Mahatma
Gandhi was approached one day by a woman and her young son. She asked,
“Mahatma, can you please tell my son to stop eating sugar. It’s
not good for him, and he won’t listen to me. He respects you,
and I know he will listen to you.”
The
Mahatma said, “Fine. Come back in a week.”
A
week later, the woman and her son came back. The Mahatma said, “I’m
not quite ready. Please come back in another week.”
Another
week went by, and the woman came back with her son. The Mahatma was
ready, and he said, “Son, you should stop eating sugar. It is
not good for you.”
The
woman was pleased, but also a bit confused. She said, “Why did
it take you so long to say such a simple thing.”
The
Mahatma replied, “When you first came to me, I had not stopped
eating sugar myself.”
The
moral of the story is clear: Don’t tell people to do things
you haven’t done yourself. So, I don’t want to write about
things I haven’t tried and tested myself, and I don’t
want to tell you a bunch of nonsense I don’t believe in.
What
I can do, though, is to share what I’ve learned about life,
in the hope I will say something that will be useful to you. I’m
going to write briefly about six principles that represent what I’ve
learned over the past thirty years since I graduated high school,
based purely on my own experiments in living. I try to practice these
six principles every day, and I like to think these principles are
a tree whose fruits are an honorable life, which is what I wish for
you.
The
first principle is: Live your own life. It would be a shame
to get to the end of your life—and who knows when that time
will come—only to discover in the last moment that you did not
live your life, but the life that someone else wanted you to live.
It takes a lot of strength and courage to live your own life, because
so many people want you to live their idea of what your life should
be.
But
they are not you, and their values and goals and dreams are theirs,
not yours. Only you are you, so find out who you are and how you want
to live and what you want to do. Take as much time as you need to
do this. Don’t be afraid of changing your mind or of making
mistakes, because these are part of the journey of living your own
life. Explore different paths, keep learning and growing, and don’t
be afraid of wandering off into the unknown, because that wilderness
is where great people are born.
My
older brother and I took different paths after high school. He went
to college, got married, had two kids, went to law school and became
a lawyer. Following my heart, I traveled around the world and lived
in Europe, the Middle East, and India. I had a lot of adventures,
most of which were X- rated, while he had a lot of adventures that
were more PG-rated. To this day, I am not a lawyer and I am not married
and I don’t have two kids. I don’t even have a dog. Come
to think of it, I don’t even have a house plant. Never mind:
different strokes for different folks.
However,
my brother and I are friends, and we share what we have each learned
and thus we enrich each other’s lives. My brother was not wrong,
and neither was I. We each followed the true path of our own life.
Though our paths and lives are different, we enjoy and share the same
passion for authentic living. In a word, we are each happy, which
is what I hope you will be.
And
remember: houses, cars, boats, and big bank accounts are not who you
are, they are just things you own. Who you are has more to do with
character and integrity, and how you treat people, and whether or
not you love what you do.
The
second principle is: Be persistent. Don’t give up.
Keep building your dream, whatever it is. Imagine how many difficulties
Noah must have had when he started to build his ark. I’m sure
he maxed out his credit cards and borrowed even more money from anyone
who would lend him some. He had to work weekends, and vacations were
definitely out. People laughed and thought he was crazy. Still, he
stuck with it, and history tells us that Noah had the last laugh.
Thomas
Edison racked up over 10,000 failed experiments before he invented
the light bulb. Be persistent, but also be flexible. Flexibility allows
us to learn from our mistakes, and to learn from others.
Persistence
means to just keep at it, and flexibility means to embrace change
when necessary.
The
third principle is: Respect other people, especially those
people you don’t like or who are so different from you that
you are sure they come from another galaxy. A Buddhist version of
this principle might be: do no harm. The Buddha used to say this all
the time: do no harm. Instead of saying “Hi” or “How
are you?” he would say “Do no harm.”
Respecting
other people invites them to respect you. If you do no harm to others,
and others do no harm to you, can you imagine what a lovely planet
this would be?
The
fourth principle is: Express gratitude and appreciation to
everyone every day. This is a hard one for me, because I tend to be
self-absorbed, and I forget to acknowledge other people. But for anyone
reading this who has experienced the sudden loss of a loved one, you
know what I mean. The first thing that comes to our mind is: “I
never said ‘I love you’.”
Expressing
gratitude and appreciation is a form of saying “I love you,”
which is a form of respect. It only takes a moment, but it makes all
the difference in the world. This is how we create heaven on earth.
For
example, around you are the teachers who have given their very best
effort, day after day, year after year, to help you, to teach you,
to care for you. You may never see them again. Wouldn’t it be
fun to go to each one and say, “Thank you for all you have done
and tried to do to make me a better person. I love you.” I know
you would have friends for life, and you would feel great.
You
could also say this to your parents as you leave home for college,
or wherever else you may be heading. I know they would be deeply appreciative.
The
fifth principle is: Now is the only time there is. Make now
count. It’s fine to plan ahead, to set goals, and to wonder
about where you want to be in five or ten years. But life is unpredictable,
and in five years you might be worm food. I hope not, but you never
know. Even as you look ahead and plan ahead, make sure your feet,
head, and heart are planted firmly in now, this minute, because that
is all we have. There are no guarantees about tomorrow.
This
moment is where we live our unique life, where we demonstrate who
we are. Be your very best in this moment. Face your fears in this
moment. Speak the truth of your heart in this moment. Live from the
depths of your soul in this moment. If you do, tomorrow and the day
after will exceed your wildest dreams.
The
sixth, and final, principle is: Don’t become cynical
and selfish. I know there are a lot of things wrong in our world,
and that we all face an uncertain future. It may seem that we can’t
change things, or that the world is not our business. But the world
is our business, and we can change things. Don’t cop out, stay
involved, be heard. Stand up for righteousness and justice for all.
Take
care of yourself and your families, but also make a contribution to
others. Find a way to be of service to your community, and to the
world in which we live. We should all pitch in and make this Earth
a better place for our children, and for their children, and for theirs.
Keep a positive outlook, be optimistic, and help those less fortunate
than you. And, of course, always, always be kind to children.
So,
that’s it. I’ve just given you my best pitch. I know you
will develop your own principles of living as the years roll by, but
maybe something I’ve said will help you along your way. You
should be very proud of yourselves. You have worked hard and you have
achieved much. I sincerely applaud each and every one of you, and
I wish that you all have magnificent and honorable lives.
Thank
you, and good luck.
