Learn

What we always keep on seeking in life is news about some burning issue or something of our interest, for which we never made time for before. Events and incidences make us want to know the reality or the in- depth truth of a particular situation. Also when someone knows better than us or even challenges/ teases us for not knowing what they know, a bit of ego in us arises and pushes our mind to know and learn that particular thing. 

How we look at life and instances that we come across solely depends on our mindset and our attitude towards life. The famous example of the glass either half full or half empty explains about our attitude to life. All events in life teach us something and leave us with something precious for lifetime memories to cherish. 

Let’s begin with the desire to know or learn something by the example of a person who is a voracious reader. Another person who constantly notices him reading feels that after a certain stretch of time the desire to read has arisen in him.

 

In the same way many other things also take place in life without much effort. Either we see others doing something and want to do it or we are challenged or provoked by someone to learn something. Either ways, the motivation level seems to be high. Once we start learning, all things seem to flow smoothly.

There was a teenager who had gone for a Eucharistic Celebration. The one in charge of music was supposed to play that day. However he thought it better to give the opportunity to the teenager. He told him to play the piano for the Eucharist. However the teenager didn’t know how to tune the keyboard to match the tuning of the guitar. He had a lucky escape that day because the speaker that was required for the piano wasn’t available. 

The teenager felt a sense of relief. He made up his mind that he would learn to play the piano without being nervous and also learn to tune instruments. Another person from the parish who knew the music in charge grumbled saying that he only played during feast days and that too to show off. The only difference between the two perspectives was that one took it in a positive way and made a resolution to better himself while the other looked at the situation in a negative way and spoiled the musicians name. Our attitude to life determines what we will do, where we will go and how far we will succeed. 

At another moment the same teenager who knew little bit about piano was asked by the same music in charge to play during the Eucharist. The teenager would have played like a maestro if he was given the chords, however he had to play by ear (This talent he hadn’t developed as yet and didn’t have the confidence to play on the spot). The hymn began and he was struggling to get the notes. He kept the volume bar somewhere in the middle so that people wouldn’t make out whether he made a mistake or not. 

Since the teenager was finding it difficult to play, another musician beside him who was playing the congo told the music in charge to come and play. A thousand thoughts were running through the teenagers mind on not being able to play well, of switching places with the music in charge and so on. Finally they switched places and the teenager felt a sense of relief. The teenager took this event positively and made sure that he learnt music well.

There were two possibilities or ways in which the teenager could have looked at this situation namely positively and negatively. Looking at it negatively would have only left him bitter and negative. Since he took the event in a positive sense he learnt not only the keyboard but also many other musical instruments. We get what we look for.

We make or break ourselves by the way we look at life and the situations we face in life. An open mind and an open heart will take us to places we have never even dreamt of. Learning to take situations in the right sense and making the best use of opportunities available will surely help us to go a long way in life.

Accept situations positively!   

Trust

Many things that we do in life arise from our beliefs and convictions. The analysis of a situation in our mind forms our belief system. We naturally agree with some things that are said and also at the same time chuck out the things that we do not agree with. This process of accepting certain things as values and sidelining other things happens automatically or naturally in our mind.

To make a person do something that you want him/ her to do, the only thing needed is strong belief that has to be put in that person. The person must feel that s/ he is trusted completely, that s/ he is special and can match up to the standards that are expected of him/ her.

To explain the point a story would go well. This story is of a young boy who joined the seminary to become a priest. This particular individual had joined the seminary not with the purest of intentions. His plan was to finish his studies and wash his hands off the seminary. However there was a priest who firmly believed in him and made it known to him that he would be a holy priest one day. After some months that seminarian felt like he done a big mistake by entering the seminary. 

The priest gave him hope in his time of distress. The seminarian became hopeful and carried on with the help of God and the guidance of this priest. That seminarian went on to be a good and holy priest. According to me that seminarian became a priest not to a great extent because of divine assistance, but more so because of the hope and positive belief placed in him by the priest. God too puts His trust in us even though we fail and fall down several times.

You will be able to trust another only if you have had the experience of being trusted in by another. It is a wonderful experience of being trusted by another person (more so if that person is one who is in authority). 

Trust and you will be trusted!

