It is raining, and raining like a poem.
The sky is beautiful still. I always loved the silver shade of sky when it rains. The leaves are shining too, and I realize sadly how little I paid attention to their existence right outside the entrance!
We had this rocking chair in the car porch for months, kept there to sit, unwind and relax after a days hardwork or a week’s toil; however, the only time I ever used it is to hold its arm for support when I remove the lace of my shoes as I return home!
The focus has been always on what appeared to be ‘big’ and ‘there’ and hardly any time was spent on what is beautifully ‘small’ and ‘here’ as we raced towards what we kept as a goal far out there as a means to live happily one day, while the components of happiness in form of enjoying the beauty of these shining leaves and the silver strings of rain drops continue to slip through our fingers of time...
Today I decided to live in the now and here. And how relieving is the experience.
I am sitting here in the car porch, in the comfort of this rocking chair, watching rain in all its splendour, and listening to its symphony – the variation of sound from the drops falling on the roof of my car and on the window shades, that mixed with the splashing sound of its fall in the pool of water on the floor. It can turn out to be a noise for those who care less, but its rhythm is in the ears of the beholder. Today, I chose to listen to its rhythm, and listened to it with joy.
There is an inspiration in nature. The inspiration is in the stillness of what is around us. The inspiration is also in the slowness of how that stillness evolve into its being. The tree outside my entrance is still, and if I care to notice the life in it and its evolution, I begin to feel the waves of breeze washing its leaves, the leaves responding with her shyness, the branches dancing to its tunes and enjoying the sensation of its caressing, and the other plants and shrubs joining the fraternity to collectively celebrate the arrival of a season.
Kanchan – one of the participants from a lifeskills programme- shared with me the other day how she is stopped from doing what she wanted to do, due to the rain we are having in Chennai for the last couple of days. I shared with her the response of Nelson Mandela during his first tour to France after his release from 27 years of imprisonment, where he was asked by the reporters on what he want to do most now since he is free. He responded with clarity, that all he wanted to do is to “sit down and do nothing”.
Isn’t that vital to do so, when the race has been for so long and the nourishment in between was relatively little? For the sixteen years of working, I wonder sometimes if I too were not imprisoned to a target or a goal or a dream or a certain knowledge of what I must be doing and what I should abstain from doing or what I should do to project my abilities and what I should do to hide my vulnerabilities. I feel too that this ‘inactive reflection’ is crucial to replenish the worn out portion of our being – physically and intellectually, and that it provides in itself the pool of resources from which we can draw the wisdom and energy to realign to the purpose of being, unlock the shackles that we ourselves locked us into in the process of attaining prosperity and remove from within us the obstacles in form of ideas and thoughts that leads to actions and therefore results that do not benefit our growth nor contribute to the legitimate attainment of our ultimate happiness of living that can be celebrated in public than in hiding.
When the nature is clean, when its design is genuine and, in my submission to its grandeur, it is inspiration enough for me to live, and to leave a legacy with what I am capable of delivering to the hearts and minds I meet, in spite of the roadblocks that are being put ahead by those whom I believed – an episode similar to many successful people who has looked upon it at a later stage in their life as events that has stimulated them to excel.
I love rain; I love rain today than ever before. It brought for me with it a tranquil silence, a subtle hope, and brilliant calmness.
Salient features of a successful mind.
The sky is beautiful still. I always loved the silver shade of sky when it rains. The leaves are shining too, and I realize sadly how little I paid attention to their existence right outside the entrance!
We had this rocking chair in the car porch for months, kept there to sit, unwind and relax after a days hardwork or a week’s toil; however, the only time I ever used it is to hold its arm for support when I remove the lace of my shoes as I return home!
The focus has been always on what appeared to be ‘big’ and ‘there’ and hardly any time was spent on what is beautifully ‘small’ and ‘here’ as we raced towards what we kept as a goal far out there as a means to live happily one day, while the components of happiness in form of enjoying the beauty of these shining leaves and the silver strings of rain drops continue to slip through our fingers of time...
Today I decided to live in the now and here. And how relieving is the experience.
I am sitting here in the car porch, in the comfort of this rocking chair, watching rain in all its splendour, and listening to its symphony – the variation of sound from the drops falling on the roof of my car and on the window shades, that mixed with the splashing sound of its fall in the pool of water on the floor. It can turn out to be a noise for those who care less, but its rhythm is in the ears of the beholder. Today, I chose to listen to its rhythm, and listened to it with joy.
There is an inspiration in nature. The inspiration is in the stillness of what is around us. The inspiration is also in the slowness of how that stillness evolve into its being. The tree outside my entrance is still, and if I care to notice the life in it and its evolution, I begin to feel the waves of breeze washing its leaves, the leaves responding with her shyness, the branches dancing to its tunes and enjoying the sensation of its caressing, and the other plants and shrubs joining the fraternity to collectively celebrate the arrival of a season.
Kanchan – one of the participants from a lifeskills programme- shared with me the other day how she is stopped from doing what she wanted to do, due to the rain we are having in Chennai for the last couple of days. I shared with her the response of Nelson Mandela during his first tour to France after his release from 27 years of imprisonment, where he was asked by the reporters on what he want to do most now since he is free. He responded with clarity, that all he wanted to do is to “sit down and do nothing”.
Isn’t that vital to do so, when the race has been for so long and the nourishment in between was relatively little? For the sixteen years of working, I wonder sometimes if I too were not imprisoned to a target or a goal or a dream or a certain knowledge of what I must be doing and what I should abstain from doing or what I should do to project my abilities and what I should do to hide my vulnerabilities. I feel too that this ‘inactive reflection’ is crucial to replenish the worn out portion of our being – physically and intellectually, and that it provides in itself the pool of resources from which we can draw the wisdom and energy to realign to the purpose of being, unlock the shackles that we ourselves locked us into in the process of attaining prosperity and remove from within us the obstacles in form of ideas and thoughts that leads to actions and therefore results that do not benefit our growth nor contribute to the legitimate attainment of our ultimate happiness of living that can be celebrated in public than in hiding.
When the nature is clean, when its design is genuine and, in my submission to its grandeur, it is inspiration enough for me to live, and to leave a legacy with what I am capable of delivering to the hearts and minds I meet, in spite of the roadblocks that are being put ahead by those whom I believed – an episode similar to many successful people who has looked upon it at a later stage in their life as events that has stimulated them to excel.
I love rain; I love rain today than ever before. It brought for me with it a tranquil silence, a subtle hope, and brilliant calmness.
Salient features of a successful mind.
.
