Gerald D'Cunha

    “The cause of poverty is not scarcity, it’s fear and small thinking.” Alan Cohen W e find the poorest of the souls, often, sitting on the mightiest of the thrones, or owning largest ‘wealth’ on this planet… Poverty is a state of mind… the state of lack of love and gratitude towards life and people around… Be it Donald Trump, or be it Elon Musk… These guys are nowhere near the treasure called ‘Love’… The more they crave to sit on the thrones, the less secure they feel. Forget about their outlandish dreams and promises to make the Nation, or Life, great… “Enough is abundance to the wise,” said Euripides… People who are consumed with the ambition to conquer the world – yes, they will never understand… what ‘enough’ is! The Bible… Sorry, why do they need help from ‘the Manger and the Cross’ to woo people - to place them on thrones? Jesus Christ, Gautama Buddha, Shirdi ka Sai Baba, Mahatma Gandhi – were they ‘poor’ souls? Did they suffer from insecurity? T here ...

This morning, a young boy was speaking on the topic - ‘What Money Means to Me’. He quoted Bill Gates: “If you are born in poverty, it is not your fault; But, if you die in poverty, it certainly is.” I had come across this famous statement of the Microsoft founder long before. Today, as our young-man was speaking on the stage, I found myself saying in my mind: “Hey, why poverty, is it not true everywhere else, too?” We really can’t do anything about the condition we are born into. But, we can certainly do something about the condition we choose to live in… and, particularly, about the condition we leave behind, when we leave. Just think about it, again… Think about any area of life, any condition… Yes, what we leave behind is always our legacy… There is an old spiritual principle, whose beauty is concealed in such a legacy. This age-old principle urges all of us that when w...

The early eighties. Mr. Mukesh Ambani, like me, was in his early twenties. His dynamic father, the late, Mr. Dhirubhai Ambani, had set up the Reliance Industries and was relentlessly pursuing his dream of making it the 'Number One' Company in the world. That was the time, I had just landed up in Bombay, to pursue my own dreams. I do not know about Mr. Mukesh Ambani, but, in those early days of mine here, I was too raw and self-conscious. I was desperately trying for a job to keep myself afloat. I had faced many interviews and failed. My self-confidence had hit the rock bottom. In one interview, the gentleman asked me the question: "How much salary do you expect?" I said, "Whatever amount you fix." Well, in those days, I did not know: that meant 'the end'! Any way, it was a small firm; and so, the kind soul, informed me that they would offer me a monthly salary of Rs. 300/- . Then, he assured me, that if I worked, with dedication, for a year or two, I...