SCATTERED PAPER

Once upon a time an old man spread rumours that his neighbour was a thief. As a result, the young man was arrested. Days later the young man was proven innocent. After been released he sued the old man for wrongly accusing him.

In court the old man told the Judge: "They were just comments, didn't harm anyone."

The judge, before passing sentence on the case, told the old man: "Write all the things you said about him on a piece of paper. Cut them up and on the way home, throw the pieces of paper out. Tomorrow, come back to hear the sentence."

The next day, the judge told the old man: "Before receiving the sentence, you will have to go out and gather all the pieces of paper that you threw out yesterday."

The old man said: "I can't do that! The wind spread them and I won't know where to find them."

The judge then replied: "The same way, simple comments may destroy the honor of a man to such an extent that one is not able to fix it. If you can't speak well of someone, rather don't say anything.

Moral : "Let's all be masters of our mouths, so that we won't be slaves of our words."

The seed of honesty

A successful business man was growing old and knew it was time to choose a successor to take over the business.
Instead of choosing one of his Directors or his children, he decided to do something different. He called all the young executives in his company together.


He said, "It is time for me to step down and choose the next CEO.
I have decided to choose one of you. "The young executives were Shocked, but the boss continued. "I am going to give each one of you a SEED today - one very special SEED. I want you to plant the seed, water it, and come back here one year from today with what you have grown from the seed I have given you. I will then
judge the plants that you bring, and the one I choose will be the next CEO."

One man, named Jim, was there that day and he, like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly, told his wife the story. She helped him get a pot, soil and compost and he planted the seed. Everyday, he would water it and watch to see if it had
grown. After about three weeks, some of the other executives began to talk about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow.

Jim kept checking his seed, but nothing ever grew. Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by, still nothing. By now, others were talking about their plants, but Jim didn't have
a plant and he felt like a failure..
Six months went by -- still nothing in Jim's pot. He just knew he had killed his seed. Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had nothing. Jim didn't say anything to his colleagues, however..
He just kept watering and fertilizing the soil - He so wanted the seed to grow.

A year finally went by and all the young executives of the company brought their plants to the CEO for inspection.
Jim told his wife that he wasn't going to take an empty pot. But she asked him to be honest about what happened. Jim felt sick to his stomach, it was going to be the most embarrassing moment of his life, but he knew his wife was right. He took his empty pot
to the board room. When Jim arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown by the other executives. They were beautiful --
in all shapes and sizes. Jim put his empty pot on the floor and
many of his colleagues laughed, a few felt sorry for him!

When the CEO arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted his young executives.

Jim just tried to hide in the back. "My, what great plants, trees, and flowers you have grown," said the CEO. "Today one of you will be appointed the next CEO!"

All of a sudden, the CEO spotted Jim at the back of the room with his empty pot. He ordered the Financial Director to bring him to the front.. Jim was terrified. He thought, "The CEO knows I'm a
failure! Maybe he will have me fired!"

When Jim got to the front, the CEO asked him what had happened to his seed - Jim told him the story

The CEO asked everyone to sit down except Jim. He looked at Jim, and then announced to the young executives, "Behold your next Chief Executive Officer!

His name is Jim!" Jim couldn't believe it. Jim couldn't even grow his seed.

"How could he be the new CEO?" the others said.

Then the CEO said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone in this room a seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds; they were dead - it was not possible for them to grow.

All of you, except Jim, have brought me trees and plants and flowers. When you found that the seed would not grow, you substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Jim was the only one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new "Chief Executive Officer!"

If you plant honesty, you will reap trust
If you plant goodness, you will reap friends
If you plant humanity, you will reap greatness
If you plant perseverance, you will reap contentment
If you plant hard work, you will reap success.
If you plant forgiveness, you will reap reconciliation.
If you plant faith in God , you will reap a harvest.

Moral : Honesty Pays You Back.

The Perfectionist Sculptor

A gentleman once visited a temple under construction where he saw a sculptor making an idol of God.

Suddenly he noticed a similar idol lying nearby. Surprised, he asked the sculptor, “Do you need two statues of the same idol?”

“No,” said the sculptor without looking up, “We need only one, but the first one got damaged at the last stage.”

The gentleman examined the idol and found no apparent damage. “Where is the damage?” he asked.

“There is a scratch on the nose of the idol.” said the sculptor, still busy with his work.

“Where are you going to install the idol?”

The sculptor replied that it would be installed on a pillar twenty feet high.

“If the idol is that far, who is going to know that there is a scratch on the nose?” the gentleman asked.

The sculptor stopped his work, looked up at the gentleman, smiled and said,

“I know it !”

Moral – The desire to excel should be exclusive of the fact whether someone appreciates it or not. Excellence is a drive from inside, not outside. Excel at a task today – not necessarily for someone else to notice but for your own satisfaction.

Think Big!

