Break the Egg from inside

I received this wonderful message in whats app and wished to share with you

Break the Egg from Inside - Maulik Unadkat

One night Rabia, a noble Sufi saint, was desperately searching for something on the street outside her small hut. When Hasan, returned back from work, he saw this and curiously asked, “Rabia, my dear, what are you looking for, here on the street, at this hour?”

Rabia replied, “I lost my needle.”

Hasan joined her in the search, but after searching for a while, he asked, “Can you try and recollect where you might have dropped it?”

Rabia said, “Of course, I remember. I dropped it near the bed, in our hut.”

Hasan mocked her, “Are you insane? You lost it inside the house, then why are we looking for it outside?”

Rabia innocently replied, “There was no oil left in our lamp. It was pitch dark inside the house to search for it. Hence I thought of searching for it outside, since there was enough streetlight here.”

While holding his laugh, Hasan said, “You are really acting weird. If you lost your needle inside the house, how could you even expect to find it outside?”

Rabia simply smiled back at Hasan and Hasan got the beautiful moral behind her silly act. We are all seeking outside, what we have lost inside us. Why, just because it is pitch dark inside? Silly, aren’t we? Light the lamp inside you. Find your lost treasure.

As children, we were all so happy. Somewhere along the journey of life, we lost our happiness. Where did we start searching for it again? Outside! We do not need the latest Smartphone, a 7 digit salary, a beach house or a long vacation to be happy.  Happiness is an INSIDE job. Nothing in this world outside will make us happy, if we are unhappy from inside. Many a times, people who have much less than us are much happier than us. Happiness is self generated. You are not expected to be unrealistically happy when your life may be miserable. When life is harsh on you, stay at peace and wait for happy days peacefully. This too shall pass. When your peace of mind is lost, remember where to look for it, INSIDE.

We keep looking for God in the world outside, while He resides inside each one of us. God can never be found outside but that doesn’t mean temples are useless. Temples help us connect with the God inside us. God is lost somewhere inside us, in the darkness of our disbelief and our ignorance. Light the lamp and search, the postal address of God is INSIDE.

If an egg is broken by an outside force, a LIFE ENDS. If broken by an inside force, a LIFE BEGINS. You will find all the treasures of life, all the secrets of life inside you. Stop looking outside. Break the egg from inside, let LIFE BEGIN.

Add glamour to life by calculated risks

In our lives we are often confronted with situations where the future outcome is not clear. We tend to weigh the pros and cons but still remain undecided, or opt for a safe path that is always less attractive. Nevertheless in day to day life, we are to take risks constantly, we cross the road hoping that vehicle users would follow the rule of road, we take our food in restaurants hoping the food is made hygienically, take our medicines trusting they are not fake duplicates and submit ourselves to treatment believing the doctors know their job well. Even marrying a person is a risky gamble until everything turns out to be fine. In business risks are taken day in and day out based on reasonable conjectures of the market, supplies and margin. One cannot play safe waiting for the waves to subside to take a sea bath. It never happens. Risk free road where no vehicles ply is the busiest boulevard but no successful men are found there.

We must remember that all risks are not the same. There are some risks that are just dumb, foolish and chancy like buying a lottery ticket, placing a bet on a horse over which you have no control or playing roulette in a casino to win a jackpot. But many are reasonable risks which one has to take perforce, intelligent risks, where the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. In the evaluation where all factors have been taken into account, it would be foolish to let go an idea where the positive outcome is more than negative fallout. If the damage by failure is minimal or manageable, the risk should be taken and an opportunity to make good should not be lost by excessive caution. "A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.” -John A Shedd

Take the simple example of a young lover wanting to propose to his girl friend but afraid of possible .rejection. If he fails to take the risk of proposing to her and face whatever her response is, he would surely miss the girl forever. While we should give a wide berth to reckless dumb risks, we should not fail to avail intelligent risks. Otherwise our lives would be ordinary with no glamour or success.Every decision has an element of risk.No risk means no success.

There are a couple of things,however to bear in mind like taking a long term view of the decision and the likely positive outcomes and not being guided by a few cases of failure we often hear about. Success may not be immediate but one should work putting in maximum efforts and hoping the intelligent risk taken will pay out well at the end. Success is not for cowards. Those who refuse to lean towards risks by bending with each storm of life may never get hurt but their character to be daring would be irreparably hurt.

