Gerald D'Cunha

I was talking to a new member in our Tai Chi class, yesterday. It was an interesting discussion; rather… it left me smiling. During the course of our discussion, our new member said,  “My job situation is like a pressure cooker, full of tension. I went out for a couple of days and  to ‘throw out’ all my tension.” “Did you succeed?” our Tai Chi sir asked. “Totally,” the new member said with loads of exuberance, “I am totally free, now!” I should have shut up my mouth. But, by now, I had already said this: “Sir, in my case, what I have found is, that, wherever I go, I carry my mind, too… I carry my all my tensions and anxieties, too. I have found it difficult to drop them fully and come back.” “That’s the mistake you are making,” the gentleman said, “You should throw out all your tensions.” “But, sir, how?” I asked sincerely, “You know how the mind is.” “I want you to do only one thing: Watch the video of Sandeep Maheshwari,” the g...

I was talking to a new member in our Tai Chi class, yesterday. It was an interesting discussion; rather… it left me smiling. During the course of our discussion, our new member said,  “My job situation is like a pressure cooker, full of tension. I went out for a couple of days  to ‘throw out’ all my tension.” “Did you succeed?” Rakesh, our Tai Chi sir asked. “Totally,” the new member said with loads of exuberance, “I am totally free, now!” I should have shut my mouth. But, by now, I had already said this: “Sir, in my case, what I have found is, that, wherever I go, I carry my mind, too… I carry my all my tensions and anxieties, too. I have found it difficult to drop them fully and come back.” “That’s the mistake you are making,” the gentleman said, “You should throw out all your tensions.” “But, sir, how?” I asked sincerely, “You know how the mind is.” “I want you to do only one thing: Watch the video of Sandeep Maheshwari,”...

Pic.: Aparna Khanolkar Sheth Y ears ago, when I had decided to do something about my poor English, one of the things I did – and found it very useful – was telling a nice story in two tenses… Past and Present. Over the years, I have helped hundreds of people who were earnest to improve their English with the same method… Yes, write a nice story down in both the tenses… and tell it to someone. Many years ago, my friend, Manjeet, had shown this slide story to me on his P.C. when I had gone to him to unload some of my life-burden… I came back a lot lighter and wiser, that morning… PAST: O ne day, a man was watching a butterfly emerging out of the cocoon. The butterfly was emerging very, very slowly. The man could feel the struggle and the pain the butterfly was going through co come out. He was moved to see the painful and slow process of birth… and, he really wanted to help the butterfly to come out painlessly, and fast. He wanted to re...

Pic.: Chetna Shetty “Raise your words, not your voice… It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” -           Oprha Winfrey M any a times, when we keep screaming and shouting at our children or our students, our intention is very simple and straight: they should listen to us, show remorse and change… But, do they? Mostly, they don’t. What, generally, happens is: they yell back at us, argue and make the scene more volatile… or, they get suppressed by our authority and sulk… or, they keep just mocking – visibly or invisibly - at us seeing our weakness and helplessness… Rarely do they show remorse or empathy… rarely do they listen to us and change.   That frustrates us more… and, it doesn't allow us to come out of our shouting-and- screaming bouts, easily… We find ourselves in more turmoil, now! Time and again, I have realized that shouting and screaming at our young-on...

some rhyme. some reason -       Shankar Ramachandran N an-in was a great Japanese Master who lived in the Meiji era (1868 – 1912). One day, he was visited by Tes-hu – another Zen master who had gained a reputation for being a deep thinker. Nan-in invited Tes-hu in for tea. Tes-hu said, “I have been pondering the reasons why some people are more successful than others. Many different things contribute, but I am convinced that the door to success is the ability to dream big.” Nan-in smiled as he served tea, but said nothing. As he was leaving, Tes-hu turned and asked, “Master, you have not commented on my theory of success. Does this mean you agree?”. Nan-in nodded, “You have come close, Tes-hu; dreaming may very well be the door to success, but the key to open that door lies in the ability to wake up.” Tes-hu bows low and leaves. T his story illustrates a timeless lesson relevant to entrepreneurs today. Who does not aspire to succ...

Pic.: Sheela Krihnamony “Don't be satisfied with stories - how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.”   ―   Rumi T he more I think on the subject of ‘Success’, the more I get convinced that, it is all about scripting our own – unique and distinct -  stories; it is all about unfolding our own myth... Look at a small baby. It is so unique, so distinct. As a parent, when we look at the baby, we simply believe in its uniqueness... Its each little-gesture is a mighty milestone for us... We watch it in delight; we rejoice in it, celebrate it...  As the baby grows up, we encourage the kid to blossom fully with all its God-given gifts... We want our kid to sing, dance, draw, play, swim, act, click pictures, talk well, study well and behave well... All this we do with our kid, because, we believe that those things are good and our kids should be good in them... But, somewhere along the way, we ...

Pic.:Sherry Haridas “For a tree to become tall and tough,  it must grow tough roots among the rocks.” -          Friedrich Nietzsche             T here is a garden, barely some distance away from my classes. It is known as ‘Chimney garden’... and, I really do not know why it is called so. But, just go and look there, early in the morning: it is packed to the brim with students, who quietly sit and study there for their up-coming exams. I have been watching this scene for years now; and let me tell you, it gives me great hope! For, I have no doubt in my mind when I say this: these are the kids who value their education... who know what a square-foot of land in Mumbai city really means... what it means for a large family to live in a single ten-by-ten room – where they cook, sleep, bathe, change clothes, watch TV, entertain and accommodate their guests, even accommodate s...

Pic.:Bhushan Thakkar T his morning, an eleventh-standard boy, in my class, prompted me to take a break from teaching the subject I was supposed to teach – Accountancy… and, go on a marathon forty-minutes lecture on what I thought was a thousand times more important than those accounting principles… The subject I chose to lecture on was: Why do parents worry so much about their young-adults? This young-boy’s parents, like many others’, did a great deal of worrying. They were both working parents, and, their concern and anxiety was quite understandable… The boy’s marks were poor, he seemed uninterested in things he did… almost lost. So, like most working parents, these parents, too, operated from a nagging guilt inside, that they had, perhaps, not given enough time for their child when needed… And, the constant coaxing, and nagging had only made things worse… The boy’s motivation had gone down and, something had to happen within him to arr...

Pic.: Madan Manik T oday, I had scheduled our second Prilims for the twelfth-standard students. As I was correcting the papers of first Prilims, I had stopped midway… yes, a lot disappointed and annoyed. “How could, almost all of them, be so callous… even at this stage?” I had reacted in my mind, “There are hardly any days left.” So, this morning, before they started writing their second Prilims, I spent some 15 minutes and made my observations… I picked some very common mistakes they had committed in their first paper and helped them so that the same mistake would not be repeated today… As I was talking to them, a parent appeared outside my class with her daughter. We were already overshot 15 minutes, by then. The parent seemed extremely upset… She removed the entire bundle of answer-sheets of her daughter’s college Prilims. “Sir, she has failed in almost all subjects,” the mother broke down, “How much time is now left?” I froze for a momen...