Beholden: "Paying off my debts of gratitude"

Robert Heinlein was the one who popularised the concept of "Paying It Forward." The whole idea is that when someone does a good deed to you, in turn, all you need to do is to do at least three good deeds to others.

The idea is simple yet powerful. Imagine. If someone does something nice for you, all you have to do is pass that kindness to someone else who deserves it. Won't that be such a wonderful way to spreading goodness to the world that is plagued by vices like greed, envy, selfishness and bitterness?

Instinctively, I know that somehow if you do things with sincerity and your actions are motivated by love, then good things will come to you. It's very much the idea of 'karma'.

Yet, isn't it sad that that sometimes, we grow jaded and cynical? ...that we doubt that there is good in humanity? We have grown to be skeptics, and can be suspicious when people are nice to us. We think of the negatives rather than focus on the positive, and scrutinise the actions; we question the motives of our benefactors. And when that happens, we lose out on our chance of really paying it forward...we prematurely cut off the opportunity to do continue doing a greater good for others.

I am here to remind myself...that there is still hope for Humanity. I must not lose faith in human nature...and that if I truly play my role as one of the 'last bastions of values', I would have fulfilled my job as a wife, mother and teacher...maybe as a human being.

There will days when you feel that life has handed you lemons...and a lot of other 'toot toot' thrown in. You have to clean up after other people, and be made the scapegoat when things go wrong.

I am also here to remind myself never to give up trying. And one more thing...that when you do something...never to expect anything in return. If you expect life to be a bed of roses, and others to treat you well, just because you try to be good; then you'll be very, very disappointed.

Love, kindness and respect need to be given away with no strings attached...Do not think that others will be beholden to you. Life is not a matter of checks and balances...of the 'you-owe-me-one" kind of attitudes...nor is it, worse still, 'an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth'

Do something because you want to; not because you have to; and not because you want something in return. Then it really frees you from being beholden to others, when others are good to you. Pay your debt of gratitude forward.

If you truly believe you can make a difference, than pay it forward.