Becoming present with helping hands!

The Flowers at dawn and mid day ! The first two appeared rain soaked at dawn and the third flower at mid day looked dry and radiant!

They are the two different moods of the flowers in the garden during this rainy season. 

I felt disturbed by the shut down of my regular computer after having got used to it for eight years. An attempt to locate one to replace it did not happen even after contacting the different outlets of the apple computers. The prices escalated by about thirty percent last week end and the heavy demand reduced the chance of me able to get one.

I use this mac air now which is now13 years old, which is also failing with photographs having lost the colour richness and the soft ware unable to be updated as apple does not support this model anymore. 

I took time to reflect on the difficulty this experience created. I got engaged in an inner conversation about it which helped me to sense the   thought process that I am used to. 

The rain soaked flowers regain some of the colourfulness at sunrise, although the fragrance is not fully restored!

This is the blend of gain and loss, each of us experiences in our lives in our daily rhythm of life. 

There is a need to stay anchored with faith and hope because life events enrich us in some ways unknown to us when we engage and endure. 

I experienced this with two computer firms out of seven I contacted. Both those firms went out of their way to search for any availability of one in the net work of their shops or affiliated ones. They had alternatives to suggest, although it involved waiting! 

I have calls and messages from people who need some clarification or help or a desire to keep in touch. I felt awakened to the opportunity, such contacts offer to bring a word of encouragement or support ! 

I experienced a new level of consciousness about being sensitive to   the need of others when they call or contact. 

It is when one personally experiences the value of 'helping hands' one is further aroused to be in a similar role to others!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

In the fullness of time !

The nutmeg trees in our garden about seventy-five of them give their fruits for harvesting during this season. The months of May, June and July each year are the harvesting season. 

It is also the season for Bulbul birds resident in our garden to become pairs and begin their courtship. This is a time when we look around for their nests to keep a track on their formative journey to become a family. 

The becoming of a family is a major life event in the human journey on earth. During a recent discussion with a group of parents, I discovered how the family life is a major experience around which they weave their daily and seasonal events. A family after a holiday discovered that between their children there was so much intimacy, trust and acceptance that the couple felt challenged to have conversation between themselves about the way thy can grow into more trustful and communicative relationship. To hear from the parents how their children inspired them to seek to grow in depth of  between themselves was a heartening message.  

Anna and I had two days of outings in the last two days during which time we had conversations about the way our lives are further evolving and growing to find deeper levels of freshness and openness! 

The language of birds during the courtship is different tonal bird calls. The reciprocity we observe in their communication arising from growing intimacy is a delightful scene to watch. 

A home is a place where children watch the caring ways of parents between themselves. The parents watching the way children are spontaneously caring towards each other can delight them, which is  the fruit of their self giving as parents. 

For Anna and me while we live our lives in the mid seventies, we get a resonance from within about the joyful years awaiting us, while we live each day remembering that this becoming journey towards oneness is a gift.  We remain grateful for experiencing growing togetherness. 

What a privilege it is to stay connected with some friends and families of our children and feel supported and affirmed!

We live in the garden of life where relationships bring us to feel grounded. To be able to reach out to others in our small ways is an opportunity! In that sense, there is a fullness to this season in our lives. 

M.V.Mathew(text and photo)

 

The growing journey!

The flowers bring a new look during the monsoon season. The plants look healthier and the leaves look greener and fresh. I noticed that they are denied sunshine during the cloudy days. The soil is more moist than they are usually used to. The flowers have shorter life span than they have during the winter season. 

I spent a day with a groups of medical professionals recently listening to their experiences at work. I observed how they were glad to be together to listen to the stories of people and participate in discussing the different work related stressful factors. The tension between excellence at work and optimum attention to life at home was a real concern for most of them. 

It occurred to me that most people find their way of attending to this tension in creative ways to live well integrated. However the time for leisure, or to pursue a hobby or build deeper supportive relationships do not get attended to amidst the pressures that come upon them. 

The plant life has a rhythm even in difficult weather conditions. Mot of us too have a rhythm that helps us to live with composure and joyful experiences. When that inner wellness is compromised, the subtle insidious tiredness sets in which gets recognised rather late. The freedom to find a respite is not always easy. 

With a six day work rigour that is the norm, the Sunday in between cannot always absorb the demands associated with heaviness of work and home centred routines and transitions. 

The 'relaxation time' is occupied with watching entertainments in the visual screen. It shifts our mind to something lighter or humorous. But that is not restorative of the inner movements of ups and downs of the week. 

