Gerald D'Cunha

We never know our true potentials unless we are challenged by something beyond us… Mostly an unexpected crisis in life… We fight the best when we are driven to the wall… We try to earn the most, when shame of financial crunch doesn’t allow us to sleep… We learn the most when our ego and arrogance bring us to the isolation of emotional turmoil… We run the fastest when we run for our lives… We love the most when our loved ones are lost… Yes, something has to happen in our soul – some great churning, some emotional upheaval… something has to threaten us, shame us, mock us… humble us… Our best, always, lies dormant within our souls…  The best strength… The best talent… The most-earning capacity… The best-learning capacity… The best speed… The best loving, caring and giving heart… Each one of them needs to be tapped, awakened…  And, it, invariably, takes a massive crisis to do that… Yes, to awaken th...

Some days back, one of my students came to see me with her mother. Her twelfth-standard (HSC) results were just out and they had come to show me the result. It was 86% overall and in the subject I had taught, i.e. Accountancy, she had scored 96. “Very good,” I said looking at her face. The face did not glow… girl’s and mother’s, both. “Why, not happy?” I asked. “No sir,” the girl said in a sad voice, “I was expecting more.” “How much were you expecting?” I probed. “Around 90%,” came the answer. My colleague - a lady teacher, who, too, had taught this young-one - quietly got up and went to the next room, where she had to teach the waiting students. I knew the reason for her abrupt exit, though… We had taught this girl for a year and we knew where she stood. 90% was pure fantasy! “ Beta , for a commerce student, 86% is a very good performance,” I gently assured her, hiding my annoyance or, even, mild anger, “Ju...

Hon estly, judging others is a huge human weakness. An utter waste of time and energy. It is, also, a self-destructive habit. If this Post has to be an honest attempt from my end, then, I must tell it from my own perspective… So, here I go… I am human; I fail… I fall… I judge… and, I spoil. I am talking about my tendency to judge someone as he is talking to me… Yes, as he is talking, I am busy judging him… See him through my own colored glasses… taking in his words with my own prejudiced filter… Then, where is the room for listening to him, really? Where is the room for acceptance, love? Even before he has completed his sentence, I am ready with what I have to say… And, I say that just because, I get a thrill from disagreeing with him, snubbing him, making him sound like a fool… It, normally, doesn’t happen when I speak to a new acquaintance… a new friend, a new neighbor, a stranger I meet during my travel etc. But, when it comes to my ...

A gentleman called me the other day and wanted me to help his daughter in the Accountancy subject. Now, that’s nothing special to talk about, here. Let me tell you, in this Post, what makes this case special. The girl had done exceptionally well in her latest twelfth-standard CBSE-Board-exams. They were planning to enroll her in one of the select engineering-colleges; and, if that would not happen, they would make her switch over to commerce and settle for nothing less than Chartered Accountancy! When the call came to me, that night, from the father of this girl, I was a lot apprehensive. Switching over to commerce after twelfth, without any foundation of the core subject, Accountancy, is nothing uncommon. I do get to teach many such students, every year. But, directly jumping over to CA… Yes, I had to grill this gentleman. But, throughout the discussion, he sounded extremely confident of his young daughter. “Sir, we have done our enough home w...

A lady had this crazy habit. Every day morning, as soon as she was up from the bed, the first thing she did was to point at her neighbors’ windows to her husband and yell, “Darling, darling, look at their window-glasses; so dirty they are… I don’t know when the lady of the house cleaned them up last.” Yes, this used to be our lady’s ritual, every morning… Her husband, obviously, was fed up with his wife’s obsession with their neighbor’s windows. He had tried to dissuade from doing it, but in vain…And, so, the darling- darling ritual would continue for a long, long time. Then, one fine morning, our lady excitedly was screaming at the top of her voice, again, “Darling, daring,” she pointed to the same windows, “look, at last, they found time to do the clean-up… Can you see the difference, Honey?” And, the Honey smilingly let his sweetheart know this, “Yes, my love, I can see the difference, “but, you know what, this morning, I rose a lot earlier a...