Who is the Wisest?

Sometime back, I remember to have heard a thought provoking joke on varying human perspectives. The minister of a large country decided to visit an island under his jurisdiction. The Minister traveled for days by train and car and boat to this furthest island in the nation. As he surveyed the bleak but inspiring landscape, he turned to a local villager and said: "You're very remote here, aren't you?" She responded: "Remote from what?" In real life, we consider some people to be suffering, some celebrating, some desperate. We have to admit that all these passions and subtle levels of understandings in life greatly depend upon the nature of perspective we hold. To learn more about the magnitude of differences perspectives cause, let us go through these life situations. 

It was a partially cool afternoon and a little boy was on his knees scooping and packing the sand with plastic shovels into a bright blue bucket. The little boy architect worked all afternoon spooning out the moat or fixing the walls and finally a castle city was created on the sea shore. Bottle tops were sentries, popsicle sticks formed bridges. It was a charming sandcastle anyway. This pretty narration of the boy on the sea shore connected my thoughts to a congested model corporate office of the day.

It was certainly the other side of technology, which is considered soft but quite wild. Aside the busy streets and rumbling traffic of the city, there sits a man with his head buried in stacks of projects and assignments. A mobile phone is always on his shoulder which is shrugged to please his ear. His fingers are always busy punching the keyboard. Numbers are juggled and contracts are signed and much to the delight of the man, a profit is made. All his life he works, formulating the plans and forecasting the future. Here, Annuities are sentries and Capital gains are bridges. Spending all his life, he builds an empire, quite real according to our standards.  

Two builders of two castles. They have much in common. They shape granules into grandeurs. They see nothing and make something. They are diligent and determined. And for both the tide will rise and the end will come. Yet that is where the similarities cease. Watch the boy as the dusk approaches and the waves encroach. The child jumps to his feet excited and begins to clap. He might have no regret, no sorrow or  any fear. He knew this would happen. He is not surprised. And when the great breaker crashes into his castle and his masterpiece is sucked into the sea, he smiles. He smiles, picks up his tools, takes his father’s hand, and goes home. For the boy sees the end while the man ignores it. As for the grown up entrepreneur once the wave of years collapses on his castle he is terrified. He hovers over the sandy monument to protect it. He blocks the waves from the walls he has made. Salt-water soaked and shivering he snarls at the incoming tide. “It’s my castle,” he defies. 

I do not know who originally wrote this piece of thought. However, I’m sure that this little story could change my attitude further. What that came to my mind is the truth that it is always our attitude  that decides our present.

Joseph Mattappally