unique capacity to diagnose the cause for the lion's handicap and take out the thorn in it's foot. What did Androcles do for the lion and what did he get back in return? He took out a tiny thorn in it's foot spending about 1/2 hour and he got his whole life back from it! How often we may be handicapped due to some thorns in our bodies, minds or relationships and suffer endlessly, unable to take them out on our own? Sometimes we may not even be aware of the hidden thorns. Each one of us need an Androcles some times to help us take out the thorns. But we may not be as humble as the lion to seek help from apparently weaker people. Our pride may prevent us from seeking help. How much better our lives could be if we can behave like the lion and Androcles, in seeking help and giving meaningful help? Taking out tiny thorns and getting lives back! Lastly, how many of us intentionally or otherwise insert thorns into minds, bodies or relationships rather than taking some of them out? We Do
Not See The First Parts
Of People’s Lives Let us start with some imaginary scenarios to bring out an important concept. A boy ‘A’ was playing with a ball. He was throwing it to a wall, it was bouncing back to him, he was catching it and was throwing it back to the wall. On one occasion, he missed his catch and the ball hit his head. A person ‘B’ made a video recording of this missed-ball sequence, from the moment the ball left the hand of the boy, till it hit his head. Next, he cut the total sequence into two parts. Part one showed the action from the moment the ball left the boy’s hand till it contacted the wall. Part two showed the balance action from the moment the ball leaves the wall, till the ball contacts the boy’s head. He then showed only the part two of the sequence to a person ‘C’ who immediately commented that something mysterious happened. How can a wall throw a ball to a boy and hit him on his head? Then he was shown part one of the sequence and then part 2. ‘C’ immediately realized that what he saw was something quite natural, the ball was thrown at the wall and it bounced back to hit the boy when he missed it. In both the above imaginary scenarios, the impressions created and the comments they generated on seeing the only the second (or the reaction) part of the incidents, were false. Immediately on seeing the part one (or the action that caused the reaction) of the incident, the people reversed their conclusions. If the onlookers had not seen the first parts they would have persisted in their wrong conclusions. Alternatively
the onlookers could have asked the
videographer “Did
anything happen before the incident you are showing us’. If
they thought of
this possibility and taken the time to inquire for possible reasons for
the incidents
shown to them, they might have found the causes for the part
two’s of the
incidents. Justice would have been done to One Living Self And Infinite Dead Selves C S:Can you see any of those 39 Johns who were real and living some time back, any time, anywhere in the universe? The imaginary dialogue with John ends here. Now consider these thoughts - The visible changes noticed in John’s yearly pictures did not take place suddenly on the nights preceding his birthdays. He was changing a little bit every day though these changes can not be seen with the limited capacity of our senses, just as the naked eyes can not see any thing less than 40 microns which is the smallest visible dot you can make on a paper. Imagine that the pictures were taken every month instead of every year. Then there would be one living John # 40 and pictures of 468 dead Johns (39 times 12) with real differences that we can not see. Go one more step. A picture taken every day will show 4416 dead Johns. One picture every hour will be 105984 dead Johns. There can only be one living John at any point of time but there are infinite dead Johns with infinitismally small but real differences. John is obviously unaware of the one and only living John # 40 with a pulsing heart and lungs. By his logic, he will become aware of John # 40 only when he becomes John # 41 and John # 40 also dies. This phenomena of totally ignoring the only living John will continue indefinitely till the final John dies. What should we call this? - funny, ironical or stupid? What causes this strange behavior? How can we do it? The Earth Bound Balloon
We
went
walking with our 4 year old daughter to a nearby village fair. Daughter
bought
a gas balloon and enjoyed playing with it till we reached home after
which she
had no interest in it. Left to itself, the balloon floated to the
ceiling with
the string hanging down. Looking at it made me think.
The
balloon has
gone up because the gas in it is lighter than air, creating an upward
force
higher than the combined weight of the balloon and the string. If I
attach a
heavier and longer string, the balloon will come down closer to the
floor. Imagine
that I first attached a heavier string, let it come down and then
trimmed the
string. What will happen? As I keep on trimming the string a little at
a time,
a stage would be reached when the upward force trying to lift the
balloon will
exactly equal the downward force due to weight of the balloon and
string. When this
happens, the
balloon should have no tendency to either go up or come down. It should
remain
suspended in air wherever I place it, at any height. It should
remain there
– neither going up nor coming down. Good in theory, right?
I started
testing
the idea by attaching a heavier string and brought the balloon closer
to the
floor. Then I began cutting the string a little at a time. The balloon
started
going up a little every time I cut the string. It reached a height of
about 3
feet with only a fraction of an inch of string lying on the ground.
After a few
tiny cuts only the tip of the string was touching the floor. Then I cut
only a tiny
bit of string with great anticipation of fulfilling my dream of seeing
the
balloon and string hanging mid air, neither the balloon touching the
ceiling
nor the end of the string touching the floor. Guess what actually
happened!
The moment I
cut a tiny bit of string, the balloon went up smart and quick and
touched the
ceiling.
