The Life-Script Blog

I met a young man once in India who taught me a valuable lesson. He was the driver assigned to me by an industrial company to take me to their various factories in the country. We spent a lot of time together in the car, passing time with idle chatter that soon led to discussions about his life and his family. Vasu was poorer than the poorest, at least by my standards, yet he carried himself like a man of great wealth, who had not a worry in the world. I pried to get more information and quite accidentally he divulged his secret: his name, Vasu, means “wealth” in Sanskrit. Vasu’s Inner Voices were telling him that he was blessed with wealth, and hence he was not bothered by the holes in his shoes. He saw abundance in what little he had, and did not focus on what he lacked. He was a very wise young man…

The image that you have of yourself is what shapes your destiny. Nothing else matters. For decades I had an image of myself that held me back from achieving personal and professional fulfillment in spite of significant successes in business. My Inner Voices (greatly influenced by my SCRIPT) were telling me that I could never achieve great things – and I believed them. I second-guessed myself every step of the way. The reversal of my fortunes came when I started to change the way I thought about myself.

How do you judge yourself? Have you ever asked yourself “what did I do that for?” or “what was I thinking?” Have you ever internally chastised yourself for “being so stupid”, for “acting like an idiot”? Such words serve no purpose – they only tear you down, make you feel unworthy and destroy your self esteem.

Think positive words. Train yourself to reject every negative thought that comes into your mind. Never, ever voice a negative thought about yourself, not even in jest! Every time you say something – positive or negative – it reinforces your belief in whatever you expressed: if you say “I’ll never get rid of those extra 10 lbs” – guess what, you won’t, until you train your Inner Voice to say: “I’m fabulous, and those extra 10 lbs will come off in a jiffy!”

I still remember the gist from a one-act play named “Reunion”. The story is about four people who were in the army during the Second World War. The enemies surround their group and there is hardly any chance of escaping from death. The people in the group vow that if they survive the siege and get out alive, they will all meet at one particular restaurant on a specific date. One of soldiers volunteers to sneak out and summon help from other groups. Ultimately, all four survive.

The scene is enacted in the restaurant where three of the soldiers are seated and are discussing the happenings of that night and life in general. One is now a successful chain supermarket owner, one has climbed to a high pedestal as a clergyman and the other is a politician. They were all talking of the fourth person who is missing at the reunion. He was the Sergeant who volunteered to sneak out to summon assistance.

Meanwhile a man walks in and joins them, and the group identifies him as the Sergeant. This man takes the group through all the conversations, visions, yearnings and promises that they had made while they were trapped. They had taken an oath that they will work for the betterment of the society through their chosen professions. Throughout this session, when he starts dissecting the current status of the three men and their routes to individual successes, the group feels that there is something amiss. The fourth man confesses that he is the younger brother of the Sergeant, who had told him everything that transpired that night, about the people, their promises and the date and place of the reunion.

When queried about the whereabouts of the Sergeant, the brother asks the group whether they had seen a clip from a news paper which said, “Small corner shop owner gases himself after being price squeezed and run into the ground by a new neighbourhood chain supermarket”? At this the group falls into a deathly silence.

I brought this up to remind ourselves that we all make promises to ourselves and others many times in our lives, and then do not keep them. When we are in deep trouble, we vow that if we survive this crisis, we will do all things good for the society and make this world a better place to live, for all. The moment the crisis is over, we forget about our promises and go on with our own selfish agendas and material greed. We trample other people ruthlessly to climb up in life. We do not bother to look back to see if we have hurt people in our hurry to succeed. That is the way we are.

Be like the Sergeant in the above story; willing to sacrifice his life for his friends and living further to serve others, without trampling people in the process.

“A process which led from the amoeba to man appeared to the philosophers to be obviously a progress, though whether the amoeba would agree with this opinion is not known.” –  Bertrand Russel

Have you ever thought of real happiness?

When did you feel the joy of fulfilment the most?

Take the case of a pregnant woman in labor pain. She probably feels the ultimate happiness after she has given birth, when she listens to the newborn baby crying and even more when she feels the baby’s warm wriggling body close to hers. Beyond that, the story could vary from case to case.

Take another case of person with a full bladder searching frantically for a rest room to relieve himself. Ever been in such a situation? He would feel completely relieved and happy when he empties his bladder. Beyond this state, what happens is unpredictable.

Happiness has to be achieved without any conditions attached to it. Many may feel that they would be happy if they made a million dollars in a few months time; from the moment the million is made, the next target of a few millions would pull them down from the happiness pedestal. In our highly materialistic world, we tend to attach conditions to everything. “If I have this electric blue dress, I will be happy”, “If I have this sports model car, I will be happy”, If I have this dream luxury boat, I will be happy”, “If I pass in this examination I will be happy”, and so on and so on.

How do we get out of this cliché?

