I am a nature lover and really enjoy going for treks and nature-walks. Fortunately, I stay at a location like Kharghar (Navi Mumbai) which is surrounded by beautiful hills and in the monsoon, its beauty comes at its peak with all the mountains turning lush green and lovely water streams emerging out of them. 

I am a regular for morning walks. It freshens up my mind thereby giving me a great jumpstart for the day. While I absolutely enjoy my morning-walks, one thing that really annoys me is the garbage that is spread by us. Negligence towards mother nature is something that I really dislike about our own species. Wherever we go, we really enjoy littering around. I very often say, “A place wherever a human can reach, can’t remain clean.” While trekking, I usually complain about the amount of garbage found in all those beautiful locations. Finding things like chips packets, tissue papers, beer bottles, etc. is very common and I find it really depressing. 

Today again as my regular routine, I got up in the morning and went out for the walk. But today’s walk was different as I came across three set of people which challenged the way I think.  

While I was busy enjoying the view, I noticed a group of people at a distance; they were about 20-25 of them. I could very distinctly see blue colored bags that they were carrying. After observing them for a while, I realized that they were planting trees. They were spread across the mountain, carrying nicely packed plantations, water and the other necessary material required. It really felt great to witness those people coming all the way and making efforts to maintain the ecology.  

As I moved forward, I noticed that this group was not just 20-25 people, it was much bigger than I had thought and well quite spread out also. But this group did not have those blue colored bags, which I had noticed about the previous group, rather they had black-colored bags. No, this was not the same group, they were a separate set of people working towards maintaining the “existing beauty.” They were in fact carrying the garbage bags and trying to make the location litter-free. Unlike my kind of people who easily crib and move on. I was really overwhelmed after seeing these two groups. While there are people like me who just enjoy the beauty and crib about not keeping it properly, there are people like those who actively think not only about just looking after it but also enhancing its beauty. 

While climbing down the hill and on my way back, I kept thinking about the efforts those people are making and what contribution have I made in order to preserve the natural beauty of these hills that I really love. While I was completely absorbed in my thoughts, I saw a person sitting on the road picking up something, but interestingly after picking up the stuff he was throwing it back towards the bushes. I was really amused to see this. Interestingly anything unusual captures our attention really fast, a minute back I was fully engrossed with my thoughts about those two groups and how they a making a difference, however, just by observing this interesting fellow all my thoughts instantly vanished. Only after getting a little closer to him, I came to know what exactly he was doing. He was picking up the earthworms that had accidentally come to road from the nearby bushes and sending them back to their habitat. 

Since he was picking them with his bare hands, I couldn’t control my curiosity and went ahead to ask him

“Aren’t you scared of them?” 

“Not at all, they are completely harmless,” he replied. He continued, “most of them get crushed under the vehicles going by, I am just trying to save as many. Just doing my bit” 

As if those two groups had not given enough “food for thought” for the day. I was rendered speechless; I had no words to speak. I simply saluted him and went ahead. 

These three sets of people clearly demonstrated that there is certainly a very thin line of difference between “Thinkers and Doers”. While people like me appreciate the view and easily complain about not maintaining it, there are people who step out and try to make sure that the view of the natural surroundings is kept like the way it is and few people even go a step further and try to make it even more vibrant.

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