VN October 2023

Vetnuus | October 2023 32 I hope this article finds you and your families well and safe!!! Last month we discussed the concept of how sometimes we tend to go through life so fast that someone must throw a brick at you to get your attention. It can be difficult to do sometimes when we get caught up in life’s vortex of activities and thoughts. It takes a conscious effort to remain attentive and listen actively. Take time to quieten your mind and listen. This month we look at the application of common sense. Here is a tale to demonstrate the lesson: This is the story of four learned and knowledgeable friends living in a small village. Well, the fourth one, called John, wasn’t exactly well educated or insightful in any way but he did possess the one quality that his intellectual friends did not: common sense. A day arrived when three of the friends decided to go exploring for jobs in distant towns and villages. They wanted greater monetary gain for their knowledge. After all, there was no use of being so learned in scriptures and sciences if they were not going to gain anything back from it. The general feeling was that their talent and knowledge were being wasted back home. Although the three friends did not wish to take John along because of his lack of intellect but since he was an old childhood friend, they decided to invite him too. After some time spent planning and preparing for their trip, the four youngsters set out on a long journey, moving systematically from one town to another in search of a way to earn more money. While passing through a dense forest between towns, they discovered a pile of bones lying under a tree. Being highly intellectual beings and feeling a little bored with the challenges they had faced thus far, they decided that the bunch of bones they discovered provided a fine opportunity to display their powers had presented itself. The first friend used his biological and anatomical skills to assemble the bones into a skeleton. His friends watched and cheered him on knowing that he would make sense of the various sized bones and how they all fit together. When the skeleton was finally ready, the second friendwho had skills inwizardly and spells chanted amantra, which led to the formation of flesh and meat on the skeleton. They all stood around this newly formed animal body and realised that it was a lifeless lion. This all brought about bewilderment but also some apprehension and fear. The third friend was very keen to jump in at this point and demonstrate his powers of magic too, all too keen not to be left out of the praise and celebration created by his two previous friends’ efforts. Just as the third friend was about to end the show by bringing the lion back to life, the fourth friend stopped him. John knew that once the ferocious lion was brought back to life, it wouldn’t spare them. What seemed painfully obvious to John seemed to escape all three of his apparently much more intelligent friends. However, the third friend ignored John’s advice, made fun of him, and went ahead with something that was clearly a bad idea. John quickly climbed up a tree nearby to protect himself as the third friend began to chant, thereby bringing the lion back to life. As predicted by John, the lion killed all three of the learned friends while John rushed back to the village later, alive. Obvious examples of this exist all around us in everyday life. Getting sucked into the vortex of work, so much to forget about the obvious need for rest and relaxation, only to predispose ourselves to severe physical problems like malnutrition, obesity, heart attacks and strokes, or expose ourselves to alternative but more often, compounding mental disease like compassion fatigue, depression, and burnout. Pushing ourselves to work through a bout of flu which can predispose us to secondary pneumonia. Watching our children grow in albums and pictures rather than spending time physically being with them. At the time, it may be difficult to see, but in retrospect, we often realise that we did not apply common sense as we were distracted by something else that we thought was a priority then. Having 15 minutes of quiet time at the end of every week to reassess your activities and results can be an absolute lifesaver and provide the very opportunity we need to slow things down and apply common sense as to what is genuinely important in your life. Next month, we will continue looking at more ideas for improving our quality of life and overall performance both at work and at home. v Influential Life Coaching THE FOUR LEARNED FRIENDS Dr Mats Abatzidis B.Sc. B.V.Sc. New Insights Certified VIP Life Coach mats.abatzidis@yahoo.co.za Founder of Influential Life Coaching http://www.matsaba.wix.com/drmatscoach Author of the published book“Life outside your comfort zone. Better and beyond all expectations”. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref =nb_sb_noss?url=search- alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Abatzidis http://www.life-coach-directory.co.za/mats-abatzidis Vet's Health I Life Coaching