We normally live from moment to moment and travel between highs a lows of happiness. Happiness is more of a state of mind. When we decide that we are happy we can be, even when we are in great distress. If we take each of our problems as a challenge to achieve happiness rather than allowing them to weigh us down, half the battle is won. A few tips to improve your happiness quotient are given below.

Be satisfied fully with what you have now. Live today, but definitely plan for tomorrow.

Be ambitious, but for things within your reach and capabilities. What would happen to a rabbit’s anus if it wants to defecate like an elephant?

Share all that you have with others. The joy of giving and sharing is at a higher level compared to the joy of receiving.

Help people in need. The joy of the people whom you have helped would increase your happiness quotient too.

Finally, happiness is a state of mind. Decide that you will remain happy…..be happy!

Throughout our life we remain in quest for peace, quiet, happiness, beauty, satisfaction, fulfilment, comfort, convenience and many other such aspects. We tend to gather as much of each in our own niche environments, but find it difficult to achieve everything.

There are few memorable characters in the novel “The Drifters” by Pulitzer Prize winner James A Michener. The story traces the travels of six young people who tour Europe and Africa searching for meaning in their lives. On the surface, they are runaways carving themselves an existence based on drugs and physical pleasure in exotic locales.

Out of the six people mentioned above, Britta is a classical blonde beauty from Norway. She is sick and tired of her cold and grey environs in Norway, where they enter a tunnel with grey days and nights every winter. She is fascinated by her father’s fantasy of living in warm and sunny Ceylon (now Srilanka). Her journey from a cold town in Norway to a sunny beach in Spain and further progress to her dream destination, Ceylon is fantastic.

We have been reading the latest happenings in Srilanka regarding the ethnic strife, poverty, outright war, oppression, divisive politics and general discontent of the local people. Could this be the same heaven perceived by Britta?

The Amazon basin is known for the world’s largest rain forest, rugged beauty and typically difficult terrain. For people who love nature, it could be a perceived heaven on earth. On the other hand, Bolivia, Peru and Columbia where the Amazonian rain forests exist happen to be in continuous strife due to drug trafficking and mafia related terrorism. Could this be a heaven then?

Then where is this heaven on earth? At a spiritual level, it is our choice. We have the ability to make any place a heaven, by choice and default. To amplify, if we decide that a place where we are in now is heaven, it is by choice. If we make this a habit, any and every place you are in becomes heaven by default. Once we live in our own heaven, all the other goodies would flow in without any effort.

Many of you would have heard about or seen the Broadway musical “Fiddler on the Roof”, based on Tevye and his Daughters (or Tevye the Milkman) and other tales by Sholem Aleichem, or the movie adaptation starring Topol as Tevye. The story revolves around Tevye, the milkman living in an impoverished and predominantly Jewish village in Tsarist Russia.

It is the story of his struggle to keep up with the traditions handed down the generations and the set-backs he suffers when three of his five daughters get married against all known traditions. In one of the songs, Tevie talks about various traditions that they follow, but is not able to explain why such traditions came about.

Our perception about traditions and values handed down the generations keeps changing with our age.

Children in the formative years are not aware of what is good or bad and normally follow their parents’ dictum of what is good.

As they grow, they keep learning and observing others. They start forming their own opinion on what is good for them; but while they still follow their parental instructions most of the time, dissenting thoughts begin to gel.

Adolescence is the most difficult time when young adults question most or all the traditions and values of the older generations. This is applicable to every generation, be it the dead and buried, or the living, or the yet to be born. Pink Floyd’s “Brick in the Wall” (an all time favourite among teenagers) where the singer screams, “Hey teacher, leave those kids alone,” reflects the anti- establishment fervour at that age.

With adulthood come responsibilities, work pressures, peer pressures, pressure to perform and many other commitments. Some people start getting back to basics on traditions at this stage. Good and bad experiences on-the-go help in moulding the set of values that each one of us accepts and embraces.

As we cross middle age, we are most probably advocating traditions and lecturing about the values that we hold and the lack of values among the younger generations.

This is the fact of life – we may call it the “generation gap “…

It all starts out with a tiny egg laid by the female butterfly, out of which the larva or caterpillar emerges. Its only job is to eat, and it does a very good job indeed eating and growing bigger and bigger. In fact, it grows so big that its skin cannot keep up with it, so the caterpillar has to shed its skin several times. Each time it re-appears from the old skin it looks a little different, more colorful and more alive. And finally, after five rounds of shedding old skin it is ready for its final metamorphosis from a lowly caterpillar to a gorgeous butterfly! There is much to be done in this final stage before the transformation is complete: wings are fully formed, antennae are formed and the chewing mouthparts of the caterpillar are transformed into the sucking mouthparts of the butterfly. This final state takes a bit of time, about 10-14 days, but when it’s finished and the magnificent new creature emerges, spreads its delicate wings and rises up to greet the sun – you know that it was all worth it!

