Parenting - Self Esteem of your child

Thiruvalluvar 5000 years ago wrote 1330 couplets about life codes which is a manual of life even today. According to him we are the sculptures of our child. About our children's self esteem he wrote:

"If your child had poor self-esteem, it is because you advice them more than you encourage them"

Self esteem is the core of anyone's behaviour which means how much we respect and value ourselves as a human being. It dramatically varies from person to person. It is the result of how we were treated during childhood.

Whenever we attempted to do something how our parents responded decides our self worth. If we have faced frequent 'put downs', we tend condition ourselves as a worth less person. Thiruvalluvar puts mildly saying frequent advice which he really means 'put downs'.

Even at this age I suffer this syndrome of feeling worthless in front of any top management guys I meet. This subconscious program runs on its own under a given circumstances ruining your opportunity to prove your worth.

Children grown in south India are more Inhibitive than the ones grown in North! Why? It is not lack of exposure but the parental treatment of their child. We control our children 'minute to minute' in South where as they enjoy much more freedom for self expression in North.

Please remember:

1. Parents are no wiser than their children. Be humble. 

2. You don't need to monitor and control your child every minute which is like putting the seed in the earth and dig and see every day! It will never grow. 

3. Be a coach and facilitator to your child than a 'Ring master'

4. If your children are not sharing their feelings with you that means you are a tyrant in their life. 

5. Your put downs leads to low self esteem which programs the sub conscious of your child feeling 'I am not good & worthless human being'. This ruins their personality for ever. 

6. Talk to your child very often and figure out the level of their self esteem. 

7. Appreciate every little things your child does which build their self esteem.

Be a Mentor of your child

Love you all

With whole of my heart

NC

Paradigm on Compassion

Kindness & compassion to start from home. If we don't follow at home it will be a pseudo act with outsiders. Are we kind to our loved ones ? A honest introspection will reveal we are not.

Rajneesh once said 'if you have to be compassionate to your wife or husband, just imagine he or she is terminally ill and has only few days to live. In that state you will do everything for that person.'

In reality life is a frail stuff with fleeting experiences and each moment slips by without we recognise. By the time you wake up from slumber, it is gone!! During my younger days I felt there is enough time left; but when I look back it just vanished.

Osho Rajneesh also says when someone dies we cry for the "Un-lived life with that person" If we live life fully, we will send off that person with a smile. After all we have to go later and they have gone early. Living life fully means pouring our love & compassion when the person is alive. The difference of ideology, food preference, taste and all that non-sense makes us to displease our loved ones. In a real state of love all these does not matter; the happiness of that person only matters like the love of a mother towards its child.

In one of the discourse by Sadguru a person asked him whether he can talk to his father who has already died. Sadguru clarifies to him that he did not live his life fully when his father was alive or else why he wants to contact him? If you want to be free from guilt after some one dies, please live life 100% with them.

I practice this advise for very many years now and I find it is very effective. It appears as a pessimistic thinking that loved ones will vanish one day. But it reminds our responsibility to be compassionate to our loved ones. When you say 'Loved ones' and you really mean it, their happiness is of paramount importance. This is possible only when we love them 'UNCONDITIONALLY'. All other love upon condition is non-sense because it becomes a business.

Practice compassion imitating Lord Buddha and you will become one; if not at least your loved ones will be happy in your presence. Every day at least once give up your way and do things in their way and you will learn compassion.

Jai Gurudev

With whole of my heart

NC

Psychic Equity - Muladhara Chakra

Psychic equity is the phrase used to represent your emotional stability progression which decides your material as well as spiritual advancement. I have just completed my book 'Pragmatic Leadership' for Mc Graw Hill (India) in which I elaborated this concept in detail. In this series I wish to give an excerpt of my book.

Great Masters say our life energy rises through 7 centres in our spine called 'chakras' depending on our efforts to raise them through 'sadhanas'. The lowest state of energy is called 'Muladhara' which resides at the bottom most part of spine medically called coccyx. The other name for this chakra is 'sex centre' as it is closer to reproductive organ.

