Ruling The World Via Kindness And Compassion – Mother Teresa

“A life not lived for others is not a life.”

Visit To Deepashram

Last Christmas, the organization I work for organized a volunteering drive to Deepashram in Gurgaon. Established in 1994, Deepashram is currently home to 53 mentally and/or physically handicapped boys and men, ranging in age from 10 to 35 years. It is run by the Society of the Missionaries of Charity of Mother Teresa.
We collected clothes, ration supplies, and other goodies from our colleagues and visited the center to spread some smiles among the inmates – to be their Santa Claus.

Deepashram Visit

The Care
What we saw was amazing! The inmates were kept under constant care. We visited a room full of happy and cheerful faces dancing energetically to chirpy songs being played. Throughout the day, caregivers organized activities to keep them happy, engaged, and alive.
There was no greater satisfaction than seeing the smiles on their faces as they received the goodies. One of the kids came up to me and kept pointing at my watch – I understood he wanted a watch the next time we visited. A heart-melting moment.

The Originator

My mind wandered back to the founder of the Missionaries of Charity, Mother Teresa. What a fulfilling life she must have lived, having sacrificed everything to serve the needy and helpless. She showed the world how kindness and compassion can change our way of life. Not for nothing was she bestowed with several awards, the highest among them being:
• Nobel Peace Prize in 1979
• Bharat Ratna in 1980
• Padma Shri in 1962

Her Life

“Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.”
Mother Teresa, or Saint Teresa, was born as Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Macedonia. She was fascinated by the stories of missionaries from a very young age, and at 18, she left her home to join the missionaries.
Once in India, in Calcutta, she was deeply moved and saddened by the condition of the poor and needy. It is said that she felt “the call within a call” and began serving the shunned and diseased—patients suffering from cholera, leprosy, and tuberculosis, which were deemed highly infectious diseases.
In 1950, she established the Missionaries of Charity, which runs orphanages, daycare centers, and numerous schools throughout Calcutta, all staffed by volunteers.
In 1952, she established Nirmal Hriday, a place where the terminally ill could die with dignity. She also helped open numerous centers for serving the blind, the aged, and the disabled. It is known that Pope Paul VI, on his trip to India, gave her his ceremonial limousine, which she immediately raffled to help build a leper colony.
When we think of kindness and compassion, we think of a powerful and strong woman in a white saree with blue edges, moving from street to street, helping the needy and helpless—such is her legacy.

Her Legacy

In one interesting incident, while traveling on a plane, she asked the flight crew how much her meal cost. Upon knowing the cost, she asked if she could forgo her meal so that the amount could be donated to the poor. When the flight crew obliged, many other passengers followed suit. At the end of the trip, she remembered to collect the unused food to distribute among the poor and needy.

What Can We Follow in Our Everyday Lives

• Practice kindness and compassion: Every person we interact with might be fighting a battle we know nothing about. So, deal with everyone with kindness and compassion.
• Serve the needy: Help those who need your love, support, and care. It might be as simple as providing food to someone who is hungry or being with someone who feels lonely and uncared for.
• Make small efforts in our everyday lives: Our efforts need not be big—a small effort every day can bring delightful changes in someone else’s life.

Let us love, live, and spread joy and compassion to keep her spirit alive across the world.

Editor’s Note : This article is one of the entries for #TheShe Contest..

By Manjusha Dutta

Manjusha Dutta is a Senior Manager with a Software Insurance organization. A movie buff and an amateur dancer, she rocks in the videos that she creates for her YouTube channel. She can be reached at manjushadutta@gmail.com.