Biology lesson, you ask? No, just an analogy: you see, you could be like this caterpillar, growing every day, shedding layer and layer of limiting beliefs about yourself and your abilities, stage after stage until you too are ready to spread your wings and live the life you have always dreamed about! Your SCRIPT holds you in shackles now; it confines you to imaginary boundaries that you bump into with every step you take. You feel trapped – yet all the while you know that there is a butterfly inside of you ready to experience the world.

In Chapter 5 of my book “7 Steps to Personal Fulfillment” I will show you how to release your shackles, how to shed your skin, and how to grow golden wings that will lift you to the heavens with the promise of a glorious life!

Meditation is a wonderful way to relax the mind. I know, because I learned to meditate. It’s easy, everyone can do it, and once you get the hang of it – you’ll love it!

The mind races at 50-60,000 thoughts per day. It has no “off button”. Even at night, the mind keeps going and produces the most wonderful – and sometimes horrible – dreams. When pleasant thoughts cross your mind, you automatically relax, all tension leaves your body and you feel great. After a pleasant dream you wake up refreshed and ready to take on the world. When something is bothering you, however, your thoughts become a prison – anytime you try to break out of it, the confining thoughts pop up again like barbed wire, keeping you confined to dwell on them. Your body tenses up and physical pain is added to the emotional pain that you are trying to rid yourself of. Meditation helps to break this vicious cycle.

When you practice meditation often, you will find that your self-interest and self-concern will change. Instead of dwelling on your Script and all the negativity associated with it, you will uncover inner resources of compassion and wisdom that will help you overcome obstacles and act in beneficial ways towards others as well. These activities will reduce your suffering, and the process will come effortlessly through the simple practice of meditation.

The Blarney Stone is a historical stone, or actually part of the Blarney Castle in Ireland where it was believed that kissing the stone can grant you the gift of gab. Yeah, it seems strange in this day and age, but who are we to question tradition?

There is so much to know about conversation that anyone, even I, could ever realize. You can watch talk shows; listen to radio programs; go to clubs dedicated to public speaking; and listen to ordinary conversations – and you will find that certain rules still apply when it comes to interaction through words. It may sound tedious, I know, but even though it’s your mouth that’s doing the work, your brain works twice as hard to churn out a lot of things you know. So what better way to start learning to be an effective communicator than to know the very person closest to you: yourself.

1. What you know. Education is all about learning the basics, but to be an effective speaker is to practice what you’ve learned. My stint as occasional public speaker taught me that we all have our limitations, but that doesn’t mean we can’t learn to keep up and share what we know.

2. Listening. It’s just as important as asking questions. Sometimes listening to the sound of our own voice can teach us to be a little bit confident with ourselves and to say the things we believe in with conviction.

3. Humility. We all make mistakes, and sometimes we tend to slur our words, stutter, and probably mispronounce certain words even though we know what it means, but rarely use it only to impress listeners. So in a group, don’t be afraid to ask if you’re saying the right word properly and if they’re unsure about it then make a joke out of it. I promise you it’ll make everyone laugh and you can get away with it as well.

4. Eye Contact. There’s a lot to say when it comes to directing your attention to your audience with an eye-catching gaze. It’s important that you keep your focus when talking to a large group in a meeting or a gathering, even though he or she may be gorgeous.

5. Kidding Around. A little bit of humor can do wonders to lift the tension, or worse boredom when making your speech. That way, you’ll get the attention of the majority of the crowd and they’ll feel that you’re just as approachable, and as human to those who listen.

6. Be like the rest of them. Interaction is all about mingling with other people. You’ll get a lot of ideas, as well as knowing what people make them as they are.

7. Me, Myself, and I. Admit it, there are times you sing to yourself in the shower. I know I do! Listening to the sound of your own voice while you practice your speech in front of a mirror can help correct the stress areas of your pitch. And while you’re at it you can spruce up as well.

8. With a smile. A smile says it all much like eye contact. There’s no point on grimacing or frowning in a meeting or a gathering, unless it’s a wake. You can better express what you’re saying when you smile.

9. A Role Model. There must be at least one or two people in your life you have listened to when they’re at a public gathering or maybe at church. Sure they read their lines, but taking a mental note of how they emphasize what they say can help you once you take center stage.

10. Preparation. Make the best out of preparation rather than just scribbling notes and often in a hurried panic. Some people like to write things down on index cards, while others resort to being a little more silly as they look at their notes written on the palm of their hand (not for clammy hands, please). Just be comfortable with what you know since you enjoy your work.

And that about wraps it up. These suggestions are rather amateurish in edgewise, but I’ve learned to empower myself when it comes to public or private speaking and it never hurts to be with people to listen how they make conversations and meetings far more enjoyable as well as educational.