There is a proverb ‘Everybody pushes a falling fence’. You can never command respect. We can easily distinguish the leader among men just by looking at a pack of animals cowering under danger. Suddenly one animal steps forward and moves towards the danger. This halts the other terrified many. So is the case among men too. The leader takes an intelligent risk and assumes charge of the situation. This ability to take risk distinguishes the grain from the chaff

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The 10th Apple Effect!

(I received this write up and wish to share with you as I found it inspiring.The source is unknown)

A hunter once lost his way deep inside the jungle while chasing a deer. He used all his navigation skills but neither did he find any way out of the jungle nor could he find any food to eat for 8 days at a stretch. He started feeling so damn hungry that he could eat an entire elephant at one go. Disappointed, he lost all hope. And that is exactly when an apple tree caught his sight. He collected a dozen apples to feed him for the rest of his search.

As he ate the 1st apple, his joy knew no bounds and he just couldn't stop feeling grateful and blessed. He thanked life. He thanked God. He could not believe his luck when he ate the 1st apple but he was less grateful while having the 2nd apple and even lesser grateful when he had the 5th apple. Somehow, with each passing apple, the hunger still kept on increasing and the joy kept on reducing drastically. He just could not enjoy the 10th apple. Why? He had already taken for granted the gift of having found an apple tree in the middle of a forest after 8 long days of wandering with hunger. When he took the 10th apple in his hand, he was still very hungry but he just did not feel like having it any more. Economics calls this diminishing marginal utility. I would like to call it diminishing gratitude, in simple words, taking things for granted. Or let’s just call it the 10th apple effect.

The 10th apple did not lack taste, it did not lack the potential to satisfy his hunger but the only thing lacking was his gratitude for finding food in the middle of the jungle.

The hunter represents us. And the apple represents the gifts that life gives us. The 10th apple represents our lack of gratitude for these gifts of life and our ‘take everything for granted’ attitude. As we continue receiving the gifts of life, our hunger, our greed keeps on increasing and the joy we get from these gifts diminishes.

Imagine the joy you get when you deliver a baby and hold your baby in your hands for the first time. The gratitude you have in that moment, for life and for God is unmatched. But what happens as time passes? Do you get the same joy when you look at your child every single day? Do you still find enough happy time to spend with your kids? Never let the 10th apple effect make you feel less grateful for the gift of a child.

The 10th apple is as sweet as the first apple. If the 10th apple fails to give you as much pleasure as the first one, nothing is wrong with the apple, everything is wrong with you. If you get bored on a dull day, it is not because the day is dull and boring. It is because your gratitude has become dull and boring. The gift of life for another day cannot be taken for granted. The Nth year of life should seem as exciting as the 16th year, as the 25th year, as the 50th year.

Never let the ‘10th apple effect’ make you take these gifts of life for granted. Never let your gratitude for life fade away. Happy life! 

Some thoughts on parenting

Not sure if this is actually in the Thirukkural or somebody's interpretation but seems pretty good.

Thirukkural  by Thiruvalluvar ( a  celebrated Tamil  poet/writer) was written more than 5000 yrs ago. It's one of the  ancient science on Human behaviour , which has not   changed in-spite of modern education  & technology !  .

SOME GOLDEN THOUGHTS OF THIRUKKURAL

1. If your child lies to you often, it is because you over-react too harshly to their inappropriate behaviour.

2. If your child is not taught to confide in you about their mistakes, you've lost them.

3. If your child had poor self-esteem, it is because you advice them more than you encourage them.

4. If your child does not stand up for themselves, it is because from a young age you have disciplined them regularly in public.

5. If your child takes things that do not belong to them, it is because when you buy them things, you don't let them chose what they want.

6. If your child is cowardly, it is because you help them too quickly.

7. If your child does not respect other people's feelings, it is because instead of speaking to your child, you order and command them.

8. If your child is too quick to anger, it is because you give too much attention to misbehaviour and you give little attention to good behaviour.

9. If your child is excessively jealous, it is because you only congratulate them when they successfully complete something and not when they improve at something even if they don't successfully complete it.

