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Positive Attitude And Unremitting Effort - Key To Success

Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa gives a beautiful illustration to understand Shraddha. Swami Ranganathananda explains it and points out that the key to success in any field depends on positive attitude and unremitting effort.

When we go to fish in a lake, we take a fishing rod and line, with bait fixed to it. We cast the line and bait into the lake and wait patiently. We may not have seen fishes in that lake. We have only heard from others who have fished there. Our Shradha in their words makes us go to the lake and verify the truth of their statement.

We sit for a long time and yet fail to catch a fish. But by this alone we do not conclude that there is no fish in the lake.

We come again the next day and keep striving. What is the basis of this unremitting effort? It is the dynamic faith that there is fish in the lake.

All great discoveries in the fields of science and religion are the result of such a positive attitude and the action based on such an attitude. Finally when we catch a fish, our belief turns into a verified truth.

Similarly, there is a divine truth hidden in all of us. Our guru tells us about it and so do the scriptures. We have not seen it. But we believe in their words and struggle to make that belief true by realization.

Swami Ranganathananda was the 13th president of the Ramakrishna Mission