Gandhi and the One shoe Syndrome
It concerns a rail journey that the young Gandhi was to undertake on his return to India. He waited at the railway platform for the train to arrive. And it so happened that as the young Gandhi claimed on to the moving trains, one of his shoes slipped off. As he bent to try and grab it, it slithered down to the track, while the train gathered momentum. In a flash, Gandhi reached for his others shoe and threw it towards the fast disappearing others shoe on the track.
A perplexed onlooker wondered aloud if Gandhi had indeed lost it completely. Gandhi explained: ‘Ah well, if someone is to find one of my shoes, hopefully he’ll find the other one too, and thus have a fine pair for himself!’
Learning to give. Learning to share. Instead of spending our walking lives worrying about the shoe that got away, perhaps we should thank God for the shoe we still have, and discover how giving it away could make us, and someone else, happier.
Become a go-giver, not a go-getter.