Open Up : Seize The Opportunity

The moment we shift our perspective and begin to see our problems as challenges, is the moment we start to train our brain to spot opportunities   -  Photo by Maarten van den Heuvel on Unsplash

It is unanimously said that opportunity is all around us. However mostly we remain unaware of the signals that blink and we fail to grab the things. But when we take a note on some thing that may be interesting, we invariably haunt for the problems associated with the things.

There is no doubt that we cannot open up and miss out on incredible opportunities every single day. We work hard to achieve our goals and objectives, only to sabotage our own success because we are unable to take advantage of the chances that are coming to us. Our human nature prevents us to grab the opportunities.

Our Thought Process - Perspective of Opportunity

What actually means by opportunity ?

The Oxford Dictionary defines Opportunity as

A time or set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something.

Of course on the surface, this sounds good and wonderful. But it may not be so easy to find. Many opportunities we come across are actually appears as problems or seems hard to achieve. Our untrained eyes and mind are unable to witness the present moment and sum up all opportunities as insurmountable problems that make our life difficult, stressful and hard. And it is the point, where we make mistake, we see the problems as problems rather than challenges that test and strengthen our ability, our resolve.
The moment we shift our perspective and begin to see our problems as challenges, is the moment we start to train our brain to spot opportunities. Problems may seem to us difficult, but a challenge is something we can work with to better our circumstances.

Swami Vivekananda avers,

The human race is in process of development , all have not needed the same altitude. Therefore, some are nobler and purer in their earthly lives than others. Everyone has an opportunity within the limits of the sphere of his present development of making himself better. We cannot unmake ourselves, we cannot destroy or impair the vital force within us. But we have the freedom to give it different directions.

 
This  'opportunity' to grow, to give a better directive to our life-energy is present in our every life-situation. Every experience is an education. The value of anything in life lies not in to enjoyment or possession but in the meaning and direction that it gives to life. Discovering this meaning hidden in our experiences of the world- both internal and external- is the total challenge in life.
  

Finding Meaning

In his seminal book Man's Search for Meaning, Viktor Emil Frankl, a neurologist and psychologist, speaks about

the potential meaning inherent and dormant in all the single situations

that we have to face throughout life. While accepting that there is a long-range meaning of life as a whole. Frankl uses the analogy of a movie to explain the importance of single situations.

Viktor E Frankl  (26 March 1905 - 2 September 1997)

A movie has thousands of individual pictures, each of which

makes sense and carries a meaning.

While it is true that the meaning of the whole movie is seen only in its last sequence, it remains that

we cannot understand the whole film without having first understand each of its components, each of the individual pictures.

Similarly, the final meaning of our life or what shape we give to our life - which perhaps reveals itself on the verge of death - depends

on whether or not the potential meaning of each single situation has been actualized 

to the best of our knowledge and capacity.
       
 But most people, like restless, bored school kids, are inattentive or just blind to these growth-opportunities offered by life. Consequently, their learning and growth is intermittent or they simply get detained to repeatedly experience the same kind of life situations.

Greed, sensual indulgence, fear, anger, hatred, jealousy, lethargy and the like prevent us from seeing the opportunities of life.

Again, of all the life experiences, the most educative are those which are commonly called difficulties or sufferings.

Swami Vivekananda

Swami Vivekananda would often point out that blows of hardships give us better experience of life than enjoyment, because these blows have the power to awaken our inner resources.     

Turning Challenges as Opportunities

Viktor E Frankl was also an Austrian Jew who had survived the German Concentration Camps. So he discusses, how seeking meaning in his unspeakably inhuman experiences at the Camps, became life-saving and also a source of spiritual growth. While most of the prisoners believed that real opportunities of life were over for them. Frankl knew that in those very terrifying experiences lay a challenge and an opportunity.

One could make a victory of those experiences, turning life into an inner triumph or one could ignore the challenge and simply vegetate, as did a majority of prisoners.

A wonderful example of turning a devastating life-experience into a learning opportunity is seen in 

Thomas Alva Edison (11 February 1847 - 18 October 1931)

the life of Thomas Alva Edison, the profile inventor. When Edison was 67 years old, on 10th December 1914 late in the evening there was a massive chemical explosion in his laboratory. While the firefighters struggled to control the blazing fire which was destroying his precious inventions, prototypes and notes, Edison called out his son

Where's your Mom! Go get her! Tell her to get her friends! They'll never see a fire like this again

Early next morning, when the fire was still smouldering, Edison called his employees together and announced

We're rebuilding.

Moreover, in the midst of the catastrophe, Edison had noticed that the firefighters were hampered by loss of power and light. So within two days he came out with a design for a potable battery light source! And the thing was ready and displayed in six months!

Dimensions of Learning

A single situation can produce different consequences and learning opportunities and thus obviously vary among the stake holders. The charm of life is that a life-situation can be source of different

Sri Ramkrishna

meanings, as necessary for growth of the involved individuals. Two of Sri Ramkrishna's direct disciples Niranjan and Jogin had such an experience. On two different occasions, while traveling on a boat to Dakshineswar they had to listen to fellow boat passengers criticizing their guru Sri Ramkrishna. Though deeply hurt, Jogin who was mild-manner to a fault, kept quiet thinking that he could do nothing about it. But Niranjan, who was by nature of a harsh temperament, strongly protested against the calumny and even rocked the boat threatening to sink it in retaliation. When he came to know of those incidents, Sri Ramkrishna pointed out to both how they had failed to discover the correct meaning of the boat experience necessary for the spiritual development. He then taught Jogin to cultivate manliness and chided Niranjan to learn self-control.

Discovering the Meaning and Stepping into It

As each situations in life represents a singular challenge, Frankl argues

Photo by Steve Halama on Unsplash

that instead of asking

What is the meaning of my life ?

We should recognize the fact that it is life which is questioning us

What is the meaning of your life ?

And the meaning of our life is created by discovering the meaning, the growth opportunity, hidden in every single situation of our life. To be able to do this we should take some measured steps.     

1 Maintain a Detached Awareness

Most of our daily activities are done on auto-pilot mode, i.e. by force of habit. Maintaining a detached awareness throughout the day prevents us from getting sucked into instinctive reactions that create problems out of opportunities.
              

2 Practise Moral Values

Morality gives a higher turn to our mental energies and helps to sublimate base samskaras (an act of making perfect, preparation). We should have a clear idea of our moral values and remind ourselves everyday to practice them.

3 Engage in Contribution Work

Hard, efficient and unselfish work is the powerful tool that can detach us from the clutches of attachments.

4 Raise Correct Questions

Once an opportunity is sensed or identified we have to ask ourselves,

What is happening here now ?

What is the evolutionary-response for this ?

5 Serve Fellow Beings 

Serving the people around us with a worshipful attitude awakens in us the power of love which unlocks all opportunities for spiritual evolution.

Final Thought

As Swami Vivekananda declares

the object of life is to learn the laws of spiritual progress

These laws are hidden in our everyday experiences of life. May the Lord, the universal God bless us with the insight to recognize them, seize them and steadily act upon them.