A great Italian sculptor was brought by the Bishop of Florence to  create a  statue.

One tonne of marble was brought and put up in the front of the chapel. The sculptor was told: “They have the Sistine Chapel, now I want something special here, in Florence. I want it to be the best ever.” He commissioned him and asked: “How long do you need?” He said: “I need a year.” He said,  “Ok, take a year”.

The bishop went on a small tour and  when he came back, he walked straight into the chapel to see what had been done…half expecting a half-finished piece of work.

It had been three months…and the stone was completely left untouched. Not a single scratch, not a mark. All the tools were brand new, still lying on the side…nothing had moved, nothing had happened.

So he called one of the lay brothers and said “Where is my statue?”

He was told: “Every single day, the sculptor is here. He comes at the crack of dawn and he sits in front of that statue. Then he repositions himself and then he repositions himself  again, as the light changes. And he just sits and stares at the stone.:

“Does he take notes, does he draw sketches…what does he do?”

“Nothing. He just stares and stares and stares. And when dusk falls, he leaves.”

“This is going on for three months?

“Yes, it is going on for 3 months.”

 “Oh well, he is a great sculptor, maybe he needs time.” So saying, the bishop took off for another tour. He came back 2 months later. He went into the chapel,  and again not a single scratch. Again, when we he talked to the lay monks, they told him exactly the same story.

 So he called the abbot and said, “You are the abbot of the monastery. Go down to him tomorrow and tap him on the shoulder and ask him what is going on”. So he went, and there he was—the sculptor—staring intently at the white square marble.

He leaned over very gingerly and tapped him on the shoulder. At first, the sculptor didn’t react. So, he tapped him a little bit more…again there was no reaction. So he gave him a light shout and there was a massive eruption.

The sculptor turned around and immediately snapped at the abbot, cursing him vehemently, demanding that he get out of the chapel, and not darken the threshold of the chapel ever again for as along as he was there. If he ever took a breath, made a squeak of a noise again, or interrupted the sculptor, the sculptor would actually complain to the archbishop.

The abbot just slunk away. The archbishop, on hearing this, thought “Let us leave him for a little while and see what happens. I am coming back next month. By then, he should be finished. Again, he went into the chapel…there was nothing waiting for him to see. Seven months of the year had gone by.

The archbishop decided to talk to him the next day. At the crack of dawn, the archbishop sat in front of the marble, waiting. The doors opened. The sculptor strode right in. He did not even see the archbishop.

He went straight up, picked up his tools and started hammering. The archbishop quietly left. Four months later, one month short of the year, La Peitra David was born. It is considered to be the finest sculpture ever done.

Now the question would be: What was he doing for 7 months? The lay monks asked the archbishop this when it was unveiled.

The archbishop replied: “The question is what has happened to my other 200 Davids.”

"What 200 Davids?” 

The archbishop said: “Seven months of 30 days, makes is 210 days. Each day, he sat there and as he walked around and he has finished an entire sculpture in his mind, and then chosen to reject it. Can you imagine, I just missed 210 Davids.”

The sculptor had studied the grain of the stone, the colour, the lighting and everything. You cannot remove it after it has been sculpted, and the sculptor learnt from the stone.

If you can learn from stone, then the question even for an agnostic is, why can’t you learn from the person in front of you? Why would you need to asses him?

The question is: How receptive are you? That is studentship.

 

Asking does not reduce me nor does it take away from my friendship.
Asking requires humility, something I am always in need of.
Asking is how I learnt as student and how I remain so.
Asking is how I learnt my trade and how I continue to ply it.
Asking is how I get customers and how I keep them.
Asking is how I got my wife and how she remains so.
Asking is the basis of prayer.

It is the only way to the Lord.

If I have no expectation and no fear asking can only make me stronger.

EVERY PERSON ought to have a great vision. You have to get to where you want to be by not accepting what ever has taken place but by often questioning the current state of things.

Did you know that one can create a vision in a 'future backwards' manner, rather than the conventional 'present forward' manner. Try it out. You will come out successful. Companies like Motorola and Toyota have emerged successful after implementing this.

