Yes, you read it right. We have all been told from our childhood that everything that ever happens to us, happens for a reason and we also believe in it, because it is comforting. Comforting to know that everything that ever happens, happens for a positive reason. There’s a hope that sometime in the future all of these dots will connect. But what if that weren’t true?
I want to give you an instance. Let’s say you are walking on a busy road. You see traffic, and traffic police are not minding the traffic but taking 100, 200 rupees from people- you get angry, You see a homeless beggar chasing you with a kid on her shoulder and the kid crying in vain, ‘maaa…’ You get irritated. Now, you see some beautiful flowers and you get excited, you see your favorite chat joint open after 7 months of lock down! You are suddenly hungry and excited. As you order that masala puri with extra spice you see your ex-girlfriend, also having the same dish, with her new boyfriend. All of a sudden that chat has no taste left and you simply give an awkward smile, pay the 35 rupees, and walk away. In all this you forgot to do 2-3 tasks, that you initially wanted to do and the very reason why you stepped out.
As you reach home you realize that you forgot these things, what would be your feeling? Ineffective? Stupid? A combination of these both? Maybe. But would your mind go to the zone of- maybe I forgot for a reason? Maybe I didn’t purchase it because there is an inner meaning behind it? What if I forgot now, maybe it was never meant to be purchased? The answer would be no. Rather, You would pick up your bag and quickly rush and get those things before your mom or spouse finds out you forgot, right?
But, when it comes to bigger events in life, whenever we mess-up something or Despite our plans, when few things go here and there, why do we give up and settle for a possibility of an inner meaning? I want you to pause reading this and think of one similar incident that has happened to you, where you simply said maybe it was for the best, maybe it happened for a reason. The rest of the article will not make sense if you do not do the reflection, think about that one incident where you felt you cannot do anything about it and you said to yourself, maybe it had to happen for a reason.
Now, when you think of a tree, birds & insects use it to live in there, few use the leaves from the tree, few have the fruits, few use the shade, few tie a thread around it to pray and find hope. The usage just keeps changing with every moment and every person. But the tree is essentially just one. We give it meanings. Humans are meaning-making machines. We find meaning and purpose in everything. Due to this we sometimes forget to give our best and blame it on the grand plan.
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Let me make something very clear, I am no one to say the grand plan/ destiny/ fate exists or doesn’t. Human life is so magical and complex that you cannot really be 100% certain about anything. What I am only trying to convey is-
When something goes wrong, disassociate yourself from the effects of the result, and see possibilities of solutions because there is always one just around the corner.
There is a saying that my Guru says “SHAT BHIR MANUSHYAS CHAIVA, SAPTABIR DAIVA CHINTANAM”- You put in 6 efforts, leave the 7th one to God.
We have to put in everything we have, to get something right and put in our 100% all the time.. The blaming begins when things start happening out of our control, and that is when you could disassociate and start thinking of other possible solutions. It is our absolute responsibility to pull all the strings we possibly can before we give it up.
Just like how you would go all the way back to the market to fetch one or two items, that may be very small but you wouldn’t mind doing it, because facing your mother or spouse without them would be an unfavorable situation, you must also not refrain from doing a certain task completely from the beginning if it is not up to your own expectations. At the end of the day if you have put in the 6-part efforts i.e., every effort you possibly can, every possible solution that you or your team can ever think of and you still haven’t gotten the result: Trust me that is when you will see a miracle. Miracles happen when you have devoted yourself to your karma – or your duty! I have witnessed so many miracles, read stories of so many inventions, so many discoveries of how the scientists tried their level best to invent something and almost gave up, but at the 100th attempt, they got the desired outcome, almost as a coincidence. Even if they failed at something, they took it up as learning because when you give your everything, you can never fail.
I will let you think about this.
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