yamtimsina

Few years ago, I had a colleague in my office. He was older than me, he was also more experienced than me in various ways, in life as well as in career.
One day in our informal chat he told me, he hasn’t spoken to his dad for the last 7 years.
I became so awkward and surprised to know how one can pass 7 years without talking to his dad who is living just 300 hundred miles away.
He continued, “yes, I haven’t spoken with him since our family feud broke out.”
Without going into specific detail I asked him, “have you seen any family which is untouched by any kind of feud?”
His reply was simply to ignore my question.

In reality, there is no family which is free from any kind of feud.
Feud can be major or minor but we all go through this.
We all have problems, we all have things to resolve but it doesn’t mean we stop talking to our dad and mom.
In the middle of our conversation he suddenly asked me another question, “what did I do last weekend?”
Instead of giving him the straight answer I asked him, “what did you do?”
He said, “I went to the botanical garden with my daughters.”
I further added, “Do you imagine the same situation as you have with your dad at present between you and your daughters in the future?”
He unequivocally said, “no, it’s not possible, he continued that he is different than his dad, he was raised by his parents in wrong way, and he is raising his daughters in different way than how he was raised by his parents”
He was blaming his dad in various ways but I didn’t comment at all. I just listened because I don’t know his dad. I simply knew that he was talking about his dad to me.
Nonetheless, I couldn’t remain silent without asking, I asked, “who is more educated and resourceful now compared to your dad when you were growing up with him?”
He simply avoided my question and didn’t answer.

We all devote our time with our kids, we want to raise them in such a way they would become successful and independent when they grow up.
As parents we don’t expect anything in return, this is how human generation transforms, progresses, and moves.
This is the beauty of generational transformation.
I asked him, “Does your daughter know you don’t speak to her grandpa?”
He said, “Yes, she knows it but she never brings that up in the family.”

Whatever happened to us in our family in the past, especially with our parents, whoever is involved in the fedu either dad or mom, whoever is faulty either dad or mom, we must forget it and forgive them, and move on.
Dad is dad. Mom is mom.
Remember, this life is a gift our parents gave us. Period.
Nobody can replace them in this generation.
We are here, we are alive, we became the luckiest product of the luckiest winning sperm and winning ovum.
This chance is rare.
We became the luckiest of all.
Think about this, the probability of us being born is at about one in 400 trillion.
One in 400 trillion.
Isn’t it luck?
If this isn’t luck then what is it, I don’t know.

One thing, keep in mind, whatever our parents did in the past, they did according to their capacity, knowledge, and resources available at that time.
They might have made major or minor mistakes while raising us, whatever it was, just forget it and forgive them. Period.
They gave us this amazing life.
If you haven’t spoken to your dad for a long time, just pick up a phone and call, start the conversation.
If you haven’t visited them for a long time, give them a surprise visit.
Drink a beer with your dad if you can, if not drink tea with him in the nearest most beautiful and expensive restaurant.
Express the experience, tell your parents that you love them.
When they see you in front of them, they will forget the past feud, don’t bring that up.
Start the conversation fresh.
There are only three things you can enjoy in life: best conversation, best food, and best experience.

Always remember, we all die but our parents will die before us leaving all the family feud behind us.
You always see them growing older than before.
This is emotional but a fact.
Our family feud is temporary and it is due to ego but if we don’t forgive our parents the regret will remain forever.
That will remain as a scar in our heart.
Regret is permanent, this regret will eat us from inside throughout our life.

Humility and forgiveness are human tools to uplift our life.
They serve the best for human endeavors.
If we fail to forgive the mistakes then there is no way we can grow as a free human being.
This also hampers our ability to improve our other skills to upgrade our own life.
We often mix ego with confidence but they are very different.
For some people it takes a few seconds to distinguish whether they are egotistical or confident but for some other people it might take a longer time to differentiate.
If we are able to separate ego from confidence from inside then only we can recognize our identity.
It’s alway better to be confident than to look confident, because both take the same amount of time.
The research of social science also suggests that forgiveness is a multi-dimensional trait and takes into account self-understanding and awareness, as well as openness.
Ego ruins us, confidence talks loud but humility and forgiveness whispers.
We need many more whispers for a free and happy life.

So first and foremost, forgive your parents unconditionally.
Secondly, if you can, forgive your ex-spouse, ex-boss, and ex-friend unconditionally.
Once you forgive them, you feel amazing, you don’t know what they feel but you feel free, you feel you are winning at life.

Humility and forgiveness are inherent human characteristics which are different from other acquired human skills.
In many situations, people choose advisors or life coaches or mentors to acquire various skills.
But advisors don’t help to acquire inherent characteristics.
Their role is to find out how to reach our life goals, how to make reasonable plans, and how to stick with the plan.
They don’t help to find out what our inherent characters are.

Nowadays, technology has become an integral part of our life to connect.
There is nothing we cannot find on the internet as information.
The Internet has become an extension of our behaviour.
The way we are living our lives these days is heavily influenced by technology and smartphones.
There are both pros and cons of it.
It has become a massive timesaver for us in many ways.
It solves a lot of problems quicker, there is no doubt about it.
In the meantime, technology has also become a huge distraction for us if we don’t know how to react to our human emotions.

Similarly, technology is also helping us to be more reactive than proactive, making us poor thinkers and poor decision makers.
It gives ads 24/7.
The commercial motif of technology is to distract us more and more with ads, mostly with attention grabbing items, news, and notifications.
If you cannot hold information for a certain time to absorb and analyze and show your reactive attitude too fast on the internet forum then you degrade your inherent character.
You become too reactive to people whom you don’t like, places where you have never visited, and circumstances which you have never experienced.

When technology rules us in many ways, we must focus on where it doesn’t rule us.
Humility is to pause and think before making any judgement or reaction.
Forgiveness sits on the corner of humility.

Reactive nature invites more distraction and leads to a habit of multitasking which is absolutely bad for real solution oriented people and deep thinkers.
Keep in mind, there is a difference between problem oriented mindset and solution oriented mindset.
Multitasking might be good for mindless things but harmful for a solution oriented mindset.
Only we can multitask but our mind cannot multitask, that’s the reason we shouldn’t watch iPhone while crossing the street.
As always, our mind cannot multitask, otherwise a moving vehicle doesn’t hit us while watching the screen on the street.

