High Private Healthcare Costs and Role of Govt.

If hospital bills Rs 100, direct plus indirect cost of providing healthcare service is Rs 75 to 90. Every one talks about Rs 100 charged to patient. Nothing is done to reduce / subsidize Rs 75 to 90 expenses. Electricity bill, water bill, medical equipment, taxes , real estate building cost etc etc- nothing is subsidized and charged at actual.

There are some 200+ laws which hospitals have to follow. If govt is serious about affordable healthcare, it should ensure that hospitals survive. Govt itself is not spending and day by day making it difficult for hospitals to survive through these laws and bills like KPMEA.

Govt taxes all vendors supplying services and goods to hospitals. These vendors include those taxes/ gst in their bills. These taxes/ gst are indirectly paid by hospital. All salaries to doctors and employees, govt taxes it in the form of income tax. This income tax/ tds is deducted and paid by hospital. After paying to doctors ( income tax) , employees ( income tax), housekeeping vendor (gst), security vendor ( gst), Maintainance vendor (gst), electricity bill, water bill, bmw bill (gst), medical equipments (gst), AMC/ CMC ( gst), drugs and consumables (gst), EMI of loans, canteen bill ( gst) etc etc whatever profit remains govt taxes it at 25 to 35 % as Corporate tax. In this entire value chain, govt earns more than individual doctor, individual employee,individual vendor and hospital.

Govt must either invest in healthcare infrastructure or at least reduce the above mentioned tax burden and laws so that hospitals can survive and provide affordable healthcare.

Private healthcare contributes to 75% of healthcare services provided in India. Private healthcare is delivering excellent high quality patient clinical outcomes thanks to our talented doctors and advanced medical equipments.

Private healthcare is providing high quality healthcare services at 1/10th cost when compared to developed world countries.

Government spends less than 1.5% gdp on healthcare which is extremely low. Government hospitals could provide services at lesser price because their cost of running hospital is financed from tax payer’s money. I heard that Govt spends 100 to 200 cr + for running one tertiary care hospital. If this amount is to be charged to patients, prices at Government hospital will also rise. Resident doctors are exploited at a very low salary / stipend in government hospitals. Doctor to patient ratio and nurse to patient ratio is grossly inadequate in many government hospitals.

People are taking health for granted and not able to understand that high costs are involved in receiving medical treatment. Private Healthcare insurance penetration is less than 5%. Many a times insurance coverage amount is very less. We are ready to buy car insurance at 10k but not our body ( health) insurance at similar range price per annum. The way car insurance is compulsory for every car, we should make health insurance compulsory for every person. We need to create more awareness in society.

Regards,
Dr Sameer Kulkarni

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/high-private-healthcare-costs-role-govt-dr-sameer-kulkarni/?trackingId=BUIS6Q8VS9gWQ9xiUwaDgw%3D%3D

Nice sentence read today

Everything is easy if you are crazy about it & Anything is difficult if you are lazy about it.

God

God is an entity where you deposit your positivity, energy, faith, inner strength. Whenever you feel low, you go back to this entity to withdraw some of the positivity and energy to fight against difficult circumstances. It is like a bank. Many people deposit their inner strength at this entity. Not everyone is capable enough to believe in thy self and store all this energy which can do anything if used appropriately. So they store this energy in God. When saints say God and I God are the same they mean to say that it is my inner strength and potential which manifests in God. God is nothing but my positive emotions and strength stored in an entity. Everything is within me. Since I doubt myself, I cannot believe that I can do anything. So I store this inner potential in God. I believe that God can do anything. 

Since it is very tough to believe in thy self, we create God and put trust and faith in him. Plus there is a factor of luck which is not in our hands so we pray or hope that things will be alright with God’s grace.

In reality finally everything boils down to how much you try and do. You need to believe in yourself – inner potential or God (your inner potential stored in external entity) and try your best. Rest is luck and destiny.

