Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Another walk into the wilderness...

The biggest problem of being human is the capability to think that has been given to us by God, or by nature, whatever you want to believe in. Thinking as a package, has both positive and negative effects, but the problem is that we are affected mostly by the negative side of this 'gift'.
As I walked down the street once again this evening, I was struck by this preposterous gift almost immediately the moment I looked up into the sky. Nature has always fascinated me, just like a huge majority of us humans, and just a moment of losing myself to it seems like an eternity of penance for a thousand sins I might've committed.
I look toward the moon and the stars almost everytime I go out for a walk, but today as I sought to enchant my soul with the mesmerizations of the infinite, I lost myself amidst the scatter of the stars. This was when the demon of the God-gifted entity that I am, struck me.
I was serenaded by the little bombshells this demon catapults, commonly known as thoughts. The light of one single star caught my attention. It was a bright little star, but it seemed inconspicuous most of the time because it was just some way off a constellation of its fellow beings, that absorbed most of the attention that was given in that direction.
I wondered how happily, or sadly that star was lost in its own insignificance. It was as though destiny had played a game with that star, seperating it from the constellation and yet keeping it just so far that it could not deem it's own significance. Maybe that star too would have done something wrong, that it seemed to be happy in this oblivion, or maybe, it was just a pretentious star. The star could not still cease to shine. It was made by nature to shine, so it had to shine, keeping the ignorance of all the other significant stars and also of the demi-god of the night, the moon, at bay. They hardly noticed the loneliness of this star, too busy grabbing all the attention themselves.
All these questions enacted by my brain were testimony to the betrothal of this star to my own entity at that particular time, one lost in a sea of stars, while the other lost in a jungle of human beings. Both seeking attention in their own ways, but both fading out into a wider oblivion. While I walk just to kill my loneliness trying to lose myself within this whirlpool of people, the star shines just as beautifully as it can, to undo its loneliness.
But maybe, it does not shine to try to get rid of its oblivion and just shines gratefully for the fact that it merely exists. Maybe, it does not loathe all it's fellow celestial bodies for pushing it into oblivion, and rather shines with the humility of being present right there, by their side. It gets its own moments of attention when people like me look at it and wonder why it shines. So, it shines with hope, enthralling one and all who look at it, making them realize that their moment in the limelight will come, they just have to keep shining with their deeds. Someone or the other will realize the light they reflect to brighten the path of life of that someone who seems to be oblivious at that moment in time.
This is the reason why I love walking so much. Every time I discover a new person in myself, someone who hasn't lost his hope, hasn't given in to the indifference of the people, and every time I end up thanking the nature and the god-gifted demon I possess. Yet, I call it a demon, because it possesses the capability to flood the mind with fear, and also to give the most beautiful of nature's creations like the stars the souls of human beings, making it possible for them to hate, loathe, mistrust, and expect.


Monday, February 16, 2015

The Transition....

The spiral of life keeps going, and with itself, it makes sure that you keep going. In just a year or two, things change to the extent that you look back at the time gone by, wondering if the person who was living this life at that time, was you or someone you relate to remotely, or some one completely unknown altogether.

There was this fellow I knew once, just a couple of years back. He was in college then, about to complete the final hurdle of the four-year race of a Bachelors degree in Computer Science Engineering. The decision to enter into this race, had been a rather spur-of-the-moment type of a reflex, but then the indecision surrounding that makes for another story that I'll get back to share with you later. He was a very chirpy person it seemed, talking and talking the whole day, his world seemed to be centered on his friends, with whom he'd spend a major part of his day, the smiles and laughs the friends shared, seemed to push away any trouble that might be headed in their way.

The best thing I remember about that person is the confidence he effused, the ease with which he spoke to anyone and everyone, the positivity that he had about what his future beheld for him. He could just go upto anyone, stand in front of a crowd, and go on speaking his mind and heart out, knowing that people would listen. He had his mind fixed on doing MBA at that time, and couldn't care less of the Engineering Degree he was going to complete, and I really thought his positive outlook and confidence would take him a long way in life.

The way things go with life, you never know how a toss of a coin can change the way you look at this beautiful misery bequeathed upon us all. I met that person again a few days back, or should I say that I just met a shadow of the person I once knew.
The smile from the face was missing, the confidence had given way to a more held-back approach, an almost shy outlook to the once effusive demeanor that used to be a part of who he was. The MBA plan hadn't worked out as he had imagined, and the whole procedure of sitting through tests and going through interviews actually left quite a scar on his mental bearing.
And then there was the job that he had to take up, because there was really nothing else he could do, and then again the continuous displeasure of doing something that he never wanted to do.
It was disheartening to see the transition of this once confident center-stage actor, into a mannequin that would remain inconspicuous to the crowd, no matter where it was kept on the stage.
The river of life, has to go through plains and mountains, and there have to be waterfalls in between, what is important is that even after falling through hundreds of meters, the river continues to flow through the plains, watering fields of brown, making them green once again.
I just hope that my friend too finds out that everybody has ups and downs, greens and browns, water and sand, it is just the fact that the people who become successful are those who don't let any pitfall become the final fall, but in fact treat it like a crater on an otherwise shining life.
It is only when we don't let the gray part of our lives affect us, do we realize how colourful our life ought to be.
It is only when you become comfortable with your shortcomings, that you discover something called inner peace (Kungfu-panda fame), and it is only then that you become more confident of who you really are, and I just wish that my friend finds his inner peace, because in the end there's nothing special that he needs to have, it is just he himself that can make his life special.

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