I started this piece of content with the relationship between son and dad, but please allow me to go a little deeper why we keep bitter feelings, acrimony, and ego inside us.
According to psychologist and Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman, there are two types of thinking processes.
Fast thinking and slow thinking.
Fast process recognizes patterns automatically, quickly, and effortlessly and tells quickly what happens next and what to do next.

When the sky is predicted to fall and you cannot save it then the fast process says run, but for the same situation slow process says relax.
Slow process instructs us: reduce the fast intake of outside information, be calm, and don’t be reactive quickly.
Fast process only informs us “ what happens next? What to do next?” “Where to go?” but the slow process instructs us “how to handle next?”
But for a slow process to happen we have to wait, we have pause, which we don’t do most of the time.
Humility and forgiveness comes only in our life if we practice to adapt to the slow process.

Our relationship with our parents must be a slow process, we should not be quick to pull the flowers because we might end up watering the weeds.
Remember, life’s too short to wallow in the weeds of negative vibes and self-pity.
Slow thinking process always allocates attention to beautiful flowers, but the fast process might invite the weeds.
Slower the process, the higher the chance to reach a rational decision.
In reality, our decisions often originate in a fast process which in most cases lead us to the wrong track.

I believe that’s what happened to my colleague and he is living carrying the acrimony over his dad.

Forgiveness is an essential human quality which can be improved everyday by practice.
Most often ego appears as confidence and corrodes us, that confidence which comes from ignorance rather than from knowledge which is very dangerous.
Fast process also nurtures ignorance and ego.

We have a natural tendency, our emotion is inversely related to our knowledge, the less we know the more excited we become, the less we know the more confident we sound.
This is the reason that religion, politics, and love act in the same way.
The real followers of these disciplines always remain steadfast regardless of any kind of circumstances, evidence or consequences.
They are called blind supporters.
Political followers become like smokers.
Smokers become addicted to tobacco by the nicotine, but the real health risks come from inhaling burning tar.

In an underdeveloped society where people are less educated, political leaders feed the tar to the general public all the time so that they keep fire on for their motivated political agendas.
When a politician has a criminal record, or a history of cheating people or even just feels above the law, we as public must stop following them and think slowly.
If our mind remains in the middle of good and bad, most of the time we do bad stuff.

Philosopher Hannah Arendt has said beautifully, “most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.”
Crook politicians don’t suddenly sprout a sense of responsibility, that is possible only when the general public starts to think slowly based on social merits.

If we think slowly and act slowly, we always select fewer but better choices.
It helps us to separate ideas from the person, and let ideas fight to each other, but not the people.
When the superior person gives order to the inferior person, the inferior person stops thinking and starts reacting.
Because the authority or hierarchy shuts down our mind.
This is how our mind works and we can not go deeper, this is natural but we can change it by practice.
There is no guarantee that the order from the superior person is correct but our mind takes order in such a way that there is no alternative of higher authority order.
But if we pause and think slowly, one single word or one single sentence or one single idea could change our existing mindset and we become better decision makers.

While testing the general theory of relativity, Albert Einstein said, “ if a single one of the conclusions from it proves wrong, it must be given up.”
Just one counterfact is enough to show that the scientific theory is wrong.

If you can not forgive your dad unconditionally, then your theory of life is wrong and you will remain wrong forever, you will never be happy, healthy, and wealthy again.
Therefore, always and always forgive your dad unconditionally.

Thank you for your time.
-Yam Timsina

Life is amazing and we don’t understand its gist until we see it crumbling in our own eyes.
Very early in my career, I worked as an assistant in a refugee camp.
I’ve vivid memories of these crumbling lives.
When we talk to refugees who lost everything, who ran from their home to save their families; the role of our life becomes crystal clear.

We dedicate our whole life to protect our family and to do so when you flee abandoning your home, your property, your relatives, and your own land, you definitely feel like you are dead.
If we’re born in Bhutan, we would feel the same.
If we were born in Syria and our house is bombed to shambles, we wouldn’t hold any dreams in life.
How can we see any dream from a burning house?
This is very emotional but it is a fact.

One of my long-time friends and his family emigrated to the USA from Cambodia.
He had a very beautiful wife and two wonderful daughters 11 and 14 years old.
If we were born in Cambodia and have seen the killing fields where Pol Pot slaughtered three million people, we would visualize life very differently.
When we have these kinds of painful negative vibrations in life, it makes us realize that even if we are born into a very poor family of a poor country, we have won some amazing things in life.
We definitely feel we are winners in life because fate didn’t make us refugees.

My friend and his wife saw and experienced many similar devastating moments in life.
They saw so much carnage, killings, they fled from their native country, they emigrated as refugees, they settled in a new country, their kids are growing in a new environment and still need a lot of support and care.

Unfortunately, my friend and his wife decided to end their 17 years of married life.
When my friend told me about this, I couldn’t believe it.
It was shocking and beyond my expectations.

In 2019, we heard the news of Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos, the wealthiest couple on earth, 25 years of marriage ending.
Recently, we also heard the news of Bill and Melinda Gates’s separation, another globally powerful couple, after 27 years of togetherness.
I was taking these news as normal and tried to digest thinking that these are everyday news.
But, in reality, this recent news of Bill and Melinda’s separation helped to refresh my friend’s old story.


I couldn’t take my friend’s separation easy because I was involved physically, mentally, and emotionally with their separation.
I’ve experienced tears in my eyes multiple times when I was playing with their two little girls.
They were very small and innocent, they weren’t mature enough to experience what life is throwing behind them.

As I learned a lesson from them, it’s very difficult to change our core values in life.
If we are developing our core values in opposite directions under the same roof, then separation is inevitable.
To identify it, as a couple we must have a dedicated contemplation.

After a few weeks, I asked my friend, “Why did you both make this painful decision?”
He replied philosophically, hard to understand for me at the moment.
He said, “Your core value in life is a white horse, you can paint it with black stripes and you can call it zebra for other people but not for yourself. No matter what the color tells to other people, the horse would still be a horse for you.”
He further added, “We as human beings, cannot choose our core value by its external appearance. Me and my wife nurtured different sets of core values over the time. I’m not saying they are bad but they don’t align with each other now”
I asked, “How come you didn’t know then and you know now?”
He added, “My friend everything is time, you don’t expect apples tomorrow by planting apple seeds today. We need to plant it, water it, care for it, and wait to get apples. I am sure me and my wife planted the right seed but couldn’t care and couldn’t water it properly so that the plant died before it could give us apples.”

