A father

Describe a man who has positively impacted your life.

“One must elevate oneself by one’s own mind, and not degrade oneself.
The mind can be the friend or the enemy of the self.” — Bhagavad Gita 6.5
The man who positively impacted my life was my father not because he was perfect, but because his life became a lesson I could not ignore.
My father lived with a mind heavy with unprocessed baggage. Over time, that weight turned into dementia. He was neither the best father nor the worst just a man shaped by his choices and fears. He loved reading books, yet he rarely lived what he read. Even in his eighties, wisdom stayed on the page instead of entering his life. He listened unquestioningly to his sisters, and that obedience led him away from his own children and into a nursing home. For him, their approval was fame and glory; his children and granddaughter were not.
I often wondered why he grew harsher toward the very end.
One morning during meditation, an image arose not as reality, but as understanding. I saw him walking out of his room, smiling peacefully. He said, “I couldn’t do as much as you have done for yourself.” He wore a light blue sweater and a deep blue-green sarong, holding a book I had written. He returned quietly to his room and closed the door.
The message was clear: his journey ended where mine must not.
I felt anger not at him, but at myself. Why did my mind seek attention, even in grief? Why create stories instead of growth?
Then I understood: attention-seeking is not vanity it is unmet self-acceptance. And outgrowing it means turning inward, not outward.
My father impacted my life by showing me what happens when one does not take responsibility for one’s own mind. His life became my awakening.

“A person who is not disturbed by praise or blame,
who is steady, silent, and content within that person is dear to Me.”  Bhagavad Gita 12.19