Thus I Became Stress Free
Oh, really?
by
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That incident is quite vivid in my mind. I was only 12 years of age and never even heard of stress problems. My father* was getting ready to go to the house of a common friend, Mr. Jindal. Mr. Jindal had invited a learned saint who would handle the problem of his devotees. It was a fine Sunday morning. After reluctantly taking bath, I was sitting in our kitchen eating my typical favorite Punjabi breakfast that my mother was cooking on old styled charcoal grill. It was so delicious, as usual, I kept eating irrespective of my needs or even irrespective of space in my stomach. As I started feeling full, my mother asked me if I needed more. I reluctantly said no and she quickly wound up and went to get ready to give company to my father. My father asked me to get ready so as to accompany them. I was in no mood to go anywhere on this rare holiday and requested him to let me play. Immediately came a reprimand “You don’t want to learn anything good. Babaji (as he called that saint) has solution to all problems”. But I did not have any problems other than some spanking by schoolteachers now and then. Anyway I had to accompany my parents to join the congregation. Mr. Jindal’s house was about half a mile from our home. We walked down to that place. There were about 35 to 40 people in the living room. Most of them were family friends. We found a place to sit right in front by the side of our neighbor, Sharma Ji. How I wished we could have sat somewhere in the rear. The saint was speaking something about spirituality, God and Karma , which sometimes I would hear as part of sentences. The saint, known as Baba Ji, was a very typical looking old wise man with flowing white beard. He was bearing some mysteriously calm smile on his face adding lot of grace to his personality. He was wearing a white kurta and white dhoti. He was sitting on an ‘asan’ (a raised platform covered with cushioned mattress) with folded hands. Every now and then he would raise and wave his hands to emphasize some point and again would go back to his position of folded hands. Everybody, intermittently, was nodding his/her head as if to communicate their understanding and acceptance of the utterances of Baba Ji. Suddenly I heard the saint addressing my father. “Harivansh, I understand you have lot of problems”. (Although my father’s first name was Harbans, Baba Ji used to address him like this only) “Yes, Baba Ji”, my father responded by standing up with folded hands. “I can take care of most of them right now”, said the saint. “I am sure you would Baba Ji. I will be really grateful”, my father said while bowing a little bit to the front. “How many problems do you have? Can you give me a rough figure?” “May be 20 to 25” my father did not want to look ignorant of his proclaimed problems. *My father, Shri Harbans Rai Joshi, passed away in 1974. All this conversation is translated form Hindi. “How many of these are due to unrealistic wishes?” “None, Baba Ji” “Do those keep you bothering all the time?” “Yes, Baba Ji” “OK, let me write those down on a piece of paper, umm…. The biggest problem on the top … go ahead, I am writing”, said the saint while picking up a notebook and a pencil. Now was the turn of my father to start telling the problems. He was trying to start with a long list of problems but was little staggering. Finally he started. “I don’t have enough money for education of my children”. “Next”. “I have chronic back pain”. “Next”. “My wife keeps arguing with me on petty things”. “Next”. “My elder son does not have a good job”. By now my father had started really hesitating. He was noticing mischievous smile on the faces of his friends. But he bravely continued. “My younger son is not good at studies”. “Next”. “My…my house needs major upgrading”. “Next”. “My boss creates problems for me in the office”. “Next”. “My neighbors are jealous of me”. “Next”. But before my father spoke further, Sharma Ji shouted “That is my problem too”. Obviously my father had run out of his so-called long list of problems and was feeling embarrassed on his last stated problem. In order to escape from the unpleasant situation, he hurriedly said that he had no more problems. “You said you had 20 to 25 problems. But as I count those on list, you have only 8 problems. So nearly 15 problems are already taken care just by making a list”, mused Baba Ji. “And even out of 8 problems some are perceived problems and do not appear to be actual problems”, continued Baba Ji. By now every body was wondering whether they had any big problems they could not handle. Then Baba Ji said, “Now Harivansh I want to ask you a few questions”. “Yes, Baba Ji”, said my father submissively. “Do you own a house?” “Yes, Baba Ji” “Are you married?” “Yes, Baba Ji” “Are your family members mentally sound?” “Yes, Baba Ji”. “Do you have children?” “Yes, Baba Ji”. “Do they have some chronic disease or physical disabilities?” “No, Baba Ji” “Do you have a job?” “Yes, Baba Ji” “Do you have any difficulty in feeding your family?” “No, Baba Ji” “Now, whether lack of any of these things I asked would be a bigger problem than any of the 8 problems you listed?” “Definitely, Baba Ji” “Harivansh, there are lot of similar things you have, lack of any one of which would be far bigger problem for you than the ones on your list”. “Yes, Baba Ji. I understand. Thanks a lot. I don’t have any problem. I am fortunate to realize it”. Saying this, my father sat down with cheerful face. Then Baba Ji asked, “Who else has lot of problems?” Nobody was ready to volunteer after seeing my father’s list of problems. Then one devotee took the lead and said with folded hands, “Baba Ji you have enlightened us today. We unnecessarily keep thinking all the time that we are the cursed ones having biggest problems of the world”. “Yes, that’s what I want all of you to realize. We should be thankful to the almighty for what He has given us and not complain for what He has not given us. That is the only way to have a peaceful happy life”. The saint then continued giving worldly advice as to how to be content and happy. “You have to count your blessings, and not curses. Everybody in this world has some problem or the other. If you keep looking only at your curses, you can never be happy because everybody at any given time can find some deficiencies in life. Always be positive. God always helps you the way you want to help yourself. If you think negatively, that means you are trying to help yourself in a negative way. Same negative way would the God’s help come. If you think positively, you would get helped by God in a positive way. Choice is yours”. And many more wise sermons followed. After sometime, prasadam was served and everybody left for his/her home after observing usual formalities. I kept wondering about the existence of problems and solution to those problems. I almost forgot about this incident until I had my own family and was in my late thirties.
