Little Things That Matter

Learn From The Past, Live The Present and Have An Open Mind to Face Tomorrow

Archives for March 2013

Does Hope Matter At The Face of Destiny?

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How many times have you heard people say , “You Control Your Destiny” and not vice versa.

How do you progress in life?

How do you achieve what you are passionate about ?

How do you translate your vision into action ?

How do you on a day-to-day basis get to where you want to be ?

Each of us have our dreams, our passions, our purpose in life which drives us and makes us come alive ?

Without putting an effort our dreams would never get fulfilled, if we leave everything to destiny.

Yet Destiny plays an imperative role in our journey of life, one we can’t change.

Do I believe in destiny?

Recent events in my life have convinced me that we can’t change our destiny. Two of my close family members are facing destiny, as I type this.

My Father in law is battling with his life for the past two months in the ICU and my mother’s health seems to be on a continuous downtrend.  Doctors and family members are doing everything they can. Prayers, medications, enquiries with various experts continue but yet I and others in our family feel helpless.  It feels that Destiny is shaping their life and we are watching helplessly.

Destiny after all controls when we die, and no matter what, none of us can control it. Yes we can control how we live but if we are destined to die in a particular way there is no changing that.  When you go through such events in your life it makes you wonder do we have control over what finally dictates our fate?

My mom has always been very careful with the way she has lived her life. She has always been kind, thankful, and helpful. Though she came from a conservative family, she has always been bold and empowered herself in her journey of life. She has always been meticulous, disciplined and a human being from whom I have learnt a lot. Yet where she stands today, she suffers at the hands of destiny.

I often question as to why her ? Doesn’t the balance sheet of her life need to tally in that when all she has done is good, why make her suffer?

Old age has its own share of miseries some of which may be caused by the way we have lived our younger years and yet others beyond our control.  You may say why worry about things beyond your control. Yes, but when you see your mom suffer and you aren’t able to do anything, you feel helpless and defeated.

Have I given up hope? No, hope is what is taking me through from day-to-day. My mind is restless and the flight from Hope to hope through each moment is what carries me through.  Hope is the power of being cheerful in circumstances which we know to be desperate. –G.K. Chesterton

Extreme hopes are born of extreme misery. –Bertrand Russell

I can only pray for miracles at this stage. I pray that their suffering reduces. I am pained to see my Dad’s pain. He is the best optimist I have always known and yet there are times of despair in his eyes.

My mother in law is a woman of tremendous strength and yet she feels helpless and hopeless that she is not able to do much in being able to reduce the pain and suffering her husband is going through.

Each of our strength and character has been tested in the past several months.

What have I learnt and still learning?   To believe in destiny but yet not give up hope. I have reiterated to myself to be realistic but be positive and be gratuitous to what I have amongst suffering and despair. It is moments of positivity that carries me through. I remind myself to treat life well rather than get hung up on people’s attitudes, ego and arrogance. I consciously avoid the naysayers, the arrogant and egoistic people because they don’t matter. You know your true friends in your life’s challenges. I am learning to value each moment through mindfulness, rather than worry about how tomorrow is going to be.  I don’t want to lose each moment that has been gifted to me with my loved ones.

I don’t want to give up, so God help me.

 

 

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Top 5 Lessons That Pain Teaches You

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Physical Pain is something that each of us undergo at some stage during our life. Many of us agonize over the pain that we undergo.   There is pain when we hurt ourself when we fall, hit ourself somewhere or from food poisoning, a surgery, a sprain, or a ligament tear. There are different kinds of physical pain : somatic, neuropathic, and visceral.

Have you ever asked or wondered as to how do you know when you sprain or twist a part of your body or when you have a tear of any tissue or  ligament or shoulder joint?

Do you take pain for granted?

For the first time, I realized after reading this article from the BBC, which appeared in July 2012, that there are people in this world who suffer from congenital analgesia.  Steven Pete and his brother were born with the rare genetic disorder congenital analgesia. They grew up – in Washington state, US – with a sense of touch but, as he explains in his own words, without ever feeling pain.

To suffer from physical pain is difficult and gets even more challenging for those whose tolerance level to bear the same may not be very high. Most of us moan and curse when we are in pain. Apart from all these pains is the emotional pain – pain in seeing our near and dear suffer, pain of regret, pain from having trusted someone who abused the trust.

Do you realize that pain can actually be a blessing ?

Physical pain warns you not to do something – for instance not walk with a ligament tear. Physical pain also enables you to determine an injury.

Emotional pain too can be a warning, for instance, to be careful of not trusting any person.

New brain scanning technologies are revealing that the part of the brain that processes physical pain also deals with emotional pain.

How can we use pain to grow, develop, to change and be human?

  1. Caution – many times because of your carelessness or being preoccupied with something or being unconsciously incompetent or consciously competent leading to overconfidence, you meet with accidents or perform an exercise in an incorrect way. Physical pain is thus caused. However if you were more conscious or not lost in your thoughts, chances of accidents reduce.
  2. Reduce regrets – you cannot control  every event in your life or for that matter influences in your life. What lies within your control is the meaning you attribute to each of these.  If you control the meaning or the impact of events in your life by creating as much value as you can, you will have a sense of purpose and personal power. Learn, unlearn and relearn from each regret and move forward.
  3. Recognize emotional blind spots – most of us tend to focus on the possible causes of pain and vulnerability. Instead if you were to try to ask what each hurtful incident means to you and what you can do to heal and improve. Recognize the emotional blind spots not by engaging in a blame game, self-pity, self-criticism or avoiding the hurt feeling but by being compassionate and controlling your attitude towards the situation. Ask What am I feeling?  What does it mean to me?  What can I do to improve and heal?   Ask for help from friends, family if you think you need to share.
  4. Thoughts – our thoughts control our feeling and our behavior.   Dale Carnegie was once asked what was the biggest lesson he had ever learned. He replied that, “By far, the most vital lesson I have ever learned is the importance of what we think.”   You see, Carnegie knew that our thoughts make us what we are—our mental attitude is the “X” factor that determines our fate. He quoted Emerson as having said, “A man is what he thinks about all day long…How could he possibly be anything else?”  Yes, if we think happy thoughts, we will be happy, if we think miserable thoughts, we will be miserable. If we think fear thoughts, we will be fearful. If we think sickly thoughts, we will probably be ill. If we think failure, we will certainly fail.  At the same time, Dale Carnegie knew that people couldn’t go around with a devil-may-care attitude about all their problems. Unfortunately, life isn’t so simple as all that. But he did advocate that we assume a positive attitude instead of a negative attitude. In other words, we need to be concerned about our problems, but not worried.  Our mind’s power to bring about change doesn’t stop with attitude, however. Remember…“Our life is what our thoughts make it.” Make yours strong, positive, and all it can be. For the full post click LINK
  5. Emotional intelligence – self-awareness is a crucial step in overcoming emotional pain. Once you are aware you can acknowledge it.  When you become aware that you feel emotionally vulnerable, allow yourself time and space to investigate your feelings. Use the power of your words. Remember your words create your thoughts and align your energy in a specific direction. Emotional memory management enables us to manage our emotions in a way that will produce more positive outcomes. I like to think emotions as colors, some simple, and yet others are blends.

As a leader if you are emotionally vulnerable, your department and the organization as a whole will experience high turnover and absenteeism.

How have you dealt with pain?

What have been your takeaways from each occasion of pain ?