COUNTING OUR OWN BLESSINGS

 




“Envy is the art of counting the other fellow’s blessings 

instead of your own.”

― Harold Coffin

 

‘Thou shall not covet.’ This was the last of the Ten Commandments. When our Sunday-school teacher tried to explain to us the meaning of the word ‘Covet’, I don’t remember getting it. With time, I understood the term referred to ‘lust’ -– an obsession with what rightfully didn’t belong to us. Thus, I kept adding to this ‘lust list’ –- ‘Thou shall not covet thy neighbours’ wealth, spouse, success, and whatever that’s his.

For long, I wasn’t able to follow the Tenth Commandment… To be specific: ‘Thou shall not covet thy neighbours’ success’. When my neighbour succeeded, I would simply feel jealous of him… Oh, that familiar feeling of being a small person, a loser!

Trust me, this feeling of inadequacy lasted for many years in my life. Then, a time came, when I started rejoicing in my neighbours’ success… I started seeing him as myself –- his success/glory as my own…

And, that’s the end of my envy… My pettiness. My inadequacy.

‘Count your blessings’… Well, as the quote mentioned at the outset      tells, when we count our neighbours’ blessings (ignoring our own), we do it out of envy. No matter, how hard we try to envy others, it won’t make us any greater… Envy leaves us perennially in a pit called ‘lack’…

It’s misery… It’s poverty of our soul…

So, for quite some time, now, I have started focusing on my own blessings… however small they seem. Yes, my little blessings -– when I count them, recognize and appreciate them, be grateful for them, and celebrate them, I feel very successful and fulfilled in life…

To be fulfilled in life, we do not need any external yardsticks -– how much our fellow humans achieve or accumulate… We just need our own internal yardsticks.

I feel blessed, that I could touch lives of not only students whom I taught academic subjects, but also to a cross-section of people –- little ones, young ones, and adults… I feel blessed, that I could do it from inside my classroom as well as outside… I feel blessed, that I could write my simple stories and reach people near and far, known people and strangers…

Yes, when I bring my focus on my own blessings –- envy dissolves.





The obsession to grow bigger… well, after a certain point in life, it leaves us high and dry… perennially starving. For, that goalpost is outside… forever illusive.

 

GERALD D’CUNHA

 

Pic.: Pixel/Nataliya Vaitkevich

Video: Surf Excel

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