Tony Robbins:

Decision -> standards -> belief -> massive action


What you focus on, you find that. If you focus on people not caring about you, you being unlucky, you will find many events and reasons to find that it is true. If you focus on being lovable and lucky, you will find many events and reasons to find that it is true. What you focus on , you find and get it. Most of the times we focus on such things subconsciously or unconsciously. We need to change that and consciously focus on things we want to focus on.Second is decision and choices.We always have a choice and make decision.

1) We always have a choice - whether to just survive or to live life. Once we choose to live, we can start enjoying and appreciating the delicacies of life.

2) Once a choice is made, second step is decision. We need to decide what will we change or do to live life fully.

3) Once decision is made, we need to raise our standards and not compromise on that. You need to believe in the decision to maintain and continue with standards. You need to expand or change the limiting beliefs. If you decide to become millionaire but you have a belief that it is not possible then you won't be able to maintain the standards.

4) Next step is implementation and action. 

If there is no visible change in action then it means decision is not powerful.


Positive thinking does not help. Positive massive action does.

Education and schooling asks us to be disciplined and be silent , don't talk etc. That makes us passive. Business requires opposite characters - pro activeness, go getter, disruptive innovation, talkative and communicative.

Commit yourself to outstanding standard better than excellence not good or poor or average at all.

Exercise muscle and it will develop. Exercise confidence, standard, attitude and it will develop. Exercise 'feel good'. Emotion starts with motion. You can make yourself feel good and you have to do that. It changes everything.

Conditioning - driving - on phone -take direction which might be opposite because of conditioning. Similarly condition yourself for being positive, happy, confident, peak state, feel good.

Feeling is governed with
1) Physiology and motion,
2) Language and self dialogue,
3) Your focus and belief system.

What stops you from getting what you want - fear. successful people have stress not fear.

Question you ask yourself is very important. If you ask negative question, you will get negative answers. If you ask why I am not good, you will get many answers. If you ask how you can make yourself better, whole focus changes. To change focus ask different questions.

Clarity is most powerful weapon. If you are clear about your goal, your brain helps you get there. Clarity will need purpose. why question helps you get clarity. Purpose drives.

Perception - whatever you perceive is going to be true. Perception can make you feel euphoric or depressive about the same thing.

Physiology - Physiology can change perception.

Strategy 

Right Posture
Right Internal Dialogue
Right Dress & Presentation
Compliment and boost other's confidence
Fake it till you make it.
I like myself feeling is very important for self esteem. Feelings govern actions. You can control feelings by changing the focus.

All actions are governed by decision.
Decision - positive , enthusiasm, energetic , successful - quality of person you want to be - this then governs actions. live life at highest levels. Circumstances and conditions do not decide your destiny. Decisions decide destiny.
Decision is different from wishlist and preferences. Decision is no option.

Decisions - actions - analysis - correction to achieve - result. Don't focus on process , be flexible and focus on result. Decision -> result. Don't focus on decision - process - result. be flexible with process not result.

Pain and pleasure influence your behavior, decision and action. Pain and pleasure is driven mostly by perceptions. If you are not taking action then you are associating more pain than pleasure for it. Change the perception to pleasure over and over to govern actions. Change the false neuro association connections of pain in the past.

Belief governs decisions, actions, body. Belief is most powerful. Change bad belief - 1) use pain pleasure association 2) create doubt - ask questions. If you question anything many times, doubt arises.Use it for bad belief and avoid them for good belief. Good belief if used becomes conviction. Take action - it is feeder to belief.  

Change happens in an instance. Change needs support of pain - pleasure association support. First believe that change can happen. We are responsible for change not some one else. Dis-empowering beliefs hinder decisions. Change is must and urgent.  

Goals are always there. many times they might not be conscious goals. But i do not have goals is not true. Ur subconscious goals might be pay bill, feel good, earn money. Goals - disappointments in past make you not set your real goals. Believe and create compelling future and goals. Have goals for different areas of life. Have absolute faith in goals. 

