“Every Cloud has silver lining”

Sukhmani Kaur

“Every cloud has silver lining” is a very common phrase often used in English whenever we are trying to uplift someone’s spirits. Silver Lining doesn’t mean the actual boundary line that appears when sun suddenly shines from behind the clouds on a stormy day, even though it makes a beautiful scene. It means that after all the hardships and struggles, there is always hope or a lesson that helps us in our future journey or helps us in not repeating our mistakes in future.

People often feel sad, gloomy, depressed whenever they are surrounded by the hardships, which quite normal considering that no one really prays for sorrows in their life, but cursing their destiny or fates for all the struggles they are facing isn’t going to solve those problems. We fail to notice, encumbered in our hardships that it might be blessings in disguise, that may the same we are cursing today for not being able to achieve a goal, has something even bigger in store for us.

My mother often used to recite a story when we were younger about a person who was lost wandering in the desert. As he wandered in the desert, he came across the two paths that lead in completely different directions. One path looked easy and he could see a small pond that was filled with murky water at some distance, while the other path was filled with stones and thorny bushes and he couldn’t see any hope or vegetation for as far as he could see. Famished as he was, after wandering in the woods for so long, he decided to take the easier path that at least had some water for him to quench his thirst, but the dog that had accompanied him, kept on pulling on his pants and dragging him towards the hurdle some path. He jerked the dog away and reached the murky pond and quenched his thirst, disregarding its effects on his health when he consumed that dirty water. The path which he hadn’t chosen to follow because of its hardships had lead to a beautiful village near an oasis, that had not only clean drinking water and food but also other amenities that could have rescued him from the blazing desert. The dog had heard the distant sounds of oasis and village and had been trying to push his master in the right direction but the person was so far gone in his gloominess and cursing his fate for what had befallen on him that he had lost his chance to witness what God had in store for him.

Many a times, we fail to see the benefits or blessings that may come our way, we exhaust ourselves beforehand thinking about all the reason’s the work or project would fail or we couldn’t succeed and in the end we blame our fate or assuage our conscience that we’ll get it if it’s in our fate.

We forget that, “God helps those, who help themselves.” We forget that unless we work hard, forsaking all others, all the troubles and the result our hard work, we won’t succeed. God might be able to take us to the opportunity, open many doors for us, but in the end of the day, it is our own hard work, diligence that is going to help us to succeed. “You may take horse to the water but you can’t make him drink.”

We have to make our own roads, our life is our journey, and no one is going to live it for you. Yes, we’ll make mistakes, fall down, face failures but it goes to show that at least we are trying. All those famous personalities that we have read about, their successes that is inspiring to us, they didn’t succeed on their first attempt. It was their persistence and hard work that helped them. If they would also have thought that if it’s in my fate we’ll get the correct answer or solution, we still would have been living in dark, without telephones and all the other facilities that we are so used to today.

We have to work hard and keep on blazing that fire that was in our heart, when we had first set on the path. Yes, people will mock us, call us foolish for not letting it go, for being short sighted like a bull with its eyes covered that it can’t see beyond a path, but the same people will applaud us and pat our backs when we taste the sweet fruit of success.

The earth is round wasn’t accepted till an explorer had against all odds and insults decided to take a voyage around the world. India wouldn’t have been discovered, had Vasco Da Gama, not set his course disregarding all the negative comments. These are quite ancient examples, but in recent times too, be it Walt Disney, who was told he lacked creativity, or Steve Jobs who was booted from his own company or the famous author J.K. Rowling who was rejected by twelve publishers before she attained success. None of them had it easy, yet all of them are successful.

“Rome was not built in a day.” It takes work, sweat, and tears and yes, failures too, before you attain your goals. It’s often quoted that if you aren’t getting rejected on daily basis; it means your goals are not big enough. So don’t be afraid to set high goals, do set them, and then work hard to achieve those goals, then don’t stumble or curse your fate for your chosen path but keep faith and continue trying, because then success will be yours for taking.  Success might not come as soon as you had expected, but it will come if you are persistent enough to follow after your dreams.

To conclude, Dream Big!! Think Big!! And then toil with all your might and have patience and faith.

“Shoot for the moon, even if you miss the moon, you’ll still land among the stars”.