My dream was shattered. I tried to redo the experiment by adding more
string
and cutting the tiniest bit I could. Even after many attempts to refine
my
technique I could never cut just the right bit of string to keep the
balloon
and string suspended mid air. Either the balloon touched the ceiling or
the
string touched the floor. After many attempts, I gave up my dream and
reconciled to the fact I could not exactly match the upward and
downward forces.
The unexpected
phenomena I witnessed set me thinking. Just before I cut the last bit
of string,
the balloon was close to the floor, not able to go up. When I
cut only
an
almost invisible bit of string, the floor bound balloon soared up
quickly and touched
the ceiling. If I had done this experiment in open air, it would have
gone to
into the clouds and higher into the sky.
What does this
mean? Because of the last tiny bit of string the balloon was unable to
rise to
the sky. The moment the balloon shed ‘a
little’
bit of weight, it could
go up freely to a great height!
Let us bring
this concept into real life. It could be that our performance in any
field of
life is low or we consider ourselves a failure because we are burdened
with a
little of some little downward pull – laziness, lack of
interest or concentration
or effort so on. We may not be even aware of it. The moment this
‘little’ negative
is shed, our performance may reach remarkable heights (sky high) which
we never
even imagined possible.
This
concept
needs some clarification. There are 2 preconditions for this sky high
performance to
be achieved.
First: This magical
going up after cutting a little bit of string
happens only at the critical stage when the upward force is almost
matching the
downward force but just a little less. It is only when this
‘little less’ upward
force becomes a ‘little more’ than the downward
force the magic takes place.
Till this state close to balance is reached, the balloon
is cursed
to be earth bound. Looking at it’s failure to go up as
desired by us, we tend
to think there is something major wrong with the balloon. It
could
be that
the balloon has the potential to go up the moment a little negative is
cut off.
We may be ignorant of this threshold status.
Similarly,
our
performance at this moment may be at the critical stage and can quickly
go up
but we feel like an utter failure because it is low. If we keenly
observe what
is going on, we can see that every time we cut the string, the balloon
goes up
a little and the tail of the string lying on the ground gets lesser.
This observation
should give us hope that something positive is going on by cutting the
bits of
string. Second: The little net uplifting force should be present all the time (24/7) for the balloon to continuously go up. It is not enough to give it an upward push once in a while.
Applying it to
our performance, the practice of
going the
extra mile should be continuous and never ending. Appearances
can be deceptive like the balloon ready to go up looks like it can
never go up
to sky. Our performance may not be going up but has the potential to
dramatically go up. When both of the above conditions are achieved, nothing can stop the balloon or our performance from reaching great heights. The Dusty Mirror Imagine a mirror covered with a very thin layer of dust. You can hardly see your face in it. If you can't clean it quickly and see your face, you feel the mirror is useless. You would walk away from it feeling frustrated. The mirror costing a lot of money is treated as useless thing just because of ......what? A layer of dust! What is the weight of the mirror and what is the weight of the layer of dust? The weight and volume of the dust is an infinitismal part of the weight of the mirror but it has the power to make the mirror totally useless. Even if you gather all the dust together it will be less than a pinch. What is required to make the mirror useful again? A wet tissue paper and a few seconds of cleaning effort is all that is needed to restore the mirror to it's full usefulness.
Seemingly
ineffective or useless people may also be covered or bugged
by insignificant layers of negative aspects. All that
may be
required is a little effort on their part to clean
those out.
Then their performance may shine like a clean mirror.
The
time and
effort required to clean out the negatives may be very little,
as
little as
that required for cleaning a dusty mirror.