I happened to hear the experiences of a few who have set apart time for personal debriefing and interior silence during each day or two or three times in a week. They shared how they practice centerdness during such occasions when they attend to recollecting the learning and growing experiences arising our of the valley and peek experiences of each day. 

Carl Jung's  proposal of the journey from being a 'persona' to becoming the true Self in the individuation process, came back to me as a theme to pursue in mid life. The unresolved events in life add to the baggage of the persona and remain concealed in the subconscious. It is when we engage and demystify the baggage we carry within, we find the emergence of our true self with inner freedom, delight and hope to experience the peace that gives us energy to live above the feeling level and grow in the richness of our being!  

We are more than what we do in our profession. We are beings with a life purpose! A teenage boy goes to visit a senior citizen who lives in his neighbourhood to read to him newspaper and stories as he no more can read due to cortical blindness. He does it most days of the week and told me that, the time spent in this experience brings yet another reason for his learning and growing. 

Our source of wellness comes from different experiences. One source is mindful living to bring wellness to the lives of others. 

We add to our wellness when we can create space for others and attend to their needs.  

The flowers are a gift with their nectar, colourful presence and fragrance!

We grow to be our true self when we too can become a means of encouragement to others. 

M.C.Mathew( text and photo)

 

Beyond weariness !

 

The garden has its own rhythm during each season. This season brings a confluence of fruits raw and ripe and flowers looking dull, drained of their colourfulness due to incessant rain. 

It occurred to me that our daily life is a blend of fruitfulness and weariness while we go through the rhythm of each day.  

For some reason, which is not easily definable, the traction to focus on weariness is a common experience. 

A seven year child who was chasing to catch a dragon fly spent the whole evening chasing his desire. His was not a successful effort. At dinner time, while talking about it he mentioned all the different ways he ought to avoid while attempting to catch a dragon fly. He was observant enough to describe the flying behaviour of a dragon fly. He looked enthusiastic and reflective of the experience without any sign of  giving up on his plan for another attempt the next day. 

The plants are similar. Although the inclement weather might batter them, they continue fruiting and flowering. 

I watched how a teacher was organising a group of pre-school children to sing a song on the Father's day celebration in  a hospital. To get the group who looked distracted was an effortful activity. When they sang there was cheer and melody. The teacher's efforts brought the desired intent. I noticed the teacher focussing to get the children attentive which became possible. It was a tribute to her enthusiasm and belief in children. 

Our situations can appear to be demanding making us feel weary. But we are also blessed with an overcoming spirit and hope. 

To live in hope and aspiration is the gift we can bring to our lives. That is the message I receive as I walk in our garden! I wish I can live internalising this message when challenged by difficulties! 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

Father's day 2026

I was able to join in for the recollection of the Father's day, 2026 with two groups of Fathers on two subsequent days. What encouraged the resilience and delight with which they live their lives in their families with attentiveness to the formation of their children in an ambience of care and vision. 

The desert roses have an unusual steadfastness about flowering. They grow and flower. They grow sturdy to live longer and bear fruits! 

The parenting is a long journey with different stages of intensity to support the formation fo children. The time till the pre-school years is the season of early formative stage of grounding in the family life. It is form that rootedness in the ambience of a flourishing family children take off to begin their subsequent formative stages till early adulthood. 

As I listened to the experiences of journeying through family life and childhood supportive experiences, I felt moved by the consciousness and self giving ways most fathers talked about the primacy of attention they have invested in childhood formation. 

I came back with three thoughts form these meetings. 

A family who has the habit of conversation times with children stay intimate with their children. The parents know their children and children are close to their parents regardfully. 

A family who has a 'child centric view' of life modulate the involvement and communication contextually so that there is constancy of engagement and a plan for facilitating their developmental process. 

A family who resolves to move through difficult seasons patiently and trustfully would turn such difficult times to deepen relationships and nearness. 

The fathers in the two groups I met with, conveyed a heart of concern to lead the family initiatives to respond to the needs and aspirations of children.

A delightful experience was how some parents found their teenage children and young adults becoming their partners to discover the vocation or purpose for themselves ! The adult children lead the way for pursuit of their purpose under the shadow of the goodwill of parents.   

What a delight it was to listen to stories of pleasant transitions and hopeful relationships that fathers experience in their family life! They referred to the consciousness of being 'fathered by God'!

Three cheers to fathers for finding their mission in life!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

 

The transcendent view of life!

 

The life in a garden is celebration of new life !

The earth gives its produce seasonally and perennially. 

I had not expected new shoots in rose bushes during this season, when rain and humidity with only in between short spells of sunshine do not favour them. And yet they surprise us by thier overcoming ability!

