Life Lessons: Diligent, Detail, and Daring

One lesson that I will never forget in life is what a brother told me, "Never take a shortcut; the longest way is the shortest way." Whenever faced with a situation that demands my decision either to take the easier and shorter way or the difficult and longer yet the best way was, I decided to take the latter. Last week and this week, incidents happened in my life that made me exercise my character in this regard.

I needed to take an Anti-Rabbi Vaccination (ARV) on a frequency of 0-3-7-28 days from the day I got the first vaccination. My first vaccination was done at a government hospital in Delhi. For the second one, I had a choice. I could go to Delhi or find a government hospital in Gurugram. Or, the simplest and easiest way was to buy the vaccine and get vaccinated by any medical practitioner. 

I deemed it best to find a government hospital and started checking on it. Even after enquiring from the local saints, I was simply told not to bother to visit government hospitals as it was troublesome, and with Covid patients increasing, it was best to avoid public health care places. I was deeply not convinced by this logic. With pandemics, all public places including the shopping area adjacent to my house were as dangerous as any hospital. I determined to find a solution to get access to government health care by all means. In private, one has to shell out a good amount of money. I found no reason to not use what has been made available. I simply have to pay a little price to find out the proper ones.

With my right leg still aching from the dog bite wound, I went to enquire first where were the private clinics and how much they would cost for vaccination. Then I went to a nearby charity hospital to enquire the same. Then I googled to look for a nearby government hospital. I followed Google map direction and found Wazirabd Government Hospital. Upon enquiring, I was told that ARV was dispensed in another government-run Poly Clinic at Sector 31. I googled and followed Google Maps to find the hospital. 

Then, upon enquiring I was told to get registered first before I could get vaccinated. Meanwhile, I had been driving and moving around with my wounded leg. Due to the fear of Covid, many had come to get a check or get vaccinated for Covid-19. All patients had to stand in the queue for the registration. I had no choice but to stand in the queue with my right leg barely able to hold me. A thought came to me just to give it up and take the easier way but avoiding all these formalities and get vaccinated at my own time and comfort. But I decided to stay in the queue and wait for my turn. For the entire one-hour period of waiting, I listened to two life-study radio programs on Philippians. Finally, my turn came. I got registered and then got vaccinated. 

Now that I found out the proper place for vaccination and all the other detail, I would come again for all the other courses of vaccination. Besides, I can also let other needy saints know about this facility and where it was located. In fact, I informed a brother about this as well. 

The idea here was not merely to save the cost of vaccination, but also to find out the government facilities available, and other details if the need arises in the future. Now for Covid and all other medical needs, I came to know what was available. After 15 years of my stay in Gurugram, this was the first time I availed myself affordable government facilities. Otherwise, private facilities are super expensive and run purely for business. I am glad I could discover this, besides exercising my character to be diligent in finding the detail of dispensaries and be daring to do so at such a time like this when the second wave of Corona is on the rise.

Yesterday and today, I was researching the way to create professional HD promotional material according to my idea for the Holy Bible Recovery Version promotion. A brother had once done something but I needed something better. I had the idea but now I must find a way to implement it. After some hours of research online, I discovered the best and simplest way of doing it exactly according to my ideas. This too required diligent researching, learning, and trying and trying. Finally, I created a very professional presentation on PPT and added all the animations, transitions, music, and designs, and converted it into an MP4 file.  As I replayed the media and observed carefully, more new ideas came for improvement. Therefore, I had to redo it again and again, a couple of times, until it fully satisfied me. Herein was also the exercise of character involved. Actually, there were promotional materials already available, but those did not satisfy me. I wanted something better.  The shortcut way was to simply use what was available. But if I had to add or change something I need to contact the designer and the process would be much longer.

The lesson learned here is; be diligent, be detailed in anything I do, and for it I must be daring, taking risks, and pay the price as well.