This is where our tail was there when we were monkey before. The tail disappeared as we grew in our stature in consciousness. This symbolically says that the purpose of becoming human from animal is to raise our state of consciousness and not loosing tail alone.

This life energy state is symbolised as a serpent as it sleeps in a coil form till it is awakened. It is not a physical entity but metaphysical which means you cannot find it by scanning electron microscope.

At Muladhara state of our consciousness and being, we will be in body state of consciousness, focusing on indulgence only. This means one will be always oriented in carnal pleasures like eating, drinking, sleeping, having sex etc. Gita calls this state as 'Tamasic' state of consciousness in which the person is generally fit for nothing as he consumes resources but adds no value. Person of this kind will destroy the planet by doing nothing.

The colour that denotes Muladhara chakra is RED which is at the lowest rung of light spectrum in frequency. It is not coincident that 'Red' signifies danger but it is chosen intelligently as you can't see a red colour for very long time as it hurts your eye as well as psyche.

When we were young we were always keen to look ourselves in the mirror and groom our hair all the time. This state is called body consciousness in which body alone is the reality and centre of life to enjoy carnal pleasures. You will notice young people like Red colour car as their predominant energy is in Muladhara chakra. That is the way life starts.

You will not find a matured senior guy using a red colour car unless he still resides in the Muladhara state.

As we grow we find it is not enough to feed the body alone with pleasures but our emotions are important. Slowly body focus loses its significance and mind focus takes over. If you experience hair fall at 25 you are devastated but at 40 you would not mind and feel it is a sign of wisdom.

Let me stop here and continue the next chakra in the next post.

Love you all
With whole of my heart
NC

How to banish worry? Tips-4 Nothing is indispensable

If you notice the Universe you will recognize it runs its show on its own without anyone's intervention - the earth rotates and moves in its orbit without anyone's instruction. In the same way all our body mechanisms function without our instruction or intervention.

One of the human follies is 'thinking that we are indispensable and feeling everything will come to a halt if we are not there'. Alas! What a stupid idea? This makes us to worry 'What will happen to my children if I am not there? Or what will happen to my family or company? - whatever.

Just for a moment look back - all our great grandfathers also thought the same way when they were alive; but what happened after they have all gone? Their absence did not make a wee bit of difference to this universe or even to our family - life goes on as usual. In fact things became better after their departure!!

There is a famous poem I read long time back which describes indispensability. "If you insert your hand inside water it creates a void; but when you pull your hand out, water instantly fills that space. The poet says, your indispensability is like that space which will get filled up on the same day we are buried".

Hence, don't worry that anyone will suffer without you. On the other hand many will be happy that you are also gone and carry on with their pursuits. Enjoy every moment of your life as that is all you have.

Jai Gurudev
Love you all
With whole of my heart
NC

How to banish worry? - Tips-3 Positive Assertions

Enough have been spoken about 'Power of Positive Thinking' starting from Norman Vincent Peale days. In the self development section of any book stall you find enough of these stuff. Merely reading them gives an intellectual appreciation only, but no practical value except yet another bragging rights.

One of the tips Dale Carnegie gave was 'Live in a day tight compartment'. Let's see what does this mean?

Our Masters advice us, to live in peace we must learn to live in the 'Present Moment' ie one moment at a time. This piece of advice did not appeal to us till a Westerner packaged the same in a different phrase. Let's look at this advice through a different lens.

Starting & Ending the Day:

When I get up in the morning first thing I do is to express my gratitude to my creator for keeping me alive as I am not one among those one million people don't wake up ! The next thing I do is to declare that it is going to be a 'wonderful day' and I will banish all my negative thoughts and substitute positive in their place.

Next, When I am in the bathroom I express my wonderment of all that is functioning well in my body and thank almighty for being kind to me. When we keep asserting positive energy and be thankful to all that is positive we tend to eliminate despondency.

Before eating my lunch I say the prayer which Lord Krishna says in Gita "The food is you, the eater is you, the digester is you. I thank you my Lord for blessing me with this food, the ability to eat and digest"

During the day I remind my mind to focus on the job on hand and not the thoughts about past and future. This improves my focus and effectiveness. I remember what Andrew Carnegie the richest man in the World said about the secret of his success as the ability to concentrate only on each day's actions.

