Saturday, January 14, 2012

Reading Gandhi

In a self-improvement book, "The Success Principle", the author admonishes  us  to read autobiographies of great men and women. For he contends great knowledge, wisdom and good life skills, practical experience  to be gleaned/adopted, acquired/imbibed from those books. The author for the same reason mocks those people who spent their precious time watching other people in movies, and televisions. Those according to this successful men is a distraction, a waste of time.  Hence I have detached myself from the idiot box and make effort to understand the lives of great men. My first pick is Gandhi's autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth. I am mesmerized by his stories. Gandhi's struggle, and his insistence on truth and his effort toward self realization is extremely inspirational. His ideas and wisdom resonates with me deeply.
I have only go through half of the book and there are interesting quotes that I come across and i would like to put them down.


Of parents and children's upbring, Gandhi echoes with what His Holiness the Dalai Lama preach today. The importance of parents influence and role in fostering children's education and wellbeing and how can mother's affection,warmth  can affect the children's future. Gandhi urged that parents and children should not be physically separated. They should remain together at their earlist ages, for  parents are the first line of teacher for their kids. They will leave an indelible mark on their impressionable mind. As Gandhi said " The education of the child begins with the conception. The physical and mental state of the parents at the moment of conception  are reproduced in the baby. Then during the period of pregnancy it continues to be affected by the mother's moods, desires and temperament, as also by her ways of life. After  birth the child imitates the parents, and for a considerable number of years entirely depends on them for its growth".(page 204).

As my wife is in her second pregnancy, it is a timely advice appear to be intended to us. His Holiness the Dalai Lama often cites of the power of mother's compassion. A child who has received maximum affection and love from the parents at their formidable years are grow up to become more compassionate and caring person. Whereas the contrary is the truth for those children who were abused, and neglected tend to be more insecure and troublesome.   I believe there must be such a correlation between parent's treatment their young ones and the quality of their adult life.


Another quote from Ghandi's book is "Things that are heard of  from distance appear to be bigger than they are" is true to what i have been witnessing in my life.