10. If your child intentionally disturbs you, it is because you are not physically affectionate enough.

11. If your child is openly defied, it is because you openly threaten to do something but don't follow through.

12. If your child is secretive, it is because they don't trust that you won't blow things out of proportion.

13. If your child talks back to you, it is because they watch you do it to others and think its normal behaviour.

14. If your child doesn't listen to you but listens to others, it is because you are too quick to make decisions.

15. If your child rebels it is because they know you care more about what others think than what is right

The impostor

(

I am an impostor

A pretender

Calling myself

Everything

The body,

The mind,

And the soul

Where as you

The real ‘I’ is hidden

Inside me,

A silent spectator,

And a mute witness

To my foolishness.

Masquerading in arrogance

In my temporary unreal garb

I grope in the darkness of my mind

As the true self

Wasting my precious human life

At the altar of desires

Making no attempt to know you

Though you reside in me

Till my last breath

I die

When the shell dies

You the real ‘I’

Is undying

Carrying with you my baggage

Of many sins and a few good

To find a new shell, a new form

Determined for me by my baggage.

On my unending

Journeys of births and deaths

We are as happy as we wish to be

I do not know how many of us know the name of our postman who comes to deliver our letters almost daily? No, we hardly talk to him even when he delivers us a registered letter or a parcel. We silently receive the mail and sign in acknowledgement in the form he produces. Our encounter or should I say non-encounter with him is over in a minute or two. He invariably comes on his cycle when the sun is over the head and  is hot. He would visit any number of homes and would not have remembered a single exchange of words worth remembering at the end of the day.

My first encounter with my postman started with a tiff. It was very hot that day and after a heavy lunch, I had dozed off. My wife was away. The postman had rung the bell twice or thrice. I opened the door with a frown on my face at the disturbance. He had a registered parcel for my wife and asked for her.

 I told him in abrasive tone”she has gone out. You may deliver it to me.”

 Possibly upset with my harsh tone he replied “I would need an authorization letter as per rules.”

“You are very punctilious especially when you know the addressee is my wife” I remonstrated with him.

 He politely replied” I was only doing my duty. Since I know both of you, I would have readily  delivered it to you had you been a little gentle”

It was only then that I noticed he was perspiring heavily standing in the hot sun with a big bundle. I requested him to come in and asked him to sit under the fan. He was hesitant initially but sat down when pressed. I gave him a glass of cold butter milk. I ascertained his name was Radhakrishnan and that he has been on this beat for the last twenty years. He had two sons and one girl and all of them studying.

He was touched by my kind enquiries and said “This was the first time anyone ever invited me into the drawing room and offered me a glass of cold water let alone buttermilk.”

“Do you like this arduous work of going out daily in hot sun or in rains on rainy days?”

 “I have no choice as I need to earn and so I decided to like it. Sorting of the letters was easy once one gets experienced. I have the opportunity to meet all sorts of people though the hazard of unchained dogs and tiresome climbing of the stairs of multi storied apartments poses  me a problem.You see I am getting older”he said with a smile.”

“I understand fully” I said in empathy

“It is not without its joy. I enjoy helping the illiterate with the occasional reading out the post cards. Though there are a few insensitive people making me wait at their doors taking their own time to chain the dogs or open the doors, most of the people are good and happy to see me at their doors.. I have no reason to be unhappy though walking through slushy roads during rainy days is difficult.”

Six months later, I had to get an affidavit urgently from a notary public. I didn’t know of anyone in the locality. The neighbours also could not help. It was then I saw Radhakrishnan in my colony on his beat. When I mentioned about this, he reeled out half a dozen names within a kilometer of my house. It was then I found that he knew well the people who lived in his area and enjoyed being helpful whenever approached.

 It was then the thought occurred to me that how many of us who work in the cool comfort of air-conditioned offices with transport or pick up facility  and yet keep griping about the well paid work little realizing there are people who enjoy their work even in unfavourable circumstances.

I was surprised at Radhakrishnan’s positive attitude and remarked “I am surprised how you like your work which to me does not appear comfortable.”

He laughed and said “Unlike you big officers, I am not chained to a table or a cabin all through the day. I am mostly in the open breathing fresh air and meeting a cross section of people. Most of them cheer up and smile when they see me bringing  a letter or a money order.. At the end of the day I do not have to carry the worries of the office to my home. I have many friends and interests. Life is not about earning money alone. I am quite happy,Sir.”