I like a quote from Mahatma Gandhi, “Your beliefs become your thoughts, your thoughts become your words, your words become your actions, your actions become your habits, your habits become your values, and your values become your destiny.”
Now I’m adding here, if your destiny is different than your spouse, sooner or later, your marriage ends.

When my friend got married 17 years ago, he hadn’t heard the word prenup.
His parents and grandparents used to tell him to get married with the girl who is in your level as much as possible.
The question was in his mind, what kind of level?
It’s very complicated, he couldn’t understand it, the level could be professional, financial, emotional, intellectual, or physical.
He didn’t pay much attention either because he had no idea of personal values at the time when he was getting ready for conjugal life.

Marriage is a tough game, pivoting is the name of the game.
If you can not pivot, you will definitely lose.
Marriage doesn’t grow itself; it needs time, effort, and consistent dedication from both partners to mature.

Any person can kiss the supreme success in his or her professional life but may experience the rock-bottom in his or her marital life.
We can take examples from multiple professionally successful people like Bill and Melinda Gates, Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos, Elon Musk, Donald Trump, just a few who failed miserably in their marriage.
Marriage in itself is not a final human product, it is a continuous working product.
Nature has given it as a working contract, work on it until you die.

Nowadays many rich people get married with prenup.
I’m not against prenups, it’s a product of real society, but marriage is more a human aspect than business or financial transaction.
When you are in prenup from the beginning your mind and emotion works differently.
The advantage is you can sincerely work to make your marriage great but there is no guarantee that your other partner will work equally on your marriage.
Prenup could change each partner’s mindset pretty quickly.
Prenup certainly contains some kind of pre-existing notion regarding your finances.

Recently, the two richest couples on the planet, Bill-Melinda and Jeff-MacKenzie, got divorce.
It became a national and international headline because both couples have touched billions of lives through their work.
In spite of their pinnacle success in their professional life, both couples failed miserably on their marriage.
This is definitely a sincere lesson for all of us, relationships are damn hard.
Professional success never predicts personal happiness and success.
We certainly believe that both couple’s marriage was pristine, both couples didn’t have a prenup, and their marriage was faithful from the beginning.
It doesn’t mean marriage with prenup is faithless, it only means dedication and respect was alive more than finances.

To be honest I learned more about marriage and relationships from my friend’s divorce than my own 15 years old marriage.
I got a chance to study and analyze very closely about their relationship because I was quite familiar with the couple.

In marriage the possession of an insight from only one partner is not sufficient.
We can only benefit from this eternal relationship if both partners have the insights.
We must go through all hindsight, insight, and foresight.
Lack of trust and respect crumbles the relationship, especially marriage.
The problem is, trust is an intangible quality.
It can not be quantified in our life in the same way as we can look in our other activities.
Trust creates order in our married life but lack of trust creates a lot of chaos.
When we trust somebody, that person goes into our heart and communicates with our mind.
That trusted person is called a spouse.

Marriage is a long journey with a lot of ups and a lot of downs.
We cannot pay equal attention during ups and downs in our lives, otherwise we wouldn’t remain an emotional creature.
At peak up and bottom down, marriage has a high chance to bring a necessary evil.
I call it necessary but evil because during this long journey, there comes something which is unpleasant or undesirable but is essential to succeed in the relationship.
This evil tests us and we must pass it as a couple.
Very few of us see the existence of this necessary evil coming.
We never plan and prepare for this evil. Marriage fails if we don’t see the existence of this necessary evil. This evil can be both pain and happiness.
Marriage is not only chocolate and cake, not only burning candles, it also includes the shadow under the burning candle.

Many of us take marriage lightly, we don’t dedicate time to grow this relationship because we take it for granted.
We assume it as a free lunch, and we never foresee the risks associated with it.
And many of us have no idea how to minimize these risks even if we have little knowledge about these risks.
And most importantly, we don’t see these risks until it becomes too late to face.
When you have a habit of walking together for 5 minutes as a couple in the evening, you reduce this risk.
When you write a paragraph of something and your spouse read aloud, you reduce this risk.
These are very simple steps but we never apply, we have ready made answers, oh, I know but I don’t have time.
Well, nobody has time to do everything in life, but we must have time to do necessary important things.
Marriage is an important thing.

Higher the society, more educated the couple, more is the risk in marriage.
There is data on that but I’m not going into the details.
It is virtually certain that the risks will show up from time to time.
Unfortunately, we cannot know when and how they will appear or how long they will last or how severe they will be.

A necessary ingredient for successful marriage is to have the discipline to adhere to our relationship.
We have to ignore a lot of noise and a lot of emotions fueled by the circumstance.
Marriage is our choice not a circumstance so that if any hurdle, pain, happiness or emotion comes through circumstance, we have to deal with it. Plain and simple.

We should not be overconfident with our marriage.
Oh my wife is different, oh my husband is a different kind of person.
Please, be humble, head down and work on.
Be patient and never stop working on your relationship no matter what.
Don’t make your marriage just familiar, make it safe.
There is a difference between familiar marriage and safe marriage.
Familiar marriage is full of words and appreciation from both partners; but safe marriage is full of actions from both partners.

Married life, of course, is complicated and difficult, but if we work one step at a time, it becomes marvelous.
Spend time with your spouse on the dining table, not with your screen.
Hold your spouse’s hand for 30 seconds and tell two sentences about the food you are about to eat.
Whoever wakes up first in the morning, kiss your spouse on the forehead and start the day by saying good morning.
It takes only 30 seconds to do this but you will be amazed how fast your 30th anniversary knocks your door.
Make it a ritual not a habit.
Most of the success in married life is in just remembrance that you are married.
There is nothing new in married life but we must make something new everyday. This could be as simple as this: brush your teeth together for one minute.
Remember, never ever turn your desires into needs, by doing this your married life crumbles.
Always and always enjoy your life in desires.
I wish you all the best.
Happy married life.

Thank you for your time.
-Yam Timsina

Bob said, “I am stuck here in my office but my school friend Robin is in Vianna enjoying his life”.
He further added, “I saw his facebook posts recently”.
These are everyday gossip we hear all the time in all places.
Because we don’t have time to compare our lives to our past self, but we always have time to compare our lives to other people’s lives.
If we compare our life to others, we get nothing but envy, the worst enemy of all.

