Well, this is the topic i'd prepared for a public speaking competition earlier this month.
Just wanted to share it here...
' Life is like a glass of water'.
Water is a free-flow entity which needs a vessel to contain them. Without it, well...you'll be wet! Some people had said life to a glass of water. It is interesting to know how they relate it together. There are few anecdotes which details this and below I'll share 2 of them.
A chemistry professor decided to teach
his students a different lesson one day. Holding a glass of water in his
hand, he asked the students,
“How much do you think this glass of
water weighs?”
“1/2 litre!” came a voice from the back. “1 litre,” said
another student.
“Well, even I don’t really know!” said the professor, holding the
glass up to make sure everyone could see it. “And unless we weigh it, we
won’t know.” With the glass still in his outstretched hand, the
professor continued, “What will happen if I hold it like this for a few
minutes?”
“Nothing!” came the reply.
“Right, and if I hold it for an hour like
this, what might happen?”
“Your hand will begin to hurt,” said a
student.
“Indeed. And what would happen if I held the glass in my hand
like this for 24 hours?”
“You would be in tremendous pain,” said one student. “Your hand will probably go numb,” said another.
“Your arm will be paralysed and we’ll need to rush you to the hospital!” said a student on the last bench.
“True,” said the professor. “But notice that through all this, the
weight of the glass did not change. What then causes the pain?”
The class went quiet. The students seemed puzzled.
“What should I do to avoid the pain?” asked the professor.
“Put the glass down!” said a student of the floor,
"Well said!” exclaimed the professor. “And that’s a lesson I want you to
remember. The problems and worries in life are like that glass of water.
Think about them for a while and nothing happens. But think about it a
bit longer and they begin to hurt. And if you think about them all day
long, you will feel paralysed – incapable of doing anything. It’s
important to remember to let go of your problems. Remember to put the
glass down!”
We may not have been in that classroom that day, but it’s a lesson we
would all do well to remember. Put the glass down!
Always!
It’s not just problems and worries. Sometimes, we feel hurt and betrayed
by a friend. And we carry that grudge through our lives. It grows and
causes us anguish and pain. Learning to forgive – and forget – is not
just good for the other people, it’s great for you.
It is the same with our fears too. A failure or an incident in early
childhood becomes a deeply entrenched fear over time. Fear of public
speaking, fear of rejection. You name it, and chances
are, we have it. Someone gave us that glass to hold when we were little
kids – ‘you are no good, you can’t do it’ - and we have
faithfully held on to it all our lives. ‘I can’t’ - becomes a thought
that stays in our mind and grows – leading us to complete paralysis.
Time to put the glass down!
Another anecdote is to compare my mind to a glass of water.
It’s small, mostly transparent, and limited in capacity. I can add
water to the brim of the glass, but once it’s full it can no longer fit
any additional water. Instead, it just spills over the side of the glass
and runs all over the table. In the same way, my mind is continually
filled with bits and pieces of information – thus when new information
is added, the old tends to spill out.
Does this sound familiar?
A friend asks me to stop at the grocery store on my way home. I can do
that. While I successfully make the stop to pick up bread and milk, I
subsequently forget to stop at the bank and post office. It’s as if my
mind was filled to full capacity and could no longer add anything
additional.
Pouring out your glass. In order to truly relieve the stress on your mind, you need to empty
the glass of water. In order to do this, you need to have a system you
can trust. You probably can think of examples of how you do this in your
own life. For example, have you ever put your keys next to the door at
night just so you ensure they are not lost in the morning? By doing so,
you have created a system you trust and probably did not add any “what
if I lose my keys” stress to your sleep that night.
There are hundreds of ways you can structure your system to make it
work for you. If you have a smartphone, learn to use the calendar or
reminder features. Use posterboard to make a plan for specific tasks.
Perhaps even buy and carry around a personal notebook planner. Whatever
your system is – make it yours and learn to trust your system.
Hopefully by reading this you'll learn something relevant to your life. Stop stressing around. Instead, take your time and tend to it. It's better for your mental health.