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About the Book
Whether you have ever pondered in some of your free time that why you are doing whatever you are doing? In most cases the answer would be:
• To have more money.
• To help my family.
• To get higher education.
• To achieve fame etc. etc. and many different answers like this.
But if you try to look little deeper, don't you think that all the answers are same, namely, ‘To achieve happiness’.
Each of us is defining the same thing in his/her own way depending on one's priorities.
This could also be said this way:
• To have less sadness.
• To have less worries.
• To have less problems etc. etc. and many more answers like this.
This being a very broad topic let us for the present concentrate on having less worries
Or,
‘Being worry free’.
Though it is not the same, but being Stress Free comes very close to it.
It is not that by some magic wand you would start having no problems, but it could be very possible that you could handle the problems in a different way, or you could manage your stress causing sources in a better way.
Said in a different way,
You could manage to be Stress Free.
That aspect of 'managing' is dealt with in this book.
About the Author
I had been hearing about stress and stress related problems for quite some time. I came across close friends and relatives who always talked of negative things about life and looked always burdened with some unknown problem. I could not realize the gravity until I started having loss of concentration in my work myself due to petty disturbing instances. While trying to figure out my problem, I suddenly recollected the instance of my childhood where problems were solved only by looking at those from a different angle. That instance is described in Chapter 1 of this book. Most of my career has been administrative and managerial. I have run my own business, worked for government department, semi government company and private companies. I have lived in 10 different states in India, each state having vastly different culture. I have lived in African continent and presently I am living in U.S.A. I hold Ph.D. in ‘Coordination Chemistry’. This complements my capability to study, analyze and resolve a problem and then present its solution in an organized and effective manner. My expertise in managing stress is akin to anyone among the masses. That I believe is a Big Plus because it makes my thinking, feeling, experiences, problems and solutions just like those for anybody else. That also means that analysis would be more effective and matching with the common person’s requirement. I don’t care what medical experts or other authorities on this subject say about medical treatments of this ‘projected’ complex problem. Yes, I call it ‘projected’ because the vested interests in multi trillion medical industry never support any treatment that does not take you to hospital. How could they? They have to have customers to sell new drugs on the discovery of which they have spent lot of money. I have experienced lot of vicissitudes in life. Following some techniques from my past experiences and learning new techniques to handle stress made me feel so stress free, and it was so simple that I felt an urge to share it with the world. It would be worth my effort even if a few people could benefit from what I have learnt. The instance quoted in the very first chapter of the book basically coveys everything this book is about. The detailed instance covered therein mainly re-enforces the expression 'The things change if you change the way you look at them'. There are a number of depressing things those affect every one in day-to-day life. Everyone handles most of these problems successfully without really being aware of doing so. But many people don't handle the remaining problems in an organized way. This book is an effort to help reader handle the day-to-day problems without being stressed. The book presents the reader with different scenarios with suggested approach. Potential sources of stress with related scenarios are included for easy grasp. You would come across a number of stress releasers those could help in a number of different situations. While explaining various stress-releasers, information about some important ‘kriyas’ of YOGA has been provided in detail. One chapter has been devoted to practical ‘Hands-On’ procedure to follow for achieving the desired results. There are lot of interesting one liners used in the book to effectively bring the point home. One could read first chapter of this book under the link ‘Chapter One’ by visiting my website ‘www.howibecamestressfree.com'. Overall approach of this book is to help the reader minimize his/her stress level by conscious effort to achieve a wonderfully relaxed life style.