When I close the day I thank the almighty for helping me to live one day at a time and surrender myself to his lotus feet. Then I start sleeping as though I am lying down in my Lords lap like a baby. I also mention in my prayer seeking peace in my body, mind & intellect. At the end I mention " My Lord It is thy will to keep me alive the next day. If you do, I will live one day at a time'

This way I found I have less luggage to carry as it is "ONE DAY AT A TIME"

Jai Gurudev
Love you all
With whole of my heart
NC

Parenting - Relationship with a grown up child

There is a famous proverb which says " Children never grows up in the eyes of their parents". My son is now in early thirties and 6 feet 4 tall. In stature He is the MD of our international business. But still I feel like fondle him as I still see him as an 'Ice cream boy' when he was 3 years old.

Another proverb says "Father's first love is with his daughter". My sweet heart Sashi is in her mid thirties heading our Asia Pacific business. But I still see her as that little girl of 5 who used to sit on my motor cycle fuel tank to have a small ride around our street when I am back home from work. When I try to hug or kiss my children now in public, they yell at me saying 'What people will think?'

Why I am recalling these anecdotes is to illustrate how parents should keep their relations with grown ups. Most of the parents have serious disconnects with their grown up children and they blame their children for ignoring them. In variably the parents attitude with their children as they grow is the root cause of their relationship issues. I found the major cause is parents trying to possess their children and become a control freak.

One of the popular relationship model research shows, the relationship blossoms only when we include that person, be affectionate and don't try to control them all the time.

In this aspect most parents screw up relationship with their children; Almost 99.9999 % of the parents are doing the same. Quite often children harm themselves to punish their parents.

All problem starts with the stupid idea of possessing the children. One should understand 'Life is a bridge to cross over to somewhere and we can only use what we have but cannot possess for ever as death will snatch all of them one day. Remember all of us born with a 'Death warrant in hand except with expiry date blank'.

Almost one million people die everyday. In spite of it we feel we won't be in that list for ever. Alas! What a stupid creation we are!! Drop the idea of possession and you will see Life suddenly becomes a wonderful journey.

I remember the placard in the olden days train "Less luggage makes your travel pleasant". The real issue is we won't change as we ate Apple Jesus warned us not to eat. That Apple is 'Greed to possess'

Jai Gurudeva

NC

How to banish worry? Tips - 2 Worry does not alter possibility

Interestingly worry emanates from the concept of time as past, present & future. We worry about either what has happened (past) or what will happen (future); 90% of the worry thoughts are about future.

In the process of evolution each new creation happens to be a better model with an additional feature like a motor car. The mineral, the oldest creation did not have life but next model plant has but it stays in the same place. The next model animal in addition to life, is mobile and has more advanced consciousness as it responds to stimuli. But they live exactly the way the creator made them as we don't see them 'making choices' as they are not empowered to.

They are not 'aware' that they are alive and hence they don't have the concept of time which is needed to define past, present & future. In the absence of the concept of time the animals don't have worry which is evident from the absence of diseases like blood pressure, heart attack, ulcer etc. which are characteristics of human & psychosomatic in nature.

The most advanced species namely human beings has the highest level of consciousness and has the ability to make choices of our actions which decides our destiny. The creator has empowered us with higher consciousness for some unknown reason. Instead of using this power for the betterment of our life we made all wrong choices and one of them is defining time.

Our worry thought belong to three categories.

1. It is imaginary - 99% of what we feared has never happened. Then why worry?
2. Nothing can be done about it. Then why worry? Accept it without denial. 
3. Something can be done about it. Then do it. Then Why worry?

In summary, as Dr. Richard Carlson's title of the book "Don't sweat the small stuff; it is all the small stuff", all the worry thoughts are futile stuff. Please remember the old adage which said "Worry is a rocking chair; it keeps you busy but never takes anywhere.

Love you all
With whole of my heart
NC