Gerald D'Cunha

“The apple tree never asks the beech how it shall grow , nor the lion how he shall take his prey.” William Blake   C hetna, my dear friend and an old student (some twenty-five years ago), has been living in America for several years. She is a passionate and relentless mountains hiker. She and dozens of her fellow-hikers hike a new mountain every day! And she, also, shares those colourful pictures and videos on FB and Insta everyday… Just watching those pictures, often, makes my head go dizzy! But then, mountains don’t stop calling Chetna and her fellow- hikers… My friend is not tired of the mountains! (Chetna and her fellow-hikers on one of the mountains)   Today, Chetna had messaged me: “I always feel, that I am notorious for over sharing my hiking stories.” I responded: “Chetna, I think, ‘over sharing’ and ‘under sharing’ are subjective terms. Like, in my case, I share my simple writings every day. Some may call it ‘over sharing’. But then, if writing a...

  “ Half of life is lost in charming others. The other half is lost in going through anxieties caused by others.   Leave this play. You have played enough.” Rumi. T rying to please others is akin to handing the remote of our personal peace in others’ hands. The need to please others stems from another innate need: to seek other people’s approval – their validation. Yes, it’s a human need… Hence, ordinary people like you, me and others crave to see Likes, Loves, Wows and generous comments on every single line we post or every single picture we share on social media – we justify it saying, “What’s wrong with it? We are humans, after all!” Rumi and other wise souls, for hundreds of years, have drawn our attention to this human craving. Excess attachment to other people’s approval and validation only undermines our own self-confidence… Beyond a certain point, it not only drains us, it, also, hurts us very badly. What other people think of us should never be...