Teaching by example has more power than sermons, says Sant Rajinder Singh
Many live under the false assumption that we can bring about change in the world by telling others how to live. The world is filled with people giving sermons, lectures, and talks about how to lead our lives to be good, honest, and ethical people. Yet with all the efforts made by people through the ages, the world is still filled with people who act with anger, greed, attachment, and ego. Millions go to their places of worship and hear sermons about leading good lives. Yet so far have we seen any measurable change in the worldIJ
In this connection, there is a true anecdote about the famous writer, Jonathan Swift, who wrote books such as Gulliver’s Travels. Besides being a writer, he was also the dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin, Ireland. People called him Dean Swift. One day he was working in his office when someone knocked at the door. He sent his servant to answer it to see who was there. The servant answered the door and found a messenger standing there. The messenger said in a gruff voice, “Here is a gift for the dean from his neighbour who sent me to deliver it.” The messenger then turned and abruptly walked away.
A few days passed and the messenger returned to the dean’s home and knocked on the door again. He had another package with him. The servant answered the door, and the messenger said, “Here is another gift for the dean from his neighbour.” Then the messenger turned and walked abruptly away. The neighbour was an admirer of the dean and enjoyed sending him presents out of appreciation for him.
A few days later, the messenger came for a third time, delivering a gift for the dean. This time when the messenger knocked and the dean’s servant opened the door, the messenger rudely and disrespectfully threw the gift into the arms of the servant and left. Fed up with the rude and disrespectful behaviour of the messenger, the servant finally complained to the dean about it. The servant told the dean, “The neighbour’s messenger has no manners at all!” The dean, who was a kind and patient man, said, “The next time the messenger comes back, let me know and I will answer the door myself.”
A few days later, the messenger returned with another gift from the neighbour. This time the dean answered the door. The messenger, with his same rude attitude, told the dean, “Here’s a gift from your neighbour.” The dean could detect how rude the messenger was, just as his servant had described.
The dean said to the messenger, “look here, this is not the way to talk to others when you deliver a message here. This is no way to act. Come inside and let me show you what I am talking about.” The messenger came inside the dean’s home. The dean said, “let me show you what I am talking about so you can understand how one should act when one is delivering a message or gift to someone. let us pretend that you are me, the dean. You stay inside the house. I will step outside and pretend I am the messenger bringing a present. I will knock on the door and show you how a messenger should act.”
The dean took the gift from the messenger, stepped outside, and closed the door behind him. He then took a short walk, returned a short while later, and knocked gently on the door, pretending to be the messenger bringing the gift. The messenger, pretending to be the dean, opened the door. The real dean, pretending to be the messenger, bowed with respect to the pretending dean, and said, “If you please, sir, your neighbour, with compliments, wishes you to accept this lovely gift from him.”
The real messenger, seeing how respectfully he was being spoken to, responded saying, politely, “Thank you very much.” The real messenger, acting like the dean, then took out some money from his wallet and handed it to the real dean as a tip, saying, “Here is a little something for your kind service.”
From that day on, the neighbour’s messenger understood how he should act. He never forgot this lesson in good manners and from that day on acted politely and respectfully whenever he brought presents or messages from the neighbour. In response, the dean would always give him a tip for his service as a reminder of the importance of having good manners.
The lesson here is that the dean could have just told the messenger to act politely. Instead, he acted it out and showed him what it meant to be polite. He taught by example. That lesson had more power than mere words, reprimands, or lectures.
Many of us who are parents know that when we want our children to behave in a certain way, they will only listen to us when they see us setting an example. When we tell them to do something, yet they see us doing the opposite, they think we are hypocritical. They do not believe our words because there is no example of us exhibiting the desired behaviour in our own lives. Thus, the result is, they do not listen to us, and they do what we do rather than do what we say. They copy our bad habits because that is the example we set.
Similarly, when we are in the position to train or teach others, they will learn more from our example than from our words. Whether we are preachers, teachers, parents, trainers, employers, or citizens imploring other people to be good people in our society, we must first set the example ourselves. That is the only way to bring about change. We need to teach by example rather than mere words. Mahatma Gandhi had also appropriately quoted in this regard, “Be the change you want to see in the world.”
The writer is a spiritual leader