Have you ever been frustrated? We all have been, some time or the other, including me. People who get frustrated and overcome it are people who become very successful in life. This is my theory. Through my blogs I have been writing various incidents and stories, sharing my thoughts about different aspects of life.
Frustration is quite common today, especially amongst the new generation. The new generation often finds it difficult to face the hard realities of life and the unexpected challenges they face. Of late, so many sad bits of news about youngsters committing suicide have disturbed me. This is unbearable. Ending one’s life due to some silly reason, due to frustration? Oh no, this is unacceptable. Only a coward will attempt taking these drastic steps.
To me, life is all about taking ownership of what you do and not complaining about things that are beyond your control. I’m sure you’ll agree that excessive social media is becoming a distraction to the youth and many youngsters fall into a trap, living in a very artificial world called, social network. Social networking is good, as long as it is in the right measure. Understanding life in its totality and being a blessing to others is what makes life worth living. I wish the youth would understand this.
I am dedicating this blog to the new generation and I hope reading this will benefit them and their parents as well.
I often stand in front of a mirror and ask myself, Who are you, where did you come from? What has your contribution to this world been? I never used to ask these questions when I was a kid because I was not aware of why I was born and what I was supposed to deliver.
Have you ever asked these questions looking at yourself? Friends, do it. It will take you some time to get the answers, but you will. In a way, by doing this we are questioning our own existence and the purpose of our life. If you really understand your purpose of life, you will be in a better position to fight frustration. Frustration is an enemy to the human race and it must be erased. Greed can lead to frustration and not getting what you want leads to frustration and so on. But what is frustration? Do you term it as a failure? No, this is not a failure. Frustration is a stumbling block that comes in between your life and accomplishment.
Friends, many people in this world including me have successfully come out of difficult situations by handling crises. Having lived in this world for so many years, especially being in business activities for the past 35 years, I have gone through many crises. If I have to write about situations that I have faced, it will be quite a bit to write. However, for this story, I decided to pick up a particular incident that happened to me in the early days of my life.
When I was doing business in those early days, I had no bank or creditors to stand by me. It used to frustrate me. I too have attempted to give up and let me confess, I have also crossed the bridge of temptation to end my life.
In fact, I shared this with a friend of mine in Madras. He was a good friend, working in another organization. He was not a businessman but was just an employee. He was a motivator and had the qualities of a good individual and of course a leader. I became friends with him and I knew I had picked the right friend. I learned quite a bit from him and used that in my life which has helped me to be what I am today. I have had multiple failures in my life: financial failures and personal failures, and even a love affair that failed very early in life. I decided to overcome these failures because I refused to get frustrated.
Here goes something that really happened. This friend in Madras finally decided to get married. By this time he was more than a friend. He was like a brother to me; a brother who had helped me in so many ways. He was marrying a traditional Hindu Brahmin lady from Madras and that too, from a very conservative society. Usually, weddings in Madras mean a lot of traditional ceremonies and it used to be a custom (I believe even today it is so) to take gifts to the bridal couple. As soon as I got invited to the wedding, my first worry was, What should I gift my friend? It was not that I didn’t know what to buy him; it was simply because I did not have the money to get him a gift. I then decided to make a conscious decision and gifted him a cheque for Rs.500/- ($ 10). To my utter dismay, I could not arrange the funds in the bank and the cheque was returned unpaid due to unavailability of funds.
Friends, you will agree this was a terribly insulting moment for me, bringing down my self-esteem and making me feel ridiculed. When I got to know this, guess what I did? I didn’t shy away. Instead, I took ownership of this devastating incident and explained to my friend that my intention was to give him this gift but unfortunately I could not honor the cheque because my plans went wrong. It did not take me much of convincing because I was sincere in confessing my difficulties to him. He understood my good intention and even today he continues to be a good friend of mine.
Imagine if I had got frustrated and shied away from by not meeting him and explaining the whole situation to him and even avoiding him! Gosh! That would have been terrible. I wouldn’t have really known how to overcome this situation and I would have been another frustrated individual living in this world. Thank God I am not frustrated and here I am with lots of vigor in me, ready to face any challenge in this life.
Friends, what do you learn from this? Let nothing come in the way of keeping your relationships and realizing your dreams.