Dr. Gunjan Jadon, Professor of Pharmaceutical Chemistry at Pacific College of Pharmacy, Udaipur, shares a motivating story to explain what truly drives a person in life. She expresses that life is filled with many questions and answers about what motivates us, and at different points in time, we need stories that inspire and guide us.

She narrates a story of a Sanskrit professor from Nalanda University, who himself shared in his book how he became an expert in Sanskrit despite being a weak and struggling student in his childhood. His father worked very hard and sent him to a sage’s ashram to gain knowledge. At the ashram, many students from wealthy families, including kings and landlords, used to study, and he constantly felt inferior among them, believing that he would never be able to learn like them.

For a long time, he struggled to learn anything. He approached the sage and expressed his inability, asking for a new way to learn. The sage put in continuous effort, teaching him from morning to evening, yet nothing changed. His self-doubt remained strong, and whenever he saw other students, he felt even more inferior due to his background. Eventually, he decided that he could not continue and wrote a letter to his father, stating that he was leaving. The sage also allowed him to go if he felt he could not do it.

While returning home, he felt thirsty and stopped at a well, where an elderly woman gave him water. His attention was drawn to a stone through which water was being drawn. The stone was very smooth and looked beautiful. When he asked how it became like that, the women told him that water had been drawn through it every day from the well, which made it smooth over time.

This realization changed his thinking. He understood that repeated action had transformed the stone, and he decided to return to the ashram instead of going home. He went back to the sage and requested to be taught again. From that day, he began learning through consistent repetition and motivated himself continuously. Over time, his learning improved so much that he went on to become a great Sanskrit professor at Nalanda University, whose books are still studied today.

Through this story, Dr. Gunjan Jadon emphasizes that no matter how poor someone is or how difficult something may seem to understand, consistent practice leads to mastery and one can definitely achieve their goal one day.