Learn to manage time

“Being rich is having money; being wealthy is having time.”

                                                                                                                                —Margaret Bonnano

Time is a resource which we all have in equal measure and yet we never seem to have our fair share of it. It is the only factor which works as a limitation to every activity and has no substitute.

There are infinite ways to spend or even lose it, but not a single way to retrieve a lost hour. It openly makes us aware of its speed and yet we never seem to catch up with it.

An old adage says, “Health is wealth,” but, if today, I am permitted to re-modify it, it would be: “Time and health is wealth.”

For success, effective time management is inevitable.

A juggler was once asked, how he could manage so many balls at one time, to which he was quick to point that it wasn’t about managing so many balls at one time; it was all about fixing and shifting of priorities, while effectively managing and utilising the time that he gets while he throws a ball up in the air!

How true! Your willingness, mood and prioritising skills have much to do with how you manage and use your time. The more willing you are, the lesser time you will take to finish a work. Similarly, the healthier is your mood, the more productive you will be.

                                                                                THE END 
© Anchit Barnwal

The King’s Wisdom

In the kingdom of Vijaynagar, King Virendra Pratap was on a lookout for a person who could be appointed as a managing head for his agriculture department.

      “Your majesty, you can select one of your farmers to hold the post,” suggested Veermal, the young, skinny adviser to the king.

      The king who sat, listening to Veermal, on his exquisite throne with his chin resting on the palm of his right hand, said “Veermal, go and fetch me the list of the farmers who are willing to hold the post.”

      Veermal went away and laid the king’s proposal before the farmers, who were more than happy to apply for the post as it would get them a seat in the kingdom.

      After two days, Veermal presented himself before the king and revealed, pointing at the long list he held in his hand, “Your highness, I have returned with the names, but the matter of concern is that more than four hundred farmers are willing to fill in the coveted post.”

      “More than four hundred!” the king exclaimed. “We need to devise a way to further sift the best from the rest.” He called upon his gardener and asked him to draw a one meter wide circle in the backyard of his garden.

      Next day, he invited all the four hundred applicants to the marked place. The applicants, all farmers, looked pleased in their tidy, colourful dresses.

      “Is everyone interested in holding the highest post for agriculture?” the king inquired in a loud voice.

      A quick ‘yes’ reverberated in the arena for a moment.

      “Is everyone ready to face the challenge of burrowing a six-foot deep pit inside this marked circle before the day ends?” the king squealed, pointing his finger at the marked place.

      Again, cheers and hoots with a resounding ‘yes’ enveloped the air, as burrowing a six-feet deep pit was a child’s play for any farmer.

      “But the burrowing is not to be done with a spade but with a fork and spoon!” the king continued, raising his right hand in anticipation of seeing someone raise his hand to confirm his acceptance of proposal.

      An air of silence and gloom engulfed the atmosphere. Not only wasn’t a raised hand to be seen, the hitherto giggling crowd had suddenly cut a long face. Each head had turned down with some sneakily trying to notice the person coming up with a ‘yes’ to the proposal. A big chaos was evident on everyone’s face.

      “Is anyone coming forward to take up the challenge?” the king repeated with a worried frown.

      But again no ‘yes’ was to be heard.

      By the end of the day just two persons, Ramprasad and Kripanath showed their willingness to go ahead with the challenge. The king was happy to see the flood of applicants being reduced to just two with the condition of ‘a spoon and fork’ acting as a barrier to many.

      The king asked both the applicants to come prepared at the same place on Sunday, a holiday, so that more and more people could see them working their way out to the esteemed post.

      In the farmer’s circle everyone was mocking at Ramprasad and Kripanath, who had accepted to accomplish a seemingly impossible task setup by the king. Some even wanted to call them fools, for what they had chosen to do was only a fool can choose.

      There was so much negativity and criticism in the air that by Sunday, Ramprasad was sufficiently convinced that the task he had agreed to accomplish was an impossible one, so accordingly he decided to quit the competition.

      Now it was all left to Kripanath to prove everybody wrong. On the appointed day, he was up before a thousand people, who had gathered there for the much awaited event they had ever seen in their lives.

      Kripanath, who arrived at the scene clad in a white dhoti, looked calm as he took an overview of the crowd assembled there. By now all eyes were carefully set upon him. After the king gave a go-ahead, Kripanath started poking the earth with a fork. The soft earth was easily getting poked but the biggest hindrance was to move away the loosened soil, which Kripanath moved with the spoon he had brought with him. His incessant effort made him look committed to his goal.

      Half the day passed and he had not even managed to dig a two-foot deep pit; time was running out, but he kept with his efforts, applying harder with each passing hour. All the calculations showed that he would not make it in any probability. Again a quarter day passed and he had barely managed to touch the mark of three-feet. But so devoted was he, that he continued without fail.

