inspiration
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Tuesday, September 11th, 2007
Deep within each heart
There lies a magic spark
That lights the fire of our imagination
And since the dawn of man
The strenght of just “I can”
Has brought together people of all nations
There’s nothing ordinary
In the living of each day
There’s a special part
Every one of us will play
Feel the flame forever burn
Teaching lessons we must learn
To bring us closer to the power of the dream
As the world gives us its best
To stand apart from all the rest
It is the power of the dream that brings us here
Your mind will take you far
The rest is just pure heart
You’ll find your fate is all your own creation
Every boy and girl
As they come into this world
They bring the gift of hope and inspiration
Feel the flame forever burn
Teaching lessons we must learn
To bring us closer to the power of the dream
The world unites in hope and peace
We pray that it will always be
It is the power of the dream that brings us here
There’s so much strength in all of us
Every woman child and man
It’s the moment that you think you can’t
You’ll discover that you can
Feel the flame forever burn
Teaching lessons we must learn
To bring us closer to the power of the dream
The world unites in hope and peace
We pray that it will always be
It is the power of the dream that brings us here
Feel the flame forever burn
Teaching lessons we must learn
To bring us closer to the power of the dream
The world unites in hope and peace
We pray that it will always be
It is the power of the dream that brings us here
The power of the dream
The faith in things unseen
The courage to embrace your fear
No matter where you are
To reach for your own star
To realize the power of the dream
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That’s The Way It Is - Celine Dion
Tuesday, September 11th, 2007
I can read your mind and I know your story
I see what you’re going through
It’s an uphill climb, and I’m feeling sorry
But I know it will come to you
Don’t surrender ’cause you can win
In this thing called love
When you want it the most there’s no easy way out
When you’re ready to go and your heart’s left in doubt
Don’t give up on your faith
Love comes to those who believe it
And that’s the way it is
When you question me for a simple answer
I don’t know what to say, no
But it’s plain to see, if you stick together
You’re gonna find a way, yeah
So don’t surrender ’cause you can win
In this thing called love
When you want it the most there’s no easy way out
When you’re ready to go and your heart’s left in doubt
Don’t give up on your faith
Love comes to those who believe it
And that’s the way it is
When life is empty with no tomorrow
And loneliness starts to call
Baby, don’t worry, forget your sorrow
‘Cause love’s gonna conquer it all, all
When you want it the most there’s no easy way out
When you’re ready to go and your heart’s left in doubt
Don’t give up on your faith
Love comes to those who believe it
And that’s the way it is
When you want it the most there’s no easy way out
When you’re ready to go and your heart’s left in doubt
Don’t give up on your faith
Love comes to those who believe it
And that’s the way it is
That’s the way it is
That’s the way it is, babe
Don’t give up on your faith
Love comes to those who believe it
And that’s the way it is.
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Care, but not t-h-a-t much
Sunday, September 9th, 2007“Whenever a social interaction looms so large in your mind that you view it as watershed event in Western Civilization, you are in trouble. You’re caring too much and with that you lose the requisite detachment necessary for success.
There’s a prosaic saying that whenever a person is overcome with feelings, be it anger or desire, he or she “can’t see the forest for the trees”. Oddly, or maybe fittingly, when that happens you move in close that you might even swear, “There is no tree, only a knothole right here.”
In other words, what you must do is to train yourself to step back, so that you can see the pattern, relationships and interconnection of things.”
Excerpt taken from Negotiate This!: By Caring, but Not T-H-A-T Much
This not only applies in negotiation, but also in the endeavours we undertake. Do you sometimes suffer from mental blocks in your work, or the things you do ? I do. Besides the occasional perfectionism bout, I think one other reason is that I care too much for the outcome of my efforts. This excerpt is a stark reminder to me to care, but not that much.
Caring too much about the outcome will only impede progress because we are too afraid to try. We are forever aiming and aiming but never firing.
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Tibet - the adventure which made an impact
Friday, September 7th, 2007What’s your most memorable experience or achievement ?
