The most beautiful story I ever read

A few nuns visited our office some years ago (don’t remember why). They carried some newsletters with them that they shared with Sujata, my HR colleague. I happened to read one of the newsletters and found this amazing story about a school teacher. This story, they said, was a true story about a global leader.

For me, this story has been the most powerful story. I tried to look for it on the internet but could not find it. I am sharing what I recollect.

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This is a story of a school teacher from a small place. Teaching was his job and he was doing it dutifully. He was an ordinary teacher, teaching ordinary students, using ordinary teaching methods. There was nothing exceptional that one could speak about this person.

One night, this teacher dreamt an Angel approaching him. The Angel came near him and said, “Do you know, one of your students is going to be a world leader?” Then the Angel held the teacher’s hand and took him to his classroom where all his students had gathered.

The Angel looked at the teacher, pointed his finger to one of his students and said, “This child will become a world leader.” The teacher tried to look at where the Angel was pointing; but before he could see the face of the student, the poor fellow woke up from his dream.

He sat in his bed thinking about the dream. He cursed himself for waking up before he could see this student’s face. He couldn’t even remember whether it was a boy or a girl. He could not sleep the whole night. He was now determined to find out this brat.

He went to his class the next day fully prepared to find this future global leader. Throughout the period, he was looking at each face to check if it showed any signs of global leadership. After the class was over, he went to the door and stood there and asked the students to go out of the class in a single file; so that he could scrutinize each of them closely. To his dismay, each one looked like a possible global leader.

He was frustrated. He did not know what to do next. He repeated the exercise the next day looking at each student to do a recheck.

He then tried to recollect the background of each child to check if there was some clue; but soon realised that the global leaders he knew of came from diverse backgrounds; some were poor, some others were born in wealthy families, some were highly educated while some others were illiterate, some were able bodied while some others were physically challenged. He realized that this exercise too was futile.

Finally, he gave up his search.

The dream continued to haunt him. One fine day a thought flashed in his mind, “Why don’t I assume all my students to become global leaders?”.

This thought changed his outlook totally. He started preparing himself to become the teacher for global leaders. His manner of teaching changed, the way he responded to the students changed; he started showing utmost care to each student. Every moment of his life was devoted to making his students great.

As the story goes, one of his students actually grew to become a global leader. She also happens to be his daughter. I forget the name of this person. Hope someone will find her name for me.

What did I learn from this story?

The first thing I learnt - when you have a greater purpose, you become extraordinary. The moment the teacher felt that his job was NOT to teach but to CREATE great leaders, his total approach to work changed. Work became a mission for him; it was a job no more. 

Photo credit - https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/1/gandhiji-work-is-worship-piety-dsilva.jpg

The second learning I had was, as a parent we have an opportunity to create great citizens. The moment we start thinking on these lines, our interaction with children will change dramatically. We now become custodians on behalf of our country; we start working towards repaying our debt to the world. I remember a great father, Shanmugasundaram, my old colleague and friend. Shan once went with his daughter to buy a Barbie. Looking at the price tag, they went back home without buying the doll but with an agreement that they will, together, build a telescope for the same price; and they did. I once visited his place only to see this telescope. His daughter showed me the Venus planet with such pride.

Photo credit - Yashoda sees the whole universe Krishna’s mouth

My third learning was, if a manager starts feeling that he is managing a team of superstars and not mere employees, his work becomes a religion for him. They say about Sir Alex Ferguson, a great football manager, that he could motivate an average player to outshine the world’s best. He was able to maintain the hunger inside his players, that desperation to win, at all costs, even after they’d won everything there was to win. He understood his players better than they knew themselves. Closer home, I know of a Manager from India, K V Kamath, ex-Chairman of ICICI Bank. Kamath built so many leaders in his organization that he had to let go of at least 30 of them to work as CEOs of other large companies.

Photo credit - https://www.nurturingart.com/nurturing_energy.jpg

Hope this story helps you in your career and in life.

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Postscript:

Whenever I create an article, I want to write something about Impressionism. Impressionism is my source of inspiration. It reminds me to think about innovation and about challenging the status quo.

Impressionism (1860-1890) is a 19th-century art movement. It was started by painters to challenge the then existing style of painting. They re-defined painting as an impression of one’s mind rather than what is seen by the eye. They turned the artistic establishment upside down with their revolutionary new approach to painting.

Today I want to remember Paul Signac (1863-1935) a French Neo-Impressionist painter who, working with Georges Seurat, helped develop the Pointillist style. Paul decided to become a full-time painter after viewing Claud Monet’s work. Under Seurat's influence, he abandoned the short brushstrokes of Impressionism to experiment with juxtaposed small dots of pure color, intended to combine and blend not on the canvas but in the viewer's eye, the defining feature of Pointillism.

Paul Signac painted this painting called The Pine Tree at Saint Tropez in 1909. It is now on display in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow. 

Photo credit - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Signac#/media/File:Paul_Signac,_1909,_The_Pine_Tree_at_Saint_Tropez,_oil_on_canvas,_72_x_92_cm,_Pushkin_Museum,_Moscow.jpg

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