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Making Time for Meaning

After Linesh Sheth shifted from Latur to Mumbai to eke out a livelihood, he realised that the routine of commuting from home to work and back was "a prison – a place where you couldn't do anything with freedom." Frustrated with the dull monotony, he wondered if he was born to do this. "I had to go to work for survival, but it did not give meaning to my life." This feeling resonated deeply in the lecture given by the Argentinian founder of the Humanist Movement, Silo, that he attended. Sheth then realised that only when you break your personal boundaries, and get interested in other people, do you find meaning. He joined the Humanist movement, and moved away from the paradigm of doing only those things that brought returns. There was opposition from his wife and children, but he wanted release from the idea of 'have-to', of working in duty-bound and compulsion-bound roles.

“Since I was a householder, I could not neglect home, and plunge myself into the Humanist work alone. So the question of prioritising came up as an inner revelation – priorities have to be numbered in order of importance, and they have to be few. If there were only one priority, it would be a mission. And a householder cannot be on a mission. He has to be practical."

Sheth worked out three priorities, and ordered them in an 'irreversible' manner. These priorities comprise things that matter most. If there's something that does not fit into these three, he considers it unnecessary. This framework determines clearly what and whom to say No to. He says, "If you concentrate on what matters most, you don't do anything unnecessary, and so you don't keep busy all the time. The first priority is what gives meaning to your life. The second is what gives you your livelihood. The third consists of your interests, the things that make life joyful – be it listening to music or meditation."

According to him, what matters most about work is not what you can do best, but what can set you free. This involves giving the best of what you have to others – distributing functions, responsibilities and power. Today, Sheth is 68 years of age. He is the chairman and managing director of three companies – Total Tools, Wud Tools, and Industrial Product Company. All of these are family-run businesses, along with sons and brothers. Sheth also helps run a hospital in Latur. He manages fundraising and buying of equipment. Despite this, work takes up only about five to six hours of his day. The rest of his time is spent carefully and well, in keeping with the priorities he has set for himself. He meditates for two hours in the morning – by himself, and with his wife. One hour is kept for exercising. He also spends an hour teaching meditation to interested people at home. During the day, he devotes time to reading "relevant things". Most of these are books he reads for repeated study. Sheth has written a book called The Friend You Will Never See. He also writes articles for the Speaking Tree column in The Times of India.

He says, "The most important thing in my life is the relationship I share with myself. Activities keep you away from yourself. What you will miss is the contact with the friend that lives within. You must let yourself feel the touch of it."
- Chintan Girish Modi