Blog

June 2015

Be cheerful within, and loving and peaceful outside. –  Chinmaya

A cheerful mind is the greatest treasure one can possess in life. None can loot away this treasure from us without our own consent.

A newly appointed salesman, after working for a few days returned back to his boss and complained, “Sir, I want to quit this profession. I can’t stand it any longer. The insult is too much to bear.”

The boss gave a loud laugh and said, “Dear, I have been in this profession for the last 20 years but never have I been insulted even once. Yes, people have asked me to get out, they have slammed the door on my face, they have kicked me out of their houses, and they have even thrown my briefcase out to the streets… but insult? Never !!”

How I feel is determined by what I think. Ensure positive thoughts, and you will remain choicelessly happy. But the majority of us think that the condition of our mind is determined by the outer happenings.

In a small school, a drawing teacher was showing the students the art and the craft of painting. And he said, “It is such a delicate phenomenon. You look at the painting.”

And they said, “Yes, we can see a man with a sad face.”

The painter went to the painting and just gave one or two touches with his brush and the whole painting changed – the face was smiling. And because the face was smiling, the whole complex of trees and flowers and stars now had a different effect. Everybody was impressed; the teachers were impressed… parents had come; they were very much impressed.

Just one small boy was not interested. The painter asked, “Are you not interested?”

He said, “I am interested. But this is not something great; my mother does it every day.”

The painter was amazed, “What do you mean? Is she a painter?”

The boy said, “She is not a painter. But I go home smiling, and with one slap the whole world changes into tears. My mother knows better. Without a brush, without colour, just a hit and everything changes; the whole world changes.”

In tragic and painful situations, the peace and tranquillity of our mind go for a toss and we, therefore, conclude that the happenings of the outer world decide our state of mind. But the fact is that our state of the mind is determined not by the ups and downs of the outer world, but by the nature of thoughts that we entertain in our mind.

A great psychoanalyst had become very old but still, he continued to practice six, seven, eight hours per day, listening to the patients. He had a young disciple, an apprentice, who became tired after three or four hours – listening to nonsense, neurotic obsessions and fixations – the same thing again and again.

He asked his old master one day, “How do you manage? – Because I see you as fresh in the evening as in the morning when you come to the clinic. You are as fresh as when you go – seven, eight hours of nonsense. You never get tired. I get tired after two, three hours – and I am a young man!”

The old man laughed and said, “Who listens?”

One has to be constantly alert not to allow the worldly garbage to enter the mind. Constant vigilance is the price to be paid to remain in this blessed state of cheerfulness.

A cheerful mind not only creates heaven within, but creates, even in hell, an environment of joy and peace.

A doctor entered the hospital in hurry after being called in for an urgent surgery. He answered the call as soon as possible, changed his clothes and went directly to the surgery block.

He found the boy’s father pacing in the hall waiting for the doctor. On seeing him, the dad yelled: “Why did you take all this time to come? Don’t you know that my son’s life is in danger? Don’t you have any sense of responsibility?”

The doctor smiled and said, “I’m sorry, I wasn’t in the hospital and I came as fast as I could after receiving the call. And now, I wish you could calm down so that I can do my work.”

“Calm down? What if your son was in this room right now? Would you calm down? If your own son dies now what will you do?” said the father angrily.

The doctor smiled again and replied, “I will say what Job said in the Holy Book – ‘From dust we came and to dust we return, blessed be the name of God.’ Doctors cannot prolong lives. Go and intercede for your son, we will do our best by God’s grace.”

“Giving advises when we’re not concerned is so easy,” murmured the father.

The surgery took some hours, after which the doctor went out happy, “Thank goodness! Your son is saved.”

And without waiting for the father’s reply he carried on his way running. “If you have any question, ask the nurse!!”

“Why is he so arrogant? He couldn’t wait some minutes so that I ask about my son’s state,” commented the father when seeing the nurse minutes after the doctor left.

The nurse answered, tears coming down her face, “His son died yesterday in a road accident, he was in the burial when we called him for your son’s surgery. And now that he saved your son’s life, he left running to finish his son’s burial.”

There are only two types of people in this world:

The one who wakes up with a smile saying: “God! Good morning!”

And the others who wake up saying, “Good God! Morning?”

The choice is ours.

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