By Pradeep A. Shah
Chartered Accountant
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Namaskaar
The end of man is an action and not a thought.
— Thomas Carlyle
All of us have wonderful thoughts and grand dreams of what we
wish to do. The sad part is that we are somehow unable to put our thoughts into
action and our dreams remain unfulfilled. We are unable to translate our ideas,
our pious intentions, our noble plans into action. Hence, wishes remain only
wishes, they just remain unfulfilled dreams. While there could be justification
in case of people who die young and who did not get time to act on their
thoughts, for most of us who live up to ripe old age there is no justification
whatsoever.
Some of the possible reasons for our not taking action are :
- we always believe that there is ‘a tomorrow’ which unfortunately never comes. We
procrastinate.
- we are shy of stepping out from our comfort zone.
- we are scared of the unknown.
It is true that when we act we may fail, but fear of failure
should never be the reason not to act. There are two kinds of failures — those
who thought and never acted — and those who acted but failed. One would rather
be the second type of failure than the first. I am reminded of what Shakespeare
said :
“It is better to have loved and lost rather than not to
have loved at all.”
When one looks back at life, one finds that most of our
regrets are for actions not taken. Brilliant thought, noble intentions, grand
plans and magnificent goals all remain within us, like buds which never
blossomed into flowers. It takes a lifetime for us to understand that the
smallest of action is always better than the noblest of intentions. We have to
make a start, convert our dreams into goals, and take action to fulfil our goals. Without action,
dreams are useless. Nothing can be achieved by merely having wishes and good
thoughts. There is a well-known subhashit which is as under :
“Goals can only be achieved by action, not merely by
having grand ambition. Even the deer do not enter the mouth of a sleeping lion.“
There is a story of a person who every day went to the temple
of Hanuman, and asked for rupees ten lakhs. This went on for quite some time,
till Hanuman lost his patience. He appeared and gave the devotee a hard
resounding slap and said :
“If you want ten lakhs, at least buy a lottery ticket ! Do
not expect me to do that for you !”
We have to wake up and be bold, learn to take risks and act
to realise our dreams and achieve our goals. We have to act. A ship would be
very safe in the harbour, but that is not what it is meant for. As Andre Gide
has expressed it :
“Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage
to lose sight of the shore.”
Putting it in a language we accountants can easily relate to,
there is a wide gap between what we are capable of and what we actually attain.
I have always felt that in our case our actual ’production’ is far less than our
installed capacity. I would dare say that our actual production seldom exceeds
20% of our installed capacity. If we take the right action and raise this even
to 30%, our world would be a much better place to live in than it is today. By
taking action on our dreams we have the capacity to bring heaven on earth. Hence
let us act. I would conclude by quoting Vivekananda :
“Arise ! Awake ! And stop not till the goal is reached.”
