There was a man who had the habit of reading the newspaper in the morning. He would do anything else only after reading the entire newspaper.
One morning while he was reading the news columns, his six year old daughter was insisting that he play with her. The father was interrupted by the child’s actions. He saw a full page advertisement of a courier company with the world map on it .
Instantly the father tore the advertisement into pieces from the paper. He scattered the pieces of paper all-round the room and told the kid "Dear, this is your jigsaw puzzle. Complete this and I will play with you soon after you are done"
Within ten minutes the child came back to the father , "Dad look. I am done".
The father was shocked at the speed at which the kid had completed that jigsaw puzzle. Immediately the child said, "Dad ,I do know why you are shocked. When you tore the newspaper advertisement , I noticed the picture of a man behind the advertisement page"
The child continued stating, "Dad, I do not know where exactly New Zealand is, where exactly Japan ,Canada are …but I know one thing . I know where the nose should be, where the eyes should be, where the forehead should be. I got the man right and the map came out right. "
We cannot solve the jigsaw puzzles in our lives with the same thinking that went in to creating them. The moment you change your perception is the moment you rewrite your possibilities of becoming successful!!
An eight-year-old child heard her parents talking about her little brother. All she knew was that he was very sick and they had no money left. They were moving to a smaller house because they could not afford to stay in the present house after paying the doctor's bills. Only a very costly surgery could save him now and there was no one to loan them the money.
When she heard her daddy say to her tearful mother with whispered desperation, 'Only a miracle can save him now', the little girl went to her bedroom and pulled her piggy bank from its hiding place in the closet. She poured all the change out on the floor and counted it carefully. Clutching the precious piggy bank tightly, she slipped out the back door and made her way six blocks to the local drugstore. She took a quarter from her bank and placed it on the glass counter.
"What do you want?" asked the pharmacist.
"It's for my little brother," the girl answered back. "He's really very sick and I want to buy a miracle."
"I beg your pardon?" said the pharmacist.
"His name is Andrew and he has something bad growing inside his head and my daddy says only a miracle can save him. So how much does a miracle cost?"
"We don't sell miracles here, child. I'm sorry," the pharmacist said, smiling sadly at the little girl.
"Listen, I have the money to pay for it. If it isn't enough, I can try and get some more. Just tell me how much it costs."
In the shop was a well-dressed customer. He stooped down and asked the little girl, "What kind of a miracle does your brother need?""I don't know," she replied with her eyes welling up. "He's really sick and mommy says he needs an operation. But my daddy can't pay for it, so I have brought my savings".
"How much do you have?" asked the man.
"One dollar and eleven cents; but I can try and get some more", she answered barely audibly.
"Well, what a coincidence," smiled the man, "A dollar and eleven cents - the exact price of a miracle for little brothers."
He took her money in one hand and held her hand with the other. He said, "Take me to where you live. I want to see your brother and meet your parents. Let's see if I have the kind of miracle you need. "That well-dressed man was Dr.Carlton Armstrong, a neurosurgeon. The operation was completed without charge and it wasn't long before Andrew was home again and doing well. "That surgery," her mom whispered, "was a real miracle. I wonder how much it would have cost."The little girl smiled. She knew exactly how much the miracle cost ... one dollar and eleven cents ... plus the faith of a little child.
Perseverance can make miracles happen! Miracle can come in various forms - as a doctor, as a lawyer, as a teacher, as a police ,as a friend, as a stranger and many others. A river cuts the rock not because of its power, but because of its consistency.
Never lose your hope & keep walking towards your vision.
In a small office, there were a set of project mates who shared a refrigerator .In that refrigerator was a water filter pitcher. One of the coworkers complained that the water tasted "dirty". It went on for a few days and she was stunned to see others could drink the water without any trouble. The others started to doubt their taste buds but the water tasted fine to the others who consumed it.
The management brought in experts to fix the water filter , who dismissed the complaint of the company .Finally, they figured that the problem was actually the employee’s cup. She simply forgot to clean it, and after a while started to affect the water inside it. She cleaned her cup and then had water which tasted good.
Think about the world we live in. Too often we quickly blame other people, other things but ourselves.
E.g. - "You're troublesome". "Others are intolerant". "The problem is in our system".
The world isn't perfect, we all know but we should take a step back sometimes and ask ourselves some tough questions. Can I be better at this? Is there a way I can do this better ? Is there a way I can manage this situation better with the available support ?
Please look into yourself before you complain . Your life can only change to the degree of responsibility you accept. Self-reflection is the school of Wisdom!!
A disciple asked his Master, “My mind is fluttery always and unclear , what could be wrong with me?”
The Master said, “In order to answer your question, go through the rose garden next to our place and pick the one rose you like the most. But there is a rule. As you pass through the garden, you cannot turn back. You must pick the rose as you go forward only.”
The disciple went to the Rose garden. As he walked through, He found a rose - fragrant and fully bloomed in the moon light , he instantly liked it but he wondered that he may find a much better one further. So, he walked further, and he saw another rose . But again, he thought the same. When he reached the end of the garden, he couldn’t see any rose at all ,there were plants which were yet to bear any flowers and he started to regret his decision of letting them all go earlier.
Finally, he gave up. He went back to the Master empty handed.
The Master told him, "You did like the first rose very much but still you kept looking for a better one. And later you realized that what you let go was the best one you could find there. That my dear is called Greed."
Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction. A bird in hand, is any day worth two in a bush.
Charles Plumb was a US Navy jet pilot in Vietnam. After 75 combat missions, his plane as destroyed by a surface-to-air missile. Plumb ejected and parachuted into enemy hands. He was captured and spent 6 years in a communist Vietnamese prison. He survived the ordeal and now lectures on lessons learned from that experience.
One day, when Plumb and his wife were sitting in a restaurant, a man at another table came up and said, “You’re Plumb! You flew jet fighters in Vietnam from the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk. You were shot down!”
“How in the world did you know that?” asked Plumb.
“I packed your parachute” the man replied.
Plumb gasped in surprise and gratitude. The man pumped his hand and said, “I guess it worked!” Plumb assured him, “It sure did. If your chute hadn’t worked, I wouldn’t be here today.”
Plumb couldn’t sleep that night, thinking about that man. Plumb says, “I kept wondering what he might have looked like in a Navy uniform: a white hat, a bib in the back, and bell-bottom trousers. I wonder how many times I might have seen him and not even said Good morning, how are you?’ or anything because, you see, I was a fighter pilot and he was just a sailor.”
Plumb thought of the man hours the sailor had spent on a long wooden table in the bowels of the ship, carefully weaving the shrouds and folding the silks of each chute, holding in his hands each time the fate of someone he didn’t know.
“Who’s packing your parachute?” Everyone has someone who provides what they need to make it through the day. Plumb also points out that he needed many kinds of parachutes when his plane was shot down over enemy territory-he needed his physical parachute, his mental parachute, his emotional parachute, and his spiritual parachute. He called on all these supports before reaching safety.
Sometimes in the daily challenges that life gives us, we miss what is really important. We may fail to say hello, please, or thank you, congratulate someone on something wonderful that has happened to them, give a compliment, or just do something nice for no reason.
As you go through this week, this month, this year, recognize people who pack your parachute. Take a moment to thank everyone who packed your parachute in 2016 - with your words, deeds and prayers. Cheers to a wonderful 2017.
Wish you all a very happy New year !!