LAST LECTURE

The Carnegie Mellon University had an academic tradition where top academics were invited to deliver a hypothetical ‘last lecture’. The speaker had to share the pick of his wisdom with the world as if it was his last chance! However in 2007, when Randy Pausch stood up to speak, it was no hypothetical situation as he was actually facing death!

A month before the lecture, Randy’s pancreatic cancer, after a year of surgery and chemotherapy, was confirmed to be terminal. However, in his ‘last lecture’, Randy shrugged off pity. He didn’t speak about death; he spoke about life and of living a more fulfilling life, by simply achieving childhood dreams. He offered insights from his childhood and important lessons he wanted his kids to learn. He reiterated the need to enjoy everything we do and to live life to its fullest before it ends.

On 25 July 2008, Randy succumbed to pancreatic cancer, but his book based on his last lecture continues to inspire. He said that he would rather have cancer than be hit by a bus. After all, if he died suddenly, he wouldn't have had the time to spend as much possible time with his family and getting their life ready for his death and beyond. Knowing that he was going to die resulted in enhancing his remaining life.

To be better at living the life that we really want to live, we must put together our ‘last lecture’… our thoughts, if we knew we had few days to live. We need to reconnect to our childhood dreams that lie hidden in the maze of complexities that are created by our desperate dash towards materialistic goals. When we envision our ‘last lecture’ and allow it to align with a mission, we will find true meaning to our lives.

Our last lecture can truly be our guiding mission…

To BE BETTER at living life in sync with our vision!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

H2O

Today as the world celebrates Water Day; let’s revisit the stirring story of Ralegaon Siddhi in Maharashtra, India. The drought-prone villagers were in debt. Rampant alcoholism brought along feuds and crime, especially against women. The village temple around the samadhi of ‘Yadavbaba’ had broken down. The wood from it had been used as firewood. It was to this village that Anna Hazare returned 25 years ago.

Today the temple is the hub of activity and houses a ‘grain bank’. Water is systematically harvested and three crops are grown. The village where a fifth of the families ate only one meal a day, now markets vegetables, grain, and milk. While neighboring villages wait for Government tankers to bring drinking water, Ralegaon has enough for the villagers as well as the hundreds who walk in to see Anna’s vision.

The very way of life and relationships within the village has been transformed. Everything is built by community effort. People get married in community marriages. All this has been achieved by decades of dedication by Anna who came from a poor family in debt, took an early retirement from the army as a truck driver, inspired by Swami Vivekananda's dictum, ‘The purpose of life is to serve others.’

A once destitute village is now, a brand for appropriate development. It isn’t enough to identify what is wrong, we must initiate action and back it with committed perseverance. Anna has shown the way of involving community to change the situation. Ralegaon Siddhi is stimulation to be better at managing the real elixir of life – water!

To BE BETTER at overcoming the H2O situation,

We must walk Anna’s path of collective action!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

BUILDING BRIDGES

Two brothers with adjacent farms fell apart after years of farming side by side, sharing machinery and labour. The relationship soured because a small misunderstanding grew into an exchange of bitter words. The enmity resulted in the younger brother excavating the meadow between their lands to create a deep trench.

The infuriated elder brother asked a carpenter to block his brother out of view by building a high fence. The farmer went to town and returned at sunset to see that the carpenter had not built any fence. Instead he had built a bridge across the trench! And his estranged younger brother was coming across, his hand outstretched and saying, ‘after all I've said and done, you have built this bridge’. The brothers laid to rest their differences as they embraced on the bridge.

So often, small misunderstandings develop into major rifts. The deepest of divides can be overcome, only by the building of bridges. If we cannot bridge the gap ourselves, we must permit mutual well-wishers to build the bridge like the carpenter did. The bridge of communication helps us to be better at crossing across the unwarranted rift in a relationship.

So many gaps widen only because there were no attempts to bridge the break-ups. We must re-look at all our conflicts and examine them to see whether they are divergences on values and principles or just frivolous misunderstandings. Most of the time, we discover it is the latter and when do realise the fact, may the bridge be built!

May we BE BETTER at building bridges of connection…

to overcome every divisive gap in the bond of association!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

YIN-YANG

In the 1980s, when television was new to Goa, the start of the telecast would bring into view the rotating form of ‘yin-yang’ that evolved into the logo of Doordarshan. However, we were not aware of the deep meaning of one of the oldest and best-known life symbols which though opposite, are bound together as parts of a mutual whole.

As two aspects of a single reality, Yin and Yang are forces that always seek balance. Each contains the seed of the other (seen as a black spot of Yin in the white Yang and vice versa). This Monday muse, on occasion of the International Women’s day, seeks to connect to the manifestations of Yin and Yang as female and male. Though seemingly contrary forces, they are interconnected and interdependent.

It is pertinent to note that in Yin and Yang, every advance is matched by a retreat, and every rise transforms into a fall. They are not meant to replace each other but actually become each other through a constant flow of interaction and transformation. Yin and yang constantly interact and hold significant lessons for both, men and women.

It is not only women, but men, too, who need empowerment in a male-chauvinistic world. Both have to accept their own individualities as well as the commonalities. To be better, we must respect the dignity of all sorts of roles that we look down upon due to regressive conditioning in society. We must discover that we are like yin-yang, holding the seed of complementary harmony that needs to connect to deep roots of understanding each other while stretching out to the unlimited skies!

Together, women and men create a beautiful way…

Yin and Yang show the way to BE BETTER, each day!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Leaves sprout… flowers bloom

Trees smile and chase the gloom

Spring is here to spread the cheer

Shed your inhibitions, have no fear!

Here’s the flavoured milk, say cheers

For the veterans, open the bhang & beers

The fire’s going down, bring more wood

There it lies where once the tree stood

A full moon looks on as winds stoke embers,

in the season of spring, trees get dismembered

Wood chars, so does the plastic trash

flowers singe smearing earth with ash.

Next we get to spray the colours everywhere

Made from mud, paint and chemicals not very rare

But don’t you mind the itch and the stains

It won’t happen till spring comes again!

- 3 March 2007

It would be better for bad thoughts to burn

Instead of screaming abuses around the fiery urn…

It would be better to celebrate the colours of life

And a resolve to shun discrimination and unjust strife!

- 1 March 2009

- Pravin K. Sabnis