Learn to face the worse

“Can you imagine of a life that’s void of everything what you enjoy today?” True, you might feel horrible when I pose the above question to one of my affluent friends, he raised his eye brows and drew a long breath, after a pause he gave an answer.

“Oh! no, I can’t even think of a life without my job, my car, my house, my children and wife. No man no...... I don’t think such a calamity will befall me. Do you think that one day I will lose everything?”

“It might happen.” Though I wanted to tell that to him, I saved my breath lest he would mistake me. That’s quite natural. We are not ready to lose what we have. We have not eliminated our worldly longings or mundane requirements. Those desires can be found in everyone.

According to Buddhism, in order to be void of desires, one should attain the state of “Arhanth.” The Buddha showed that as the only way of getting rid of all kind of suffering.

I randomly posed the above question to my friends. The answer most of them gave me was very similar to the answer of my rich friend.

It took sometime for me to receive a deviated answer from the above. That was when I was chatting with another person. I drew her attention to the area of my question. She gave me quite a different answer. “I don’t know what my future will hold for me. Yes, I might lose everything in future what I enjoy today. That’s my fate.”

“So, what will you do, if you lose everything?” I asked a bit emotional question. But she didn’t seem to change her facial expression or appeared to be excited. “I have the strength within to meet any worse situation in my life. Because no one can evade trouble if the person deserves it.” She smiled.

“Are you sure that you will be able to act according to what you said if you face a calamity?” I inquired to clarify her answer further more. “Yes, I have understood the reality of my life.”

As many of my friends said they are afraid to meet with a calamity, that means to lose what they already have. They are even afraid to think of such a misfortune.

Think of people who were stricken by the Tsunami catastrophe. Did they ever think that they would meet with such a calamity? Had they ever got ready to face such a calamity.

They might not have seen such a thing even in their dreams. It happened all of a sudden shattering their dreams, depriving them of their still belongings and moreover the lives of their loved ones.

Some have lost parts of their body and now have become disabled. That’s an example for people to think that unexpected things might occur at anytime to anyone.

Jesus Christ’s life too is an example of such nature. No one would had thought that Jesus would be inflicted upon a crucification.

Having lived in Jerusalem and delivering his disciples the words of God, such a noble human being was ultimately crucified by ignorant enemies. No one would had anticipated such a misfortune to befall their religious leader.

But, Jesus under went that pain, and resurrected. He knew the nature of the world. He was ready to meet with any calamity. Because a human’s life could never be predicted. Therefore the crucification brought him no astonishment. He met it with a calm mind neither being over whelmed with sorrow nor making a fuss over what he encountered.

“Everything is perishable”. The Buddha taught. Why the we worry over perishable things. Sooner or later we will lose everything we have perhaps before that we will lose our lives.

If you can get ready beforehand for what will happen to you in future. It will lesson your sorrow of losing them. As Chief monk Punna, who ordained the Buddha’s Chief Assistant cum Tresurer of Dhamma. monk Ananda, taught his Student a Precious lesson.

“See a faded flower through a bloomed one, see a broken glass through an ordinary one. If you would be wise enough to act according to that, you will not have slightest suffering or sorrow, when the glass is broken or and the flower is faded.”

Practically it may be difficult at the beginning to think of a worst scenario which might happen to you. Say, if you have a lover, would you be able to think that he or she would leave you in another two month’s time, Thinking of such a situation itself would be miserable.

But when you have to face such a situation your life will turn upside down. You might have experienced it yourself or might have seen abundantly in society how people suffer after they are abandoned by their lover.

They appear half dead and emotionally paled. The reason is that the situation they have faced was never imagined or thought of. The pain or suffering would be lesser if they were able to get read for the worse that can happen to them as monk Punna advised if they were able to see a broken love affair when they start the affair would result a little pain. Splitting off of affairs would not lead to Suicides.

I read in a book a scholar himself had written of his experience of how he felt when he was to face the worse situation which was never expected.

“I was extreamly competitive to achieve good grades at college. I worked so hard that I was hundred percent sure that I would score a higher class. But I failed two subjects, when the results were out, a black cloud of depression hung over me and for a number of nights that followed, I found it difficult to sleep. Certain classmates of mine even took pleasure in my failure. What had occurred had been totally unexpected. I was sad for the next few days.

This had gravely affected me. The depression in to which I fell did not help in the least, and it had no effect what so ever in changing my failed grades into passed ones.” This is common situation students often face. They keep high expectations and build castles in the air but when they have to accept what they deserve or in other words the reality, they are unable to meet the situation with a calm mental condition. They often suffered from depression stress and various types of mental diseascs.

“Who ever is mentally prepared for bankruptcy in his business will not worry over partial losses”

An Arabian Writer.