Covid Resolutions!
So has enough time passed in lockdown for us to make some resolutions, would you agree?
Let's ask ourselves a few questions to understand where we stand today, or how our thought process has changed.
For yourself
Were you joyful before, or after lockdown has started? If your answer is 'before' then may God help you get back to the precovid at the earliest! -If you are joyful now, then what has this changed in you, have you given it a thought? -Is it your work from home? -Is it the time spent with family? -Is it the limited financial burden? -Is it that you didn't have to socialise? -Is it that you didn't have to drive around and it was actually the sound and the noise pollution that was getting you? -Is it that you are not feeling the pressure from your competitors, professionals, business, or anything on those terms? -Is it not meeting people at your work place? -Is it ....anything else?
Kids
Are they happier now at home, or at school? Forget what its doing to you if they're home!
If you have seen your child most joyful during the past few months since lockdown, you may consider home schooling, maybe that's what his/her personality likes. I say again don't think of what this is doing to you!
Spouse
If your spouse seems joyful in the past few days, its easy for you to understand where joy is!
If your spouse seems unhappy, ...no comments.
Keep asking yourself what is it that has made you more joyful than before, this would be true inner work that you will be doing. Once you realise where your joy is, then work towards achieving that as soon as possible.
They say that before we die, when we have our entire life flashing in front of our eyes, there are many changes that we would like to make,but then it's too late to do anything. But now, we may be the only generation ever getting a second chance like this, to ponder, to choose what changes we want to make with our lives! Rumi says, Live life as if everything is rigged in your favour.
Remember when you are joyful, your spouse, your children, your parents and grandparents, your colleagues, will all be joyful. We are all but a sum of emotions that affect one another.If your are not joyful from within, none of them will be.You will only be fooling yourself thinking that even though you are not joyful you are still keeping so many others joyful.
We are all the time in a rush, trying to do so many things, to keep ourselves in the rat race, the competition, trying to out do each other. We aim at better cars, houses, positions, than what the others possess, that we don't even know where our joy lies.
Time to relook at our lives, make plans that are different from what they have been for the past so many years. Once we know where our joy lies, work towards it, forget the society, the competition; just think of yourself and your joy! Remember most Indians die when they reach around 69 years, that's what the 2019 statistics say! The clock is ticking! I will end with a beautiful quote by Haruki Murakami', ponder on the last line and do something about it; Nature has given us all a second chance.
Unfortunately, the clock is ticking, the hours are going by. The past increases, the future recedes. Possibilities decreasing, regrets mounting.
-Dr.Manoj Kuriakose