One of the wonders of mother Nature is her ability to reduce ones quotidian worries to a ludicrous level when one is in her midst. I have felt my troubles being mocked at whenever I have stood under the night sky by the rock at the corner of the cricket field in Shimoga; especially the nights before the semester exams. The Big Dipper would stare down at me as if to ask, What is your problem, son? I have felt it moments before ducking under a head-high wave as a little boy on the shores of Puri, and as a grown lad on the shores of the Atlantic. The momentary experience of drowning has on each occasion allowed me to appreciate the next free breath. I have felt it while coming down the icy slope at breakneck speed, unsure if the wedge i formed with my ski blades would be enough to stop me in time. Today, I felt the same, gaping at the everlasting ribbons of white foam roaring down and disappearing into the mist beneath. The Niagara, has yet again convinced me of my nugatory existence in the larger scheme of things.
I sat by the spectacular site as the tiny ripples grew into waves and the waves systematically plunged to their death, and were reborn through the mist to start another journey. As I quietly stood, a thousand faces must have passed by; each a different hue, a different tongue, a different coiffure, a different living being, inconsequential in the canvas that my mind was staring at. I felt that if i jumped into the flowing mass of water right there, it would have made no difference to these moving faces except for a spectacle to stare at, maybe for a while. Which makes me ask myself; What is more important? To live a selfish existence whereby I can cater to all the desires that the flesh and mind is constantly subjected to, till the very end, chasing everything that can improve the livability of my life and thereby ensuring that I spend the entire span of my life just for myself; Or, to live a life that by example may influence other lives to deviate from the selfish existence, and in the process pick up a perpetual fight against human desires that constantly obfuscate an unselfish thought?
I tried but could not think of one human being who was known and revered just for having led a bon vivant for himself. Nothing else, but a good selfish life for himself. So, what is the intention of the millions who like me have come from a middle class existence, have duly become engineers, and are now one among the myriad faces gradually flowing towards the plunge. What mark are we going to leave mates? What will you and I be if the job, house, car, laptop, and other parasitic details were stripped off us and we were to stand stark naked under the Big Dipper which questioned, What good are you, son? What good is your life?
There is a little dwarf living in a decrepit dark room inside each of us. Let us call him anna hazare (Since an unknown entity can be better identified by a know entity. That is how the brain works). This guy wants to rid you of your selfish existence and make you fit to answer the Big Dipper's questions. But he stands no chance, for he is fighting Goliath. The Goliath in this case is not a biblical myth; it is real. It is the self obsessed you. It is you who finds a mascot in the outside world to fight corruption, but fails to listen to the dying dwarf, asking you to fight for a similar cause. Sadly his fight is not against a corrupt government or a dysfunctional establishment. It is against the frankenstein you created; yourselves.
The day I give more importance to the story about a persevering teacher in the rundown hinterlands of my country over the success story of a lecturer at MIT; the day a weekly donation follows my weekly paycheck; the day my writing influences other people to follow suit; the day i wake up convincing myself that an act of honesty isn't also an act of a simpleton; the day I can look myself in the mirror and convince the reflection that there is at least one other person apart from the two of us whom I could influence to help that poor dwarf win, will, also be the day when I can face the Big Dipper proudly, and say, yes i did good in life. And that is the day I shall not need a mascot, for I shall be my own mascot.
The most important questions in life are those that do not have answers. They keep you interested, till the end.
2 comments:
While going through your
observation I was thinking about one gentleman named Alexander Pope.
Perhaps he had similar
questions in his mind and wrote one
poem.."An Essay On Man".Perhaps it
will not be an adventure for you to go through this poem.
The lucid and candid analysis of your
mind and independent thought process is commendable.KEEP WRITING.
We can maybe carry on a discussion on this very fertile subject after you have gone through two posts on my blog, Saptarshi? They are titled 'Living Selfishly' and 'Living Selfishly, part two'. Just use the search bar. My take on this issue is that, far from being too selfish, we have most of us become far too self-forgetful, too obsessed with what others are doing and saying, too frantic to stick with the herd...
I hear about that weekly donation: good for your soul. And do I recognize the "persevering teacher in the rundown hinterlands of my country"?
By the way, take heart, little dwarf. It was Goliath who lost. David needs only to believe in himself. But of course, much easier said than done!
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