Remember, knowing, doing, and then realizing what you knew and what you did, is the most powerful edge in life.
Not spending time to realize where you were is certainly the road to failure, and road to unhappiness.
We don’t spend time in comparison of knowing, doing, and the final realization of the outcome in our own life.
Our comparison to other’s lives only creates dissatisfaction.

Envy is the cancer of our mindset, we can become influenced negatively so fast by the success of others.
There is nothing wrong with this attitude because it it natural but it hinders our self-reflection and self-growth.

Abhi is a corporate CFO.
Natasha drives BMW.
But, I drive a Chevrolet.
This pattern of thinking is the key to our frustration.
Who we are as individuals, what we actually want, and what are our core values become overshadowed when we compare ourselves to others in various things.
BMW might give a little more comfort in our body while driving, but both are tools to solve our problems in the same way and most importantly both are not different to ingrain mental experience.
The funny part is our mind doesn’t distinguish BMW and Chevrolet, it only absorbs experience of driving.
It doesn’t mean I am against BMW, I am just against comparison.

We are so quick to idolize ourselves to Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Tony Robbins and think that their path to success is our key to happiness.
But we never review our everyday activities, habits, and especially diets.
Envy is a difficult human emotion, we all feel it.
It’s really hard to manage if we become prey on it.

Envy also takes our focus off from our own work and passion.
We completely erase our own goals and are attracted to passing-by shiny objects.
When we have envious feelings, we try to copy someone else’s success, we completely forget our own path.
We forget that there are different paths to reach the same destination.

False comparison is actually the cause of envy, we shouldn’t compare our first chapter of a book to someone else’s final chapter.
We shouldn’t compare fictional stories with non-fiction stories because both have different sets of target readers.
Each of our life has different paths to lead different destinations.

Mahatma Gandhi never compared his revolution with other rulers across the world who used force in their demonstrations.
In his time period, no rulers were doing peaceful demonstrations across the globe.
He was exceptionally good to follow his sheer determination, not to follow what others do.
Mahatma Gandhi, in his famous “Quit India” speech inspired every single indian to liberate themselves from British rule without using violence through peaceful protests.
Mahatma Gandhi is not only the inspiration of individuality but also the symbol of wisdom.

When we compare ourselves to others, we can’t differentiate among information, knowledge and wisdom.
Information is simply facts or data or somebody’s opinion; but knowledge is information of value.
If we are unable to differentiate these two, then we will remain foolish even though we watch news all day on television.
Similarly, knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit but wisdom is not putting tomato in a fruit salad.
Never ever think that having an abundance of knowledge is the same as having an abundance of wisdom.
The actual understanding of relationships among these elements: information, knowledge, and wisdom is possible when we stop comparing our lives with others but only with our own past self.

When we compare ourselves to others we become envious, we start to work more.
Most of the time grossly, not with a cool and calculated mindset.
We think working more might be the only option.
We confuse ourselves and think that more is better.
We forget that more is never the substitute of better.
Better is always better.
This feeling inside us comes when we are free from comparison.

Envious people also start to work more in negative perception and the more work turns into fatigue.
Fatigue leads to compromise in our health, family, and friends.
It’s definitely not better.
If we aim for more in a corrosive environment, we invite stress, conflicts, and deteriorating health.
But if we aim for better with self-reflection, we invite greater freedom.
Multiple scientific research has shown this trend over and over again.

I remember the conversation between two dads in one of the conferences where I was also a participant.
One dad said, “I rarely get to see my kids, that’s a risk you have to take in life.”
Another dad replied, “Is it really worth it?”
The first dad added, “I have to make payments for my BMW.”
The second dad again replied, “Chevrolet runs the same like BMW but the difference is Chevrolet gets time to give rides for your kids but BMW doesn’t.”
I just listened and laughed but didn’t respond.
The conversation was hilarious and worth-consuming.

However, there is also a good part of envy which is the result of comparison.
Sometimes envy becomes like a forest fire, we all know envy isn’t good, but it also stimulates some part of our human growth.
The forest fire burns the old trees to make space for new trees.
The heat of the fire pops open the seeds so new trees can grow.
Same happens with envy.
Just as a new tree can’t grow while the fire is still burning, a new you can’t grow higher while the current envy is still inside you.
However, as soon as your current envy dies down and a new you begins, the next you take off.

Envy also diminishes trial and error from our life, we just compare the outcome.
We hope for the best, and only dream.
And, oh, we develop the habit of comparing ourselves to others during lunch and dinner.
Anything great in our life is a process of trial and error.
We try something, we see results, if happy we continue, if not we eliminate.
Science is so fascinating that it doesn’t allow us to prove anything, it only allows us to disprove our thoughts by results.
We can accept and keep working on the remaining thoughts until we can’t disprove it.
But if we become envious by comparison, we disprove it without working.
We never try, we never take even a small risk of working to disprove it.

Risk taking is essential to sooth our envious character.
We all know there is still a chance, one in a million chance that when we go on a car trip, we may die.
But, we don’t, however, let it stop to visit our dad.
We don’t let it stop to visit our grandma.
Or do you?
Then why are you afraid to take even minor risks in life?
Take a risk and sooth the envy.

Remember, we all came into this world naked and we will leave this world naked, we are here to fill the gap of birth and death by our own choices in life.
Be humble, dump your envy, and never ever compare yourself to anybody else.
You are unique in this generation, there is nobody like you on the planet.

Thank you for your time.
-Yam Timsina

A teacher and a student were out for a walk.
Student saw a fox chasing a rabbit.
Teacher said, “The rabbit will get away from the fox.”
“I don’t think so,” the student replied.
The teacher said, “The fox may be faster, but the rabbit will elude the fox.”
Student asked, “Why?”
Teacher said, “Fox is running for his lunch, but the rabbit is running for his life.”

So the hidden question is what is the motive behind the run?
The motive behind the run always wins, if it is with purpose, sometimes winning may not appear immediately but eventually it will.
Then, why do we all run everyday?
To go through the day.
Most of us make our day as our immediate goal, but it doesn’t limit us to run for the real purpose of our life.
Very few of us really understand or try to understand the real purpose of life, but each and every one of us should have some kind of purpose for our life.
Purpose is a drive.
We can’t make our day only for lunch or dinner even though lunch and dinner are equally important.