Michael Rua

 

1.      Michael Rua, S.D.B., (Italian: Michele Rua) (9 June 1837 - 6 April 1910) was an Italian Catholic priest, a student of St. John Boscoand first collaborator in the founding of the Salesians of Don Bosco. He was the first Rector Major of the Salesians, and has been beatified by the Catholic Church. Michael Rua was Don Bosco's closest collaborator in the development of the new Salesian congregation

2.      Early life       

      Rua was born in Turin in Italy, in a poverty-stricken neighborhood on the outskirts of the city of Turin. He was the youngest of the nine children of Giovanni Battista and Giovanna Maria Rua. He was a refined and quiet. He used to dress neatly. The father, who was the supervisor of a weapons factory in the city, died on 2 August 1845 when he barely 8 years old. He then lived with his widowed mother in their apartment in the factory which she was able to keep, and which then employed her. The young Michel attended a school run by the Brothers of the Christian Schools. . Michael Rua was one of the boys who at fifteen came to live with St John Bosco in his Oratory in Turin and later became his close associate in the setting up and early guidance of the Society of Don Bosco (Salesians), now one of the biggest religious orders in the world.

3.       “We two will go halves in everything”
One day Don Bosco was giving out little medals and Michael, who was late and at the end of the line, thought he heard him say, “Take, Michelino”. The priest stood there but he didn’t give him anything. Then he said to him, “We two will go halves in everything”. And that was how it turned out. Michael went on to become the founder’s close friend and associate. He was among the first few with whom Don Bosco shared the idea of forming a Salesian Society. The order was called after Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622), who had a genius for converting souls through kindness and persuasion.

4.      Inspired by Don Bosco
Michael Rua joined the other first Salesians at seventeen, and, inspired by Don Bosco’s example, he spent his days at the youth club, morning and evening classes, supervising theatre or music rehearsals, gymnastics, lively outdoor games, solitary study, along with frequent reception of the sacraments. “I got much more from observing Don Bosco, even in the humblest of actions,” Rua later said, “than from reading and meditating on a treatise on asceticism.”

5.      Close collaborator
Rua was Don Bosco’s closest collaborator in the development of the new Salesian congregation over the next thirty-six years. He made his first profession in 1855, was the first spiritual director of the Society at the age of 22 years (1859), was ordained priest in 1860. At 26 became the rector of the college at Mirabello in Emilia-Romagna, the first Salesian foundation outside Turin.

6.      Illness
In 1865, Michael returned to Turin to rejoin Don Bosco, who was ill and over-burdened with work. He re-organised the house at Valdocco, a youth club with a boarding school of seven hundred students whose spirit had declined. With remarkable tact, he restored good discipline. But in July 1868, Don Rua’s constant activity got the better of his strength and he was confined to bed with a sudden attack of peritonitis. The doctors gave him only a few hours to live. But Don Bosco asserted, “Listen, Don Rua, even if you were thrown out the window just as you are, I assure you that you won’t die.” A few days later, despite the doctor’s prognosis, the patient recovered.

7.      Differences in character
Although the two men were close, each kept his own personality and sometimes were in opposition. Where Don Bosco would focus on the work of the day and was audacious in his projects, Don Rua was prudent, calculating, and foresaw and forestalled the problems he saw coming down the track.

8.      Successor to Don Bosco
When Don Bosco died, Pope Leo XIII, honouring his request, designated Michael as his successor. There was progress in Europe, Italy, Spain, France and England.

Unusual Foundations

At Naples in 1909 they accepted the Direction of a school for deaf- mutes.

At Sienna, on the island of Malta, the Congregation accepted in  1903 a school for young delinquents.

Finally, a work on behalf of Italian workers laboring at the Sempion tunnel was highly praised not only by Catholics but even by the Socialists of the time.

Recruitment

There were 774 religious professed at the time of Don Bosco’s death which increased to 4,001 at the death of Don Rua.

The Salesian, he explained, is like a diligent gardener cultivating with particular solicitude those tender little plants which are healthier and more flourishing than the rest and are destined to produce the grains that will be the seed for the new harvest.

Provinces

From 1888 to 1910 the number increased from 6 to 32.