Mine was a trip to Tibet several years back. I went alone but with a group. I liked the silence without a companion, which aided my soul-searching.
Two sights made an indelible impression on me - Potala Palace and Yamdrok Lake.
Potala Place and Yamdrok Lake
Standing at the foot of the Potala Palace and looking up at the majestic architecture, I thought to myself, “Finally, I’m here at the Potala Palace”. It was a feeling of awe and disbelief that I was actually here at this majestic yet mystic place on the rooftop of the world. How blessed I was to be able to set my foot on this land and be in the midst of its wonders.
Yamdrok Lake was over 4,400 metres above sea level. To get a view of the lake, our jeep made its way up the mountain on a meandering road trail. This was one of the toughest stretches in the entire journey, and most of us were panting out of breath and inhaling from our portable oxygen supply. However when we reached the peak and gazed down below at the holy lake, the journey was totally worth it.
Looking at the clear blue lake, time stood still. I had never felt so peaceful, calm and serene before. All desires, worries and anxieties terminated at the edge of the mountain where I stood. Ripples of the heart’s disturbances disappeared as they dissolved into the deep ocean of calm and eternity.
An old lady’s advice
A 70-year old lady was one of my group-mates on the trip. I sat next to her on the plane and she told me this, “He who is going up the mountain should not ask the one who is coming down how it’s like”. If she had listened to those who travelled before her how it’s like and how tough it is, she would probably be too scared and never make the trip.
What good advice ! I remember it till this day.
Here’s another old lady who was 50 years old when she travelled to Tibet alone for 50 days.
The transient nature of worldly attachments
My trip to Tibet was in Aug 2001. When I returned home, I was completely recharged and felt a sense of hope knowing there is such a wonderful place on earth.
Ironically, the 911 incident took place barely 2 weeks after the trip. I remember my heart plunged when I saw the World Trade Centre collapse on TV. For about a week, I suffered mild depression and felt somewhat disillusioned.
Looking back, I think it is a way of the universe telling me that all worldly attachments are transient in nature. Even the heavenly state of mind which I felt in Tibet was transient, and I should not attach to it.
Indeed, looking at how China tries to influence the state of affairs in Tibet and pry it open, who knows how long the sanctity of Tibet can last. The world is growing in greed and falling short of purelands. Heaven forbid the erosion of the Tibetan pureland by political and commercial vultures !
I made a wish
Tibet is an enchanting place. I feel a sense of affinity with the place. Before I left Tibet, I made a wish that I will return. I’m going to visit Tibet again someday !
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Did Mother Teresa doubt her faith and God ?
Wednesday, August 29th, 2007
Letters reveal Mother Teresa’s doubt about her faith and God
By Daniel Trotta, Reuters | August 25, 2007
NEW YORK - A book of letters written by Mother Teresa of Calcutta reveals for the first time that she was deeply tormented about her faith and suffered periods of doubt about God.
“Jesus has a very special love for you. As for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear,” she wrote the Rev. Michael van der Peet in September 1979.
Due out on September 4, “Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light” is a collection of letters written to colleagues and superiors over 66 years. In the United States it will be published by Doubleday, an imprint of Random House, which is owned by German media group Bertelsmann.
The ethnic Albanian Roman Catholic nun, who dedicated her life to poor, sick and dying in India, died in 1997 aged 87.
Mother Teresa had wanted all her letters destroyed, but the Vatican ordered they be preserved as potential relics of a saint, a spokeswoman for Doubleday said.
Mother Teresa has been beatified but not yet canonized.
Time magazine, which has first serial rights, published excerpts on its Web site.
“I spoke as if my very heart was in love with God — tender, personal love,” she wrote to one adviser. “If you were (there), you would have said, ‘What hypocrisy.’”
The book was compiled and edited by the Rev. Brian Kolodiejchuk, a proponent of her sainthood and senior member of the Missionaries of Charity order that she founded.
The letters likely would do little to affect her cause for sainthood as church history is dotted with saints who have been tormented about their faith.