A man was caught and thrown into a pit of about "40 feet" deep, just because he was a stranger. He struggled trying to get out of the pit, but the more he tried, the weaker his muscles became. He said to himself, "I don't know how to get myself out of this. Maybe I should just die instead of enduring these miserable struggles and pains."

Just then, he heard a voice screaming, "Help! Help!! Help!!!" The shouts were coming from another pit, which was "10 feet" deeper than the one he was in. He thought to himself, "Wow, so there is somebody else like me trapped here too."

Listening carefully, he heard some cracking and sand dropping from the wall of the pit of the other victim. Immediately he summed up his courage and with his last bit of strength, started crawling little by little until he made it out of his pit.

Moral of the Story

That pain you think you are passing through, there are people worst off than you. Always say something sweet to yourself. Always smile at your pains. Let them be; they are just there for a while and also to challenge you. Today may be your darkest hour, but your joy will come in the morning.

Try to encourage yourself.  Always try to face your worst fear because nothing GOOD comes easy. You must be UNCOMFORTABLE to get to your COMFORT ZONE.

The Story Of Challenges

The Japanese have always loved fresh fish. But the water close to Japan has not held many fish for decades. So to feed the Japanese population, fishing boats got bigger and went farther than ever. The farther the fishermen went, the longer it took to bring the fish. If the return trip took more time, the fish were not fresh. To solve this problem, fish companies installed freezers on their boats. They would catch the fish and freeze them at sea. Freezers allowed the boats to go farther and stay longer.

However, the Japanese could taste the difference between fresh and frozen fish. And they did not like the taste of frozen fish. The frozen fish brought a lower price. So, fishing companies installed fish tanks. They would catch the fish and stuff them in the tanks, fin to fin. After a little thrashing around, they were tired, dull, and lost their fresh-fish taste. The fishing industry faced an impending crisis! But today, they get fresh-tasting fish to Japan. How did they manage? To keep the fish tasting fresh, the Japanese fishing companies still put the fish in the tanks but with a small shark. The fish are challenged and hence are constantly on the move.

The challenge they face keeps them alive and fresh! Have you realized that some of us are also living in a pond but most of the time tired and dull? Basically in our lives, sharks are new challenges to keep us active. If you are steadily conquering challenges, you are happy. Your challenges keep you energized.

Moral :Don't create success and revel in it in a state of inertia. You have the resources, skills and abilities to make a difference. Put a shark in your tank and see how far you can really go.

Proactive Leadership

 There was once a grasshopper who loved life. He spent his time lazing in the sun, eating when he wanted to, sleeping when he wanted to, generally enjoying himself all the time. He lived like he did not have a care in the world. One day as he was sun-bathing, he saw an ant pushing a bread crumb across the ground. The grasshopper asked, "Hey brother! What are you doing?" The ant replied, "I am gathering food for the winter while the weather is still warm. Once winter sets in, I am going to stay home and just eat  from my stock of food."
The grasshopper made fun of the ant's dull life and went on sun bathing saying, "There's enough time for such boring work. You should take time to have fun like me." Soon the summer passed and the winter started to set in. As the weather became colder, it became harder for the grasshopper to get out. However, he soon started to feel hungry. He decided to brave the weather and find himself some food. When he stepped out, everything was covered with snow and he could not find anything to eat. He continued to search for food every day. He did not find anything. Finally, he grew weak and died of hunger.

The ant being proactive knew himself, potentials and strengths: that he was tiny; that with the help of his teammates, there was nothing he could not achieve - it did not matter how big the morsel of food was. He knew the event that was coming on him: the winter and its severity. He knew the resources at his disposal: his teammates and time available to him in the summer.

Grasshopper being non- proactive he did not know himself, potentials or strengths. He thought he was bigger than the ant and so nothing could happen to him. He was big enough to carry his food singlehandedly. He did not know the severity of the event that was going to visit him -the winter. He did not know the 'limitedness' of the resources at his disposal. He had no teammates and before he could say 'Jack Robinson' the summer had passed.

Moral:Proactive leadership is knowing your limetedness,potentials and strengths and planning in advance incase of adversities.The ant being proactive reaped the benifits of its hard work.

Birbal caught the Thief

Once a rich merchant’s house was robbed. The merchant suspected that the thief was one of his servants. So he went to Birbal and mentioned the incident. Birbal went to his house and assembled all of his servants and asked that who stole the merchant’s things. Everybody denied.

Birbal thought for a moment, then gave a stick of equal length to all the servants of the merchant and said to them that the stick of the real thief will be longer by two inches tomorrow. All the servants should be present here again tomorrow with heir sticks.
 All the servants went to their homes and gathered again at the same place the next day. Birbal asked them to show him their sticks. One of the servants had his stick shorter by two inches. Birbal said, “This is your thief, merchant.”

                                                                                      

Later the merchant asked Birbal, “How did you catch him?” Birbal said, “The thief had already cut his stick short by two inches in the night fearing that his stick will be longer by two inches by morning.”

Moral:
Truth will always Prevail.