DEAR, NO LAST DATE FOR WINNING

 




“Your strength doesn’t come from winning.

It comes from struggles and hardships.

Everything that you go through

prepares you for the next level.”

Germany Kent

 

Some months ago, I was watching Kamiya Jani’s interview on her YouTube channel - ‘Curly Tales’. The man she was interviewing was the Celebrity Chef – Mr. Sanjeev Kapoor. Towards the end, Kamiya asks Mr. Kapoor, what advice he has for the budding chefs. The answer to this question impressed me so much, that I keep talking about it to my young students…

     The question: “How can I become a celebrity chef”

     The answer: “You can’t become a celebrity chef…

                           You can only create a body of your work

                           that becomes worth celebrating.”





I have been writing my ‘little things’ for ages. There are thousands of bog posts, out of which, I can produce scores of books. I have thousands of scribblings written in dozens of diaries, out of which, I can produce hundreds and hundreds of the so-called ‘reels’. I have held thousands of sessions for youngsters - here in our centre as well as in various schools and colleges… which, if I had documented, could have come out as hundreds of motivational videos…

Is this what, Mr. Sanjeev Kapoor, means by ‘Your body of work’?

Whatever that is, my advice to every budding writer, singer, dancer, poet, chef, baker, painter, animator, composer – or whoever he/she is and whatever he/she pursues… yes, it remains the same as what the legendary Mr. Kapoor offers…

Our work – if deserves to be celebrated - will last long, even after we are gone… The way The Ramayana, The Mahabharata, The Bible, The Quran, and other Holy books have lasted. The work of William Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Rober Frost, O Henry, A.G. Gardiner, and our own Kalidasa, Kabir, Harivansh Rai Bachchan, to mention a few from the literary world. Then, think of other fields - music, dance, painting, architecture, sports, business, inventions, education, charity and so on! Come on, in every field that you operate in, you have the opportunity to create ‘your body of work’… Trust me, you have…

Why am I saying all this in today’s Post…





Today is 31st July. Most of us have been getting those relentless reminders from our Income-tax department to file our returns by today, to ‘avoid penalty/interest' etc. They scare us to the point of death!

I am a small man; so, I have already filed my returns…

But, I am not mentioning this ‘last date’ for Income-tax reasons… I am mentioning this date, fondly, for a friendly reason…

 

 


 

Namratha Lobo - for us, Nimmi – is the daughter of my close friend (from my college days) Joe. She is ambitious, energetic, enthusiastic, passionate, and creative. She is married to Brian and they are settled in Mumbai with their two little school-goings boys. Namratha is very active in the circle of young enterprising women like her… She keeps posting the pictures relating to their events on FB and Instagram. Her main business venture is ‘Sweet Hive’, under whose banner, she has been showcasing her ‘body of work’ – to put it in Mr. Sanjeev Kapoor’s words…

Joe and I have come from identical, hand-to-mouth backgrounds. I went about doing what I was gifted to do; Joe went about doing what he was gifted to do. And, one more identical thing about us is: we went about doing our things from the scratch, with no one to pull strings for us… We did through – and still do it – through our hard work and struggles… We both have faced countless setbacks; but, risen above them… Joe’s body of work lives in thousands of households by his business brand ‘BON MASALA’…

And mine?

We both simply focused on creating our ‘body of work’… We had no FB or Insta. We just had the fire in our underdog bellies… and we never ever bothered to ask: “How can we become Celebrities in our fields?”

Dear Nimmi, our child, relax… There is no ‘last date’ for winning anything in life. Remember what another wise woman - Clarie Annette Noland said:

“Some things are better than winning.”

I have already voted for you, dear… and, to me, you are already a ‘winner’.

 

GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic’s: Pixabay

Video: Curly Tales

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