munkmind

Buzz!! goes the alarm throwing you out of your comfortable sleep. You feel the silence around with few little sounds of other similar awake souls. Then you think – Snooze and go back to the warmth of the bed shutting the world behind your eyes; or – Wake Up!

The Snooze button is a very friendly, non-progressive mechanism. It supports the state of mind which says “Oh, just a few more minutes”, or “I worked so hard, I deserve to sleep more”. If its so much to take, dont keep the alarm in the first place. Ah, the ego just got hit there! – “How can you say that, I do want to wake up….”

Well this is just the beginning of the day..

Our system is like a child which needs to be nurtured daily. If you care for a child between years 4 and 7 and say I have done enough and it will grow to be a great person, you are fooling yourself. Instead, everyday you grow it, until it can care for itself. Even then, you keep an eye, just in case.

Similarly, our system needs daily nurturing.

The PHYSICAL – needs to be nurtured through regular exercise, planned food regimen, no bad habits, physical grooming such as shaves, haircuts, moisturising, pedicures, dental checks, medical checks etc.

The EMOTIONAL – needs to be nurtured through regular reminders of gratitude, empathy, selfless support, lack of sarcasm, lending a shoulder, remorse etc.

The MENTAL – needs to be nurtured through constant practise of Never Give-up attitude, fearlessness, enduring pain as part of process, doing right always, perseverance, grit, determination, motivation to others, relentlessness and self-push.

The SPIRITUAL – needs to be nurtured through constant reminders of the power beyond us which created this system, of ego as a strength to respect the system and not as a tool to put others down, of understanding that others are also the product of the same power beyond, to work towards realizing the potential of this system and maximizing its power, and to help others do the same.

All the four parts of the system work in sync and affect each other positively or negatively. 

Many of us go through our daily life with constant appreciation of life or complaints of how its been unfair. Little do we realize that the grade at which we keep our system operating, impacts the kind of energies we draw or propagate.

We complain of less time, but we hit the snooze – yeah! We complain of being tired, being irritated, being low, losing interest in life; of people not caring about us; but the truth is we fail daily at nurturing the 4 parts. Like the child who grows up to be a gem or a mere stone, nurture affects our system as well. But, we have to understand that it takes tremondous effort, beyond comfort, beyond pain, beyond boundaries. Once its done consistently, like a habit – it gets hard coded into the system. Then you would function more efficiently, more effectively, more happily, more intentionally and more satisfactorily.

But, the underlying point in all of this is consistent, daily effort. “Oh, I have nothing to do much today, hence I pressed snooze”  – Gone – one more opportunity to nurture the system lost due to self constraint. The greats, the legends realize this early on – that nothing beats effort and hard work. They wake-up every day, nurture the system, rest the system and again move.

Some noteworthy examples: Roger Federer said in one of the interviews that he trains for almost 10,000 hours – almost 2 years at 15 hours each day for a major series. Thomas Alva Edison failed 1000 times before the 1st light bulb lit up. Michael Jordan missed 9000 shots in his career, but was a legend. Internationally acclaimed basketball players Kobe Bryant and Dwayne Wade are known for their perseverance. They are back at the gym the next day after every series to practise. There are many hundreds of such examples. All these examples indicate a simple point – It doesnt matter whether a tournament, event, review or promotion is coming up or not; it matters that you are ALWAYS PREPARED.

When you work with the a goal of being Always Prepared, then your system becomes efficient like a well lubricated and maintained machine. Up your skills, practise daily, learn constantly. Because when the event comes up eventually, you dont have to prepare more, you are already operating at a prepared level.

Break the rut, Move, Be prepared, Be legendary!