Abraham Lincoln ran for the sole purpose of his life: to preserve the union and freed the slaves.
Franklin Roosevelt ran for the sole purpose of his life: to lift the people out of a great depression and helped them win a world war.
BP Koirala ran for the sole purpose of his life: fight for humanism and social justice.
Nelson Mandela served 27 years in prison but never stopped running for democracy and social justice.

If we only chase for everyday lunch or dinner, we will never taste real life.

Extraordinary achievement and legacy is directly determined by not how fast we run, but by knowing the goal behind our run.

Powerful runners aren’t made in gyms, they are made from something they have deep inside them- a desire to run.
They have both a desire to run as well as the will, but the will must be stronger than the running skill.
This is the difference between running for life and running for a day.

If we’re running to lose weight for external reasons like to look slim for a wedding or anniversary, then we might reach our goal but the problem is we may gain weight back as soon as our wedding or anniversary ends.
If we’re running for life, we want to lose weight to feel good and to become healthy forever.
In the later case we definitely make slow progress at first but achieve sustainable results in the long term.

When we see a medical doctor, we see at least ten year’s knowledge accumulation related to medicines. That medical expertise they develop over time is by running consistently for at least 10 years.
It’s all motive for a gradual accumulation of knowledge.

One of the best ways to make the decision to run for life is by following or choosing a mentor.
Mentor is not simply our casual advisor.
He or she is more than that.
Mentor is somebody who has already walked the road we are willing to walk and he or she sees us as his or her past self.
Mentors help us to run our life course easily on track if we become able to choose the correct one.

Nobody knows our ultimate ceiling for our prosperity, so mentors teach us not to worry about it, they remind us it would just be a waste of time.
Rather than to know the ceiling of success, they help us to focus on one thing at a time.

When Sabeer Bhatia stepped on the soil of the USA, he had only $250 in his pocket, but he was running for a dream.
He created Hotmail, later Microsoft giant bought Hotmail for $400 million.
Sabeer Bhatia was running for his dream because he had Farouk Arjani on his back, the mentor.

Mentors are very special people.
Our interests and passion are two different things, most of the time we mix them up together.
Mentors help to convert our interest into passion and create value out of it.

Nobody offered a job for Walt Disney, pioneer of the animation industry, later his brother Roy appeared to be his mentor and gave him work at an art studio.

Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart, had no money for any business, his father-in-law appeared to be his mentor and gave him $20,000 to start a retail business.

Albert Einstein had Max Talmud, he not only taught Einstein math, science, and philosophy but also ate either lunch or dinner with Einstein family for six years.

Mentoring forces us to implement new thinking, new skills, and new relationships. Without a mentor these tasks don’t seem natural at first but mentors force us to see them as natural even though they seem unnatural.
It’s very hard to act naturally for yourself.
Mentors can see unnatural things as naturals which we might not see.

No one can run alone, everybody’s gasoline has limited time but each successful runner has somebody behind to refuel.
Somebody standby in the gas station.
It’s the truth.
That somebody is your authentic mentor.

Even Oprah Winfrey, media personality and philanthropist, had Jeffrey D Jacobs as a mentor.

John Lennon of the Beatles had George Martin as a mentor.

One thing mentors remind us is that our most important appointment each day is with ourself, and we shouldn’t miss it.
Our appointment with our mission.
One secret thing that mentors teach us is that we can’t please everyone, there is no way.
We shouldn’t try it.
If we try to please everybody, there is guarantee that the one person we won’t please is ourself.
Our time is finite so we must keep pleasing ourself first.
Mentors are incredible people to reassure us that we aren’t missing these appointments everyday to please ourself.

Mentors will help us to find the right direction in life as well as finding the right action.
The real mentors will also help us to keep our relationships with friends, family, and colleagues in perspective and our daily actions on track.
What we shouldn’t forget is that they have already walked down the same road we’re walking or planning to walk.

We can research, model, benchmark, and trend their experiences for our success.
The research and experience of mentors is the best place to start our own life.
Most of the time we hear people saying that you are very smart but we rarely see them saying that there were many smart people before you so you study them.
These people who did before you, who walked before you, would be the best mentors.
Some mentors are living but many of them are dead but still they can guide us through their legacies, works, and publications.
Our job is to study them and build our actions on the back of their studies, their successes, and their failures.

Seeking a mentor is also hard work. Of course, it takes time but if we are serious about our life, it’s doable.
Generally we think life is about finding ourself but mentors help us to create ourself.

And one thing, never confuse with this, mentors are not advisors or consultants.
They are not.
Period.

Advisors and consultants charge money but mentors work free for you, but their value is priceless.
When you have a mentor on your side, one plus one almost always equals something greater than two.
It’s never too soon or too late to have a mentor.
Commit to achieve excellence.
Having a mentor gives us the best chance possible.
Always associate yourself only with great mentors who are going to lift you higher no matter what.

But just keep in mind, finding the right mentor certainly takes time, if you don’t have anybody right now.
It needs little extra effort, just keep working for that.
I wish you all – the best.

Thank you for your time.
-Yam Timsina

Every one of us is not perfect, we all are trying to figure our own shit out, this is part of who we are. Everybody is struggling, everybody has a space to grow towards perfection.

One of the biggest hindrances of our growth is anxiety.
Anxiety banishes the good nature of human experience.
We suffer a lot from anxiety but that is nothing more than an imbalance in our daily life.
Many of these imbalances we create by our personal and professional habits.
If we want to grow, we have to accept every pain or anxiety as a bad day, not a bad life.
Life is a series of bad and good days, our only effort should be how to minimize bad days and maximize good days.

What we have to understand is that when we wake up in the morning, our body produces cortisol as an energy stimulant.
This is a natural chemical in our body that lets us for a fresh start each day and everyday.
But it is the same hormone which is also produced when we’re stressed and worried.
This means the same chemical works in two different ways in our body.
We have a control system for our own body chemicals.
This is also indicating that we have to know how to utilize our body secretion properly for our growth, prosperity and happiness.

