... UNTIL I SAW A MAN WHO HAD NO FEET













Gratitude has to be the best form of prayer… Maybe, the only form. The rest of our prayer is just a meaningless ritual. A waste.

I have problems in life just the way everyone else around me has… Yes, we all have our respective problems and we all complain about them…

We all struggle hard to solve them… and we all pray to God to help us come out of them.

Many a time, God helps us by opening our eyes to the reality around us – to see those whose problems are far worse than ours – and feel grateful for the blessings in our own lives…

Till we are able to open our eyes and see the worse conditions of people around us, we are unable to recognize, value and appreciate what has been given unto us…

Gratitude has to come in first… for God to perform His miracles in our lives…

Else, yes, else… our grumbling will continue… and, our meaningless mumbling, too!

Our housing colony has full twenty-four hours water supply. Rarely, due to some technical hitch, if water goes for even a few minutes, the grumbling and fuming starts. Well, that’s the time, someone has to hammer on my thick head and tell: “Honey, just look around you… Some of them receive water just for half-an-hour a day or an hour at the most… and some of them, even,  receive water only once in two or three days!”

The same way about the complaints I make about the food I eat, the clothes I wear, the money I earn, my health, my family and relationships…

Yes, someone has to tell it with a hard hammer: “Shut up! Enough of complaining… It is time you looked around you and feel how fortunate and blessed you are!”

A few days ago, I was in a hurry to rush to the court on our Society matter. No autos were available… The steam was building up inside. I had money in my pocket to take a rickshaw or cab, but no enough time… Mentally, I was fuming and grumbling as if that would solve my problem… I was about to bring the sky down… when I saw, at a distance, my favorite Simran…

I just calmed down… and, found me reminding myself – “Hey, it is okay… It is okay!”

It was really okay in my case… Just some constraint of time…

But, for Simran?

Some sixteen years ago, when Simarn was in her mother’s womb, the mother developed some major complications and the baby Simran had to be brought out surgically. The mother immediately died and Simran survived with her severe deformity. For all these sixteen years, I have been watching, how, Neelam, Simran’s aunt, has been nursing the lovely Simran… who can’t walk a single step… who can’t speak a single word clearly, who can’t write a single letter on her own… But, she can smile and brighten your life… Yes, she does, she does…

Let me tell you this: that morning, when I saw Neelam trying to help Simran take her each step on the ground – the time taken for which looked like eternity – I was left with no option but to ask me: “Why are you rushing? Why are you grumbling?”




Yes, that one moment was enough to remind me 

as to why gratitude was the best form of prayer…

 the only prayer… I needed.




Perhaps, I was of Simrans’s age when I had first come across the famous quote:

“I complained that I had no shoes… until I saw a man who had no feet!”

See, how coolly I had forgotten!



GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic.: Vimmi Batra







Comments

Neeraj Bhandari said…
I am inspired as always by your writings. Neeraj
August 10, 2013 at 4:48 PM
Anonymous said…
Attitude of gratitude! Lalit
August 10, 2013 at 5:37 PM
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