Josepine’s dilemma

Josepine was having a nervous breakdown, but she did not know the reason why. She just felt lonely and depressed, period. She wanted to see a shrink but changed her mind — long hours of expensive self-analysis. She went to her grandfather.

Gramps: What’s the matter, Jo? You look terrible.

Jo: I don’t know what to do, gramps. (She gropes for words, trying to explain her problem)

Gramps: Stop. I know what’s bothering you. It is so easy and simple. Stop looking inward. All you see is darkness. You are a mystery to yourself. You will never understand yourself. You will be more confused analyzing yourself. Your solution is out there in the outside world.

Josepine was stunned. She followed his advice. She stopped looking inward. But she did not know how to look outward.

Jo: Gramps, how do I look outward?

Gramps: It will come. Just be sensitive to people around you, whom you normally take for granted — the janitor at your office, perhaps, talk to him. He may give you bits of wisdom from his perspective that teachers cannot give. Talk to the kid in your neighborhood who pesters you. Find out why he pesters people. Learn from him. You may end up giving him advice and helping him. It will come. Be patient. Don’t make too much effort. Stop thinking of yourself. Listen and look around you. Open yourself up wide.

The words echoed in her mind — “listen and look around you.” Then it came like a lightning bolt. Her friend Liza came up to her, asking for help in her Math subject. Jo agreed instantly without thinking. She invited Liza to her house. They spent an hour every day for two whole weeks. Liza got a resounding “A” in Math.

Jo: Gramps, I did not realize that you have to give your time for others, not just listen to them.

Gramps: It’s part of giving yourself to them. Parents have to give their kids their time.

Jo: My depression has vanished. Now I understand. I know myself instantly by knowing another.

Gramps: Because the other is a mirror of yourself. You see yourself in others.

Jo: And there is another result. One is happy and at peace in helping others. I was in tears when Liza got an “A” in Math.

Gramps: It is the formula for happiness and peace, giving yourself to others. That’s the motive of priests and nuns, nurses and doctors, teachers and gurus, to give themselves to others. One step more, Jo. It’s not just giving. The next step is loving, or giving a deeper part of yourself.

Jo: You mean, when I love another I understand my inner self more?

Gramps: Your very soul, the very reason for your existence. And instantly, in the blink of an eye, without self-analysis, without a shrink.

Jo: Ah, because in love, I live for others, no longer just for myself.

Gramps: Bullseye, Jo.

Jo: I think I want to be a teacher. Thanks, gramps.

Gramps: Go for it, Jo.

Jo became the best-loved teacher in her school. When she was offered a promotion at higher pay to become the dean, she refused because she would rather be with the kids than in a plush prestigious office. The classroom was her turf with the noise and the chalk dust. She knew being a dean would kill her. She laughed when other teachers said she was crazy to refuse.

Jo realized why her gramps was a teacher in a forgotten village school. He had found heaven there just as she did in her school.

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