      While he was poking and moving the earth at around four-feet, a sound of a metal, that he had accidently hit, made him come to an abrupt halt. He thought that some useless iron pieces were hit.   

      He curiously looked inside the pit, only to notice that a yellow glow was sprouting beneath the earth he was poking. A few more poking and moving of earth led him to realize that he had accidently hit upon a gold brick!

      The king who was watching all this for a while, asked him to come to his chamber. “Have you found anything?” he enquired.

      “Yes, yes your majesty, I have found a gold brick. I don’t know how it came there,” Kripanath answered showing the dug gold.

      The king began, “Your hitting at gold brick was not an accident! I had intentionally got it buried there at a level slightly above four feet. My intention was never to see a man who could dig a six-foot deep pit with a spoon and fork, but a man who is willing to tackle a demanding, arduous task head-on; I just wanted to find a courageous man who is not afraid of the magnitude of his goal.”

      “But why did you choose to place the brick at around four feet only?” Kripanath, who was listening to king with rapt attention, enquired in a lower tone.

      The king pointed, “I wanted to see a man dig four-foot deep pit only and not six, which was not feasible. I fixed it at four only because by the time a person digs four-foot deep pit, he would have proved his love for his work, however demanding. The high-sound of six-feet was just to sift the committed ones from the herd, and it turned out that only you were committed!” Looking at Kripanath, he continued, “The other, Ramprasad who opted to quit at the last moment was no better than the rest as he willfully ignored the opportunity to enter into a competition which had just two competitors — this all because he believed the misguiding people more than he believed in himself.”

      Kripanath was not only made the head of state for agriculture but was also rewarded with the dug gold.

Moral: Luck favours only the willing, deserving and striving. It never shines upon the non-performers. Opportunities come to everyone but those who fail to recognize it call it their ill-luck. Remember, at the end, it’s always luck following the hard work and never the other way round.

END

© Anchit Barnwal

Belief in a thing makes that thing happen.

The distance between a problem and its solution often depends on our ability to try. There are no standard methods to solve life’s problems, but the moment we choose to try we clinch our deal with success.

When John Roebling, Chief Engineer of Brooklyn Bridge, wanted to build the bridge, experts worldwide asked him to forget the idea because they considered it impossible. But both Roebling and his son Washington just would not give up! The project started well, but in a series of tragic accidents, Roebling passed away and Washington was incapacitated. Washington was not able to walk, talk or even move.

All he could do was to move one finger. Gradually, using his one finger, he developed a code of communication with his wife. He touched his wife’s arm with that finger, indicating his intention to call the engineers again. He used the same method of tapping her arm to tell the engineers what to do. For thirteen years, he tapped out his instructions with his one finger, directing operations at the site, until the bridge was finally completed.

Washington’s inabilities did not deter him from following his dream. The reason the bridge stands today is because in the face of adversity he did not give up trying. His life teaches us that when we are going through a problem, or are not able to realize our dreams or achieve what we want, we don’t always have to do anything extraordinary…we just have to try harder!

THE END

© Anchit Barnwal

 

There is something with the way you start your day, for it determines the way you will spend the rest of your day. I have often found that if you start your day on a happy note you are much likely to have a positive day ahead.

Morning time is a time when so many activities demand our attention in the shortest given time which makes it for the fastest moving period of the day. It often leads to unnecessary chaos and a tension filled life. If daily one goes through this amount of inconvenience, one can only imagine the pressure he is exposing himself to in his daily life. What’s the solution? The solution lies in simplifying and managing the things.

A good night’s sleep precedes our new day. It is essential that we take optimum sleep and get up at a pre-designated time. Morning activities can be planned in advance with a fixed time slot allotted to each activity so that we don’t feel any kind of strain in the morning. If we could set aside just fifteen minutes for ourselves in the morning, it would help us to rejuvenate and to be at ease with ourselves besides making us feel the calmness from within.  

The idea is to start your day in a good mood. Make those activities a part of your daily morning life which enhances your mood and make you feel happy. You may get up early to make time for those activities which are closer to your heart, like walking bare foot on grass, reading newspaper, listening to music, reading something inspirational or anything that gives you a sense of peace and happiness in the morning.

© Anchit Barnwal

 

 

Arrange the motivational and inspirational list according to your preference.

Arrange the following in order of your preference, i.e. starting from the most preferable thing you have to gradually go down to pick the thing which you prefer the least. Though all entries in the list have much relevance to anyone’s life, not everyone’s final list will tally exactly with that of others.   

·        Time

·        Health

·        Money

·        Love

·        Freedom

You can compare one thing with every other in the list to determine that thing’s importance according to you, like what I have done here:

·        Time

If you have time you can:

Ø Look after your health.

Ø Earn money.

Ø Pursue your love; and

Ø Enjoy your freedom.

·        Health

If you have health you can:

Ø Work more number of hours and save time.