“The Living Rule”                

Nicknamed “The Living Rule” because of his austere fidelity, Don Michael Rua was also known for his fatherliness and goodness. As the numbers of members and communities increased, he sent Salesians all over the world, showing special care for the missionary expeditions. In the long and difficult journeys which he undertook to visit the Salesian works in Europe and in the Middle East, he was a constant source of comfort and encouragement, always taking inspiration from the Founder with words like: “Don Bosco used to say… Don Bosco used to do it this way… Don Bosco wanted…” just before Don Bosco passed away he whispered to him: “Make yourself loved”. Fr. Auffray notes that the contrast between them was striking: “In one, the face, smile and attitude pointed to fatherly goodness; in the other, the whole person showed a gentle seriousness, recollected activity, and a note of austerity. Among the boys in the playground, the former appeared gay, expansive, cordia; the latter, instead, as affable as the Father but more restrained, less effusive.

9.      Years of suffering       
These were years of great suffering. In 1895, a Salesian priest was murdered by a half-crazy student. Five months later, Bishop Lasagna, one of the great hopes of the Salesian society, his secretary, and four sisters of Mary Help of Christians, were victims of a train accident. Then, a flood in Argentina destroyed the material results of ten years of missionary work. In France, the so-called Law of Associations (June 2, 1901) required the closing and sale of the Salesian establishments. In 1907, a scandal in a high school stirred up a violent storm of protest against the Salesians all across Italy. He vowed to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, if the honour of his religious family was fully restored. It was, and he fulfilled his vow in 1908.        

                                                                                                                                                    Growth of the society, death and influence
When Michael Rua died on 6th April 1910 at the age of 73, the Society had grown from 773 to 4000 Salesians, from 57 to 345 communities, from 6 to 34 Provinces in 33 countries. His body is venerated in the crypt of the Basilica of Mary Help of Christians at Valdocco in Turin. Don Rua was beatified by Pope Paul VI on October 29, 1972. Today the Salesians are one of the third largest missionary societies in the world, with about 18,000 members and some are involved in the work of the Curia in Rome.

Silence

 

Pythagoras says: ‘Learn to be silent. Let your quiet mind listen and absorb.’ A quiet mind produces wonderful results. What Pythagoras said is very relevant to all our lives. The silence that we need to spend time with is not the silence of depression, heartbreak, fatigue or even staring at photos of happier times and going through texts sent by your friends on how your ex is enjoying without you. Silence is about creating an ambient around yourself where you are just happy to be by yourself. The presence or absence of others won’t disturb you if you are internally silent.

Speaking about a tranquil mind Anshul Chaturvedi says that silence should allow your mind to settle. In this silence, you give place to yourself to know what you are knowing, thinking and feeling at the present moment. The traffic police imposes a fine on us if we take calls while driving, hence learning from this we must fine ourselves for indulging in unnecessary and trivial things that land us in tension and depression.

Ramakrishna speaks of a picturistic idea where the still mind is like a tranquil pool which reflects the moon in all its grandeur. The common man’s mind is like a pool which is constantly in a whirlpool, the water never gets an opportunity or a chance to settle down. Due to this it is unable to reflect and present what’s above. Growth takes place only when we absorb and listen. Sometimes we must put a pause to our communication with others. We need to do something better with our time rather than only waste it by unnecessarily communicating with others.

We need to live in solidarity, at the same time we shouldn’t be too obsessed with our friends but give them their due space and respect. When it is fun time with friends it is fun time with friends, when its work time it is work time. We can’t afford to make our work an extension of our personal and emotional equations. Nowadays all of us interrupted by messages on various social sites which don’t allow us to concentrate on our work or disturbs our moments of silence and stillness. 

All this needs to be cut down. We need to avoid unnecessary waste of time conversations. We need to force our minds so that we deal square with what we need and when we need it. S. Radhakrishnan commenting on Bhagwad Gita 6: 10 says ‘In a world which is daily growing noisier, the duty of the civilized man is to have moments of thoughtful stillness.’ What he means is that we need to create a sacred space in the midst of a concrete jungle.

Silence and single minded focus are the two sides of the same coin or two wings of a bird. The achievement of one makes the achievement of the other possible and easy. Whatever be the situation outside, be it noisy, filthy, confusing etc we need to create an inner silence which will be of great help and benefit to us.