Gerald D'Cunha

  “If you want to turn a vision in to reality, you have to give hundred percent and never stop believing in your dreams.” Arnold Schwarzenegger   E very time I see a beautiful building or a villa, a bridge, tunnel or a flyover… Every time I listen to a mesmerizing song, a piece of music, watch a gripping movie or a stage show… Every time I read a beautiful book   – be it prose or poetry, fiction, nonfiction, self-help whatever… Why all these… Every time I see a beautiful dress, a piece of jewelry, footwear… Every time I relish an amazing dish or enjoy a   beautiful ambience… a lawn, a resort, a hospital, a school, a temple or a church …  Yes, when I behold anything and everything, that is created by humans there outside, I stand there spellbound, marveling on the ‘process’ of creating them… Someone, like you and me – made of flesh, bones and blood – yes, someone there must’ve conceived it first in his/her mind, believed in it… toiled hard and long to a...

  “Follow your dreams; they know the way.” Kobe Yamada   V idhi, my student, messaged me, the other day: “Good evening Sir. Just wanted to share some news - I  cleared my  CA foundation-exam.” I smiled… Both her parents are CA’s… Her brother, Nishant (also my student), is about to become one… and, now, this family-of-four is all set to complete the circle of Chartered Accountancy… I was also smiling for another reason: Neither by wife nor my only son wanted to do what I have been doing all my life – teaching. REFLECTION: One’s vocation is a calling in life. It can be heard only when one is ‘ready’ to hear. That’s why, it’s said, “In life, if you do what you love, and love what you do, you do not have to ‘work’ at all." GERALD D’CUNHA Pic’s: Pixabay Video: ABBA/Young Pilgrim Music

  “Don’t fill life with struggles - fill it with joy. A flower always struggles to survive; but, it never forgets to bloom with joy.” Debashis Mirdha   O ne late evening, while commuting in an autorickshaw, I struck a conversation with the auto-driver… He looked quite old, but very courteous and enthusiastic. On my prodding, he started narrating his story: He had come from his village in UP when he was barely a boy… The odd jobs he had done… How hard it was to find a place to live… The responsibility to fend people back in his village – his parents, grandparents and younger siblings… How, eventually, he started running others’ autorickshaws, till the time he could manage to buy one of his own (through a bank loan) … How, after his marriage, his wife and two children lived in their village, while he continued to work here… His son, after completing his graduation, was working in Noida and daughter was married and settled in a nearby town in UP… Now, the man owned a sm...

  “My body wasn’t the problem; my thoughts and beliefs were.” Anne Poirier   N o matter who we are, we cannot learn ‘every skill’ under the sky. We can learn ‘only some’… We can hone them well to become even experts in them… to be hailed by people - “Fine hands.” And, as we become experts in some of these skills, we do not bother to learn many other skills. Often, we try to… But, our lack of motivation, soon, makes us give up… True, where there is will, there is certainly a way. Whatever skills I have mastered in my life, invariably, are those where I have applied my strong will… I was miserably bad in Public Speaking and communicating (both, written and spoken) in English. But, because I wanted to become a fine teacher – where I dreamt of teaching Accounting subjects in English language, and because I wanted to write well, too, in English – yes, I found the necessary will to overcome my ‘problems’… It became clear to me, at a young age, that the motivation to ...

  “Through the dark, through the door, Through where no one’s been before, But it feels like home.” From the song ‘A Million Dreams’ (Movie ‘The Greatest Showman’) I f I told you this: “Stop searching… Stop setting goals… Be like a river… Everything changes… Everything returns…” how would you react? “Good for you”? And, how would I react, when 17-year-old Aaditya, my twelfth-standard student, called me in the middle of last night, on getting a jhatka, that he should become a commercial pilot, and asked: “Sir, what do you think?” “Beta , go to sleep”? Yes, I precisely told my boy that: “Beta , go to sleep now; will talk about it,  tomorrow morning.” Aaditya had asked me, if I knew anyone who had done this course. Of course, I knew a couple of them, including, both, commercial and   Airforce pilots. So, I could have pleased my boy saying, “Ye s beta , I know some of them; I can connect you to them.” Yes, I could have put my young student to sleep with...

  “You may always dream; and, sometimes, they will even come true.” Martin Hurkens   L ast evening, my friend, Rekha, shared the inspiring story of Martin Hurkens. I don’t think many of you have heard about him. At least, I hadn’t, till I read his incredible story. The story tells us, that Martin worked for over thirty-five years as a baker. He was, always, passionate about singing and possessed a natural tenor-voice. He sang the popular songs as he went about his baking work and delighted his customers. Then came a day, when he lost his job and was left with nothing to fall back on for his livelihood. He had a family to fend; but he was too old to seek a new job. Faced with this challenge, he decided to hit the streets of his city in Holland and sing with all his heart… The onlookers dropped small coins in his hat. But, a new leap of faith had been taken… Martin’s destiny was on its way to unfold! His young daughter, without his knowledge, sent his entry form for th...

  “Maturity is when your world opens up, and you realize, that you are not the centre of it.” M.J. Croan T he 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?...

“Obsessed is a word the lazy use to describe the dedicated.” -           Anonymous -              I n last three days, at least six parents of my students have met me or called me just to express their one major concern about their young ones… “Sir, they have clue about what they want to do in life.” They ask: “What can be done about it?” Wish I had an answer to that question – “What can be done about it?” My experience has been this: Each one of us has to figure out, sooner or later, what one wants to pursue in life. Parents, with all their good intentions, education, information and money, yes, they can only guide, inform, enlighten, inspire and support… But, they cannot plant dreams in their young one’s hearts… They cannot set their young ones’) hearts on fire. In other words, parents cannot make their young ones obsessed with their dr...