Pain pleasure principle is linked with action - inaction. Actions lead sometimes to criticism, failure or rejection. It results in pain. Our mind associates actions with pain. It prefers inaction over action. We need to train our mind that inaction leading to no result is more painful than action leading to rejection, criticism and failure. Action is life and we are born to live life, take actions. Without actions there is no meaning to life and existence. Fear of criticism, failure or rejection should not govern your actions and life. Meditation helps in dealing with criticism, failure or rejection. It connects you with your true self and God. You start taking action without fear and enjoy the gift called life.


Belief becomes reality . Belief affects thinking.Thinking affects feelings. Feelings affect physiology - body and posture. Thinking, feeling and physiology affect action. Actions affects success and reality. Belief gets its required support from thinking, feeling, physiology, action to affect success and reality

Belief is something which our subconscious mind trusts in. Belief can be modified. Doubt bad beliefs. Reinforce good beliefs.

Faith is something which our conscious mind trusts in. 

Criticism : No matter what you do people are going to judge you, evaluate you and criticize you. They will have positive opinion, negative opinion or neutral opinion based on their perception, experiences and preconceptions. Criticism comes from jealousy or ignorance. In no case criticism should stop or affect you from being you. Because no matter what you do there will be criticism and evaluation. Best practice is to be true to yourself. 

Negative words - Hope try but should would could

Positive words - Do, make, and, will, now, can /can't, choose,  want
absolutely, definitely, certainly, obviously, naturally, sure, of course, no doubt

Do it now.  Next 24 hrs will not come back. Invest properly.  They are very precious

Each Day is a new Life for a wise Man !!!

Success can not be a goal but a Byproduct

Thought a lot on what is success. Many a times it is a state of mind. If you think of moments when you felt successful in the past life, you see that many a times it is an accomplishment which is recognized by society or people around you. Some times it is just something that is very valuable to you nothing related to people. But many a times societial recognition, people perceptions define success. People who are rich are considered successful in general. But are they really successful? They might be successful in the mind of society and people, but what about their own perception of success. Do they feel successful?

If success is a perception and state of mind, we need to define what is success for us. No matter what we achieve or what we earn there will be people who are better than us in that. You earn 1 crore and there are people who earn 10 crore.  Also there are people who earn 10k and feel that they are very successful. In short we set expectations for ourselves, keep on comparing / benchmarking expectations w r t peers, other people and define a state/ condition where we will feel successful. As we keep on accomplishing, we redefine and elevate the standards of conditions defining success for us. If we fail to achieve the set standards, we feel that we are not yet successful or unsuccessful. These set standards are highly influenced by peers, society and people. This is where problem comes. We start doing things for people. Thats what Steve Jobs explains in his keynote at Stanford.

Is success important? If yes then why? Success makes you feel good about yourself. Society recognizes you, respects you. This respect makes you feel better and cycle goes on. To achieve this cycle lot of efforts are poured in by us. Some efforts which we love to put in and some efforts we hate to put in. After that if we achieve success ( defined condition), we feel good. Otherwise it makes us feel sad.  

After much thought I feel that you should not care about success as long as you are happy about current state and are enjoying life. You should keep on doing good things and things which you truly enjoy doing. As long as you are enjoying and happy about yourself, why to care if you are successful or not. Success can not be a goal but a byproduct. If we keep doing good things with enjoyment, sooner or later we will get fruits - which will give us recognition in the eyes of society and make us successful from peoples' point of view. During whole process we are happy about ourselves as we are doing things we like. Even if we do not succeed or succeed late, it is ok because we are happy about ourselves. Instead of defining a state of success and chasing it , it is better to keep on doing good things which we enjoy and be successful.

There is no point in taking life too seriously and chasing success. On daily basis doing enjoyable good work is very important. Enjoyment and happiness is the goal, success follows in. We generally take it other way round.    

It is very easy to loose hope in this country. It is very easy to set your aspirations low in this country. - Narayan Murthy, Infosys.

Emotions are highly overrated, actions are everything.
Its all about packaging & communication.

