Random rambling...

How often have you felt that things seem to fall in place by themselves. Very rarely. And how often do we notice those signs? Not always. In our hectic day to day life of making money, we tend to ignore those small signs which could very well lead us to happiness.

On some thoughts, I was thinking why we tend to lose these signs. For me, the answer was 'Money'. If we take money out of the picture for sometime, we tend to see things we would have normally not noticed. It is not that they are coming up out of the blue. They have always been there. But a storm cloud called money had blocked our vision. Once the storm is over, you can see clear skies. The sky was always there. In the same way, once the clout of money is removed from the priorities, you can see a clearer and better picture- a picture that you would love to see.

Alas, the world is not so simple. Peer pressure, family, friends- many of these aspects, sometimes all, tend to bring the dark cloud back into your life. Even though you are steadfast in your resolve not to let that happen, the winds dont help your cause. And then, you are there, again in the storm thinking about what a life you have got to live.

I am not telling money is not important. After all, we all work for that very reason. What I say is money is important to the extent it deserves respect. That's all. Not more.Not less. For eg: I dont want to be working in a job which pays me a brilliant 6 figure salary, but doesnt give me the space to spend time with my friends, family and myself. What is the use of getting a 6 figure salary? Am I able to use it to do what I want to do? No. Rather, I will be happy with a lower paying job, which gives me time and space for myself. That will obviously provide me with satisfaction. Agreed, there is nothing called 100% satisfaction. But I will surely be more satisfied than that high paying job.

The world would laugh at you if you said the last statement above. That is the sad truth. But think about this. If money becomes the primary objective, then whatever work you do will not bring you happiness. There will always be another person in another job who gets a higher salary than you. And you are back in the storm again. There is no limit to the greed of money. The more you have, the more you want.

The satisfaction that you get when you can enjoy the small things in life, like a cup of coffee with friends, time with family, an hour all alone with nature, cannot be quantified. And all these become a possibility when money is moved away from top priority. i.e when the cloud starts to convert itself from a storm cloud to the one that provides shade from the sun.

We have been Naught. We shall be all

I was going to have dinner at my regular place in Tambaram today. As usual, it was a crowded place and again as usual, a political party had put up pandals right in the middle of the road. Some white clad men were seated on the dias. The background on the dias had the picture of few men on one side and that of their leader on the other along with something written in Tamil. The audio system was rendering a very harsh output of a person who was already shouting at the top of his voice. With little attention to the speech and more towards sailing through the crowd, I was passing by the dias when the only English words on the dias caught my attention.
"We have been a naught. We be all"
Somehow, this line put me in a thought. What could it mean? why was it put up in that meeting? I could not figure it out at that point in time. Then I came back home and started watching the TV and I thought I would forget that like I always do. But to my amazement, I didnt. In fact, my curiosity was increasing by the second !. So i thought let me go ogle..err i mean Google ;). And i could make out why that statement was put up in that rally.
Extremely captivating words they were. And in a political scenario which is highly volatile now, this does invoke lot of interest in the onlookers. This line has that power in it to grab attention(as it did to me. To be frank, I m a person who gives least interest to details), to convey the intentions of the speaker/party, to bring about a change. It says that all the big things that we can perceive and see today were actually nothing in their initial days. Perseverence pays. I am mesmerised by this line. Just wonderful !

The google result page is here.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,811656-1,00.html