A GREAT MAN

 

“Maturity is when your world opens up,

and you realize, that you are not the centre of it.”

M.J. Croan

The other day, I was teaching a group of my eleventh-standard students. In the middle of seriousness, I heard, in the background, a little kid screaming at the top of its voice… and, suddenly, my student – Latika* – screaming back, supported by the sound of blows. The video was on a off-mode… So, we couldn’t’ see what the WWF was all about. So, I asked, as others laughed loudly, “What happened Latika – Who’s it in the room?”

“Sorry Sir,” Latika said embarrassed, “It was my ‘kid brother’.”

“Kid brother’?” I exclaimed, “How old is he?”

“3, Sir,” Latika replied.

“And you?”

“Just completed 15.”

“It must be a great fun at home, every day, na?” I teased.

“Not fun, Sir, it’s a circus,” Latika reacted as others enjoyed this new twist in our otherwise serious and boring online teaching-learning circus…

“Any of you have a kid brother or sister, like Latika, at home?” I asked rest of my students.

“No,” was the unanimous response. But, one of them murmured, “I wish I had one!”

“And imagine having two kid-brothers at home!” I said, “I had two… Rony kidder by 10 and Vivek by 12!”

I did not tell them about Harry, who was smaller by 2 years. He will, always, be my ‘Small Brother’, while Rony and Viva will, always, be my ‘Kid Brothers’.

A couple of my students were curious. So, they asked, “Sir, was it a fun or a circus at home, every day?”

“I will tell you what it was in a couple of days,” I told my students and got on with the class…   

Just before this class, I had received a phone call from Sonu, Vivek’s wife. She mentioned about Vivek’s 50^th birthday on 28^th August. She requested me to video-record our messages for Vivek. “I am putting them together as a surprise for him,” she said.

I had promised Sonu, that I would be blogging about my ‘Kid Brother’. That’s why I had asked my students to wait for a couple of days to know whether it’s a great fun or a great circus – or a great bloodbath – at home, every day!

With my elder brother Franky (older my two years) and younger brother Harry (younger by two years), I am guilty of saying, it’s a regular bloodbath!

But, with my two kid brothers – Rony and Vivek – it’s like raising my own kids. Trust me, it was!

And, through the process of raising these two ‘kids’, what actually I was trying to do was to live my own unfulfilled dreams through them. Interestingly, I did not know, that, what I was doing was unhealthy for their growth. 

I had grown up with a huge load of shyness and low confidence… I dreaded stage and limelight, even though I desired them… I hadn’t gone on stage to sing, act, dance or speak… I hadn’t played a single outdoor or indoor game… A nagging feeling of unworthiness had prevented me from expressing myself through these. However, at the same time, I was burning within to become a fine teacher and a writer like my own idol, Prof. B.S. Raman… It was at this point of my life, that I realized how important the feeling of self-confidence was… I did not want my two kid brothers to suffer the way I had… I wanted them to go out on stage and perform… or go out in the ground and play. So, I decided, that Rony would go on stage to sing… and Vivek would go out in the ground to play cricket…

Thus started my relentless preaching, teaching and mentoring of my two kid brothers… All that I wanted was: one had to be a great singer, the other had to be a great cricketer… Nothing less than that! When each one of them completed their graduation, I got them to Bombay, one by one, made them live with me – and ‘do as I planned for them’. In the beginning, it worked quite well. Then came a time, when ‘kids’ had become ‘young men’… and, I was still treating them as ‘kids’. So, both Rony and Vivek, one day, gathered their courage and honesty and said, “Brother, we really appreciate your love, care and efforts to make us ‘great’… But, then, we feel ‘very suffocated’… Please let’s find our own paths; we promise you, that we not only will remain grateful to you, but we, also, won’t let you down.”

After decades, when I look back at this ‘growing-up experience’ of myself and my two kid brothers, I am able to feel the pride in my heart. Yes, they have not only not let me down, but, they have, also, taught me a priceless lesson in my life, which has helped me not to repeat the same mistake with my only son, or my thousands of students over all these years…

I know how harsh it is for a ‘kid’ to carry the burden of someone else’s unfulfilled dreams!

A few years after, both, Rony and Vivek left my nest, I wrote this poem:

 

A GREAT MAN

“I wanted to make my younger brother a ‘Great Man.

Day-in and day-out, I sat with him,

tried to motivate him, coax him, train him,

guide him, support him… and I kept reminding him –

 “One day, you shall be ‘Great’.”

 

Many years passed by, nothing dramatic happened…

I became frustrated… mad!

Then, one day, he coolly told me:

“Brother, there are mountains, there are plateaus

and there are plains…

Is it necessary for every soul on this earth,

to be ‘Great’ like a mountain?”

 

I started thinking…

I started thinking.”

“Growing together, beautifully.” In 1989, when I founded The Dawn Club, I infused the essence of ‘Personality-development experience’ in this one tagline…

The Mountains, the Plateaus and the Plains – add up more if you wish: the Deserts, the Forests, the Streams and the Oceans – yes, all are supposed to be where they are… so beautifully!

Thank you Rony and Viva for this wisdom…

Happy b’day Viva… Not because you have turned 50… Not because you have become a ‘Great Man’… But, because, we all have remained ‘loving brothers’ all along…

Yes, to me, that’s being a ‘Great Man’!

*Name changed

 

GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic's.: pixabay

Video: America's Got Talent