Common Enemy

" Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here? "

" That depends a good deal on where you want to get to, " said the Cat.

" I don't much care where " said Alice.

" Then it doesn't matter which way you go, " said the Cat.

" - so long as I get SOMEWHERE, " Alice added as an explanation.

" Oh, you're sure to do that, " said the Cat, " if you only walk long enough ".

                                                - Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Where am I headed? And Why?

Why am I doing which I am not passionate about?

Is this feeling of mundaneness for a particular activity is temporary or is it here to stay?

What do I actually want?

What achievements shall content my heart when I will look back from the end?

Most of the people do not dare to ask these questions to themselves. They don't go beyond the second question. And they do not even answer the first question. And gradually it becomes easier to live cheating oneself by giving evasive excuses and complaining for one or the other thing. Their situation is just like an envelope without an address on it, just the way Mark Twain has said, "Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?" Aimless. Living because they are afraid of committing suicide or of afterlife!

People don't want to do things which come to them easily. They never do anything about it. Had they developed and nurtured those skills, they would have achieved all they have ever wanted. Even when some people realize what their gifts and talents are, they don't actually give their best to nurture and develop them daily. They procrastinate! This habit is the common trait of all those people, whom you see around you, complaining and blaming.

I had a friend in college who loved watching movies. He had a real taste and thorough understanding about movies. He could be a really successful movie critic. He was a good judge of all the aspects to be considered to rate a movie. We, as friends, used to suggest him to opt for that career but he always took it casually. He didn't do anything about it. During the last semester of our graduation, he fell sick and after 3 months of hospitalization, he died. He was just 22 years old. You don't know how long you will live. People procrastinate the actions which matter most instead they ought to be procrastinating procrastination.

How much time do you have?

Someone has said, " You spend your whole life believing that you're on the right track, only to discover that you are on the wrong train." On the wrong train of procrastination.

Get up!

List down 5 most fascinating things you would like to do in your life, and then layout a plan to achieve those. Believe that it is possible! Believe that you can do it! Work daily, unnervingly, towards it. Move further inch by inch. Do something about it. Anything! Once you have absorbed a thought that certain activity can take you to the highest level of success, if you improve at it continuously, you will not need any external motivation to act on it. If you have the "why" to stand for, to fight for and to die for, you can easily take care of the "how". Target for the most ideal state of your success. If that is not possible right now, go for the next most ideal state and so on and on. But keep " most ideal state " as your primary goal. Question yourself and the way you have always done things. Learning comes from observation and practice.

Fight the feeling of procrastination. It is the most commonly found habit, common among all small players. Don't settle being small. Go and get what you wish for.

Get up! do it. This is the sign you have been waiting for. This is the right moment to start.

Do it now!

(FYI - There is no afterlife.)

Improvement is just a beginning

Every day brings new choices.

We must make the choices that enable us to fulfill the deepest capacities of our real selves. Because the choices we make lead up to real experiences. It is one thing to decide to climb a mountain and quite another to be on top of it.

When it comes to making a choice, words like "tedious" and "complicated" surround our minds. However, it is a really simple area if we try to understand the basic concept of making a choice. It becomes very easy to make a choice when we are clear about what our values are and what we actually want. In my opinion, as far as the purpose of making a choice is "self-improvement" and "self-development", any choice is good. Making the best choice out of available alternatives is what needs consideration. We can start from where we are, with what we have, to be what we want to be by doing what we have to do so that we could do what we want to do.

Most of the people neglect their natural gifts. They ignore their in-born talents with what they are sent into this world, and hoping that they will make an exciting and interesting living, try to get into the race with other people, just to find out it's all the same everywhere. People must understand that there are people everywhere. Various facilities and different methods are not going to change the very fact that ultimately they have to interact with people. It's funny that we are expecting something interestingly different from the people who are also expecting same thing from us. How is that going to change everything?

A person acquires around 80-90 % of the traits from the closest 5 people around him. His thinking pattern and habits are highly influenced by these people. That is why it is very important for you to choose the people around you wisely. If you are thinking that, I am not in a condition to make such choices with the available limited resources and provided circumstances, then let me tell this to you that you have got the power to choose. You have an opportunity to enjoy and cherish the company of greatest people of the world whom you admire and consider successful. Do you want to choose your closest 5 persons out of these successful, enthusiastic and famous people? Yes? You can do one or more of the following things:

1. Watch them online. Observe them. Learn from them. Spend at least 1 hour with them consciously. Listen to their audios.

2. Read their biographies. Again and again. Even 1 chapter a day means spending a week or two with them.

3. If you are not in a position to do any of the above, imagine! Imagine about those people conversing with you. Make their image like God. Imagine how relentlessly they must be doing their job and persevere to achieve their goals. Think about how impeccably simple and modest their behavior is in spite of such a great success. Visualize how they make extraordinary and challenging tasks look convenient and easy. It's a treat to watch them doing their work. Isn't it?It doesn't have to be right when you envision these traits. It doesn't matter what the facts are as long as your purpose is to develop yourself.You just have to deliberately give efforts and make sure that every day you spend maximum time with the people you want to be like. You have a choice to improve your company.

Fill the brain with high thoughts, highest ideals, place them day and night before you, and out of that will come great work.

Now consider this - How many of all successful people did not follow their intuition? How many of them ignored the talents which came naturally to them? Almost none I guess. Imagine Picasso making a sales presentation or Mother Teresa acting in a movie instead of Marilyn Monroe. Isn't that we ought to do the same thing? Should not we find or identify our natural gifts and develop and nurture them?

Trust me! There is struggle in every field. It would be a wise choice to find what we love and then persist in enhancing skills in those areas. Of course there will be ups and downs through the course of time but you will be able to sustain because you love doing it. You will gracefully handle yourself because you have chosen doing this. And in case you have not found out what your natural gift is, you are lucky enough! Swami Vivekananda has said,“If you have aim, concentrate all your energy to achieve it. If don’t, you have the strength of 100 horses lying inside you. You have the potential to achieve anything and everything. Set any goal and get it.”You are free to choose any area to start with and then progress, improving yourself to become an expert at it. If you read one book per month from the area you want to develop yourself in, within next 5 years, you will be among top 5% world experts of that field. Make "continuous improvement" your purpose of life and you will handle the times of turbulence with confidence. You will be in control when money and fame will come to you, out of your continuous efforts, because, then you will be aware that you are still on the way towards excellence and it's just a beginning.

Christianity says:

Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Phil 3:14

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
Phil 4:13

Stay assured that no matter which field you are choosing to begin with, it will take you all over the places you have always wanted to go, as long as you are committed to improve continuously. If you take a break from improvement, success will take a break from you. It all depends on the choices we make. And behavior is a choice. Make a promise to yourself that until you make "continuous improvement" your behavior, you won't stop. Promise yourself to improve to such an extent that when people think something related to your field, they think about you. Make yourself a brand of your area out of improvement. Everything starts from small. Believe that one step at a time is all we need to take. It's just a beginning. Even each next step is just a beginning.

Make improvement you choice.

Write your history on your own!