Thank You!

How many words are there in English language? It’s hard to answer this question. Even those conditions which decide a word are not fully agreed upon. The second edition of the 20 volume Oxford English Dictionary contains 171,476 words in current use, and 47,156 obsolete words. However, a question on the most powerful word combination in the language has always a clear answer. It is ‘Thank You’. We often miss out on the fact that people really want to be appreciated. We see people choosing a work place depending upon the appreciation they get. Making ‘thank you’ part of vocabulary changes any one’s destiny. That recognition you give to others helps you to complete every interaction more than a success. Setting aside 10 minutes to thank everyone related to you that week do wonders in your relationship with them. Appreciate both your superiors and inferiors. Punish in private and praise in public is a good policy to be adopted.

I remember an old folk story. A boy and his friends happened to come aside an unusually huge tree. They were hungry. To his surprise, the boy heard the tree speaking. It said, “Use the magical words and I will give you and your friends a nice treat.” The boy and his friends tried all magical words they knew - Abracadabra to Ajji Majji la Tarajji . Nothing happened. At last the boy turned to the tree and requested it, “Please tell us the magical words, dear tree.” Immediately, a door opened on its’ trunk. As the boy and his friends entered the tree trunk, they said, “Thank you.”  The moment they said thank you, the interior of the tree lit up and they saw a table loaded with the most delicious dishes they yearned for. The moral of the story tells us that Thank you and Please are the magical words in the language.

Sometime back, I happened to be in a mechanical workshop, managed by an engineer I knew. In spite of all his talents, he has ever been struggling to make both ends meet. His workshop always had only a few other laborers. He was busy at work, when I met him there. He asked me to wait a little and I did so. In between I saw himself bursting upon his helper every time the helper did something which he did not intend. My long withheld question was answered. I understood that he never uses these magical words, which would have changed his destiny. Filling every interaction with things and beings with an expression of thank you is all that we need to do to win man and God alike.  Download these Words; it is free!

Joseph Mattappally