A Superb Thought for our day to day life in 2012

The following is a mail that I recently received... 

 

There once was a farmer who discovered that he had lost his watch in the barn. It was no ordinary watch because it had sentimental value for him. After searching high and low among the hay for a long while; he gave up and enlisted the help of a group of children playing outside the barn.

 

He promised them that the person who found it would be rewarded.

 

Hearing this, the children hurried inside the barn, went through and around the entire stack of hay but still could not find the watch. Just when the farmer was about to give up looking for his watch, a little boy went up to him and asked to be given another chance.

 

The farmer looked at him and thought, "Why not? After all, this kid looks sincere enough."

 

So the farmer sent the little boy back in the barn. After a while the little boy came out with the watch in his hand! The farmer was both happy and surprised and so he asked the boy how he succeeded where the rest had failed.

 

The boy replied, "I did nothing but sit on the ground and listen. In the silence, I heard the ticking of the watch and just looked for it in that direction."

 

Moral:

 

A peaceful mind can think better than a worked up mind. Allow a few minutes of silence to your mind every day, and see, how sharply it helps you to set your life the way you expect it to be...!

Dream

Someone rightly said, “Man cannot live without a vision.” Others say dreams are not reality; dreams are expressions of the suppressed feelings calling out for a proper expression. Believers say that God speaks through dreams. 

Joseph, the dreamer of the Old Testament dreamt, interpreted dreams and he was convinced that God leads his people through the events of history and brings good out of evil.

Only a dreamer can understand the dreaming. 

Dreams are often expressions of the very ‘you’. Of course, various understandings do exist. Indian philosophical terms would distinguish two states of mind: waking state and dream state – former is real and the latter is illusory. 

People also say to ‘pay attention to your dreams.’ Why so? Because they find them to be true. 

Dreams have their metaphorical value and the realities they point to is true. Dreams can’t be taken on their face value. Think of Don Bosco’s dream at the age of nine. He saw ferocious wolves turning to mild lambs (indicating the effect of his approach to the young through love that would eventually transform the young). He hears voices, amidst the clang of voices, he distinctly hears: “Not with blows but with gentleness and love must you make them good.”

If you do not discover yourself, dreams might perhaps discover you, only if you heed to them. Dreams call you to deep intimacy with the Lord, precisely because we live unconsummated. Do married people truly live consummated? Ronald Rolheiser in his book Seeking Spirituality says that only God can sleep with everyone and only in God can we sleep with everyone.

Different sayings on dreams

“You have to dream before your dreams can come true.” Abdul Kalaam

“Dream no small dreams for they have no power to move the hearts of men." Goethe

"In Dreams Begin Responsibilities." Delmore Schwartz

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams." Eleanor Roosevelt

"They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night. In their grey visions they obtain glimpses of eternity." Edgar Allan Poe

OPPOSITES DO EXIST

The evil lurks in every moment. A human soul is vacillating between good and evil and under great pangs to realize that it is made for good and goodness alone. There are many vacillating points:

            Hope – discouragement

            Faith – faithlessness

            Love – hate

            Obedience – disobedience

Why should we be under the mysterious clutch of realities that we hardly understand? A man who is wane on faith must ponder – there are two kinds of people. Both the kinds are driven and taken over by the driving dimension. The first one is driven by an overarching meaning (e.g. Mother Teresa – she promised not to refuse God for anything, not even refusing to give water to quench the thirst for souls). The second one is driven by the passion of one’s body (e.g. the habit of drinking, or any other irregular behaviors arising out of a lack of self-control).

Both types are characterized by “irrationality.” Both are in search of the “irrational.” The one who is led by an overarching meaning understand the seriousness of following that meaning. On the other hand, one who is driven by one’s body is moving towards disintegration, disunity and dissatisfaction. 

Why should opposites exist? Why should good people exist along with the people of evil inclinations? Why should God bring good out of evil?

SILENCE AND WORD

Do the words spoken eclipse the silence of the reality the word represents? If then no words are necessary. Just consider the paradox of the “sound of silence.”

The revelation of Being takes place in silence. The truth emerges from the interior depth of silence. And we have to face the “awe of that great mystery” in silence.

Pope Benedict XVI states the truth – “Christ is fullness, in him we find everything.” Hence it is our duty to appropriate one of the dimensions of his fullness. Can one appropriate ‘the silence of Jesus?’

Now, inclining towards silence would mean basically two things among the many other aspects it would lean on to:

 To hear in what is not spoken

Silence in the moment of non-understanding

Silence and understanding are very much connected. Did Pilate understand why Jesus kept silent when he was questioned? Jesus’ silence for Pilate was an external existential reality. He covered his non-understanding with “are you?”- Still groping to find and hear an answer to make a final judgment. Our silence should be such that we are aware of the weight of the body that we carry within us.