Sunday, June 14, 2009

I wish you enough

Recently at chennai I overheard a mother and daughter in their last moments together at the airport. They had announced the departure. Standing near the security gate, they hugged and the
mother said "I love you and I wish you enough." The daughter replied, "Mom, our life together
has been more than enough. Your love is all I ever needed. I wish you enough, too, Mom."
They kissed and the daughter left.

The mother walked over to the window where I was seated. Standing there I could see she
wanted and needed to cry. I tried not to intrude on her privacy but she welcomed me in by
asking, "Did you ever say good-bye to someone knowing it would be forever?"
"Yes, I have," I replied.
"Forgive me for asking but why is this a forever good-bye?"
"I am old and she lives so far away. I have challenges ahead and the reality is the next trip
back will be for my funeral" she said.
"When you were saying good-bye, I heard you say 'I wish you enough'. May I ask what that means?"
She began to smile. "That's a wish that has been handed down from other generations. My parents
used to say it to everyone." She paused a moment and looked up as if trying to remember it in >
detail and she smiled even more. "When we said 'I wish you enough', we were wanting the other person
to have a life filled with just enough good things to sustain them."

Then turning toward me she shared the following as if she were reciting it from memory:
I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive.
I wish you enough pain so that the smallest joys in life appear much bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.
I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

She then began to cry and walked away.

Then i came to know the meaning of it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them,
a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them . . .

Think

A man came out of his home to admire his new truck. To his puzzlement,
his three-year-old son was happily hammering dents into the shiny paint.
The man ran to his son, knocked him away, hammered the little boy’s
hands into a pulp as punishment. When the father calmed down, he rushed
his son to the hospital. Although the doctor tried desperately to save the
crushed bones, he finally had to amputate the fingers from both the boy’s
hands. When the boy woke up from the surgery and saw his bandaged stubs,
he innocently said, “Daddy, I’m sorry about your truck.” Then he asked,
“but when are my fingers going to grow back..?”
The father went home and committed suicide.
Think about the story the next time you see someone spilled milk at a
dinner table or hear a baby cry. Think first before you lose your patience
and become angry with someone you love. Trucks can be repaired.
Broken bones and hurt feelings often cannot. Too often we fail to recognize
the difference between the person and the performance. People make mistakes.
We are allowed to make mistakes. But the actions we take while in a rage
will haunt us forever. Pause and ponder. Think before you act. Be patient..
YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO BE ANGRY, BUT YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO BE CRUEL . . .

Life Goes on....

A TRUTH WHICH I STILL WONDER

In every human life,
there are some moments when one is sad and depressed
Frustrated from every zone of life,
And feel like leaving everything & going away
And Life Goes on..
Some moments in which
one is wrapped with tensions
one wants to get out of them
and fly high in the sky
But cant run away, and life goes on..
Some moments in which,
one who adores hurts sentiments,
one needs a support, a shoulder to dry on,
But doesnt find one, and life goes on..
Some moments in which one gets tired of life
or so intensely hurt that one wants to die
one wishes to end up with
life at that very moment, and life goes on..
And in every human life on day arrives
When there is a big halt to one's life.
And then the people cry
and show that they were concerned
Then the question arises
Do they wait for one's death..,
To care, To understand the one
If so, then wait till death and until then
Life Goes On . . .

Stress Management

A lecturer, when explaining stress management to an audience, raised a glass of water and asked, "how heavy is this glass of water?" Answers called out ranged from 20g to 500g. The lecturer replied, "The absolute weight doesn't matter. It depends on how long you try to hold it."

"If I hold it for a minute, that's not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I'll have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you'll have to call an ambulance. In each case, it's the same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes."

He continued, "And that's the way it is with stress management. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, as the burden becomes increasingly heavy, we won't be able to carry on." "As with the glass of water, you have to put it down for a while and rest before holding it again. When we're refreshed, we can carry on with the burden."
"So, before you return home tonight, put the burden of work down. Don't carry it home. You can pick it up tomorrow. Whatever burdens you're carrying now, let them down for a moment if you can." "Relax; pick them up later after you've rested. Life is yours. Enjoy it!

And then he shared some ways of dealing with the burdens of life:

* Accept that some days you're the pigeon, and some days you're the statue.
* Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them.
* Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.
* It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.
* Never buy a car you can't push.
* Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and dance.
* When everything is coming your way, you're in the wrong lane.
* Birthdays are good for you. The more you have, the longer you live.
* You may be only one person in the world, but you may also be the world to one person.
* A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour . . .

Never judged anyone by their appearance.....

One beautiful spring day a red rose blossomed in a forest. Many kinds of
trees and plants grew there. As the rose looked around, a pine tree nearby
said, "What a beautiful flower. I wish I was that lovely." Another tree
said, "Dear pine, do not be sad, we can not have everything."
The rose turned its head and remarked, "It seems that I am the most
beautiful plant in this forest." A sunflower raised its yellow head and
asked, "Why do you say that? In this forest there are many beautiful plants.
You are just one of them." The red rose replied, "I see everyone looking at
me and admiring me." Then the rose looked at a cactus and said, "Look at
that ugly plant full of thorns!" The pine tree said, "Red rose, what kind of
talk is this? Who can say what beauty is? You have thorns too."
The proud red rose looked angrily at the pine and said, "I thought you had
good taste! You do not know what beauty is at all. You can not compare my
thorns to that of the cactus."
"What a proud flower", thought the trees.
The rose tried to move its roots away from the cactus, but it could not
move. As the days passed, the red rose would look at the cactus and say
insulting things, like: This plant is useless? How sorry I am to be his
neighbor."
The cactus never got upset and he even tried to advise the rose, saying,
"God did not create any form of life without a purpose."
Spring passed, and the weather became very warm. Life became difficult in
the forest, as the plants and animals needed water and no rain fell. The red
rose began to wilt. One day the rose saw sparrows stick their beaks into the
cactus and then fly away, refreshed. This was puzzling, and the red rose
asked the pine tree what the birds were doing. The pine tree explained that
the birds got water from the cactus. "Does it not hurt when they make
holes?" asked the rose.
"Yes, but the cactus does not like to see any birds suffer," replied the
pine.
The rose opened its eyes in wonder and said, "The cactus has water?"
"Yes you can also drink from it. The sparrow can bring water to you if you
ask the cactus for help."
The red rose felt too ashamed of its past words and behavior to ask for
water from the cactus, but then it finally did ask the cactus for help. The
cactus kindly agreed and the birds filled their beaks with water and watered
the rose's roots. Thus the rose learned a lesson and never judged anyone by
their appearance again . . .