Thursday, June 7, 2007

Walk the talk


Walk the talk


It is early morning and I was taking my bath. I was in great hurry to start from the home to honour an appointment. One of my friends had called me from Hyderabad. My friend usually will not hang the phone without chitchatting for a minimum of 15 minutes, even if I am in a hurry. So I told my wife to say that I had gone away. My son who had been watching all this loudly objected to my falsehood. It was only couple of days back I had given him the credo of speaking the truth. Why we should not lie. And how god will punish those who speak lies. And now I was going back on my words in a couple of days. You know how ashamed I felt. Why could not I just conveyed to my friend that I was in such a hurry that I cannot speak to him now. What hindered me?

Perhaps most of us had such moments of disgrace when we cannot uphold the values and principle we profess and like to follow. Why do we falter at crucial junctures? Does it show a lack of commitment to our values ? Or is it due to our lack of conviction in them ? I believe both. If we truly believe the credo of truth, honesty, justice etc. We would definitely give our life to honour them.

There have been simple men who lived their life with meaning and never bothered to worry the history writers. They are nameless but they stuck on to their task of following their heart. And then there have been the mahatmas who created history. Where do I stand? Can I live by my values and ideals I profess? Can I “walk my talk”?

My left-brain says that I should consider the strategy of carefully choosing my ‘talk’. Do not advice what you yourself cannot follow. There is an interesting anecdote my 5th standard class teacher told us. One-day mother brought a boy to Gandhiji and complained that he was eating lot of sweets and his teeth are getting spoilt. But he is still unwilling to stop the habit. Gandhiji was silent for a few minutes. After much though he asked the mom to bring back the boy after two weeks. When she did return, the mahatma advised the brat to stop eating sweets. The mother was very curious as to why he had not done this advice earlier. He replied that he himself was eating sweets a lot, and how could he reprimand the boy!

But there is a serious flaw in that kind of thinking. If we only talk what we could walk, then we would restrict our values. Then we would be careful in choosing to follow our values. In that case we would be only fooling ourselves. The values are built into our conscience. They are meticulously built into our mental framework during our childhood, by our parents and important others. We cannot just follow a few values and choose to ignore some. We would feel the pangs of conscience. There might creep up in our mind an uneasy feeling that we cannot attribute to any tangible cause. To avoid this we should be holistic in our implementation of values.

I am resolving to go through my life enabling the outward expression of my core values. While in the process I feel my every mental muscle of will power being stretched to its limit. It is painful initially. But I feel happy that I am transcending the banal desires and impulses and showing the way for my kids. The extraordinary responsibility of raising kids in these crazy times rest on us. We may have to repent a lot later if pseudo values corrupt our kids. By ‘pseudo values’ I am referring to the hedonistic superficial values of pure self-gratification.

So the tremendous importance of walking our talk is self-evident. Our family and thereafter the society depend upon people who walk the talk. If the scientists, bureaucrats, policy makers, social advocates and more importantly swamis’s, Christian fathers, and imam’s - the moral custodians of the society of religion do not practice what they preach then the societal structures will crumble under an adventitious crisis. Already very much aware of the ills of our society due to the hypocrisy and nepotism of the politicians. But the responsibility of upholding the principles does not stop with them. Each one of us should realize that it is up to us follow the philosophy of life we believe will facilitate our spiritual growth, help our family realize its potential and harmonious living in the society we belong.