A very apt saying which addresses a very germane fact that, “Everything is in one’s mind”. If he thinks he can do it (things which are permissible to a mortal considering the limitations of the whole race), then he would definitely be able to and if he thinks otherwise, then chances are umpteen that he would fail in his venture. Human civilization is replete with examples which will testify that humanity has leapt forward not by conforming to the existing norms, rather by questioning the status quo.
Bumblebee is an insect which is characterised by yellow and black hair throughout its body. It is being earlier presumed that because of its aerodynamically flawed structure, it is impossible for a bumblebee to make a flight. However, all these scientific conclusions made by human beings, which are of course not infallible, are confined to the human race only. The bumblebee does not have an iota of cognizance about what human thinks of its structure and thus it does not have that mental block that it can never fly and hence, it defies the conventional wisdom of aerodynamics.
A similar story comes to my mind, when I encounter this adage and that is of a deaf man participating in a very arduous mountain race. The deaf man was among the 30 self proclaimed daredevils who decided to take part in the ordeal. The race was indeed insurmountable. The race and its treachery had been a hot talk among the people of the village since a fortnight ahead of the final race day. The village was a small one and thus the participants were also indulged in those talks, still they put themselves forward, just because it was the village sarpanch’s daughter which was at stake, needless to say that she was the most beautiful and effervescently mesmerizing nubile girl of the village. Finally, the day came and the race was just minutes ahead of being shown the green signal. The audience took their seat rather they came to the place where the race was supposed to start. The audience, although came to cheer the participants, couldn’t stop themselves from talking about the bleak chances of anybody finishing the race and the talks were very much audible to the participants. The rule was anybody taking part in the race should anyhow finish it and if he can’t he has to give two cows to the sarpanch. Hearing all these and the rules of the game, only 10 out of 30 showed willingness to start the race. The race started and finally it came out as a result that only the deaf person was able to finish the race. All the co-participants could not even come close to him. As was promised, the daughter of the sarpanch was married to that guy.
Leaving apart the treachery of the race, most of the participants couldn’t finish the race just because they heard people saying it was impossible to finish the race. This very thought weakened many of the participants who decided to take part in the race earlier. The deaf person was, all this while, insulated to these talks and thus, atleast on a psychological basis, he was having an upperhand. The story of the victory of the deaf person became folklore in the village.
In order to achieve one’s target, a person has to choose carefully what to listen to and what not. We are very much influenced by our environment and our environment consist of people both strangers and acquaintances, among many other entities. If I am just confining myself to the human part, the words that come out of the people around us affect us drastically. And if, the words are pertaining to something which we strive for, we have to be all the more cautious. It would be highly underestimating and illusionary to think that you will get only the good and motivating advice from your surroundings. People can have ulterior motives. I am not being cynical but I have to believe in that. Evolutionarily, human race has been designed to be selfish and these selfish intentions give rise to jealousy. So, people should be very careful to what they allow to get into their head, because a seed of negative thought implanted from the surrounding can decimate all the efforts made towards one’s goal.
One should never listen to the negative talks, talks that pertain to his wishes and goals. He should rather be selective in imbibing all the positive things and discarding the negative things. Bumblebee is an insect, so it is unable to comprehend and didn’t know what human beings think of its flight. However, as human beings we are bestowed with an involuntary listening capability and a voluntary thinking capability. We can do nothing about our ears and in order to not listen to something we have to plug our ears with our finger or any other convenient stuff, not as simple as closing one’s eyes. Hence, all we can do and that to, if put an effort, very successfully is to apply our voluntary thinking abilities to decide what to imbibe and what to discard. A wise man will not only extract the favourable things from his environment but also expunge the unfavourable ones.
The flight of a bumblebee should not be considered as something which is defying nature’s laws. It is just that some from the scientific fraternity thought that aerodynamically it cannot make a flight. However, now scientific theories are well established which corroborate the possibility of its flight. So, it was not that nature never wanted bumblebee to fly and by being able to fly, it is defying nature. Likewise, it is not that a man cannot do or achieve a certain thing, it is just that some people think so, may be because of their own failures or inability to take a step forward in that direction. Thus, everybody is endowed with a skill and that is deeply ingrained in us, it is the way we use our skills, undeterred by unfavorable circumstances, which dictate our success.
