Take it easy!

LIFE’S LESSONS

By Henrylito D. Tacio

“Even a wild horse can be tamed; even metal that is difficult to work with eventually goes into a mold. If you take it easy and do not stir yourself, you will never make any progress.” – Zicheng Hong

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Growing up in General Santos City, Rain Rivera Ramas came to Metro Manila in 2006 to work in one of the country’s noted companies. To prove that he had what it takes to become successful, he got so engrossed with his work in the corporate world.

“I worked six days a week, spending almost 12 hours in the office,” he said, adding that sometimes he had no time for himself. “My daily commute from Quezon City to Makati was an average of two hours per way.”

Although it was so strenuous and exhausting, Ramas persevered. “The pay was good, the perks were great, but the work was demanding,” he said. When he was at the office, he had to battle the three P’s: politics, protocol, and pressure.

“It was a glamorous job, but it slowly lost its glitter as fast as my blood pressure rose,” he admitted. Until one day, his temper just popped. “So, I resigned,” he said.

Now, Ramas is back in his hometown running his own business “with stress levels just a small fraction of how it was before.”

The song of the famous American band, Eagles, comes to mind: “Lighten up while you still can. Don’t even try to understand, just find a place to make your stand. And take it easy.”

We cannot do all things simultaneously. If you cannot finish your work today, there is always tomorrow. As Ernest Agyemang Yeboah wrote: “Today is another day! Yesterday is gone but not its memories. There were so many things we expected yesterday which did not happen and what we least expected happened instead.

“Some are still expecting something,” Yeboah went on. “Expectation is a pillar of life. We all do have our expectations for today. Though we may or we may not be able to tell with certainty how our expectations would materialize. We ought to take life easy. Well, it may not be so easy to take it easy but, take it easy!”

Don’t take things seriously. In fact, never accomplish them in a hurry. “When you want to hurry something, that means you no longer care about it and want to get on to other things,” wrote Robert M. Pirsig in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values. “I just want to get at it slowly, but carefully and thoroughly, with the same attitude I remember was present just before I found that sheared pin. It was that attitude that found it, nothing else.”

So, relax and have fun. “Life is simple,” wrote Byron Katie. “Everything happens for you, not to you. Everything happens at exactly the right moment, neither too soon nor too late. You don’t have to like it… it’s just easier if you do.”

I know, life is hard but don’t take it seriously. Rajneesh reminds us, “Millions of people have tried meditation and dropped out of it because they took it very seriously. Religion has been thought to be a very serious affair – it is not.

“One has to understand – at least those who are with me – that religion is a playfulness, a laughter. Take it easy; then things blossom without any tension. You are not taking it easy; you are making it difficult,” he added.

We may live in the same world but we have different passions and objectives in life. So, we should not compare ourselves with others or else we will be in big trouble. We may never be contented with what we have done. Or we may be complacent in our accomplishments.

Read these words of wisdom from Erlend Loe: “We shall never meet, but there is something I want you to know. My time is not the same as your time. Our times are not the same. And do you know what that means? That means that time does not exist.

“Do you want me to repeat that? There is no time. There is a life and a death. There are people and animals. Our thoughts exist. And the world. The universe, too. But there is no time. You might as well take it easy. Do you feel better now? I feel better. This is going to work out. Have a nice day.”

“So long and take it easy, because if you start taking things seriously, it is the end of you,” American writer and humorist Kurt Vonnegut reminds.

Chill and relax – if you want to live longer. Hollywood actor Bill Murray points this out: “The more relaxed you are, the better you are at everything: the better you are with your loved ones, the better you are with your enemies, the better you are at your job, the better you are with yourself.”

The Joyce Brothers also said, “No matter how much pressure you feel at work, if you could find ways to relax for at least five minutes every hour, you’d be more productive.”

Better still, take a rest. English banker and philanthropist John Lubbock states, “Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.”

Once you can do all these, it’s time to go back to where you left off. “The mind should be allowed some relaxation, that it may return to its work all the better for the rest,” Seneca said.

Again, take it easy! – ###