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Let’s be Ready

I was facilitating a session for senior managers on Time Management. To being with, I have taken all of them through a hypothetical situation. I told them, God forbids, if all of them are told by their doctors, that they have only one month to live more, what all pending jobs they will try to finish before they are no more. This has taken a few minutes for everyone to consume. Once they internalized the scenario, there was pin drop silence in the hall and I have noticed everyone engrossed in deep thoughts. Around fifteen minutes passed, the silence was unbearable, and suddenly one middle aged person broke the silence in chocked voice, “I can’t complete all these in mere thirty days”. Then the second one said, “my daughter needs a Barbie house”, third one said, “I have to repay my home loan”…and so on and so forth.
Though this exercise was only to establish the importance of time management and prioritizing in our life, but did we ever think about this? This may happen to any of us, one fine morning, one can realize that, days are numbered. That sweet but inevitable death is not far and many pending jobs to complete!
We know that best approach to life is to live in present, without thinking too much about past and future. But when one realizes that only another couple of days are left, then one needs to concentrate on future. I have seen my mother going through this phase. When doctors pronounced that only about six months left for her, we thought of letting her know about this. She should be mentally prepared. When the initial shock was over for her, she used to tell us about uncompleted tasks which she would like to see before her last day. She expressed that she would like to visit Varanasi once, and take a boat ride in river Ganga there. May be, before this, in her life time she has never realized that a boat ride in Varanasi may give her a fulfilling death. And, the evening when she was looking at the evening aarti at Dashawamedh Ghat  from the boat, I have noticed tears of fulfillment from her eyes.
Have we ever pondered upon that “pending job” in our life, which, if completed, can give us a fulfilling death? For one, it may be getting his daughter’s room painted in a Barbie theme, for other, it may be securing his family’s future with enough bank balance. This needs a serious thought and the most fulfilling desire has to be captured. Then we need to work for that, and work really hard for that. Because we never know when this show is going to be stopped and without that fulfillment in life, death will not be a sweet one. Let’s be ready to embrace the inevitable in a sweeter note and let’s not curse her that she has come untimely.
Bitter facts, but true !!

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