Source: New City Philippines
I find it
difficult to be kind to people because I’m nervous around others. Why am I like
this? (Kiko Guillermo)
To explain how a
person may become nervous and tense, I would like to tell you a story from the
circus.
When I was
small, I enjoyed going to the circus and in particular I loved watching the
elephant in action. While performing before an audience, the elephant seemed so
strong, but later and in between performance, the elephant remained chained
with one foot to an iron nail buried in the ground.
I knew that an
elephant is a strong animal capable of uprooting trees and that it could easily
pull out the iron nail from the ground and free itself. But why didn’t it do so
and escape? When I was five, I asked my teachers, as well as my father and my
uncle, this question. Their common answer was that the elephant had been
trained and tamed. Then I asked, if it had been trained, why did they have to
chain it? I don’t remember ever receiving an answer that satisfied me and so it
remained a mystery.
In time, as I
grew up, I forgot about it. Some years ago, as I began studying the subject of
nervousness, I managed to find the answer by myself. The circus elephant did
not escape because it had been chained to the same iron nail since it was
small. You may close your eyes and imagine the small elephant right after it
was born, as soon as it was born, being chained to that nail. I am sure that
the small elephant tried to pull in vain, because the iron nail was without
doubt stronger than he was. I guess the elephant had fallen asleep many nights
trying and trying again to break away from its chain but to no avail.
Then the day
came – a terrible day in its life – when it accepted its own weakness and
incapability and surrendered to its own destiny. This adult elephant, which is
today enormous and powerful, does not escape because it still believes itself
to be an incapacitated, weak baby elephant.
This is how it
is for those who are nervous. Like the elephant, they confront the world
convinced that they are chained to a nail that prevents their flight. They live
as if they cannot “do things,” simply because, a long time ago, when they were
small, they tried and were not able to, and so they think, “I can’t do it … I
will never be able to do it…”
There is a
saying that goes: “A journey begins with the first step…” Overcoming
nervousness requires that a first step be made – a step to go outside of
oneself and towards the others. It may just be a small step, a simple smile,
but it could start us on a journey to discover how nervousness can be overcome
when we stop looking at ourselves and instead look outwards and focus on the other
persons around us.
Pasquale Ionata with Ting Nolasco
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