I have always been an ardent admirer of Nature. I have never had enough of nature and every day I am astonished at the miracles around me. I recently had a few experiences which made me admire nature more and learn important life lessons.

The first one was when my Christmas tree was growing up in the garden. As we know, Xmas tree grows tall and so was mine. One day its tip reached below the leaves of my coconut tree. I thought I will have to ask my gardener to chop of the coconuts fronds. But before I realised, the leaves of the Xmas tree found its way through the leaves of the coconut tree and continued to grow tall without complaining to anyone.

The second instance was when I saw a lotus pond near the place I stayed in Pondicherry. I had requested the estate manager to get me a small lotus sapling from the pond. But every time he tried, he could not. I was disappointed till my visit last month. He presented me the same and I brought it diligently to Bangalore and put it in my lily pond. Within days the lotus sapling dried and died. I realised and learnt that a lotus pond is more than 20 feet deep and my Lilly pond is around 3 feet only. Hence, there was no way that the lotus could survive in a shallow lily pond.

Both these experiences are great learnings in life for me. The first was to let people learn and grow their way. We should not interfere and want them to do it our way. In the second experience, nature taught me that I should not mess up with nature. If I try to force people to do it my way or learn my way, they may not succeed. Encourage people to do it their way and let them bloom in their own backyard.

If we sit down and reflect, we learn a lot of life lessons from nature every day. Many of us tend to complain and crib all the time that we are not able to grow for any number of reasons in the organisation. We sometimes say bad boss, poor opportunities, lack of support or resources or something else. If we are willing to learn from nature, we will not allow anything to come in our way and will continue to learn and grow.

Similarly, as leaders and parents we tend to make people behave as we think since we feel it is the best way to do. It may or may not be right. If we create a work environment as a leader or a home environment as a parent and let our colleagues and our kids learn and grow as they would like to do, they may prosper. If we try to force fit like I did with the lotus tree in my Lilly pond, nobody prospers.

Nature teaches us every day in every way. It is upto us to admire, observe and learn.

Time to start is today.

S Ramesh Shankar

8th March 2022