Swami Vivekananda (The Master Builder of Our Nation)

April 2, 2000

ON THE NEED FOR PERSEVERANCE

Lack of perseverance was another national drawback that caught his attention. He said : "Failures are bound to occur in life. But one should not be downcast or discouraged by them." It is of course not easy to overcome weaknesses and pitfalls. Swami Vivekananda has illustrated this point through a story in Aesop's fables. "Once there lived a stag. Having a very high opinion of itself it began to boast to its young one. It said, "Look at my beautiful horns. What powerful and muscular limbs I have! Do you know at what great speed I can run ?" While the stag was engaged in this bragging, it heard the barking of some dogs at a distance. Alas! No more courage! No more strength! So much was it frightened that the stag ran off as fast as it could as if fleeing for life. After sometime, when no more barking was heard, the stag returned to the old spot.

The younger stag ask him dubiously : "Well, you were so boastful of your qualities of strength and what not. But when the dogs began to bark you were no longer yourself and you simply ran away in fright. Why did you do that ?" Then the elder stag replied: "Yes my dear, it was all so. But the moment I heard the barking, I lost all my courage and I could not stay here any longer". That in short is the case with most people. When trials and tribulations come, they don't have the courage to face them. It is but natural. Let it not detract anyone from the ideal. Persevere. Keep on trying. Swamiji said, "...Perseverance will finally conquer. The vast majority of persons are groping through this dark life without any ideal at all. If a man with an ideal makes a thousand mistakes, I am sure that the man without an ideal makes fifty thousand... So, never mind these failures, these little back slidings. Hold the ideals a thousand times, and if you fail a thousand times, make the attempt once more... So, you can go. There is infinite life before the soul. Take your time and you will achieve your end".

"Victory is not for the meek. There is no success for the lazy. Arise, awake, sleep no more. Within you there is the power to remove all wants and all miseries. Believe this and power will be manifested"

Swamiji had this to say on education: "Education is not the amount of information that is put into your brain and runs riot there, undigested all your life. We must have life-building, man-making, character-making, assimilation of ideas. If you have assimilated five ideas and made them your life and character, you have more education than any man who has got by heart a whole library. If education were identical with information, the libraries would be the greatest sages in the world and encyclopaedias the Rishis"

Cont.