Friday, December 15, 2006
An article

This morning, we were forced to change to another lecture hall due to the ever-problematic aircon. So, i found this article lying on the table. This is how it goes...


One morning in a Railway Station
I remember a mini-paradigm shift I experienced one Sunday morning on a suburb railway station in Bombay. People were sitting quietly, some reading newpapers, some lost in thought, some resting with their eyes closed. It was a calm, peaceful scene.

Then suddenly, a man and his children entered the station. The children were so loud and rambunctious that instantly the whole climate changed.

The man sat down next to me and closed his eyes, apparently oblivious to the situation. The children were yelling back and forth, throwing things, even grabbing people's papers. It was very disturbing. And yet, the man sitting next to me did nothing.

It was too difficult not to feel irritated. I could not believe that he could be so insensitive as to let his children run wild like that and do nothing about it, taking no responsibility at all. It was easy to see that everyone else on the subway fell irritated, too. So finally, with what i felt was unusual patience and restraint, I turned to him and said, "Sir, your children are really disturbing a lot of people. I wonder if you could control them a little more?"

The man lifted his gaze as if to come to a consciousness of the situation for the first time and said softly. "Oh you are right, I guess I should do something about it. We just came from the hospital where their mother died about an hour ago. I don't know what to think, and I guess they don't know how to handle it either."

Can you imagine what i felt at that moment? My paradigm shifted. Suddenly I saw things diffrently, and because i saw differently, I thought diffrently, I felt diffrently, I behaved differently. My irritation vanished. I didn't have to worry about controlling my attitude or my behaviour; my heart was filled with the man's pain. Feeling of sympathy and compasssion flowed freely. "Your wife just died? Oh, I am sorry! Can you tell me about it? What can I do to help?" Everything changed in an instant.