Our life is a Miracle, nothing less!
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below note is especially for those who don’t believe in the above fact.
Let me share the story of a boy born in a middle class family in south Delhi somewhere in 1975 (yes you can do the math, the boy is soon gonna b turning 45 yrs old!); we can call him by his nick name “Tinku”
Tinku was an average boy in school and faced the first challenge in his school when he could not score the passing percentage (40%) that made his parents decide to change the school rather than having to repeat the same class again.
I will take a minute to emphasize how crucial this first change was on the mind of Tinku since the change in school made him realise what a privilege he had with the former school that was now missing from his life.
During these last four years of school, he was simply cursing his situation and unable to accept his fate that made him bring his reality into this new school which wasn’t comparable (as per any standards to his prior school).
This situation made him resolve to study harder and the results did improve to an extent that Tinku decided to take up science (with biology) and aim to become a Doctor one day.
When the time came for the tests to get admission for medical, Tinku failed to clear…2nd disappointment of his life!
Tinku decided that this situation will not make him accept the normal/pattern that every student goes through in India i.e. do graduation, instead he thought of studying pharmaceutical sciences and gained admission into a gruelling program away from his home town (Nagpur).
After 4 gruelling years of pharma degree, Tinku found himself a job in sales selling pharma molecules of a well known organisation (Sanofi) and that’s how his career kicked off.
The next 20 years of his career were fraught with several ups and downs as Tinku made several decisions to find a faster/better route to advance in his career (including doing an MBA) but this article isn’t about that.
what I wish to highlight to the readers via sharing the story of Tinku is how in spite of the several personal impacts he was able to rise in his career and so can you.
what you might wonder were the personal impacts that I refer to above; hold your breadth…
At the end of 14/15 yrs, Tinku realised that his father health situation wasn’t doing so well as he was on dialysis and had to underwent a kidney transplant.
Around 5 yrs down the line, his health worsened and he collapsed right in front of Tinku in one of the hospitals in Delhi. (at this moment do note that there was no one else other than Tinku staying overnight with his father on that dreaded night)
As helpless as Tinku felt that moment unable to do anything for his father who collapsed in front of his eyes, little did he realise that this wasn’t the end of his suffering in life but just the beginning.
About two years later, Tinku found his mother having cancer and was operated (as destined in same hospital where his father had passed away)!
Although the surgery was proven to be successful the surgeon categorically mentioned that the chances of recurrence are high and so it did happen, within 6 months, she passed away one fateful night.
As though this was the end of all the personal tragedies that Tinku had to face on his family front, his elder sister during all this time developed depression and started getting regular treatment from psychiatrist.
At this point let me remind readers that depression at that point in time wasn’t much heard of little discussed and visit to mental health hospital not very comforting to say the least.
Not to bore the readers with the details here but imp to hightlight that such patients of depression do form a cyclical habit of not taking drugs after few years and by now Tinku had witnessed several of these cycles whereby her sister was (forcefully) treated in hospital, an experience which is as cruel for the patient as for the care-giver.
fast forwarding Tinku personal life by 15 yrs, when he got married (at the age of 33 yrs) his wife met with an accident (just an year and half to the marriage) and drowned in the same boat. do note, this was a tourist boat run by the government that capsized in the middle of the lake!!
when all this was going on in his personal life, Tinku was still able to rise in his corporate life and did reach a milestone by being perhaps the youngest country manager for a Swiss company dealing in healthcare.
8 yrs into this role and the calling to do something on his own dawned on Tinku and he took the plunge only to realise within two years that it was a wrong choice of business but it was too late as this took a toil on his personal life and he experienced a heart attack!
Now, what would you make out from this story?
A life of suffering perhaps like any other human life.
Yes but No, the twist lies in the lessons, 3 in fact…
When you start connecting the dots, you realise the first and most clear lesson is that somehow even before the tragedies were coming into Tinku’s life, “he was being prepared to take the hit”
whether you wish to call it God or give it any other name, the fact remainsthat there is a purpose behind every existence on this planet.
Let me explain with one example, when he was unable to get admission for medicine (to become a physician) he was forced to look at options outside his hometown and had to travel to west India (a small city called Nagpur) all alone for 4 years, this taught him several lessons but most of which can be compressed into one single strength “being self sufficient on his own”
Also at this time, he found the anchor in his life in the form of meditation that helped him to keep his mental stability intact.
Second lesson being the fact that “life is eternal”. Having come so close to death and to witness the passing away of so many loved ones so early in life, you tend to look at the bigger picture which can be simply explained via an analogy that we are all traveling in this train called life and we depart on respective stations and fellow passengers whom we call our friends/relatives/family members will also de-board the train at some point in time.
Third lesson perhaps the most critical being that “wisdom is in accepting sufferings in life and simply flow with life itself”
what helped Tinku to stay sane while going through all of the above mentioned (and several more that aren’t listed) suffering’s was the faith in life itself and this was percolated in the love being showered by his family who were by his side to support in this crucial journey.
what suffering’s do is to refine us and make us a stronger version of our real Self.
Having heard my story (yes, I'm sure you guessed it by now-Tinku is my nick name); I'm sure you would believe miracles do exist via the presence of every living soul on this planet!