Great vision always reserves room for providence and lends itself to the power of emergence. If you have thought through how to execute the vision in fullest detail; you probably do not kow that you do not know. Great vision is an apparition of the future - not the future itself. Even when you lose your sight, there is no need to give up you vision.

We all have with us the potential for greatness or for failure. Both possibilites are an innate part of our character. Whether we reach for the stars or plunge to the depths of despair depends in large measure on how we manage our positive and negative potential. It is doubtful that, if left unchecked, your virtues will rage out of control. Unfortunately, faults have a way of multiplying until they eventually choke out your good quailities and more importantly your past good deeds. The surest way to control your faults is to attack them moment they appear.

Move on people; The world is waiting for you.

Confront before you conflict.  Only way to avoid conflict is to confront. As human beings we are different and hence,  conflict is inevitable.

A forest can exist because the trees learn to confront. Trees, as they grow up, realize that if they do not learn to confront essentially their air space, they cannot exist. There are trees which grow within 6-12 inches from each other when they are seedlings. Only one gets beyond the others, and the little ones eventually die in the shadow of the big one. Then, the seedling 12 feet away from this one, will eventually come into space where they have to give in to each other. The forest can appease this whole series of confrontations happening.

And that is essentially what we need to do—learn from nature. Confront before you conflict. And you have to confront early, so that even when the tiny little branches from two opposing trees come close to each other, the saplings touch each other, they recognize each otherand that is a confrontation.

 
Confrontation is never personal, conflict is always personal.

Confront issues.

One doesn’t confront the person. One is in conflict with the person.

It is not about addressing you. One can confront on one’s methodology, one’s philosophy, one’s psychology or any of this without confronting the person. A confrontation should be as beneficial to the confrontee as it is to the confronter. If the issue to you is relevant to you as a learning process, you don’t care where you learn it from.

It is like learning a language. You want to say it right, and in that process if you have someone saying to you…”No, that is wrong. You have to say dosti and not doste, the t is pronounced this way.” Are you insulted by that? It will be foolish of you to be insulted by that. You have to recognize that you do want to say it right, your goal is to say it right. The more you use the language the more people can correct you.

In confrontation it is always about the issue. You present your issue and say: “Do you think this is right?” Then you must be open to the fact that it could be wrong. But not to speak up and confront will always lead to conflict. The more you keep you keep quiet, the longer the time bomb is ticking.

But, you have to do your homework. Otherwise you will find that in every confrontation, you are proved wrong. You basically sit back and wonder – ‘why is it that I am always wrong?’  If you don’t do your homework, naturally every confrontation is a battle you are losing. That is the first aspect in the art of learning.

Read also : TAPS

There is no purpose to our existence if there is no dream. We all start off with a dream before we meet success—a dream or a reason which keeps you awake every night, and not something which you have when you are asleep. A dream which keeps you going—which keeps you out there pushing yourself, not making you feel tired—because you are so focused on what you are doing.

If this dream is not compelling, you will not do anything to achieve it. It should push you forward to do something.

If you are looking at the predicament of an impoverished village, or of a dying best friend or of a homeless child,  it evokes so much compassion and pity in you, , so much that you feel: “I want to do something for this person. I want to build a hospital. I want to give them a school…” There is a reason first, and then it compels you, it drives you.  Compelling reason is something that makes you get up every morning to do something you strongly believe in.

The first step towards achieving success is in understanding yourself and finding that compelling reason to reach your dream. Identify the driving force which will take you out there everyday, face rejections, come back home and take you back the next day.

Most of us are not sure what our compelling reason is. If we don’t have a reason pushing us forward, nothing can be achieved. No one else can tell you what your compelling reason is.

You have to BE more before you can do, and you have to DO more before you can have. Compelling reason defies logic; it does not allow you to be tired. It makes your think bigger. Because you know that there is something to be achieved.

The only secret to achieving your dreams is to help people around you achieve theirs, giving hope to people who lost it. It is in raising yourself to help mankind. If your compelling reason is beyond material needs, it is even more compelling.