There are two simple recommendations I can provide, from my own personal experience, if you’re imploding with anxiety and worry all the time.
The first is shower everyday with cold water after you wake up, whether you go out or not, you will start your day feeling pride and a sense of accomplishment.
This comes into play because you are calming down your body chemistry.
Not only that, a typical manifestation of each person’s orderliness starts from shower every morning.

The second is don’t scroll your electronic device first thing in the morning, don’t fill your mind with other people’s stuff.
Don’t start your day letting your mind compare your stuff with others.
Reserve the morning slot for you, for your peace, health, and growth.
If we learn how to own our morning, we will elevate life by decimating anxiety.
Start the day with deep breathing: breath slowly, inhale by nose and exhale by mouth, 3 times, repeat a couple of more times.
That’s it.
Now your body becomes a good reservoir for all day activities.
Congratulations.

We all know how it feels when we’re in pain.
But know this, pain is not a weakness everytime, it’s also a strength.
There is a power inside pain to connect us as humans because every pain is different.
Ask a mom who lost her 23 years old son in a car accident, what pain is.
Ask your neighbor who lost her spouse due to COVID-19, what suffering is.
We must absorb these pain experiences in our body and mind but never ever compare our neighbor’s pain, who lost her spouse due to COVID-19, with mom’s pain, who lost her 23 years old son in an accident.
Because these two people have completely different kinds of pain. No comparison.
This is the only way pain works in our lives.
Pain is personal, absolutely personal.
Pain teaches us how to show our inside out but in our own way.
Pain could be our greatest strength, but the best strategy is not to rely on it in all situations, we must save it for emergencies.
There is a good reason that we have a saying, “ the more the body suffers, the more the spirit flowers.”

One of the most important things we have to keep in mind is that any kind of advice for anything from other people (except trained professionals in the areas) may or may not work for us because advice is also personal.
And most of these advice are biased based on your relationship to that person.
It’s natural.
It is generally offered through the eyes of somebody’s own experience.
Your experience for anything happening in your life is completely different than somebody else’s.
Every personal situation encompasses a few unscrupulous individuals, so you’re always better off if you find your own facts rather than rely on someone else.
We can still show our courtesy by thanking the person for suggestions but we’re not obliged to follow all of them.
In many situations, others’ advice helps us to be chess pieces not the chess player.

Even family members’ advice doesn’t work all the time.
Remember, Michael Dell, Bill Gates, and Larry Ellison, the greatest tech-savvy billionaires and the most successful innovators of our time.
They all are college dropouts, they all couldn’t follow their parents advice not to drop out of college.
Their parents’ advice didn’t work for them because their life experiences were different from their parents’ experiences.

We can take other people’s advice as a risk even though many of us are scared when we hear the word risk.
Risk in life is something that happens regularly but we must know how to quantify the damage.
Uncertainty in life is more dangerous than risk because it can happen at any moment and no one can figure out the damage.
The bottom line is, if we don’t know how to quantify the risk then somebody else’s advice may lead us to uncertainty.

As a human being, we might not experience the same after pain, but sure we can still shine.
Hiding our pain-scars inside does not do good for us, we have to wear them as pride and tackle every single day.

The truth of the matter is we aren’t entitled to be happy all the time.
The world doesn’t owe anything from us.
We are emotional creatures, we must experience sadness, grief, frustration, anger, hate, loss, which we cannot ignore.
But we always have to strive for a fulfilled life.
Happy life might be short but fulfilled isn’t.
If happy life craves for knowledge then a fulfilled life is for wisdom.
If we aim for fulfilled life then pain is no more weakness, it becomes strength.

Suffering from pain requires rest, complete and full rest.
Rest is not a pastime, it is the gasoline for the body to recharge.
Albert Einstein, the greatest genius of our time, used to play the piano and violin that helped him relax, focus, and get back to his scientific work.
Einstein’s wife, Elsa once said, “I fell in love with Albert because he played Mozart so beautifully on the violin.”

Though rest is essential for our mental and physical well being but we cannot take rest if we have unfinished tasks or goals pending.
This is one biggest cause of our anxiety.
According to Baumeister and Tierney, authors of “Willpower”, we don’t have to finish the task to take rest but we must have a plan to finish the task.
If we have a plan to finish the task, we don’t wake up in the middle of the night just thinking about the pending task and pending deadline because our unconscious mind stops asking questions to the conscious mind about the unfinished task.
Just planning is also so much more powerful even if we are far from finishing the task.
To fully utilize the advantage of rest in life, we must create the mental workflow and habit of executing them according to plan.

Finally, solitude is another tool to turn pain into strength and happiness.
We shouldn’t fear solitude, we have to recognize that it is normal, healthy and it’s essential.
Spending time alone has huge advantages in life.
Modern research has shown again and again that solitude fosters creativity, boosts self-knowledge, compassion, and lowers stress.
The only approval we need is our own way to isolate our body and mind from others for the time being.
Solitude empowers compassion.
Spiritual leader Dalai Lama has said and I quote here, “ if you want others to be happy, practise compassion, if you want to be happy, practise compassion.”

Thank you for your time.
– Yam Timsina

Few days ago I entered my daughter’s room and saw that she was doing high-school algebra.
She is in middle school and I asked her, “can you do it?”
She replied, “yes, of course.”
I added, “if you encounter any problem, get help from Tony, my son.”
My daughter became upset. I could read her face.
She replied to me, “Dad, why don’t you trust me?”
I didn’t respond immediately but I felt that I hurt her feelings.
I came back to the kitchen and reminded myself what I had learned from Dr. Carol Dweck book ‘mindset.’
I had read, I had learned but I wasn’t applying the principle given by Dr. Dweck.
I would definitely recommend Dr. Dweck’s book “mindset” as a recommended reading for those who are suffering from a fixed mindset in life.
At the moment when I replied to my daughter, I was operated by my fixed mindset which is actually hidden inside me.
Even Though I was aware of it, I was still not shifting toward the periphery of another area, a growth mindset.

The other day I also saw a similar scene.
I was attending my daughter’s parent conference meeting in her school.
Me and my wife were sitting at one table and my daughter was sitting at another table.
One of her friends’ dad approached my daughter and asked, “what are you doing?”
She replied “I’m reviewing my story for competition. It’s a little bit complicated, I’m a bit confused.”
“You secured first position last time, am I right?” he added.
My daughter replied, “Yes I did.”
He replied, “Oh, you spend so much time on your story.”
He further added, “I used to think you are a genius and your competitors must not be as smart as you’re.”
After watching this scene of conversation, I realized that this is another example of an individual suffering from an ill mindset, a fixed mindset.
Actually, these are only some examples but there are so many of these kinds of stories prevalent in our society.

