Last Saturday, I was sitting and enjoying my evening tea. The weather
was breezy and I was viewing the beautiful winter sunset as I was sipping my
tea. It was then that I got a phone call from an office colleague who informed
me that he got a new job with almost double the salary of what he was getting
and would be joining from the next month. As adults we are tuned to camouflaging our
actual thoughts on various issues. So as expected I shrieked with excitement at
the “wonderful” news and congratulated him. We had a chat on the times we had
spent bashing our manager, strategising our office works etc. By the time our
conversation ended, I realized I was going into a terrible mood slump. “How did
this happen?” “How come I am stuck here when all my friends are going so fast
with their life?” ...
As these thoughts started flooding me I thought of going
online for a while to take my mind off. I opened my Facebook hoping for some
respite. As I logged in, I found my page filled with happy pictures of my friends some of who were getting married, some who were holidaying abroad etc. As I checked the pictures, I realized I had never been so sad
before. I immediately closed my laptop and fell flat on my bed running my life
events like a bio scope. Then I convinced myself, putting all blame on fate and
that good things never happen to me. Everything happened in a span of one hour.
Just an hour ago, I was in the best of my moods, optimistic and happy about
what life had to offer me and after one hour,my mood was the exact opposite. I
suddenly wished I had no network connectivity. I could have at least enjoyed my
Saturday evening. So who is to blame for spoiling my mood that day?
BSNL for providing me
with connectivity?
Nokia for providing me a mobile way of staying in touch with
acquaintances?
My colleague for
giving me the news?
His new company for
recruiting him?
I myself for not
having tried that myself?
But analysing each ‘accused’ again, how can I blame BSNL or Nokia
for that is its basic property for which I myself choose to use it. How can I
blame my colleague for sharing his happiness with me. Blaming the company would
be ridiculous for it doesn’t even know of my existence. Now the only option
left is I myself. But I would never want to spoil my own mood!! Then what went
wrong? Yet again, what if I had tried that myself? There is no guarantee that
this would not have happened there as well. So back to square one..its fate to
be blamed. But seriously!!! Who is this fate and what has he/she got against
me? Why is it screwing with my life?
I don’t know who this fate is but now I know how it works.
This is where my postman theory comes in.
Except me everyone in
the world is a postman chosen by fate to deliver me a message. The same holds true for everyone! Can I be angry
on the postman for delivering me a bad news? Or can I be pleased with the
postman for giving me a good news or making me happy. They are just postmen
delivering me a message. But who sends me this message? Of course its fate!!
But who is fate? Maybe we don’t have to know that now. It’s the message that we
have to deal with and understand, to decipher it to know its hidden meanings. Fate
delivered me a message which evoked the feeling of jealousy and frustration in
me. Absolutely speaking, there’s nothing wrong in my life but I did the mistake
of linking it to an external source whom I mistook to be a person just like me and got angry on him.
The solution is simple, understanding that happiness is
absolute and not relative. If we know that postmen are not part of our life and
they are just messengers we will never feel angry on them for giving us bad
news. They cannot make us happy or sad. If happiness is sourced from within and as
long as we stick to this source, no message from some external source can make
us sad.
