Destiny Designing

Introduction

          If life is a puzzle, Destiny Designing is a solution.  If life is simple, Destiny Designing makes it even simpler.  Each Destiny Designing analyses a certain aspects of life and delves into the depths of it.  The most striking feature of it is its simplicity.  It explains the “WHY” behind things.  Destiny Designing is an answer to all your unanswered questions of life.  Clarity is power.  Read Destiny Designing to gain clarity and the power that comes with it.

            A bunch of plastic flowers lived inside a flower vase, obviously sheltered and protected from the winds, the rains and even the sun’s rays.  One day a bouquet of rose flowers was placed next to them.  The presence and the fragrance of those gorgeous roses made one of the plastic flowers feel ashamed of its existence.  So it prayed to God, “I do not want to live as a faceless flower; please turn into a rose.”

            God replied, “Why do you want to get into unnecessary trouble?  The life of a rose is very arduous.  Someone will always pluck it.  The sun will burn the petals.  It has a very limited lifespan.  You are living a well-protected life, Do not forsake it.”

            The plastic flower insisted, “I have long lived a sheltered life.  Now, I want to feel real.  I want to feel the life of LIFE.  I want to fight death.  Please transform me into a rose.”  God finally yielded and it became a rose.  Almost immediately, its saga of trials and tribulations began.  A young boy plucked a few of its petals.  The midday sun followed and it burned the remaining petals.  As the day progressed it was feeling dehydrated and was beginning to dry down.  The other plastic flowers gathered around the rose and said, “We knew this would happen.  Don’t you see how secure you were in your old life?  Granted, even as plastic flowers we had our problem but they were old and familiar problems.  We were used to them.  Do you see what a mess you have made of your life?”

            To this the rose replied, “You are all fools.  It is far better to live as rose, even if it is for just twenty-four hours than to live in lifelong security as mere plastic flowers.  It was great to breathe, to feel the warmth of the sun and to be in communion with life.  I might wither away in twenty-four hours, but before I die I would have emitted fragrance.  I have achieved my soul’s fulfiment.  I lived fully and I am going to die fully.  As far as you are concerned, you live a life of living death.  To have been a flower and not to have known fragrance at all… is not to have lived at all.  I am real.”

            Life itself isn’t secure.  Then, where is the question of security within life?  Then why choose to be a plastic flower?  Why not be the real rose?  In searching for security, we resist change, and in resisting change, we stagnate.  We build our own comfort zones and become prisoners in our own comfort zones.  That which does not change, does not grow.  And, that which does not grow, dies.  And growth is your willingness to give up who you are, in order to become, what you can be.

            A seed is very well protected as long as it remains a seed.  There is a security in remaining a seed whereas a plant is always vulnerable.  To sprout into a plant makes the seed susceptible; but then, what else is the purpose of the seed?  It contains a thousand forests within itself and it is only when the seed transforms into a plant that those possibilities are opened.  If the seed resists change and remains a kernel, it is no better than a pebble on the beach.

            The most important quality of great people is in their willingness to change.  It is in the willingness to give up the life of a caterpillar that it becomes a butterfly.  That which does not change does not grow.  That which does not grow, dies.  Grow, we must.  So, change, we must.  Growth and the willingness to change are inseparable.

            If changes are the way to growth and growth is the way to greatness, then why is change always resisted?  Let us take an example.  See, when you were a just-born you were comfortable because you were completely dependent on your environment.  To learn to crawl was an uncomfortable transition because you would have bruised your knees so many times.  But this transition to learn to crawl was a needed one for you to grow.  Once you learnt to crawl, you were completely comfortable once again.  Now learning to walk was another uncomfortable transition because you would have fallen down and hurt yourself so many times.  But, again this transition to learn to walk was a needed one for you to grow.  Once you learnt to walk, you were completely comfortable once again.  So it was from blabbering to talking to communicating.  Therefore, it was from scribbling to writing to drawing.  So it was from school to college to work.

            Comfort zone – uncomfortable transition – again a new comfort zone – another uncomfortable transition – another new comfort zone – and one more uncomfortable transition – This is the cycle of growth.  Grow, we must.  So, change, we must.  So, we cannot avoid uncomfortable transitions.  Change is the willingness to give up an existing comfort zone and the willingness to take up an uncomfortable transition.  Giving up an existing comfort zone is never easy.  Uncomfortable transitions are never easy.  But grow, we must.  So change, we must.  So we cannot avoid uncomfortable transitions.

            The cycle of change is such that before change you are comfortable, after change you will again be comfortable; but the transition is never comfortable.  However, the comfort you experience after change is always of a higher degree than the comfort you experienced before change.  So, legends permanently keep their life in transition, for that’s the only way to grow up.  The alternative is mere stagnation.

            To sweep issues in a relationship under the carpet is comfortable; to talk and resolve the issue is never comfortable, but once the issue is sorted out, that’s where the higher comfort is. To sleep those extra hours is comfortable; to get up and exercise is never comfortable; to get up and exercise is never comfortable, but once the body is fit after adhering to the exercise routines, that’s where the higher comfort is.  To smoke is comfortable; to give up that craving for nicotine is never comfortable, but once you have transcended the desire for nicotine, that’s where the higher comfort is.

            So people who made it to the top in life had the vision to see the higher realities of life at the end of those uncomfortable transitions.  The willingness of a woman to go through the transition of labour gives birth to a new life.  Similarly, your willingness to through the transition of change will give a new life.

            On the bottom of a quiet pond lived a little colony of water bugs.  They did notice that every once in a while one from their colony clinging to the stem of a pond lily and gradually moved out of sight and was seen no more.  They wondered, “Why would anybody give up this comfortable life, great friends, and move up in search of a new life?”  One more found himself climbing up the lily stalk, and before he knew what was happening, he had broken through the surface of the water and fallen onto the broad, green lily pond above.  When he awoke, a startling change had come to his old body.  His movement revealed four silver wings and a long tail.  He moved his wings and found himself up above the water.  He had become a dragonfly!!  Swooping and dipping in great curves, flying through the air, experiencing the freedom of space, he truly felt on ‘Top of the World’. 

            Now, if this water bug had not given up the comfort of remaining a water bug, it would have never become a dragonfly.  This is where all great people stood out from the rest.  They were willing to change and grow.  They never sought comfort zones.  They never thought what is ‘Easy’ for me.  They always thought what is ‘Good’ for me.  So, do not settle.  Keep changing.  Do not settle.  Keep growing.  Do not look at the transition.  Look at the possibilities beyond the transition.

            People do not dare to give up their certainty for uncertainty.  They are afraid to push ahead.  It is not that they cannot.  Just that they don’t.  They wait and wait, hoping that some mysterious power may liberate them.  These people finally die still waiting.

            It is astonishing as to how the world makes way for a resolute soul and how obstacles get out of the pathof a determined man, who believes in the power of change and growth.  Transcendence is like taking the lantern in the hand knowing that you will always have light, just enough for your ext step, no matter how dark, for the light will move along with you.  Take oe step, then take another step and then another.. till your reach the top. 

Design your Destiny

            If you keep doing the same stuff, you will keep getting the same results.  If you have to achieve what you have not achieved before, then you must be willing to do what you have never done before.  That simply means, you must change.

            Mahatma Gandhi said, “Become the change you wish to see.”  You first have to “Become the change you wish to be,” much before you “Beome the change you wish to see.”  Give up who you are, and become what  you can be.  Sometimes, you need to give up, in order to go up.

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Source: Excerpts from the articles published in FT.