Skip to main content

THE QUEST FOR SUCCESS

"In the end we only regret the chances we didn't take."

A few weeks ago, I was doing a training program for our devotees at our ISKCON center in Siolim. My theme that day was to highlight the need for devotees to find their hidden potential. I was explaining, how important it is for every devotee to feel successful in life; how the growth of every organisation depends on the growth of the individuals within the organisation. I explained to them, how in the name of growth of the organisation, we can't overlook individual growth - both are interconnected.
One devotee asked me a very intelligent question. He asked me, "What does success mean?" I told him, "Success, doesn't mean to become successful in the eyes of people. It doesn't mean name, fame or any other external things." I told him that, "Success means to feel that you have done your best, that you have lived up to your full potential. Others are not the judge of our success but we ourselves are." I concluded by saying, "The ultimate test of success is, when one is on one's death bed, he or she shouldn't have any regrets that "I didn't live up to my full potential. I could have done so much more." Rather, one should feel, "I have lived life fully to my potential and I am dieing with pride in my heart and not regrets." That feeling is the feeling of success." Mahatma Prabhu, a senior disciple of Srila Prabhupada, puts this succinctly as, "Don't enter the grave with music still in your head." What it means is that, whatever, we want to do, we need to do it while we are still alive. And because we don't know when death will strike us, it is all the more important to go and chase our dreams now and not postpone it.

The joy of finding one's talent, one's niche, one's potential and then getting better at it, is a joy that everyone should experience. No one should be barred from it - it is everyone's birthright and everyone's sacred duty. We all are uniquely created and we all have a unique place in this universe in terms of our contribution. We just need to find it. As Mark Twain's famous quote goes - "The two most important days in life are - the day you were born and the day you find out why." We all need to find our "Why". That's one part of self-discovery and an important part as well. We can't neglect it. This "Why" is our Sva-dharma - our God ordained duty.

Whenever some devotee would go and ask Srila Prabhupada, "What should I do, what service should I do?" Srila Prabhupada would invariably have the same answer. He would counter question them, "What do you want to do, How would you like to serve Krishna?" He always encouraged devotees to think, strain their brain and do something that they really liked doing. He wanted independently thoughtful devotees.

With now knowing what is success and the need to achieve it, it is our scared responsibility to act now and become a success for us, for the world and for God. Wishing you all the best in your journey to success - the world is waiting for you. Don't keep it waiting too long.

- Achyut Gopal Das

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

SPEEDING UP BY SLOWING DOWN

If you want to increase the speed of your success in life then learn to slow down. One may argue, either you speed up or slow down, how can one speed up and slow down simultaneously. It looks like a contradiction. But often life is about reconciling opposites, finding the mid-point, the balance between two extremes. I would like to explain two meanings of ‘ slowing down ’. The first meaning of slowing down is to regularly take time to analyse, introspect and recheck our direction in life. Somehow in today's high-tech world where so much value and stress is given on speed, we many times overlook the direction of our life. As Stephen Covey, the famous author aptly put it by saying - ' The difference between a leader and manager is that, a manager is one who knows how to efficiently climb the ladder, but a leader is one who knows if the ladder is on the right wall. ' Most people spend their entire life in efficiently climbing the ' so called ' ladder of success only ...
Post a Comment
Read more

RELAX YOUR WAY THROUGH LIFE

We all have problems in life, that's given but the question is - how do we deal with them? Generally when faced with difficulties, we panic and stress out, but this doesn't solve the problem rather aggravates it. The best way to deal with our problems is by being calm . How can one remain calm amidst problems? That's a question of practice. The point is unless we are calm we will not be able to see the problem for what it is, what to speak of solving it. Just like if a pond is agitated we can't see our reflection, similarly we can't see the obvious as long as our mind remains agitated. We always think that peace is obtained by solving our problems. That may be true but we forget that to solve our problems we need to be at peace first. This is something most of us don't get. By being calm and relaxed in face of a difficulty, we are placing ourselves in the mode of goodness and only in goodness can solutions come forth because the symptoms of the mode of g...
Post a Comment
Read more

FINDING RELEVANCE IN TIMES OF IRRELEVANCE

"The world will value us as long as we are valid. As soon as we become invalid, the world stops valuing us."  In the epic of Mahabharata, one of the most important and powerful leaders was Bhismadev. As long as he was active, fit and fine, everyone came to him for consultation and dependent on his performance, skill and valour but as soon as he became incapacitated and incapable of performing and delivering results being fatally wounded by the arrows of Arjuna, he sort of became irrelevant. No one depended on him, no one came to him for consultation. One who was visited by everyone and was the center of attraction, now hardly got visitors and became sidelined. The most crucial war of Kurukshetra continued on without Bhismadev, the most critical person. Life is such that everyone has to become outdated and irrelevant at some point or the other. No one, however powerful he or she may be can be in the limelight forever. History ultimately shows that how ever...
Post a Comment
Read more