I realized that the postman had developed a robust and positive outlook towards life. He liked his job, worked efficiently, helped illiterate people, made friends and was cheerful. How many of us could boast of such a privilege? We are as happy as we wish to be.

Fostering moral courage

Decades back when I was a young boy studying in class 6, there was a heavily built bully in the class. Being the son of the class teacher he ran amuck doing things that pleased him with none bold enough to question him or complain against him. He stole lunch boxes and took away from  school bags of others whatever he desired. He beat the weak boys and frequently pushed a polio affected boy without any provocation. The poor teacher was not aware of the misdeeds of this bully as none informed him.

 It was a hot summer. There was a big earthen pot kept in the corner of the class room. The water boy filled the pot with water each morning before the classes commenced. There was a brass tumbler kept by the side of the pot. The boys slaked their thirst in between the two classes. It so happened one day the bully commanded one boy to fetch him the water in the tumbler. The boy strangely ignored him and after drinking the water returned to his seat.

 The bully roared” how dare you disobey me? If you do not get me water within the next minute, I will make you pay for it.”

 The boy did not budge. All the other boys watched anxiously suppressing their glee at his defiance. The bully got up in anger and thrashed the boy. He took the black board wiper and hit the pot breaking it into pieces with all the water spilling out. It was a little later the class teacher entered and saw the damage. He took the cane in his hand and asked generally who broke the pot. There was a deafening silence.

The bully stood up and said pointing out the boy who refused to give him the water”Sir,he broke  the pot in anger as others were drinking water and he did not get the tumbler when he wanted.”

The good teacher unusually lost his temper  and beat the boy once when there was a sudden shriek “Stop it, Sir”.

 Everyone turned towards the direction of the voice. It was the polio affected boy who stood up.and said “Sir, the pot was broken by your son in anger as that boy refused to bring him water when commanded by your son. He thrashed the boy mercilessly and pushed him down. He is tormenting us daily in several ways.”

The teacher looked at the class and asked the boys “Is it true? You do not have to fear him or me. Please raise your hands if what the boy said is true.”

All the boys,except the bully and a couple of his buddies raised their hands,, and shouted”Yes, sir” in chorus

The teacher full of remorse for his rash behavior rubbed softly the arm of the boy and said “I was rash and should have asked others. I am sorry. Please go to your seat and sit down.”

He called the polio affected boy to his side and affectionately put his arm around him and said “I really appreciate your boldly speaking out the truth. I do not know why all the others did not have the courage you showed.. I am thankful to you and proud of you as my student.

 He called his son near him and caned him thrice telling that he was ashamed of his despicable behavior.

The point of this story is that most of us lack the moral courage to stand up against injustice wherever we see. While the soldiers who fight the war, the firemen who fight the raging fires and the policemen controlling a violent mob are all courageous in the course of their duty, ordinary people remain mute witnesses to the atrocities out of fear. The daring few whistle blowers pay a heavy price for their courage in this unethical system.

 While individually we cannot fight the corrupt politicians, the greedy mafia, the defrauding traders, we should collectively raise our voice of protest at the appropriate times. I have read that ‘moral courage is not just an intellectual exercise. Having the strength to do what is right when faced with difficult decisions is the key to being an ethical leader.”

If the ration shop or a petrol bunk deals with adulterated goods, we must have the courage to appeal to the consumer protection organization. If the auto driver fleeces you, you must stand up for your right and take a public bus than succumb to his unreasonable demand. It is difficult and inconvenient no doubt but we must at some stage learn lessons from great leaders like Mahatma Gandhi or a Nelson Mandela. The latter had said that "I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear."

We should teach our children by personal example in the ordinary daily transactions about the values of integrity and moral character. Even in the sphere of games, how many players have the willingness to walk without waiting for the umpire’s ruling when they know they are out? We must develop the strength to stand up for what we believe. Our actions should be based on our ethical values and willingness to undergo hardships and even face some risks. We should not be willing accessories to manipulative bosses in office, cunning politicians during elections and corrupt bureaucrats in our dealings.

 It is high time that schools set apart an hour for moral instruction to children even from the small classes to build a nation of high moral fibre.