Life has its own momentum and flourishes in adverse situations as life is lived in a transcendent plane and not subdued by existential transitions. 

This helped me to revise my optic! 

My thoughts or expectations or reactions condition my optic. 

Anna and I visited a widow of 86 years who lives alone with a domestic helper supporting her in the morning and a college going girl coming to stay at night. She has health constraints for which she needs regular visits to the hospital. It was after about six months we visited her. She led us to conversations focussing on the goodness she receives from people who care for her. She remembered her family and their support. She looked forward to the visit of her daughter and her husband during this week end. 

The garden in the front yard of her house looked well kept with flowers and fruits. The garden had a well maintained appearance. 

The spirit of the inner life within her surprised and ministered to us. This was an expression of transcendent living, with hope and peace. She referred to the goodness of God a few times in her conversation. 

At the end of a day, when we had a disturbing news of a neighbour slipping into alcohol dependence, what lifted our spirit was the hope and graceful outlook to life this elderly woman carries with her. Life in its fullness breaks though in the hostile situations! 

The garden with its new life with buds, flowers and fruits tell us that life emerges and thrives. Life is endowed to subdue circumstances! 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo) 

Becoming fruitful !

The red and yellow Rambutan fruits in our garden are ready for harvest. The flowering started in February and now the fruits are ready. 

I noticed a few transition stages in their growth to be ripe fruits. The flowers when became raw fruits at the early stage, the trees dropped many raw fruits. A few weeks later, the wind and storm caused damage and many more raw fruits got dropped. When the fruits were reaching the maturing stage about six weeks ago some more were lost. What survived are now ripe and fully formed fruits. 

The fruits which got dropped became the manure for the tree. The soil received them to nourish the tree. 

What was evident was that the trees did not have any tender leaves during these preceding months. The trees converged to nourish the fruits. In one sense the fruiting season is when the trees turn the attention from growing to fruiting! 

This is an annual feature when the trees have about five to six months in this stage of flowering and fruiting. 

As we distributed the fruits to about twenty-five families in our neighbourhood, Anna and I found that this annual feature, since we returned to our cottage to live here twelve years ago, has a vibrant story to tell us about life itself. All the trees were planted when we arrived to live here. Now all the five trees grow to give. 

This is a life lesson for us- Grow to give! 

A Rambutan tree becomes the tree that it is meant to be, only when it flowers and gives fruits for others to receive them. 

Life is fully lived only when we offer the fruits of our lives for others to receive! 

What is this fruit of full living! 

It dawned on me while visiting two homes yesterday that just the visit sparked an encouragement in the families. Both families have had  some difficult times recently. I returned feeling awakened to the resilience they carry within ! They live in the midst of illnesses which they endure and yet feeling ready to move on! 

The South African thought of 'ubuntu' which Arch bishop Desmond Tutu often referred to represented a vision: each person becomes a person by being with others. 

We as humans are relational beings helping each other to become fully human and humane. This dual journey is the formative journey that we embrace more so in mid-life. The journey beyond mid-life is to become an elder ! 

The fruits above in the Rambutan tree are ready for anyone to relish! Our lives too are an offering to bring hope and purpose to the lives of others! That is the calling in life! 

I ponder and pause to internalise this truth more!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

 

Doing good as the motto !

 

The flowers in our garden look different since the monsoon rain subdue their colour, vigour and odour! The usual fullness and fragrance are missing!

This season was to be a celebration time for students waiting to begin their academic year in schools and colleges in India. 

However, the students waiting for their medical college admissions got disappointed as the National Entrance and Eligibility Test for which they appeared was cancelled due to leakage of the test paper. Now they await for the next test and the academic year for them would begin two or three months later. 

Every year in the recent years, there was a strong suspicion of some disorder in connection with the organisation of the entrance test for medical admission. 

This brings back a debate that some teachers in medical colleges raised when the national entrance test was imposed. The concern was the transparency and integrity of the system in setting the examination paper and valuing them, more so, the valuing was to be done digitally with hundreds of supervisors involved in this process !

Now that suspicion is upheld with the government cancelling the examination and ordering for another entrance test! The corrupt practices of leaking the examination paper to gain financially is now under investigation. 

The beautiful flowers in the garden get dampened by incessant rain. 

The moral decline in value system and the indulgence in practices to gain financially impair the ethical standards needed in such situations. 

This is the down side of life style changes in the society where success is attributed to being wealthy. The wealth acquisition becomes a greed and people succumb to this violating all moral precepts. 

The escalating war in West Asia, caused by irresponsible acts of the USA, Israel and Iran spring from such a moral distortion. For each of the three nations, personal gain alone matters. The global value system of equity and equal opportunities for all got subsumed by the desire to control, dominate and gain financially. 