Ø Work more number of hours and earn accordingly.

Ø Losing your health means losing your freedom.

Ø However, no sound health can even remotely guarantee you love.

·        Money

If you have money you can:

Ø Have ten people to do your work and yet the work done could not be of your liking. So it doesn’t mean more money means more time.

Ø Money also doesn’t guarantee you health. Money can get you the most expensive treatment but not before you lose your health.

Ø Money can give you the means and ways to pursue your love but still it doesn’t guarantee you love.

Ø More money doesn’t equals to more freedom.

·        Love

Ø Love cannot guarantee you time.

Ø Love can make you work harder for your health.

Ø It can also make you work harder for money.

Ø However, it cannot guarantee you freedom.

·        Freedom

Ø Freedom means having time and enjoying it too.

Ø Freedom doesn’t necessarily transform into a good health.

Ø Freedom can allow you to make money by your means and wishes.

Ø Like time, freedom also means that you can pursue your love for anything.

So, for me ‘time' is the best contender among all five, as it allows you to have everything viz. health, money, love and freedom.

Second best to me is ‘freedom,’ as it allows you to have a bit of everything. It loses the top slot only because ‘time’ fair better when it comes to looking after your health.

The third place is safely being held by ‘health,’ as it can guarantee you ‘time’ and ‘money,’ but it loses its strength when it comes to securing ‘love’ and ‘freedom’. Meet any celebrity, they are in their best shapes, but are they free or, have they always been reciprocated by their love? May be not.

The fourth slot is being held by ‘love’ which is clueless about ‘time’ and ‘freedom,’ the crucial ones.

At fifth and last position is ‘money,’ damn… it doesn’t guarantee you anything, not even love or freedom.

THE END

© Anchit Barnwal

Inner cleansing is a must

Whenever we form excess saliva in our mouth, we immediately spit it out, or eagerly look for the ways to get rid of it. Similarly, we are quick to shake, dust and wipe ourselves off, when our skin or clothes get smeared with dirt. The point here common is our eagerness in getting what we consider filth, away from us.

      Have we ever tried to make out the reason behind this quickness in cleaning ourselves from outside, or to find out as to why do we take so long in cleansing ourselves from within?

      When a new bride does a mistake in her new home, the in-laws try to chide her parents for not teaching her accordingly, but the same in-laws never even think of blaming themselves for the wrong of their own children! Why such a contrast in our attitudes?

      All these differences in our attitudes boil down to our acknowledgement and affirmations. What we readily acknowledge as good or bad, we react to it accordingly. But we remain clueless about what we fail to acknowledge altogether. The purpose of acknowledgement is to make us self aware of the baggage that we constantly carry with us around; to get rid of our unwanted behaviours and attitudes.

      The process of inner cleansing starts with our believing that, since we are the generator of our emotions, we can be their destroyer as well. Taking an overall view of ourselves help us to acknowledge our negativities and sort-out their root causes. It’s primarily our inner qualities that manifest themselves in our daily lives. So we must think seriously where we stand today and where we would be tomorrow. Looking deep into ourselves mean working upon our beliefs, attitudes and actions, and eventually clearing ourselves of our negative emotions.

      The best way, therefore, to deal with our negative feelings is to make a room to accommodate more positive changes in our lives by accentuating our positive behaviour, while recognizing, correcting and giving a positive vent to our negative emotions. This will result in having the reins of our life fully settled in our hands.

END

© 2011 Anchit Barnwal

Ever thought...

·        We enjoy simplicity but we ourselves fall short of meeting its standards.

·        We never tell our customers that s/he really needs no solution.

·        We know the cost of many things yet the value of nothing.

·        We go to exotic locations—with bag and baggage—and yet we fail to free up our minds.

·    We boast of being well connected and yet people complain of us being inaccessible.

·        We know time is money and yet we fail to decipher its calculation.

·        We want the right answers but get settled with the comfortable ones.

·        We complain of an inconvenience even after we had willfully let go an opportunity to undo the things which made us complain in the first place.

·        We hold strong positions and do great businesses but get afraid of competition from a newbie or a roadside vendor.

·        We are concerned about our outward beauty but fail to cleanse ourselves from within.

·        We never compete with our competitors in paying more to our staff but we surely remain competitive in paying them less than our competitors.

·        When our health takes a beating we treat it as if there is nothing more important, but after regaining it, we neglect it as if there is nothing more useless.

·        We wear costly watches but fail to keep an appointment.

·        We watch movies more attentively than any other thing but forget its message right after it gets over.

·        We get an increase in our earnings that never lead to a proportionate increase in our happiness.

·        We know the cost of getting educated but lack in knowing the value of education.

·        We put more hours at work but fail to realize the coordination required between the mind and hand.

·        We never teach our children how to react, only not to revolt.

·        We are getting richer by money but poorer by time. 

THE END

© Anchit Barnwal