Many of us feel that we returned from our school empty-handed. We learned nothing there. In our childhood, we learned a lot.
We were creative and brilliant. But after joining school, everything changed. For the first time in our lives, we started to fear ‘what people will say’. Suddenly, our goal in life became ‘not to be embarrassed by others’. We started to fear what people would say behind our backs and stopped taking any risks in life
I will never forget what happened to my friend Richard Nyard at school. (He is now a famous photographer, with his permission I am telling his story here). One day, Richard and I were walking home from school. Suddenly, he stopped in the middle of the road. He looked very frightened. I asked him what happened? I thought he must have had a seizure. He pointed to the belt of his pants and saw that it was unfastened!
He said, “I have been like this all day!” He was confused, wondering what everyone at school would think. His self-respect was shattered. This is the school environment
When I give a lecture on motivation in a seminar, I enjoy taking questions from the audience. I often see how many people have a worried look on their faces when they ask questions. They think what everyone else will think after hearing this question.
In school life, we start thinking about other people instead of ourselves and it haunts us throughout our lives. So we have to do our own thing without listening to what other people say. Now we have to re-develop that creative mindset of our childhood. We have to go back to that wild and energetic time.
By the way, during the question and answer session in the seminar room, many people do not want to ask questions. They think of leaving. I have found a way to overcome this situation. If I tell them that if there are no questions, I will take a break for now, then it is seen that everyone prefers to take a break without asking questions. So I have found this way. I then draw five circles on the board and say that I will take a break after five questions. Then everyone is interested in asking questions.
So that they can go out quickly. In fact, the main reason for doing this is to relieve stress from their minds and create a little mental pleasure.
Most people do not think how easily they can be socially fearless. Without doing this, they turn themselves into narrow-minded people by taking the harsh words of many people as a basis, like teenagers. Do you want to be such a narrow-minded person?
But you can come out of this stupid idea if you want. You have to motivate yourself without listening to what others say. This can be done through a simple question. As Emerson said, “Why should I leave my future to the thoughts of others?”