I met a couple last week end, both retired professors from the Christian Medical College, Vellore, who inspite of their physical limitations reach out to others to support them in times of need.  Their gentle message was 'Do good all the time and that becomes a leaven to influence people and behaviour'!

When the collective system fails or succumbs to existential pressures, the moral fortitude of some can become a lamp in darkness. 

I feel disturbed by the way a nation like the USA, who has 'In God we Trust' inscribed in their bills, turning to an orientation 'In wealth we trust' initiated by its current president. 

The Benedictine monks in the late 8th century who sponsored the rescue mission in the Alpine mountains to save those who were crossing the  mountain ranges when caught in a snow storm, comes back to me. They established network of mountain monasteries, valley hospices, medical dispensaries, supply depots for travellers and took care of pilgrims. The rail and road connection between Locarno and Zurich developed inspired by this noble service. The saint Bernard rescue dogs were used probably from 1050 initiated by St Bernard OF Menthon, an Augustanian canon. The Gotthard Museum located in an old road house of 1834, brings together the stories and recollections of acts of service done to rescue people from an impending calamity. 

I feel enthused by a verse in the New Testament of the Bible in the book of Galatians 6:9, ' Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up'! 

This calls for hope and doing good with liberality and goodwill! 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

our garden 

The communicative presence !

I watched a single Bulbul, who was alone in the nutmeg tree in our garden, which was joined by another Bulbul and how they exchanged bird calls on a cloudy morning !

Each became present to the other! 

Becoming present in a communicative way in a conversation, is a transformative experience bringing a level of trust and nearness. 

I realise from conversations in the recent months that those with whom I was in touch were looking for sharing experiences and thoughts to receive resonances of cheer and affirmation. 

The two Bulbuls seemed to connect with each other emotionally! 

It is this which calls for attention! I felt inclined to audit how much I feel for people with whom I am in touch. Am I in touch with people for what I might need from them or am I in touch with some people for what I can offer by way of conversation, support, affirmation and encouragement. 

The way to stay in touch with people ought to transcend a utilitarian purpose! Each of us can stay in touch with some for their sake or for supporting their needs and stay near to make them feel supported!  

When a relationship has a self-giving dimension, it enables others to feel valued and appreciated! 

The communicative presence is such a way of carrying others in our thoughts and heart !

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

A joint experience !

This sequence of a toddler  attempting to crawl, assisted by his mother is an evidence of perseverance on the part of the child and mother! 

When the usual child development sequence is impaired, such a perseverant effort alone can make the child move forward developmentally. 

It was a moving and awakening experience to watch this joint effort of the child and mother giving a new experience for the child. 

This is an act of nurturing the initiative of a child by patient and thoughtful support! 

What was central to this effort was the gentle touch the mother offered with words of appreciation and encouragement! The self-giving mother and a responsive child in collaboration! 

The only thing we added by a word of support to the mother was to offer him a toy in the front, to have his focus on reaching the toy which becomes a motivation to move. In fact the concentration shifts from movement to playing by reaching out for the toy!

The way the mother responded enthusiastically to that suggestion indicated that the mother and child are soon going to be fulfilled by their joint efforts. 

The parenting experience is therefore a joint experience- parents and the child make a partnership for mutual encouragement!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

Parents showed the way!

In the early years of my involvement in child development, I was not sensitive about the physical ambience to be made child friendly when we invite children and families for consultation. A child needs that provision for his or her attention to be drawn by sounds, sights and movements. 

A toy shelf was added to the room which made a signifiant difference in observing the cognitive, behavioural and communication levels of children. 

I recall how a child friendly ambience provided information about children beyond what parents could describe. 

From this stage,  we moved on by requesting parents to upload short videos of children taken during solitary and group play, when they request for a consultation, which helped us to prepare ourselves to be ready to make further observations by providing an environment in the consultation room, which would make the child explore and interact. 

It was from this experience, we turned to video consultation for parents who had difficulties to travel. We uploaded video tutorials for parents to take the anthropometry and screen for vision, hearing and language ability. We used protocols to get information on sleep, diet and play. 

When I retired three years ago, this form of video based consultations were available for parents located in other countries, provided they came at least once for a physical consultation. 

Let me confess, it look a while to move to this path and provide a support system for parents that was easier for them to respond to!

I have conversations with Paediatricians on the video platform now, which has evolved into a dependable communication portal for discussion on child development and rehabilitation!

Let me confess, that parents had to persuade me to shift from insisting on physical consultation to video-based conversations as much as possible. Thank you parents. 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)