Inspiration from Biographies

Kishore (February 2002)

Part of my book reading I have read a few Autobiographies and Biographies. I found these books quite motivating and inspirational.

 

Following is the list of advantages of reading such books:

 

1. Understanding life style during different era: Everyone of us so much focused in current age and time and it becomes difficult for us to imagine when some of the things we have taken for granted do not exist. Some examples

 

- Now Internet is so prevalent that after a few years, our kids will not believe there was a world without internet.

- Can you imagine how the world used to live before computer, TV and electricity?

- Can you imagine how life was before airplane, car etc were invented?

- (Being an Indian) Can you imagine how life was before Independence? And what happened during independence struggle?

- Can you imagine the pain and misery two World Wars caused?

 

We have tendency to forget what we did last week. We forget what we have done last month and last year. We are so much immersed in 'Present and Future' problems that we don't have to take a good perspective of our own life. We loose track of our own experiences and hence lack motivation. We forget lessons we learned and sometimes repeat same mistakes.

 

By reading biography of a person in a different era, we wonder: how people lived a full and complete life at an age we cannot imagine. Events and experiences they have gone through gives a fresh perspective to our own liveS. We realize that we are taking our life too seriously and need to be different.

 

2. There is more to life that our own personal goals:  Because of our Survival Instincts and Selfish goals we cannot imagine there are other things to aspire for than what we are pursuing.

 

We tend to limit our achievements to what we feel we can achieve and don't aspire for higher goals. While reading biography of great people, we realize that they attained different goals in their life because they sought them with zeal and enthusiasm. They went through various struggles/troubles in their life. They didn't rest on small achievements.

 

This kind of realization forces me think beyond my ordinary goals and aspire something different.

 

Influential biographies I read that helped me are:

 

- Autobiography of a Yogi: A Complete Spiritual life under divine guidance in this modern age. His life was filled with miracles which we cannot imagine.

- My Experiments with Truth: Mahatma Gandhi: An honest account of his personal life, he ideas, struggles. He said any personal account written with honesty with be appreciated by people. His life was dedicated to Indian Independence.

- Gospel of Ramakrishna: Paramahamsa lived a complete spiritual life merged in divine moods. His soul purpose in life was God and nothing else mattered. While reading his life, it completely amazes me.

- Sai Satcharitra: Life story of another Great Spiritual Saint in last century which many people find highly inspirational.

- Swami Vivekananda: A Single individual who was capable of achieving any thing he wants. He had a very strong personality and his spritual mission was a great inspiration. His words and action still resonate strongly in current age and his life story influenced lot of people and events in India and around the world.

 

I feel reading these biographies any number of times will give similar motivation anytime. Have you read any Autobiographies? To see whether I can get more motivation from biographies, I subscribed to a daily mailing list at www.biography.com. You receive one mail per day giving details of a person born on that day. Only problem with this list is it does not contain only people who can inspire, it contains everyone including criminals.