Pune Mirror Article - BMD check up

http://www.punemirror.in/article/62/20111105201111050544461496fcb60f/No-sun-sign.html

Tony Robbins

Change your focus
Change your physiology

Set standards - convert should to must
Expand limiting beliefs
Take action
Be tough n believe when u fail.
Give more than what u expect

In sakal

Intellect, Mind, Body and World

There are grossly three main parts of us - Intellect (brain) Mind (Mann) and body. Then there is an external world. If you purely listen to your brain, you are less likely to be unhappy. Mind creates desires. Some of them are satisfied by the external world and some are not. The unfulfilled desires lead to unhappiness. Also when one desire is satisfied, you become neutralized for that desire. e g as a kid you crave for two wheeler like anything and when desire is satisfied, after some days it just remains as a vehicle for you. You did not get continuous happiness out of that.

It is extremely important for your intellect to have control on your mind and body. Use body as a vehicle. Ensure maintenance and petrol fuel. But treat it as your slave and you don't become slave of your body. Mind creates desires. All of them are not granted by the world. There is constant struggle between mind and world. This reduces the energy level of the person. e g after 8 hours work you feel tired. If you actually calculate the time and efforts spent - physically and mentally on the task, then you will realize that you cannot justify the tiredness. Still you are tired. That is because of the struggle between your mind and the world. Your mind wants something, world behave differently. You have no control over the world. But you can control your mind. The energy wasted in the struggle between the world and the mind can be used by intellect to do proper act. If you use that energy in working/action instead of struggling, you will be more productive. Desires are endless. Your intellect should control them to ensure higher productivity and efficiency.
( Learning from Mr Parathasarthy )

Identity 3 rd Stage Phenomenon

The population of pune is around 50,00,000 (5 million). I am one of them. The population of Mumbai is around 200,00,000 (20 million). Who am I in this huge population. What is my identity? 5 million people make their living. Some earn less. Some earn more. People do job, buy flat, marry, raise kids. Everyone among 5 million probably does that. Then what is it that differentiates you from the rest? In other words what is your identity.

Thought a lot on it. I think people in India live their life in 3 stages.
1) Get well equipped
2) Make your living
3) Create your identity

In the first stage there is fierce competition in education to reach the top. Get a better degree. Perform well. Find a good job.

In the second stage, people buy flat, marry, raise kids and have a good married life.

In the third stage, people try to do something which is beyond their self and try to create an identity for themselves in the world full of commodities.

There is so much competition in the first stage that kids are over pressurized for the competitive performance. Each one gets equipped with his/her own set of education, training, experience, course and projects.

In the second stage, we get jobs. It is so difficult to get job if you are not among the so called extra ordinary people. One of my friends supposedly paid 8 lac (0.8 million) to get a job of 15000 per month. He poured in all of the retirement savings of his father. Somehow you get job. Then we strive hard to make our living. Get so called well settled in life. The struggle increases as time passes and you get better positions with better salaries in your job. There is hardly any identity outside your job and your family. Then you have to support your kid going through stage 1 of the process. Many people get old in crossing this 2nd stage.

The third stage remains unaddressed throughout the first 2 stages. The challenges and demands of first 2 stages hardly allow you to devote any time to put some active efforts for the stage 3. There are some people in society who had not had any access to education and other facilities. So they directly started searching for their identity, creating their identity and in the process they became hugely successful. We hear many such stories about such people - severe poverty to super rich transition. Further there are some people who directly enter 3 rd stage after crossing 1st stage e g Obama, Dr Abhay Bang etc. These people also succeed in creating their identity.

So my hypothesis in short is that earlier we target the third stage, more are the chances of succeeding in it. We need to start thinking beyond ourselves in the earlier stages of life. Earlier we do that better are the chances of creating an 'Identity' in the society.

Attitude

Having the correct attitude is a key to the success. No matter what you do, what your sector is, what your profile is, if you have a positive mental attitude (PMA ), you are more likely to succeed. The PMA as explained by Professor Osborne contributes a lot to the success of the accomplished individuals. Faith and spirituality nurture confidence and attitude.