It Is Only A Tiny Drop Imagine a big plate of food filled with delicious items set before you. You are tempted to eat immediately. Just then some one told you that a drop of deadly poison (potassium cyanide) had fallen on it. Suddenly all the great attraction you had for that plate of food disappears and it is replaced by fear. The tiny drop of poison is an insignificant part of the total weight or volume of the food. But all their value is destroyed by that tiny drop. Just like that, a person's or an organization's value or goodness can be destroyed or greatly weakened by a small but persistent lapse in performance. How to avoid such potential drops of poison? The best insurance is to be totally receptive to smaller lapses and errors seen by own self or reported by others, take them as blessings and make corrections to our thinking or actions. We may thereby avoid the danger of such drops of poison destroying our plate full of talents. My brother
‘Ramu’
died at the age of 10 In the year 1965, almost 40 years back, I was in a place far away from home, in my first job. I was for the first time away from home and unmarried. One day, I got a post card from my father that my brother named ‘Ramu’ of age 10, died due to drowning in the lake near our house. His body was found in a decomposed condition after searching for 2 days. Ramu was the darling boy of our family. He was the second youngest. He was exceptionally good in behavior, studies, and helping at home. I remember him learning to sew on the sewing machine and helping mother in domestic chores. When I got the news of his death, I was in mental turmoil. One question was constantly gong round in my mind – ‘Why did God take away such a good boy at the premature age of 10? Why? Why? Why? ‘ This question was ringing all the time in my mind, not allowing me to do my normal work or eat normal food or have normal sleep. This state continued for 2 full days. I was totally restless and inconsolable. Later on, I came to know that my brother, who did not know how to swim, went to a nearby lake, along with some of his friends who could swim. When my father came to know of this, he thrashed him and warned him to never to go near that lake. It was also learnt from his friends that some time back, he came across a fortune teller sitting by the side of a road, with a parrot in a cage. There were printed cards kept outside the cage, with different versions of future written on each of them. My brother paid that man, that man released the trained parrot, it came out of the cage and picked up one of the cards spread out before the cage. The card picked up for my brother was read out by the parrot keeper. It read among other things, that he would meet with a danger to his life from water. This was perhaps working in his young mind and made him to seek out the danger from water, as forecast in the parrot card. Let me come back to my constant agony over his death. On the third day of my getting the news of his death, I heard a silent voice in my mind. The voice asked me a counter question – ‘Mr C S Rao, how are you blaming God for your brother’s premature death? Did HE promise or even just tell you, that your great darling brother Ramu would live up to ripe old age? If God or anyone made such a promise to you, you can go to that God or person and blame him for breaking his promise. If no one had promised you, you have no business to blame any one or even raise that question. I got stumped by the irrefutable truth behind the counter question. I was stuck in my thinking and forced to be silent. All the restless questioning in my mind for last two days stopped suddenly. There was some peace in my mind, after being in great torture for last 2 days. Then after some time, a supplementary thought arose in my mind. As it is said in some spiritual texts, this world is like a stage. We are all the actors. Some are old actors, some middle aged and some child actors. As one actor completes his assigned role, he or she goes behind the stage. Some actors never return to the stage after they exit. My brother Ramu was assigned a child actor’s role. He played it very well and went behind the stage never to appear again. What am I complaining about? On the other hand, I should be happy that he played his assigned role superbly and gave all of us the pleasure of his company for 10 long years. In spite of all above self explanations, I was still suffering mentally, at the loss of my dear brother. After a few more days, another wave of a thought arose in my mind. Why was I suffering? A thought came in response. I am suffering because of my own incorrect expectation about his life term. If I was aware about the uncertainty of my brother’s life and accepted that he may die any time, I would not have suffered beyond the practical loss of a very dear person. If I had totally absorbed the uncertainty of any individual’s life, not only his, I would have thought this way - ‘Yes, nobody guaranteed his long life, neither God nor any one. He could have died any moment but we are lucky that he lived 10 full years, to give us the great pleasure of his company.’ After these thoughts repeatedly circulated in my mind over a few weeks, the reality of his death did not cause me any further suffering. I was at peace with the occurrence of his death. Later, when faced with come disappointments in life, another offshoot of a thought arose. If there is zero certainty about the full circle called life, how can there be any degree of certainty about any segment of life, like - education, employment, marriage, children and others? If the circle itself is uncertain, any segment of that circle has to be uncertain. If I could be at peace about my brother’s death at age 10, I might as well be at peace about the other happenings in my own life or of any other person. Once I accept the basic uncertainty I can deal with it. The uncertainty need not paralyze me into inaction. Generally we believe our disbelief in our success far more than the belief. This is because of the negative mode in which we are brought up since birth. It is rare that I have zero chances of fulfilling my goals. Not trying at all and missing the apparently available chances is foolishness arising out of my conditioning in the negative mode. The positive probability of success (of any magnitude), is as real as the negative probability. The negative probability need not be blown up. This attitude could motivate me to keep on trying to the best of my capability, to achieve what I like to achieve, with a positive attitude. Whatever I achieve this way, is a surprise gift compared with what I would have got by adopting alternative attitudes. When does his pen become your pen?
I
heard a spiritual teacher giving the
bare bones of this idea on TV many years ago. I have put flesh on the
bones. 3. While seeing
his pen moving towards your palm or even while feeling the
pen being placed
in it, you do not withdraw your hand. 4. You meekly grasp the pen placed in
your palm. 3. When you see
his hand moving towards your open palm and feel the
pen being placed
in it, you immediately withdraw your hand and
let the pen fall to
the
ground, surprising him. Failing this -
You thus have
plenty of opportunities to avoid becoming the victim of the unwanted
pen. When you
fail to use these opportunities, is it fair to blame him for his
success in transferring his pen to you?
1. Divert your attention when
you notice his attempt to insult you.
4.
You
receive the insult pretending to accept
it. After the encounter, drop
it from your mind, happy about fooling him. 5.
You keep his
insult in a corner of your mind like an old scar
from a mugger’s
attack. The scar does not hurt, it is not even
sensitive to touch. He laughs at every one!
One day one
of my associates told me privately with great distress “Mr. X
(the senior
manager, not his boss) always speaks insultingly to me in public. It
hurts me for
a long time. I can not bear it any more”.
The moment
the above thought arose, a smile came on my lips realizing the
stupidity of my
thinking. My attitude towards the garbage changed dramatically. |