The Road of Inaction

“Dishes! Dishes! Dishes! I’m tired of doing the dishes. I’m the only one doing them. And all you guys do is eat and leave the dishes for me to wash. And these glasses? They are the worst. Every time someone has to drink water, they take a new glass. Have you seen the number of glasses I have to wash at the end of the day? Can’t the three of you take a glass in the beginning of the day and drink water from that glass only the entire day?”, my mom fumed after coming from the kitchen

“But mumma the glasses get mixed up.” I told her, somewhat scared for my life.

“Then just label the damn things.”

And so we did.

My younger sister – like the sweet kid she is – made labels with every family member’s name on it, and “laminated” them covering them entirely with transparent tape.

Fast forward to a few hours. 

I was drinking water and looking at my designated glass and examining my label. The whole label was coated with tape, except a teeny little section at the left edge.

“Hey listen. You missed a little part here. Please tape it too na.” I said informing my sister.

“I’m not doing it now.”

“Fine.” And with that, I just let it be.

Even after withstanding a few tests of time, water and vim bar 🧼, I’m impressed that the labels managed to stay put without looking like they were holding onto the glass with all their might. However it wasn’t quite the same for that teeny little section. Too bad it was ripped off from his family at such a young age 😔

But it wasn’t his fault. To expect to be worn off is quite reasonable because it was the only part that wasn’t covered, isn’t it? Correct. When I leave the label just like that, without any protection, unlike the others, it is prone to the effects of soap and water.

Same goes for every other thing. When you work for something, it improves. And what happens when you don’t work on something? Common sense dictates it remains the way it is. Our mind equates work with progress, and no work with no progress. But it is not quite the situation. This is because the counterpart of progress is deterioration, and not no progress. What happens – when you don’t work on something – is that it starts to degrade. Even if you leave it as it is, it starts to go downhill. 

It is the nature’s law that when you don’t work on or towards something, it is going to perish.

Because nothing ever remains the same. Things either get better or they get worse. They go up or they go down. 

Consider anything that appears to be long-term. Take a car for example. If it is just sitting there, neglected in the parking lot and no one is cleaning it, or getting it serviced, it’s going to break down pretty soon. 

And just like the car, our lives will break down if we don’t take charge of them and don’t take any action.

Even to keep something the same, you need to work for it.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Diqkw2IUwAAqAOp.jpg

If you are not working on it, then something else is. And it is not gonna turn things in your favor.

The universe is always doing its work. To keep things your way, you first need to work enough to keep the universe’s activities in check.

Moral of the story – Take care of things, situations and conditions. Take hold of them. Protect them. Otherwise, they’re gonna wear off and you shouldn’t be surprised because you were the one who failed to take action in the first place.

As Benjamin Franklin once said, “By failing to prepare you are preparing to fail.”