Incident after incident, our society carries flawed perception.
We all want natural recognition rather than recognition through hard work.
We try to make natural recognition as our desire leaving hard work behind us.
We completely forget how our mindset works.
As Marie Curie said beautifully, “Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.”
Fear comes from a mindset.
We show fear to our kids to be supertalent as they should be born with it.
We want them as Albert Einstein, Michael Jordan, and Steve Jobs.
This kind of wish is not only bad for the kid’s psychology but it also degrades their confidence for a long time.
Our society is full of people with fixed mindsets.
If we have to teach our kids only to be a genius, then we have to lose a lot for them, most of the natural talents deplete if we have an unchanged mindset.

There is another problem we have as a society.
We label our kids as genius in various fields.
My son is good at math.
My daughter is excellent in storytelling.
It seems like we are encouraging our kids but actually we aren’t.
Unknowingly, we are saying that my daughter can’t do math and my son can’t do story telling.
This happens because we are not creatures of logic and reasoning, we are creatures of emotions.
Logic and reasoning is the result of a growth mindset.
In reality either son or daughter can do either work, math or story telling, fabulously if we develop a exploring mindset, a growth mindset.

People who believe in a fixed mindset need a quick fix to succeed, and when they do, they feel proud, more important, and famous than others.
They feel a sense of superiority, since for them this is a win.
The truth is we shouldn’t lurk behind the self-esteem of a dark cloud.
Fixed mindset is a dark cloud because sometimes it gives us false impressions as clouds cover the sun.
No doubt, a fixed mindset hinders our growth potential and development.
A growth mindset teaches us how to pinpoint our identity when we are unsuccessful because it is so easy to spot who we are when we are successful.
We must be able to give a specific and precise answer for it and most importantly we must teach this phenomenon to our kids.
If we answer this question properly then only we nurture our mindset in a positive direction, and teach others to do the same.

In many cases the societal reality remains opposite.
The answer for a growth mindset as opposed to fixed mindset is hard work.
If we love something or we are thinking of it as our long lasting career, we have to work hard for it to achieve.
One simple example, Michael Jordan became the king of basketball because he used to practice when other players were taking a break.
Michael Jordan wasn’t a natural player by birth, he was the most hard-working person.
He wasn’t selected in his high school team, he wasn’t selected by his college team, and he wasn’t selected by the first two NBA teams.
So then what kind of mindset he had when he was beginning his basketball career.
Truth is he gave his all for basketball that he only valued and cared in his entire basketball career.
Michael Jordan taught us: we have to take the challenge, learn from our mistakes, and continue the positive mindset to achieve more.
He grew his positive mindset every single day.
Our mindset isn’t static, it is dynamic as cloud. Clouds don’t change into something new, it only changes its shape and size.
As what Michael Jordan did, we have to value and respect what we’re doing regardless of the final outcome.
And we have to show and teach the same to our kids.
We must teach our kids: Becoming is way better than being.
The only way we can teach our kids to improve their everyday skills is by keeping track of what works for them and what doesn’t and trying to understand why.
Michael Jordan became the symbol of basketball due to his everyday growth attitude and discipline of keeping track of it.
When we believe our core qualities can be developed through a growth mindset, failures can still hurt, but they shouldn’t deviate and distract us.

One of my friends works in a pharmaceutical company as a lead scientist. He told me that he has to tackle problems everyday, review new courses of actions, figure out what works and what doesn’t in vaccine development.
He once told me during this COVID pandemic, “we haven’t found the effective vaccine for coronavirus yet, but the search is continuous.”

He reminded me once again that mindsets are our beliefs. They’re quite powerful even though they’re just faith in our mind, and we can grow our mind every second.

We don’t always need hard confidence in everyday lives to succeed but we always need a kind of mental push subconsciously.
Our subconscious mind works 24/7 so that it doesn’t contradict with our conscious mind of not having pure confidence everyday. The equilibrium between conscious and subconscious mind could be shifted in our decisions by our mental habits.

From my reading what I learnt is that Buddha passed through absolute stillness and peace on his way into nirvana, this was possible by moving both conscious and subconscious mind in one direction.

We have to have a habit of forming a picture in our brain forming new connections even if we aren’t doing any practice or work. The picture of a growth mindset helps to take challenges and more to learn continuously.
There is nothing like innate talent, this is crystal clear, we must teach our kids about this misconception that talent isn’t born, it is made.
As Dr. Dweck says, “success is more than 99 percent is hard work.”
Hard work beats talent if talent doesn’t put into work.

According to psychologists Karen Horney and Carl Rogers, many times our kids feel insecure particularly from parents. Kids feel distress, pain, and lost in the crazy world. The truth is they are very young and cannot speak against parents. They cannot walk alone, they have to find out how to win parents’ trust.
The most important thing is that we must give our kids the freedom to grow.
They learn more from their own interest than our own interest.
We as parents must learn what our kids are trying to tell us rather than what we are trying to tell them.

Let our kids know that Albert Einstein, Michael Jordan, and Steve Jobs have made the word ‘impossible’ a very small word.
‘Impossible’ word is thrown around by fixed mindsets who find it easier to live in a small bubble of the world.

Thank you for your time.
-Yam Timsina

Why was I lacking focus in my required task?
Was I sick?
Not really.
Was I a victim of instant gratification?
Maybe, but I had no clue.
Was I a lover of pleasure rather than happiness?
I had no idea but I felt like I was addicted to something, and it was a strange feeling.
In the past I used to think alcoholism is addiction, drug or tobacco use is addiction, but later I realized I was addicted to something more unusual than that.
Now I firmly believe that addiction does not only indicate alcoholism and drug use, it also indicates lack of focus and concentration.

I am re-examining my past life, my past activities and how I was spending my time.
These are some other forms of addiction that I have seen in my surroundings, in my family, in my close friend circle, and colleagues.
Many are addicted to excessive web-surfing, they can’t stay even fifteen minutes without their smartphone. Smartphones are a tonic for them.
Some are addicted to excessive texting, they enjoy chat rooms more than their spouses and family.
Few are addicted to driving and texting, it’s fun for them rather than to wait until they stop.
Couple of my crazy friends are addicted to excessive sexting, let’s not go deeper, it’s self-understood.
Two of my former colleagues are addicted to excessive twittering, whoa, they love that twitter-bird, how fast it flies.

