Few words for mentation to my dear classmates

I joined this course with one and only objective i.e. to get out as fast as possible with a job, the reason being the difficult circumstances under which I decided to take up this course. This course was the silver lining for me to pull myself together and bounce back after a few stumbling blocks which I encountered in my life. I always believe that stumbling blocks are path correctors. They serve as an opportunity to rectify wrong 

decisions we make.

Happy Moments 

According to me, DECISIONS, which we take at different times in our lives is the most important factor that steers our life. It acts like the rudder of a ship. If we steer the rudder in the wrong direction, then there is a good possibility that your ship will get grounded and vice versa. Good decisions give us good results and bad decisions give us bad and sometimes disastrous results. Decisions we take have the power to temporarily and sometimes permanently affect our life. A lot of what we are today is the consequence of the decisions which we have taken in the past.  If our situation right now in our life is good it is because we took good and wise decisions and if we find ourselves  in a mess that is also because of a decision which we have taken in the past. My life is a live example.  But let’s leave that story for another day.  So in short, we can safely conclude what we are right now are the consequences of a variety of decisions we have taken in our life.  To strengthen my argument let’s say people today come and compliment you for being person with lots of patience, love and an ability to understand others. Well if you introspect a  little more deeply into your life,  I am sure you will see the origins of this present character of yours in some decisions you made earlier in life. When someone hurt you badly instead of getting back at the person you decided to forgive that person, see why he/she behaved badly with you and in this way understood that person. You then decided instead to bear with that person irrespective of how bad you felt. As time went by you became a more patience person, understanding the others point of view, loving others more and this is exactly what others saw in you. The decisions you made at that point of suffering and hurt in your life became a stepping stone to build your character. Imagine that instead of forgiving you decided to hit back. As years go by that becomes a part of your character and you become a difficult person to live with. 

Now taking the right decision alone is not enough. The timing too is very important. Here I would like to bring in to your notice the season’s of life. When I joined Loyola and was going through a crisis I wrote a long letter to my dad. He replied the very next week with another long letter talking about the season’s of life.  A farmer knows in his wisdom that he has to work hard to raise a crop and he decides to work harder. But he has to sow seeds at the right time i.e. the rainy season. If he sows it in the summers it will be too late for him to get any crop at all. In the same way we should take the right decisions in the right season. Here let the reader note that the seasons in the environment come and go but seasons in life come only once. If we miss the bus the bus will never come back.

Why am I telling all this to you? It is because all us who are young and bubbling with energy are in a very crucial season in our life. Many a decisions you take today will determine your course for the rest of your life. I am too in that stage. But the difference is I am almost at the end of this season and at the threshold of another. I don’t have any chance to make any mistake. I have already made many mistakes in this season and the “stumbling block mechanism” which I believe is a quality control tool God has enabled to immediately rectify wrong decisions has saved and corrected me. Coming to Rajagiri is the result of this corrective mechanism. But a lot of you are in the middle of this season and have a lot of chances to experiment with decisions see how it goes and rectify it if needed. Hence, I appeal to you to make full use of the opportunity experiment with good decisions fine tune it and thus move into the next season of your life as better and strong human beings with impeccable character which will stand the test of times.

Lets decide to study well, take the lecturers and their lectures seriously even though it might be boring, be organized in our life affairs thoughts and in our rooms. An organized and clean room I believe is the first step towards an organized life. Let’s also decide to forgive people, set higher moral, professional and spiritual benchmarks. Let’s decide as a matter of principle never to the completely blame others for anything in our lives. (You always clap using two hands not one. In the same way if there a problem remember that you too along with the other person play a part in the problem). Decide to take active part in group assignment lest you carry on that trait of being a bad team player to the next season. If we are mindful of all these I am sure we all will only be prosperous financially but also spiritually thus building up a fine perfect and a balanced character.

In a Tribal Museum in Gumla, Jharkhand

Yes, I did join this course just to get a degree and pass. But in the last two years YOU PEOPLE HAPPENED IN MY LIFE. And now I hope to leave this place seeing all my friends and classmates taking the right decisions in the right season and making a difference in their lives and in other’s lives.

God bless you all.

Ashwin Joseph