Flowering Trees

It was a lovely morning. I was enjoying my walk, admiring the
beauty of nature around me, and paying my silent tribute to the creator who
created this wonderful world. My eyes rested on a tree standing tall in its
majestic glory and fully decked with lovely flowers. I started thinking about
flowering trees. How many did I know ? I could recall about twenty in my mind.
And then it dawned on me, and what I had learnt came to my mind. Every tree
(unless it be a cone bearing one) is a flowering tree ! Every tree has to have
flowers. Only we fail to see the flowers. We do not have eyes for them.

And my mind wandered further. This principle applies to us
humans too. All of us have some wonderful qualities. Every one of us is great
and unique in some special way. God has made every one of us different. No two
persons have the same fingerprints. Each one’s DNA is different. Each one of us
is gifted with some good qualities.

It is said that no one is perfect. But it is equally true
that no one is totally devoid of good qualities. A 100% hero or a 100% villain
exists only in romantic films, novels of ‘Mills and Boon’ type or in TV serials.
Even in ‘Mahabharat’, ‘Ramayana’ and other epics, we find that the authors
realised this and depicted it correctly. Even great personalities like
Bhishma and Drona were not devoid of faults and weaknesses.
Bhishma silently witnessed the dishonour of Draupadi without
attempting to stop Kauravas, and Drona for the sake of money
backed the wrong side.

On the other hand Duryodhan stood firmly besides
Karna and conferred instant princehood on Karna when he was being
humiliated because of his alleged birth in a low caste family. He also chose to
fight Bhima and met his death at his hands when he could have well chosen
any of the other four of Pandavas who were no match for him in fighting
with Gada. Karna also magnanimously gave away knowingly his
Kavatch and Kundals which were providing him with invincibility, to
God Indra who came dressed as a beggar, knowing that he was signing his
own death warrant. Even Ravana had his good qualities. Laxman was
sent by Rama to seek wisdom from Ravana, when Ravana was
dying on the battlefield.

There are also numerous instances where the latent goodness
comes out and a person gets transformed from being a sinner to a saint. We all
know how Valya the dreaded robber became saint Valmiki and gave us
the priceless gift of Ramayana. In not too a distant past Leo Tolstoy
completely changed from leading life full of vices to reach great heights. He
became a champion of poorest of poor and started living a very simple life with
only bare necessities. He became one of the three major influences in Mahatma
Gandhi’s life. There is a current case of one Laxman Gode who was sentenced
eight times for as many as 19 criminal offences. Reading Mahatma Gandhi’s work
while in jail, completely transformed him. He came out clean, confessed to his
wrong deeds and is today totally devoted to Gandhiji’s ideals. He has been
responsible for spreading Gandhiji’s message amongst hardened criminals and
transforming many of them !

In Bhagvad Gita lord Krishna describes the qualities of good
persons in the first three shlokas of the 16th Chapter.

The Blessed Lord said :

Fearlessness, cleanness of life, steadfastness in the Yoga of
wisdom, almsgiving, self-restraint and sacrifice and study of the Scriptures,
austerity and straightforwardness,

Harmlessness, truth, absence of wrath, renunciation,
peacefulness, absence of crookedness, compassion to living beings,
uncovetousness, mildness, modesty, absence of fickleness,

Vigour, forgiveness, fortitude, purity, absence of envy and
pride, all these are his who is born with the divine properties, O Bharata.