First of all, I instinctively believe that life must not be treated in its abstract form. Victory, ambition, dream, dedication are attached, no doubt, but the very essence of life is far too elite…to be expressed. In everyday life, I’ve seen a lot of ups & downs but one thing strikes me through is the way ‘my life’ & ‘I’ is connected. I often wonder what would have been my life was I born some famous personality or so-called stars. But then this is what life is all about! To me, it seems like I was supposed to be a bird but ended up a human. Because I often understand the dissimilarity between me and my other friends who simply don’t take risk. I’m not saying that life is meant to be tested or breath held longer to prove might. All I’m trying to purport is that we are unheedingly sublime as we tend to be since we are socially answerable to the society we are in.
But life could be too short to hold back on our dreams or to choke our urge to express our creativity. These all factors shape our life as we understand every single day of our life that we are here to learn, not to prophesize any event, as we often tend to do.
I am hardly religious and don’t observe fast and other religious obligation. Neither d i stoop to orthodox rituals that don’t stand the test of time. To me, God is within me and I’m trying to find him outside of me so that I can show myself how my creator looks like. That’s my thought on religion and more importantly on God. Friendship, honesty, courage, modesty are something we learn in moral science and of course, within the walls of our home. But to apply these unwritten codes in pragmatic life is assuredly a chore to do. Being human we calculate our risks and needs evenly; in this line we lose a lot of colour. We are abruptly selfish and terminally hypocritical, despite the fact that we are ruling the animal kingdom. And we don’t need to worry of any species taking over us. Yet we are insecure and are fighting among ourselves and all this either in the name of an innocent lord or violent means.
I truly believe that our life is bounded to each other in some way and if we don’t feel that hunch of being connected then we are pathetically growing isolated. My grandmother often used to render stories about battle between good and evil in which evil is always subdued. But my grandma wasn’t aware of the fact that in today’s world these stories mean zilch. Even our schools are tired of these clichéd tales and our kids have grown too big to imbibe these elements.
Eventually, all our actions results in something which could be good or bad or stupid. But seriously who cares? Your parents? Your teachers? To me, it seems that results are fabricated and lose their mettle once the purpose is served. We all are fallacious. We all are fatal. We all are idiotic. So what? Accept it and move. That sounds easy. But trust me. That is the toughest part. To accept the way things are! Some put on their best face and smirk through to get their mean. Some cry foul to achieve what they intended and some simply write poems! Whatever the reasons are, I know for sure that even my life is deserted and hopeless. All parents want their offspring to be self dependent, like any other animal. But we tend to take a lot of time to stand on our own risk. Naturally, we lose a lot of life in it.
Listening to good music is leisure, watching inspiring movies with hard-slap dialogues isn’t going to help our case because little or more everything remains the same.
Today, we as a human race are missing the very fire that ignited renaissance or revolution. We are suppressing our thoughts, lest we may be mocked for our travesty. God forbid, someday we may realize that the kids who were left stranded on the last benches might have us saved or our society or contained aggression. These are just thoughts by which we can debate with whats going on. Since long time, we have turned robotic & worldly affairs are depriving us of our daily leisure. We have stopped living, I guess. Life with all its ingredients including good, bad, ugly and best can deliver back. Of course work is worship and without hard work, we can’t move a inch but at what cost are we providing ourselves these perks of mundane beauty?.......maybe we are paying exorbitantly! We all are different and that’s a good thing because being similar can be monotonous. But we don’t define ourselves by what food we eat, or clothes we wear or beliefs we follow. We just don’t know for real what future holds for us and whether our incumbent action shows any fruit, at all.
I might be too young to comment on issues such as life & death but from whatever books that I’ve reads, movies that I’ve seen and stories that I’ve heard-one thing is for sure, nothing is predictable. We can die any moment and that’s what intrigues me to test myself to the farthest extent. We can’t treat life like a gift because gifts are always smothered and rendered useless. I don’t wish to spoil my life by being corny & afraid. To me, fear is essential until it serves it purpose that is helping us learn. If it is not doing that, then fear is a hindrance, the sooner eliminated, sooner and the good! Sports and school exams teach us that failure is inexcusable but they fail to teach that success is just another side for failure-because a person is winning because someone is out there performing the role of a loser. That is what life duly is! Success can be someone’s curse while perseverance may be someone else’s bliss. We are performers here and we can’t encompass life in its upright form. It is way beyond us. All we can do is stay clear of its tricks and use our brain cells to cope with hurdles. We can be smart or we can dumb but what matters is we realize what we are before its too late. Some people die not knowing the fact that they were utmost gifted because they never realized it themselves and so no one else acknowledged it either.
That’s unchecked tragedy. Some people go kill someone because anger overcomes their cloud of sanity. And some cheat and some embezzle even the strongest of walls. Most of these kinds end up in jail. Some forget how they once were outside those stinking wall while some just can’t give up on their hope. But darkness hardly leaves these unfortunate souls alone. What is the whole point behind standing and kneeling and standing and kneeling before a statue or edifice when we can’t figure out ourselves? We don’t find it cool enough to discuss AIDS, drugs, orthodoxy and other trivial concerns. Because we all know that somewhere within us we are contributing to this bane and we are afraid that we may get caught. Life is this and life is that but what is life if we don’t travel and see for ourselves how the sun looks like on the other side or how the leaves fall. These idyllic truths won’t salvage us. But still without love and calm we can’t go long enough to see things and its beauty. We may too end up like vegetables. For me, this is my chance either I get to do it or never again. Its my choice and I must not regret spilled milk.
These statements are naïve in sense but this is what I feel about life. Like I’ve said earlier life can’t be abstract except in poems or on canvas. There are some folks out there who cry on getting their umbrella wet. They will never learn. Life can’t be dealt with words that soothe but with activities that help us go on and on, tirelessly.
Contributed by: Shakti Shetty, Sanpada, Navi Mumbai, India
