4th May 2011
`The life of a man consists not in seeing visions and in dreaming dreams, but in active charity and in willing service'
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
What will make you to persist asking for help or persist extending help? Especially when it comes to asking for help, an external factor is in control. You cannot be sure how the other person is going to take your request for help. You cannot expect that everyone will be as interested in your project as you are. The situation is more complicated when you seek help to benefit someone else.
You will experience this when you take up a project of public interest. In this you are not the beneficiary and your project is going to help someone else. For example you start a club or association to preserve the environment. Or you start a magazine to propagate some values in the society. Or start a old age home. In these situations, you need the help and support of a wide range of people. The larger the project, the bigger will be the task of resource mobilization. Especially when you are not in a position to influence others, you will find it extremely difficult to solicit and get help. On these occasions, the degree of your perseverance will be in direct proportion to how much you are dedicated to your project.
Somewhere I read an anecdote about Mother Teresa, and I don't know if it is true. But the content of what I read impressed me a lot and I would like to present the same.
The story goes back to the initial days when Mother Teresa started her charitable society to help the poor and needy. Obviously she was in need of lot of help. We approached a lot of people in Calcutta. Some helped and some others did not. Some went to the extent of abusing her saying that she is in the project of converting people from one religion to another. But Mother knew that her mission is very noble and sacred.
There was one very wealthy person in Calcutta whom she approached persistently. But he did not help her. She persisted in asking for help. He got very angry and irritated and abused her. But she did not give up. One day, she went and asked him to help with stretched hands seeking his help. It is said that he got so angry that he spit on her palms. But, mother looked at his face and calmly said, `Sir, I will take this for me, but give something else for my destitute children!'. These sincere words touched the emotions of that rich person and donated a lot of money and property!
As I said, I do not know if the above incident took place, but the moral of the story is very important: you will not stop asking for help, if you sincerely and honestly want help!
A crying child gets milk!
N C Sridharan
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