Doubt weakens confidence which affects attitude. Constant use of brain over heart dilutes the enthusiasm which sometimes results in lack of interest and joy in the work. In my view, if we follow our heart we can be very enthusiastic about what we are doing which helps with maintaining a PMA. If you are doing what you like and what you have passion for, then work does not remain work but it becomes your favorite activity. The chances of success would be exponentially high in such work. Following your heart also keeps you happy which improves your attitude and confidence. There is constantly a difference between one's real self and one's ideal self. The whole struggle is to travel from real to ideal, from a commodity to a differentiation. In the end what matters is how you feel about yourself and how happy you are !!!

Simple Mantra

Don't complain. Don't regret. Don't expect.
Do the right work. Enjoy the fruits.
Say YES to the life !!! :)

Shortcut and Focus

Life is always about choices. Choices we make govern our life. Success has always been very important to me. I almost always had to compete against strong opponents - me having less resources and more responsibilities. Original me is a person of integrity, honesty, principles, values, respect and dignity. I remain so in the process of life till now. Of course have done my part of mistakes. But in all have managed to remain as I am.

But in retrospect I see that though I have not done injustice, I have tolerated a lot of injustice and wrong behavior of many people. Many times I needed them and could not afford to go in their bad books. Many times I did not have time to fight with them. I was very focused in my life and always avoided or ignored the stuff not related to my point of focus. I could have resisted the injustice but I was so focused on my goals that I ignored the injustice. Sometimes even I did injustice to some extent in the name of 'chalta hai' or 'everyone is doing it'.

There have been many incidences where I had to be diplomatic. When the power is in someone else's hand and he/she can decide your success, you automatically become diplomatic in dealing with that person. e g A lab worker is stubborn and will not take sample of patients. You have to handle 20 patients in the ward. You can not go yourself and carry the sample. You have 2 options- carry the sample on your own and ignore the patients for a while or be diplomatic and manage the lab assistant by praising good things in him and request him to do his work. So in the professional life and the personal life , I have always faced many situations where I was helpless and had no way to complain. I had to ensure good results always. I used complaining, scolding. But it did not work.I could have fought against such lab workers. But I was busy with my goals and ambitions and hadn't had time to address the issue related to this injustice.
Another example- if you want to start any good thing in village, you have to request the Sarpanch to inaugurate it. Otherwise you can not start.You know he has 'n' no of bad things in him. But you don't care for him but for the results for the poor villagers.

This is not just my story. It is a common story of all middle class students who have to ignore and avoid 'n' number of things in life and focus on their goals. We are always taught to look at the big picture and ignore irrelevant and trivial stuff. I understand and agree with it to some extent. But with time I guess every injustice and wrong thing in this world becomes trivial and your 'focus' becomes your 'selfishness' and nothing else. I am seeing many of my friends doing that. Till the time of survival if you are doing that, I can understand. But even in prosperity if you chose such a path, I think that is a shortcut. In my view you would be compromising on your integrity in doing so. In my view we should never compromise on our integrity. It is something that defines you. Its a 'identity' kind of thing.
Demands are ever lasting. Greed is never satisfied. Nothing is enough. Ours dreams and goals become bigger and larger. That should happen. But I think we have reached a stage where we can ignore shortcuts while maintaining the focus on our goals. In avoiding shortcuts we are choosing to give more time and efforts (long cut and sacrifices) to reach our goals. The cost and the sacrifice related to the shortcut is definitely not worth our integrity. There is a perception amongst some of us that rich people exploit and they are bad. So its ok to do bad to become rich. You don't necessarily have to become a bad person to become rich. You can be both good and rich. I have seen many people who are good as well as rich. We can join their party !!! :)

So Avoid shortcuts and focus on integrity and choose long cut !!! What say ?

( Just writing thoughts in my mind. No intention of advising anyone. I am too small to advise anyone. Whatever is coming to my mind, I am writing it in the blog and even I will try to follow what has been written )

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar says that the cause of anxiety is impatience. We sow and expect immediate results. Life is so instant these days. We are bound to believe in short cuts. But Life is not a short cut. Many times one has to continue doing good, maintain integrity and patience and survive the hardship. It is very easy to lose faith in difficult and trying circumstances. But if we are more patient and persistent in our efforts in the right direction and if we don't necessarily be dependent on the short term results and have a vision then we will lead our life in a more happy way. If we sow and keep on nurturing then one day we will get fruits. It is essential not to lose sight and vision while nurturing.

