Gerald D'Cunha

M ost of my inner unrest comes from the fact that I resist the unpleasant experiences in my life. The moment the resistance stops and acceptance comes, along with that comes peace too. Peace and resistance cannot live in the same living-room… Interestingly, peace doesn’t call for any ‘effort’… It only calls for ‘clarity… my ability, my readiness to ‘see’ what ‘is’… the reality, the truth… That’s all what is called for peace… I can be in the midst of sorrow, hurt and pain… I can be surrounded by my tormentors and torments… even in such unpleasant state, peace – call it serenity, grace or silence – can just come home. My inner turmoil, therefore, is directly proportionate to the resistance I throw out in my life… resistance to my every unpleasant experience… And the beauty lies right here: The moment I see the truth that my turmoil is coming from my resistance, I am freed from the chains of resistance… Silence just settles in! It is a lifelong roller-coaster…...

Pic.: Natrajan Ramsubramani I f we want to achieve anything in life, accomplish any task, we need to be determined to achieve it. We need to pursue it with a single-minded focus and a passionate heart. Ever since I stepped out of my college, I have been very alive to this inner chemistry of achievement. I know, that the starting point of any achievement in life is our burning desire to achieve it, coupled with our total commitment to do it… with passion and  persistence . When we are young, the success slogans such as “A winner never quits and a quitter never wins,” get into our system like a war-cry. “Thou shall never, ever quit” – yes, we take it like a commandment from God… the God of Success. My belief in the above success philosophy hasn’t changed at all. I know, for sure, that, to achieve anything in life, we need to be determined and passionate to achieve it. We need to commit ourselves fully and passionately go about it with loads and loads o...

Pic.: Devki Joshi T o me, Baba Amte had, always, been a great motivator. Many years ago, The Dawn Club had run a cover story on this hero of ‘Anandvan’ in its motivational magazine – ‘The BLOOM’. But, honestly, I hadn’t followed much about his son, Dr. Prakash Amte... It took just a 2-hr-15-min Marathi-movie to tell me who Dr. Prakash was and why he was a hero in his own right... as tall and as tough as his legendary father...Both, my wife and I, came back a lot moved by his life, remarkably portrayed by Nana Patekar and Sonali Kulkarni (as his wife)... Both, Dr. Prakash and his wife, Manda, had studied together in Government Medical College, Nagpur, where they fell in love with each other... Falling in love with each other is a ‘conscious choice’ a young man and woman make... It is the same conscious choice that they make when they promise each other in marriage,  before God – “I shall live with you in good times and bad times, in joys and sorr...

Pic.: Ruma Chatterjee “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Albert Einstein I know, that, in life, all problems are not small.  I, also, know, that, all problems are not huge, either. And, above all, I know this: the more I struggle to solve my problems, the less they get solved, leaving me only drained. And, ironically, the less I throw resistance to them, trusting in the Higher Power to take care of them, the more I see them getting solved. Is this being indifferent? No... Is this being lethargic? Far from it... Is this being naïve? The other way around... My own track record proves it. I have constantly put resistance and struggled desperately to come out of some of my problems in life... Big or small is just a matter of perspective. But, as I told, the more I have resisted and struggled, the more I have found caught up in the web of my problems... When I loo...

Pic.: Malabika Ganguly “Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work.” - Stephen King W ork, no matter how hard and long it is, has never broken anybody’s back. The resistance to work, which essentially comes from lack of love for the work, has. If I do not love the work I am doing, I will be doing it reluctantly, with my grumbling heart... Back is broken only when heart grumbles... Nobody has died due to hard work... Never, ever. But with a hard, complaining heart, plenty have died, and they are dying still! I don’t watch TV serials. But, whenever KBC comes, I do. Why? Besides the fact that I am a huge fan of Amitabh Bachchan, I watch it for this reason, too: He makes you feel that work can be a great pleasure even at an age when many retire, sit at home and keep complaining about their knee-joints, backache, poor eyesight and hard hearing... Age is only in your...