Book
Name: Who will cry when you die?
Author:
Robin Sharma
Year of
Publication: 2003
Publisher:
Jaico Publishing House, Mumbai.
ISBN:
81-7992-232-4
Number
of Pages: 255
Language:
English
“The
day when you cried and all others around you smiled is the day you were born”.
Robin Sharma, a well known writer for his “The Monk who sold his Ferrari” has
dedicated this book to the readers, his children, Colby and Blanca his
teachers. The title of the book may give you deeper thoughts that at once start
to arise as soon as you read it. I consider the title is a much apt title
because it ironically tells us that we should live in such a way that the world
cries for our death. As Sharma adds it to the title, this book is a series of
life’s lessons that we one way or the other come across every day.
“The tragedy of life is not death,
but what we let die inside of us while we live.”
-Norman Cousins
Sharma
begins this book with the above quote which I personally believe to be the
quote that summarizes the whole book. The 101 chapters of the book deal with
101 perspectives that we already know but we fail to hold in our day to day
life. Today our lives have become so mechanical that we fail to understand the
real meaning of life. I strongly believe in a quote,” Life isn’t about surviving it’s
all about living”. In this book Sharma gives the readers a fair deal on
how to begin a day and end it. 101 ways that life often knocks us down or we
fail to understand its conceptual meaning. Sharma offers us many assertions
that he as a representative of his readers has gone through and what he has
learnt from all of them.
Sharma
must have done a good research before authoring this book. Some of the inspirations and motivational points
given in this book are:-
1.
Writing
down your daily experiences along with the lessons you have learnt from them
will make you wiser with each passing day.
2.
Daily write journal and the lessons you learnt
in a day. A journal is not a diary. A diary is a place where you record events
while a journal is a place where you analyze and evaluate them.
3.
When you want to grow in a specific area,
focus your entire energies in that only to acquire mastery.
4.
Weekly once spend your time with your family.
5.
To live your life to the fullest, start taking
more risks and doing the things you fear.
6.
The greatest leader in this new economy will
be the greatest thinkers.
7.
List all your problems on a piece of paper and
burn the paper. It brings you some peace.
8.
The greatest gift you can give to your
children is the gift of your time.
9.
You will never be able to eliminate a weakness
you don’t even know about. The first step to eliminating a negative habit is to
become aware of it.
10. The job of leadership today is not just to
make money, it’s to make meaning.
11. The problem with people is that they spend
more time focusing on their weaknesses rather than developing their strengths.
12. It takes about 21 days to develop
a new habit.
13. Help those who are less fortunate.
14. The tree that has the most fruit is the tree
that bends to the ground.
15. You perform best when you meet tough people.
Conclusion
This is
the most amazing book I have read till date. It has really brought about a radical
change in my life. Making me realize how precious each day is in our life and
how grateful we should be for all that we receive during the day. How down to
earth one should be. Robin explains the importance of every second so
beautifully that makes me feel as if he’s writing all about my life.
This book has helped me to cope up with the setbacks in my life and helped me
to live life by looking at the brighter side of things. Every day I wake up, I
remind myself to live like it’s my last day and thus my life which was earlier
simply a white sheet of paper has now been covered with all the things I have
to do before I die . And I hope I’ll add some meaning to my life this way. Because
more than existing, I want to live.
“Give a man a fish you feed him
for a day, teach a man how to fish you feed him for a Life time” -Chinese Proverb.
- Akil Raj. G
