HOW TO OVERCOME TENSIONS AND HAVE PEACE OF MIND - 5
When I was a student in school, I saw a picture, which left a lasting impression on my mind. It was the picture of two pails, each half-filled with water. On one of the pails was a face with a frown and underneath were written the words: “Of what use is it to be half empty all the time?” On the other pail was a face with a smile and the words: “I am grateful to God that I am at least half full!” The two buckets symbolised respectively the negative and positive attitudes towards life. The man with negative attitude wears a frown on his face, and is morose and resentful. He feels unwanted and rejected. The man with the positive attitude is cheerful and buoyant and has the strength to face the difficulties of life in the right spirit. The man with the positive attitude has a singing heart: his heart keeps on singing all the time. Try this experiment. When you get up in the morning, the very first thing, hum yourself a simple tune, such as Deena bandhu deenaa naath, meri dori tere haath. “O Thou, the Friend of the friendless, the Lord of the lowly, I surrender the thread of my life in your safe Hands: lead me where Thou wilt!” As the day advances, in the midst of your work, pause for a while, again and again, and hum to yourself the tune: Deena bandhu deenaa naath, meri dori tere haath. You will find that difficulties will have no power over you; tensions will not be able to touch you. And see that your face always wears a smile. For smile mounting up, just smile: you will break the force of tensions. The imagined clouds will scatter and the sun will shine once again.
Suggestion number one is, adopt a positive attitude towards life. And suggestion number two is, do not anticipate troubles. There are some who imagine all sorts of troubles, -troubles which never come. It was Benjamin Franklin who said: “Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.” Many of us, by anticipating troubles, keep on building up tension. I know of a man who has made himself a virtual prisoner in his house. If you ask him to out for a walk, he will tell you, “If I go out, my foot may slip, and I will break my bones.”
There is a mother who has a son, and if the child gets late in returning home, she imagines that all sorts of misfortunes have befallen him. One evening, the child was late in returning home by fifteen minutes: and the mother called up different hospitals to find out if a child of his age had been admitted to any hospital. After fifteen minutes, the child quietly walked into the house, unaware of the anxiety he had caused his mother. Significant are the words of Thomas Jefferson: “How much have cost us the evils that never happened.”
There is a poem which is full of wisdom of life:
Better never trouble trouble,
Until trouble troubles you,
For you’re sure to make your trouble
Double trouble when you do.
And your trouble, like a bubble,
That you are troubling about,
May be nothing but a cipher
With the rim rubbed out.
So do not anticipate trouble.
-to be continued
(Author: Sri J P Vaswani)