The Theory of Karma

Theory of karma:

Sorrow and worry are functions of ignorance unless you are not doing your duty. Loss or win does not matter. Doing duty does. Everything created will get destroyed. Each born will be dead. This is definite. There is no point in feeling sorry for the definite. Understand the truth. Human body dies. Soul is immortal. Current life is a part of the journey of the soul. You brought nothing when you were born. You will take nothing when you will die.

Duty is to fight against injustice. If you don't fight, you will be labeled as a coward. If you lose in that cause, it is worth losing. If you win then you can enjoy fruits of being a winner. Win or loss, sorrow and worry, life or death, happiness or sadness- leave everything and concentrate of doing duty. Profit or loss should not matter. Try to expand your thinking beyond that.

It is necessary to fight. Maya (illusion) makes you think that you are doing everything for yourself. You associate loss or win of the cause to your own self. That confuses you. You get worried about results. Sorrow touches you. Such sorrow and worry do not benefit you or the society, the present or the future. Doing right duty in itself is a win. Results are anyways not in your hands. You can only decide if you will fight or will not fight for the right cause. Even if you decide to fight, there is no guarantee of the success.

Without work, you cannot survive. We need material things to live this life. To earn these things you have to work. Not doing anything is anyways boring. You have to work. You have to decide whether you will do the right work- duty or not. So you have option of deciding what to do or not to do and whether to do or not to do. Result is not in your control.

If you are not attached to your win, you will not be afraid of your loss. If you compete thinking it as your duty, your struggle itself is a win. Do things as your duty. You have right on efforts, not results. Don't cross your boundaries. Just keep on doing right things. Cause is more important than the result. Cause itself should be worth. If you win, enjoy it. If you lose, be sure that it is worth losing in the right cause.

Right person tries to control his senses. Senses make you greedy. Lust is never satisfied. That makes you angry. Anger hurts logic. Once logic is affected, person loses the sight of what makes him happy. Your senses control you instead of you controlling your senses. Right person also is attracted towards these senses. But the right person knows the right things and controls his senses and does not cross his limits. He becomes master of his life instead of life being master of him. Right person controls his senses, not kill them. Right person knows his options and redirects all his senses towards the right destination. He does not give free pass to his senses. He lives his life as a knowledgeable person.

Introverts try to dig in themselves to search for God. Extroverts do work to reach God. But even introverts have to work in finding the value of life.

Results affect the person’s work. Person fails to see the big picture and why and how his efforts will benefit this world. He concentrates on his own win or loss and not with the cause for which he is fighting and living his life. So suddenly win or loss becomes magnanimously important for the person. All this is the result of the Maya (illusion). Maya makes you live your life for selfish reasons. If you are gifted with strengths and power and if you do your work for selfish reasons and indulge in wrong behavior and acts, then normal people thinking you as their role model will be get enticed towards wrong acts and behavior. So you should try to think beyond your own self. It is not just the question of you- your win – your loss – your work. It is much bigger than that especially if you are a gifted and a fortunate one. If you use your strengths to do good and right things, normal people who follow you, when they will become fortunate and powerful, they will also do good work and thus benefit the society and the world. Thus it is the duty of powerful people to become correct role models by thinking beyond their own self and thus benefit this world.

Following your duty makes you free from all the sins. Maya makes you selfish and you do sins. If you can see beyond that and become knowledgeable, you can avoid doing sins. Body is controlled by senses. Senses are controlled by heart (emotions and feeling). Heart is controlled by mind. Mind is controlled by conscience and soul. Thus if you control your conscience and do the right thing for the soul, you can control your life.

