FINDING OUR TRUE NORTH




“On the ocean of life, let your mind be the ship,
and heart be the compass.”

James David Manning

One of the things I had seriously planned, but had to keep on hold because of the lockdown was: Our new book!

It’s been a long tradition at the DAWN CLUB to publish a book or two on the Certification Day of the summer programme on Personality Development. I would involve our li’l ones, young ones and general adults on this project. So, this time around, the book I had planned was on a very important subject: How one decides what he/she has to pursue in life.

How?

There is no one fits-for-all answer… In fact, there should not be one. I firmly believe, that the answer should be the outcome of a ‘process’… that, there should be a lot of confusion in the mind and churning in the heart. Rarely, a young one is ready with the answer as he/she comes out of his tenth standard. Parents, relatives, teachers, peers do have a role in deciding the one field they must now get into… Some go by their marks; some go by their hearts; and some leave it to somebody who matters in their lives… And, yes, some leave it to the winds!

Well, once it’s decided – Science, Commerce, Arts etc. - is it all over?

Hardly!

The process of ‘finding your nemo’ is an exciting and adventurous one… It’s never going to be over!

So, the book I had planned was supposed to bear the title: ‘FINDING YOUR TRUE NORTH’. Now, anyone who is familiar with Stephen Covey’s amazing literature, is, also, familiar with his analogy of ‘a map and a compass’. Covey insists on having a compass to navigate through this vast, uncertain ocean… There is no road-map in an ocean… Only compass will help us find our ‘True North’.





“Do what you love, or love what you do.” We have heard it enough, right? Let me ask this to myself: Did I do what I loved, or did I love what I did?

I was not one of those ‘clear-headed’ young ones. I was clueless when I took up Commerce after my tenth. Well, if I blame it on my circumstances and stars, I will be an idiot and coward, both. Yes, my parents had not been schooled enough, and we had hard times at home. Yes, I suffered from a killing inferiority-complex and it showed on my results. So, with this much baggage, I just landed in Commerce stream and barely scraped through my junior college. But, everything was destined to change once I landed in F.Y.B. Com.  When I sat in our packed boys-only classroom and watched my teacher, Prof. B.S. Raman, teach, I sensed in my soul a desire to become like him – a good teacher and a writer. He taught well, wrote well and he was an idealist. And, I woke up to the truth - that’s exactly what I wanted to be in my own life… I had gotten hold of the compass… to find my ‘True North’!

That one defining-moment in our lives – when we get hold of our compass… and realize where our True North is!

Yes, that’s what, I think, should happen while a young boy or girl navigates in life…

It’s okay when that happens. The early, the better… I know. But, there are late-bloomers like me, who, too, bloom in their own gardens, at their own time… but, boom beautifully!




Take heart!



GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic.: 1. www.istockphoto.com  2. unsplash.com

Video: South China Morning Post


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