Saint Thomas the Apostle — the “Doubting Thomas” — doubted that Jesus had risen from the dead until, according to scripture, he touches the wound of a resurrected Jesus. Christ himself wondered “God, why have you forsaken me” while on the cross, the Bible says.
But the Mother Teresa letters nonetheless stand in marked contrast to her public image as a selfless and tireless minister for the poor who was driven by faith.
“I’ve never read a saint’s life where the saint has such an intense spiritual darkness. No one knew she was that tormented,” the Rev. James Martin, an editor at Jesuit magazine America and the author of “My Life with the Saints,” told Time.
THE DARK LETTERS
The writings address numerous topics, but the ones most likely to create a stir are what Doubleday called the “dark letters.”
“Please pray specially for me that I may not spoil His work and that Our Lord may show Himself — for there is such terrible darkness within me, as if everything was dead,” she wrote in 1953. “It has been like this more or less from the time I started ‘the work.’”
Then in 1956: “Such deep longing for God — and … repulsed — empty — no faith — no love — no zeal. (Saving) souls holds no attraction — Heaven means nothing — pray for me please that I keep smiling at Him in spite of everything.”
And then in 1959: “If there be no God — there can be no soul — if there is no Soul then Jesus — You also are not true.”
At times she also found it hard to pray.
“I utter words of community prayers — and try my utmost to get out of every word the sweetness it has to give — but my prayer of union is not there any longer — I no longer pray.”
After reading the news reports, what do you think ?
Most of us will never be able to appreciate what Mother Teresa went through during “the work” because we have not been in situations as trying as hers for an extended period of time. To live amidst deeply suffering people and offer perhaps the only hope in their world, is to live a life of tremendous burden and stress.
People who do not come close to living in similar conditions will find it hard to empathasize with what Mother Teresa went through. We think we know through words and print which we hear and read, but unless and until we are in the same shoes, we’ll never truly know.
When you read a book or listen to a news report, do you find yourself thinking then that you know what is written or said ? Then at some point in the future, when you experience a similar situation, your memory calls forth whatever that you have read or heard, and you realise that only now do you truly understand what it was all about.
I’m an ardent student of personal development and business. In a strange twist of events, I find myself attracted to the path of entrepreneurship. I guess it’s a natural progression and choice because I am an adventurous person, and passionate about growing and developing myself spiritually, emotionally, mentally and fully as a human being. Entrepreneurship is the ultimate challenge. You are bound to no master but yourself. Slave to no one but your own demons.
Some times you think that you know, but do you really know ? Until I embarked on the journey, I could never come this close to appreciating what it’s like. The journey is exciting and challenging, yet at the same time it’s lonely, uncertain and grey. The path ahead is lighted only by the fire in my heart. The heart and mind wavers between belief and faith in one moment, and self-doubt and anxiety in another. Sometimes the fire burns bright with passion and strength, other times it dims and weakens and is at the brink of extinguishing.
Does it mean that I need to have absolute faith and no tinge of weakness whatsoever to be worthy of this journey ? Definitely not. It’s only human to experience these emotions. And these emotions are brought out by the experience that I’m going through. In earlier “secure” times, I had always perceived myself to be strong. I never knew I can be so weak - till I choose to put myself through the test.
“I spoke as if my very heart was in love with God — tender, personal love,” she wrote to one adviser. “If you were (there), you would have said, ‘What hypocrisy.’”
Mother Teresa was not a hyprocrite. She was honest and humble to admit the doubt in her heart.
Saint Thomas the Apostle — the “Doubting Thomas” — doubted that Jesus had risen from the dead until, according to scripture, he touches the wound of a resurrected Jesus. Christ himself wondered “God, why have you forsaken me” while on the cross, the Bible says.
But the Mother Teresa letters nonetheless stand in marked contrast to her public image as a selfless and tireless minister for the poor who was driven by faith.
Existence of doubt in one who is spiritually advanced and saintly like Mother Teresa can only suggest how tormented she was in what she was doing. Most people are of spiritual levels very distant from that of Mother Teresa, and so will not be able to appreciate how she saw, felt and thought.
Without doubt, what is faith worth ?
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