It was yet another day in office. The alarm in my mobile started ringing as I was looking into the matters of priority for the day. It was a reminder about the birthday of Mr. Jonas Richard who had taught me human resource management at my post graduate college in Bangalore. I thought of wishing him and looked for his contact number in my phone book. But, I could not find the number as it was stored in my old Motorola phone. I had used the phone for nearly four years before getting it pick pocketed by some clever chap while travelling in a blue line bus in Delhi. Anyways, I dropped the plan to call him up. Instead, I sent him an email with birthday wishes.
In the afternoon, I found a reply to my mail in the inbox. He wrote, ‘You are one among the few students whom I really admired. Continue to be in touch’. I was elated as none of my teachers ever had such a comment about me in my academic life. I grew eager to know what actually prompted my teacher to consider me as one among the selected few. Fortunately, his contact number was there at the bottom of the message.
I dialed the number and he picked up the call at the other end. He said, ‘it is really a surprise that I told my students about you this morning and when I reached home your message was awaiting me’. I sensed the amount of curiosity mounting in me. I asked, ‘what have you told them about me, sir?’ ‘I told them we remember certain people not by face but by their words’, he said. He continued, ‘do you remember the story you narrated on the occasion of my birthday during your first year in college?’Those days, we used to celebrate the birthday of all our faculty members. It was always the responsibility of the class representative to organize the function and speak a few words on behalf of the classmates. I said, ‘sir, I remember celebrating your birthday but I cannot recollect the story that I had narrated.’
To remind me and take me back to those days, he started telling the story. It was about a revolutionary, who had the dream of influencing the whole mankind, bringing changes into their lives and, thereby, transforming the entire world. He had this dream when he was a vibrant and energetic youth. Years passed. As he progressed to his middle age, with pain and despair he realized that he could neither influence anyone nor bring changes to somebody’s life and that half of his life was wasted. He decided to compromise with himself. He thought, “I do not know the number of days left in my life. But, during the rest of my life, I will strive hard to influence those in my close circle and bring changes in their lives”. He continued his efforts with added vigour. At last, he grew old and his days were numbered. He was taking stock of his life and got saddened by the realization that he had not been able to influence and transform anyone and that his entire life was wasted. At this stage, he had the ultimate realization that before setting out to influence and transform the whole world he should have attempted to bring the desired changes into his own life i.e. the process of transforming the society and thereby the whole world should start at the individual level.
I was reminded of the whole story when he started narrating but I listened to him till the end. I had read this story in the Sunday Supplement of a leading Malayalam daily years ago. I had kept that paper cutting in my diary for a long time and shared it with others whenever I had chances to speak.
I am sharing this incident with two objectives; firstly, to reiterate the message of the story which we have already heard from many sources and keeps on hearing but finding it difficult to put into practice; secondly, to share the limitless joy that you experience when somebody attaches value to your words.
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