Think beyond you own self- your happiness, sorrow, worry, profit, loss, ambition. Do the right thing. Your conscience knows it. Live your life for a greater cause. Not doing wrong things helps you remain in peace with your conscience. Doing right things makes you happy. Control your ignorance through knowledge.

Doubt, fear and greed degrade you. Doing right work and living for the right cause makes your life worth. You cannot become happy if you don’t do your duty. Results are not your problems. Your efforts are your problems, because efforts are in your control.

Thus become knowledgeable and believe in the theory of karma (karma yog- doing right work without thinking of results).

Panipat

Story of Panipat- Afghanistan King Abdali attacks India and wins over Delhi. To protect independence of India, Marathas decide to combat Abdali. Due to betrayals, religious divides, politics, lack of resources, Marathas were left powerless and had to either surrender or die.

Sadashiv Bhavu - maratha general - commander in charge is asked to surrender when all his resources are depleted. He replies " Everyone has to die. Whats a big deal about this 6 feet body. Success or failure does not matter much. What matters is the purpose for which you live - the reason for your existence on this earth. I am fighting to protect India from the foreign rule. In that purpose I will win or die. "

If Bhavu had surrendered succumbing to fear, Afghanistan king Abdali would have remained strong with intact forces. Sadashiv Bhavu fought till his death and reduced the power of Abdali to such an extent that he did not remain in any position to rule India. Abdali signed a treaty and ended the war.

Vivekananda

To succeed, you must have tremendous perseverance, tremendous will. "I will drink the ocean," says the persevering soul, "at my will mountains will crumble up." Have that sort of energy, that sort of will, work hard, and you will reach the goal.

Why are people so afraid? The answer is that they have made themselves helpless and dependent on others. We are so lazy, we do not want to do anything ourselves. We want a Personal God, a Savior or a Prophet to do everything for us.

You cannot believe in God until you believe in yourself.

What is the use of talking of one’s mistakes to the world? They cannot thereby be undone. For what one has done one must suffer; one must try and do better. The world sympathizes only with the strong and the powerful.

What about this marvelous experience of standing alone, discarding all help, breasting the storms of life, of working without any sense of recompense, without any sense of putrid duty, and of working a whole life, joyful, free -- not goaded on to work like slaves by false human love or ambition?

Have you got the will to surmount mountain-high obstructions? If the whole world stands against you sword in hand, would you still dare to do what you think is right?

This is the first lesson to learn: be determined not to curse anything outside, not to lay the blame upon anyone outside, but stand up, lay the blame on yourself. You will find that is always true. Get hold of yourself.

We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves. If what we are now has been the result of our own past actions, it certainly follows that whatever we wish to be in future can be produced by our present actions; so we have to know how to act

All the powers in the universe are already ours. It is we who have put our hands before our eyes and cry that it is dark

“Stand up, be bold, be strong. Take the whole responsibility on your own shoulders, and know that you are the creator of your own destiny. All the strength and succor you want is within yourselves. Therefore, make your own future.”

Selfishness and Friendship

There were two childhood buddies who went through school and college and even joined the army together. War broke out and they were fighting in the same unit. One night they were ambushed.

Bullets were flying all over and out of the darkness came a voice, "Harry, please come and help me."

Harry immediately recognized the voice of his childhood buddy, Bill. He asked the captain if he could go.

The captain said, "No, I can't let you go, I am already short-handed and I cannot afford to lose one more person. Besides, the way Bill sounds he is not going to make it." Harry kept quiet.

Again the voice came, "Harry, please come and help me." Harry sat quietly because the captain had refused earlier.

Again and again the voice came.

Harry couldn't contain himself any longer and told the captain, "Captain, this is my childhood buddy. I have to go and help."

The captain reluctantly let him go. Harry crawled through the darkness and dragged Bill back into the trench. They found that Bill was dead.

Now the captain got angry and shouted at Harry, "Didn't I tell you he was not going to make it? He is dead, you could have been killed and I could have lost a hand. That was a mistake."

Harry replied, "Captain, I did the right thing. When I reached Bill he was still alive and his last words were 'Harry, I knew you would come."'