“I have reached my present position by climbing a
ladder and not by coming up to it in a lift.” This
observation was made by a tailor who had started
with nothing but his own two hands and the will to
work, and who had become eminently successful in
his line of business. “Making a good coat is not
child’s play. The whole process is so complicated
that without detailed information as to how to
proceed, long experience and a high degree of skill,
it is almost impossible to accomplish. It is only after
a lifetime of hard work that I have succeeded in
running a prosperous shop in the city.”
The tailor went on to explain how he had served his
apprenticeship under the guidance of an expert
tailor. Just learning the art of cutting and sewing
had taken him five long years. When he opened his
own little shop, he discovered that he had difficulty
in giving his customers a good fitting. This was
because during his apprenticeship he had never
really grasped the fact that people could be of such
different shapes and sizes. He therefore set himself
to the task of studying human anatomy, but it was
only after many years of effort that he could make a
coat with an absolutely perfect fitting. He
eventually became so expert in this that he could
even give perfect fittings to those who
unfortunately suffered from deformities—such as
hunchbacks. “In any type of work, there are many
things which one has to learn on one’s own. Often
one cannot foresee these things at the outset, and
each obstacle has to be overcome by hard work and
ingenuity”
The tailor talked of many things of this nature
concerning his skills, and it seemed to me as though
I were listening to a lecture on the building of the
nation by some very experienced person.
In truth, the only way to solve our economic and
social problems is to follow the example of the
tailor. After this initial apprenticeship, he had gone
ahead and done things on his own. He had gone up
by the stairs and not by the lift. There are no
buttons which you can just push and then
automatically reach your goals. You can only make
progress step by step. Progress can seldom be made
by leaps and bounds. By means of the ladder you
can progress even to the stage of owning the lift, but
you cannot make a success of your life by starting
with the lift and expecting it to do everything for
you.
Ref - The Moral Vision
- by Maulana Wahiduddin Khan