I was addicted to excessive facebooking, contemplating its influence in my life, I decided to invest some money in Facebook stock. How far can I go?
Everytime I surf, Facebook makes money, so why not take a small share of the profit?

When I became an excessive facebooker, I began to live in the past and dream about the future because I have less time to do the real work at the present moment.
I always procrastinated for my real work.
I used to open my facebook page to warm up my task but I never noticed the passing time.
In the end I regretted, I couldn’t finish the task.

Many years ago I had a family friend couple, who used to upload many happy moments pictures everyday on facebook.
My wife used to tell me how happy their relationship is.
I thought the same way for many years.
But three years ago we heard they divorced.
Me and my wife both became shocked.
After reading a book “Atomic Habits” by bestselling author James Clear, I realized that they were too busy to upload the pictures on facebook rather than to work on their real relationship.
Well, this is only my reporting, not a judgement, maybe they became addicted to facebook and couldn’t comprehend its caustic effects in their lives.
Not only Facebooking, any kind of addiction costs us enormously.
Most of the time, Facebooking teaches us to follow the digital shiny objects rather than spending time on real objects.

With Facebook, I have a personal relationship so that, please, allow me to go a little bit deeper here.

Facebook is a double-edged sword.
It helps to stay connected with the lives of people we care about.
Amazing, how far we have come due to technology.
We must salute the people who innovated this technology.
Kudos to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
But Facebook also tricks us into dreaming of other people’s digital happy lives.
Life is far from comparison as shown in Facebook.
We rarely see negatives of people’s lives on Facebook, everybody posts only their positives.
Life never becomes only of positives, it’s a conglomerate of both positives and negatives.
Ultimately Facebook is only a trailer, not the full movie, the real life is with us as a full movie.

I have another friend who spends a lot of time on facebook but he makes a living there, he is an advertisement optimizer. Facebook is his employer.
Facebook is his playground for his earning.
But I became the only addicted customer for facebook.
Anyway no regrets for the past. I learned from it and now moving ahead in life.

Alas, I forgot the worst, I used to surf facebook during pee break at 2 a.m.
What a shitty habit I had !

Why was I having a hard time to break the addiction?
It took a long time to crush the addiction.
Because it required work, hard work, mental work.
It required initiation where I was very lazy.
If no initiation, no beginning, and no flow.

One of my friends shared with me about another addiction that he is suffering.
He loves frequent changes of girl for love, which I have noticed quite regularly.
We may not think it as an addiction but it is also another form of severe addiction.
His family life is in choas.
This is the addiction to friction.

When we become addicted to something, this something brings deeper addiction due to repetition of the same habit with no realization of harm.
This habit doesn’t allow us to keep track of time.
When I was severely addicted to Facebook, I was also addicted to distraction, so I used to open my facebook page all the time even during time of focus reading and writing.
I was in love with distraction.
When distractions came my way, I stopped the task at hand and used to talk either past events or future plannings.
Distraction became my good buddy either to fear me or to show hope.
I wanted to finish my task but I was unwilling to turn off my facebook notification on my cell phone.
I used to respond to text messages immediately, absolutely no patience to wait.
I used to count the number of likes on my facebook upload all the time.
No regret, even at midnight.

I loved to be more reactive than proactive because I wanted to impress others by my comments, my shallow expertise.
I was crazy like a rat between two holes, I used to check my email more than hundred times in a day, maybe every 10-15 minutes.
I used to carry my smartphone all the time with me in my pocket, in class, in meetings and check the phone every couple of minutes ignoring what’s happening inside the room.
I couldn’t make good, healthy and intimate relationships with anybody because I never paid hundred percent attention to anybody because of my smartphone.
I was pathetically poor at listening.
The person who was next to me physically and to whom I was talking always felt unimportant and insulted because in our talk I used to text constantly to somebody else.
Author of “Start With Why” Simon Sinek says, “if you keep your smartphone in front of you on the table in an important meeting even if your phone is in silent mode or off, you are addicted to the phone. If you talk to anybody in person by holding your smartphone on hand, you are addicted.”
As Sinek said, whether it’s true or false, I lived with all of those habits.
Ultimately, I also became addicted to shallowness.
I hated focus and depth.
I became superficial rather than a person of depth.

One of my friends, who is a security analyst in a brokerage firm, has an interesting addiction.
As you know from his job title, he is not a celebrity, he is a normal person with a normal job.
When he comes out of bed, immediately, he surfs the tabloids.
Later he confessed to me he is addicted to celebrity-gossips, celebrity affairs, break-ups, and divorces.
He told me he couldn’t stop reading.
At one point he felt sick if he was not keeping up with Jennifer Lawrence, Kim Kardashian, and Namrata Shrestha.
Once he told me that those things have no value in his life but still he is addicted to reading them.
He realized it and said to me that he is wasting his precious time.

Spending time on celebrity twitter feeds, perusing the Facebook uploads excessively of the people we don’t care about is a self-sabotaging habit.
I love the quote from my favourite personal development expert, Jim Rohn, “you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”
In my view, we are also the average of the five habits we spend the most time with.

The bottom line is:
Without inspecting our life, our activities, and habits thoroughly, we can not expect something out of it.
When I was addicted to Facebook, I wasn’t aware of what I was doing.
Awareness comes only by knowing what we are doing in all aspects of our lives. It’s the same as peeling off each layer of onion even though we know there is nothing inside.
I was having the ripple effect of my addiction to my family and relationship.
At one point I became aware of its effect when I received the email from my daughter’s teacher saying that she is weak in reading comprehension according to her grade standard. This was just one ripple effect.

As a human being, we all are able to forgive and forget. We must be able to forgive our terrible habits and addictions, and we must be able to forget these habits and addictions as well.
We don’t need any counselling, advice, courses, or any other commercial products to kill our addiction.
All we need is we have to change our mind.
To say it simply, change is tough.
Mental change is extremely tough.
Remember: if we don’t bring mental peace and happiness which of course require findings, addiction will always follow us.
Be aware of your life.
Stay away from addiction.

Thank you for your time.
– Yam Timsina